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This glossary is from the ONIX for Books Specification + Best Practice Guide + Codelists posted to EDItEUR’s website at https://www.editeur.org/93/Release-3.0-Downloads/#Best%20practice. Appearing as Appendix A.1 in the Best Practice Guide, we have re-created it here for easy reference and repeat reading.

BookNet Canada has added to this glossary with terminology and contextual information specific to the Canadian market. You will find BookNet Canada entries to this document identified with a

A

A0, A4 etc

See A series paper sizes. A0 is 1m² in area (1189 × 841mm), A1 is half that, A2 is half again and so on. All sizes have width and height in the ratio 1:√2. A4 is 1⁄16m², and 297 × 210mm.

...

American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Simple character set comprising 0–9, A–Z and a–z, plus a few basic symbols and punctuation characters. An ‘Ascii’ text file is one that contains plain text (‘words and spaces’) using only characters from this set. There’s no control over fonts, no formatting or styling (eg different point sizes, justification, bold or italic), and no accented characters, specialized symbols or fancy punctuation – ASCII does not even allow for proper curly quotation marks “ … ” or currency symbols like £ and €. Plain text. cf Latin‑1, Windows‑1252, Unicode.

Ascribed collection

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

A bibliographic collection to which someone other than the publisher, typically a metadata aggregator, assigns a collective identity. (For example, among the novels of Tony Hillerman, there are several that feature the same protagonists Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee. The publisher does not give them a series identity, but in retailer databases they may carry an ascribed identity Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee Series).

See collection.

A series

ISO standard cut sheet paper sizes, used almost everywhere except North America. A0 is 1189 × 841 mm – 1 square metre in area, with sides in the ratio of 1:√2. A1 is half that area (but the same shape), A2 is half again, and so on. 2A0 is twice the area of A0. A4 is 297 × 210 mm (1⁄16th of a square metre). RA and SRA raw paper sizes are roughly 5% or 15% larger in area than A series sizes, to allow for bleed and final trimming, so SRA4 is 320 × 225 mm. B series sheets are intermediate between the A series sizes (B1 is between A0 and A1). These ISO 216 A and B series paper sizes are not used in the USA and Canada, where Letter sized paper is more common than A4 for office use. Letter is 11 × 8½ inches (or about 279 × 216 mm), similar in area but ‘squarer’ in shape than A4. US Legal size is 13½ × 8½ inches (about 343 × 216 mm), significantly taller than A4.

...

A relatively new abstract model and RDF-based data format for library bibliographic data, intended to replace MARC but at the same time also breaking with FRBR data modeling practice. Where FRBR offers work, expression, manifestation and item entities, BIBFRAME originally contained only work and instance – work conflated FRBR’s work and expression, and instance conflated manifestation and item. BIBFRAME version 2 introduces an item entity, making it much closer to the <indecs> work, manifestation and item structure (though a BIBFRAME work may be more abstract than an <indecs> work>). BIBFRAME data is expressed in RDF using linked data principles.

Bibliographic collection

Status
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A collection to which an identity is ascribed which is also part of the bibliographic description of each member (eg Penguin Modern Classics).

See collection.

BIC

Book Industry Communication, a UK-based trade organization.

...

See carton.

BIP

See books in print.

BISAC

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA Amendment

Book Industry Systems Advisory Committee. It was later incorporated into BISG, along with SISAC, its serials publishing counterpart. In the past, BISAC and SISAC have also been known as BASIC (Book and Serial Industry Communications).

More frequently, the subject categorization scheme the schemes developed by the BISAC Subjects committee and administered by BISG and used mostly in the North American book trade. . The schemes include: subject categorization, merchandising themes, and regional themes. cf BIC, see also Thema.

BISG

...

Print or printable area that extends beyond the trimmed page edge. Headline text or images can extend into the bleed area to avoid an unsightly edge when the book block is slightly mis-trimmed.

Block

Blocking

...

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

See Organization of data delivery.

Blocking

Metallic foil (often gold or silver colored) often used to ‘print’ the title, logo or decorative pattern on the spine or boards of a hardback book, or added for visual impact on a cover. It is applied with a heated stamping die.

...

GTIN-13s are normally allocated nationally, with the first two or three digits indicating the country. Bookland is the fictional country to which the 978 and 979 prefixes used for ISBNs are assigned. In this way, the range of ISBNs becomes a small subset of the larger GTIN numbering scheme.

BookNet Canada

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

BookNet Canada is a non-profit organization that develops technology, standards, and education to serve the Canadian book industry. Founded in 2002 to address systemic challenges in the industry, BookNet Canada supports publishing companies, booksellers, wholesalers, distributors, sales agents, industry associations, literary agents, media, and libraries across the country.

Book proof

Paginated and bound proof copy, usually without the final cover and with text that still requires final corrections. Used for marketing and (sometimes) review purposes, as well as final proofreading and correction. See also advance reading copy, page proof.

...

See book proof, advance reading copy.

Boxed set

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

See Set.

Brackets, Braces, Parentheses

...

In the UTF‑16 encoding of Unicode characters, each character is represented by two or more bytes of information. But these bytes might be in either order – something like saying either ‘seventy three’ or ‘three and seventy’. The latter could easily be misinterpreted as 37. A special character, a byte order mark, may be included as the first character in a Unicode file to make it clear which way around the rest of the file is. However, the strong recommendation in ONIX is to omit byte order marks, and to declare either UTF‑16BE (‘big endian’, like seventy three) or UTF‑16LE (‘little endian’, like three and seventy) explicitly in the first line of the XML file. A byte order mark is valid in UTF‑8 too, but it has no real meaning, and again should be omitted.

C

Caliper

See bulk.

Canadian contributor

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

Is an author, illustrator, translator or editor (in the case of an edited collection of material) who is a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident of Canada.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Identifying Canadian Authorship.

Cancel

Abandon plans for publication before a book is published, see AB.

...

Proscription of sales, or sometimes of publication of reviews, of a book prior to a particular date. See sales embargo date.

EMEA

Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Encoding

Embargo date

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

See Sales embargo date.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

EMEA

Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Encoding

All text is encoded in some way in order to store and process it digitally: each character is stored as a number, and the relationship between the characters and the numbers is the encoding. ‘A’ might be stored as the number 65, or more likely as the binary equivalent 01000001. B is 66, C is 67 and so on. There are many different standardized encodings, though for historical reasons, most actually do use 65 for A (because ASCII is the basis of many later, more complex encodings). However, encodings vary greatly for characters that are not present on an English typewriter keyboard – é might be stored as 233 (11101001 in binary), or as two numbers 195 then 169 (11000011 and 10101001), or in another way. And most encodings have a very limited repertoire of characters (their character set), so there are many characters that cannot be encoded at all. See Unicode, UTF-8, Latin-1, Windows-1252.

...

Global Trade Item Number, a numbering scheme for tradeable items and consumer products of all types in the supply chain. The GTIN identifier scheme is administered by GS1. Common GTINs have 12, 13 and 14 digits. GTIN-12s were formerly known as UPCs(Universal Product Codes), and are used almost exclusively used in North America. Their use on books has been deprecated since 2005. GTIN-13s were formerly known as EANs(European Article Numbers), and they are used globally to identify a wide range of retail items. The barcode symbology used to represent GTIN-13s is still referred to as ‘EAN-13’. Thirteen digit ISBNs are a small subset of the GTIN-13 number scheme (see Bookland). GTIN-14s are used to identify trade packs of items (from cartons to pallets).

GTIN-13

See GTIN.

GTIN-14

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

See GTIN.

GUID

Globally Unique Identifier. See UUID.

...

Actionable ISBN, a special type of DOI that incorporates an ISBN as part of its syntax. The equivalent ISBN-A for the ISBN 978-0-00-123456-7 would be 10.978.000/1234567. Note that registration of an ISBN-A is separate from the registration of the ISBN – it is not an automatic part of the ISBN registration process.

ISCC

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

The ISCC is a universal identifier for multiple generic media-types (text, image, audio, video), a lightweight and similarity-preserving fingerprint designed for digital content, and is free, open-source and transparent. It is designed for cross-sector applicability (journalism, books, music, film, etc.) and to identify content in decentralized and networked environments.

ISLI

International Standard Link Identifier. An embryonic international standard identifier that can be attached to a relationship between two entities, when it is important to identify and manage the link itself, not just assert the fact that it exists. The ISLI could find potential application in rights management, where in a relationship such as ‘A licenses B’, it would be important to attach an identifier and other metadata to the ‘licenses’ relationship.

...

A page or image in landscape format is wider than it is tall. cf portrait, where the height is greater than the width. See also aspect ratio.

Latin‑1

Also known as ISO 8859‑1. One of a range of standard 8‑bit encoded character setsintended for use with various European languages – Latin‑1 is designed for a wide range of west European languages, and includes the common characters A–Z, a–z, 0–9 and basic punctuation, plus some fancy symbols (eg §, ¶, ¿, × and ÷ symbols) and extra and ‘accented’ characters like ð, ø, ß, and á, ç, ê, ñ, ü. It omits curly quotes, en- and em-dashes and some other fancy punctuation (see Windows‑1252), and many Latin characters and diacritics used only by central and east European languages. It is a superset of ASCII, and a subset of Unicode. Related character sets Latin‑2 to Latin‑10 are optimized for other Latin-script languages: Latin‑2 contains the necessary characters for most central European languages, Latin‑5 is for Turkish, Latin‑8 is for Celtic languages such as Welsh, Gaelic and Breton, and Latin‑9 (also termed ISO 8859‑15) is an improved version of Latin‑1 that additionally includes the Euro sign (€) and a handful of letters (Œ, Š, Ž plus their lower case equivalents, and Ÿ) while omitting common fractions and the international currency symbol ¤. Further ISO 8859 character sets combine basic Latin characters and symbols with Cyrillic, with monotonic Greek, with Hebrew and with basic Arabic characters.

Latin‑9

See Latin‑1.

Laydown

See sales embargo date. In printing, is occasionally used to mean Imposition.

LC

US Library of Congress.

LCC

Library of Congress Classification, book subject classification used in some libraries. See also DDC, UDC, CLC, LCSH.

Linked Content Coalition, a consortium of standards bodies and identifier registries that aims to – over time – increase interoperability between metadata, rights information and identifier standards across multiple media sectors.

LCSH

Library of Congress Subject Headings, book subject classification used in some libraries, and distinct from LCC.

Lead time

Expected time taken from order to delivery, for example of a POD product.

Lead title, Key title

Publisher’s frontlist titles for any particular month or season that are expected to sell the most copies or become bestsellers, which are given significant advertising and promotion support (A&P). cf midlist.

Leaf

Single thickness of paper, forming two pages of a book (one verso, one recto).

Learning object

See LOM.

Legal deposit

Legal requirement and administrative process whereby publishers lodge a copy – sometimes multiple copies – of every publication with a national library or with other repositories. Exact requirements vary from country to country, and increasingly apply to digital as well as physical publications.

Leveling

Measurement or assessment of the complexity of text, or the reading ability required for comprehension.

Libel

Publication of a defamatory or untrue statement about a person, organization etc that will harm their reputation, or tend to make them the target of ridicule, scorn, dislike or contempt. cf slander, which is the oral equivalent.

Library supplier

Wholesaler which specializes in supplying library and sometimes school customers. Library suppliers (jobbers, in North America) usually provide selection or bundling of suitable products and cataloging services and in addition to normal wholesale fulfillment, and even offer services such as rebinding.

License

Legal permission to make use of some intellectual property. A rightsholder may license another party (a licensee) to do something that would – without the license – be an infringement of copyright. With the license, the licensee is also a rightsholder (though most likely with narrower rights), and may in some cases be able to sub-license rights to a third party.

Ligature

In typesetting, special precomposed glyph representing two (occasionally, three) letters. In Latin-based typesetting, the combinations æ, ff, fi, fl, ij and a handful of others are common (depending on the fonts available, the difference between ff and ff may not be apparent, but the former is a single Unicode glyph, not a pair of characters). In Arabic typesetting, there are many common ligatures, as characters change shape according to the surrounding letters and their position in a word.

Limp-bound

See case-bound.

Line art

See halftone.

Linked data

Approach that expresses structured data as collections of subject–predicate–object ‘triples’. So for example ISNI:0000000121479135—‘is author of’—ISBN:9780007232833 is a triple. Additionally, linked data identifies the subject entities, predicates and many object entities using URIs – so http://isni.org/isni/0000000121479135 could be used as the subject of a linked data triple. Linked data triples can be expressed and exchanged in RDF JSON-LD or other formats, or stored in a specialized database called a ‘triple store’. Linked open data (LOD) is linked data published under an ‘open’ license, and the Semantic web is a collection of highly interlinked machine-readable Linked open data resources on the internet that allows data to be shared and widely reused.

List

Informally, the books a publisher or imprint has available in print, or are soon to be published. Within a large publisher, there are usually separate lists for different types of book. See also backlist and frontlist. cf imprint.

List price

The retail price for the product set by the publisher. See RRP, FRP.

Literal

A typographical error or ‘typo’ – an error in typeset text.

Literary agent

Person or organisation representing creators such as authors, negotiating and licensing their rights to publishers and others in return for a share of the licensing revenue.

Litho, offset litho

Traditional high-volume lithographic printing technology using oil-based inks and oleophobic printing plates with oleophilic patterns to pick up the ink and transfer it to the paper. cf POD.

LMS

Library Management System, integrated software application to support the functioning of a library, including acquisition, cataloging and access. Also ILS, Integrated Library System.

Learning Management System, integrated application to support administration, delivery, tracking and reporting of digital educational resources or of complete courses. See also VLE.

Locale

The set of location or culturally-specific patterns and conventions used for display of numbers, prices, time and date formats, etc, sometimes also encompassing language and script preferences, and sort order. ONIX generally aims to ensure data (other than textual descriptions) is communicated in a locale-independent way, leaving the details of locale-specific use or display of the data to the eventual recipient. The Common Local Data Repository (CLDR) is a useful central source of information about specific locales.

LOD

Linked Open Data, see Linked data, Semantic web

LOM

Learning Object Metadata, a metadata scheme for describing educational resources, used within most LMSs. Learning objects are self-contained collections of instructional or explanatory content, together with practice activities and assessment. The LOM model describes the subject, educational objective, interaction model, any prerequisites and the technology requirements of a learning object.

Long grain

Pages printed and bound where the spine of the book lies parallel to the ‘grain’, the preferred orientation of fibres, in the paper. This means a stronger binding because folds aligned with the grain break fewer fibres in the paper. cf cross grain, where the spine is aligned across the grain of the paper.

Loose leaf

Publication which is supplied unbound, as individual sheets or leaves. These are usually punched to fit in a binder (often the type with openable metal rings) which makes replacing updated (or ‘canceled’) pages simple.

Lossy, lossless

See compression.

Lower case

See case.

LPI

See halftone.

M

Manifestation

The physical or digital embodiment of a particular work. The related hardback, paperback and e‑book products are different manifestations of the same work. All contain essentially identical content. Note that a manifestation encompasses multiple individual copies (or instances) of a book, which are identical (or very nearly so). Manifestations may be identified with ISBNs. See <indecs> and FRBR.

MARC

Machine Readable Cataloging, a family of metadata formats used in library cataloging. MARC21, the latest version in use in North America and the UK, is closely tied to the AACR2 cataloging rules. UNIMARC and many minor national variations are common elsewhere. MARC has been in use for nearly 50 years, and has been updated many times to cope with developments in cataloging practices (see AACR2 and RDA), but it is likely to be replaced by more modern data formats over the next decade.

Market

A geographical area within which commercial arrangements for distributing and selling a product are consistent – usually with a single exclusive distributor and single availability date across the market.

Markup

Labels, delimiters or tags within a document that define its structure or meaning. In XMLand HTML, markup tags are placed between < and > symbols. Tags are often paired to indicate the beginning and end of a particular data element within the document, so top-level heading text in HTML is contained between <H1> and </H1> tags. Markup can be described as semantic or presentational, but in practice is usually a mixture of both.

Marrakesh Treaty

International agreement signed in 2013 providing for an exception to copyright to facilitate the creation of accessible versions of books and other copyrighted works for print-impaired readers. It also allows for cross-border supply of these accessible versions via trusted intermediaries, independent of the territorial rights arrangements for the works.

Mass market

General non-specialist (adult) consumer market. Also, a paperback product aimed at this broad-based market, often a rack-size or A-format size.

Measure

In typesetting, the width of a column of type.

Media type

Formerly MIME type, the descriptor for file formats used in many internet applications. For example, an HTML file may have the media type ‘text/html’ and a zipped ONIX file should be ‘application/xml+zip’.

Message

See ONIX message.

Metadata

Strictly, data about other data. More usefully in the context of the book and e‑book supply chain, metadata can be thought of as all the data used to describe and trade products through the supply chain. This encompasses both simple, structured and factual information like titles, author names, distribution arrangements and prices, and richer, more complex descriptive data, classifications of various types and even parts of the book itself (a table of contents can be seen also as valuable descriptive metadata). ONIX messages are a method of communicating this highly structured and standardized metadata from one party to another within the supply chain. Some organizations might also consider internal workflow information to be part of the product’s metadata.

Midlist

Frontlist titles not expected to become bestsellers, and thus not attracting the marketing and promotional effort that publishers afford to lead titles.

MIME type

Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension type. See media type.

ML

Markup language, see HTML, SGML, MathML.

Machine learning, computer algorithms that build and use mathematical or statistical models based on pre-existing ‘training’ data to classify or make decisions about new data, often seen as one facet of AI.

Mono, monochrome

Printed using a single ink (usually black). Note this can include halftone images, not just text and line illustrations.

Monograph

Publication that’s complete in one part or volume (or occasionally, in a small number of separate volumes). Individual stand-alone books – or occasionally, sets of books – are monographs. Sometimes also implies a detailed scholarly work. cf a serial publication such as an academic journal or magazine.

Moral rights

See copyright.

MP3

MPEG Audio Layer-III, standard for compressed audio files. cf AAC. See also codec.

MS

Manuscript, the author’s original version of the text. Occasionally ‘TS’ for Typescript.

Multi-component, multi-item

A single product may contain multiple parts – components – that are intended to be sold together, for example a book bundled with a toy or a slipcase containing three volumes. In contrast, a multi-item product contains several other products and is intended to be split before resale. Multi-item products such as a box containing a dozen copies of an individual book are often available only to the trade.

N

Namespace

A naming system, or collection of all the possible unique names or identifiers for a particular type of entity. For example, the ISBN namespace consists of all possible 13-digit numbers between 9780000000000 and 9799999999999 (minus those numbers that begin 9790, and those which the check digit indicates are invalid). The ONIX namespace is the complete list of XML tags that could be used in an ONIX message. In XML, namespaces are themselves often given URI-style names, so http://ns.editeur.org/onix/3.0/reference is the name of the ONIX 3.0 reference namespace. Note that there is no web page at that address – it is merely an unambiguous way of naming the namespace.

NBN

National Bibliography Number, an identifier assigned to a book or other document by a national library. Unlike the ISBN, there is no international standard – every library uses its own proprietary format, and NBNs are rarely used outside the library context.

Neighboring rights

See publishing rights.

Net Book Agreement

Former agreement administered by the UK Publishers Association which prevented sale of books at below the publisher’s list price. The NBA was abandoned in 1995, allowing retailers to compete by selling below the list or recommended retail price. But there are laws and similar agreements in other countries that fix the retail price or limit retailers’ ability to sell at a discount, eg the Lang Law in France. See FRP.

Net price

Generally, a price after tax, trade discounts and other adjustments are made – in effect, a business-to-business or wholesale price. See RRP.

NFC

Near-field communication, a set of communication protocols used to communicate over very short distances (a few centimetres) with mobile phones, ‘contactless’ payment cards, biometric passports etc, and closely related to older RFID standards.

In Unicode, see Normalization.

NIP

New in Paperback – a paperback version of a book previously published in hardback.

In binding, to catch paper between rollers to sharpen a fold, or to expel air between sheets.

Non-exclusive rights

See Sales rights composite in Group P.21, though non-exclusivity could apply to other types of rights, for example distribution rights.

Normalization

In a relational database, the strategy of designing data tables and relationships between tables to ensure each chunk of data is stored only once, so that it can be managed efficiently and consistently. However, database designs can sometimes be judiciously denormalized to improve performance, if data management is not such a priority.

In Unicode, the normalization form (NFC, NFD, NFKC or NFKD) concerns whether composite characters like é or the ff ligature are decomposed into two separate characters, the e and ´ (acute accent) or f plus f, or kept as a single precomposed character.

In XML and HTML, ‘whitespace normalization’ means that combinations of multiple space, tab, return and newline characters are treated as if they were a single space character.

NYP

Not yet published: publication is forthcoming. cf AB.

O

OA

See open access.

OCLC

Online Computer Library Center, US-based global library cooperative offering services such as cooperative cataloging, technology services and research.

OFC, OBC

Outside front cover (cover 1), Outside back cover (cover 4).

Offset fee

Fee paid by one publisher to another for use of typesetting, film or printing plates and occasionally of data files, in the manufacture of a book, entirely separate from any licensing or rights to the intellectual property content.

ONIX for Books

Online Information eXchange, a standardized framework for communication of rich bibliographic and product metadata between computer systems within the book and e‑book supply chains. Originated under the aegis of the Association of American Publishers in 1999 and first published in January 2000, the standard is now managed, developed and supported by EDItEUR.

onix@groups.io

e‑mail mailing list and support forum for general questions about ONIX. Subscribe by sending a blank e-mail to onix+subscribe@groups.io

ONIX message

A complete ONIX data file, generally one in a series of messages passed between a data provider and a data recipient. A single message may contain one or many Product records.

On-sale date

See strict on-sale date.

Ontology

In information science, a formally-defined set of entities and their properties and relationships needed to model a domain or area of interest. See taxonomy.

OP

See out of print.

OPAC

Online Public Access Catalog, bibliographic database of a library’s holdings, accessible either online or via terminals within the library.

OPDS

Open Publication Distribution System, a simple data format for distributing catalogs of electronic publications, and usually containing only basic Dublin Core metadata.

Open access

Licensed on ‘open’ terms, for example under a Creative Commons license, which typically mean that a work or published product can be read, used and re-distributed freely – free of charge, and free of at least some of the usual copyright restrictions. The particular license chosen may still require attribution, prevent the distribution of derivative works, or impose other restrictions. More often associated with serials such as academic journals, but some academic publishers produce open access monographs (ie books). Open access material is usually made available via a digital archive maintained by the publisher (so-called ‘Gold’ OA), or an an archive maintained by the author, the research institution or an independent ‘open access repository’ (collectively, ‘Green’ OA). Gold OA material is almost always made available under a highly permissive license, whereas Green OA may be free of charge but remain subject to many or even all the usual copyright restrictions.

Open access publisher

Publisher which specializes in making its products available on open access terms. The publisher charges the author a fee – often termed an APC (article processing charge) or BPC (book processing charge) – to cover the cost of editorial work, peer review, production and distribution, and these fees are usually paid from the author’s research grants. Note that although the product is free of charge to the reader, reputable open access publishers impose the same editorial controls, academic review processes and quality standards as conventional publishers.

Open source (software)

Computer software whose source code is available under an ‘open’ license allowing anyone to use, modify and distribute the code without most of the usual copyrightrestrictions. See for example Apache v2 licenses.

Open standard

Broadly, standards that are publicly available and often implementable without charge, and which are developed and maintained through a transparent decision-making process open to a broad range of stakeholders.

OPS

Out of print, Substitute. An answer code meaning the product is OP, but the publisher suggests another equivalent or updated product (eg a second edition may be marked as OPS when the third edition becomes available).

ORCID

Open Researcher and Contributor ID, a unique identifier used for academic and scholarly contributors somewhat similar to ISNI, but requiring only self-registration instead of assignment through an ISNI registration agency.

Order-to-cash

High-level business process, or the IT system (often an ERP) responsible for the processes of accepting orders, dispatching goods, generating invoices, and receiving payments. Sometimes OTC, O2C, Purchase-to-pay, PTP or P2P.

Orphan

In typesetting, a single word or excessively short line that appears at the end of a paragraph. Alternatively, a section heading or the first line of a paragraph, or a partial or short line of text (eg the last line of a paragraph), which occurs at the bottom of a column or page. Typesetters and designers try to avoid all three types of orphan. See also widow.

Orphan work

A work protected by copyright or other rights, but where the presumed rightsholders are unknown or cannot be contacted (perhaps because the work is out of commerce). Such orphans are problematic, because uncertainty about the rightsholders and the expiry of their rights means they cannot be exploited.

Out of commerce

Out of print and no new stock is available in the supply chain (though used copies may be available). May apply to a particular product (which implies that other manifestations of the same work may still be in commerce), or may be applied to a work (which implies nomanifestations of the work are in commerce).

Out of copyright

Work on which copyright (and other IP rights) have expired. After expiry, the work passes into the public domain.

Out of print

A publisher may declare a product out of print (or OP) to indicate it (or its primary distributor) will no longer accept orders. This usually also means copies sold to retailers on a sale or return basis are no longer returnable (or may be returnable only for a short period after the product is declared OP). However, out of print does not mean ‘unavailable’, as there may still be many copies in the supply chain. See also in print, out of commerce. Out of print can also be applied to a work rather than an individual product, which implies all manifestations of a work are out of print.

OWP

Open Web Platform, term used to describe the combination of HTML, CSS and JavaScriptused to create web pages and web-based applications, and EPUB e‑books.

P

Packager

Agency contracted by the publisher to produce a book, usually including text creation, editing, design and illustration but not manufacturing of the final product.

P&A

Price and availability. Not to be confused with A&P, advertising and promotion.

Page count

See extent.

Page proof

Paginated but unbound proof copy for final checking, indexing etc prior to printing and publication. cf galley proof, bound proof.

Pagination

The process or result of dividing the text into individual pages. See also extent.

Pallet

Wooden packing base on which books (or more typically, cartons of books) or other goods are stacked, stored and transported in bulk. A pallet or skid is typically around 1 × 1.2m (the most common size in the UK), is designed to be handled using a pallet-jack or forklift truck, and can carry up to about 1000 typical hardback novels or 2500 paperbacks (depending on their extent), or a tonne or more of paper sheets. Common Euro and US ‘standard’ pallets differ in size – 1 × 0.8m and 48 × 40in respectively. In many Asian countries, 1.1m square is the most common size. Euro pallets are convenient because they fit through doors even when laden, but they waste more space than US and UK sizes when packed in a standard shipping container.

Pamphlet

Small booklet with few pages, often self-covered (no separate cover), and usually bound with a simple wire stitch.

Pantone

The Pantone Matching System (PMS) is a proprietary colorspace used to specify colors of print and ink, paint, plastic, dye and fabric. Only a subset of named Pantone colors can be printed accurately using CMYK four-color printing. Other Pantone colors are printed using special inks.

Paper weight

The weight (or more strictly, the mass) of a particular grade of paper, usually measured in gsm (grams per square metre of a single sheet). Handily, an A0 sheet is 1 square metre, and so are 16 sheets of A4. Typical book paper lies in the range of 60–100gsm. In North America, paper weight may instead be expressed in terms of the Basis weight, the weight in pounds of a Ream (500 sheets) sized 25 × 38 inches. Typical book paper lies in the range of 40–70lb basis weight (approximately equivalent to 60–100gsm). For some types of paper and board, a different basis size is used – eg 20 × 26 inches for cover board, so 230gsm cover board is 85lb basis weight (and this is sometimes written 85#). See https://www.papersizes.org/us-international-weights.htm for basis weight to gsm conversion tables. See also bulk.

Parser

In XML, a parser is software that can read an XML document (such as an ONIX message), check that it matches the required XML syntax and grammar (by comparing it with a DTD or schema file), and make each individual data element available to other software (via an API).

Partwork

Publication released in several weekly or monthly installments, which may be bound together to form a complete book.

Party

Generalized term for a person or organization involved in a creative activity. See also persona.

PDA

See DDA.

PDF

Portable Document Format, standard file format for electronic documents (including e‑books), originally devised by Adobe as a simplification of PostScript, but now an ISOstandard. A PDF file can encapsulate almost every aspect of the document – the text, fonts, all vector and raster graphics and even limited interactivity. In general, a PDF fixes the visual aspects of the document exactly and PDF is often used to transfer publisher files to the printer for manufacturing, but reflowing PDFs are possible. Unfortunately, PDFs do not retain structural or semantic markup, which reduces its accessibility. So-called ‘web PDFs’ are normal PDFs (generally not reflowable) but which may have lower quality images (fewer pixels or more loosely, lower resolution, than PDFs intended for printing) to limit the file size.

PEFC

See FSC.

Perfect binding

See adhesive binding.

Period

Punctuation mark (‘ . ’) also called a full stop, used at the end of a a sentence, as a decimal point in a real number, or after an abbreviation. Not to be confused with a mid-dot (‘ · ’) or comma (‘ , ’) which can also be used as decimal points in different locales. XML data uses only the period as a decimal point within real numbers, even if that data is then displayed using the appropriate separator for the locale.

Permissions

Authorization from the copyright or other rightsholder to incorporate one work, or more often a part of a work, within another – for example the permission to include a copyright image or to quote a passage of text from one book in another. See also rights.

Persona

The public-facing outward identity of a party – usually of a person, though a persona may be pseudonymic, or otherwise distinct from the private identity of a real-world person. See also ISNI, contributor.

Pilcrow

Typographic symbol ‘ ¶ ’ usually indicating ‘paragraph’ (or sometimes in technical contexts, the Return character at the end of a paragraph).

Pinakes

The first recorded bibliographic database, developed by Callimachus to catalog the papyri holdings of the Library of Alexandria around 245 BCE.

Pixel

See raster image.

Plate section

Pages bound into a book containing primarily halftoned illustrations (often photographs), usually printed on higher quality paper than the remainder of the book block. Plate sections – sometimes also termed Inserts – usually lack page numbers. cf integrated book.

PLC

Printed laminated case, a decorative variation of a plain paper over boards hardback. The printed design on the cover boards is usually varnished or laminated, as PLCs often lack a separate jacket.

PLR

Public lending right, the right of an author to be compensated for the loan of books from libraries – and in the UK, the system used to provide the related payments.

PNG

Portable network graphics, a losslessly-compressed raster image file format. While mostly intended as an improvement over GIF (a relatively low-quality image format) for online use, PNG can carry high-quality RGB images, including transparency, color profiles etc – but it does not support CMYK. As a result, its use in publishing workflows is limited. See also TIFF, JPEG.

Pocket book

Small book, usually a paperback. Just how small varies from publisher to publisher and country to country. (In the UK, a pocketbook is a small blank notebook, often spiral bound, and the term ‘pocket book’ is not used – it is roughly synonymous with A-formatpaperback.)

POD

Print on demand, the manufacture of a single copy – often using xerographic (dry, toner-based) or ink-jet printing – in response to a customer order. POD copies may be drop-shipped to the retail customer, or fulfilled via a retailer. POD has a largely undeserved reputation for inferior print quality and binding: current POD technology rivals the quality of conventional litho manufacturing. cf short-run printing. See also ASR.

Point

Traditional primarily American and British typographic unit of size, abbreviated as pt. Historically, slightly less than 1⁄72nd of an inch (or about 0.3515mm). The use of points in PostScript has made exactly 1⁄72 (0.3527mm) the de facto standard, and spread the use of points to other typographic traditions. The main text in a printed document is usually around 9–12pt. See also em. cf didot, similar measurement unit widespread in European typography at least until the 1980s, around 0.375mm (ie about 7% larger than a traditional point).

Portrait

See landscape.

POS

Point of Sale, or Point of Service – ultimately, the retailer’s till or checkout. In the US, Point of Purchase.

Promotional material such as posters, dumpbins, bookmarks placed at or for sale at the retailer’s till or checkout.

Post-coordination

See pre-coordination.

PostScript

Computer programming language devised by Adobe, used by early laser printers and by typesetting machines to describe page images, now mostly superseded by PDF.

PPI

Pixels per inch, an unsatisfactory measure of resolution of a digital image. It relates the number of pixels in a digital image to the physical size of the image when printed or displayed.

Pre-coordination

Method of classification where multiple concepts are combined to form single subject headings or codes carrying a complex meaning. All allowed combinations are enumerated in advance. The opposite is Post-coordination, where multiple simple subject headings are used, and the complex combined meaning emerges from the combination of subject headings or codes. Post-coordination allows creative combination of the subject headings. As an example, BISAC is pre-coordinated: a children’s sports story featuring baseball would be classified as JUV032010. In contrast, Thema is at least in part post-coordinated: the same book would be classified as YFR (Children’s sporting stories) plus YNWD3 (baseball), and the full meaning emerges from the combination of the two codes.

Prelims

See front matter.

Pre-order

Consumer order placed with a retailer in advance of actual availability of the product, for delivery on (or at least close to) the publication date.

Presentational markup

See semantic markup.

Print-impaired readers

Readers with visual, physical or cognitive impairments who cannot use conventional printed or on-screen books, for example blind, partially-sighted or dyslexic readers, or readers with a physical disability. Print-impairment is a range of issues rather than a single problem, but print-impaired readers can often make use of various types of assistive technology and accessible editions. In many countries – in particular, those that have ratified the Marrakesh Treaty – print-impaired readers have a copyright exception that allows copying and modification of copyright material to make it accessible for personal use.

Print run

Number of copies printed in a single impression. Historically, this was an edition, and this sense is still used in book collecting (‘a valuable first edition’).

Process color

Color printing in which CMYK inks and halftoning are used to simulate the full range of color. Note that cyan, magenta, yellow and black is not the only possible combination of process colors – though rare, a six-color process with additional orange and green inks can widen the range of colors that can be simulated faithfully (the color gamut). cf mono, spot color.

Product

A particular manifestation of a work that is available for sale to the public (or to an organization, on a business-to-business basis). Although ONIX is often characterized as describing products, it can be used to describe parts of a product that are not individually available, or components that are used during creation of products. However, such parts and components should not be identified using an ISBN, unless they are also products in their own right.

Product record

The complete collection of metadata relating to a single product, provided within an ONIX message. A Product record is contained between <Product> and </Product> XML tags.

Provenance

In metadata, the origin of an assertion or metadata property – for example, who says that the book is about motorcycle maintenance? The provenance is important when metadata sources conflict.

Publication date

The date on which the product is nominally ‘published’, though not necessarily the date on which it first becomes available at retail. See Publishing date composite in Group P.20.

Public domain

Works in which all copyright, neighboring and related rights have expired, or those where such rights never pertained. Note that works covered by Creative Commons and similar open access licenses are not public domain, though for particular ‘licenses’ such as the CC0 (‘CC Zero’) waiver, the net effect may be somewhat similar.

Publisher

The organization responsible for making the product available, and generally the one taking the financial risk. cf distributor, contributor and imprint. The publisher is a legal entity, whereas the imprint is merely a brand name.

Publishing rights

The rights to publish or commercially exploit a work in various ways, obtained by the publisher from the author, creator or other rightsholder, and ultimately derived from the creator’s copyright. The publishing rights obtained by a publisher may be exclusive, global and perpetual, or non-exclusive, limited geographically or for a limited period, and may cover all languages or a specific language. In the English-language publishing market, it is common for a British-based publisher to obtain exclusive world (or world English language) rights from an author, but then sublicense exclusive North American rights to a US-based publisher (or vice versa). Such a sublicense may include additional non-exclusive rights to countries where both UK and US publishers compete to sell their own separate versions of the work. Alternatively, the author may license the North American and remaining rights separately to two different publishers, or a single publisher may obtain the rights to publish globally. A publisher may also sublicense subsidiary and neighboring rights (translation, abridgement, serialization, audio etc) it does not wish to exploit directly. cf sales rights.

Pulping

Destruction of unsold copies of a book to remove them from the supply chain. This ultimately involves shredding and recycling of the paper mass to make new paper, but there may be stages prior to recycling that involve defacing or otherwise making copies of the book unsaleable.

Q

QR code

Quick Response code, a type of 2D barcode comprising a grid of black and white squares. When scanned (eg with a smartphone), QR codes can trigger actions (go to a URL, send an SMS text message, add contact details to an address book, display text), and some actions have attendant security risks. There is no standard use within the book trade, but they are often used in consumer advertising to avoid the need to type long URIs.

Qualifier

Subject code used within schemes such as BIC and Thema that can only be used to refine the meaning of another code.

Quarter-bound

High-quality binding in which the spine (only) is bound in leather (or other fine and durable material). cf half-bound, full-bound.

Quotation marks

Typographic symbols (eg ‘ ’ or “ ”) used in pairs around quotations, reported speech or to highlight a word or phrase. Different languages use different quotation marks, even within the same writing system, and conventions for single or double quotes vary too (eg English uses ‘…’, German uses „…‟, French uses « … », Japanese uses 「…」).

R

Rack size

Size of mass-market paperback common in the US, 6¾ × 4¼ inches (or 171mm × 108mm), occasionally slightly taller. A ‘tall rack size’ is around 7½ × 4¼ ins. See also A-format.

Rag book

Children’s book in which the cover and every leaf are fabric rather than paper, card or board. Also termed a ‘Cloth book’.

RAM

Random Access Memory, the working memory of a computer, usually in the range of 1 gigabyte (roughly a billion bytes, in a smartphone) to 64 gigabytes (in a server). The contents of RAM are usually lost when the computer is switched off. Contrast with the more or less permanent storage attached to a computer, which is also measured in gigabytes.

Raster image

A digital image represented as rows and columns of colored dots (pixels – picture elements). TIFFs and JPEGs are raster image formats. Raster images cannot be scaled without losing visual clarity – if displayed too large, curves become jagged and the image pixels become individually visible. cf vector image.

RDA

Resource Description and Access. Modern set of library cataloging rules – increasingly widely used and gradually supplanting AACR2 in most English language library applications. RDA rules are also applicable to cataloguing in other languages.

RDBMS

See relational database.

RDF

Resource Description Framework, a set of W3C specifications (‘Recommendations’) for representation of metadata about resources (typically web resources) as sets of ‘triples’, three-part statements expressing relationships between entities. RDF triple data can be expressed as XML, or in a variety of other data formats (eg Turtle or JSON‑LD, and is the foundation of the ‘semantic web’. RDFa is a data format for embedding RDF-style structured data within the markup of HTML web pages, and is one of the data formats used by schema.org.

Reading age

Measure of a child’s reading proficiency or the proficiency required to read a text, expressed as the age of a child of average reading ability.

Real number

Number that contains both a whole number part and a fractional part, representing a quantity that can vary continuously rather than in discrete increments. Can be expressed as a vulgar or mixed fraction (eg 5⁄4 or 1¼) or as a decimal (1.25), though only the latter can be used in an XML data element. (More strictly, in mathematics, these are rational numbers. Real numbers also include irrational numbers, which cannot be represented exactly by fractions.) cf integer.

Recommended retail price

Often just RRP, or occasionally termed a Suggested retail price, or SRP. Price chosen and recommended by the publisher for sales to the consumer. The retailer does not haveto use this price, and may choose to sell the product for a lower (or higher) price – the Actual selling price or ASP. But royalties paid to the contributors of the book are often based on a percentage of the RRP, even though the Actual selling price is different. In some countries, retail prices set by publishers are fixed: by law, retailers may not reduce (or increase) the Fixed retail price, or may do so only within a fairly narrow band or only after a certain time has elapsed since publication. In countries where RRPs are the norm, the Agency model may also allow publishers to exert direct control over consumer prices.

Recto

The side of a single leaf in a book that is read first – usually the right hand page in a book, which is given an odd page number. (Conceptually at least, a recto page is a left page in Arabic, Hebrew, or in traditional Chinese and Japanese, where page progression is right-to-left.) The opposite is a Verso page, the second side of a leaf, or left hand page (in most languages and writing systems), with an even page number.

Red Book

The standard covering the physical, optical and electronic nature of all Compact Discs, and for recording high-quality (44.1kHz, stereo, 16‑bit linear PCM) digital audio on such discs. cf Yellow Book.

Registration agency

See registration authority. 

Registration authority

Organization ultimately responsible for managing an identifier standard, its governance, and registrations or assignments, for example the International ISBN Agency which is responsible for the ISBN system on a global basis. A registration authority may delegate the process of registration or assignment to multiple Registration agencies, perhaps on a geographical or sectoral basis. For example, Nielsen in the UK and Bowker in the US operate national ISBN registration agencies. (This terminology mostly applies to ISOidentifier standards.)

Reissue

As for reprint, but with refreshed marketing collateral, a new cover etc. Reissue sometimes implies renewed availability after a period where the product has been unavailable. Reissues continue to carry the same ISBN as earlier impressions – and in contrast, using a new ISBN means it is a new product, not a reissue of the original, even if it carries identical content and has an identical product form etc.

Relational database

Metadata is often managed using a relational database, in which the data is stored in one or more tables. Each table has rows representing entities such as products or contributors, and the table columns are the properties of each entity. Tables are related to each other, usually through sharing a single column in common, and the relationships usually mirror the real-world relationships between the entities. The tables are usually normalized (designed to minimize redundancy) – so an author who has written a dozen books has their name stored once, forming a row in a Contributor table, and data in that row can be linked to the many rows in the Books table as required. Most relational database management systems (RDBMSs) or applications have library software for importing and exporting XML. See also SQL.

Release date

See Expected availability date in Group P.20.

Remainders

Excess stock of books disposed of by the publisher or distributor at a low price to a specialist bookseller (who cannot return them). An alternative to destruction of excess unsold copies, for example by pulping.

Rental

In e‑books, a limited-term (temporary) license, where a ‘purchase’ is a perpetual license. cf subscription.

Repertoire

In text encoding, the range of characters used in a document, or present in a particular character set.

In rights, may refer to the works of a particular creator or rightsholder, or those offered by a righsholder for licensing under particular terms.

Reprint

[Print] a new impression, usually manufactured to replenish stock. Copies are essentially identical to the previous batch or impression, though may incorporate minor changes to correct errors, and they carry the same ISBN as previous impressions. Note that if the changes represent significant alterations to the content, then the new copies are a distinct edition – in ONIX terms a new product (and indeed a new work) which would also have a new ISBN (and a new ISTC).

Reseller model

Business model based on the idea that the publisher sells to an intermediary (typically a distributor, wholesaler or retailer) based on an established retail price (RRP or FRP) minus a trade discount (the discount may vary from intermediary to intermediary), or via an established business-to-business or wholesale price. The intermediary can subsequently sell on the book to the consumer at whatever price they choose. Alternatively, in some legal frameworks, the retailer must sell to the consumer at the fixed retail price. In either case, it is the wholesaler or retailer that is the publisher’s direct customer, and not the consumer. This is the most common business model in the book trade; cf the alternative agency model.

Resolution

The process of resolving an identifier to retrieve its underlying metadata, or to find the entity itself. For some ‘actionable’ identifiers such as the ISBN-A, this resolution process can be via the internet, in the same way a DNS name may be resolved to an IP address.

The degree of detail captured in an image (or more generally, degree of precision in a measurement). Image resolution is usually expressed in dots per inch (DPI) or per centimetre (occasionally it’s pixels per inch, PPI). Note that resolution applies to an image in the physical world, not to the underlying pixel data which can be reproduced at any size (see notes on image resolution in Group P.16).

Return

See returns.

Carriage return, character typed to indicate a new paragraph or confirm entry of data.

Returns

Books sold to retailers on ‘sale or return’ terms, and which fail to sell at retail, can be returned to the wholesaler or distributor for credit. Returned copies can be re-sold to another retailer, or may be pulped. Some publishers allow low-value books to be destroyed by the retailer rather than physically returned (eg by stripping off the cover, which is then returned as proof of destruction). Publishers clearly aim to discourage over-ordering and minimise the consequent returns from retailers, but the trade as a whole benefits from ensuring bookstores are full of potentially-saleable books rather than full of books known to be unsaleaable. Thus, a certain level of returns is anticipated, and the credit on returns frees retailers to order new books that are more likely to sell.

Reversion

Return to the creator of rights previously licensed by the creator to a publisher, for example at the end of a contractually-set term or under other agreed circumstances. Reversions are often requested if a publisher fails to keep a work in print. Similarly, sublicensed rights can revert to the licensor.

Review copy

Copy sent (free of charge) to the press or other media for the purposes of review. See ARC.

See approval copy.

RFID

Radio frequency identification, technology used to communicate with tiny electronic tags that can be attached to physical items such as books. The tags contain identification and other information for the item, which can be read at a short distance to track the item and automate many logistics processes. For example RFID tags can be used to automate library lending processes.

RGB

Red, Green, Blue – basic additive color model used (eg) on a computer screen to generate (or at least simulate) the full range (or gamut) of visible colors. See sRGB, Adobe RGB, CMYK, color profile.

Rights

General term covering copyright, moral rights and other intellectual property rights, plus contractual rights such as the right to distribute or sell products. So-called ‘Volume rights’ give the publisher the right to publish and sell products based on (manifestations of) a copyright work, and are sometimes divided by language and geographical territory (eg ‘the publisher holds Commonwealth English language rights’). Subsidiary rights or ‘sub-rights’ – usually attached to the volume rights, but often sublicensed by the volume rights holder to another publisher – include the right to create and publish serializations for newspapers or magazines, abridgements, adaptations as a play or movie, and (assuming the underlying volume rights are not limited by language) translations. Distribution rights are contractual rights conferred by the publisher on a distributor, enabling the distributor to trade a product in a particular market. See also permissions, publishing rights, sales rights.

Rightsholder

Party which holds copyright or some related rights in a work.

RNG

RELAX NG schema language. See schema.

Rough front

See deckle edge.

Royal

Common UK hardback book size typically around 234 × 153mm. See also demy, trade paperback.

Royalties

Payments made by the publisher to authors or other contributors, in return for the right to publish and sell the book. Royalties are usually calculated based on the number of copies sold and a percentage of the list price of the book – though sums are often paid in advance, and minor contributors may only receive a fixed fee.

RRP

See recommended retail price.

Ruby

Small gloss or annotation added to characters in non-alphabetic scripts such as Japanese Kanji or Chinese Hànzì, used to guide pronunciation of unfamiliar characters or provide phonetic information for sorting purposes. Ruby glosses are written using phonetic characters such as Pinyin for Chinese or Hiragana for Japanese. See Person name in Group P.7.9, though ruby glosses can be incorporated into any textual data element in ONIX. In HTML, the <ruby> tag can be used to specify glosses. Ruby glosses are so named in English because they were supposedly typeset in Ruby size (5½pt) type.

S

Saddle stitched

Binding by stapling (wire stitching) folded sheets together in the seam of the fold. The clinch of the staple lies in the centre of the book. cf side stitched, where a wire stitch is driven through the folded sheets from front to back (the clinch of the staple lies at the back of the book).

Sale or return

Transaction terms where goods are sold (eg from a distributor or wholesaler to a retailer) and the purchaser retains the right to return them for full credit if not sold at retail. Sometimes called ‘see-safe’ terms. The purchaser’s right to return unsold copies may expire when – or a fixed period after – a book is declared out of print by the publisher. In some cases, goods need not be physically returned to claim a credit – the cover can be torn off and returned instead (such books are ‘strippable’ and carry a triangular indicator containing a letter S adjacent to the barcode), or the products can be defaced or destroyed in some trusted process to prevent resale. In contrast, ‘Firm sale’ terms mean the product is sold and is not returnable for credit at all, and ‘Consignment’ terms mean the product is still owned by the upstream distributor or wholesaler even though it is physically stocked by the retailer (the retailer ‘buys’ it only after selling it on to a consumer).

Occasionally, sale or return terms (more strictly, consignment terms) are applied to products supplied to end-purchasers, and the purchaser pays only after deciding to keep the goods. See approval copy.

Sales embargo date

See Publishing date composite in Group P.20.

Sales rights

The commercial rights derived from the publisher’s publishing rights that a publisher confers on its distributors, wholesalers and retailers, allowing them to trade in and make the product available to customers. Note the contrast with publishing rights: publishing rights concern where a publisher has the right to publish and sell a product. The sales rights are where the publisher chooses to make the product available (ie chooses to exercise those publishing rights). Clearly the sales rights must be a subset of (or the same as) the publishing rights. In ONIX, only the sales rights are described in detail, and the publishing rights themselves are not made explicit (at least in part because the publishing rights pertain to the work, not the product). In ONIX, the <SalesRights> composites list the set of countries and regions where the publisher is exercising its rights to make a product available. A <ProductSupply> composite and its enclosed <Market> composites can detail the subset of countries and regions where those rights are conferred upon a particular set of distributors, wholesalers and retailers. Another market might have a different subset of the sales rights conferred upon a different group of suppliers. When broken down by market, these are often termed Distribution rights.

Sales tax

Tax levied as a percentage of retail sales to the consumer or end user. cf VAT, which is levied incrementally at all points in the supply chain. Sales taxes are levied by most US states and some Canadian provinces, with rates varying typically in the 0–7.5% range, and additional sales taxes may be levied by city and local government. Since the total retail price – inclusive of tax – varies according to the exact location of the retail sale, advertised prices in those countries do not include the sales tax element, and tax is added at the checkout.

SAN

Standard Address Number, American national standard identifier for a trading location within the supply chain. The SAN registry is administered by Bowker. In Germany, the Börsenverein administers the similar Verkehrsnummer. In contrast to the GLN, the SAN is unique to the publishing industry, but is well established in book-related e-commerce in North America and parts of Europe to identify distribution locations, customer delivery addresses etc.

Schema

Like a DTD, an XML schema formally defines the set of markup tags that may be used in a particular type of XML document, whether each tag is mandatory or optional, and their order and nesting. But unlike a DTD, a schema also constrains the data types and values that may be used within the data elements in the document. It can require that a particular tag contains an integer, or a date, or set a limit on the length of text. And an XML schema can define lists of allowed values (‘enumerations’, controlled vocabularies, or in ONIX terminology, codelists) that can be used in a particular data element. Two primary ‘flavors’ of ONIX for Books schemas are available, using the XSD and RNG schema languages, both of which are themselves XML documents. (Technically, the DTD is a very simple kind of schema too, though DTDs are not themselves XML documents and they cannot define required data types or enumerations.) The normal or ‘classic’ ONIX XSD is based around XSD 1.0. A ‘strict’ XSD 1.1 is also available, which checks a further range of data types, business rules and other requirements, although it not compatible with all XML validation scenarios. A further schema language flavor, Schematron, can be used independently or in conjunction with an XSD schema. A range of Schematron-based rules are embedded within the ONIX ‘strict’ XSD to provide optional warnings covering the use of deprecated data elements and codes.

A database schema is a formal definition of the structure of a database, specifying the nature of the columns, tables, relationships and so on in the database.

Schema.org

Initiative by the major search engines – specifically by Google, Bing, Yahoo and Yandex – that encourages addition of structured metadata into HTML web page markup using a JSON‑LD, Microdata or RDFa vocabulary, largely for SEO purposes.

Schematron

An alternative type of XML schema language. Schematron is rule-based, and is able to test conformance with a wider range of document constraints and business rules than XSD or RNG schemas. Over and above the pass/fail capability of validation with an XSD 1.1, Schematron validation can also deliver warnings about the data.

Script

A writing system of conventional symbols representing the elements of language. A script can be alphabetic, like Latin or Cyrillic, or logographic like Kanji or Hanzi. Scripts can be linked to particular languages (eg Hangul to Korean), or used for a variety of languages (eg Latin to a host of European languages, and also to Chinese via phonetic Hanyu pinyin). A handful of languages are commonly written in more than one script (eg Serbian in either Cyrillic or Latin), or have changed their script at some point in recent history (eg Turkish, Vietnamese are written using Latin script).

Scroll

Printed or manuscript content arranged as a continuous document, not divided into discrete pages. cf codex.

Section mark

Typographic symbol ‘ § ’ usually indicating a section or clause in a document.

Self-publisher

Person combining the roles of contributor and publisher.

Sell-in

Sales to retailers – the number of copies entering the sales channel. In the book trade, most of these copies are typically sold on sale or return terms, so sell-in is not a final sales total. cf sell-through.

Sell-through

Sales to consumers. In principle, over the long term, sell-through equals sell-in minus returns – though over a shorter period, this can be masked by changes in the number of copies held in stock by retailers. Sell-through is sometimes expressed as a percentage of sell-in (eg a sell-through of 85% implies a 15% return rate). See also EST.

Semantic markup

Markup tags that define or at least highlight the meaning or nature of the tagged text, rather than specifying how it should be presented. In contrast, presentational markupdefines only how the text should be displayed on page or screen. As a simple example, HTML includes <i>, a purely presentational tag that indicates text should be displayed in italics. In contrast, the <em> and <cite> tags have the same typographic effect on the appearance, but have extra semantic value – they indicate why the text should be italicized (for emphasis, or because it is a title citation).

Semantic web

See linked data.

SEO

Search engine optimization, the process of enhancing the visibility of your web pages in organic search results, by adding cross-links, keywords and structured metadata about the web page within the web page itself (see schema.org and RDFa), or using terms in the content that are frequently searched for.

Serial

Ongoing publication issued under the same title in a succession of discrete parts, often at regular intervals, such as a magazine, academic journal, newspaper or regularly-issued directory or annual report. Issues are usually dated or numbered sequentially, and are usually purchased via a subscription rather than by purchase of individual issues. Just as monographic publications are identified with an ISBN, serial publications are identified with an ISSN.

Series

Continuing and indefinite sequence of monographic products published separately over a period of time, with a shared identity such as a ‘series title’. The products are usually of similar product form, and share a distinctive branding or design style. A series is not available for purchase as a single product. In ONIX, a series is a type of collection. cf set.

Set

Finite number of products published simultaneously or over a definite period of time, with a shared identity such as a ‘set title’. The products are usually of similar product form, and share a distinctive branding or design style. The products in the set may be available individually, or the set may be a single product, or both. In ONIX, a set is a type of collection. cf series.

SGML

Standard Generalized Markup Language. Highly complex technical standard for markup. Effectively the predecessor of XML, but rarely used because of its complexity.

Sheet-fed press

See web press.

Short-run printing

Uses similar technology to POD to manufacture small numbers of copies (a print run of perhaps 10 up to 200 copies) in response to a publisher order. These copies are then warehoused and distributed in a conventional manner (though warehousing for such small numbers of copies may be at the printer, rather than at a dedicated distributor’s or wholesaler’s warehouse). See also ASR.

Shrinkwrap

Thin plastic film used for packaging, which contracts tight around the packed goods when exposed to heat. Single copies of high-value books can be shrink-wrapped to protect them until they are sold, or entire pallets of cartons can be wrapped to maintain their stability and integrity during distribution.

Side stitched

See saddle stiched.

Signature

A number of pages (usually a multiple of eight) printed on a single sheet and then folded and trimmed to form a section of a book. Signatures are gathered in the correct order and bound to form the book block. See also imposition.

Skid

See pallet.

SKOS

Simple Knowledge Organization System, a way of structuring and representing controlled vocabularies such as ONIX codelists, subject classification and categorization schemes, taxonomies, etc. Using SKOS, each concept (such as a single entry in an ONIX codelist or a single Thema subject) has an optional (language-independent) notation, a preferred label (per language), alternative labels (per language) and a variety of notes (per language), and can be related in various ways to other concepts (eg semantically broader than, narrower than, related to).

SKU

Stock Keeping Unit. In logistics, a unique (and often proprietary) identifier for each product available. In the book trade, the ISBN is sometimes used as an SKU. But often – for example where a single ISBN is reprinted or reissued – an internal stock control process needs to use more granular identification than is provided by the external product identifier (the ISBN). A book distributor might supplement the ISBN with an impression, lot or batch number to ensure older stock is sold before newer.

SLA

Service Level Agreement, the agreed quality of service (often quoted in terms of time to react, time to complete a task, acceptable technical standards etc) to be provided by a service department or an external partner.

Slip-case

Sleeve constructed of rigid board into which the book slides, leaving the spine exposed.

Social DRM

See watermarking, DRM.

Solus

Alone, apart from others of its type. So a ‘solus review’ which concentrates on a single book, or a solus advertisement, placed away from other adverts (or at least away from others offering similar products, cf classified advertising).

SOR

See sale or return.

Sort

Arrange into alphabetical or numerical order.

In typesetting, a special symbol (as opposed to a normal alphabetic or numeric character), a ‘dingbat’.

Special sale

Business-to-business sale where the terms and conditions of sale differ from the norm – for example, for a product where sale-or-return terms are normal, a firm sale (non-returnable) is a special sale. The buyer usually pays a lower price, of course.

Spine

Bound edge or ‘back’ of a bound book, squared off or slightly rounded.

Spot color

Specific colored ink used for printing, in contrast to simulating that color using process color inks and halftoning.

Spread

Pair of facing pages in a book.

SQL

Structured Query Language, a programming language for querying a relational database.

sRGB

Standard RGB, the colorspace that Windows uses by default for RGB images. See also Adobe RGB, DCI-P3.

SRP

See RRP.

SSCC

Serial Shipping Container Code, an 18-digit number used to identify logistics units such as containers, pallets and shipping cartons (parcels) in the supply chain. The SSCC is often printed as a GS1-128 barcode.

STEM

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics curriculum topics and publishing sectors.

Stemming

Reducing inflected or derived words to their word stem, base or root form. Search engines use stemming to improve the search results, ensuring that searches for ‘fishes’, ‘fishing’, ‘fished’, ‘fisher’, and possibly ‘fisherman’, all match ‘fish’. Occasionally termed ‘lemmatization’.

STM, STML

Scientific, Technical, Medical (and Legal) publishing sectors.

Stock

Number of copies of books in a warehouse, or held at a retailer, available for distribution or for sale (eg ‘free stock’).

The grade or type of paper or card used for printing (eg ‘cover stock’).

Strict on-sale date

Also known as a sales embargo date (this is the preferred term within ONIX), ‘on-sale date’ or ‘laydown date’ – see the <PublishingDate> composite in Group P.20, and note that ONIX does not distinguish between a strict on-sale date backed by legal force (eg an affidavit) and one that is not (eg backed only by an industry code of conduct). Where the publisher wishes to exercise close control over the earliest retail availability of a product, this is the earliest date that a consumer may obtain a copy of a product – though advance orders (pre-orders) may be placed prior to the embargo date, and advance orders fulfilled by mail-order may be dispatched one day prior to expiry of the embargo. cf publication date.

Stream, streaming

Download and play or display audio, video or e‑book data in real time, without the recipient storing the data permanently as a file.

Strippable

See sale or return

Language

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

For ONIX and book metadata in general the language of the book’s text is typically the as the language of the intended audience. Another way to put it is the text, the language of reader and the language that a retailer will market in and to are all the same. Language instruction book are solved by using the language of the intended audience as the metadata’s language of the text supported by a Subject providing the language being taught. So long as the language of text is the same as the language the retailer sells to, using the intended audience is recommended. For other exceptions like genuinely bi-or-multilingual books designed for multiple language markets please consult the Language section of EDItEUR’s Best Practices for guidance.

ONIX supports language attributes in many tags to support marketing to readers in different languages but this has no bearing on the Language of Text entry. While one use case is support a multilingual text with metadata in each language a common Canadian need might be to provide an English language description for a book otherwise intended for a French audience. This might be offered to facilitate the book's use by English speakers or its use in French immersion classes. Use of attributes means the metadata translation is a distinct entry running in parallel the French entry allowing for retailers to display it appropriately.

Latin‑1

Also known as ISO 8859‑1. One of a range of standard 8‑bit encoded character setsintended for use with various European languages – Latin‑1 is designed for a wide range of west European languages, and includes the common characters A–Z, a–z, 0–9 and basic punctuation, plus some fancy symbols (eg §, ¶, ¿, × and ÷ symbols) and extra and ‘accented’ characters like ð, ø, ß, and á, ç, ê, ñ, ü. It omits curly quotes, en- and em-dashes and some other fancy punctuation (see Windows‑1252), and many Latin characters and diacritics used only by central and east European languages. It is a superset of ASCII, and a subset of Unicode. Related character sets Latin‑2 to Latin‑10 are optimized for other Latin-script languages: Latin‑2 contains the necessary characters for most central European languages, Latin‑5 is for Turkish, Latin‑8 is for Celtic languages such as Welsh, Gaelic and Breton, and Latin‑9 (also termed ISO 8859‑15) is an improved version of Latin‑1 that additionally includes the Euro sign (€) and a handful of letters (Œ, Š, Ž plus their lower case equivalents, and Ÿ) while omitting common fractions and the international currency symbol ¤. Further ISO 8859 character sets combine basic Latin characters and symbols with Cyrillic, with monotonic Greek, with Hebrew and with basic Arabic characters.

Latin‑9

See Latin‑1.

Laydown

See sales embargo date. In printing, is occasionally used to mean Imposition.

LC

US Library of Congress.

LCC

Library of Congress Classification, book subject classification used in some libraries. See also DDC, UDC, CLC, LCSH.

Linked Content Coalition, a consortium of standards bodies and identifier registries that aims to – over time – increase interoperability between metadata, rights information and identifier standards across multiple media sectors.

LCSH

Library of Congress Subject Headings, book subject classification used in some libraries, and distinct from LCC.

Lead time

Expected time taken from order to delivery, for example of a POD product.

Lead title, Key title

Publisher’s frontlist titles for any particular month or season that are expected to sell the most copies or become bestsellers, which are given significant advertising and promotion support (A&P). cf midlist.

Leaf

Single thickness of paper, forming two pages of a book (one verso, one recto).

Learning object

See LOM.

Legal deposit

Legal requirement and administrative process whereby publishers lodge a copy – sometimes multiple copies – of every publication with a national library or with other repositories. Exact requirements vary from country to country, and increasingly apply to digital as well as physical publications.

Leveling

Measurement or assessment of the complexity of text, or the reading ability required for comprehension.

Libel

Publication of a defamatory or untrue statement about a person, organization etc that will harm their reputation, or tend to make them the target of ridicule, scorn, dislike or contempt. cf slander, which is the oral equivalent.

Library supplier

Wholesaler which specializes in supplying library and sometimes school customers. Library suppliers (jobbers, in North America) usually provide selection or bundling of suitable products and cataloging services and in addition to normal wholesale fulfillment, and even offer services such as rebinding.

License

Legal permission to make use of some intellectual property. A rightsholder may license another party (a licensee) to do something that would – without the license – be an infringement of copyright. With the license, the licensee is also a rightsholder (though most likely with narrower rights), and may in some cases be able to sub-license rights to a third party.

Ligature

In typesetting, special precomposed glyph representing two (occasionally, three) letters. In Latin-based typesetting, the combinations æ, ff, fi, fl, ij and a handful of others are common (depending on the fonts available, the difference between ff and ff may not be apparent, but the former is a single Unicode glyph, not a pair of characters). In Arabic typesetting, there are many common ligatures, as characters change shape according to the surrounding letters and their position in a word.

Limp-bound

See case-bound.

Line art

See halftone.

Linked data

Approach that expresses structured data as collections of subject–predicate–object ‘triples’. So for example ISNI:0000000121479135—‘is author of’—ISBN:9780007232833 is a triple. Additionally, linked data identifies the subject entities, predicates and many object entities using URIs – so http://isni.org/isni/0000000121479135 could be used as the subject of a linked data triple. Linked data triples can be expressed and exchanged in RDF JSON-LD or other formats, or stored in a specialized database called a ‘triple store’. Linked open data (LOD) is linked data published under an ‘open’ license, and the Semantic web is a collection of highly interlinked machine-readable Linked open data resources on the internet that allows data to be shared and widely reused.

List

Informally, the books a publisher or imprint has available in print, or are soon to be published. Within a large publisher, there are usually separate lists for different types of book. See also backlist and frontlist. cf imprint.

List price

The retail price for the product set by the publisher. See RRP, FRP.

Literal

A typographical error or ‘typo’ – an error in typeset text.

Literary agent

Person or organisation representing creators such as authors, negotiating and licensing their rights to publishers and others in return for a share of the licensing revenue.

Litho, offset litho

Traditional high-volume lithographic printing technology using oil-based inks and oleophobic printing plates with oleophilic patterns to pick up the ink and transfer it to the paper. cf POD.

LMS

Library Management System, integrated software application to support the functioning of a library, including acquisition, cataloging and access. Also ILS, Integrated Library System.

Learning Management System, integrated application to support administration, delivery, tracking and reporting of digital educational resources or of complete courses. See also VLE.

Locale

The set of location or culturally-specific patterns and conventions used for display of numbers, prices, time and date formats, etc, sometimes also encompassing language and script preferences, and sort order. ONIX generally aims to ensure data (other than textual descriptions) is communicated in a locale-independent way, leaving the details of locale-specific use or display of the data to the eventual recipient. The Common Local Data Repository (CLDR) is a useful central source of information about specific locales.

LOD

Linked Open Data, see Linked data, Semantic web

LOM

Learning Object Metadata, a metadata scheme for describing educational resources, used within most LMSs. Learning objects are self-contained collections of instructional or explanatory content, together with practice activities and assessment. The LOM model describes the subject, educational objective, interaction model, any prerequisites and the technology requirements of a learning object.

Long grain

Pages printed and bound where the spine of the book lies parallel to the ‘grain’, the preferred orientation of fibres, in the paper. This means a stronger binding because folds aligned with the grain break fewer fibres in the paper. cf cross grain, where the spine is aligned across the grain of the paper.

Loose leaf

Publication which is supplied unbound, as individual sheets or leaves. These are usually punched to fit in a binder (often the type with openable metal rings) which makes replacing updated (or ‘canceled’) pages simple.

Lossy, lossless

See compression.

Lower case

See case.

LPI

See halftone.

M

Manifestation

The physical or digital embodiment of a particular work. The related hardback, paperback and e‑book products are different manifestations of the same work. All contain essentially identical content. Note that a manifestation encompasses multiple individual copies (or instances) of a book, which are identical (or very nearly so). Manifestations may be identified with ISBNs. See <indecs> and FRBR.

MARC

Machine Readable Cataloging, a family of metadata formats used in library cataloging. MARC21, the latest version in use in North America and the UK, is closely tied to the AACR2 cataloging rules. UNIMARC and many minor national variations are common elsewhere. MARC has been in use for nearly 50 years, and has been updated many times to cope with developments in cataloging practices (see AACR2 and RDA), but it is likely to be replaced by more modern data formats over the next decade.

Market

A geographical area within which commercial arrangements for distributing and selling a product are consistent – usually with a single exclusive distributor and single availability date across the market.

Markup

Labels, delimiters or tags within a document that define its structure or meaning. In XMLand HTML, markup tags are placed between < and > symbols. Tags are often paired to indicate the beginning and end of a particular data element within the document, so top-level heading text in HTML is contained between <H1> and </H1> tags. Markup can be described as semantic or presentational, but in practice is usually a mixture of both.

Marrakesh Treaty

International agreement signed in 2013 providing for an exception to copyright to facilitate the creation of accessible versions of books and other copyrighted works for print-impaired readers. It also allows for cross-border supply of these accessible versions via trusted intermediaries, independent of the territorial rights arrangements for the works.

Mass market

General non-specialist (adult) consumer market. Also, a paperback product aimed at this broad-based market, often a rack-size or A-format size.

Measure

In typesetting, the width of a column of type.

Media type

Formerly MIME type, the descriptor for file formats used in many internet applications. For example, an HTML file may have the media type ‘text/html’ and a zipped ONIX file should be ‘application/xml+zip’.

Message

See ONIX message.

Metadata

Strictly, data about other data. More usefully in the context of the book and e‑book supply chain, metadata can be thought of as all the data used to describe and trade products through the supply chain. This encompasses both simple, structured and factual information like titles, author names, distribution arrangements and prices, and richer, more complex descriptive data, classifications of various types and even parts of the book itself (a table of contents can be seen also as valuable descriptive metadata). ONIX messages are a method of communicating this highly structured and standardized metadata from one party to another within the supply chain. Some organizations might also consider internal workflow information to be part of the product’s metadata.

Midlist

Frontlist titles not expected to become bestsellers, and thus not attracting the marketing and promotional effort that publishers afford to lead titles.

MIME type

Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension type. See media type.

ML

Markup language, see HTML, SGML, MathML.

Machine learning, computer algorithms that build and use mathematical or statistical models based on pre-existing ‘training’ data to classify or make decisions about new data, often seen as one facet of AI.

Mono, monochrome

Printed using a single ink (usually black). Note this can include halftone images, not just text and line illustrations.

Monograph

Publication that’s complete in one part or volume (or occasionally, in a small number of separate volumes). Individual stand-alone books – or occasionally, sets of books – are monographs. Sometimes also implies a detailed scholarly work. cf a serial publication such as an academic journal or magazine.

Moral rights

See copyright.

MP3

MPEG Audio Layer-III, standard for compressed audio files. cf AAC. See also codec.

MS

Manuscript, the author’s original version of the text. Occasionally ‘TS’ for Typescript.

Multi-component, multi-item

A single product may contain multiple parts – components – that are intended to be sold together, for example a book bundled with a toy or a slipcase containing three volumes. In contrast, a multi-item product contains several other products and is intended to be split before resale. Multi-item products such as a box containing a dozen copies of an individual book are often available only to the trade.

N

Namespace

A naming system, or collection of all the possible unique names or identifiers for a particular type of entity. For example, the ISBN namespace consists of all possible 13-digit numbers between 9780000000000 and 9799999999999 (minus those numbers that begin 9790, and those which the check digit indicates are invalid). The ONIX namespace is the complete list of XML tags that could be used in an ONIX message. In XML, namespaces are themselves often given URI-style names, so http://ns.editeur.org/onix/3.0/reference is the name of the ONIX 3.0 reference namespace. Note that there is no web page at that address – it is merely an unambiguous way of naming the namespace.

NBN

National Bibliography Number, an identifier assigned to a book or other document by a national library. Unlike the ISBN, there is no international standard – every library uses its own proprietary format, and NBNs are rarely used outside the library context.

Neighboring rights

See publishing rights.

Net Book Agreement

Former agreement administered by the UK Publishers Association which prevented sale of books at below the publisher’s list price. The NBA was abandoned in 1995, allowing retailers to compete by selling below the list or recommended retail price. But there are laws and similar agreements in other countries that fix the retail price or limit retailers’ ability to sell at a discount, eg the Lang Law in France. See FRP.

Net price

Generally, a price after tax, trade discounts and other adjustments are made – in effect, a business-to-business or wholesale price. See RRP.

NFC

Near-field communication, a set of communication protocols used to communicate over very short distances (a few centimetres) with mobile phones, ‘contactless’ payment cards, biometric passports etc, and closely related to older RFID standards.

In Unicode, see Normalization.

NIP

New in Paperback – a paperback version of a book previously published in hardback.

In binding, to catch paper between rollers to sharpen a fold, or to expel air between sheets.

Non-exclusive rights

See Sales rights composite in Group P.21, though non-exclusivity could apply to other types of rights, for example distribution rights.

Normalization

In a relational database, the strategy of designing data tables and relationships between tables to ensure each chunk of data is stored only once, so that it can be managed efficiently and consistently. However, database designs can sometimes be judiciously denormalized to improve performance, if data management is not such a priority.

In Unicode, the normalization form (NFC, NFD, NFKC or NFKD) concerns whether composite characters like é or the ff ligature are decomposed into two separate characters, the e and ´ (acute accent) or f plus f, or kept as a single precomposed character.

In XML and HTML, ‘whitespace normalization’ means that combinations of multiple space, tab, return and newline characters are treated as if they were a single space character.

NYP

Not yet published: publication is forthcoming. cf AB.

O

OA

See open access.

OCLC

Online Computer Library Center, US-based global library cooperative offering services such as cooperative cataloging, technology services and research.

OFC, OBC

Outside front cover (cover 1), Outside back cover (cover 4).

Offset fee

Fee paid by one publisher to another for use of typesetting, film or printing plates and occasionally of data files, in the manufacture of a book, entirely separate from any licensing or rights to the intellectual property content.

ONIX for Books

Online Information eXchange, a standardized framework for communication of rich bibliographic and product metadata between computer systems within the book and e‑book supply chains. Originated under the aegis of the Association of American Publishers in 1999 and first published in January 2000, the standard is now managed, developed and supported by EDItEUR.

onix@groups.io

e‑mail mailing list and support forum for general questions about ONIX. Subscribe by sending a blank e-mail to onix+subscribe@groups.io

ONIX message

A complete ONIX data file, generally one in a series of messages passed between a data provider and a data recipient. A single message may contain one or many Product records.

On-sale date

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA Amendment

See Sales embargo date.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

Ontology

In information science, a formally-defined set of entities and their properties and relationships needed to model a domain or area of interest. See taxonomy.

OP

See out of print.

OPAC

Online Public Access Catalog, bibliographic database of a library’s holdings, accessible either online or via terminals within the library.

OPDS

Open Publication Distribution System, a simple data format for distributing catalogs of electronic publications, and usually containing only basic Dublin Core metadata.

Open access

Licensed on ‘open’ terms, for example under a Creative Commons license, which typically mean that a work or published product can be read, used and re-distributed freely – free of charge, and free of at least some of the usual copyright restrictions. The particular license chosen may still require attribution, prevent the distribution of derivative works, or impose other restrictions. More often associated with serials such as academic journals, but some academic publishers produce open access monographs (ie books). Open access material is usually made available via a digital archive maintained by the publisher (so-called ‘Gold’ OA), or an an archive maintained by the author, the research institution or an independent ‘open access repository’ (collectively, ‘Green’ OA). Gold OA material is almost always made available under a highly permissive license, whereas Green OA may be free of charge but remain subject to many or even all the usual copyright restrictions.

Open access publisher

Publisher which specializes in making its products available on open access terms. The publisher charges the author a fee – often termed an APC (article processing charge) or BPC (book processing charge) – to cover the cost of editorial work, peer review, production and distribution, and these fees are usually paid from the author’s research grants. Note that although the product is free of charge to the reader, reputable open access publishers impose the same editorial controls, academic review processes and quality standards as conventional publishers.

Open source (software)

Computer software whose source code is available under an ‘open’ license allowing anyone to use, modify and distribute the code without most of the usual copyrightrestrictions. See for example Apache v2 licenses.

Open standard

Broadly, standards that are publicly available and often implementable without charge, and which are developed and maintained through a transparent decision-making process open to a broad range of stakeholders.

OPS

Out of print, Substitute. An answer code meaning the product is OP, but the publisher suggests another equivalent or updated product (eg a second edition may be marked as OPS when the third edition becomes available).

ORCID

Open Researcher and Contributor ID, a unique identifier used for academic and scholarly contributors somewhat similar to ISNI, but requiring only self-registration instead of assignment through an ISNI registration agency.

Order-to-cash

High-level business process, or the IT system (often an ERP) responsible for the processes of accepting orders, dispatching goods, generating invoices, and receiving payments. Sometimes OTC, O2C, Purchase-to-pay, PTP or P2P.

Organization of data delivery

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA ADDITION

ONIX data files are sent from a ‘sender’ to a ‘recipient’ – for example from a publisher to a retailer. One data file, or ‘message’, may contain information about many products, and may form part of a sequence or ‘feed’ of ONIX messages.

There is a separate – and entirely optional – Acknowledgement message which may be returned from recipient to sender, to confirm receipt and processing of the data. Use of the Acknowledgement message should be agreed between parties involved in a message exchange.

A single ONIX data file or ‘message’ includes a snapshot of the sender’s data about a range of products at the moment the message was created – and that snapshot can be transferred into the recipient’s system. But within the sender’s in-house systems, that data is subject to change. For example, as a forthcoming product approaches publication, more comprehensive bibliographic data becomes available, and previously collected data is corrected or refined. Thus exchanges of ONIX data are better thought of as ‘data feeds’ consisting of an ongoing sequence of messages – either a series of complete snapshots of the entire set of data, or (more likely) a series of changes between one snapshot and the next.

Refer to the ONIX for Books Best Practice Guide for more information.

Orphan

In typesetting, a single word or excessively short line that appears at the end of a paragraph. Alternatively, a section heading or the first line of a paragraph, or a partial or short line of text (eg the last line of a paragraph), which occurs at the bottom of a column or page. Typesetters and designers try to avoid all three types of orphan. See also widow.

Orphan work

A work protected by copyright or other rights, but where the presumed rightsholders are unknown or cannot be contacted (perhaps because the work is out of commerce). Such orphans are problematic, because uncertainty about the rightsholders and the expiry of their rights means they cannot be exploited.

Out of commerce

Out of print and no new stock is available in the supply chain (though used copies may be available). May apply to a particular product (which implies that other manifestations of the same work may still be in commerce), or may be applied to a work (which implies nomanifestations of the work are in commerce).

Out of copyright

Work on which copyright (and other IP rights) have expired. After expiry, the work passes into the public domain.

Out of print

A publisher may declare a product out of print (or OP) to indicate it (or its primary distributor) will no longer accept orders. This usually also means copies sold to retailers on a sale or return basis are no longer returnable (or may be returnable only for a short period after the product is declared OP). However, out of print does not mean ‘unavailable’, as there may still be many copies in the supply chain. See also in print, out of commerce. Out of print can also be applied to a work rather than an individual product, which implies all manifestations of a work are out of print.

OWP

Open Web Platform, term used to describe the combination of HTML, CSS and JavaScriptused to create web pages and web-based applications, and EPUB e‑books.

P

Packager

Agency contracted by the publisher to produce a book, usually including text creation, editing, design and illustration but not manufacturing of the final product.

P&A

Price and availability. Not to be confused with A&P, advertising and promotion.

Page count

See extent.

Page proof

Paginated but unbound proof copy for final checking, indexing etc prior to printing and publication. cf galley proof, bound proof.

Pagination

The process or result of dividing the text into individual pages. See also extent.

Pallet

Wooden packing base on which books (or more typically, cartons of books) or other goods are stacked, stored and transported in bulk. A pallet or skid is typically around 1 × 1.2m (the most common size in the UK), is designed to be handled using a pallet-jack or forklift truck, and can carry up to about 1000 typical hardback novels or 2500 paperbacks (depending on their extent), or a tonne or more of paper sheets. Common Euro and US ‘standard’ pallets differ in size – 1 × 0.8m and 48 × 40in respectively. In many Asian countries, 1.1m square is the most common size. Euro pallets are convenient because they fit through doors even when laden, but they waste more space than US and UK sizes when packed in a standard shipping container.

Pamphlet

Small booklet with few pages, often self-covered (no separate cover), and usually bound with a simple wire stitch.

Pantone

The Pantone Matching System (PMS) is a proprietary colorspace used to specify colors of print and ink, paint, plastic, dye and fabric. Only a subset of named Pantone colors can be printed accurately using CMYK four-color printing. Other Pantone colors are printed using special inks.

Paper weight

The weight (or more strictly, the mass) of a particular grade of paper, usually measured in gsm (grams per square metre of a single sheet). Handily, an A0 sheet is 1 square metre, and so are 16 sheets of A4. Typical book paper lies in the range of 60–100gsm. In North America, paper weight may instead be expressed in terms of the Basis weight, the weight in pounds of a Ream (500 sheets) sized 25 × 38 inches. Typical book paper lies in the range of 40–70lb basis weight (approximately equivalent to 60–100gsm). For some types of paper and board, a different basis size is used – eg 20 × 26 inches for cover board, so 230gsm cover board is 85lb basis weight (and this is sometimes written 85#). See https://www.papersizes.org/us-international-weights.htm for basis weight to gsm conversion tables. See also bulk.

Parser

In XML, a parser is software that can read an XML document (such as an ONIX message), check that it matches the required XML syntax and grammar (by comparing it with a DTD or schema file), and make each individual data element available to other software (via an API).

Partwork

Publication released in several weekly or monthly installments, which may be bound together to form a complete book.

Party

Generalized term for a person or organization involved in a creative activity. See also persona.

PDA

See DDA.

PDF

Portable Document Format, standard file format for electronic documents (including e‑books), originally devised by Adobe as a simplification of PostScript, but now an ISOstandard. A PDF file can encapsulate almost every aspect of the document – the text, fonts, all vector and raster graphics and even limited interactivity. In general, a PDF fixes the visual aspects of the document exactly and PDF is often used to transfer publisher files to the printer for manufacturing, but reflowing PDFs are possible. Unfortunately, PDFs do not retain structural or semantic markup, which reduces its accessibility. So-called ‘web PDFs’ are normal PDFs (generally not reflowable) but which may have lower quality images (fewer pixels or more loosely, lower resolution, than PDFs intended for printing) to limit the file size.

PEFC

See FSC.

Perfect binding

See adhesive binding.

Period

Punctuation mark (‘ . ’) also called a full stop, used at the end of a a sentence, as a decimal point in a real number, or after an abbreviation. Not to be confused with a mid-dot (‘ · ’) or comma (‘ , ’) which can also be used as decimal points in different locales. XML data uses only the period as a decimal point within real numbers, even if that data is then displayed using the appropriate separator for the locale.

Permissions

Authorization from the copyright or other rightsholder to incorporate one work, or more often a part of a work, within another – for example the permission to include a copyright image or to quote a passage of text from one book in another. See also rights.

Persona

The public-facing outward identity of a party – usually of a person, though a persona may be pseudonymic, or otherwise distinct from the private identity of a real-world person. See also ISNI, contributor.

Pilcrow

Typographic symbol ‘ ¶ ’ usually indicating ‘paragraph’ (or sometimes in technical contexts, the Return character at the end of a paragraph).

Pinakes

The first recorded bibliographic database, developed by Callimachus to catalog the papyri holdings of the Library of Alexandria around 245 BCE.

Pixel

See raster image.

Plate section

Pages bound into a book containing primarily halftoned illustrations (often photographs), usually printed on higher quality paper than the remainder of the book block. Plate sections – sometimes also termed Inserts – usually lack page numbers. cf integrated book.

PLC

Printed laminated case, a decorative variation of a plain paper over boards hardback. The printed design on the cover boards is usually varnished or laminated, as PLCs often lack a separate jacket.

PLR

Public lending right, the right of an author to be compensated for the loan of books from libraries – and in the UK, the system used to provide the related payments.

PNG

Portable network graphics, a losslessly-compressed raster image file format. While mostly intended as an improvement over GIF (a relatively low-quality image format) for online use, PNG can carry high-quality RGB images, including transparency, color profiles etc – but it does not support CMYK. As a result, its use in publishing workflows is limited. See also TIFF, JPEG.

Pocket book

Small book, usually a paperback. Just how small varies from publisher to publisher and country to country. (In the UK, a pocketbook is a small blank notebook, often spiral bound, and the term ‘pocket book’ is not used – it is roughly synonymous with A-formatpaperback.)

POD

Print on demand, the manufacture of a single copy – often using xerographic (dry, toner-based) or ink-jet printing – in response to a customer order. POD copies may be drop-shipped to the retail customer, or fulfilled via a retailer. POD has a largely undeserved reputation for inferior print quality and binding: current POD technology rivals the quality of conventional litho manufacturing. cf short-run printing. See also ASR.

Point

Traditional primarily American and British typographic unit of size, abbreviated as pt. Historically, slightly less than 1⁄72nd of an inch (or about 0.3515mm). The use of points in PostScript has made exactly 1⁄72 (0.3527mm) the de facto standard, and spread the use of points to other typographic traditions. The main text in a printed document is usually around 9–12pt. See also em. cf didot, similar measurement unit widespread in European typography at least until the 1980s, around 0.375mm (ie about 7% larger than a traditional point).

Portrait

See landscape.

POS

Point of Sale, or Point of Service – ultimately, the retailer’s till or checkout. In the US, Point of Purchase.

Promotional material such as posters, dumpbins, bookmarks placed at or for sale at the retailer’s till or checkout.

Post-coordination

See pre-coordination.

PostScript

Computer programming language devised by Adobe, used by early laser printers and by typesetting machines to describe page images, now mostly superseded by PDF.

PPI

Pixels per inch, an unsatisfactory measure of resolution of a digital image. It relates the number of pixels in a digital image to the physical size of the image when printed or displayed.

Pre-coordination

Method of classification where multiple concepts are combined to form single subject headings or codes carrying a complex meaning. All allowed combinations are enumerated in advance. The opposite is Post-coordination, where multiple simple subject headings are used, and the complex combined meaning emerges from the combination of subject headings or codes. Post-coordination allows creative combination of the subject headings. As an example, BISAC is pre-coordinated: a children’s sports story featuring baseball would be classified as JUV032010. In contrast, Thema is at least in part post-coordinated: the same book would be classified as YFR (Children’s sporting stories) plus YNWD3 (baseball), and the full meaning emerges from the combination of the two codes.

Prelims

See front matter.

Pre-order

Consumer order placed with a retailer in advance of actual availability of the product, for delivery on (or at least close to) the publication date.

Presentational markup

See semantic markup.

Print-impaired readers

Readers with visual, physical or cognitive impairments who cannot use conventional printed or on-screen books, for example blind, partially-sighted or dyslexic readers, or readers with a physical disability. Print-impairment is a range of issues rather than a single problem, but print-impaired readers can often make use of various types of assistive technology and accessible editions. In many countries – in particular, those that have ratified the Marrakesh Treaty – print-impaired readers have a copyright exception that allows copying and modification of copyright material to make it accessible for personal use.

Print run

Number of copies printed in a single impression. Historically, this was an edition, and this sense is still used in book collecting (‘a valuable first edition’).

Process color

Color printing in which CMYK inks and halftoning are used to simulate the full range of color. Note that cyan, magenta, yellow and black is not the only possible combination of process colors – though rare, a six-color process with additional orange and green inks can widen the range of colors that can be simulated faithfully (the color gamut). cf mono, spot color.

Product

A particular manifestation of a work that is available for sale to the public (or to an organization, on a business-to-business basis). Although ONIX is often characterized as describing products, it can be used to describe parts of a product that are not individually available, or components that are used during creation of products. However, such parts and components should not be identified using an ISBN, unless they are also products in their own right.

Product record

The complete collection of metadata relating to a single product, provided within an ONIX message. A Product record is contained between <Product> and </Product> XML tags.

rele

Status
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A text value or code created by an organization and exclusively used to promote or communicate their products. i.e. discount codes, identifiers, etc.

Provenance

In metadata, the origin of an assertion or metadata property – for example, who says that the book is about motorcycle maintenance? The provenance is important when metadata sources conflict.

Publication date

Status
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The date on which the product is nominally ‘published’, though not necessarily the date on which it first becomes available at retail. See Publishing date composite in Group P.20.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

Public domain

Works in which all copyright, neighboring and related rights have expired, or those where such rights never pertained. Note that works covered by Creative Commons and similar open access licenses are not public domain, though for particular ‘licenses’ such as the CC0 (‘CC Zero’) waiver, the net effect may be somewhat similar.

Publisher

The organization responsible for making the product available, and generally the one taking the financial risk. cf distributor, contributor and imprint. The publisher is a legal entity, whereas the imprint is merely a brand name.

Publisher collection

Status
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A bibliographic collection to which the publisher assigns a collective identity, either on the products themselves, or in product information for which it is responsible (again, Penguin Modern Classics is a clear example).

See collection.

Publishing rights

The rights to publish or commercially exploit a work in various ways, obtained by the publisher from the author, creator or other rightsholder, and ultimately derived from the creator’s copyright. The publishing rights obtained by a publisher may be exclusive, global and perpetual, or non-exclusive, limited geographically or for a limited period, and may cover all languages or a specific language. In the English-language publishing market, it is common for a British-based publisher to obtain exclusive world (or world English language) rights from an author, but then sublicense exclusive North American rights to a US-based publisher (or vice versa). Such a sublicense may include additional non-exclusive rights to countries where both UK and US publishers compete to sell their own separate versions of the work. Alternatively, the author may license the North American and remaining rights separately to two different publishers, or a single publisher may obtain the rights to publish globally. A publisher may also sublicense subsidiary and neighboring rights (translation, abridgement, serialization, audio etc) it does not wish to exploit directly. cf sales rights.

Pulping

Destruction of unsold copies of a book to remove them from the supply chain. This ultimately involves shredding and recycling of the paper mass to make new paper, but there may be stages prior to recycling that involve defacing or otherwise making copies of the book unsaleable.

Q

QR code

Quick Response code, a type of 2D barcode comprising a grid of black and white squares. When scanned (eg with a smartphone), QR codes can trigger actions (go to a URL, send an SMS text message, add contact details to an address book, display text), and some actions have attendant security risks. There is no standard use within the book trade, but they are often used in consumer advertising to avoid the need to type long URIs.

Qualifier

Subject code used within schemes such as BIC and Thema that can only be used to refine the meaning of another code.

Quarter-bound

High-quality binding in which the spine (only) is bound in leather (or other fine and durable material). cf half-bound, full-bound.

Quotation marks

Typographic symbols (eg ‘ ’ or “ ”) used in pairs around quotations, reported speech or to highlight a word or phrase. Different languages use different quotation marks, even within the same writing system, and conventions for single or double quotes vary too (eg English uses ‘…’, German uses „…‟, French uses « … », Japanese uses 「…」).

R

Rack size

Size of mass-market paperback common in the US, 6¾ × 4¼ inches (or 171mm × 108mm), occasionally slightly taller. A ‘tall rack size’ is around 7½ × 4¼ ins. See also A-format.

Rag book

Children’s book in which the cover and every leaf are fabric rather than paper, card or board. Also termed a ‘Cloth book’.

RAM

Random Access Memory, the working memory of a computer, usually in the range of 1 gigabyte (roughly a billion bytes, in a smartphone) to 64 gigabytes (in a server). The contents of RAM are usually lost when the computer is switched off. Contrast with the more or less permanent storage attached to a computer, which is also measured in gigabytes.

Raster image

A digital image represented as rows and columns of colored dots (pixels – picture elements). TIFFs and JPEGs are raster image formats. Raster images cannot be scaled without losing visual clarity – if displayed too large, curves become jagged and the image pixels become individually visible. cf vector image.

RDA

Resource Description and Access. Modern set of library cataloging rules – increasingly widely used and gradually supplanting AACR2 in most English language library applications. RDA rules are also applicable to cataloguing in other languages.

RDBMS

See relational database.

RDF

Resource Description Framework, a set of W3C specifications (‘Recommendations’) for representation of metadata about resources (typically web resources) as sets of ‘triples’, three-part statements expressing relationships between entities. RDF triple data can be expressed as XML, or in a variety of other data formats (eg Turtle or JSON‑LD, and is the foundation of the ‘semantic web’. RDFa is a data format for embedding RDF-style structured data within the markup of HTML web pages, and is one of the data formats used by schema.org.

Reading age

Measure of a child’s reading proficiency or the proficiency required to read a text, expressed as the age of a child of average reading ability.

Real number

Number that contains both a whole number part and a fractional part, representing a quantity that can vary continuously rather than in discrete increments. Can be expressed as a vulgar or mixed fraction (eg 5⁄4 or 1¼) or as a decimal (1.25), though only the latter can be used in an XML data element. (More strictly, in mathematics, these are rational numbers. Real numbers also include irrational numbers, which cannot be represented exactly by fractions.) cf integer.

Recommended retail price

Often just RRP, or occasionally termed a Suggested retail price, or SRP. Price chosen and recommended by the publisher for sales to the consumer. The retailer does not haveto use this price, and may choose to sell the product for a lower (or higher) price – the Actual selling price or ASP. But royalties paid to the contributors of the book are often based on a percentage of the RRP, even though the Actual selling price is different. In some countries, retail prices set by publishers are fixed: by law, retailers may not reduce (or increase) the Fixed retail price, or may do so only within a fairly narrow band or only after a certain time has elapsed since publication. In countries where RRPs are the norm, the Agency model may also allow publishers to exert direct control over consumer prices.

Recto

The side of a single leaf in a book that is read first – usually the right hand page in a book, which is given an odd page number. (Conceptually at least, a recto page is a left page in Arabic, Hebrew, or in traditional Chinese and Japanese, where page progression is right-to-left.) The opposite is a Verso page, the second side of a leaf, or left hand page (in most languages and writing systems), with an even page number.

Red Book

The standard covering the physical, optical and electronic nature of all Compact Discs, and for recording high-quality (44.1kHz, stereo, 16‑bit linear PCM) digital audio on such discs. cf Yellow Book.

Region

Status
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Internationally recognized codes of letters and/or numbers to countries and their subdivisions, based on ISO 3166. See ONIX code list 49.

Registration agency

See registration authority. 

Registration authority

Organization ultimately responsible for managing an identifier standard, its governance, and registrations or assignments, for example the International ISBN Agency which is responsible for the ISBN system on a global basis. A registration authority may delegate the process of registration or assignment to multiple Registration agencies, perhaps on a geographical or sectoral basis. For example, Nielsen in the UK and Bowker in the US operate national ISBN registration agencies. (This terminology mostly applies to ISOidentifier standards.)

Reissue

As for reprint, but with refreshed marketing collateral, a new cover etc. Reissue sometimes implies renewed availability after a period where the product has been unavailable. Reissues continue to carry the same ISBN as earlier impressions – and in contrast, using a new ISBN means it is a new product, not a reissue of the original, even if it carries identical content and has an identical product form etc.

Relational database

Metadata is often managed using a relational database, in which the data is stored in one or more tables. Each table has rows representing entities such as products or contributors, and the table columns are the properties of each entity. Tables are related to each other, usually through sharing a single column in common, and the relationships usually mirror the real-world relationships between the entities. The tables are usually normalized (designed to minimize redundancy) – so an author who has written a dozen books has their name stored once, forming a row in a Contributor table, and data in that row can be linked to the many rows in the Books table as required. Most relational database management systems (RDBMSs) or applications have library software for importing and exporting XML. See also SQL.

Release Date

Status
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See Expected availability date in Group P.20.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

Remainders

Excess stock of books disposed of by the publisher or distributor at a low price to a specialist bookseller (who cannot return them). An alternative to destruction of excess unsold copies, for example by pulping.

Rental

In e‑books, a limited-term (temporary) license, where a ‘purchase’ is a perpetual license. cf subscription.

Repertoire

In text encoding, the range of characters used in a document, or present in a particular character set.

In rights, may refer to the works of a particular creator or rightsholder, or those offered by a righsholder for licensing under particular terms.

Reprint

[Print] a new impression, usually manufactured to replenish stock. Copies are essentially identical to the previous batch or impression, though may incorporate minor changes to correct errors, and they carry the same ISBN as previous impressions. Note that if the changes represent significant alterations to the content, then the new copies are a distinct edition – in ONIX terms a new product (and indeed a new work) which would also have a new ISBN (and a new ISTC).

Reseller model

Business model based on the idea that the publisher sells to an intermediary (typically a distributor, wholesaler or retailer) based on an established retail price (RRP or FRP) minus a trade discount (the discount may vary from intermediary to intermediary), or via an established business-to-business or wholesale price. The intermediary can subsequently sell on the book to the consumer at whatever price they choose. Alternatively, in some legal frameworks, the retailer must sell to the consumer at the fixed retail price. In either case, it is the wholesaler or retailer that is the publisher’s direct customer, and not the consumer. This is the most common business model in the book trade; cf the alternative agency model.

Resolution

The process of resolving an identifier to retrieve its underlying metadata, or to find the entity itself. For some ‘actionable’ identifiers such as the ISBN-A, this resolution process can be via the internet, in the same way a DNS name may be resolved to an IP address.

The degree of detail captured in an image (or more generally, degree of precision in a measurement). Image resolution is usually expressed in dots per inch (DPI) or per centimetre (occasionally it’s pixels per inch, PPI). Note that resolution applies to an image in the physical world, not to the underlying pixel data which can be reproduced at any size (see notes on image resolution in Group P.16).

Return

See returns.

Carriage return, character typed to indicate a new paragraph or confirm entry of data.

Returns

Books sold to retailers on ‘sale or return’ terms, and which fail to sell at retail, can be returned to the wholesaler or distributor for credit. Returned copies can be re-sold to another retailer, or may be pulped. Some publishers allow low-value books to be destroyed by the retailer rather than physically returned (eg by stripping off the cover, which is then returned as proof of destruction). Publishers clearly aim to discourage over-ordering and minimise the consequent returns from retailers, but the trade as a whole benefits from ensuring bookstores are full of potentially-saleable books rather than full of books known to be unsaleaable. Thus, a certain level of returns is anticipated, and the credit on returns frees retailers to order new books that are more likely to sell.

Reversion

Return to the creator of rights previously licensed by the creator to a publisher, for example at the end of a contractually-set term or under other agreed circumstances. Reversions are often requested if a publisher fails to keep a work in print. Similarly, sublicensed rights can revert to the licensor.

Review copy

Copy sent (free of charge) to the press or other media for the purposes of review. See ARC.

See approval copy.

RFID

Radio frequency identification, technology used to communicate with tiny electronic tags that can be attached to physical items such as books. The tags contain identification and other information for the item, which can be read at a short distance to track the item and automate many logistics processes. For example RFID tags can be used to automate library lending processes.

RGB

Red, Green, Blue – basic additive color model used (eg) on a computer screen to generate (or at least simulate) the full range (or gamut) of visible colors. See sRGB, Adobe RGB, CMYK, color profile.

Rights

General term covering copyright, moral rights and other intellectual property rights, plus contractual rights such as the right to distribute or sell products. So-called ‘Volume rights’ give the publisher the right to publish and sell products based on (manifestations of) a copyright work, and are sometimes divided by language and geographical territory (eg ‘the publisher holds Commonwealth English language rights’). Subsidiary rights or ‘sub-rights’ – usually attached to the volume rights, but often sublicensed by the volume rights holder to another publisher – include the right to create and publish serializations for newspapers or magazines, abridgements, adaptations as a play or movie, and (assuming the underlying volume rights are not limited by language) translations. Distribution rights are contractual rights conferred by the publisher on a distributor, enabling the distributor to trade a product in a particular market. See also permissions, publishing rights, sales rights.

Rightsholder

Party which holds copyright or some related rights in a work.

RNG

RELAX NG schema language. See schema.

Rough front

See deckle edge.

Royal

Common UK hardback book size typically around 234 × 153mm. See also demy, trade paperback.

Royalties

Payments made by the publisher to authors or other contributors, in return for the right to publish and sell the book. Royalties are usually calculated based on the number of copies sold and a percentage of the list price of the book – though sums are often paid in advance, and minor contributors may only receive a fixed fee.

RRP

See recommended retail price.

Ruby

Small gloss or annotation added to characters in non-alphabetic scripts such as Japanese Kanji or Chinese Hànzì, used to guide pronunciation of unfamiliar characters or provide phonetic information for sorting purposes. Ruby glosses are written using phonetic characters such as Pinyin for Chinese or Hiragana for Japanese. See Person name in Group P.7.9, though ruby glosses can be incorporated into any textual data element in ONIX. In HTML, the <ruby> tag can be used to specify glosses. Ruby glosses are so named in English because they were supposedly typeset in Ruby size (5½pt) type.

S

Saddle stitched

Binding by stapling (wire stitching) folded sheets together in the seam of the fold. The clinch of the staple lies in the centre of the book. cf side stitched, where a wire stitch is driven through the folded sheets from front to back (the clinch of the staple lies at the back of the book).

Sale or return

Transaction terms where goods are sold (eg from a distributor or wholesaler to a retailer) and the purchaser retains the right to return them for full credit if not sold at retail. Sometimes called ‘see-safe’ terms. The purchaser’s right to return unsold copies may expire when – or a fixed period after – a book is declared out of print by the publisher. In some cases, goods need not be physically returned to claim a credit – the cover can be torn off and returned instead (such books are ‘strippable’ and carry a triangular indicator containing a letter S adjacent to the barcode), or the products can be defaced or destroyed in some trusted process to prevent resale. In contrast, ‘Firm sale’ terms mean the product is sold and is not returnable for credit at all, and ‘Consignment’ terms mean the product is still owned by the upstream distributor or wholesaler even though it is physically stocked by the retailer (the retailer ‘buys’ it only after selling it on to a consumer).

Occasionally, sale or return terms (more strictly, consignment terms) are applied to products supplied to end-purchasers, and the purchaser pays only after deciding to keep the goods. See approval copy.

Sales embargo date

Status
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See Publishing date composite in Group P.20.

See On-sale date.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

Sales rights

The commercial rights derived from the publisher’s publishing rights that a publisher confers on its distributors, wholesalers and retailers, allowing them to trade in and make the product available to customers. Note the contrast with publishing rights: publishing rights concern where a publisher has the right to publish and sell a product. The sales rights are where the publisher chooses to make the product available (ie chooses to exercise those publishing rights). Clearly the sales rights must be a subset of (or the same as) the publishing rights. In ONIX, only the sales rights are described in detail, and the publishing rights themselves are not made explicit (at least in part because the publishing rights pertain to the work, not the product). In ONIX, the <SalesRights> composites list the set of countries and regions where the publisher is exercising its rights to make a product available. A <ProductSupply> composite and its enclosed <Market> composites can detail the subset of countries and regions where those rights are conferred upon a particular set of distributors, wholesalers and retailers. Another market might have a different subset of the sales rights conferred upon a different group of suppliers. When broken down by market, these are often termed Distribution rights.

Sales tax

Tax levied as a percentage of retail sales to the consumer or end user. cf VAT, which is levied incrementally at all points in the supply chain. Sales taxes are levied by most US states and some Canadian provinces, with rates varying typically in the 0–7.5% range, and additional sales taxes may be levied by city and local government. Since the total retail price – inclusive of tax – varies according to the exact location of the retail sale, advertised prices in those countries do not include the sales tax element, and tax is added at the checkout.

SAN

Standard Address Number, American national standard identifier for a trading location within the supply chain. The SAN registry is administered by Bowker. In Germany, the Börsenverein administers the similar Verkehrsnummer. In contrast to the GLN, the SAN is unique to the publishing industry, but is well established in book-related e-commerce in North America and parts of Europe to identify distribution locations, customer delivery addresses etc.

Schema

Like a DTD, an XML schema formally defines the set of markup tags that may be used in a particular type of XML document, whether each tag is mandatory or optional, and their order and nesting. But unlike a DTD, a schema also constrains the data types and values that may be used within the data elements in the document. It can require that a particular tag contains an integer, or a date, or set a limit on the length of text. And an XML schema can define lists of allowed values (‘enumerations’, controlled vocabularies, or in ONIX terminology, codelists) that can be used in a particular data element. Two primary ‘flavors’ of ONIX for Books schemas are available, using the XSD and RNG schema languages, both of which are themselves XML documents. (Technically, the DTD is a very simple kind of schema too, though DTDs are not themselves XML documents and they cannot define required data types or enumerations.) The normal or ‘classic’ ONIX XSD is based around XSD 1.0. A ‘strict’ XSD 1.1 is also available, which checks a further range of data types, business rules and other requirements, although it not compatible with all XML validation scenarios. A further schema language flavor, Schematron, can be used independently or in conjunction with an XSD schema. A range of Schematron-based rules are embedded within the ONIX ‘strict’ XSD to provide optional warnings covering the use of deprecated data elements and codes.

A database schema is a formal definition of the structure of a database, specifying the nature of the columns, tables, relationships and so on in the database.

Schema Validation

Status
colour Purple title BOOKNET CANADA AMENDMENT

See Schema.

See Validation.

Schema.org

Initiative by the major search engines – specifically by Google, Bing, Yahoo and Yandex – that encourages addition of structured metadata into HTML web page markup using a JSON‑LD, Microdata or RDFa vocabulary, largely for SEO purposes.

Schematron

An alternative type of XML schema language. Schematron is rule-based, and is able to test conformance with a wider range of document constraints and business rules than XSD or RNG schemas. Over and above the pass/fail capability of validation with an XSD 1.1, Schematron validation can also deliver warnings about the data.

Script

A writing system of conventional symbols representing the elements of language. A script can be alphabetic, like Latin or Cyrillic, or logographic like Kanji or Hanzi. Scripts can be linked to particular languages (eg Hangul to Korean), or used for a variety of languages (eg Latin to a host of European languages, and also to Chinese via phonetic Hanyu pinyin). A handful of languages are commonly written in more than one script (eg Serbian in either Cyrillic or Latin), or have changed their script at some point in recent history (eg Turkish, Vietnamese are written using Latin script).

Scroll

Printed or manuscript content arranged as a continuous document, not divided into discrete pages. cf codex.

Section mark

Typographic symbol ‘ § ’ usually indicating a section or clause in a document.

Self-publisher

Person combining the roles of contributor and publisher.

Sell-in

Sales to retailers – the number of copies entering the sales channel. In the book trade, most of these copies are typically sold on sale or return terms, so sell-in is not a final sales total. cf sell-through.

Sell-through

Sales to consumers. In principle, over the long term, sell-through equals sell-in minus returns – though over a shorter period, this can be masked by changes in the number of copies held in stock by retailers. Sell-through is sometimes expressed as a percentage of sell-in (eg a sell-through of 85% implies a 15% return rate). See also EST.

Semantic markup

Markup tags that define or at least highlight the meaning or nature of the tagged text, rather than specifying how it should be presented. In contrast, presentational markupdefines only how the text should be displayed on page or screen. As a simple example, HTML includes <i>, a purely presentational tag that indicates text should be displayed in italics. In contrast, the <em> and <cite> tags have the same typographic effect on the appearance, but have extra semantic value – they indicate why the text should be italicized (for emphasis, or because it is a title citation).

Semantic web

See linked data.

SEO

Search engine optimization, the process of enhancing the visibility of your web pages in organic search results, by adding cross-links, keywords and structured metadata about the web page within the web page itself (see schema.org and RDFa), or using terms in the content that are frequently searched for.

Sequence

Status
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A distinct data feed.

See Organization of data delivery.

Serial

Ongoing publication issued under the same title in a succession of discrete parts, often at regular intervals, such as a magazine, academic journal, newspaper or regularly-issued directory or annual report. Issues are usually dated or numbered sequentially, and are usually purchased via a subscription rather than by purchase of individual issues. Just as monographic publications are identified with an ISBN, serial publications are identified with an ISSN.

Series

Continuing and indefinite sequence of monographic products published separately over a period of time, with a shared identity such as a ‘series title’. The products are usually of similar product form, and share a distinctive branding or design style. A series is not available for purchase as a single product. In ONIX, a series is a type of collection. cf set.

Set

Finite number of products published simultaneously or over a definite period of time, with a shared identity such as a ‘set title’. The products are usually of similar product form, and share a distinctive branding or design style. The products in the set may be available individually, or the set may be a single product, or both. In ONIX, a set is a type of collection. cf series.

SGML

Standard Generalized Markup Language. Highly complex technical standard for markup. Effectively the predecessor of XML, but rarely used because of its complexity.

Sheet-fed press

See web press.

Short-run printing

Uses similar technology to POD to manufacture small numbers of copies (a print run of perhaps 10 up to 200 copies) in response to a publisher order. These copies are then warehoused and distributed in a conventional manner (though warehousing for such small numbers of copies may be at the printer, rather than at a dedicated distributor’s or wholesaler’s warehouse). See also ASR.

Shrinkwrap

Thin plastic film used for packaging, which contracts tight around the packed goods when exposed to heat. Single copies of high-value books can be shrink-wrapped to protect them until they are sold, or entire pallets of cartons can be wrapped to maintain their stability and integrity during distribution.

Side stitched

See saddle stiched.

Signature

A number of pages (usually a multiple of eight) printed on a single sheet and then folded and trimmed to form a section of a book. Signatures are gathered in the correct order and bound to form the book block. See also imposition.

Skid

See pallet.

SKOS

Simple Knowledge Organization System, a way of structuring and representing controlled vocabularies such as ONIX codelists, subject classification and categorization schemes, taxonomies, etc. Using SKOS, each concept (such as a single entry in an ONIX codelist or a single Thema subject) has an optional (language-independent) notation, a preferred label (per language), alternative labels (per language) and a variety of notes (per language), and can be related in various ways to other concepts (eg semantically broader than, narrower than, related to).

SKU

Stock Keeping Unit. In logistics, a unique (and often proprietary) identifier for each product available. In the book trade, the ISBN is sometimes used as an SKU. But often – for example where a single ISBN is reprinted or reissued – an internal stock control process needs to use more granular identification than is provided by the external product identifier (the ISBN). A book distributor might supplement the ISBN with an impression, lot or batch number to ensure older stock is sold before newer.

SLA

Service Level Agreement, the agreed quality of service (often quoted in terms of time to react, time to complete a task, acceptable technical standards etc) to be provided by a service department or an external partner.

Slip-case

Sleeve constructed of rigid board into which the book slides, leaving the spine exposed.

Social DRM

See watermarking, DRM.

Solus

Alone, apart from others of its type. So a ‘solus review’ which concentrates on a single book, or a solus advertisement, placed away from other adverts (or at least away from others offering similar products, cf classified advertising).

SOR

See sale or return.

Sort

Arrange into alphabetical or numerical order.

In typesetting, a special symbol (as opposed to a normal alphabetic or numeric character), a ‘dingbat’.

Special sale

Business-to-business sale where the terms and conditions of sale differ from the norm – for example, for a product where sale-or-return terms are normal, a firm sale (non-returnable) is a special sale. The buyer usually pays a lower price, of course.

Spine

Bound edge or ‘back’ of a bound book, squared off or slightly rounded.

Spot color

Specific colored ink used for printing, in contrast to simulating that color using process color inks and halftoning.

Spread

Pair of facing pages in a book.

SQL

Structured Query Language, a programming language for querying a relational database.

sRGB

Standard RGB, the colorspace that Windows uses by default for RGB images. See also Adobe RGB, DCI-P3.

SRP

See RRP.

SSCC

Serial Shipping Container Code, an 18-digit number used to identify logistics units such as containers, pallets and shipping cartons (parcels) in the supply chain. The SSCC is often printed as a GS1-128 barcode.

STEM

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics curriculum topics and publishing sectors.

Stemming

Reducing inflected or derived words to their word stem, base or root form. Search engines use stemming to improve the search results, ensuring that searches for ‘fishes’, ‘fishing’, ‘fished’, ‘fisher’, and possibly ‘fisherman’, all match ‘fish’. Occasionally termed ‘lemmatization’.

STM, STML

Scientific, Technical, Medical (and Legal) publishing sectors.

Stock

Number of copies of books in a warehouse, or held at a retailer, available for distribution or for sale (eg ‘free stock’).

The grade or type of paper or card used for printing (eg ‘cover stock’).

Strict on-sale date

Status
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Also known as a sales embargo date (this is the preferred term within ONIX), ‘on-sale date’ or ‘laydown date’ – see the <PublishingDate> composite in Group P.20, and note that ONIX does not distinguish between a strict on-sale date backed by legal force (eg an affidavit) and one that is not (eg backed only by an industry code of conduct). Where the publisher wishes to exercise close control over the earliest retail availability of a product, this is the earliest date that a consumer may obtain a copy of a product – though advance orders (pre-orders) may be placed prior to the embargo date, and advance orders fulfilled by mail-order may be dispatched one day prior to expiry of the embargo. cf publication date.

For Canadian market context, refer to the BookNet Canada documentation on Date Recommendations for Canadian Publishers.

Stream, streaming

Download and play or display audio, video or e‑book data in real time, without the recipient storing the data permanently as a file.

Strippable

See sale or return.

Sub-collection

Status
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A collection that is retailed as a single product. This definition includes what are traditionally considered to be sets, but also covers multi-packs and other multiple-item retail products, since in ONIX 3.0 they are all handled in the same way. Trade packs, designed to be broken up so that the contents can be retailed singly, are not multiple-item retail products1 . For ONIX purposes, the following are all multiple-item products: a complete set of Proust’s A la Recherche du Temps Perdu; all the Harry Potter novels packaged together with items of ‘memorabilia’ in a box; a classroom set of 25 copies of a coursebook together with a teacher text and DVD; a two volume dictionary; a book and toy. In Spain and Latin-America, and possibly elsewhere, however, it is common practice for collections of a fixed number of items that are not retailed as a single product to be identified and described as multiple-item products.

A group of any two or more items within a bibliographic collection to which an additional, subsidiary, identity is ascribed which is also part of the bibliographic description of each member (eg in A History of Western Europe, Part II: The Dark Ages, Volume I: After Rome, the complete History of Western Europe is a bibliographic collection, and the volumes in Part II: The Dark Ages are a sub-collection).

See collection.

Sub-rights

Subsidiary rights, or a sublicensed fraction of the volume rights.

...

Prepayment of a regular (eg monthly or annual) fee for access to an online resource such as a journal, journal collection or an online library of e‑books for a specific period. Access to the journal or e‑book library ends if the subscription is canceled (in principle at least – some e-journal subscriptions can include limited ‘post-cancellation access’). Note that some so-called B2C ‘subscription’ models are structured more like ordinary B2B salesbetween publisher or distributor and the subscription library operator, but operate as subscriptions between the subscription library operator and the consumer. For books, subscription has features in common with rental, but subscription usually applies to a library of many e‑books, whereas rental usually applies to a single book, and subscription is open-ended whereas rental tends to be for a fixed period.

Subscription orders

Retailer orders placed with a wholesaler or distributor several weeks prior to publication date – see also dues.

Subsidiary rights

See rights.

Superior, Inferior

Also termed superscript, subscript. Characters printed smaller and higher or lower than normal characters on a line.

Superscript

See superior. For books, subscription has features in common with rental, but subscription usually applies to a library of many e‑books, whereas rental usually applies to a single book, and subscription is open-ended whereas rental tends to be for a fixed period.

Subscription orders

Retailer orders placed with a wholesaler or distributor several weeks prior to publication date – see also dues.

Subsidiary rights

See rights.

Superior, Inferior

Also termed superscript, subscript. Characters printed smaller and higher or lower than normal characters on a line.

Superscript

See superior.

Supplier 

Status
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The company who supplies the book to Retailers (not consumers) – so the name of the company who has been assigned by the publisher a market area (usually on a exclusive basis) and they supply retailers within that market.  While that's makes the most sense in a print world supporting warehouses, EDI and distribution, it's no less true for digital books.  The difference in the digital world is that it's common that the publisher = supplier and the market area is the "WORLD".

Supplier role

Status
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See supplier.

Supply chain

A network – not necessarily a linear chain – of organizations and processes involved in creating and delivering a product or service from the initial producer to the end user. In principle, the supply chain begins with the author and ends with the reader, via publishers, typesetters, printers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers etc. The supply chain encompasses the flow of both goods such as physical or digital books, and informationsuch as metadata, orders and invoices, between the supply chain partner organizations. This is a operational management concept that encourages focus on process optimization, logistics and customer satisfaction, cf value chain, a closely-related business management term.

...

A new(ish) subject categorization scheme developed in part from the legacy BIC scheme, but updated, internationalized and significantly extended to create a multi-lingual scheme with global applicability. It differs from BIC in that it makes greater use of post-coordination, and has a mechanism for national extensions to qualifiers within the scheme. An interactive category browser is available at ns.editeur.org/thema. Like ONIX, Thema is managed by EDItEUR. Thema was introduced in late 2013, and is currently in the early stages of implementation in many countries. It was initially intended to be used in parallel with existing nationally-focused schemes, but with the potential to supplant them as a single global scheme. It has already been adopted widely across the book trade in a number of countries, including Germany, Spain, the UK, Norway and Sweden, and has become a key part of Amazon’s ‘browse by subject’ scheme in its European stores.

...

Trade discount

See discount.

Trade pack

Status
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Designed to be broken up so that the contents can be retailed singly, are not multiple-item retail products, though they are described in a similar way, using Product Part elements (refer to page 36 here).

See multi-component, multi-item.

Trade paperback

In the UK, a paperback produced in a size more typical of hardbacks (see demy, royal); in the US, a paperback that’s usually larger than rack-size mass-market paperbacks (but not as large as a typical hardcover book).

...

Zipped and Gzipped data files are compressed to be smaller than the original data files, making them easier or quicker to send to a recipient. They can be decompressed (unzipped, gunzipped) by the recipient to recover the exact original data. The compression algorithm is the same, but Gzip is used for single files, whereas zip may be used on entire folders of files. Note that zipping or gzipping doesn’t greatly reduce the size of files that are already compressed, such as JPEGs or MP3s.