Proper Use of Work Identifiers in Webform

Owned by Lauren Stewart
Dec 14, 2023
2 min read

In metadata, as defined by EDItEUR and used in the ONIX standard, the typical case is:

  • An ONIX record represents a single ISBN and both represent a single saleable product.

  • Another way to say that might be an ISBN is an order number that can be used to get a specific format of a book – and an ONIX record exists to describes that specific orderable object.

Most books are published in multiple formats – paperback, hardcover, digital as epub file, digital as audiobook file.   Each of these, represents the same “content” – they are created from the same source manuscript and are for all practical purposes the “same book” but each has it’s own ONIX record describing the specifics of each – say the size differences between hard and paperback, the duration of the audio book and so on – while sharing a great deal of other information.

ONIX records are very repetitious and all those records would share some basic bibliographic information.

A “Work identifier” is a ‘match value’ inserted into that group of “same content” product records to enable them to be grouped together.  The ONIX records can be grouped by isolating their shared “work identifier.”

It would be ideal if some outside agency – like ISBN – assigned work identifiers but publishers have not agreed to that so each individual publisher chooses what they use and there are two typical solutions:

  1. A “proprietary” value is chosen by the publisher – that just means some unique value that acts as the “match code”.  Note that a code should look like a code – repeating the book title is a poor choice.  Normally no spaces, short as practical – and it just needs to be used consistently across the records that need to be grouped.   USE “01 – Proprietary” as the Work Identifier code

  2. The ISBN first book published is sometimes used. Traditionally that’s the hardcover but these days more likely the paperback but so long as all the book records (including the source book) share the same ISBN it can work.  USE “15 - ISBN-13” as the Work Identifier code. 

FAQ:

  • If it seems confusing to use a specific product’s ISBN as a group’s work identifier – you’re right.  It’s easy to get confused doing this and new staff tend to assume that it’s just a “match the product” value.  In general, a “proprietary” value is a better choice – but it relies on that value being available and used correctly.  Either can work if used consistently – choose the one that makes the most sense for your workflow & business.

  • The Related Product section – the section of an ONIX record where you can supply a different product’s ISBN with a code to explain its relationship to the ONIX Record’s product and ISBN – can fulfil a similar purpose:

    • Related Product code “06” Alternate Format – can also be used to list the all the “other format” (same content, different format) ISBNs.

    • Webform offers a limited number of “slots” for Related Product so using the Work Identifier can help free ups space for other needs.