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              *  ATTRIBUTE SET BIB-1 (Z39.50-1995):   *
              *             SEMANTICS                 *
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                           September 1995

Modified October 1997 to change the definition of Use attribute Documet
identifier (1032). 
      -     Old Definition: A persistent identifier, or Doc-ID, assigned by a
            server, that uniquely identifies a document on that server. 
      -     New Definition: An identifier or Doc-ID, assigned by a server, that
            uniquely identifies a document on that server. May or may not be
            persistent. May be, for example, a URL.




1.  ABOUT THIS DOCUMENT

This document provides suggested interpretations for the semantics of the
bib-1 Attribute Set.

This document represents consensus among the members of the Z39.50
Implementors Group.  It will be maintained as an official document of
the Z39.50 Maintenance Agency, and will be revised periodically to
reflect the most pragmatic guidelines for interoperability agreed upon
by the Implementors Group.

This document contains references to certain definitions and
behaviors that are specific to the target.  These can be problem
areas for interoperability.  The specific definitions and behaviors
may be described in a "Profile" document.  In the absence of a
profile, one must contact the service provider and ask.  The
behavior may be UNIQUE to that target.  The expectation is that,
over time, more and more will be documented explicitly in the
standard and in profiles.

2.  ATTRIBUTES

The attributes of Attribute Set bib-1 are used to indicate the
characteristics of a search term in a Type-1 query when the query is
of the form AttributeList+term (as described in section 3.7.1 of
Z39.50-1995).  The descriptions in this document apply when all
attributes within 'AttributeList' are from the bib-1 attribute set.
It does not define semantics when bib-1 is mixed with other
attribute sets.

There are six types of attributes:  Use, Relation, Position,
Structure, Truncation, and Completeness.  The Use attribute, if
provided, identifies a set of access points against which the term
is to be matched.  The Relation, Completeness, Truncation and
Position attributes, if provided, specify additional match criteria.
The Structure attribute, if provided, identifies the form in which
the term has been supplied.

Within an attribute list, each attribute type is optional.  However, if
a particular attribute type is not supplied, this document does not
address target behavior -- a given target might supply a default
attribute, dynamically select an appropriate attribute based on the
other attributes supplied, or fail the search because it requires that
the attribute type be supplied.

While Attribute Set bib-1 was originally established for use in the
retrieval of records that are representable using the MARC formats for
information interchange, it can also be used for the retrieval of records
or documents representable in other formats.

Within an attribute list, multiple instances of a given type of
attribute element are undefined and discouraged.  Use of version 3
semantic actions is encouraged.

The remainder of this section describes each of the six attribute
types, in order by the type number:

    Use attributes          (type = 1)
    Relation attributes     (type = 2)
    Position attributes     (type = 3)
    Structure attributes    (type = 4)
    Truncation attributes   (type = 5)
    Completeness attributes (type = 6)