[Archivesspace_Users_Group] LCNAF plugin - related agents duplicated

[Custer, Mark D.]

Hi Caitlin,

To answer your question about how other repositories are handling this, I’ll note that at the Smithsonian we decided to override this behavior with a plugin for the time being.  The override ensures that the LCNAF plugin behaves as it would previously, without importing related subjects + agents (since those lack identifiers, when they were imported, due to the single MARC-authority-record approach) and without trying to add additional demographic data, like gender.  The approach is very heavy handed, in that it simply removes the new behavior from the MARC Authority record importer code.

If you can install plugins in your instance of ArchivesSpace and would like any help getting this set up, just let me know.  For the basic approach, though, see https://github.com/Smithsonian/lassb-aspace-overrides/blob/main/backend/plugin_init.rb.  If you add that file + file structure in a plugin (even the ‘local’ plugin would do), then that approach might work for you.

Best,

Mark



From: archivesspace_users_group-bounces at lyralists.lyrasis.org <archivesspace_users_group-bounces at lyralists.lyrasis.org> on behalf of Caitlin Goodman <cgoodma2 at swarthmore.edu>
Date: Tuesday, November 21, 2023 at 2:37 PM
To: Archivesspace_Users_Group at lyralists.lyrasis.org <Archivesspace_Users_Group at lyralists.lyrasis.org>
Subject: [Archivesspace_Users_Group] LCNAF plugin - related agents duplicated
External Email - Exercise Caution
Hi all,

For those using the LCNAF plug-in - We have noticed that when we use the LCNAF plugin to import agent records, in addition to importing the target record, it is also importing related agent/name records (for associated organizations, locations, etc). This is creating a lot of additional records with the source “Unspecified ingest source” that aren’t reconciled against our existing agents.

Some of this is likely due to us running an older version (3.2) without the option to check/uncheck "Import Related Subjects" but even testing it in the ASpace sandbox (3.4.1) with the box unchecked it's bringing over 510s without any merging/reconciliation against existing agents.

Here's the "map" part of the converter code<https://github.com/archivesspace/archivesspace/blob/master/backend/app/converters/lib/marcxml_auth_agent_base_map.rb> in anyone can better interpret what's going on.

How are other repositories handling this? Have you come up with workflows to reconcile, dedupe, and update records in ArchivesSpace?

We think it would be best to add an optional checkbox, like the one added for subjects, e.g. "Import Related Name Authority Records?" to skip over these if desired. If you agree, please add a comment to our ticket: https://archivesspace.atlassian.net/browse/ANW-1857

Thank you!
Caitlin


Caitlin Goodman (she/her)
Archivist, Friends Historical Library
Swarthmore College
610-690-3349
cgoodma2 at swarthmore.edu<mailto:cgoodma2 at swarthmore.edu>
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