Skip to Main Content
SUNY OLIS logo
 

Alma Resource Management

Working with the Metadata Editor in the Institution and Network Zones. Includes indication and normalization rules.

Diacritics

To add diacritics in the MD Editor:

  • From the Windows Start menu, select All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Character Map.
  • Select a font from the Font drop-down list.
  • Click the special character that you want to insert into the MD Editor.
  • Click Select, and then click Copy.
  • Paste the character in the MD Editor.

 

OCLC Export and Diacritics

If a bib record has bad/corrupted diacritics or special characters upon import into Alma, try changing Character Set to UTF-8 in the OCLC Connexion Client and/or OCLC Record Manager. Then, reimport the bib record into Alma. This should resolve the issue.

To verify and/or change the Character Set in OCLC Connexion Client:

  • In OCLC Connexion Client, go to Tools>Options
  • Click on the Export tab
  • Click on Record Characteristics
  • Verify or change Character Set to UTF-8
  • Click Ok

To verify and/or change the Character Set in OCLC Record Manager:

  • In the Record Manager tab, go to User Preferences>Exporting Bibliographic Records
  • Under the "General" tab select the Format drop-down list
  • Choose MARC 21 with UTF-8 Unicode
  • Click Save

NOTE: There is no UTF-8 configuration available in OCLC Connexion Web version and therefore bad/corrupted characters will result when exporting bib records into Alma that contain diacritics and special characters. OCLC suggests using the OCLC Connexion Client or Record Manager as a solution to diacritics displaying strangely in Alma: .

Fixing Incorrect Diacritics

Here's an example of bad diacritic display in Primo VE:

bad diacritics

This is caused by data in OCLC records, which get exported to Alma, rather than with Primo VE display issues. It could be coming from multiple 245 fields, with one being correct and the other incorrect, or it could be just bad data in general. The best thing to do if you see this is to fix them in OCLC as you see them. This can also happen if you use the online version of Connexion to export instead of the client.

If you make changes to the 245 you wouldn't need to manually export back into the NZ, as our OCLC-Alma NZ job should pick this change up from the OCLC record and update our NZ bib records. However, if feel free to re-export from the Connexion client if you'd like to see the change right away.

Here's a list of updates to OCLC records that will trigger updates to our NZ bib records