University of Chicago Catalog

What is BIBFRAME?

Share Virtual Discovery Environment in Linked Data is a platform which allows the browsing of library collections using linked data. The Share-VDE data is structured in an extended version of the BIBFRAME data model. The main BIBFRAME-based entities that can be explored on the Share-VDE entity discovery portal are:

  • Agents (persons, families, organizations and conferences)
    • These are the actors that create original works or contribute to publications — e.g. “Jules Verne”
  • Original works
    • These are clusters of publications — e.g. “Around the world in 80 days”, which would be an original work. On this page would be listed all the versions in various languages and editions of the original work.
  • Publications
    • These are specific versions of Original Works. E.g. “Around the world in 80 days, Paperback, French, 2017 by Publisher X”
  • Items
    • These are copies of Publications, representing a specific, physical item held in a library

If you are interested in further details or wish to participate to the project please refer to the About Share-VDE and Contact sections.

To read more about BIBFRAME in general, feel free to take a look at the BIBFRAME pages on Library of Congress or Wikipedia.