Update module to use File_MARC PEAR module
anarchivist - April 8, 2009 - 14:58
| Project: | MARC |
| Version: | 6.x-1.1 |
| Component: | Code |
| Category: | feature request |
| Priority: | normal |
| Assigned: | aaustin |
| Status: | active |
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Description
I've noticed that the MARC module relies on the now-fairly outdated PHP-MARC library developed as part of the Emilda project. I'd like to request that the module be updated to use the File_MARC PEAR module, which is based on PHP-MARC, but is still maintained and under active development.
#1
The MARC module doesn't even use the PHP-MARC library from Emilda. It uses a method that is unique to the module. The original module was built with the single objective of getting data out of MARC records and importing them as Drupal nodes, with as little effort as possible. Part of this entailed, not requiring any dependencies other than Drupal itself.
But now revisiting this, it makes a lot of sense to use a standard accepted MARC library. I am currently, doing a major rewrite of the module that will focus on turning the module in to a tool to import MARC records and provide an API for other modules to do stuff with the MARC records, such as create nodes. It would make perfect sense to use a standard MARC library along with the API.
#2
I'd be willing to assist with this development - I've been working a lot with File_MARC within Drupal on a module I've written to use the Shrew PHP library to talk to an III web catalog. I'm also looking to (hopefully) take over maintenance of the Z39.50 module, which would rely heavily on parsing MARC records. For what it's worth, File_MARC also has support to parse MARCXML records.