SIST ISO 5127:2018
Information and documentation -- Vocabulary
Information and documentation -- Vocabulary
This document provides a concept system and general vocabulary for the field of documentation within
the whole information field. It has been created with a balanced representation of major work areas in
mind: documentation, libraries, archives, media, museums, records management, conservation as well
as legal aspects of documentation. The scope of the vocabulary provided in this document corresponds
to that of ISO/TC 46: standardization of practices relating to libraries, documentation and information
centres, publishing, archives, records management, museum documentation, indexing and abstracting
services, and information science.
Information et documentation -- Vocabulaire
Informatika in dokumentacija - Slovar
Ta dokument podaja konceptni sistem in splošni slovar za področje dokumentacije v
celotnem informacijskem polju. Ustvarjen je bil z upoštevanjem uravnotežene zastopanosti večjih delovnih področij:
dokumentacije, knjižnic, arhivov, medijev, muzejev, evidenc, hramb in pravnih vidikov dokumentacije. Področje uporabe slovarja, določeno v tem dokumentu, ustreza področju uporabe standarda ISO/TC 46: Standardizacija praks v zvezi s knjižnicami, dokumentacijskimi in informacijskimi središči, založništvom, arhivi, vodenjem evidenc, muzejsko dokumentacijo, storitvami indeksiranja in povzemanja ter informatiko.
General Information
Standards Content (Sample)
INTERNATIONAL ISO
STANDARD 5127
Second edition
2017-05
Information and documentation —
Foundation and vocabulary
Information et documentation — Fondations et vocabulaire
Reference number
ISO 5127:2017(E)
©
ISO 2017
---------------------- Page: 1 ----------------------
ISO 5127:2017(E)
COPYRIGHT PROTECTED DOCUMENT
© ISO 2017, Published in Switzerland
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, or posting on the internet or an intranet, without prior
written permission. Permission can be requested from either ISO at the address below or ISO’s member body in the country of
the requester.
ISO copyright office
Ch. de Blandonnet 8 • CP 401
CH-1214 Vernier, Geneva, Switzerland
Tel. +41 22 749 01 11
Fax +41 22 749 09 47
copyright@iso.org
www.iso.org
ii © ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 2 ----------------------
ISO 5127:2017(E)
Contents
Foreword . v
Introduction . vi
1 Scope . 1
2 Normative references . 1
3 Terms and definitions . 1
3.1 Basic and framework concepts . 1
3.1.1 Basic concepts . 1
3.1.2 Framework concepts . 11
3.1.3 Evaluation and statistics . 15
3.1.4 Signs, characters and symbols . 16
3.1.5 Language and terminology . 19
3.1.6 Writing systems and transcription . 27
3.1.7 Types of relations . 30
3.1.8 Communication and information. 33
3.1.9 Digital communication . 37
3.1.10 Types of data . 41
3.1.11 Basic operations on data . 47
3.1.12 Digital data processing . 51
3.1.13 Data representation in databases. 57
3.2 Basic concepts for information and documentation . 62
3.2.1 General concepts . 62
3.2.2 Study fields related to documentation . 69
3.2.3 Institutions in documentation . 71
3.2.4 Professions and functions in documentation . 77
bering systems, identifiers, connectors . 79
3.2.5 Num
3.3 Objects, data media, documents . 84
3.3.1 Object and document values . 84
3.3.2 Objects and data media . 85
3.3.3 Documents by medium . 90
3.3.4 Processes in the intellectual production of documents . 95
3.3.5 Physical production of documents . 98
3.4 Documents . 105
3.4.1 General concepts . 105
3.4.2 Derived documents . 114
3.4.3 Documents by acquisition status . 115
3.4.4 Records, legal and archival documents . 115
3.4.5 Special types of documents . 118
3.4.6 Documents by originator and intended purpose . 130
3.4.7 Documents by main feature . 132
3.5 Tertiary documents . 144
3.5.1 General concepts . 144
3.5.2 Catalogues and archival registers . 149
3.5.3 Documents and parts of documents reflecting archival registering . 152
3.5.4 Documents and parts of documents reflecting content analysis and content
description . 153
3.5.5 Reference works . 154
3.5.6 Services to obtain documents . 156
3.5.7 Parts of documents used in the bibliographic description . 157
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ISO 5127:2017(E)
3.5.8 Intellectual parts of documents . 158
3.5.9 Physical parts of documents . 166
3.6 Holdings of information and documentation organizations . 175
3.6.1 Types of collections . 175
3.6.2 Collection planning, development and acquisition . 178
3.6.3 Archival sets of documents . 181
3.6.4 Institutions . 187
3.6.5 Archival operations and archival collection management . 196
3.7 Analysis, representation and content description of documents and data . 198
3.7.1 Main elements at the basis of the description . 198
3.7.2 Description and cataloguing . 199
3.7.3 Headings . 205
3.7.4 Titles . 206
3.8 Content analysis and content description . 208
3.8.1 General concepts . 208
3.8.2 Indexing and evaluation of indexing results . 210
3.8.3 Thesauri and terms . 212
3.8.4 Thesauri and their elements . 220
3.8.5 Classifications and their elements . 223
3.8.6 Types of classifications . 226
3.9 Storage . 228
3.9.1 General concepts . 228
3.9.2 Filing and shelving . 229
3.10 Search and retrieval . 231
3.10.1 General concepts . 231
3.10.2 Search methods and elements . 232
3.10.3 Search operations and evaluation of their results . 236
3.11 Use of information and documents . 238
3.11.1 Access to information . 238
3.11.2 Use of information . 242
3.11.3 Infrastructure . 243
3.11.4 Types of use . 247
3.11.5 Services . 248
3.11.6 Administration . 249
3.11.7 Usage studies and performance measures . 251
3.12 Preservation of documents. 254
3.12.1 General concepts . 254
3.12.2 Properties of materials relevant to preservation . 257
3.12.3 Processes involved in the manufacture or conservation of documents . 261
3.12.4 Types of damage to documents . 262
3.12.5 Agents causing damage to documents . 265
3.12.6 Conservation measures . 266
3.13 Legal aspects of information and documentation . 270
3.13.1 General concepts . 270
3.13.2 Literary, artistic and industrial property . 271
3.13.3 Author’s rights . 273
3.13.4 Privacy and data protection . 275
3.13.5 Data protection and security . 276
Annex A (informative) ISO 5127 SKOS Description . 278
English alphabetical index . 303
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
iv
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ISO 5127:2017(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national
standards bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally
carried out through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a
technical committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee.
International organizations, governmental and non‐governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in
the work. ISO collaborates closely with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all
matters of electrotechnical standardization.
The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are
described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular the different approval criteria needed for the
different types of ISO documents should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the
editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives).
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. Details of
any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the Introduction and/or
on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents).
Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not
constitute an endorsement.
For an explanation on the voluntary nature of standards, the meaning of ISO specific terms and
expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about ISO's adherence to the
World Trade Organization (WTO) principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) see the following
URL: www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html
The committee responsible for this document is ISO/TC 46, Information and documentation.
This second edition cancels and replaces the first edition (ISO 5127:2001), which has been technically
revised.
ISO 5127 was previously published as a series of parts (from 1981).
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved v
---------------------- Page: 5 ----------------------
ISO 5127:2017(E)
0 Introduction
0.1 General
This document presents terms and definitions for selected concepts relevant to the field of information
and documentation. It includes a good deal of foundational terms and definitions, also from
international guidelines and reference works by organizations in liaison with ISO/TC 46. Thus, it serves
as a sound basis in the understanding of existing as well as possibly projected information and
documentation systems by systematically presenting well‐established terminology. It is, thus, also
intended as a tool to help in new developments to come, by underpinning scientific research projects
and helping to organize them, through mutual understanding of some of the foundations. And this
document is likewise intended as a handy, quick and comprehensive reference tool also for the newly
inaugurated to the field. Proper attention has therefore been paid to a clear, easy to follow structure of
the document. In its function as a handbook, this document may also be regarded as a legitimate and
improved successor of well‐known reference works like, e.g. the widely disseminated UNESCO
“Terminology of documentation” of 1976 and others (see Bibliography).
This document has 13 main classes. It aims to provide a logical structure in the field of information and
documentation.
The closer coalescence of the diverse professions Archives, Libraries, Museums, Printing and IT, within
documentation, in some parts rests on digitization as the basis of this process. This has also led, to some
degree, to the reformulation of documentation and its processes in terms of IT‐driven concepts and
models. Working with digital objects and systems has by no means diminished the importance of
terminology and terminological precision for and in the subject field. On the contrary, this importance is
underlined even more since the concepts and terms representing the objects need to be even more
precise when, possibly, far‐reaching automatic processing of data takes place. In any case, it is vital to
keep conceptual conformance between the documentation terminology and the IT terminology in this
subject field and to strive for the matching of terms and concepts so that an integrated, overall system
of documentation and its applications remains visible.
0.2 Main contents of this document
This document provides a well‐balanced selection of both abstract and concrete concepts (and their
terms). Documentation and work in the documentation field today are increasingly characterized by the
standard use of abstract models of the information field and of the communication flows in it, also for
the design and optimization of information systems. This type of work requires, substantially refers to,
and rests upon the structuring and exploration of the field by abstract reasoning and models,
incorporated in the respective abstract concepts. This document satisfies the need for such abstract
concepts, but also the equally required provision of a large number of concrete concepts (and terms) for
concrete objects, documents and processes. ISO 5127, in its balanced approach, thus covers main
components that constitute the information field:
abstract general concepts for the nature of information, of systems building, of identifying
concept systems, and of the basic communication features of language (thus also keeping the
bridge to information science, and to other sciences relevant for documentation);
a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse, and apply main
documentation operations (to represent concept systems, for indexing, cataloguing, classifying);
the required consideration of the storage and preservation of documents and of documentation
results, and some legal aspects of documentation;
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
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ISO 5127:2017(E)
a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse, and work with the
institutions in the field;
and, in particular, a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse,
and work with the main “raw material” basis of documentation, the large variety of documents
and components of documents. Vocabulary is provided for the general types of documents and
their main subdivisions, and a number of concepts and their terms for particular special kinds of
documents which are highly relevant but not always encountered in daily mass practice.
Notably, some needs of special collections are addressed here, too. Both documents that are the
result of, or considerably assist in, documentation are in focus, and a number of documents and
their parts whose terminology is needed because these documents constitute important main
objects for making societal documentation and information processes work.
This particular attention to “documents” and their parts concerns old and new ones: both those that are,
and need to be, subject to documentation processes as well as those which are the result of such
processes or serve as guidance in this work.
0.3 Functions of this document
The present‐day situation of documentation and its field is also largely characterized by closer
cooperation and sometimes merging of its individual professional areas and professions like
librarianship, archivistics, text documentation, editing, media documentation, printing, publishing,
sound and visual documents, broadcasting, museology, document conservation and more. ISO 5127 is
intended to serve as a tool for the representation, and mutual understanding, of the specific
terminology in the documentation field and at the same time for the closer cooperation of its different
professional branches, while at the same time respecting the organizational autonomy, traditions and
specific work procedures and related terminology of and between them.
As a terminology standard, among the main functions it serves are the following:
— to be a quick one‐stop shop, a reference pool showing a comprehensive overview of the entirety of
the terminology (terms) and its individual pieces in the field, also for ISO/TC 46 and its field of
work;
— to provide an interrelated conceptual overview, based on the underlying elaborate concept system,
of the field of information and documentation as a whole, thus creating a summary of main
terminology of the field, for the use of ISO/TC 46, related Committees and the entire information
community;
— to facilitate international communication both between countries and within international
organizations, on all matters within the scope of this document; and so, at the same time (both
national and international) between the individual professions and disciplines involved in the
documentation field;
— to be at hand as a reference tool for questions as to individual items in the field and for ensuring the
correct understanding of individual terms as they may be used in different places;
— to act, as a nucleus of validated terminology, as a reference point and for the establishing of
national language versions (translations) of this terminology; so it would assist both in the exact
understanding/interpretation of certain technical terms and in their translation and exchange
between different languages;
— to provide, as much as is in its scope, solid foundational assistance in the teaching of
“documentation”;
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ISO 5127:2017(E)
— to serve as a stock of precisely defined items (concepts) that are at hand when data elements for all
sorts of information and documentation data exchange systems and networks are to be defined,
agreed and machine‐implemented;
— to serve as a vocabulary pool for indexing, abstracting and cataloguing services covering, and active
in, the field of documentation;
— to serve as the source and starting point for creating metadata, also keeping in mind the
developments of linked data;
— to provide a pool, as a starting and reference point, for further and proper formalization of concepts
into directly applicable IT‐conforming entities;
— to as well provide necessary material for future establishing of ontologies of parts of the
documentation field or of the whole field, for more elaborate operation of automated IT processes;
— to maintain the connection to all classification systems that undertake, for any purpose, to classify
and to order the field of documentation; through its own richly cross‐referenced structure, to serve
as a first collection for the possible building of one or more thesauri of the field;
— to assist further study and scientific exploration of the field, and the sciences, of information and
documentation.
In its approach to related concepts and their definitions through generic relations, and to, in a number
of instances, connect entries through “See references” in the “Notes to entry”, ISO 5127 presents a slight
look and feel in the direction of paving the way for a thesaurus application.
0.4 A coherent terminology
In view of the now widespread formation and application of terminology of and for documentation, the
coherent terminology offered in ISO 5127 also provides, to the degree required, information on the
relation of some terms and concepts from this document to those in other ISO standards to maintain
this information and the relation mentioned, for the benefit of the users of ISO 5127. In partially
fulfilling the function of a general overview, net and vocabulary on which the individual standards in
ISO/TC 46 are built, this document may also serve as far as possible, when drafting ISO/TC 46 or other
standards, as a source of good and workable definitions. When such ISO 5127 definitions need to be
tailored to specific further‐reaching applications in individual Committees’ definitions, this can be done
using “Notes to entry”, adaptations and similar means.
As the terminology standard of ISO/TC 46, in addition to providing the basic concept system, ISO 5127
offers a collection of terminology as laid down in various ISO/TC 46 and other ISO standards.
Notwithstanding that, ISO 5127 is, and persists as, a solid corpus of terminology in its own right, being
not just a mere compilation but a proper, interrelated system. As a proper terminology standard
(following the rules from ISO/TC 37), it is built on an underlying concept system, aims at well‐balanced
coverage of the whole field, is arranged in all its Clauses from the general to the specific and in keeping
adjacent, neighbouring, or antonymic terms always close to each other. ISO 5127 also respects the rule
of definitions as short, generic expressions of a concept, the rule to avoid circular definitions, and of
defining concepts whenever possible by referring to their broader concept. Finally, a terminology
standard is more than a dictionary, not least because it does not show the sometimes several meanings
of a term under just one entry word but separates different meanings (concepts) of a word into
different (separate) entries. In real‐life practice, terms representing the concepts of a subject field like
“documentation” are, of course, often also used metaphorica
...
SLOVENSKI STANDARD
SIST ISO 5127:2018
01-februar-2018
Informatika in dokumentacija - Slovar
Information and documentation -- Vocabulary
Information et documentation -- Vocabulaire
Ta slovenski standard je istoveten z: ISO 5127:2017
ICS:
01.040.01 Splošno. Terminologija. Generalities. Terminology.
Standardizacija. Standardization.
Dokumentacija (Slovarji) Documentation
(Vocabularies)
01.140.20 Informacijske vede Information sciences
SIST ISO 5127:2018 en
2003-01.Slovenski inštitut za standardizacijo. Razmnoževanje celote ali delov tega standarda ni dovoljeno.
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SIST ISO 5127:2018
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SIST ISO 5127:2018
INTERNATIONAL ISO
STANDARD 5127
Second edition
2017-05
Information and documentation —
Foundation and vocabulary
Information et documentation — Fondations et vocabulaire
Reference number
ISO 5127:2017(E)
©
ISO 2017
---------------------- Page: 3 ----------------------
SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
COPYRIGHT PROTECTED DOCUMENT
© ISO 2017, Published in Switzerland
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, or posting on the internet or an intranet, without prior
written permission. Permission can be requested from either ISO at the address below or ISO’s member body in the country of
the requester.
ISO copyright office
Ch. de Blandonnet 8 • CP 401
CH-1214 Vernier, Geneva, Switzerland
Tel. +41 22 749 01 11
Fax +41 22 749 09 47
copyright@iso.org
www.iso.org
ii © ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 4 ----------------------
SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
Contents
Foreword . v
Introduction . vi
1 Scope . 1
2 Normative references . 1
3 Terms and definitions . 1
3.1 Basic and framework concepts . 1
3.1.1 Basic concepts . 1
3.1.2 Framework concepts . 11
3.1.3 Evaluation and statistics . 15
3.1.4 Signs, characters and symbols . 16
3.1.5 Language and terminology . 19
3.1.6 Writing systems and transcription . 27
3.1.7 Types of relations . 30
3.1.8 Communication and information. 33
3.1.9 Digital communication . 37
3.1.10 Types of data . 41
3.1.11 Basic operations on data . 47
3.1.12 Digital data processing . 51
3.1.13 Data representation in databases. 57
3.2 Basic concepts for information and documentation . 62
3.2.1 General concepts . 62
3.2.2 Study fields related to documentation . 69
3.2.3 Institutions in documentation . 71
3.2.4 Professions and functions in documentation . 77
bering systems, identifiers, connectors . 79
3.2.5 Num
3.3 Objects, data media, documents . 84
3.3.1 Object and document values . 84
3.3.2 Objects and data media . 85
3.3.3 Documents by medium . 90
3.3.4 Processes in the intellectual production of documents . 95
3.3.5 Physical production of documents . 98
3.4 Documents . 105
3.4.1 General concepts . 105
3.4.2 Derived documents . 114
3.4.3 Documents by acquisition status . 115
3.4.4 Records, legal and archival documents . 115
3.4.5 Special types of documents . 118
3.4.6 Documents by originator and intended purpose . 130
3.4.7 Documents by main feature . 132
3.5 Tertiary documents . 144
3.5.1 General concepts . 144
3.5.2 Catalogues and archival registers . 149
3.5.3 Documents and parts of documents reflecting archival registering . 152
3.5.4 Documents and parts of documents reflecting content analysis and content
description . 153
3.5.5 Reference works . 154
3.5.6 Services to obtain documents . 156
3.5.7 Parts of documents used in the bibliographic description . 157
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved iii
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SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
3.5.8 Intellectual parts of documents . 158
3.5.9 Physical parts of documents . 166
3.6 Holdings of information and documentation organizations . 175
3.6.1 Types of collections . 175
3.6.2 Collection planning, development and acquisition . 178
3.6.3 Archival sets of documents . 181
3.6.4 Institutions . 187
3.6.5 Archival operations and archival collection management . 196
3.7 Analysis, representation and content description of documents and data . 198
3.7.1 Main elements at the basis of the description . 198
3.7.2 Description and cataloguing . 199
3.7.3 Headings . 205
3.7.4 Titles . 206
3.8 Content analysis and content description . 208
3.8.1 General concepts . 208
3.8.2 Indexing and evaluation of indexing results . 210
3.8.3 Thesauri and terms . 212
3.8.4 Thesauri and their elements . 220
3.8.5 Classifications and their elements . 223
3.8.6 Types of classifications . 226
3.9 Storage . 228
3.9.1 General concepts . 228
3.9.2 Filing and shelving . 229
3.10 Search and retrieval . 231
3.10.1 General concepts . 231
3.10.2 Search methods and elements . 232
3.10.3 Search operations and evaluation of their results . 236
3.11 Use of information and documents . 238
3.11.1 Access to information . 238
3.11.2 Use of information . 242
3.11.3 Infrastructure . 243
3.11.4 Types of use . 247
3.11.5 Services . 248
3.11.6 Administration . 249
3.11.7 Usage studies and performance measures . 251
3.12 Preservation of documents. 254
3.12.1 General concepts . 254
3.12.2 Properties of materials relevant to preservation . 257
3.12.3 Processes involved in the manufacture or conservation of documents . 261
3.12.4 Types of damage to documents . 262
3.12.5 Agents causing damage to documents . 265
3.12.6 Conservation measures . 266
3.13 Legal aspects of information and documentation . 270
3.13.1 General concepts . 270
3.13.2 Literary, artistic and industrial property . 271
3.13.3 Author’s rights . 273
3.13.4 Privacy and data protection . 275
3.13.5 Data protection and security . 276
Annex A (informative) ISO 5127 SKOS Description . 278
English alphabetical index . 303
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
iv
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SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national
standards bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally
carried out through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a
technical committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee.
International organizations, governmental and non‐governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in
the work. ISO collaborates closely with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all
matters of electrotechnical standardization.
The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are
described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular the different approval criteria needed for the
different types of ISO documents should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the
editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives).
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. Details of
any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the Introduction and/or
on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents).
Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not
constitute an endorsement.
For an explanation on the voluntary nature of standards, the meaning of ISO specific terms and
expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about ISO's adherence to the
World Trade Organization (WTO) principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) see the following
URL: www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html
The committee responsible for this document is ISO/TC 46, Information and documentation.
This second edition cancels and replaces the first edition (ISO 5127:2001), which has been technically
revised.
ISO 5127 was previously published as a series of parts (from 1981).
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved v
---------------------- Page: 7 ----------------------
SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
0 Introduction
0.1 General
This document presents terms and definitions for selected concepts relevant to the field of information
and documentation. It includes a good deal of foundational terms and definitions, also from
international guidelines and reference works by organizations in liaison with ISO/TC 46. Thus, it serves
as a sound basis in the understanding of existing as well as possibly projected information and
documentation systems by systematically presenting well‐established terminology. It is, thus, also
intended as a tool to help in new developments to come, by underpinning scientific research projects
and helping to organize them, through mutual understanding of some of the foundations. And this
document is likewise intended as a handy, quick and comprehensive reference tool also for the newly
inaugurated to the field. Proper attention has therefore been paid to a clear, easy to follow structure of
the document. In its function as a handbook, this document may also be regarded as a legitimate and
improved successor of well‐known reference works like, e.g. the widely disseminated UNESCO
“Terminology of documentation” of 1976 and others (see Bibliography).
This document has 13 main classes. It aims to provide a logical structure in the field of information and
documentation.
The closer coalescence of the diverse professions Archives, Libraries, Museums, Printing and IT, within
documentation, in some parts rests on digitization as the basis of this process. This has also led, to some
degree, to the reformulation of documentation and its processes in terms of IT‐driven concepts and
models. Working with digital objects and systems has by no means diminished the importance of
terminology and terminological precision for and in the subject field. On the contrary, this importance is
underlined even more since the concepts and terms representing the objects need to be even more
precise when, possibly, far‐reaching automatic processing of data takes place. In any case, it is vital to
keep conceptual conformance between the documentation terminology and the IT terminology in this
subject field and to strive for the matching of terms and concepts so that an integrated, overall system
of documentation and its applications remains visible.
0.2 Main contents of this document
This document provides a well‐balanced selection of both abstract and concrete concepts (and their
terms). Documentation and work in the documentation field today are increasingly characterized by the
standard use of abstract models of the information field and of the communication flows in it, also for
the design and optimization of information systems. This type of work requires, substantially refers to,
and rests upon the structuring and exploration of the field by abstract reasoning and models,
incorporated in the respective abstract concepts. This document satisfies the need for such abstract
concepts, but also the equally required provision of a large number of concrete concepts (and terms) for
concrete objects, documents and processes. ISO 5127, in its balanced approach, thus covers main
components that constitute the information field:
abstract general concepts for the nature of information, of systems building, of identifying
concept systems, and of the basic communication features of language (thus also keeping the
bridge to information science, and to other sciences relevant for documentation);
a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse, and apply main
documentation operations (to represent concept systems, for indexing, cataloguing, classifying);
the required consideration of the storage and preservation of documents and of documentation
results, and some legal aspects of documentation;
© ISO 2017 – All rights reserved
vi
---------------------- Page: 8 ----------------------
SIST ISO 5127:2018
ISO 5127:2017(E)
a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse, and work with the
institutions in the field;
and, in particular, a basic stock of vocabulary required and demanded to understand, analyse,
and work with the main “raw material” basis of documentation, the large variety of documents
and components of documents. Vocabulary is provided for the general types of documents and
their main subdivisions, and a number of concepts and their terms for particular special kinds of
documents which are highly relevant but not always encountered in daily mass practice.
Notably, some needs of special collections are addressed here, too. Both documents that are the
result of, or considerably assist in, documentation are in focus, and a number of documents and
their parts whose terminology is needed because these documents constitute important main
objects for making societal documentation and information processes work.
This particular attention to “documents” and their parts concerns old and new ones: both those that are,
and need to be, subject to documentation processes as well as those which are the result of such
processes or serve as guidance in this work.
0.3 Functions of this document
The present‐day situation of documentation and its field is also largely characterized by closer
cooperation and sometimes merging of its individual professional areas and professions like
librarianship, archivistics, text documentation, editing, media documentation, printing, publishing,
sound and visual documents, broadcasting, museology, document conservation and more. ISO 5127 is
intended to serve as a tool for the representation, and mutual understanding, of the specific
terminology in the documentation field and at the same time for the closer cooperation of its different
professional branches, while at the same time respecting the organizational autonomy, traditions and
specific work procedures and related terminology of and between them.
As a terminology standard, among the main functions it serves are the following:
— to be a quick one‐stop shop, a reference pool showing a comprehensive overview of the entirety of
the terminology (terms) and its individual pieces in the field, also for ISO/TC 46 and its field of
work;
— to provide an interrelated conceptual overview, based on the underlying elaborate concept system,
of the field of information and documentation as a whole, thus creating a summary of main
terminology of the field, for the use of ISO/TC 46, related Committees and the entire information
community;
— to facilitate international communication both between countries and within international
organizations, on all matters within the scope of this document; and so, at the same time (both
national and international) between the individual professions and disciplines involved in the
documentation field;
— to be at hand as a reference tool for questions as to individual items in the field and for ensuring the
correct understanding of individual terms as they may be used in different places;
— to act, as a nucleus of validated terminology, as a reference point and for the establishing of
national language versions (translations) of this terminology; so it would assist both in the exact
understanding/interpretation of certain technical terms and in their translation and exchange
between different languages;
— to provide, as much as is in its scope, solid foundational assistance in the teaching of
“documentation”;
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ISO 5127:2017(E)
— to serve as a stock of precisely defined items (concepts) that are at hand when data elements for all
sorts of information and documentation data exchange systems and networks are to be defined,
agreed and machine‐implemented;
— to serve as a vocabulary pool for indexing, abstracting and cataloguing services covering, and active
in, the field of documentation;
— to serve as the source and starting point for creating metadata, also keeping in mind the
developments of linked data;
— to provide a pool, as a starting and reference point, for further and proper formalization of concepts
into directly applicable IT‐conforming entities;
— to as well provide necessary material for future establishing of ontologies of parts of the
documentation field or of the whole field, for more elaborate operation of automated IT processes;
— to maintain the connection to all classification systems that undertake, for any purpose, to classify
and to order the field of documentation; through its own richly cross‐referenced structure, to serve
as a first collection for the possible building of one or more thesauri of the field;
— to assist further study and scientific exploration of the field, and the sciences, of information and
documentation.
In its approach to related concepts and their definitions through generic relations, and to, in a number
of instances, connect entries through “See references” in the “Notes to entry”, ISO 5127 presents a slight
look and feel in the direction of paving the way for a thesaurus application.
0.4 A coherent terminology
In view of the now widespread formation and application of terminology of and for documentation, the
coherent terminology offered in ISO 5127 also provides, to the degree required, information on the
relation of some terms and concepts from this document to those in other ISO standards to maintain
this information and the relation mentioned, for the benefit of the users of ISO 5127. In partially
fulfilling the function of a general overview, net and vocabulary on which the individual standards in
ISO/TC 46 are built, this document may also serve as far as possible, when drafting ISO/TC 46 or other
standards, as a source of good and workable definitions. When such ISO 5127 definitions need to be
tailored to specific further‐reaching applications in individual Committees’ definitions, this can be done
using “Notes to entry”, adaptations and similar means.
As the terminology standard of ISO/TC 46, in addition to providing the basic concept system, ISO 5127
offers a collection of terminology as laid down in various ISO/TC 46 and other ISO standards.
Notwithstanding that, ISO 5127 is, and persists as, a solid corpus of terminology in its own right, being
not just a mere compilation but a proper, interrelated system. As a proper terminology standard
(following the rule
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