RDA as a tool for the bibliographic transition: the French position

This article presents the process adopted by the France to bring library catalogs to the Web of data and the RDA role in this general strategy. After analising RDA limits and inconsistencies, inherited from the tradition of AACR and MARC21 catalogues, the authors present the French approach to RDA and its positioning in correlation to international standards like ISBD and FRBR. The method adopted in France for FRBRising the catalogues go through a technical work of creating alignment beteween existing data, exploiting the technologies applied to the creation of data.bnf.fr and through a revision of the French cataloguing rules, allowing FRBRised metadata creation. This revision is based on RDA and it is setting up a French RDA application profile, keeping the analysis on the greater differences. RDA adoption, actually, is not a crucial issue in France and not a self standing purpose; it is just a tool for the transition of bibliographic data towards the Web of data.