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Information is stored as ‘fields’. Each field contains a particular type of information. Many fields contain subfields, and each subfield is identified by an 'indicator' or an alphanumeric code to specify what type of information is contained in the subfield. For example, NEED EXAMPLE. 

For general queries, we usually need to extract data from only a few fields and sub-fields.  only. These fields are described below. The rest of the fields include record length, coding scheme, etc., which are usually not of interest in materials-related queries. 

The myriad levels of confusion for a programmer who is not trained as a cataloguer are not to be understimated in terms of time required to understand the marc data and to write code to extract the correct data elements. 

This documentation briefly describes a few of the main fields that query writers will need to use in order to count materials by format. For queries that need to include details of materials, it is necessary to consult with an experienced cataloger or query writer who has in-depth knowledge of the MARC system. 

FIXED FIELDS

                These fields have no subfields, and therefore no indicators which are associated with subfields. All information is indicated according to fixed character designations (example with code below), 

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