Getting Started with MarcEdit

Last updated on 2026-07-07 | Edit this page

Estimated time: 22 minutes

Overview

Questions

  • How is MarcEdit organized?
  • What are the top-level features?
  • Where are the top-level features located?

Objectives

  • Launch MarcEdit and locate top-level menu features
  • Understand the functionality offered by the top-level menu features
  • Navigate the top-level menu and update the shortcuts displayed

Top Level Menu Features in MarcEdit

Note: A number of differences have been noted in the Top Level Menu design and features for Mac users in this lesson: - Help is in the top menu bar, not in the window - Quicklinks are not available on a Mac - Preferences gearbox is located on the bottom right hand corner of the main window - The following Preferences options are not available on a Mac: Main Window settings (no ability to set Default Programs), File Associations settings (no ability to specify .mrk files are opened in the MarcEditor and .mrc files are opened with the MarcBreaker), MarcEditor –> Set MarcEditor Font Properties –> Set Defaults (not ability to restore default font settings in the MarcEditor)

When you launch MarcEdit, the main window opens. From here, you can access the suite of MarcEdit tools, features, plug-ins, quick links, or help.

MarcEdit Main Window: Top Level Menu

In the main window top-level menu, there are three options: Tools, Plug-ins, and Help.

Note: For this lesson, it is important to note that because of the frequent updates, screenshots are not included in this lesson. As a result, it is important for the instructor to show the top level menu and its components.

Tools

The Tools menu allows you to access a number of different basic and advanced features. Features to highlight include:

  • Delimited Text Translator
  • Export, including tools to export either MARC records or records reformatted as a text delimited csv (comma-separated value) or tsv (tab-separated value) file
  • OAI Harvester
  • The MarcEdit regular expression store
  • Utilities, including a verify URL tool
  • MARC Processing Tools, including MARCsplit, MARCcompare, MARCjoin, MARCmerge, find duplicate records, RDA Helper, or MARCValidator
  • Preferences

One thing you will notice is that there are both shortcuts, linked icons, and menu options that lead to the same features or tools. For example, to update your preferences, you can go to Tools → Preferences, use the keyboard shortcut of Ctrl+Shift+P, or click on the gearbox in the upper left-hand corner of the main window.

Preferences

In MarcEdit, Preferences allow you to configure the main window and various tools, such as the MarcEditor (the tool used to manipulate MARC data). For example, you can change the font, and font size, or select your most frequently used tools to display as shortcuts in the main window. In Preferences, you can also configure settings for other tools beyond the main window menu such as the MarcEditor where you can update the default character encoding for records that are opened in this tool (such as MARC8 or UTF-8), integrations with OCLC, or accessibility settings.

Note: The following exercise is simply to demonstrate adding a shortcut to the main window. RDA Helper is used as an example, but any available and commonly used tool could be used here.

Checklist

Add a shortcut to our main window

  1. Click on the gearbox in the top left corner or go to Tools → Preferences
  2. Select “Main Window” in the Preferences window in the left-hand pane
  3. In the right-hand pane, select RDA Helper
  4. Click Ok
Challenge

Name three other tools or features that can be changed in Preferences.

  1. Click on the gear icon in the main window or go to Tools → Preferences
  2. In the left-hand pane, look at the names there
  3. Tools or features that can be changed in Preferences:
    • Main Window
    • Bibframe
    • MarcEditor
    • MARCEngine
    • Ease of Use
    • File Associations
    • Language
    • Locations
    • Other
    • Updates
    • Configure Watcher
    • ILS Integration
    • OCLC API Integration.

Plug-Ins

Packages and plug-ins were introduced briefly in the Summary and Setup episode. To re-iterate, you do not need to download any additional packages or plug-ins for this lesson. However, there are a number of useful plug-ins that can be added to MarcEdit to extend its functionality. An example is the MARC to KBART or Knowledge bases and related tools converter. You can find more information on plug-ins on the MarcEdit Plugin page. To enable these and see the list in the MarcEdit main menu, click on Plug-ins and then select Plugin Manager. In the popup Plugin Manager window, you can select any of the plug-ins and then click Save. It should be noted that administrative permissions are not needed to enable plug-ins. When you click Save, only that Plugin Manager window closes and there is no need to close and reopen the MarcEdit application.

Note: The Mac version has plugins with no hyphen. The Plugin Manager is used to add additional plug-ins (Windows) or plugins (Mac).

Help

This top-level menu Help allows you to find information on updates, about your current MarcEdit installation, and links out to video tutorials or online help.

History of Last Actions

MarcEdit remembers what you did last. You can see this history in the Quick Links section which is a drop-down of features and tools you frequently use. Although not related to a history of what you did last in MarcEdit, the “What would you like to do?” box in the upper right-hand corner is convenient for quickly finding tools and features in MarcEdit.

Key Points
  • MarcEdit offers the ability to add shortcuts to the main window
  • MarcEdit allows you to set preferences for features and tools such as the main window or the MarcEditor
  • Preferences can be accessed using the gearbox icon, selecting Tools → Preferences, or by using the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+P