Electronic Resources Interest Group Meeting (ALCTS CRS) ALA 2011

Electronic Resources Interest Group Meeting
The Electronic Resources Interest Group met on Saturday, June 25. The general theme of the meeting was Implementing and and managing web-scale discovery services : Implications for E-Resources Librarians. There were five speakers with time allotted for questions and general discussion. Summaries of the presentations are below.

Evaluating Discovery Services
presented by Kate Montgomery from Tulane University

Kate began her presentation with a description of the library’s situation post Hurricane Katrina. A combination of the destruction of physical collections due to Katrina and large increases in electronic content set the framework for the library’s interest in evaluating various discovery services.

She then described a time line of the library’s efforts in establishing a discovery service that would meet their needs.

  • 2008 – Exlibris federated search (Metalib) – Was helpful, but searching was slow, there is a limited number of collections that can be searched at once, and many of the local resources were not available for the federated search.
  • 2010 – Investigated current discovery tools with the intention of increasing access to digital collections without sacrificing access to the print collections – Chose to wait because of lack of coverage for specialized collections and known item searching was not as robust as needed. Used this time to analyze and evaluate the current federated search tool in use at the library.
  • 2011 – Priorities shift at the library with the creation of more silos of information and a greater need for an overarching discovery tool. These were in part created by the inclusion of vendor created MARC records for e-collections, an expansion of digitization projects, and discussions about creating an institutional repository using Dspace and Bpress to create a digital commons.

Kate continued her presentation by discussing how the library evaluated the discovery tools now available. They began with a list which prioritized their needs and wants in a new discovery system, and used that to devise a ranking system. This list included items such as

  • database coverage
  • indexing (how often, how customizable)
  • interface (ability to work with FRBR, customization)
  • interoperability
  • web 2.0 (ability for spell check, social networking, etc.)
  • cost (product, implementation,maintenance, etc)

She finished her presentation by sharing some of the things they learned during this evaluation process. Kate made a point of saying that good communication was key to a successful evaluation. They had tried both blogs and wikis but neither of those worked well for them. In the end they utilized LibGuides which worked well as it could easily incorporate research papers and meeting minutes. They also used Google Docs as a space for working documents. They found that listening to webinars, product demos, and visiting with customers who have established sites with the different discovery services was helpful.

    She concluded by saying that the products are now more mature, the known item search issues of the past have been resolved, it is now possible to rank results based on local collections and both the database coverage and individual customizations that are available have improved. One of the most important things she said in conclusion was that we need to remember that this is not a permanent solution; there is no magic bullet that will solve all our needs. Continual evaluation is necessary because in a few more years there will be more new a better options available.

    Bringing it all together : Discovery Service as a part of the Whole
    presented by Jessie Koennecke from Cornell University

    Jessie talked about the process that library went through to choose a new discovery service. He highlighted what worked well and what they learned along the way. He began his discussion by introducing the history of discovery tools used at Cornell. They have used a variety of services over the years from locally managed catalogs and federated search tools to WorldCat Local.

    The library established a committee to review the available discovery services. The committee consisted of 25 people which was too large for efficient decision making, so smaller sub groups were created to focus on specific issues:

    • What are our options & what are others doing to reduce separate silos of information
    • What are we currently doing and what do we want our service to look like in a perfect world
    • What will we need to build; what is lacking from the available services currently available
    • How do we effectively manage the process in the future

    The committee was then revised and a new group of teams were formed. These teams were tasked with the following:

    • Vendor – arrange demos and gather information about the available service options
    • Library – interview other libraries about their discovery services
    • SMART goals – develop goals for improving ongoing development and maintenance processes
    • Report – draft discovery & access report

    He concluded his discussion by reviewing some of the determinations and outcomes of the analysis process. It is important for a library to clearly establish their criteria for evaluating discovery services. For Cornell some of the important aspects were the content provided and the ability to search local content as well as the availability of documented and robust API. Discovery tools need to be considered a part of the whole. They are very valuable, but they won’t solve everything. Jessie indicated that their library will be implementing Summon and that perhaps next ALA he will be providing a report on how that decision has panned out.

    Integrating a Consortial Catalog into Summon
    presented by Stephanie Buck from Oregon State University

    Stephanie gave a presentation that explained the process they went through in order to integrate a union catalog with the Summon discovery service.

    She began with an introduction of SUMMIT and the Orbis Cascade alliance. Their consortia extends across Washington and Oregon and provides a courier service which allows any member to receive a book from any library within the system within three days. The SUMMIT catalog is accessed via WorldCat Local.

    Stephanie explained that the library wanted to use Summon as their discovery service, but also wanted to be able to link to the SUMMIT catalog from SUMMON. They wanted to make the interface as easy as possible for the user. They wanted it to be clear what resources were available from the library and what was available via the alliance.

    She demonstrated how they featured the search box for the discovery service predominately on the library’s homepage and how they branded it as 1Search. They wanted to market the new discovery layer, but did not want it to be confused with the already established SUMMIT catalog.

    Stephanie provided screen-shots and a demonstration of how they have made the integration. She explained how they designed the display of the search results to show local materials first and then to show results from SUMMIT. She explained how they wanted to visually separate the two results lists visually so there would be no confusion of where a resource was located, but at the same time they wanted the SUMMIT results to be prominent enough that they were not overlooked by the user.

    She concluded by explaining how they planned to do more usability testing; particularly related the the patron’s use of facets. They are also currently working to iron out a few issues with known item searching, and they expect they will make changes to the system display based on the results of the usability studies.

    What’s Going on Behind the Curtain of Content Discovery?
    presented by Mike Bushman (Serials Solutions) and Wendy Zeigler (Bridgeman Education)

    Mike and Wendy gave a presentation on how vendors work together to provide better access to materials.

    Wendy gave an overview of Bridgeman Education. She described their services and interface for accessing images.

    Mike followed this with a description of how discovery services like Summon harvest metadata, index that data and then provide direct access to the images at Bridgeman. For libraries that subscribe to Bridgeman direct access to the images is seamless for the user. For libraries that do not have a subscription, users are given a thumbnail of the image and information about options for subscribing for full access.

    They provided a demonstration of what the user will see if they search and then discussed how this type of an agreement is a win win situation for the discover service provider, the vendors and the library user.

    • Discovery and access to resources are enhanced
    • searching for multiple formats is consolidated into one place
    • partnering increases & establishes trust between vendors (data is safe & wellused)
    • increases visibility (and subscriptions) for vendors products

     

     

    About Teressa Keenan

    Head, Metadata & Continuing Resources Section Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library at The University of Montana
    This entry was posted in ALA Annual 2011. Bookmark the permalink.

    Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *