ITALica

New preprints

2011-11-01T08:34:00.000-07:00

We've added two preprints.

Library Use of Web-based Research Guides by Jimmy Ghaphery and Erin White
Reference Information Extraction and Processing using Conditional Random Fields by Tudor Groza, Gunnar AAstrand Grimnes and Siegfried Handschuh

You'll find these and others at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/publications/ital/prepub/index.cfm.

New Preprint

2011-10-19T08:03:00.000-07:00

We recently added two preprints.

Practical Limits to the Scope of Digital Preservation by Mike Kastellec
Eclipse Editor for MARC Records by Bojana Dimic Surla, PhD

You'll find these and others at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/publications/ital/prepub/index.cfm.

New Preprint

2011-09-21T12:02:00.000-07:00

We recently added a preprint.

Mobile Technologies & Academics: Do Students Use Mobile Technology in their Academic Lives and are Librarians Ready to Meet this New Challenge? by Angela Dresselhaus and Flora Shrode

You'll find this and others at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/publications/ital/prepub/index.cfm.

New preprint

2011-09-01T16:32:00.000-07:00

We've just added a new preprint.

Resource Discovery: Comparative Survey Results on Two Catalog Interfaces, by Heather Hessel and Janet Fransen

This and other preprints can be found at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/publications/ital/prepub/index.cfm.

Editorial and Technological Workflow Tools to Promote Website Quality, by Emily G. Morton-Owens

2011-08-31T17:04:00.000-07:00

Library websites are an increasingly visible representation of the library as an institution, which makes website quality an important way to communicate competence and trustworthiness to users. A website editorial workflow is one way to enforce a process and ensure quality. In a workflow, users receive roles, like author or editor, and content travels through various stages in which grammar, spelling, tone, and format are checked. One library used a workflow system to involve librarians in the creation of content. This system, implemented in Drupal, an open-source content management system, solved problems of coordination, quality, and comprehensiveness that existed on the library’s earlier, static website.

Factors Affecting University Library Website Design, by Yong-Mi Kim

2011-08-31T17:00:00.000-07:00

Existing studies have extensively explored factors that affect users’ intentions to use university library website resources (ULWR); yet little attention has been given to factors affecting university library website design. This paper investigates factors that affect university library website design and assesses the success of the university library website from both designers’ and users’ perspectives.

The findings show that when planning a website, university web designers consider university guidelines, review other websites, and consult with experts and other divisions within the library; however, resources and training for the design process are lacking. While website designers assess their websites as highly successful, user evaluations are somewhat lower. Accordingly, use is low, and users rely heavily on commercial websites. Suggestions for enhancing the usage of ULWR are provided.

Adoption of E-Book Readers among College Students: A Survey, by Nancy M. Foasberg

2011-08-31T16:56:00.000-07:00

To learn whether e-book readers have become widely popular among college students, this study surveys students at one large, urban, four-year public college. The survey asked whether the students owned e-book readers and if so, how often they used them and for what purposes. Thus far, uptake is slow; a very small proportion of students use e-readers. These students use them primarily for leisure reading and continue to rely on print for much of their reading. Students reported that price is the greatest barrier to e-reader adoption and had little interest in borrowing e-reader compatible e-books from the library.

Librarians and Technology Skill Acquisition: Issues and Perspective, by Debra A. Riley-Huff and Julia M. Rholes

2011-08-31T16:53:00.000-07:00

Libraries are increasingly searching for and employing librarians with significant technology skill sets. This article reports on a study conducted to determine how well prepared librarians are for their positions in academic libraries, how they acquired their skills and how difficult they are to hire and retain. The examination entails a close look at ALA-accredited LIS program technology course offerings and dovetails a dual survey designed to capture experiences and perspectives from practitioners, both library administrators and librarians who have significant technology roles.

Click Analytics: Visualizing Website Use Data, by Tabatha A. Farney

2011-08-31T16:47:00.000-07:00

Click analytics is a powerful technique that displays what and where users are clicking on a webpage helping libraries to easily identify areas of high and low usage on a page without having to decipher website use data sets. Click analytics is a subset of web analytics, but there is little research that discusses its potential uses for libraries. This paper introduces three click analytics tools, Google Analytics’ In-Page Analytics, ClickHeat, and Crazy Egg, and evaluates their usefulness in the context of redesigning a library’s homepage.

New preprints

2011-08-31T16:37:00.000-07:00

We've recently added three new preprints.

"Selecting a Web Content Management System for an Academic Library Web Site" by Elizabeth L. Black
"Cataloging Theory in Search of Graph Theory and Other Ivory Towers. Object: Cultural Heritage Resource Description Networks" by Ronald J. Murray and Barbara B. Tillett
"Public Library Computer Waiting Queues: Alternatives to the First-Come-First-Served Strategy" by Stuart Williamson

You'll find these and other preprints at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/publications/ital/prepub/index.cfm.

Management and Support of Shared Integrated Library Systems, by Jason Vaughan and Kristen Costello

2011-06-17T11:44:00.000-07:00

The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) University Libraries has hosted and managed a shared integrated library system (ILS) since 1989. The system and the number of partner libraries sharing the system has grown significantly over the past two decades. Spurred by the level of involvement and support contributed by the host institution, the authors administered a comprehensive survey to current Innovative Interfaces libraries. Research findings are combined with a description of UNLV’s local practices to provide substantial insights into shared funding, support, and management activities associated with shared systems.

Benign Neglect: Developing Life Rafts for Digital Content, by Jody L. DeRidder

2011-06-17T11:39:00.000-07:00

In his keynote speech at the Archiving 2009 Conference in Arlington, Virginia, Clifford Lynch called for the development of a benign neglect model for digital preservation, one in which as much content as possible is stored in whatever manner available in hopes of there someday being enough resources to more properly preserve it. This is an acknowledgment of current resource limitations relative to the burgeoning quantities of digital content that need to be preserved.

Seeing the Wood for the Trees: Enhancing Metadata Subject Elements with Weights, by Hong Zhang, Linda C. Smith, Michael Twidale, and Fang Huang Gao

2011-06-17T11:37:00.000-07:00

Subject indexing has been conducted in a dichotomous way in terms of what the information object is primarily about/of or not, corresponding to the presence or absence of a particular subject term, respectively. With more subject terms brought into information systems via social tagging, manual cataloging, or automated indexing, many more partially relevant results can be retrieved. Using examples from digital image collections and online library catalog systems, we explore the problem and advocate for adding a weighting mechanism to subject indexing and tagging to make web search and navigation more effective and efficient. We argue that the weighting of subject terms is more important than ever in today’s world of growing collections, more federated searching, and expansion of social tagging. Such a weighting mechanism needs to be considered and applied not only by indexers, catalogers, and taggers, but also needs to be incorporated into system functionality and metadata schemas.

Building an Open Source Institutional Repository at a Small Law School Library:,Is it Realistic or Unattainable? by Fang Wang

2011-06-17T11:34:00.000-07:00

Digital preservation activities among law libraries have largely been limited by a lack of funding, staffing and expertise. Most law school libraries that have already implemented an Institutional Repository (IR) chose proprietary platforms because they are easy to set up, customize, and maintain with the technical and development support they provide. The Texas Tech University School of Law Digital Repository is one of the few law school repositories in the nation that is built on the DSpace open source platform.1 The repository is the law school’s first institutional repository in history. It was designed to collect, preserve, share and promote the law school’s digital materials, including research and scholarship of the law faculty and students, institutional history, and law-related resources. In addition, the repository also serves as a dark archive to house internal records.

New preprint

2011-04-02T19:09:00.000-07:00

A new preprint.

"Click Analytics: Visualizing Web Site Use Data" by Tabatha A. Farney

New preprints

2011-03-29T12:57:00.000-07:00

Two new preprints were recently added.

"Adoption of E-Book Readers among College Students: A Survey" by Nancy M. Foasberg

"Editorial and technological workflow tools to promote website quality" by Emily G. Morton-Owens
(Originally presented at the 2010 LITA National Forum)

New preprints

2011-03-02T13:50:00.000-08:00

Two new preprints have been added to the ITAL Web site today.
http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/prepub/index.cfm

"Investigations into Library Web Scale Discovery Services" by Jason Vaughan

"Graphs in Libraries: A Primer" by James E. Powell, Daniel Alcazar, Matthew Hopkins, Robert Olendorf, Tamara M. McMahon, Amber Wu, Linn Collins

A Simple Scheme for Book Classification Using Wikipedia, by Andromeda Yelton

2011-03-02T07:37:00.000-08:00

Editor’s note: This article is the winner of the LITA/Ex Libris Student Writing Award, 2010.

Because the rate at which documents are being generated outstrips librarians’ ability to catalog them, an accurate, automated scheme of subject classification is desirable. However, simplistic word-counting schemes miss many important concepts; librarians must enrich algorithms with background knowledge to escape basic problems such as polysemy and synonymy. I have developed a script that uses Wikipedia as context for analyzing the subjects of nonfiction books. Though a simple method built quickly from freely available parts, it is partially successful, suggesting the promise of such an approach for future research.

The Internet Public Library (IPL): An Exploratory Case Study on User Perceptions, by Monica Maceli, Susan Wiedenbeck, and Eileen Abels

2011-03-02T07:33:00.000-08:00

The Internet Public Library (IPL), now known as ipl2, was created in 1995 with the mission of serving the public by providing librarian-recommended Internet resources and reference help. We present an exploratory case study on public perceptions of an “Internet public library,” based on qualitative analysis of interviews with ten college student participants: some current users and others unfamiliar with the IPL. The exploratory interviews revealed some confusion around the IPL’s name and the types of resources and services that would be offered. Participants made many positive comments about the IPL’s resource quality, credibility, and personal help.

Semantic Web for Reliable Citation Analysis in Scholarly Publishing, by Ruben Tous, Manel Guerrero, and Jaime Delgado

2011-03-02T07:31:00.000-08:00

Analysis of the impact of scholarly artifacts is constrained by current unreliable practices in cross-referencing, citation discovering, and citation indexing and analysis, which have not kept pace with the technological advances that are occurring in several areas like knowledge management and security. Because citation analysis has become the primary component in scholarly impact factor calculation, and considering the relevance of this metric within both the scholarly publishing value chain and (especially important) the professional curriculum evaluation of scholarly professionals, we defend that current practices need to be revised. This paper describes a reference architecture that aims to provide openness and reliability to the citation-tracking lifecycle. The solution relies on the use of digitally signed semantic metadata in the different stages of the scholarly publishing workflow in such a manner that authors, publishers, repositories, and citation-analysis systems will have access to independent reliable evidences that are resistant to forgery, impersonation, and repudiation. As far as we know, this is the first paper to combine Semantic Web technologies and public-key cryptography to achieve reliable citation analysis in scholarly publishing.

Web Accessibility, Libraries, and the Law, by Camilla Fulton

2011-03-02T07:27:00.000-08:00

With an abundance of library resources being served on the web, researchers are finding that disabled people oftentimes do not have the same level of access to materials as their nondisabled peers. This paper discusses web accessibility in the context of United States’ federal laws most referenced in web accessibility lawsuits. Additionally, it reveals which states have statutes that mirror federal web accessibility guidelines and to what extent. Interestingly, fewer than half of the states have adopted statutes addressing web accessibility, and fewer than half of these reference Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act or Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 1.0. Regardless of sparse legislation surrounding web accessibility, librarians should consult the appropriate web accessibility resources to ensure that their specialized content reaches all.

Usability of the VuFind Next-Generation Online Catalog, by Jennifer Emanuel

2011-03-02T07:24:00.000-08:00

The VuFind open–source, next-generation catalog system was implemented by the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois as an alternative to the WebVoyage OPAC system. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign began offering VuFind alongside WebVoyage in 2009 as an experiment in next-generation catalogs. Using a faceted search discovery interface, it offered numerous improvements to the UIUC catalog and focused on limiting results after searching rather than limiting searches up front. Library users have praised VuFind for its Web 2.0 feel and features. However, there are issues, particularly with catalog data.

Generating Collaborative Systems for Digital Libraries: a Model-Driven Approach, by Alessio Malizia, Paolo Bottoni, and S. Levialdi

2011-01-31T09:00:00.000-08:00

The design and development of a digital library involves different stakeholders, such as: information architects, librarians, and domain experts, who need to agree on a common language to describe, discuss, and negotiate the services the library has to offer. To this end, high-level, language-neutral models have to be devised. Metamodeling techniques favor the definition of domain-specific visual languages through which stakeholders can share their views and directly manipulate representations of the domain entities. This paper describes CRADLE (Cooperative-Relational Approach to Digital Library Environments), a metamodel-based framework and visual language for the definition of notions and services related to the development of digital libraries. A collection of tools allows the automatic generation of several services, defined with the CRADLE visual language, and of the graphical user interfaces providing access to them for the final user. The effectiveness of the approach is illustrated by presenting digital libraries generated with CRADLE, while the CRADLE environment has been evaluated by using the cognitive dimensions framework.

The Middle Mile: The Role of the Public Library in Ensuring Access to Broadband, by Marijke Visser and Mary Alice Ball

2011-01-31T08:57:00.000-08:00

This paper discusses the role of the public library in ensuring access to the broadband communication that is so critical in today’s knowledge-based society. It examines the culture of information in 2010, and then asks what it means if individuals are online or not. The paper also explores current issues surrounding telecommunications and policy, and finally seeks to understand the role of the library in this highly technological, perpetually connected world.

An Evolutive Process to Convert Glossaries into Ontologies, by José R. Hilera, Carmen Pagés, J. Javier Martínez, J. Antonio Gutiérrez, and Luis de-Marcos

2011-01-31T08:54:00.000-08:00

This paper describes a method to generate ontologies from glossaries of terms. The proposed method presupposes an evolutionary life cycle based on successive transformations of the original glossary that lead to products of intermediate knowledge representation (dictionary, taxonomy, and thesaurus). These products are characterized by an increase in semantic expressiveness in comparison to the product obtained in the previous transformation, with the ontology as the end product. Although this method has been applied to produce an ontology from the “IEEE Standard Glossary of Software Engineering Terminology,” it could be applied to any glossary of any knowledge domain to generate an ontology that may be used to index or search for information resources and documents stored in libraries or on the Semantic Web.

Bridging the Gap: Self-Directed Staff Technology Training, by Kayla L. Quinney, Sara D. Smith, and Quinn Galbraith

2011-01-31T08:51:00.000-08:00

Undergraduates, as members of the Millennial Generation, are proficient in Web 2.0 technology and expect to apply these technologies to their coursework—including scholarly research. To remain relevant, academic libraries need to provide the technology that student patrons expect, and academic librarians need to learn and use these technologies themselves. Because leaders at the Harold B. Lee Library of Brigham Young University (HBLL) perceived a gap in technology use between students and their staff and faculty, they developed and implemented the Technology Challenge, a self-directed technology training program that rewarded employees for exploring technology daily. The purpose of this paper is to examine the Technology Challenge through an analysis of results of surveys given to participants before and after the Technology Challenge was implemented. The program will also be evaluated in terms of the adult learning theories of andragogy and self-directed learning. HBLL found that a self-directed approach fosters technology skills that librarians need to best serve students. In addition, it promotes lifelong learning habits to keep abreast of emerging technologies. This paper offers some insights and methods that could be applied in other libraries, the most valuable of which is the use of self-directed and andragogical training methods to help academic libraries better integrate modern technologies.

Next-Generation Library Catalogs and the Problem of Slow Response Time, by Margaret Brown-Sica, Jeffrey Beall, and Nina McHale

2011-01-31T08:47:00.000-08:00

Response time as defined for this study is the time that it takes for all files that constitute a single webpage to travel across the Internet from a Web server to the end user’s browser. In this study, the authors tested response times on queries for identical items in five different library catalogs, one of them a next-generation (NextGen) catalog. The authors also discuss acceptable response time and how it may affect the discovery process. They suggest that librarians and vendors should develop standards for acceptable response time and use it in the product selection and development processes.

ITAL reader survey results...

2010-12-05T13:14:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

I promised in my December 2010 ITAL editor's column to post the full results of the 2009/2010 reader survey. Unfortunately, it seems I can't do this here, so please find the results on the ITAL website, here.

Thanks,

- Marc Truitt, Editor, Information Technology and Libraries

Batch Loading Collections into DSpace: Using Perl Scripts for Automation and Quality Control, by Maureen P. Walsh [Appendixes A-E]

2010-09-01T18:05:00.000-07:00

Due to space considerations, Appendixes A-D were not included with the published article (http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/292010/2903sep/walsh_pdf.cfm).
Appendixes A-D are included below along with Appendix E.

Appendix A. OJS Batch Loading Scripts

-- mkcol.sh --

#!/bin/sh

# Create a Collection given a name and a collection handle.

# Gets information from DSpace web pages and returns data via GET parameters to the DSpace

# Collection Wizard.

NAME="$1"

COLLECTION_HANDLE="$2"

URL="https://kb.osu.edu/dspace"

NAME_PAT=">$NAME</option>"

# Login to DSpace and create the cookie.txt file.

curl -k -L -s $URL/password-login -d "login_email=[name removed]@osu.edu" -d "login_password=XXXXX" -c cookie.txt > /dev/null

# Cut the community_id out of the web page.

COMMUNITY_ID=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/handle/1811/$COLLECTION_HANDLE \

| grep -m1 name=\"community_id\" \

| cut -d\" -f6`

# Cut the collection_id out of the web page.

COLLECTION_ID=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/tools/collection-wizard \

-d "community_id=$COMMUNITY_ID" \

| grep -m1 name=\"collection_id\" \

| cut -d\" -f6`

# Begin building the collection.

curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/tools/collection-wizard \

-d "public_read=true" \

-d "workflow1=true" \

-d "workflow2=" \

-d "workflow3=" \

-d "collection_id=$COLLECTION_ID" \

-d "default-item=" \

-d "stage=1" \

-d "admins=" > /dev/null

# Finish making the collection.

curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/tools/collection-wizard \

-F "name=$NAME" \

-F "short_description=" \

-F "introductory_text=" \

-F "copyright_text=" \

-F "side_bar_text=" \

-F "provenance_description=" \

-F "license=" \

-F "file=" \

-F "collection_id=$COLLECTION_ID" \

-F "stage=2" \

-F "permission=12" > /dev/null

# Get and return the handle_id.

HANDLE_ID=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/handle/1811/$COLLECTION_HANDLE \

| grep -m1 "$NAME_PAT" \

| cut -d\" -f2`

echo $HANDLE_ID

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- mkallcol.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Routine to clean up individual fields.

sub trim($)

{

my $string = shift;

$string =~ s/^\s+//;

$string =~ s/\s+$//;

return $string;

}

# Read the file of issue names into an array.

open(fh,"issues-prod.remainder");

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

$linenum = 0;

%lt=();

$COMMUNITY = "686";

# For each issue get the parameters from the array and call the script to create the collection.

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$linenum]);

$issue = $fields[1];

chop($issue);

system("echo -n $fields[0] ");

print " ";

system("./mkcol.sh $issue $COMMUNITY");

$linenum++;

}

-- Sample of the file of issue names --

V074N2 "Ohio Journal of Science: Volume 74, Issue 2 (March, 1974)"

V074N3 "Ohio Journal of Science: Volume 74, Issue 3 (May, 1974)"

V074N4 "Ohio Journal of Science: Volume 74, Issue 4 (July, 1974)"

V074N5 "Ohio Journal of Science: Volume 74, Issue 5 (September, 1974)"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- metadata.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

use Encode; # Routines for UTF encoding.

# Routine to clean up individual fields of metadata.

sub trim($)

{

my $string = shift;

$string =~ s/^\s+//;

$string =~ s/\s+$//;

return $string;

}

# Read the metadata into an array.

open(fh,"<:encoding(UTF-16)", "OJSPhase2-1.txt");

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

# Process each line of metadata, consolidating lines for the same item.

$linenum = 0;

%lt=();

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$linenum]);

if ($fields[0] =~ /^((v|V)[0-9]+(n|N)[0-9A-Za-z]+)/) {

$lt{uc($1)} = [@{$lt{uc($1)}}, $linenum];

}

$linenum++;

}

# Build the load set for each item.

for $key (sort(keys(%lt))) {

# Put each load set in its own subdirectory.

print "mkdir ./src/$key\n";

system "mkdir ./src/$key";

# Process the lines for this load set.

for $i (0 .. $#{$lt{$key}}) {

$dir = sprintf("item_%03d", $i);

print "mkdir ./src/$key/$dir\n";

system "mkdir ./src/$key/$dir";

# Create the XML for the metadata.

open(fh,">:encoding(UTF-8)", "./src/$key/$dir/dublin_core.xml");

print fh '<dublin_core>'."\n";

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$lt{$key}[$i]]);

$fields[1] =~ s/"//g;

$fields[5] =~ s/"//g;

if (length($fields[9])>0) {

print fh '<dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="citation">'

. "$fields[1]. v$fields[3], n$fields[4] ($fields[5]), $fields[8]-$fields[9]</dcvalue>\n";

} else {

print fh '<dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="citation">'

."$fields[1]. v$fields[3], n$fields[4] ($fields[5]), $fields[8]</dcvalue>\n";

}

if (length($fields[10]) > 0) {

$fields[10] =~ s/["]{1}([^"])/$1/g;

$fields[10] =~ s/("|"")$//g;

print fh '<dcvalue element="title" qualifier="">'.$fields[10]."</dcvalue>\n";

}

print fh '<dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="issn">'.$fields[2]."</dcvalue>\n";

print fh '<dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">'.$fields[6]."-".$fields[7]."</dcvalue>\n";

# Process multiple authors.

if (length($fields[11]) > 0) {

$fields[11] =~ s/"//g;

@authors = split(/;/,$fields[11]);

foreach $author (@authors) {

$author =~ s/^\s+//;

if (length($author) > 0) {

print fh '<dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="">'.$author.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

}

if (length($fields[12]) > 0) {

$fields[12] =~ s/"//g;

print fh '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="">Author Institution: '.$fields[12]."</dcvalue>\n";

}

if (length($fields[13]) > 0) {

$fields[13] =~ s/"//g;

print fh '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="abstract">'.$fields[13]."</dcvalue>\n";

}

print fh "</dublin_core>\n";

close(fh); # Finished creating the XML file.

# Create the contents file.

open(fh, ">./src/$key/$dir/contents");

$fields[0] = trim($fields[0]);

print fh "$fields[0].pdf\n";

close(fh);

# Move the data files into the load set.

print "cp pdfs/$fields[0] ./src/$key/$dir\n";

system "cp pdfs/$fields[0].pdf ./src/$key/$dir";

}

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- loaditems.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

#Load the list of issues into an array.

open(fh,"loaditems");

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

# Process each issue.

$linenum = 0;

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/ /, $lines[$linenum]);

chop($fields[1]);

# Add the issue to DSpace.

system("./import.sh $fields[1] $fields[0]");

$linenum++;

}

-- Sample of the load items file --

V074N2 1811/22016

V074N3 1811/22017

V074N4 1811/22018

V074N5 1811/22019

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- import.sh --

#!/bin/sh

# import.sh collection_id dir

# Import a collection from files generated on dspace

# Requires the directory of the destination collection and the collection id.

COLLECTION_ID=$1

EPERSON=[name removed]@osu.edu

SOURCE_DIR=./src/$2

MAP_DIR=./prod-map/

BASE_ID=`basename $COLLECTION_ID`

MAPFILE=./$MAP_DIR/map.$2

/dspace/bin/dsrun org.dspace.app.itemimport.ItemImport --add --eperson=$EPERSON

--collection=$COLLECTION_ID --source=$SOURCE_DIR --mapfile=$MAPFILE

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- intro.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Routine to clean up individual fields.

sub trim($)

{

my $string = shift;

$string =~ s/^\s+//;

$string =~ s/\s+$//;

return $string;

}

# Read the metadata into an array.

open(fh,"<:encoding(UTF-16)", "OJSPhase2-1.txt")

or die "Can't open metadata file: $!";

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

# Process each line of metadata, consolidating lines for the same item.

$linenum = 0;

%lt=();

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$linenum]);

if ($fields[0] =~ /^((v|V)[0-9]+(n|N)[0-9A-Za-z]+)/) {

$lt{uc($1)} = [@{$lt{uc($1)}}, $linenum];

}

$linenum++;

}

# Assemble each intro.

for $key (sort(keys(%lt))) {

open(fh,"./prod-map/map.$key") or next;

@fids=<fh>;

close(fh);

@fids = sort(@fids);

print "Generating intro for $key ...\n";

open(fh,">:encoding(UTF-8)", "./src/$key/intro");

# Create the HTML for each article.

for ($i = 0; $i <= $#{$lt{$key}}; $i++) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$lt{$key}[$i]]);

if (length($fields[10]) > 0) {

$fields[10] =~ s/["]{1}([^"])/$1/g;

$fields[10] =~ s/("|"")$//g;

print fh "$fields[10] \n";

}

# Create the list of authors.

$authcnt = 0;

if (length($fields[11]) > 0) {

$fields[11] =~ s/"//g;

@authors = split(/;/,$fields[11]);

foreach $author (@authors) {

$author =~ s/^\s+//;

if ($authcnt > 0) {

print fh "; $author";

} else {

print fh $author;

}

$authcnt++;

}

# Add page numbers.

if (length($fields[8]) > 0) {

print fh " pp. $fields[8]";

}

if (length($fields[9]) > 0) {

print fh "-$fields[9]";

}

print fh " \n";

# Create links for each article.

@item_hid = split(/\s/,$fids[$i]);

$itemno = $item_hid[0];

$itemhid = $item_hid[1];

$fields[0] = trim($fields[0]);

$filename = "./src/$key/$itemno/".$fields[0].".pdf";

@st = stat($filename) or die "No $filename: $!";

$size = int($st[7]/1024);

$url_1 = "/dspace/handle/$itemhid";

$url_2 = "/dspace/bitstream/$itemhid/1/$fields[0]";

print fh '<a href="'.$url_1.'">Article description</a> | <a href="'.$url_2.'">Article Full Text PDF ('.$size.'KB)</a> ';

print fh "\n";

}

close(fh);

}

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- installintro.sh --

#!/bin/sh

# Install an intro given a dir and a community id.

DIR="$1"

HANDLE="$2"

URL="https://kb.osu.edu/dspace"

# Login to DSpace

curl -k -L -s $URL/password-login -d "login_email=[name removed]@osu.edu" -d "login_password=password" -c cookie.txt > /dev/null

# Cut the community_id out of the web page.

COMMUNITY_ID=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/handle/$HANDLE \

| grep -m1 name=\"community_id\" \

| cut -d\" -f6`

# Cut the collection_id out of the web page.

COLLECTION_ID=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/handle/$HANDLE \

| grep -m1 name=\"collection_id\" \

| cut -d\" -f6`

# Cut the title out of the web page.

TITLE=`curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/tools/edit-communities \

-d "community_id=$COMMUNITY_ID" \

-d "collection_id=$COLLECTION_ID" \

-d "action=4" \

| grep -m1 name=\"name\" \

| cut -d\" -f6`

# Put the introductory text in DSpace.

curl -k -L -s -b cookie.txt \

$URL/tools/edit-communities \

-d "name=$TITLE" \

-d "short_description=" \

-d "introductory_text=`cat ./src/$DIR/intro`" \

-d "copyright_text=" \

-d "side_bar_text=" \

-d "license=" \

-d "provenance_description=" \

-d "community_id=$COMMUNITY_ID" \

-d "collection_id=$COLLECTION_ID" \

-d "create=false" \

-d "action=9" \

-d "submit=Update" > /dev/null

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- ldallintro.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Load file of issues into an array.

open(fh,"loaditems");

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

$linenum = 0;

%lt=();

# Process each intro.

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$linenum]);

print("$lines[$linenum]");

system("./installintro.sh $lines[$linenum] ");

$linenum++;

}

Appendix B. MSS Phase Two Scripts

-- mkxml2.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Load routines for UTF-16 and UTF-8

use Encode;

# Routine to clean up metadata fields

sub trim($)

{

my $string = shift;

$string =~ s/^\s+//;

$string =~ s/\s+$//;

$string =~ s/^"//;

$string =~ s/"$//;

return $string;

}

# Load metadata into an array.

open(fh,"<:encoding(UTF-16)", "MSA-phase-2-v3.txt");

@lines=<fh>;

close(fh);

$linenum = 0;

%lt=();

# Split tab separated metadata fields

while ($linenum <= $#lines) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$linenum]);

if ($fields[4] =~ /^([0-9]{4}-[^0-9]+[0-9]+)/) {

$lt{$1} = [@{$lt{$1}}, $linenum];

}

$linenum++;

}

$cnt1 = 0; $cnt2 = 0; $cnt3 = 0; $cnt4 = 0; $cnt5 = 0; $cnt6 = 0;

# Process metadata line by line

for $key (sort(keys(%lt))) {

$year = substr($key, 0, 4);

# Generate possible image file names.

$keyzero = substr($key,0,-1). "0" . substr($key, -1, 1);

$keyuc = uc($key);

$keyuczero = uc($keyzero);

# Compensate for inconsistent naming of images in metadata.

if (-e "../images/$year/$key.jpg") {

$filename = $key;

} elsif (-e "../images/$year/$keyzero.jpg") {

$filename = $keyzero;

} elsif (-e "../images/$year/$keyuc.jpg") {

$filename = $keyuc;

} elsif (-e "../images/$year/$keyuczero.jpg") {

$filename = $keyuczero;

} else {

$filename = "";

print " NO FILE FOUND images/$year/$key.jpg\n";

}

# Divide output into separate load sets based on year.

if (($year >= "1946") && ($year <= "1959")) {

$dir = sprintf("1/item_%04d", $cnt1++);

}

if (($year >= "1960") && ($year <= "1969")) {

$dir = sprintf("2/item_%04d", $cnt2++);

}

if (($year >= "1970") && ($year <= "1979")) {

$dir = sprintf("3/item_%04d", $cnt3++);

}

if (($year >= "1980") && ($year <= "1989")) {

$dir = sprintf("4/item_%04d", $cnt4++);

}

if (($year >= "1990") && ($year <= "1999")) {

$dir = sprintf("5/item_%04d", $cnt5++);

}

if (($year >= "2000") && ($year <= "2100")) {

$dir = sprintf("6/item_%04d", $cnt6++);

}

# Make a directory for the item.

print "mkdir $dir\n";

system "mkdir $dir";

# Create XML file from metadata

open(fh,">:encoding(UTF-8)", "$dir/dublin_core.xml");

print fh '<dublin_core>'."\n";

print fh '<dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="none">'

.$key.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

print fh '<dcvalue element="type" qualifier="none">Article</dcvalue>'."\n";

print fh '<dcvalue element="language" qualifier="iso">en</dcvalue>'."\n";

$affiliation = '';

$affiliation1 = '';

$affiliation2 = '';

# Metadata for items with multiple authors, each

# with individual affiliations, span multiple lines.

# Collect them and produce XML for them.

for $i (0 .. $#{$lt{$key}}) {

@fields = split(/\t/, $lines[$lt{$key}[$i]]);

$title = trim($fields[9]);

if (length($title) > 0) {

$title =~ s/["]{1}([^"])/$1/g;

$title =~ s/("|"")$//g;

print fh '<dcvalue element="title" qualifier="none">'

.$title.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

}

$year1 = trim($fields[1]);

if (length($year1) > 0) {

print fh '<dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">'

."$year</dcvalue>\n";

}

$author = trim($fields[5]);

if (length($author) > 0) {

$author =~ s/(\$|\^|\{|\}|\*)//g;

print fh '<dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="none">'

.$author.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

}

$abstract = trim($fields[10]);

if (length($abstract) > 0) {

print fh '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="abstract">'

.$abstract.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

}

if (length(trim($fields[6])) > 0) {

$affiliation1 = trim($fields[6]);

}

if (length(trim($fields[7])) > 0) {

$affiliation2 = trim($fields[7]);

}

if ((length(trim($fields[6])) > 0)

|| (length(trim($fields[7])) > 0)) {

if ((length(trim($fields[6])) == 0)

&& (length($affiliation1) == 0)) {

$append = $affiliation2;

} elsif ((length(trim($fields[7])) == 0)

&& (length($affiliation2) == 0)) {

$append = $affiliation1;

} else {

$append = $affiliation1.", "

.$affiliation2;

}

if (length($affiliation) > 0) {

$affiliation = $affiliation.

"; ".$append;

} else {

$affiliation = $append;

}

$note = trim($fields[11]);

if (length($note) > 0) {

print fh '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="none">'

.$note.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

}

} # Done processing multiple authors.

# Finish producing the XML for this item.

print fh '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="none">Author Institution: '

.$affiliation.'</dcvalue>'."\n";

print fh '</dublin_core>'."\n";

close(fh);

# Create the 'contents' file.

open(fh, ">$dir/contents");

if ($filename != "") {

print fh "$filename.jpg";

$cmd = "cp \"../images/$year/$filename.jpg\" $dir";

print $cmd."\n";

system $cmd;

}

close(fh);

} # Finished processing this item.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- import_collections.sh --

#!/bin/sh

# Import a collection from files generated on dspace

COLLECTION_ID=1811/6634

EPERSON="[name removed]@osu.edu"

SOURCE_DIR=./5

BASE_ID=`basename $COLLECTION_ID`

MAPFILE=./map.$BASE_ID

/dspace/bin/dsrun org.dspace.app.itemimport.ItemImport --add --eperson=$EPERSON --collection=$COLLECTION_ID --source=$SOURCE_DIR --mapfile=$MAPFILE

Appendix C. Example dublin_core.xml for MSS 2009

<dublin_core>
 <dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="none">2009-MJ-10</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="title" qualifier="none">VIBRATIONAL OVERTONE SPECTRA OF $C_2H_6$ AND $C_2H_4$ IN CRYOGENIC LIQUIDS</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">2009</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="description" qualifier="abstract">Vibrational overtone spectra of $C_2H_6$ and $C_2H_4$ in cryogenic solutions were recorded between 5000 and 14000 cm$^{-1}$. Spectral regions for the first four overtones were measured using a Fourier transform spectrophotometer. The fifth overtone $(\Delta\nu=6)$ spectra between 15,000 and 16,000 cm$^{-1}$ were recorded with a double beam (pump-probe) thermal lens technique using concentrations as low as 10$^{-3}$ mole fraction. The peak frequency shift $(\Delta\omega)$ from gas phase to solution is explained by the change in harmonic frequency and anharmonicity in solution with respect to the gas phase values. The bandwidth $(\Delta\omega_{1/2})$ of the $(\Delta\nu= 6)$ C-H absorption bands in solution can be explained in terms of collisions with the solvent molecules.</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="description" qualifier="none">Author Institution: Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Baylor University, Waco, Texas, 76798</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="type" qualifier="none">Article</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="language" qualifier="iso">en</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="none">Diez-y-Riega, Maria H.</dcvalue>
 <dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="none">Manzanares, Carlos E.</dcvalue>
</dublin_core>

Appendix D. Section of MSS Author Quality Control Script

-- flipper.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

#### Sections omitted ####

#### Begin author correction block ####

$creatorxml = "";

if (length($creators) > 0) {

# Creator name are contaminated with comments.

# Remove the comments.

$creators =~ s/"//g;

$creators =~ s/\\thanks\{.+\}//;

$creators =~ s/\\thanks \{.+\}//;

$creators =~ s/\\footnote\{.+\}//;

# Multiple creators are separated by ';' or AND in the metadata.

@creatorlist = split(/;| and | AND /,$creators);

# Process each creator.

foreach $creator (@creatorlist) {

# Remove per name comments and punctuation.

$creator =~ s/^\s+//;

$creator =~ s/FULL NAME OF AUTHOR FROM OTHER LOCATION//;

$creator =~ s/\\underline \{(.+)\}/$1/;

$creator =~ s/\\address\{//;

$creator =~ s/\\//g;

$creator =~ s/\{//g;

$creator =~ s/\}//g;

$creator =~ s/\^//g;

$creator =~ s/\'//g;

$creator =~ s/\%//g;

$creator =~ s/^AND$|^and$//;

if (length($creator) > 0) {

$creator =~ s/\.(\w)/. $1/g;

# Split the name apart on spaces.

@nameparts = split(/ /,$creator);

# Process each part of the name.

for($i = 0;$i <= $#nameparts; $i++) {

# Adjust case.

@nameparts[$i] = lc(@nameparts[$i]);

@nameparts[$i] = ucfirst(@nameparts[$i]);

$c = rindex(@nameparts[$i],"-");

# Uppercase hyphenated names.

if ($c != -1) {

$r = uc(substr(@nameparts[$i],$c+1,1));

substr(@nameparts[$i],$c+1,1,$r);

}

$lname = pop(@nameparts);

$nl = @nameparts[-1];

# Handle name prefixes.

if ($nl eq "Von"

|| $nl eq "Vander"

|| $nl eq "Le"

|| $nl eq "De"

|| $nl eq "de") {

$lname = pop(@nameparts)." ".$lname;

}

# Handle special case name parts

if ($nl eq "Der" ) {

$nl2 = @nameparts[-2];

$lname = pop(@nameparts)." ".$lname;

if ($nl2 eq "Van" ) {

$lname = pop(@nameparts)." ".$lname;

}

# assemble the name and make the XML.

$name = $lname .", ".join(" ",@nameparts);

$creatorxml .= '<dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="">'

.$name.'</dcvalue>'."\n ";

}

} # Done processing creators of this item.

#### End author correction block ####

#### Sections omitted ####

Appendix E. MSS 2009 Batch Loading Scripts

-- mkxml2009.pl --

#!/usr/bin/perl

use Encode; # Routines for UTF encoding

use Text::xSV; # Routines to process CSV files.

use File::Basename;

# Open and read the comma separated metadata file.

my $csv = new Text::xSV;

#$csv->set_sep(' '); # Use for tab separated files.

$csv->open_file("MSS2009.csv");

$csv->read_header(); # Process the CSV column headers.

# Constants for file and directory names.

$basedir = "/common/batch/input/mss/";

$indir = "$basedir/2009";

$xmldir= "./2009xml";

$imagesubdir= "processed_images";

$filename = "dublin_core.xml";

# Process each line of metadata, one line per item.

$linenum = 1;

while ($csv->get_row()) {

# This divides the item's metadata into fields, each in its own variable.

my (

$identifier,

$title,

$creators,

$description_abstract,

$issuedate,

$description,

$description2,

$abstract,

$gif,

$ppt,

) = $csv->extract(

"Talk_id",

"Title",

"Creators",

"Abstract",

"IssueDate",

"Description",

"AuthorInstitution",

"Image_file_name",

"Talk_gifs_file",

"Talk_ppt_file"

);

$creatorxml = "";

# Multiple creators are separated by ';' in the metadata.

if (length($creators) > 0) {

# Create XML for each creator.

@creatorlist = split(/;/,$creators);

foreach $creator (@creatorlist) {

if (length($creator) > 0) {

$creatorxml .= '<dcvalue element="creator" qualifier="none">'

.$creator.'</dcvalue>'."\n ";

}

} # Done processing creators for this item.

# Create the XML string for the Abstract.

$abstractxml = "";

if (length($description_abstract) > 0) {

# Convert special metadata characters for use in xml/html.

$description_abstract =~ s/\&/&/g;

$description_abstract =~ s/\>/>/g;

$description_abstract =~ s/\</</g;

# Build the Abstract in XML.

$abstractxml = '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="abstract">'

.$description_abstract.'</dcvalue>';

}

# Create the XML string for the Description.

$descriptionxml = "";

if (length($description) > 0) {

# Convert special metadata characters for use in xml/html.

$description=~ s/\&/&/g;

$description=~ s/\>/>/g;

$description=~ s/\</</g;

# Build the Description in XML.

$descriptionxml = '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="none">'

.$description.'</dcvalue>';

}

# Create the XML string for the Author Institution.

$description2xml = "";

if (length($description2) > 0) {

# Convert special metadata characters for use in xml/html.

$description2=~ s/\&/&/g;

$description2=~ s/\>/>/g;

$description2=~ s/\</</g;

# Build the Author Institution XML.

$description2xml = '<dcvalue element="description" qualifier="none">'

.'Author Institution: ' .$description2.'</dcvalue>';

}

# Convert special characters in title.

$title=~ s/\&/&/g;

$title=~ s/\>/>/g;

$title=~ s/\</</g;

# Create XML File

$subdir = $xmldir."/".$linenum;

system "mkdir $basedir/$subdir";

open(fh,">:encoding(UTF-8)", "$basedir/$subdir/$filename");

print fh <<"XML";

<dublin_core>

<dcvalue element="identifier" qualifier="none">$identifier</dcvalue>

<dcvalue element="title" qualifier="none">$title</dcvalue>

<dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">$issuedate</dcvalue>

$abstractxml

$descriptionxml

$description2xml

<dcvalue element="type" qualifier="none">Article</dcvalue>

$creatorxml

</dublin_core>

XML

close($fh);

# Create contents file and move files to the load set.

# Copy item files into the load set.

if (defined($abstract) && length($abstract) > 0) {

system "cp $indir/$abstract $basedir/$subdir";

}

$sourcedir = substr($abstract, 0, 5);

if (defined($ppt) && length($ppt) > 0 ) {

system "cp $indir/$sourcedir/$sourcedir/*.* $basedir/$subdir/";

}

if (defined($gif) && length($gif) > 0 ) {

system "cp $indir/$sourcedir/$imagesubdir/*.* $basedir/$subdir/";

}

# Make the 'contents' file and fill it with the file names.

system "touch $basedir/$subdir/contents";

if (defined($gif) && length($gif) > 0

&& -d "$indir/$sourcedir/$imagesubdir" ) {

# Sort items in reverse order so they show up right in DSpace.

# This is a hack that depends on how the DB returns items

# in unsorted (physical) order. There are better ways to do this.

system "cd $indir/$sourcedir/$imagesubdir/;"

. " ls *[0-9][0-9].* | sort -r >> $basedir/$subdir/contents";

system "cd $indir/$sourcedir/$imagesubdir/;"

. " ls *[a-zA-Z][0-9].* | sort -r >> $basedir/$subdir/contents";

}

if (defined($ppt) && length($ppt) > 0

&& -d "$indir/$sourcedir/$sourcedir" ) {

system "cd $indir/$sourcedir/$sourcedir/;"

. " ls *.* >> $basedir/$subdir/contents";

}

# Put the Abstract in last, so it displays first.

system "cd $basedir/$subdir; basename $abstract >>"

. " $basedir/$subdir/contents";

$linenum++;

} # Done processing an item.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-- import.sh --

#!/bin/sh

# Import a collection from files generated on dspace

COLLECTION_ID=1811/6635

EPERSON=[name removed]@osu.edu

SOURCE_DIR=./2009xml

BASE_ID=`basename $COLLECTION_ID`

MAPFILE=./map-dspace03-mss2009.$BASE_ID

/dspace/bin/dsrun org.dspace.app.itemimport.ItemImport --add --eperson=$EPERSON --collection=$COLLECTION_ID --source=$SOURCE_DIR --mapfile=$MAPFILE

Metadata Creation Practices in Digital Repositories and Collections: Schemata, Selection Criteria, and Interoperability, by Jung-ran Park and Yuji Tosaka

2010-08-31T17:51:00.000-07:00

This study explores the current state of metadata-creation practices across digital repositories and collections by using data collected from a nationwide survey of mostly cataloging and metadata professionals. Results show that MARC, AACR2, and LCSH are the most widely used metadata schema, content standard, and subject-controlled vocabulary, respectively. Dublin Core (DC) is the second most widely used metadata schema, followed by EAD, MODS, VRA, and TEI. Qualified DC’s wider use vis-à-vis Unqualified DC (40.6 percent versus 25.4 percent) is noteworthy. The leading criteria in selecting metadata and controlled-vocabulary schemata are collection-specific considerations, such as the types of resources, nature of the collection, and needs of primary users and communities. Existing technological infrastructure and staff expertise also are significant factors contributing to the current use of metadata schemata and controlled vocabularies for subject access across distributed digital repositories and collections. Metadata interoperability remains a major challenge. There is a lack of exposure of locally created metadata and metadata guidelines beyond the local environments. Homegrown locally added metadata elements may also hinder metadata interoperability across digital repositories and collections when there is a lack of sharable mechanisms for locally defined extensions and variants.

Batch Loading Collections into DSpace: Using Perl Scripts for Automation and Quality Control, by Maureen P. Walsh

2010-08-31T17:46:00.000-07:00

This paper describes batch loading workflows developed for the Knowledge Bank, The Ohio State University’s institutional repository. In the five years since the inception of the repository approximately 80 percent of the items added to the Knowledge Bank, a DSpace repository, have been batch loaded. Most of the batch loads utilized Perl scripts to automate the process of importing metadata and content files. Custom Perl scripts were used to migrate data from spreadsheets or comma-separated values files into the DSpace archive directory format, to build collections and tables of contents, and to provide data quality control. Two projects are described to illustrate the process and workflows.

Authentication and Access: Accommodating Public Users in an Academic World, by Lynne Weber and Peg Lawrence

2010-08-31T17:42:00.000-07:00

In the fall of 2004, the Academic Computing Center, a division of the Information Technology Services Department (ITS) at Minnesota State University, Mankato took over responsibility for the computers in the public areas of Memorial Library. For the first time, affiliated Memorial Library users were required to authenticate using a campus username and password, a change that effectively eliminated computer access for anyone not part of the university community. This posed a dilemma for the librarians. Because of its Federal Depository status, the library had a responsibility to provide general access to both print and online government publications for the general public. Furthermore, the library had a long tradition of providing guest access to most library resources, and there was reluctance to abandon the practice. Therefore the librarians worked with ITS to retain a small group of six computers that did not require authentication and were clearly marked for community use, along with several standup, open-access computers on each floor used primarily for searching the library catalog. The additional need to provide computer access to high school students visiting the library for research and instruction led to more discussions with ITS and resulted in a means of generating temporary usernames and passwords through a Web form. These user accommodations were implemented in the library without creating a written policy governing the use of open-access computers.

The Next Generation Library Catalog: A Comparative Study of the OPACs of Koha, Evergreen, and Voyager, by Sharon Q. Yang and Melissa A. Hofmann

2010-08-31T17:38:00.000-07:00

Open source has been the center of attention in the library world for the past several years. Koha and Evergreen are the two major open-source integrated library systems (ILSs), and they continue to grow in maturity and popularity. The question remains as to how much we have achieved in open-source development toward the next-generation catalog compared to commercial systems. Little has been written in the library literature to answer this question. This paper intends to answer this question by comparing the next-generation features of the OPACs of two open-source ILSs (Koha and Evergreen) and one proprietary ILS (Voyager’s WebVoyage).

Are Your Digital Documents Web Friendly?: Making Scanned Documents Web Accessible, by Yongli Zhou

2010-08-31T17:34:00.000-07:00

The Internet has greatly changed how library users search and use library resources. Many of them prefer resources available in electronic format over traditional print materials. While many documents are now born digital, many more are only accessible in print and need to be digitized. This paper focuses on how the Colorado State University Libraries creates and optimizes text-based and digitized PDF documents for easy access, downloading, and printing.

Announcing ITAL Preprints

2010-07-12T12:47:00.000-07:00

Beginning July 12, 2010, we will post preprints of forthcoming articles at the ITAL Web site. Preprints will be added when available and will be removed upon publication. At this time we have the following:

Kayla L. Quinney, Sara D. Smith and Quinn Galbraith
Bridging the Gap: Self-directed Staff Technology Training
José R. Hilera, Carmen Pagés, J. Javier Martínez, J. Antonio Gutiérrez and Luis de-Marcos
An Evolutive Process to Convert Glossaries into Ontologies
A. Malizia, P. Bottoni and S. Levialdi
Generating Collaborative Systems for Digital Libraries: a Model-Driven Approach
Marijke Visser and Mary Alice Ball
The Middle Mile: The Role of the Public Library in Ensuring Access to Broadband

June 2010 issue now online

2010-06-06T17:53:00.000-07:00

The table of contents and linked articles for the June issue are at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/292010/2902jun/toc.cfm. It can be accessed by all LITA members.

Editorial Board Thoughts: ITAL 2.0, by Andy Boze

2010-06-06T17:50:00.000-07:00

Starting with the September 2008 issue of ITAL we launched ITALica, the ITAL blog at http://ITAL-ica.blogspot.com/, as a pilot. ITALica was conceived as a forum for readers, authors, and editors of ITAL to discuss each issue. For a year and a half we’ve been open for reader feedback, and our authors have been posting to the blog and responding to reader comments. What’s your opinion of ITALica? Is it useful? What could we be doing to enhance its usefulness?

Usability Studies of Faceted Browsing: A Literature Review, by Jody Condit Fagan

2010-06-06T17:47:00.000-07:00

Faceted browsing is a common feature of new library catalog interfaces. But to what extent does it improve user performance in searching within today’s library catalog systems? This article reviews the literature for user studies involving faceted browsing and user studies of “next-generation” library catalogs that incorporate faceted browsing. Both the results and the methods of these studies are analyzed by asking, What do we currently know about faceted browsing? How can we design better studies of faceted browsing in library catalogs? The article proposes methodological considerations for practicing librarians and provides examples of goals, tasks, and measurements for user studies of faceted browsing in library catalogs.

Reducing Psychological Resistance to Digital Repositories. by Brian Quinn

2010-06-06T17:43:00.000-07:00

The potential value of digital repositories is dependent on the cooperation of scholars to deposit their work. Although many researchers have been resistant to submitting their work, the literature on digital repositories contains very little research on the psychology of resistance. This article looks at the psychological literature on resistance and explores what its implications might be for reducing the resistance of scholars to submitting their work to digital repositories. Psychologists have devised many potentially useful strategies for reducing resistance that might be used to address the problem; this article examines these strategies and how they might be applied.

Web Services and Widgets for Library Information Systems, by Godmar Back and Annette Bailey

2010-06-06T17:41:00.000-07:00

As more libraries integrate information from web services to enhance their online public displays, techniques that facilitate this integration are needed. This paper presents a technique for such integration that is based on HTML widgets. We discuss three example systems (Google Book Classes, Tictoclookup, and MAJAX) that implement this technique. These systems can be easily adapted without requiring programming experience or expensive hosting.

TUTORIAL: On the Clouds: A New Way of Computing, by Yan Han

2010-06-06T17:38:00.000-07:00

This article introduces cloud computing and discusses the author’s experience “on the clouds.” The author reviews cloud computing services and providers, then presents his experience of running multiple systems (e.g., integrated library systems, content management systems, and repository software). He evaluates costs, discusses advantages, and addresses some issues about cloud computing. Cloud computing fundamentally changes the ways institutions and companies manage their computing needs. Libraries can take advantage of cloud computing to start an IT project with low cost, to manage computing resources cost-effectively, and to explore new computing possibilities.

The New User Environment: The End of Technical Services?, by Bradford Lee Eden

2010-06-06T17:35:00.000-07:00

"Technical Services: an obsolete term used to describe the largest component of most library staffs in the twentieth century. That component of the staff was entirely devoted to arcane and mysterious processes involved in selecting, acquiring, cataloging, processing, and otherwise making available to library users physical material containing information content pieces (incops). The processes were complicated, expensive, and time-consuming, and generally served to severely limit direct service to users both by producing records that were difficult to understand and interpret, even by other library staff, and by consuming from 75–80 percent of the library’s financial and personnel resources. In the twenty-first century, the advent of new forms of publication and new techniques for providing universal records and universal access to information content made the organizational structure obsolete. That change in organizational structure, more than any other single factor, is generally credited as being responsible for the dramatic improvement in the quality of library service that has occurred in the first decade of the twenty-first century."

Ignored segregation: inaccessible websites

2010-03-12T15:07:00.000-08:00

I wrote my article, "Tending a wild garden..." as a paper while working on my Masters of Library Science. I was taking a class on "Resources and Services for People With Disabilities" and was amazed to learn how much of the Web is inaccessible to persons with visual and other impairments. I also was struggling to grasp the recommendations of the Web Accessibility Initiative and how it would affect my future work designing and maintaining library websites. My paper was a step in that direction.

It is sad that in a country that prides itself on equal rights for all that such an inequity lacks an adequate remedy in law. The current regulations and guidelines have no enforcement "teeth," and the only way to redress this is for persons with disabilities (PWD for short) to sue the worst offenders (e.g. Target).

According to a recent posting on the Accessibility Watch blog,
On 26 January 2010, the Federal IT Council (FITC) in Switzerland (Informatikrat des Bundes – IRB) accepted the changes to P028 Version 2.0 with unanimous consent. As a result of these changes, existing federal websites must meet WCAG 2.0 Level AA by 31 December 2010. New federal websites must meet this conformance level immediately.

Someday the U.S.A. will do better.

March 2010 issue now online

2010-03-11T11:40:00.000-08:00

The index and linked articles for the March issue are at http://www.lita.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/292010/2901mar/toc.cfm. It can be accessed by all LITA members.

A Partnership for Creating Successful Partnerships, by Carl Grant

2010-03-11T11:30:00.000-08:00

When Marc asked me to write this column I eagerly accepted because I feel strongly about libraries leveraging their role to their greater advantage in the rapidly changing information landscape. I see sponsorships and partnerships as an important tool for doing that. However, as noted in Marc’s column in this issue, we’d been having a discussion about the continuing involvement of Ex Libris in the LITA/Ex Libris Student Writing Award. Like many of you, we at Ex Libris are trying to keep our costs low in this challenging economic environment so that we can in turn keep your costs low. Thus we are closely evaluating all expenditures to ensure their cost is justified by the value they return to our organization. I won’t repeat the discussion already outlined by Marc above, but will just note with great pleasure his willingness to not only listen to my concerns, but to try and address them. His invitation to write this column was part of that response, a chance for me to share my thoughts and concerns with you about sponsorships and partnerships and where they need to go in the future.

To do that, I’d like to expand on some of the concepts Marc and I were discussing and talk about how to make sponsorships and partnerships successful. I want to look at what successful ones consist of as well as what types are needed in our profession tomorrow.

Editorial Board Thoughts: Issue Introduction to Student Essays, by Sandra Shores

2010-03-11T11:27:00.000-08:00

The papers in this special issue, although covering diverse topics, have in common their authorship by people currently or recently engaged in graduate library studies. It has been many years since I was a library science student—twenty-five in fact. I remember remarking to a future colleague at the time that I found the interview for my first professional job easy, not because the interviewers failed to ask challenging questions, but because I had just graduated. I was passionate about my chosen profession, and my mind was filled from my time at library school with big ideas and the latest theories, techniques, and knowledge of our discipline.

Monitoring Network and Service Availability with Open-Source Software, by T. Michael Silver

2010-03-11T11:24:00.000-08:00

Silver describes the implementation of a monitoring system using an open-source software package to improve the availability of services and reduce the response time when troubles occur. He provides a brief overview of the literature available on monitoring library systems, and then describes the implementation of Nagios, an open-source network monitoring system, to monitor a regional library system’s servers and wide area network. Particular attention is paid to using the plug-in architecture to monitor library services effectively. The author includes example displays and configuration files.

Tending a Wild Garden: Library Web Design for Persons with Disabilities, by R. Todd Vandenbark

2010-03-11T11:22:00.000-08:00

Nearly one-fifth of Americans have some form of disability, and accessibility guidelines and standards that apply to libraries are complicated, unclear, and difficult to achieve. Understanding how persons with disabilities access Web-based content is critical to accessible design. Recent research supports the use of a database-driven model for library Web development. Existing technologies offer a variety of tools to meet disabled patrons’ needs, and resources exist to assist library professionals in obtaining and evaluating product accessibility information from vendors. Librarians in charge of technology can best serve these patrons by proactively updating and adapting services as assistive technologies improve.

The Path toward Global Interoperability in Cataloging, by Ilana Tolkoff

2010-03-11T11:20:00.000-08:00

Libraries began in complete isolation with no uniformity of standards and have grown over time to be ever more interoperable. This paper examines the current steps toward the goal of universal interoperability. These projects aim to reconcile linguistic and organizational obstacles, with a particular focus on subject headings, name authorities, and titles.

Tagging: An Organization Scheme for the Internet, by Marijke A. Visser

2010-03-11T11:17:00.000-08:00

How should the information on the Internet be organized? This question and the possible solutions spark debates among people concerned with how we identify, classify, and retrieve Internet content. This paper discusses the benefits and the controversies of using a tagging system to organize Internet resources. Tagging refers to a classification system where individual Internet users apply labels, or tags, to digital resources. Tagging increased in popularity with the advent of Web 2.0 applications that encourage interaction among users. As more information is available digitally, the challenge to find an organizational system scalable to the Internet will continue to require forward thinking. Trained to ensure access to a range of informational resources, librarians need to be concerned with access to Internet content. Librarians can play a pivotal role by advocating for a system that supports the user at the moment of need. Tagging may just be the necessary system.

Dublin Core, DSpace, and a Brief Analysis of Three University Repositories, by Mary Kurtz

2010-03-11T11:14:00.000-08:00

This paper provides an overview of Dublin Core (DC) and DSpace together with an examination of the institutional repositories of three public research universities. The universities all use DC and DSpace to create and manage their repositories. I drew a sampling of records from each repository and examined them for metadata quality using the criteria of completeness, accuracy, and consistency. I also examined the quality of records with reference to the methods of educating repository users. One repository used librarians to oversee the archiving process, while the other two employed two different strategies as part of the self-archiving process. The librarian-overseen archive had the most complete and accurate records for DSpace entries.

Geographic Information Systems: Tools for Displaying In-Library Use Data, by Lauren H. Mandel

2010-03-11T11:11:00.000-08:00

In-library use data is crucial for modern libraries to understand the full spectrum of patron use, including patron self-service activities, circulation, and reference statistics. Rather than using tables and charts to display use data, a geographic information system (GIS) facilitates a more visually appealing graphical display of the data in the form of a map. GISs have been used by library and information science (LIS) researchers and practitioners to create maps that display analyses of service area populations and demographics, facilities space management issues, spatial distribution of in-library use of materials, planned branch consolidations, and so on. The “seating sweeps” method allows researchers and librarians to collect in-library use data regarding where patrons are locating themselves within the library and what they are doing at those locations, such as sitting and reading, studying in a group, or socializing. This paper proposes a GIS as a tool to visually display in-library use data collected via “seating sweeps” of a library. By using a GIS to store, manage, and display the data, researchers and librarians can create visually appealing maps that show areas of heavy use and evidence of the use and value of the library for a community. Example maps are included to facilitate the reader’s understanding of the possibilities afforded by using GISs in LIS research.

December 2009 issue now online

2010-01-06T16:20:00.000-08:00

The index and linked articles for the December issue are at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/282009/2804dec/toc.cfm.

Issue Introduction: What Do You Mean by “Discovery”?, by Judith Carter

2010-01-06T16:16:00.000-08:00

Mwuah ha ha ha haaa! Finally it’s my turn. I hold the power of the editorial. (Can you tell
I’m writing this around Halloween?) Seriously now, I’ve been intimately and extensively involved with Information Technology and Libraries for eleven years, yet this is the first time I’ve escaped from behind the editing scenes to address the readership directly. As managing editor for seven of the eleven volumes (18–22 and 27–28) and an editorial board member reviewing manuscripts (vols. 23–26), I am honored Marc agreed to let me be guest editor for this theme issue.

“Discovery” Focus as Impetus for Organizational Learning, by Jennifer L. Fabbi

2010-01-06T16:14:00.000-08:00

The University of Nevada Las Vegas Libraries’ focus on the concept of discovery and the tools and processes that enable our users to find information began with an organizational review of the Libraries’ Technical Services Division. This article outlines the phases of this review and subsequent planning and organizational commitment to discovery. Using the theoretical lens of organizational learning, it highlights how the emerging focus on discovery has provided an impetus for genuine learning and change.

Information Discovery Insights Gained from MultiPAC, a Prototype Library Discovery System, by Alex A. Dolski

2010-01-06T16:08:00.000-08:00

At the University of Nevada Las Vegas Libraries, as in most libraries, resources are dispersed into a number of closed “silos” with an organization-centric, rather than patron-centric, layout. Patrons frequently have trouble navigating and discovering the dozens of disparate interfaces, and any attempt at a global overview of our information offerings is at the same time incomplete and highly complex. While consolidation of interfaces is widely considered to be desirable, certain challenges have made it elusive in practice.

Usability as a Method for Assessing Discovery, by Tom Ipri, Michael Yunkin, and Jeanne M. Brown

2010-01-06T16:05:00.000-08:00

The University of Nevada Las Vegas Libraries engaged in three projects that helped identify areas of its website that had inhibited discovery of services and resources. These projects also helped generate staff interest in the Usability Working Group, which led these endeavors. The first project studied student responses to the site. The second focused on a usability test with the Libraries’ peer research coaches and resulted in a presentation of those findings to the Libraries staff. The final project involved a specialized test, the results of which also were presented to staff. All three of these projects led to improvements to the website and will inform a larger redesign.

UNLV Special Collections in the Twenty-First Century, by Thomas Sommer

2010-01-06T16:02:00.000-08:00

University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) Special Collections is consistently striving to provide several avenues of discovery to its diverse range of patrons. Specifically, UNLV Special Collections has planned and implemented several online tools to facilitate unearthing treasures in the collections. These online tools incorporate Web 2.0 features as well as searchable interfaces to collections.

Smartphones: A Potential Discovery Tool, by Wendy Starkweather and Eva Stowers

2010-01-06T16:00:00.000-08:00

The anticipated wide adoption of smartphones by researchers is viewed by the authors as a basis for developing mobile-based services. In response to the UNLV Libraries’ strategic plan’s focus on experimentation and outreach, the authors investigate the current and potential role of smartphones as a valuable discovery tool for library users.

Building Pathfinders with Free Screen Capture Tools, by Patrick Griffis

2010-01-06T15:57:00.000-08:00

This article outlines freely available screen capturing tools, covering their benefits and drawbacks as well as their potential applications. In discussing these tools, the author illustrates how they can be used to build pathfinding tutorials for users and how these tutorials can be shared with users. The author notes that the availability of these screen capturing tools at no cost, coupled with their ease of use, provides ample opportunity for low-stakes experimentation from library staff in building dynamic pathfinders to promote the discovery of library resources.

Enhancing OPAC Records for Discovery, by Patrick Griffis and Cyrus Ford

2010-01-06T15:54:00.000-08:00

This article proposes adding keywords and descriptors to the catalog records of electronic databases and media items to enhance their discovery. The authors contend that subject liaisons can add value to OPAC records and enhance discovery of electronic databases and media items by providing searchable keywords and resource descriptions. The authors provide an examination of OPAC records at their own library, which illustrates the disparity of useful keywords and descriptions within the notes field for media item records versus electronic database records. The authors outline methods for identifying useful keywords for indexing OPAC records of electronic databases. Also included is an analysis of the advantages of using Encore’s Community Tag and Community Review features to allow subject liaisons to work directly in the catalog instead of collaborating with cataloging staff.

Camtasia article

2009-11-24T11:40:00.000-08:00

Since writing this article I have moved on to different software that is very user friendly and is open source (FREE). It is produced by TechSmith and is called JING. I have created four flash tutorials in JING and they can be seen in the ASU Nursing LibGuide. Here is the link http://libguides.asu.edu/content.php?pid=4690&sid=401513 (Tab -Advanced Tutorials EBP)

The fourth flash tutorial can be found at the same link under the RefWorks tab and is moving citations from PubMed to RefWorks (the bibliographic management tool).

Unfortunately the streaming video "How to Order an Article that ASU Does Not Own" has been taken down. The ASU Libraries Online Learning Workgroup has decided to brand all videos on the tutorials web page. All of my videos that were created with Camtasia have been taken down.

Kathleen Carlson

From the Authors- Employing Virtualization in Library Computing: Use Cases and Lessons Learned

2009-10-09T13:02:00.001-07:00

One of the interesting things we discovered while writing our article is just how popular virtualization technology is in the private and corporate IT environment. However, it is utilized far less in academic and public library computing. We’re interested in hearing thoughts on why that seems to be the case.

Do library IT shops apply a more conservative approach to managing their resources? Does the lack of profit-based competition lead to less risk-taking with regard to new technologies? Or is it simply that virtualization might not be the best fit for library computing needs?
Or are we missing the point entirely?

September issue now online at ITAL Web site

2009-09-17T22:06:00.000-07:00

The index and linked articles for the September issue are at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/lita/ital/282009/2803sep/toc.cfm.

Delivering Information to Students 24/7 with Camtasia, by Kathleen Carlson

2009-09-17T22:01:00.000-07:00

This article examines the selection process for and use of Camtasia Studio software, a screen video capture program created by TechSmith. The Camtasia Studio software allows the author to create streaming videos which gives students 24 hour access on any topics including how to order books through interlibrary loan.

The Efficient Storage of Text Documents in Digital Libraries, by Przemysław Skibiński, et al

2009-09-17T21:58:00.000-07:00

In this paper we investigate the possibility of improving the efficiency of data compression, and thus reducing storage requirements, for seven widely used text document formats. We propose an open-source text compression software library, featuring an advanced word-substitution scheme with static and semidynamic word dictionaries. The empirical results show an average storage space reduction as high as 78 percent compared to uncompressed documents, and as high as 30 percent compared to documents compressed with the free compression software gzip.

Gender, Technology, and Libraries, by Melissa Lamont

2009-09-17T21:56:00.000-07:00

Information technology (IT) is vitally important to many organizations, including libraries. Yet a review of employment statistics and a citation analysis show that men make up the majority of the IT workforce, in libraries and in the broader workforce. Research from sociology, psychology, and women’s studies highlights the organizational and social issues that inhibit women. Understanding why women are less evident in library IT positions will help inform measures to remedy the gender disparity.

Success Factors and Strategic Planning: Rebuilding an Academic Library Digitization Program, by Cory Lampert, et al

2009-09-17T21:52:00.000-07:00

This paper discusses a dual approach of case study and research survey to investigate the complex factors in sustaining academic library digitization programs. The case study involves the background of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) Libraries’ digitization program and elaborates on the authors’ efforts to gain staff support for this program. A related survey was administered to all Association of Research Libraries (ARL) members, seeking to collect baseline data on their digital collections, understand their respective administrative frameworks, and to gather feedback on both negative obstacles and positive inputs affecting their success. Results from the survey, combined with the authors’ local experience, point to several potential success factors including staff skill sets, funding, and strategic planning.

Employing Virtualization in Library Computing: Use Cases and Lessons Learned, by Arwen Hutt, et al

2009-09-17T21:46:00.000-07:00

This paper provides a broad overview of virtualization technology and describes several examples of its use at the University of California, San Diego Libraries. Libraries can leverage virtualization to address many long-standing library computing challenges, but careful planning is needed to determine if this technology is the right solution for a specific need. This paper outlines both technical and usability considerations, and concludes with a discussion of potential enterprise impacts on the library infrastructure.

Adding Delicious Data to Your Library Website, by Andrew Darby and Ron Gilmour

2009-06-05T10:55:00.000-07:00

Social bookmarking services such as Delicious offer a simple way of developing lists of library resources. This paper outlines various methods of incorporating data from a Delicious account into a webpage. We begin with a description of Delicious Linkrolls and Tagrolls, the simplest but least flexible method of displaying Delicious results. We then describe three more advanced methods of manipulating Delicious data using RSS, JSON, and XML. Code samples using PHP and JavaScript are provided.