Hesburgh Library > DAIAD > Annual Report 2003-2004

DAIAD Annual Report 2003-2004

This text first summarizes the major developments of the Digital Access and Information Architecture Department (DAIAD) from July 2003 to July 2004.

In summary, the first half of the year the Department facilitated many digital library activities such as the Virtual New Bookshelf, Electronic Theses and Dissertations, intranet server, syndicating content to the campus-wide portal, and participating in the sponsored NSF grant called OCKHAM. The second half of the year was consumed with activities surrounding the redesign of the Libraries' external website.

The Department's goals for the coming year fall into three categories: 1) facilitating improved campus-wide search, 2) taking the website to the next level, 3) exploring ways to facilitate more digital library services against digital library collections.

Major developments and activities

This section outlines the major developments and activities of the Department. These developments do not negate the ongoing maintenance and support the Department provides to the Libraries when it comes to digital library services and collections.

Campus-wide portal and MyLibrary

Working in conjunction with the Portal Manager of OIT (Larry Latarte), the MyLibrarians group (Aaron Bales, Cheryl Smith, David Jenkins, Doug Archer, Laura Bayard, Linda Sharp, Margaret Porter, Parker Ladwig, Sherri Jones, Stephen Hayes, and Thomas Lehman), and the Department's Sr. Analyst/Programmer (Rob Fox), DAIAD facilitated an automated process to syndicate library content to the campus-wide portal. The process is an infinite loop where:

1. selectors identify content for the portal
2. selectors enter metadata describing the content into a database
3. the portal requests content from the library database
4. the database returns content in the form of an XML stream
5. the portal transforms the content into HTML and displays in a browser
6. selectors evaluate the process and begin again at Step #1

While the campus-wide portal has only recently become truly campus-wide, it is increasingly a good idea for the Libraries to be aware of the portal and proactivley syndicate content to it.

COCAO

Working with COCAO project leaders (Linda Sharp, Cheryl Smith, Joni Kansler, and Laura Fuderer) the Department's Web Developer (Elaine Savely) helped create a set of Web-based multimedia information literacy modules. These modules were a part of a grant project lead by the University of Michigan.

Through this process the Department learned how time- and work-intensive the process is to create multimedia for the Web.

DigiTool

Team DigiTool (Tom Hanstra, Mandy Havert, Lou Jordon, Mary Claire McKeown, Ben Panciera, Joe Ross, and Sara Weber) explored the functionality of a digital asset management program from ExLibris called DigiTool.

The program functioned as described by ExLibris, but the process of using it was not very easy. Data-entry was very MARC record-centric making it difficult, if not impossible, to allow non-librarians to use the tool. The end user interface was difficult to customize because of the proprietary nature of the software. The newest version of DigiTool has made significant improvements to the administrative interface that may overcome the data-entry limitations. The end user interface issues may be resolvable through the use of ExLibris's MetaLib.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Electronic Theses and Dissertations Project came to an end. A number of people throughout the Libraries (Deborah Huyvaert, Mary Claire McKeown, Diane Wilson, Bart Burk, and Michelle Stenberg) as well as the University Graduate School (Shari Hill) worked together to implement the system conceived by computer scientists at Virginia Tech.

The system is now a production service. The Graduate School does not require students to submit their theses and dissertations electronically, but students are encouraged to do so. As theses and dissertations are submitted, they are passed to the Libraries for processing in the Cataloging Department. When the cataloging is complete the theses and dissertation are made available on the Web via searchable and browsable interfaces. The Project is deemed a success, but the Libraries still needs to implement a preservation/data migration policy for the materials.

Explorations into search

Rob Fox, the Department's Digital Access Librarian (Tom Lehman) and Department's Head (Eric Lease Morgan) each explored the use of an application called swish-e to index and provide searchable interfaces to content.

Swish-e is an open source indexer/search engine. It can index plain text files as well as structured documents such as XML data. Using various plug-ins it can index various binary formats such as Microsoft Word documents and Portable Document Format (PDF) files. The search engine supports all the functions librarians have come to expect (Boolean operations, phrase and field searching, nested queries, etc.). The Department has used swish-e to index the Libraries' intranet staff directory, a combined set of serial titles from Aleph and SFX, various mailing list archives, and the content of the Libraries' database-driven website application. A standard Web Service protocol called Search/Retrieve via URL (SRU) has been implemented against swish-e indexes. Swish-e has proven to be an excellent addition to the Department's digital library toolbox.

Intranet

Tom Lehman, Elaine Savely, and others from Team Intranet (David Williams, Melody Eiteljorge, and Trudie Mullins) recreated the Libraries' intranet implementation. Using their experience gained from library-wide surveys, usability studies, and content management explorations, the Intranet was redesigned. The center piece of the system is the staff directory. Not only does it provide more accurate information than the campus directory, it provide more library-specific information such as committee membership. Others in the libraries are taking programmatic advantage of the staff directory and including it into their systems.

The Intranet could be a more effective communication tool if it were updated with content by library personnel more regularly. Content could include but not limited to: plans, goals, objectives, missions, reports, minutes, mailing list archives, policies, procedures, etc.

OCKHAM

In September a National Science Foundation Digital Libraries grant called OCKHAM was sponsored. Eric Morgan is a co-PI of this grant along with Martin Halbert (Emory University), Ed Fox (Virginia Tech), and Jeremy Frumkin (Oregon State University).

While no dollars actually came to the Notre Dame, the Department has articulated a protocol and procedure for implementing an alerting service. An outside consultant has been hired to write such an application using the protocol (SRU). After getting off to a slow start, Notre Dame's part of the grant is progressing nicely and on schedule.

Virtual New Bookshelf

Tom Lehman and Rob Fox implemented a Web-based Virtual New Bookshelf (VNB) application. It works by:

1. adding a date stamp to bibliographic record as cataloging is completed
2. dumping records no older than three months from the catalog
3. importing these "new" records into a second database
4. querying the second database for items in specific subject areas
5. making the results of these queries accessible to library users
6. returning to Step #1

This is a production service, and many subject librarians now use the Virtual New Bookshelf as a replacement for their older cut/paste method for creating new book lists. It is imagined that the alerting service developed through OCKHAM will build on the functionality of the VNB.

Website redesign

Nearly half of the Department's time was spent this past year in website redesign efforts. In conjunction with Team Redesign (Aaron Bales, Carole Pilkinton, Jim Gosz, Joni Warner, Linda Sharp, Scott Van Jacob, Sherri Jones, and Sue Dietl), these efforts included:

• Getting user input - An online survey consisting of 950 responses and fifty pages of narrative texts told Team Redesign what users expect from the Libraries' website. The survey's results were backed up and qualified through ongoing focus group interviews with the Web Advisory Group consisting of faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students. Usability studies against proposed graphic designs did not show up any crippling deficiencies.
• Writing a strategic plan - A strategic plan was written articulating the role it plays within the Libraries, who are the people it serves, and what content it disseminates. The plan, while taking a long time to write, has given direction to the Libraries in regards to its Web presence.
• Implementing technology - Technology is a definitive characteristic of a website. The Department and Team Redesign defined what computer technology was required to implement our vision of the website. This included setting up the appropriate hardware, designing a relational database, and witting software allowing the Libraries to do input/output against the database. This software could be called Sonne of MyLibrary, and it will play a significant role in the future of the website. Other implementations of technology included the use of Macromedia Contribute as an HTML editor. This application, while not perfect, had definitely solved more problems than it has created, and it too is has become an indispensable part of website creation and maintenance.
• Designing layout - Much of Team Redesigns efforts were spent trying to graphically layout information on Web pages. This was not time well spent. What the Libraries knows in the bibliographic organization of information it lacks in the visual organization of information. It has been very difficult to build and sustain consensus regarding these issues. Despite this, many pages and sub pages have been graphically layed out, agreement on the decisions is tenuous.
• Implementing policies and procedures - As our Go Live date (August 9) comes closer, the need for specific policies and procedures increases. Examples include support issues, what vocabulary is going to be used to describe things, what is a "Best Bet", and how are records appropriately cataloged in the integrated library system. This has been challenging but not as challenging as the graphic design issues.

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Date created: 2004-07-23
Date updated: 2004-07-23
URL: http://www.library.nd.edu/daiad/annual-report-2003/