Strange Bedfellows

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Strange Bedfellows
The Ultimate Digital Library

• When Libraries, Vendors, and Dot-coms Meet

Where the New Information Players Meet
Insert shameless self-promotion here
www.ala.org/editions
Andrew K. Pace Head, Systems NCSU
Libraries andrew_pace_at_ncsu.edu
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Who is this guy?
for those of you not familiar with my
opinionated (and semi-informed) rants on
listservs, in CIL, SLN, AL, and from atop various
soapboxes.

• Graduated from library school in 1996
• Innovative Interfaces, 1996 - 1999
• first year on the Help Desk
• Product Manager WebPAC, Advanced Keyword,
  Z39.50,
• KidsOnline, Ereserves, etc.

• NCSU Libraries, 1999
• DRASIRSI Web2, laptop lending, MyLibrary,
  ebooks, etc.
• Liaison to Digital Library Initiatives
• self-appointed library ombudsman
• Journalistic Soapboxes
• Computers in Libraries, Coming Full Circle,
  2000-current
• Smart Libraries Newsletter, contributing editor,
  2002-2004
• American Libraries, Technically Speaking,
  2004-current

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(No Transcript)
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Strange bedfellows, indeed

• Libraries and Vendors
• The Dark Side Library Vendors
• The Conversation Sheep in Wolves clothing
• The Competition Internet dot-coms
• The Philosophical Bridge Standards

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The Dark Side

• Cant we all just get along?

The question of who is to do library
automationlibrarians or computer expertsis no
longer meaningful. --Richard De
Gennaro, 1968
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From Co-dependence to Co-development

• Market testing Development
• Vendor-Library partnerships
• Beware the homegrown backlash
• Getting Vendors to listen
• Listening to Vendors
• When mutual listening becomes conversation
• Stealing from the Best

Beast
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Market testing Development

• 1980-2000 ? Vendor developed product
  specifications (the vacuum plan)
• 2000-2004 ? Library developed product
  specifications (the table-turning plan)
• 2004 and beyond ? Co-developed product
  specifications

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Vendor-Library Partnerships

• Sun Communities of Interest / Centers of
  Excellence
• Cornell
• Duke University
• NCSU

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Vendor-Library Partnerships

• Ebooks.com Consultative Services

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Beware the Homegrown Backlash
Aut viam inveniam aut faciam

• Why I fear open source

• wheres the open source marketing?
• wheres the open source documentation?
• wheres the open source help desk?

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Getting Vendors to Listen
How about because. Is because good enough for
you?
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Getting Vendors to Listen
OpenURL

• NCSU Libraries
• 255 Online Databases from 70 providers
• Over 5000 full electronic journals
• 30,700 activated titles in our SFX Knowledge Base
• 12,735 distinct ISSNs
• Before SFX Implementation, EJournal Finder was
  searched 350,000 times in one year 40 more than
  the year before
• 9M annual collections budget
• 6M for serials
• 3.9M for print serials

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Why should publishers care as much as libraries
do?

• What goes around, comes around

• The Value Proposition if libraries want it, our
  providers should offer it

• MetaSearch needs standard data too

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Reciprocity Works

• The Web is a reciprocal environment
• If libraries and users want it, and OpenURL
  increases incoming traffic, its a win for
  everyone
• Publishers must be sources and targets

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Libraries Comparison Shop

• Shrinking budgets
• Increasing sophistication
• System development must match development needs
• ERM System evaluation

OpenURL Compliant?
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Killing Two Birds with One Stone

• Minimal metasearch records
• Cross-fertilization
• Developmental dove-tailing

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Getting Vendors to Listen
MetaSearch

• NCSU Libraries
• 255 Online Databases from 70 providers
• 125 metasearchabe (from 7 vendors)
• 130 not metasearchable (from over 75 vendors)

• Vendors
• Putting all of their resources into search
  instead of content and metadata normalization

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Getting Vendors to Listen
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that
all metadata are not created equal.
We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall
all hang separately.
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Dont Forget to Listen

• Radio Frequency IDs (RFID)
• Digital Asset Management (DAM)
• MetaSearch
• Electronic Resource Management (ERM)

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Classic Integrated System
MARC Records
Patron Records
Patron self-service
WEBPAC
circ transactions

• websites (856)
• e-books
• e-journals
• databases
• datasets

reserve records
item holdings
serial holdings
Acquisitions Records
Serials Control Records
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Dis-integrated Library System

• Licensing Files
• ILL Files
• Collection Management Files
• Helpdesk Files
• Statistical Files

alpha list of databases
subject list of databases
web subject guides
Authentication Authorization

• websites (856)
• e-books
• e-journals
• databases

e-journal finder
institutional repository
Serials Solutions
TDNet
SFX
alert services
MyLibrary
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Opportunities

• No entrenched legacy database
• New ILS and Oracle expertise
• End of MyLibrary development
• ? ad hoc e-matrix committee

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NCSU Libraries E-matrix

• The ad hoc E-Matrix Committee will implement a
  prototype electronic resources management system
  to support acquisition and licensing, collection
  management, and resource discovery for the
  Libraries' electronic resources

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NCSU Libraries E-matrix

• define the need
• survey best practices and related local and
  national initiatives
• define functional specifications for the system
• build a data model which maximizes opportunities
  for present and future interoperability with
  existing systems (e.g., ILS, MyLibrary, Serials
  Solutions, PeopleSoft) and utilization of
  existing or emerging standards (e.g., OpenURL,
  EDI, XML)
• implement a prototype.

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Electronic Resource Management
Vendor Efforts
Library Efforts

• Innovative Interfaces ERM
• Endeavor ENCompass
• Sirsi SingleSearch
• Ex Libris MetaLib
• CARL Goldrush
• EBSCO EJS
• MuseGlobal
• Various Ejournal Finders

• DLF Electronic Resource Management Initiative
• California Digital Library
• Cornell University
• Emory University
• Griffith University
• Johns Hopkins
• Kansas State University
• MIT
• Penn State
• Tri-CollegeConsortium
• UCLA
• University of Georgia
• University of Minnesota
• University of Washington
• Yale University

http//www.library.cornell.edu/cts/elicensestudy/
Or Googleweb hub
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E-MATRIX
ADMINISTRATIVE METADATA
licensing
I L S
Website Catalog E-resources Alert
Services Local DBs Collections Digital
Archives
Data Repos- itories
subscript-ion info
statistics
E-MATRIX
DATA HOOKS
PRESENTATION LAYER
technical support
remote access
Other Databases E-journal finder ETDs Instnl
Repository Etc.
evaluative data
Evaluative Tools
vendor data
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E-matrix Challenges

• Public interface is secondary concern
• Leveraging existing ILS data
• Adherence to emerging standards
• Avoid solutions looking for problems
• Get rid of the E-

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The Competition
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The worst level of Internet service that users
will accept is the best level of service they
have ever seen.
-paraphrased from Ron Dunn, Thomson
Learning National Online 1999
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User Focus

• Library
• Academic Disciplines
• Library Promotion
• Paid Subscription Access
• Current Awareness
• Personalized Links

• Business
• Credit Card Processing
• Chat
• Calendars (with user postings)
• Classified Ads
• Surveys / Polls
• Personalized Links

vs.
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Organizational Focus

• Business
• Money
• Money
• Money
• IPO
• Chapter 11
• Library School

• Library
• Teaching and Learning
• Information Literacy
• Careful Selection
• Human Contact

vs.
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Dear Library Users, We apologize for making this
so difficult...
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Radical Classification
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Radical Classification
Local Marc Subfield r c Core resource n
Narrowly related resource b Broadly related
resource
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Google-Style Quick-Search
Animal Control
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WebFeat
Muse Global
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Why a standard?

• Because doing something uniformly across your own
  platform is NOT a standard,
• and because wide adoption of a single solution is
  NOT a standard,
• and just because yours is better than anyone
  elses does not mean that it is any good.

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Standards to Watch

• OpenURL
• COUNTER
• Shibboleth

Fledgling Standards to Watch

• MetaSearch (NISO BA, BB, BC)
• SRW/SRU
• User Agent Identification

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Conclusions

• Leveraging information expertise
• Valleys, Plateaus, and Mountains
• Mutual Listening is called Conversation

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Even Strange Bedfellows Can Dream
http//www.lib.ncsu.edu/staff/presentations
Andrew K. Pace Head, Systems NCSU
Libraries andrew_pace_at_ncsu.edu