Pathway to the Future:
Library Bibliographic Services
st
for the 21 Century
Amy Kautzman UCB
Patti Martin CDL
University of California Overview
• 10 Campuses
• 10 ILS (Endeavor, ExLibris, III, home
grown)
• Melvyl (UC union catalog)
• Shared Cataloging Program
A Wake-Up Call
“Our users expect simplicity and immediate
reward and Amazon, Google, and iTunes
are the standards against which we are
judged.”
Things are not ok
“The current Library catalog is poorly
designed for the tasks of finding,
discovering, and selecting the growing set
of resources available in our libraries …”
“We offer a fragmented set of systems to
search for published information …”
Increased recognition that:
• Bibliographic systems are the foundation of
library services
• Metadata is valuable and strategic
• Libraries are filled with undiscoverable yet
extremely valuable material
• Examples to learn from: OCLC WorldCat,
RedLightGreen, NCSU’s new catalog, etc.
The Time is Right
“The combined effect of these pressures
suggests that the time has come to thoroughly
review library bibliographic services and
practices, workflows, and technologies”
UC University Librarians appoint Bibliographic
Services Task Force, April 2005
The Charge (simplified and shortened)
• Inventory the middleware, workflow and
processes involved
• Identify the problems that need to be solved
• Develop a vision and design principles for a new
bibliographic services environment
• Identify potential actions
• Deliver a report with recommendations and
priorities
Bibliographic Services Task Force
• John Riemer, (Chair, UCLA)
Head, Cataloging and Metadata Center
• Luc Declerck (UCSD)
Associate Univ. Librarian, Technology and Technical Services
• Amy Kautzman (UCB)
Head of Research and Collections: Doe/Moffitt Libraries
• Patti Martin (CDL)
Bibliographic Services Manager
• Terry Ryan (UCLA)
Associate University Librarian for the UCLA Electronic Library
In the (almost) Beginning
Thanks to MARC
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001 0 eng
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020 $a 0195161998 (alk. paper)
035 $a (Sirsi) i0195161998
040 $a DLC $c DLC $d DLC $d OrLoB-B
042 $a pcc
049 $x jek
05000 $a BS651 $b .S54 2004
08200 $a 213 $2 21 1001 $a Shanks, Niall, $d 195924510 $a God, the devil, and Darwin : $b a critique of intelligent design theory / $c Niall Shanks.
260 $a Oxford ; $a New York : $b Oxford University Press, $c 2004.
300 $a xiii, 273 p. ; $c 22 cm.
504 $a Includes bibliographical references (p. 259-268) and index.
50500 $t Foreword / $r Richard Dawkins -- $t Introduction: The Many Designs of the Intelligent Design Movement -- $g
1. $t The Evolution of Intelligent Design Arguments -- $g 2. $t Darwin and the Illusion of Intelligent Design -- $g 3.
$t Thermodynamics and the Origins of Order -- $g 4. $t Science and the Supernatural -- $g 5. $t The Biochemical
Case for Intelligent Design -- $g 6. $t The Cosmological Case for Intelligent Design -- $t Conclusion: Intelligent
Designs on Society.
596 $a 1
The Library ILS
Non-ILS Metadata Systems
Electronic
research
databases
Archival
Systems
Digital
Library
Collections
Silos
Everywhere!
Institutional
Repositories
Pathfinders
Course Management Systems
Examples of Libraries Moving
into the Future
Enhancing Search and Retrieval
•
•
•
•
Provide users with direct access to item
Provide recommender features
Support customization/personalization
Offer alternative actions for failed
searches
– Spelling
– Suggestions for no results
Cont.
• Offer better navigation of large sets of
research results
• Deliver bibliographic services where the
users are
– Course management systems, campus
portals
– Expose metadata to search engines
• Provide relevance ranking and leverage
full-text
And now, looking behind the curtain …
Rearchitecting the OPAC
• Create a single catalog interface for all UC
• Support searching across the entire
bibliographic space
Adopting New Cataloging Practices
• Rearchitect cataloging workflow
• Select the appropriate metadata scheme
• Manually enrich metadata in important
areas
• Automate metadata creation
Resuscitate Metadata
•
•
•
•
Metadata matters
Make metadata work harder
Avoid complexity that doesn’t add value
Add more metadata to support better
services
Metadata is more than MARC
• MARC, Dublin Core, VRA Core, METS
• TOCs, book reviews, abstracts
• User comments, folksonomies, added
information
• Data mining of full text, records of use,
relationships
Make Metadata Work Together
ONIX & MARC
DUBLIN CORE & VRA
MARC & User Tags
Work Smarter
• Adopt metadata created elsewhere
• Create and maintain records in one place
• Move from shared cataloging to
collaborative cataloging
• Focus on being good enough instead of
perfect
• Generate more management information
The Report Strikes a Chord
• Strong interest within the University of
California
• Immediate community reaction
– Report hit the blogs
– Interviews by the Library press
– Invitations to present at conferences
– Guest lectures at library schools
Lita Blog: January 26 2006 KG Schneider
“If there is one meta-trend I am seeing
right now, it is this: librarians are getting
frisky. We’re talking back, questioning
authority, and in some cases taking names
and kicking booty, as Andrew Pace did
recently with the NCSU catalog (Andrew,
can we call your OPAC “Miss Piggy”?) and
as the UC system did with its must-read,
put-this-under-your-pillow, OMG-this-is-hot
BSTF Report.
Why the Buzz?
Report gives voice to some popular
opinions
– Our services must be user driven
– Our services need to be delivered where the
users are
– Libraries need to act boldly if we are to
reclaim our role in the information space
– Libraries still have a unique value-add to offer
Why the Buzz?
Report gives voice to some controversial
perspectives
– Our assumptions about metadata should be
re-examined
– Metadata practices need to have proven
value
– An intuitive interface is not by definition
“dumbed down” or anti-scholarly
Why the buzz?
Report challenges current practices
– Our catalogs are poorly designed
– Our bibliographic systems are fragmented
– Our bibliographic data dispersed
– Our workflows are cumbersome
– Work is duplicated
What Next?
Campuses and UC committee feedback
was due by March 31, 2006
Four questions
– Which 3-5 recommendations are most
important?
– Which specific recommendations should we
do first?
– Are there any recommendations to add?
– Are there any recommendations we should
NOT pursue?
Preliminary UC Feedback:
Popular recommendations
I. Enhancing Search and Retrieval
– I.1 Direct access to item
– I.4 Offer alternatives for failed searches
– I.5 Better navigation of large result sets
– I.6 Deliver services where the users are
– I.8 Better searching for non-Roman
Preliminary UC Feedback:
Popular recommendations
II. Re-architecting the OPAC
– II.1 Single catalog interface for all of UC
– II.2 Search across the entire info space
III. Adopting New Cataloging Practices
– III.1 Re-architect cataloging workflow
Preliminary UC Feedback:
Recommendations we love to hate
– III.2.c Consider abandoning controlled
vocabulary for topical subjects
– III.1.a Option 2: consolidate cataloging
into one or two centers across
the state
Surprises? Not really
Intelligent & well-intentioned people can
disagree
– Not all agree that change is urgent or we’re
doomed
– All agree that we need to preserve our values
while changing practices, but not all agree on
what is a value and what is a practice
Surprises? Not really
Recommendations are difficult to discuss
in the abstract
– Many of the underlying concepts are not well
understood without explanation
– Many can’t endorse a recommendation if they
don’t know how it will be funded
– Many are skeptical about the feasibility of
accomplishing the recommendations
Surprises? Not really
People have trouble moving beyond their
expectations of current systems
– Many look at the examples that illustrate
concepts and think the change will look the
same
– Many assume we will implement with the
same technology and/or the same
organization
Surprises!
• Fear of making the system “too easy”
– “If they don’t need to ask us how to use it, we
lose a teachable moment”
– “If the system looks like Google, the rich
diversity of our collections is lost”
• Belief that only undergraduates are
demanding change
– “Undergraduates need an easy system but
true scholars like to see the complexity”
Surprises!
• Fear that the new system envisioned will
offer less flexibility than our current
systems
– “A Google-like search box may work fine if
you just need a few good things, but won’t
support scholarly research”
– “Our users and collections are too diverse to
be served by a single solution.”
Next Steps:
Moving from vision to decision
Apr 06 -
Analyze feedback and provide
report to the University Librarians
Jun 06 - University Librarians decide on
actions
Jul 06 - Task Force reconvenes to develop
action plans
http://libraries.universityofcalifornia.edu/sopag/BSTF/Final.pdf