Access to Reference Resources
In a Digital Environment
Michael Buckland
University of California, Berkeley
Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative
School of Information
SLIS, University of South Florida
Tampa, February 3, 2009
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Some ideas about learning. . . .
1. Understanding requires knowing the context. “Knowledge
is power” (Sir Francis Bacon) implies understanding
relationships.
2. So libraries should support finding the context of
anything! What? Where? When? Who? Whatever!
3. Best place to read is in a library among reference works.
4. The reference library has been largely forgotten in the
move of library services into an online environment.
5. Using reference resources online should be as easy as
Google and the Wikipedia to use and but also as reliable
as a library reference collection.
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In a paper environment, reading inside a library is the best
place to learn. It is well designed to explain the context!
How do we move this situation into an internet environment?
Text
Library resources
with a interesting
details.
Who was she?
Where is that?
What is this?
What else was
happening?
Encyclopedias
Atlases, place name
Biographical dictionaries
Bibliographies
Library catalog
Statistical series
etc., etc. . . . .
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Reader
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Present situation – 1
-- Definition: “For the purpose of the research agenda,
digital reference is defined . . . as the use of human
intermediaries to answer questions in a digital
environment.”
Empowerment of librarians is good, but library science is
really about designing services that empower library users,
an even higher goal.
Library reference service in a digital environment, Library
and Information Science Research 30, no 2 (2008): 81-85.
http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~buckland/libref.pdf
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Martin Schrettinger. 1772-1851 Forget the mind of God!
(or “Nature”). Use an arbitrary systematic arrangement.
New name: “Library science” 1808 -- 201 years ago.
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Present situation – 2: Stage of technology change.
Adoption of new technology typically in two stages:
First – Stage 1 - use new technology to do the same
thing better.
Second - Stage 2 - exploit the full capability of the new
technology to do different better things.
The Internet Public Library reference department is a
good example of Stage 1,
Time now for Stage 2! What would it look like?
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Emanuel Goldberg, b. Moscow, 1881; son of Grigorii Goldberg;
Univ. of Moscow, 1900-04; Ph.D w. Robert Luther, Leipzig Univ.,
1906; Assistant, Adolf Miethe, TU Charlottenburg, 1906-07; Prof,
Akad. f. graphische Künste, Leipzig, 1907-17; ICA, Zeiss Ikon,
Dresden, 1917-1933; Kinamo cine camera, 1921; microdots, 1925;
search engine, 1927; Contax 35 mm camera 1932; kidnapped by Nazi
SA; refugee in Paris, 1933-37; Laboratory, Palestine, Israel, 1937; d.
1970.
WHO?
Click a name to search for an internet resource.
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Emanuel Goldberg, b. Moscow, 1881; son of Grigorii Goldberg;
Univ. of Moscow, 1900-04; Ph.D w. Robert Luther, Leipzig Univ.,
1906; Assistant, Adolf Miethe, TU Charlottenburg, 1906-07; Prof,
Akad. f. graphische Künste, Leipzig, 1907-17; ICA, Zeiss Ikon,
Dresden, 1917-1933; Kinamo cine camera, 1921; microdots, 1925;
search engine, 1927; Contax 35 mm camera 1932; kidnapped by Nazi
SA; refugee in Paris, 1933-37; Laboratory, Palestine, Israel, 1937; d.
1970.
WHERE?
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Emanuel Goldberg, b. Moscow, 1881; son of Grigorii Goldberg;
Univ. of Moscow, 1900-04; Ph.D w. Robert Luther, Leipzig Univ.,
1906; Assistant, Adolf Miethe, TU Charlottenburg, 1906-07; Prof,
Akad. f. graphische Künste, Leipzig, 1907-17; ICA, Zeiss Ikon,
Dresden, 1917-1933; Kinamo cine camera, 1921; microdots, 1925;
search engine, 1927; Contax 35 mm camera 1932; kidnapped by Nazi
SA; refugee in Paris, 1933-37; Laboratory, Palestine, Israel, 1937; d.
1970.
WHAT?
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Context and relationships: Ireland and Irish Studies – Project diagram.
Any word, name, document, or event
Connect it with its context – and other resources.
Facet
Vocabulary
Displays
WHAT
Thesaurus
e.g. LCSH
WHERE
Gazetteer
WHEN
Period directory Timeline
WHO
Biograph. dict. Personal
e.g. Who’s Who relations
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Crossreferences
Any catalog: Archives,
Libraries, Museums, TV,
Publishers
Map
Reference resources
Any resource:
Audio, Images, Texts,
Numeric data, Objects,
Virtual reality, Webpages
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The “9 to 5” problem
The reference library is open from
9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Students are writing papers at home on laptops from
9:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m.
What is wrong with this situation?
What can librarians do about it?
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And other problems with the paper reference collection . . .
-- Designed for community, not for an individual.
-- Designed for many queries, not the current one.
-- Not volatile.
-- Guides but no index. One doesn’t really know where to
look. Little green lights on shelves indicating which
volumes mention this topic would be nice.
-- Multimedia in theory; bound volumes in practice.
-- Disconnect with work practices: Much error-prone notetalking and transcription.
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Building the functionality of a reference collection.
1. Context finder: Search support from text to
reference works.
2. Context builder: Make, retain notes and links to
reference works.
3. Context provider: Make reference works better
by adding two-way links, e.g. text has links to
place name list AND place name list has links to
texts.
Demos at http://metadata.berkeley.edu/demos/
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Initial sketch for
“Context Finding /
Building” interface.
Insert / block
text
Ranked
lists of
suggested
resources
for each
facet
chosen
Define
facet
Save search path
Save link & notes as
“stand-off” markup.
Display of
search result
Save link & notes as
embedded mark-up.
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Context Finder:
Ad hoc searches. Looking
outwards, not inwards!
FRAGMENT
CONTEXT
CORPUS
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Scanned text
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Named Entities
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Cursor over a name highlights every mention
of that name in the text.
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Named entities are linked to specific resources or
dynamic searches over relevant databases.
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Building the functionality of a reference collection.
1. Context finder: Search support from text to
reference works.
2. Context builder: Make, retain notes and links to
reference works.
3. Context provider: Make reference works better
by adding two-way links, e.g. text has links to
place name list AND place name list has links to
texts.
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Context Builder: Query,
source, result saved as
markup in text; and in notes.
FRAGMENT
CONTEXT
CORPUS
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Named entities not detected automatically can
be added manually.
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Initially, named entities are linked to keyword
searches at the appropriate name authorities and
metadata services. Here we see a number of
possible candidates for “Henry V”.
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-- Disconnect with work practices: Much error-prone notetalking and transcription.
The case of editing of historical papers . . .
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Building the functionality of a reference collection.
1. Context finder: Search support from text to
reference works.
2. Context builder: Making, retaining notes / links
to reference works.
3. Context provider: Enriching reference works by
adding reverse links, e.g. place name gazetteer
mentions where a place is mentioned in texts.
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Context Provider: Also
reverse links from resource
back to text. Now two-way!
FRAGMENT
CONTEXT
CORPUS
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Paper-based reference collection: Codex determines structure and use.
Reference Genre
Encyclopedia
Atlas, place list
Chronology
Biogr. Dictionary
Vocabulary
Topics
Places
Time
Persons
Displays
Cross-references
Maps
Timelines
Relationships
Facet
WHAT
WHERE
WHEN
WHO
Search
interest
Reversed in a digital environment: Metadata forms infrastructure.
Search
interest
Facet
Vocabulary
WHAT
Topics
WHERE Places
WHEN
Periods
WHO
Persons
Displays
Cross-references
Maps
Timeline
Relationships
Reference Genre
Encyclopedia
Atlas, place list
Chronology
Biogr.dictionary
Build a union index, so you know where too look! Little green lights!
http://metadata.berkeley.edu/demos/
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Importance of inverting the relationship between the part
and the whole:
-- Indexes are created by inversion
-- Union indexes: Tell you which reference work mentions
your query, like the Science Citation Index. . . as in
Google.
Use dynamic links to for real time searches the latest
version of the best resources; and, for vocabulary:
Search term recommender systems.
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A report on work by several people: Aitao Chen, Fredric
Gey, Ray Larson, Dan Melia, Barry Pateman, Vivien
Petras, Ryan Shaw, and others.
Work supported by two U.S. federal government agencies:
The Institute of Museum and Library Services and the
National Endowment for the Humanities.
Three projects:
- Support for the learner (2004-06) ecai.org/imls2004
- Biographical texts (2006-09) ecai.org/imls2006
- Irish Studies (2007-09) ecai.org/neh2007
Demos at http://metadata.berkeley.edu/demos/
buckland@ischool.berkeley.edu
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