Developments in Library Technology: LMS and Discovery Trends

1. Developments and Trends in the LMS and Discovery Arenas Marshall Breeding Director for Innovative Technology and Research Vanderbilt University Library Founder and Publisher, Library Technology Guides http://www.librarytechnology.org/ http://twitter.com/mbreeding 26 August 2010 Stockholm Program on National Infrastructure

2. Seminar Goal • The aim of the seminar is to create an understanding of the infrastructural challenges and to contribute to a plan of action for the future. • Library Directors and System managers will discuss different solutions of availability and management of e- resources in order to make strategic choices for the development of the infrastructure at a national level.

3. Presentation Themes • Trends and recent developments in the library system market, • resource discovery services and resource management as indexing/knowledge bases • Creation and management of data wells for metadata • Ongoing discussion regarding options for building data wells in-house, open source or partneringwith commercial actors.

4. Summary • development and trends in the library system market, regarding resource discovery services and resource management as indexing/knowledge bases. If I should emphasize something special, it is the question of data wells for metadata. We have been investigating the data well question in a report (plesase see below, Summary in English) and there is a discussion about building data wells in-house, open source or with commercial actors. We have also invited three commercial actors to the seminar. Not an easy question!Related is also the topic of the national catalogue LIBRIS as a local OPAC for the libraries. How can Libris work as, not only the national catalogue, but also as a local OPAC? The third topic is the future for ExLibris, Metalib/SFX in Sweden. We´re happy with SFX, but not with Metalib/federated search, how to continue? But the main focus at the seminar will be resource management/data well, although Libris and Metalib/SFX questions need to be included in the discussions.   

5. Basic Discovery Concepts

6. Crowded Landscape of Information Providers on the Web • Lots of non-library Web destinations deliver content to library patrons • Google Search / Google Scholar • Amazon.com • Wikipedia • Ask.com

7. User expectations

8. Evolution of library collection discovery tools • Bound handwritten catalogs • Card Catalogs • Library online catalogs – OPACs • Next-Gen Catalogs / Discovery interfaces • Web-scale discovery services

9. Bound Catalog

10. Card Catalog

11. Online Card Catalog

12. Web-based online catalog

13. Next-generation Catalog

14. Next-generation Catalog

15. Modernized Interface • Single search box • Query tools • Did you mean • Type-ahead • Relevance ranked results • Faceted navigation • Enhanced visual displays • Cover art • Summaries, reviews, • Recommendation services

16. Web site as menu of search options

17. Disjointed approach to information and service delivery • Silos Prevail • Books: Library OPAC (ILS module) • Articles: Aggregated content products, e-journal collections • OpenURL linking services • E-journal finding aids (Often managed by link resolver) • Local digital collections • ETDs, photos, rich media collections • Metasearch engines • All searched separately

18. Lack of unified Web presence • User’s don’t understand the distinctions we make • Catalog? • Articles and Databases? • Digital Library? • Search our Site? • Search interfaces based on content formats or management applications • Non-library Web sites are much more unified

19. A simple vision Search: • A single point of entry to all the content and services offered by the library • …but with precision, nuanced sophistication, and multiple dimensions

21. Web-scale discovery

22. Online Catalog vs. Discovery Layer • Online Catalog • Interface conventions from an earlier Web era • Scope: Tied to the ILS and its content domain • Discovery Layer • Modern interface elements • Scope: aims to address broad range of components that constitute library collections

23. Discovery Products http://www.librarytechnology.org/discovery.pl

24. Decoupled from ILS

25. Social discovery • Tags, user-supplied ratings and reviews • Leverage social networking interactions to assist readers in identifying interesting materials: BiblioCommons • Leverage use data for a recommendation service of scholarly content based on link resolver data: Ex Libris bX service

26. Deep indexing • Metadata can no longer serve as the only basis for discovery • Increasing opportunities to search the full contents • Google Library Print, Google Publisher, Open Content Alliance, government publications, etc. • High-quality metadata will improve search precision • Commercial search providers already offer “search inside the book” and searching across the full text of large book collections • Important transition to full-text book search beginning in library projects • HathiTrust indexing 6 million volumes • Must become a routine component of library discovery • Deep search highly improved by high-quality metadata

27. Discovery product Trend • Initial products focused on technology • AquaBrowser, Endeca,Primo, Encore, VUfind • Mostly locally-installed software • Current phase focused on integrated access to both local content and remote articles to deliver Web-scale discovery. Examples: • Summon (Serials Solutions) • WorldCat Local (OCLC) • EBSCO Discovery Service (EBSCO) • Primo Central • Encore Synergy

28. Beyond Federated search • Federated Search / Metasearch use real-time queries against multiple information targets • No centralized index – presentation of dynamic results • Shallow results -- only a few results initially fetched from each target • Difficult to calculate relevancy • Performance challenges

29. Beyond local discovery interfaces • Pre-populated indexes • Web-scale • Exploits the full depth and breadth of library collections • Beyond the bounds of the local library’s collection • Targets the universe of objective, vetted library content

30. Pre-populated discovery services • New-generation interface • Harvested local content • ILS metadata • Institutional repositories, ETDs, Digital Collection platforms • Vendor-supplied indexes of library content • E-journals, databases, e-books • Full-text and metadata corresponding to e-content subscriptions • Book collections beyond local library collections • Includes full-text indexing to the fullest extent possible

31. Online Catalog ILS Data Search: Search Results

32. Federated Search ILS Data Digital Collections Search: ProQuest Search Results EBSCOhost … MLA Bibliography ABC-CLIO Real-time query and responses

33. Discovery Interface ILS Data Digital Collections Search: Local Index ProQuest Search Results EBSCOhost MetaSearch Engine … MLA Bibliography ABC-CLIO Real-time query and responses

34. Web-scale Search ILS Data Digital Collections Search: ProQuest EBSCOhost Search Results Consolidated Index … MLA Bibliography ABC-CLIO Pre-built harvesting and indexing

35. Web-scale Search + Federated Search ILS Data Digital Collections Search: ProQuest … Consolidated Index Search Results MLA Bibliography ABC-CLIO Pre-built harvesting and indexing FedSearch Non-harvestable Resources

36. Discovery  Delivery • Discovered content delivered through original repositories • Publisher agreements generally preclude exposing content for direct access • Should necessarily circumvent core role of publisher

37. Benefits • Libraries: increased access to high-cost electronic content • Users: Easer access to research resources • Publishers: Increased impact of content products • IT perspective: advance harvesting makes more efficient use of resources than simultaneous real-time queries

38. Toward a Large-scale National Discovery environment

39. Obstacles and Challenges • Scaleable technology platform • Acceptable relevancy-based retrieval for large heterogeneous collections • Acquisition of data and metadata for aggregated index

40. Opportunities • Climate more favorable to harvesting e-content for indexing • Highly scaleable, open source tools for discovery infrastructure • Lucene • SOLR • Many ongoing synergistic projects as possible collaborative partners

41. Potential Commercial Partners • Three commercial organizations will participate in the seminar: • Ex Libris • Serials Solutions • EBSCO • Each has negotiated access to commercial content products • Paved the way for library driven projects

42. Other similar projects

43. Summa • State and University Library of Denmark • Locally built integrated search • Catalogs + articles • Failed to receive EU funding due to lack of guarantees to receive article data from publishers • Now Partnering with Serials Solution to use article index from Summon via API

44. Trove • National Library of Australia • Previously called Single Business Discovery Project • Brings together many previously separate discovery systems • Built in-house at NLA • Prototype released May 2009 • Includes some full-text as well as metadata • Technology: Java, Lucene, SOLR, MySQL • Details: http://www.nla.gov.au/pub/gateways/issues/101/story01.html

45. What about OCLC? • WorldCat: ever expanding repository of metadata • Books mostly, increasing article metadata • Focused on expanding WorldCat for broad discovery • ArticleFirst 23 million records • April 2009 agreement with EBSCO for article metadata (withdrawn?). • Quantity of article metadata apparently not on track to attain the same level of comprehensiveness as seen in Summon, EDS, Primo Central

46. Developing the Data Well / Aggregated index • Aggregation of metadata and content • Normalization – map metadata to make indexing, facets, and presentation meaningful • De-duplication of records within and between content sources • FRBR – Collapsible groupings according to FRBR concepts: • work – expression -- manifestation – item

47. Content sources populating the Aggregated Index • Article metadata and full text • Index views according to profile • Coordinated with local OpenURL knowledge bases • Digital Collections • LMS Metadata • Books, Microfilm, periodical titles, DVD, etc • Blending of vendor provided metadata and locally managed unique content • At the cusp of being able to represent library collections comprehensively

48. Acquiring content for Aggregated Index • Agreements with publishers and providers of article content to libraries • Open access content • Any OAI target • Local digital collections • Relevant library catalog data • OK with OCLC record use policies when aggregated at a national level?

49. Data Well Construction • Technical • Assembling technologies of adequate scale and capacity • Indexing, Search and retrieval • Normalizing • Business / Political • Agreements with commercial publisher to provide metadata or content • Increasing expectation from libraries to allow harvesting for discovery • (Similar to COUNTER compliance, OpenURL support) • Improved performance at delivering library end users to publisher content

50. Relationship with OpenURL Knowledgebase • The aggregation of article-level citations and content relates to journal title-level profile and availability data in the OpenURL knowledgebase • Important source of profiling needed to deliver appropriate views of the index for different libraries.