More on Summon

I learned a bit more about Summon by reading my fellow classmate's review of the discovery layer.  She commented in her summary that Summon provides libraries with social media integration and allows tagging.  As I did not identify these features during my review, I referred back to the University of Sydney Library's catalog for further exploration.  I immediately noticed social media links near the top of the page, and am left wondering how on earth I missed them before.  I was not, however, able to locate the option to tag an item or a list of tags associated with an item.  Perhaps my fellow student was referencing another catalog which made use of this feature.  I did discover that Summon allows for the use of QR codes, which is pretty cool and state of the art.  The QR code stands for the permanent link, or the permalink, of the mobile version of the webpage for a particular item.  This eliminates the need for patrons to go through the archaic act of writing down the physical location of the item, as they can simply read the QR code with their mobile device and take that with them on their search through the stacks.  Finally, Summon allows users to rate an item, which simulates Amazon's user reviews.  Here is a screen shot containing the features I have discussed (click on it for a larger view)...

Adding social media integration and user contribution to the list of features offered by Summon means that it actually rates a 10 1/2 out of 12... not bad at all.  Libraries have realized that in order to remain relevant in the current technological landscape, the searching experience must be simple and intuitive, and must produce relevant results that are easy to navigate.  It seems that discovery tools are, if rather slowly, rising to the challenge of meeting the needs and expectations of users.

Discovery Layers and Summon

In class, we have been discussing the somewhat antiquated online discovery tools used to search library catalogs and the idea of a "next-generation" library catalog.  Both Proprietary and open source discovery layers are lagging behind commercial search engines in usability, web 2.0 features, and modern design, and are not meeting the expectations of the tech savvy library patrons of today.  We have all grown accustomed to the user friendly Google search box that corrects our mistakes and understands our intentions.  In order to remain relevant and competitive in the current and future information market, libraries desperately need to have these next generation catalogs that offer the user a method to easily search all library holdings through a single point of entry, faceted navigation that allows the user to easily and quickly refine her search, and additional features that enhance the user's experience.

As a part of this discussion, we were required to explore and analyze one particular discovery tool.  I chose to examine Summon 2.0, a commercial discovery layer created by Serials Solutions.  It is primarily intended for use by academic and research libraries, and is used by Dartmouth College Library, University of Sydney Library, and Western Michigan University.  Unlike most other discovery tools, in Summon, all incoming metadata is translated to a common schema before being entered into a single index for discovery.  This allows for highly relevant search results, which are easily navigated, regardless of the source provider.  By my calculations, Summon is pretty close to a next-generation catalog based on the twelve requirements outlined by Yang and Wagner, in their 2010 article Evaluating and Comparing discovery tools: how close are we towards next generation catalog?  Although Yang and Wagner credited Summon with having a state-of-the-art user interface, I'm not sure that I agree wholeheartedly with this assessment.  Really, none of the available discovery tools possess a truly technologically current and engaging user interface, but I guess that Summon's is as about as good as they get.  Three unique features that I found to be especially useful are:  1) an eye-catching bright yellow bubble indicating if a resource is accessible online 2) the recommendation of relevant specialized collections and databases based on a user's search and 3) a "keep search refinements" option under the search box, which allows the user to modify their search terms without having to reset chosen filters. 

All Serials Solutions products and services comply with industry standards and adhere to many common protocols and guidelines.  Some of these include: Dublin Core, MARC, OAI-PMH, Open URL, SOAP, SRU/SRW, XML, and Z39.50.

Here is a screen shot of one of my searches on the University of Sydney's Library site:

Notice the recommendation to use the database CINAHL for nursing and health information.

Examining Summon 2.0 was a helpful way to gain a deeper understanding of how discovery tools work and which features are most valuable to the user.

My Misadventures in Website Creation

So, as you learned from my previous post, I had to create a mock library website for the 2nd assignment in my Emerging Technological Trends in Information Access class.  I went into the project with very limited experience in website design and development, only having created one other mock website in my Media Productions class over the summer.  For that assignment, we used Google Sites, which I found to be fairly intuitive and user friendly, although I do remember having some difficulties getting my pages in the correct order.  In my opinion, the biggest drawbacks to Google Sites are user limitations on customization and personalization and the lack of added features (like social media buttons and mobile device plugins).  It is difficult to make a professional looking website specific to your needs with Google Sites.

For our website project in Emerging Technological Trends in Information Access, we used a host site... a concept that I was totally unfamiliar with.  Basically, WordPress is an open source blogging/website software that has to run on a server.  A web hosting service provides a user with space on their server and hosts the user's website in this way.  I also learned that WordPress.org and WordPress.com are two very different sites.  WordPress.org (which is what we used via BYET Host) is the website where the open source WordPress software is hosted along with thousands of free themes and plugins that you can use to modify and customize your website.  WordPress.com is a commercial website where a user can host a website for free, however there are limited themes from which to choose, no custom plugins, and limited storage space.  Also, your website created via WordPress.com will contain advertisements.  Blah.  WordPress.com does, however, relieve you from having to set up and maintain WordPress on your own server or through a web hosting site.  A library, small museum, or other such organization would want to use WordPress.org to power their website, either on their own server or through a host site, in order to take advantage of its increased functionality.

I created a mock website for the Edoras Community Library, with 5 pages including a library blog page.  You can check out my site here.  There is not a ton of content, but the point of the project was not to actually create a viable site but to simply master the skills needed to create a working website.  Here is a screenshot of the top part of the home page:

I can't stand websites that are too busy and chaotic; they just give me a headache.  So, it was important to me that my site be visually appealing but not so full of content as to scare potential users away.  I used lots of photographs and images because they add color and interest without creating a disorderly or jumbled page.

Although things went quite smoothly in the creation of my site, I did run into a few glitches in the process.  I had a difficult time selecting a theme, as I wanted a look that would catch the users attention (ie. not be too boring or generic) but that would also meet my specific needs.  I finally decided on the Two Thirteen, however I did change the heading design to another offered option.  I wanted the photo of the library to appear in the heading area as well, but after experimenting unsuccessfully with a heading widget, I had to settle for having the photo just below the heading in the right side widget area.  I didn't have any trouble inserting images via the Image Inserter plugin.  I did have some trouble getting them placed exactly where I wanted them on the teen page.  For some unknown reason, although there are spaces between the images when I edit the page, the hunger games image slightly overlaps the zombie image when I publish it.  I tried to remedy this for quite some time and finally gave up.  As I was moving widgets around, at one point, I inadvertently removed the Meta widget in the footer area, which left me with no way to login to my site!  After a few minutes of panic, I went to work trying to figure out how to access my site.  I finally realized/remembered that if I added /wp-admin to my website URL, I could access the login page to reach my dashboard.  Whew.  As I said in my earlier post, the most time consuming part of the process for me was experimenting with plugins.  I attempted to install the WP Smart Mobile plugin, but was unable to for some reason.  I ended up using the WP Mobile plugin instead, which seems to be working well when I access my site with my iPhone.  What I don't like about it though is that all the information in the right side column is displayed below the main information.  This means that the user has to scroll way down before getting to the photo of the library, the social media icons, and the library hours.  It is nice that the content fits on the screen though, and no sideways scrolling is necessary.  I also like that the pages are listed in a drop down menu, so the user can access the various pages but the menu is not always open and in the way.  I also used a business hours widget to display the library hours of operation.  I definitely wanted to have these shown on every page, but I wish that the widget presented this information in a more compact manner.  I do like that the hours for whatever day it actually is are listed at the very top. 

All in all, although I could have spent many more hours experimenting with and perfecting my website, I'm mostly pleased with my end product.  I do think that this was a valuable assignment, and I enjoyed getting a bit of experience with WordPress.  I do believe that I could now design and develop, through WordPress, a useful and aesthetically pleasing library website!

Website Creation Reflections

For a class assignment, I was required to create a mock library website via wordpress.  Here are my initial reflections on the process...

I did not encounter any difficulties in setting up my website, thanks to the explicit instructions of Dr. Oguz.  Once I had installed the wordpress script and reached my dashboard, I experiemented for quite a while with themes.  I decided that a two column layout would work best for my purposes.  After trying the Two Twelve, the Catch Evolution, and several others whose names I no longer remember, I chose the Two Thirteen.  The Two Thirteen is actually not set up as a two column site (although there is a side widget area provided), so I had to move the available widgets around to create a right side column.  Trying out the various plugins was by far the most time intensive part of the process for me.  I ended up installing quite a few plugins, but these are the ones that I ultimately used on the site:  Business Hours, Contact Form 7, Faster Image Insert, Image Widget, Slideshow, Social Media Icons Widget, and WP Mobile Plugin.  I had a difficult time getting a captcha plugin to work on my site, and I ended up installing three (SI Captcha Anti-Spam, Really Simple Captcha, and Captcha Code).  At this point, I'm not 100% positive which one is working, but I'm pretty sure it is the SI Captcha Anti-Spam.  I'm not sure why the first two that I tried did not work... I can only guess that they were perhaps incompatible with the theme for some reason.?.  I found it very simple to add users to the site and define their roles.  I made the home page a static page and created a separate blog page entitled Library News Blog.  I don't have a great deal of content on the site, but I do believe that I managed to naviagate the process of creating the necessary elements of a library website.

Does Digitization Equal Preservation?

I have been thinking a lot about the ephemeral nature of digital content, and I wonder whether or not artifacts, materials, and objects can be preserved through digitization.  I have long worried about having the majority of my photos, records of my children's growth and lives, stored in a computer.  I am not someone who is especially attached to material things; however, the loss of these would certainly cause me great sadness.  Memories, like digital content, are quite elusive and transient, and photographs provide us with a tangible access point to them.  The visible image carries our mind back to that moment in time and allows us entry to particular memories associated with the image.  Often, there must be some sort of a trigger that helps us to locate where a certain memory is stored in our brain, so, in effect, the loss of those photos would possibly prevent my access to the memories associated with them.

When my son was born, digital cameras where still a new and expensive phenomenon.  Therefore, all the pictures I have of him are what I like to call "real" photographs that were developed professionally in a darkroom using nasty chemicals to transfer the image from film to paper.  I have several very large photobooks containing the many (and, I do mean many) photos that were taken in the first two years of his life... and barring some tragedy like a fire or flood, I will always have these.  They will never fade away, and I will pass them on to my son when he becomes an adult so that his children can have a glimpse into our lives at those moments.  When my daughter was born, I had retired my "real" camera and plunged into the world of digital images.  There are two troubling results of my conversion to a digital camera.  First of all, I have very few printed images of my daughter.  I have lots of digital images stored in my computer, but I actually printed very few of these out for display or general viewing.  Of course, as is sadly always the case, there are just not as many pictures taken of a second child (and I really do feel for the third child, who is lucky to have a few photographs documenting their arrival into the world).  However, even taking that into account, there are a paltry number of physical images of my daughter.  Secondly, there are no "real" photographs of my daughter that will resist fading away to nothing and can be passed down to her and her children.  There are no physical photographs of her that will last the test of time.  I find this worrisome, given the unreliable nature of digital content.

Which brings me to the idea of digitization as preservation.  Smith says that digitization is not for preservation.  We agreed in my LIS 644 class that digital libraries are about providing access to objects, images, and sounds.  A digital library is all about user access.  We discussed ways that digitization might be viewed as a form of preservation... it can preserve an artifact that has deteriorated to an unusable degree, and it can also preserve an artifact that is in good physical condition by preventing it from being handled excessively.  I guess one's perception of the term determines whether or not they view digitization as a valid form of preservation.  The simplest definition of preservation is "to keep up, maintain", which can be interpreted many different ways.  A simple definition of historic preservation is "an endeavor that seeks to preserve, conserve, and protect buildings, objects, landscapes, or other artifacts of historical significance".  I tend to think of preservation in terms of a physical object or artifact; therefore, I can't say that I view digitization as preservation.  I do understand that digitization can offer users access to an item that they would not otherwise have, and there is certainly value in that.  However, it is not access to the actual item, and for me there is a difference.  In the absence of the original, it is better than nothing, but it is not equal to the original.  Digitization does nothing to preserve the original artifact, and actually diminishes it in some way.  Some information contained in an artifact is lost in each successive manifestation of it; therefore when a physical item is digitized, an inherently inferior item is created.  In my opinion, digitization does not equal preservation.