Emerging technologies in academic libraries

Editor's Notes

1. Cover page
2. A typical academic library organization chart. This presentation is for you if you no matter where you work in the library.
3. This presentation highlights some services available at libraries in the Washington Research Library Consortium, or that the speaker learned about through conferences, listservs, and the graduate program in Library and Information Science, Catholic University of America (CUA(.
4. Let’s start with the Administration office of the library. Here now: tables, Excel, maybe some charts and graphs. What’s next: interactive visualizations.
5. Tableau shown here; IBM’s Watson is coming soon. The link on the slide goes to a demo of the visualization shown in the screenshot. Administrators need good data, and to be able understand the data in order to: know the return on investment, use data driven decisions, and to advocate for the library.
6. Research & Instruction Librarians / staff may become more and more involved with Digital Humanities or Digital Scholarship projects. They need new skills to provide expert services.
7. IF the library chooses to provide support for Data Management, this area is a relatively new development that could impact on staffing requirements. Some libraries have Data Services Librarians and / or Data Services Centers. This video is a funny look at the problem of getting researchers to comply with data management mandates.
8. Almost all “modern” software provides an application programming interface. At GWU we use several API’s in a custom library catalog we built (the library IT name for it is “launchpad”) part one of this slide. Part two of this slide: Here is an example of our Python code to call the HathiTrust API.
9. Here is how the Internet Archive API looks in practice. When the system gets a search request for a book it checks the Internet Archive API for a free, full-text copy of the same title. If the API finds one available, our system adds a link to the catalog holding list (part one of this slide). Then the patron can access the book online (part two of this slide)
10. Another custom enhancement we made to GWU’s catalog is the ability for a patron to request a print copy of an electronic holding. (Part one of this slide shows holdings for a title, part two shows the RUSH Print request). Demand Driven or “Patron Driven” acquisition is a feature the library wants to support. The feature impacts other areas beside public services of course – acquisitions and collection development.
11. Technology that supports remote reference is free or relatively inexpensive. GWU librarians use a variety of tools like Jing and Camtasia to record “how do I…” videos and to interact with patrons online. Recently we started using a web application, “WCONLINE” for scheduling research appointments.
12. Next, we look at Special Collections and Archives. There is a lot more to a digitization project than the scanning. Selection Scan to digital format Optical Character Recognition Dublin Core Metadata Manage digital files Upload files to repository Public Access Digital repository Library Catalog Exhibits Long term preservation
13. GWU and Georgetown collaborated on an IMLS grant to digitize hundreds of books for the project called “Cultural Imaginings: the Creations of the Arab World in the Western Mind.” This page shows the Omeka exhibit (link provided). There is a Dspace repository for the digitized books (link provided). Georgetown’s Provost had some interesting comments about the project saying the important thing is what researchers can do with the digitized works (link to video provided).
14. Archivists have lots of options for digital repositories and alternative ways to promote their collections. Here is an example of an Omeka exhibit GWU libraries built to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the liberation of Kuwait and the ongoing US-Kuwaiti partnership. This exhibit has customized Php code that changes the standard Omeka layouts, and it has both an English (part one and three of this slide)and Arabic interface (part two of this slide).
15. Omeka, continues to evolve and is worth considering for online exhibits. The previous exhibit highlighted some of our digital collections. Here is an example of an Omeka exhibit that uses the “Neatline” mapping plug-in.
16. Archivists have several repository options. One might investigate “access to memory.” I like it because it displays the EAD in the a structure that mimics the print version. It also provides a way to export the finding aid as XML.
17. At GWU, our Special Collections team exports EAD-XML finding aids from Archivist’s Toolkit. Our Discovery Catalog, Summon (articlesplus at GWU), ingests the EAD-XML finding aid and does a full-text index of the contents. So, a patron could search for some keywords that occur anywhere in the finding aid, and the finding aid will be included in the search results. There will be a link to the online finding aid.
18. A lot of emerging technology applies to Resource Management. The so-called next generation of library systems replace the workstation client software with web applications. There is a Sierra version, illustrated here. The main competitors are Ex Libris “Alma”, OCLC “WorldShare”, and Proquest “Intota”. Implementing a nextGen system would be a significant project, but the result would be better for staff in cataloging, acquisitions, serials, e-resources, circulation, and public services.
19. This is a hot topic in resource management circles. Theoretically, marking up catalog records with these new formats will make it easier to create web applications that link everything together. It’s still very much under development. This is a topic worth its own presentation. Next let’s look at a concrete example of a catalog record.
20. Here is an example of a catalog record that includes RDA fields and linked data fields with URI’s. Incorporating the Linked data into thousands of catalog records is a major, major project for resource management. GW is working with OCLC batch reclamation process to accomplish some of this work. Let’s look at the link to the WorldCat “work” next.
21. Here’s an example from OCLC of a “work” record. Notice there are several formats that a user can download: Turtle, N-Triple, JSON-LD, RDF/XML, HTML. At any rate, you may also notice this URL begins with “experiment” since this is still under development. So, the takeaway here is that a lot is going on behind the scenes in resource management!
22. Library IT staff have to run to keep up with changes. Now web sites need to be updated to work on any device, typically by using responsive web design rather than creating mobile apps. This requires expertise with the latest software. LIT has to manage new releases of software products, and may set policies for use of cloud based tools like Dropbox and Google Drive.
23. Library IT staff usually lead the effort to modernize the library web site. New generations of content management systems are available, like OmniUpdate. Migrating to a new CMS is a major project not only for the IT staff, but for the site editors too.
24. Library IT staff may evaluate and recommend web applications, like this scheduling application which is modestly priced. There are free, open source apps that might work too, such as the “Booked” a web application for reserving group study rooms.
25. Access Services staff are being called upon to do more patron support. Some libraries, like GWU, provide a lot of scientific and multimedia software products on workstations in the library for patrons. 3D printing is cropping up in libraries too. It’s all great and patrons love it. GWU has some excellent Xerox touch screen scanners for patrons. Who is support to support these tools? Access Services staff? Librarians? Some universities, like Howard, move all these services to a technology center separate from the library.
26. There are lots of ways that space can be re-purposed in libraries, many of them involve the latest technology. The collection may have been moved off-site, where more high-tech comes into play, like robotic retrieval systems or other computerized retrieval mechanisms.
27. I hope I didn’t miss your library department, and / or your favorite new technology. I had to leave some things out in order to fit the available space. Take your ideas and explore them. You may be surprised what you can accomplish.