Lightning rod or seismograph? The acid test for librarians

Contends that librarians can shape their future rather than just record and manage what has already happened. The author believes that we must work to persuade our organisations that we are producers and not just consumers of information and that in making that argument we will assert that our professional skills, although in need of review and re-presentation, remain of critical value to the development of an information society. This is as true of digital libraries as paper libraries

Towards improved performance and interoperability in distributed and physical union catalogues

Purpose of this paper: This paper details research undertaken to determine the key differences in the performance of certain centralised (physical) and distributed (virtual) bibliographic catalogue services, and to suggest strategies for improving interoperability and performance in, and between, physical and virtual models. Design/methodology/approach: Methodically defined searches of a centralised catalogue service and selected distributed catalogues were conducted using the Z39.50 information retrieval protocol, allowing search types to be semantically defined. The methodology also entailed the use of two workshops comprising systems librarians and cataloguers to inform suggested strategies for improving performance and interoperability within both environments. Findings: Technical interoperability was permitted easily between centralised and distributed models, however the various individual configurations permitted only limited semantic interoperability. Significant prescription in cataloguing and indexing guidelines, greater participation in the Program for Collaborative Cataloging (PCC), consideration of future 'FRBR' migration, and greater disclosure to end users are some of the suggested strategies to improve performance and semantic interoperability. Practical implications: This paper informs the LIS research community and union catalogue administrators, but also has numerous practical implications for those establishing distributed systems based on Z39.50 and SRW, as well as those establishing centralised systems. What is original/value of the paper?: The paper moves the discussion of Z39.50 based systems away from anecdotal evidence and provides recommendations based on testing and is intimately informed by the UK cataloguing and systems librarian community

Library systems: the trends, the developments, the future

This article introduces some of the latest developments and trends taking place with respect to library systems, and makes some informed judgements on what the future holds

Improving customer satisfaction: changes as a result of Customer Value Discovery

Objective: To identify Gold Standard Services for customers in an academic library and determine whether interventions following the identification of customer value increased student satisfaction. Methods: “Customer Discovery Workshops” were undertaken with academic staff and undergraduate on‐campus students to provide managers and library staff with information on the services and resources that customers valued, and what irritated them about existing services and resources. The impact of interventions was assessed two years after the research using a university student satisfaction survey and an independent national student satisfaction survey. Results: The findings resulted in significant changes to the way forward‐facing customer services were delivered. A number of value adding services were introduced for the customer. Overall customer satisfaction was improved. Evidence Based Library and Information Practice 2008, 3:1 34 Conclusions: The Customer Value Discovery research has created a culture of innovation and continuous improvement. An operational plan was introduced to track activity and performance against the objectives identified in the customer value research. However, there is a constant need to innovate

Full-text ETD retrieval in library discovery system: designing a framework

This paper discusses designing an open source software based library discovery system for full-text ETD retrieval on the basis of a cataloguing framework developed by using available global standards and best practices in the domain of theses cataloguing. The purpose of this prototype framework is to provide a single-window search and retrieval system for end users for discovering ETD at metadata level and at full-text level. The prototype framework is based on three-layer architecture with Koha ILS as backend metadata provider, Apache-Tika as full-text extractor and VuFind as discovery system. A MARC-21 bibliographic format, especially designed to handle TDs, is working as data handler mechanism in Koha ILS and the harvester of VuFind is tuned to fetch bibliographic data related to ETD in marcxml format. The user interface of VuFind is also configured to support accessing ETDs from global-scale services like NDLTD, OATD, IndCat, ShodhGanga etc. apart from the local level ETD collection in order to provide an all-in-one search interface for users

Cataloguer Acceptance on Cataloguing Module in Open-Source Integrated Library System in Academic Library in Malaysia

This paper aims to identify the acceptance of cataloguers on cataloguing modules in the Open-Source Integrated Library System in an academic library in Malaysia. The research design adopted for this study is descriptive research surveys. This study involved cataloguers in the academic university library in Malaysia that have used Koha as their open-source software since 2013. The survey used an online questionnaire distributed via email to all cataloguers in the selected libraries. The questionnaire comprises questions related to acceptance of module features and module usability on the cataloguing module. The 5-point Likert scale is used to measure the cataloguer acceptance of the cataloguing module, and the data were analysed using SPSS. The findings conclude that the majority of the cataloguers in academic libraries in Malaysia use open-source integrated library system similar to this study, Koha, and have entirely accepted the use of cataloguing module in terms of usability and features as the majority of the data reported on agreement of the user compared to a minority of disagreement. The findings of this study will encourage other researchers to do other studies on the usability of other modules in the open-source system that might improve the acceptance of open-source software

Old Hopes, New Possibilities: Next Generation Catalogues and the Centralization of Acess

Next-generation catalogues can be viewed as the latest manifestation of a tendency in library catalogue history to strive for centralization of access to collections—a single portal for the discovery of library resources. Due to an increasing volume of published materials and the explosion of online information resources during the Internet age, the library does not currently provide centralized access to its various information silos, nor does it provide a user-friendly search and retrieval experience for users whose expectations are shaped by Google and other major commercial Web sites. Searching across library resources is a complicated task, bearing high-attention “transaction costs” for the user, which discourage the use of library resources. Libraries need access systems that minimize complexity, easing discovery and delivery of resources for user populations. Here, the authors review past efforts of centralization of access, consider the potential of next-generation catalogues in the context of this historical tendency toward centralization of access, and describe what goals underlie that centralization.published or submitted for publicatio