What's Next for Metadata at CUL?

Presented to the CUL Metadata Working Group on December 19, 2008.Given the rapidly changing information environment, both in the library and on the Web, libraries face a significant challenge in determining the appropriate roles and types of metadata for both discovery and description of information resources. As we consider professional, contributed, programmatic and intentional metadata, what combination of these will best meet the needs of our users, and best fit with the emerging architecture of information within Cornell and beyond? The talk presents a variety of relevant examples, opportunities and questions.Cornell University Library Metadata Working Grou

Sisyphean Task or the Holy Grail? Satisfying Demands of Higher Education through Community-Driven Open Source Projects

What elements are essential to successful community-driven open source projects? How much governance and overhead is required to develop and sustain an open source project? What are the factors that enhance or limit the pace of development, the growth in the development community, community adoption and longevity? Many open source projects don't start out worrying about sustainability or longevity, but successful projects often require considerable effort to succeed over time. This presentation and panel discussion will explore the use of community-driven open source projects to achieve the needs in higher education and review some of the many factors that may influence viability for community-driven open source projects. Specific projects will be discussed, along with a description of incubation strategies, governance approaches, growth challenges, ongoing support models, sustaining vibrant developer communities and lessons learned

Core Services in the Architecture of the National Digital Library for Science Education (NSDL)

We describe the core components of the architecture for the (NSDL) National Science, Mathematics, Engineering, and Technology Education Digital Library. Over time the NSDL will include heterogeneous users, content, and services. To accommodate this, a design for a technical and organization infrastructure has been formulated based on the notion of a spectrum of interoperability. This paper describes the first phase of the interoperability infrastructure including the metadata repository, search and discovery services, rights management services, and user interface portal facilities

Meeting Funders’ Data Policies: Blueprint for a Research Data Management Service Group (RDMSG)

This report summarizes the elements that we expect to be required in data management plans, describes Cornell’s current capabilities and needs in meeting such requirements, and proposes a structure for a virtual organization that builds on the collaboration between the DRSG, CAC, CUL and CISER. The proposed organization also includes Cornell Information Technologies (CIT) and Weill Cornell Medical College Information Technologies and Services (WCMC-ITS) to further develop and provide this support

Il meticciato nell'Italia contemporanea. Storia, memorie e cultura di massa.

L'idea diffusa degli "italiani brava gente" e della diversit\ue0 della nostra storia rispetto alla storia USA, segnata da razzismo istituzionale, si fonda sul silenziamento del passato coloniale e razzista italiano. Il ripudio della categoria di razza da parte dell'Italia repubblicana e la smentita scientifica dell'esistenza biologica della categoria non hanno cancellato la presenza della razza, formazione storico-culturale che paradossalmente esiste e non esiste. Priva di referenti oggettivi nella realt\ue0, la razza produce in essa effetti significativi, opera sia come categoria sociale e strumento di esclusione, sia come costruzione simbolica e istanza identitaria. A fronte del silenziamento del meticciato storico nell'uso pubblico della storia e nella memoria nazionali del secondo dopoguerra, il saggio sottolinea la presenza diffusa del meticciato nei prodotti della cultura di massa italiani contemporanei e ne indaga i significati con gli strumenti degli studi critici sulla razza e in prospettiva comparata tra Italia e Stati Uniti

So, What Does a Chief Technology Strategist Actually Do?

The Chief Technology Strategist helps the Library manage the disruptive transition to digital tools and resources. In this presentation Dean Krafft speaks of the challenges facing the Cornell Library and on some of the projects that he is working on that relate to these challenges.1_gdxlodt

AVID: A system for the Interactive Development of Verifiably Correct Programs

The AVID system is designed to Aid Verification through the techniques of Interactive program Development. AVID continues the work in programming logics begun at Cornell University in 1975. It provides a syntax-directed editing environment for the development by stepwise refinement of programs and proofs in the PL/CV2 programming logic. AVID is another step in the continuing effort to provide methods and software tools for developing correct programs. AVID contains a number of important contributions to the area of program/proof development. To allow the full power of the AVID verification facilities to be applied to programs developed by stepwise refinement, we created a new program construct, called an ATTAIN block, that formalizes the concept of a refinement level. This construct allows the independent verification of different refinement levels, and thus of partially developed programs. Using this construct, AVID can guarantee that the refinement in a top-down development actually implements its high-level specification. AVID is the first system to support the interactive display of logical dependency in proofs. We have developed a new algorithm, built on the congruence closure method for deciding the theory of equality, that efficiently determines logical dependency within this theory. This algorithm is independent of the AVID system, and has potential applications wherever the congruence closure method is used. AVID also contains some significant contributions to the area of syntax-directed editor design. AVID makes use of a standard, powerful, and widely available screen-oriented editor as its user interface. The system design gives a strategy for the incorporation of other powerful editors into syntax-directed development systems. AVID is also the first system to make extensive use of derived nonterminals to avoid redundant specification and to guide the user in developing his proof. Perhaps AVID's most important contribution is its demonstration of the feasibility of a system to support and enforce the development by stepwise refinement of provably correct programs. For programs that must be correct, this approach may be one of the most promising. One final contribution of the AVID project is the system itself as a base for future research. The modular design of the AVID system and its facilities for the high-level description of AVID language constructs make the system easy to modify and to build on. There are already several projects planning to use AVID in this fashion. AVID has been implemented on a DEC VAX 11/780 under the Berkeley UNIX operating system. The current version of the system, which supports the development and verification of the predicate calculus portion of PL/CV2, consists of approximately 20,000 lines of C language source code. When running on the VAX, the current system requires 230K bytes of memory. A version of the system suitable for distribution is expected to be available by January 1982

The Assertion Table System for the PL/CV2 Program Verifier

A system to implement the block structured storage of PL/CV2 assertions is described. The system allows certain simple logical deductions to be performed automatically. These include deductions involving propositional reasoning, associativity and commutativity of arithmetic operators, and reasoning about equality. The implementation is described at a conceptual level