Karema Heron-Grant

A Comparative Analysis of Serials Solutions Summon and WorldCat Local Web-scale Discovery Services

What is Serials Solutions Summon?

Also known as Summon or SSSA web-scale discovery service that enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full breadth of content found in library collections, from books to videos to e-resources.

What is WorldCat Local?

Also known as WCLWorldCat Local is a web-scale discovery solution which provides a main entry to a library’s print and digital collections. WCL provides another way to discover some of the resources available beyond a library’s holdings.

What do these services provide?Content layerSSS WCLContains over 500 million itemsOver 6,000 publisher’s content90,000 + journal & periodical

titlesPredominant in newspaper &

scholarly journal articles Includes various other content

type such as: Books Thesis & dissertation Conference proceedings Music scores Audio visual materials

Access to more than 1.267 billion items from authoritative content resources

Over 952 million articles Resources from 70,000

libraries worldwide Books and eBooks; full text

articles from journals and newspaper

Media (films, CDs, images Government documents Maps

What do these services provide? Discovery LayerSSS WCL Embodies ideal features of a

next generation library interface Delivers a single point of entry

into all the content offered by a library

Exceeds federated search Federated searching & Google-

ish tendencies Uses relevance ranking and one-

search box to search across article-level information.

Provides a front-end user interface featuring WorldCat menu and single-search box

Quick links to help information & different kinds of searches

Advanced search option that allows for more precise searching & limiting

Initial browse display is ordered by a ranking algorithm that preferences local records

Each record includes icons that give users visual clues as to the material’s format

Faceted searching Supports multilingual interfaces

SSS Discovery Interface – Basic Search Page

SSS Discovery Interface – Advanced Search Page

SSS Discovery Interface – Results Page

WCL Discovery Interface – Basic Search

WCL Discovery Interface – Advanced Search

WCL Discovery Interface – Results Page

How large a collection will they handle?SSS WCLHandles libraries with

very large collectionsFor Example: “The Darmouth College collection within Summon currently includes 303 million items, or 56% of the total Summon holdings” (Darmouth College Library, 2009).

“OCLC has long been the major bibliographic database for libraries and currently represents the holdings of over 10,000 libraries throughout the world” (Breeding, 2007).X Includes over 84 million records, representing about a billion individual library holdings.

Is there a union catalog?SSS WCL SSS provides a very large

centralized index Gives access to content sourced

from a multitude of commercial databases and publishers

SSS is built around a single unified index that returns a single, unified sets of results

Summon indexes holdings from other library’s collection

It is up to a library to make the option to “Add Results Beyond your Library’s Collection” available to their patrons

Includes links to catalogs of local libraries, presenting a list of the libraries that own an item

Stands as the largest library-oriented bibliographic database in the world

WCL searches the entire WorldCat database, exposing users to a much broader universe of content

Who owns the data?SSS WCLAcquires content chiefly through

agreements with content owners primarily: Journal & newspaper publishers eBook publishers and Third party aggregators such as

Proquest, Lexis Nexis, Academic, Gale (4,000 + publishers)

Other sources include: Libraries subscribing to

Summon, which contribute library catalog records and other locally digitized content.

WCL partners with several content owners to provide over 1.267 billion items. Such partnerships include: Journals (MEDLINE, ERIC,

ArticleFirst) eBooks (NetLibrary, Ebrary) Special Collections

(OAIster, Archive Grid) Open Access Content (Hathi

Trust, JSTOR, NDLTD)

Does The Service use MARC?SSS WCLSummon is able to

discover items in a library’s physical collection by importing the library’s MARC records into Summon’s index.

Libraries are responsible to provide updates.

Alternatively, libraries may subscribe to Serial Solution’s 360 MARC updates product.

Uses MARC as the match point between its and the user library’s local system for retrieving real-time availability and for placing holds.

Requires that OCLC control number be indexed in the same field of all MARC records and be prefixed in the same way.

In The CloudSSS WCLMarkets its Software-as-

a-Service (SaaS) product as a cloud computing solution

Through SaaS, Summon owns the application and delivers it via the internet

Assumes responsibility for maintaining, updating and protecting (backing-up) the data resources.

A powerful library application of cloud computing

Service is delivered to library from OCLC through the Web

Libraries therefore haveNo hardware to purchaseNo software to installNo computer system to

operate.

Z39.50 ProtocolSSS WCLEnables connection into

a wide variety of databases, web-resources and libraries’ OPACs using Z39.50, xml and HTTP connections

Operates through the OCLC Connexions Cataloging interface, and involves setting up Z39.50 access to the underlying Library Management System.

Basic PackageSSS WCLAdvanced, blank and

discipline-scope searchesSpotlighting imagesFacets and FiltersResults beyond library’s

collectionCitation counts and linksCatalog details page/pop-upRSS FeedSave items and citation

excerpt

One search for all contentMore than 2 billion items from

the world’s librariesProvides entry point for a

global network of high quality materials

Increased visibility for libraries collection through partnerships with Google, yahoo!, and 50 + social networking and book selling sites

Built-in open URL resolution to power A-Z lists links

Advanced Package – Add-OnsSSS WCLDatabase RecommenderBest BetsRelated SearchesAuto completeEmbedded chat and

reference widgetsCustom Text EditorSearch Box and Widget

builderIntegrated research

guides

Basic package is its advanced package.

References Biola University Library. (n.d.). WorldCat Local. Retrieved from

http://library.biola.edu/research/worldcat/ Breeding, M. (2009). Summon: A New Search Service from Serials Solutions. Smart Libraries

Newsletter, 29 (3).Retrieved from www.librarytechnology.org/ltg-displaytextpl?RC=1400 Breeding, M. (2007). WorldCat Local. Library Technology Reports, 43 (4), p33-37. Retrieved

from www.ebscohost.com Klein, M. B. (2010). Hacking Summon. Code4Lib Journal, (11). Retrieved from http://

journal.code4lib.org/articles/3655 Online Computer Library Center. (n.d.). WorldCat Local at a Glance. OCLC. Retrieved from

http://www.oclc.org/worldcat-local/about.en.html Pearson Library and Technology Service. (n.d.) WorldCat Local: Search California Lutheran

University Pearson Library and Beyond. California Lutheran University. Retrieved from www.callutheran.edu/lss/technology_services/.../WorldCatLocal.php

Serial Solutions. (n.d.). Software as a Service and Cloud Computing: Key Considerations for Libraries. Retrieved from http://www.serialssolutions.com/assets/resources/saas-and-cloud-computing-key-considerations-for-libraries.pdf

Vaughan, J. (2011). Chapter 3: Serials Solutions Summon. Library Technology Reports, 47 (1), p22-29. Retrieved from www.ebscohost.com

Ward, J. (2008). Why WorldCat Local? Library Technological Reports, 44 (6) p7-17. Retrieved from www.ebscohost.com