aqua browser implementation at oklahoma state university

AquaBrowser Implementation

at Oklahoma State University

presented by Anne Prestamo

Associate Dean for Collection and Technology Services

Oklahoma State University Libraries

Five College Librarians' Council Next Generation Library Catalogs

November 7, 2007

Why an alternative interface?

• Intuitive• Interactive• No training required• Expose hidden treasures• Enriched content beyond MARC data• OPACs Suck1; Lipstick on a Pig2

1“How OPACs Suck” – Three part series of blog postings by Karen SchneiderPart 1- http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/2006/03/how-opacs-suck-part-1-relevance-rank-or-the-lack-of-it.htmlPart 2- http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/2006/04/how-opacs-suck-part-2-the-checklist-of-shame.htmlPart 3- http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/2006/05/how-opacs-suck-part-3-the-big-picture.html2 Roy Tennant — April 15, 2005 http://libraryjournal.com/article/CA516027.html?display=Digital+LibrariesNews&industry=Digital+Libraries&industryid=3760&verticalid=151


“Recently I viewed a library catalog redesign before it went public. This was the first major change in many years, and it turned out to be quite an improvement to the look and feel of the system. But despite this, it still sucks. Badly.”

2 Roy Tennant — April 15, 2005 http://libraryjournal.com/article/CA516027.html?display=Digital+LibrariesNews&industry=Digital+Libraries&industryid=3760&verticalid=151


“So what can most of us do? We need to focus more energy on important, systemic changes rather than cosmetic ones. If your system is more difficult to search and less effective than Amazon.com (and whose isn't?), then you have work to do. Stop asking for minor tweaks from vendors. After all, you can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still very much a pig.”

2 Roy Tennant — April 15, 2005 http://libraryjournal.com/article/CA516027.html?display=Digital+LibrariesNews&industry=Digital+Libraries&industryid=3760&verticalid=151

“And my favorite quote from Robin's [Murray] talk was in his comment on something Pat Sommers, the CEO of SirsiDynix, said in a presentation--about the ILS-- to delegates on Sunday evening. Pat was responding, if I recall correctly, to a question from the floor about why ILS vendors don't innovate more quickly. Pat remarked that his company spends $10 million a year tweaking their systems to respond to requests from customers, and that left scant time and resources to make big changes. Robin rephrased this to describe all that activity as ‘building twiddly bits.’”

http://scanblog.blogspot.com/search?q=twiddly



http://www.youtube.com/

756 hits

And then . . . .

January 12, 2006

http://product-view.epnet.com/webauth/login.asp?user=demo&password=password&profile=ehost

http://product-view.epnet.com/webauth/login.asp?user=demo&password=password&profile=ehost

Evaluation & Implementation

• July 2006 – internal decision to implement new OPAC interface to be live August 2007

• Aug 2006 - began discussions with Endeca

• Nov 2006 - began discussions with TLC re: AquaBrowser

• Mar 2007 - terminated discussions with Endeca


• Mar 22 - Loaded bib/holdings records to Medialab test server– real-time circ status retrieved by deep

link to WebVoyage– Opens WebVoyage Brief Record in new

window

• Mar 30 - Signed letter of intent for AquaBrowser (during ACRL)


• Apr-June - Continued customization and modification work on test Server

– Serials holdings displays– Relevancy algorithm– Refine elements– Voyager data structure (item type ≠

format)– Language issues (Check out)

• June – signed agreement with Syndetics


• June 12 - Syndetics ICE content loaded to test server

• July 26 - AquaBrowser software installed on local server

• Aug 14 - Real-time circ status pulling from Voyager for full record

• Aug 15 FTP for daily Voyager exports to local AquaBroswer server


• Aug 17-19 - Final frenzy of fixes and tweaks

• Aug 20 - Link to BOSS on Library Homepage

• Aug 21 - BOSS Search box added to Homepage

Where did that come from?

BigOrangeBand

BigOrangeBunny

BigOrangeBus

Technical Information

• Server Requirements: – Ghz+ Intel-based CPU

(recommend: dual CPU) – Windows 2003 server – Internet Information Services (IIS)

v6 – 100MB Network Interface Card

(recommended: 1GB)


• Server Requirements: – Inbound access on port 80 – Outbound access on port 80 – 20GB free HD space

(recommended: 50GB) – 2GB RAM (recommended: 3GB or

more)

Technical Information• Daily Incremental Data Transfer

Voyager AquaBrowser – Bib & MFHD Data

• MARCExport runs as cronjob with resulting file FTP’d to AquaBrowser

– Item Data• PERL script runs as cronjob with resulting file

FTP’d to AquaBrowser

• Data is indexed nightly on AquaBrowser server


• AquaBrowser queries Syndetics server for ISBN matches on new records

• Matching jacket images, TOCs, summaries, and PW reviews are imported to AquaBrowser

• New TOCs and summaries are indexed nightly

Reproduced with permission from Karen Calhoun (10/29/07);

From the logfiles

• Oct 15 2007– 684 WebVoyage searches– 1178 BOSS searches

• Searches resulting in – 0 – hits– ~38% in WebVoyage– ~5% in BOSS

From the logfiles

• Query: explorations and surveys for a railroad route from the mississippi river to the pacific ocean – WebVoyage

• Title search fails• Keyword as phrase 1 hit • Keyword all of these fails

– BOSS - 6 hits

From the logfiles

• Query: college students working while going to school – WebVoyage

• Title search fails• Keyword as phrase fails• Keyword all of these fails

– BOSS - 5 hits

From the logfiles

• Query: mormon racism – WebVoyage

• Title search fails• Keyword as phrase fails• Keyword all of these 1 hit

– BOSS - 3 hits • at least one of these is a chapter title that

comes from ICE content

From the logfiles

• Query: cultural property protection west (u.s.)– WebVoyage


– BOSS - 13 hits

From the logfiles

• Query: pacific railroads explorations and surveys– WebVoyage

• Title search fails• Keyword as phrase fails • Keyword all of these fails

– BOSS - 22 hits

From the logfiles

• Query: solutions of cyber terrorism– WebVoyage


– BOSS - 4 hits

Failed Searches

• Some of these can be corrected through forced word associations

• Some could be resolved IF user clicked on “Author” tab

• Some are typos that were corrected with 2nd search statement

Some Failed Searches

• uniersities andviolence• Donald E. Parker, Value Engineering

Theory (Dayton, Ohio: SAVE International, 1998.

• organosilicon chemsitry bok • Punlic Tobacco use• stretchy lesson plan

Most Used Refine Dimensions

Dimension %

Format 23.7

Topics 22.9

Publication Date 15.2

Availability 15.2

Author 6.8

Location 6.1

Circ status 4.1

Language 2.2

Geographical 2.1

Chronological 1.2

Sort Selection

Sort Selection %

Default (relevancy) 97.8

year 1.5

author 0.6

title 0.0

Made for Librarians

• Get snapshot reports about your library’s collection without writing a report query

• Search id:*• Click on any “more” link in the Refine

Elements

Made for Librarians

What’s Next? – Near Term• LC Subject headings on “Subject” Tab• Dewey classes/subclasses above results

display• Call number search and hyperlinked call

number in Results and Full Record Display• Canned search to WorldCat from results list

screens• RSS Feeds – New Books – past 1, 2, 3, or 4

weeks OR custom based on keyword searches

What’s Next? – Jan 2008 & Beyond

• Load OSU-Tulsa, OSUCHS, OSU-OKC, OSU-OKM if they wish to do so– Other eight libraries by Aug 2008

• Record display with link to ILLIAD to request item from another campus

• Add Fed search capability using SerialsSolutions 360 Search with the AquaBrowser Interface

• Add MyDiscoveries

A funny thing happened on the way to implementation

• Cambridge Information Group bought Bowker - 2001

• Bowker bought Syndetics - 2004• ProQuest bought Serials Solutions - 2004• CIG/CSA bought ProQuest - December 2006• Bowker bought MediaLab – June 2007• Ulrichs moves to Serials Solutions – Aug

2007

Questions???

Anne PrestamoAssociate Dean for Collection and Technology Services

Oklahoma State University Libraries(405) 744-9755

[email protected]