From WorldCat Local to WorldCat Social

Lorena O’English*WSU Libraries Learning Break

10/15/2009 ; 11/19/2009

*With major assistance from Al Cornish and the unnamed-but-very- helpful WorldCat technical support people!

How is WorldCat Different?

WorldCat is a next generation library catalog that provides users with the ability to interact with its contents and share them with others

Your WorldCat Account is Your Key wsuwc key

This Key Opens Many Tools

interact with WorldCat content and readers by creating tags (assigning your own index terms) or using the tags created by others *

Interact with WorldCat content and readers by writing reviews, or reading the reviews written by other WC users (reviews can be from review publications or bookseller sites such as Amazon as well): example (but be careful…)

*Tags have their own issues though: "...bottom-up classifications which lack rigour..." (The Observer) - No promises of consistency...internally or externally...

Your WorldCat Account is (Still) Your Key

Create lists (public or private) that allow you to save items you have found on WorldCat; you can also follow other people’s public lists. (how-to video)

Example (I will add this to one of my lists) Why Create a list? …just ask Zinthia!*

*note issues with different library flavors of WorldCat…

It’s a Key that Opens Even More Things WorldCat searches can be saved…

and run with just one click from your main profile page

Saved searches can be designated public or private

Enough with the key stuff, Lorena – How Can We Share Stuff with Others?

Each item in your result list has a direct link (permalink) that can be used as a link or embedded as a hyperlink in a HTML document

http://washingtonstate.worldcat.org/oclc/232751450

Important: If you are not in WSU WorldCat when you create the permalink it will take you to the Open WorldCat result, not the WSU WorldCat result. You can manually change the link by retyping the links as washingtonstate.worldcat.org… where the link says www.worldcat.org... (in your browser or in your pasted-in HTML code)

WorldCat Widgets

An example of a keyword widget

Examples of search boxes (plain and fancy) and a list widget that can be embedded on any page that accepts HTML code

Example of a widget embedded in a blog sidebar

WorldCat in Other Tools On Facebook, Firefox, & Google (& mobile phones!)

WorldCat’s embedded RSS functionality allows it to be syndicated, so it can provide updated content on a blog or webpage (taken from this WorldCat list)

You can use the RSS Feed and Bookmark tools to share a book or list on sites all over the web (or in your ownRSS feedreader)

Sharing New Books

Via lists, list widgets, or list feeds… Via the Monthly New Book Lists (WSU all)

Search for a library Search for Washington State University See new books added in October 2009

(very basic categorization; no location limits) Note this list can be subscribed to via a RSS

feedreader or fed into a RSS publishing widget on a webpage, Facebook page, LibGuide, etc.

How Can I/patrons Do This? Create a WorldCat account

From the WSU Libraries website (My Accounts) From WSU WorldCat directly (upper right corner)

Check out http://www.worldcat.org/ for WorldCat Tools… You can’t get to the tools page directly from the WSU Worldcat page; it has to be from www.worldcat.org From the www.worldcat.org page - click on the tool links &

change URLs for Widgets and Plug-ins, WorldCat Search API, Apps & Downloads, and Links to washingtonstate.worldcat…

When you paste in the appropriate code to a blog, webpage, or feedreader, always make sure the WorldCat link is washingtonstate.worldcat… and not www.worldcat...

From a handout that will soon be posted on Al’s WSU WorldCat wikipage, or grab the code from my webpages!

Using WSU WorldCat Tools for Collaboration, Liaison & More

Embed widgets in your LibGuides! Embed them on your personal pages, FB, etc. Freshman Focus and PASS Outreach tool for study groups, labs, teams… New book lists Promote reading! Keep an ongoing list of what you’ve

read (professional and/or personal) & encourage others to do the same & share/follow

…the sky is the limit!!