Revitalizing the Library OPAC

Challenges Faced by Academic Librarians

Jia Mi

Cathy WengThe College of New Jersey

ALDP Conference, April 11, 2007

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Cathy Weng

Head of Cataloging

The College of New Jersey

U.S.A.

Presenter

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Information Seeking Landscape

Changes in technology Emergency of the Internet, WWW applications

Academic library users Information-seeking behavior

Academic libraries Losing ground to online search engines Rich resources not utilized

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Changes in User Behavior

Trends of information consumers’ needsSelf-service (moving to self-sufficiency)SatisfactionSeamlessness (*)

Caused by the emergence of search engines

* De Rosa, Dempsey and Wilson, OCLC environmental scan, 2003

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Librarian’s perceptions

Users are forgetful Users are ignorant Users are impatient

Prevented from recognizing changes in user behavior and ineffective OPAC design.

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The OPAC Re-examined

Good to find known items (successful only when structured metadata is retrieved)

Data-centered and card-catalog retrieval mechanism

Lack of features provided by search engines Bibliographic display converted from card

catalog Designed for and used fluently by librarians Not user-friendly

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The OPAC Study

Two aspects:

Public interface Bibliographic display

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Public Interface Study

123 ARL libraries’ OPACs were examined Five Major Integrated Library Systems (ILS):

ALEPH, Horizon, Millennium, Unicorn and Voyager.

Study focused on: Default search options Search ability --Keyword search functionality Relevance ranking Search results display

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Default Search Options

Eighty-one libraries (66%) have “keyword” as the default.

Thirty-six libraries (29%) have “title” as the default

Six libraries (5%) provide options for library users to choose

Keywrod66%

Title29%

List of Choices

5%

Keywrod

Title

List of Choices

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Keyword Search as the Default

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Default Search Option set to “Title”

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List of Search Keys for Users to Select

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Search Ability – True keyword Search

The power of implicit “AND” feature Not all libraries implemented the

“automatic AND” keyword search option Various phrase-search features

Explicit or implicitAffects the number of search results and

relevancyConfusing search keys and help screens

14 U. Of Washington, 3/31/07

Keyword “Phrase Only” Search

15 Michigan State U., 3/31/07

Modular Algorithms for Keyword Retrieval

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U. Of Washington, 3/31/07

Michigan State U., 3/31/07

Difference of Using Keyword Search Algorithms

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Temple Univ., 3/31/07

Syracuse Univ.; 3/31/07

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Keyword (Relevance) Keyword (Boolean)

Keyword with relevance ranking

Keyword (enclose phrases “in quotes”)

Keyword Anywhere (user “” for phrase)

Keyword Combined (use and/or/not “ “ for phrase)

Keyword Anywhere (Relevance ranked)

Keyword (and or not)

Keyword Anywhere Advanced Boolean

Words Anywhere Keyword Boolean

Basic Keyword Keyword(s) (use AND, OR, NOT , or “a phrase”)

Any word anywhere Boolean search (use and or not)

Relevance Keyword (User + for key terms)

Command Keyword

Keyword Phrase Keyword (use “And” “Or” “Not”)

Key

wo

rd S

earc

h K

eys

Use

d b

y V

oya

ger

Lib

rari

es

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Relevance Ranking in Search Results

Most useful when keyword search is performed

Three ILS vendors offer relevance ranking search results functionality Some libraries either provide sorting

options or do not use it.Some libraries sort search results by date,

title or authorSome libraries set “system sort” as the

default sorting option

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OPAC Sorting OptionsOPAC Sorting Options

Relevance

Year (Publication Date)

Author

TitleCall #

(Subject)

Format Default

ALEPH21 0 21 21 21 8 4

Year/Author: 17Title/Year Ascending: 1Title: 1System sort: 2

HORIZON7 0 7 7 7 0 0

Publication Date: 2Title: 2Author(ascending): 1System sort: 2

Millennium38 36 38 0 38 0 0

Date: 20Title: 5Relevance: 12System sort: 1

Unicorn18 5

Descending

18Ascending

18 18 18 18 0New to Old 5Relevance: 1(NCSU)System sort: 12

Voyager35

Kw (R)

27

Kw (B)

4

Descending

34Ascending

3435 35 0 0

Relevance: 5KW with Relevance: 27System sort: 8

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Search Results Display

Great disparities in OPAC quality Some issues

Search terms and search boxes were not retained on the results page

Post-search limit functions were not always readily available

Item statuses were not available on the search results page

Searched keywords not highlighted

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Bibliographic Display Study

Fifteen libraries’ OPACs were examined Eight records were used Findings are based on three criteria:

The accuracy and clarity of display labels The order of bibliographic elements displayThe utilization of bibliographic data

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Display Labels

IssuesMARC mapping not intuitive Only suitable for certain types of materialsUnclear labels Inaccurate labelsLevel of effort devoted to the labels’ clarity

and accuracy

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Some Examples Use one label to represent various types of

names Use library jargons (e.g., LC, MESH subject

headings, uniform title) Unclear labels to describe information about

publication span Series statements

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Use “Author” to represent personal names, corporate names, and meeting names

* SUNY Buffalo, access 3/25/07

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Use “Conference” to represent conference name

* University of Ill, access 3/25/07

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Use library jargons (e.g., LC, MESH subject headings, uniform title)

* Univ. of Ill., accessed 3/25/07

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Unclear Labels (label for publication span)

Princeton Univ. & Univ. of Minnesota, accessed 3/25/07

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Unclear Labels (label for publication span)

Northwestern Univ. & Vanderbilt Univ., accessed 3/25/07

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Series Statement

Northwestern Univ. & Vanderbilt Univ., accessed 3/25/07

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Series Statement

Univ. of Minnesota & Univ. of Ill., accessed, 3/25/07

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Utilization of bibliographic data

Completeness and suitability in display Data should not be displayed but displayed Data should be displayed but not displayed Etc….

Repurposing bibliographic data to create added-value features

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Data should not be displayed

Univ. of Washington, & Suny Buffalo, accessed 3/25/07

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Repurposing Bibliographic Data

Making use of data creatively (outside- the-box thinking)

Amazon’s successful story (*)

* Lorcan Demsey’s blog “Making data work - Web 2.0 and catalogs”, Oct. 4, 2005

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NCSU’s Endeca Catalog

Using facets to facilitate retrieval process

Eight facets are extracted from existing MARC records

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NCSU’s Endeca

Facets extracted from MARC records

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NCSU’s EndecaFacets extracted from MARC records

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Thoughts from the Study Findings

System limitations Libraries are not fully exploiting the

functionality already made available by ILSs

The unsuitability of MARC standards to online bibliographic display

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“To create a system that didn’t need to be taught.” (*)

“Trusting users as co-developers .” (**)

Vision

Maximize and creatively utilize system’s functionality and metadata.

Restructure metadata to support modular display.

* Tennant, Roy, “Lipstick on a pig,” Library Journal, 2005.

** O’Reilly, Tim, “Wat is Web 2.0?”, 2005.

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Thank You!

Jmi@tcnj.edu

weng@tcnj.edu