Re: who is the primary user?

I've just joined the list, but already wanted to respond to this one.

I'm in our libraries' rare book department, and I find that ONE of the
primary users of the front-end of our catalog is ME.  Users can't browse
our rare items, and therefore come to me to find out if we have things
like presentation bindings, 18th century bookplates, books in Hebrew.
Most of this can not be searched in the online catalog unless I put in
lots of extra information - which I do.  But they still come to me, and
I either show them how to search in our online catalog for the special
things they want, or do the search for them.  In this case, I'm a
primary user of our catalog.

My 2 cents....

Edward


Edward Hoyenski
Assistant Curator
Rare Book & Texana Collections
University of North Texas Libraries
ehoyensk_at_library.unt.edu
940-565-2769
940-565-2599
P.O. Box 305190
Denton, TX 76203

>>> ross.singer_at_LIBRARY.GATECH.EDU 6/7/2006 7:37 AM >>>

On 6/7/06, Eric Lease Morgan <emorgan_at_nd.edu> wrote:
> So, who is the primary audience of the "catalog"? While we might all
> have different audiences in mind, I'd be willing to bet that the
> primary audience of the catalog is NOT librarians.

I think this strongly depends on which part of the interface you're
talking about.  The 'web client' on the front end of the catalog's
audience is, indeed, probably intended for somebody other than
librarians.