Jimmie Lundgren wrote:
It would be helpful after choosing one of these
> headers and opening it if upon returning to the results list each of the
> titles were displayed indented below the corresponding specific
> headings. This enables much smoother and more efficient navigation for
> selecting useful items than hiding them in little pockets under the
> heading strings.
Harvard's Hollis catalog does something of this nature, although the
interface leaves me a bit cold. You do have to go to another screen to
see the entries under each author. Do an author search and then click on
the button "sorted index" to the right.
This requires some gyrations in the database design. I can't go further
with that without diagrams, but let me just say that a very different
design would be needed, and I'd love to hear design ideas. I think it
would require us to give up our "unit record" -- that is the monolithic
MARC-based record that gets stored in most databases (even if not in
true iso 2709 format). Creating a database that emphasizes relationships
(authorx wrote booky, authorx wrote bookz) rather than a bibliographic
record would make this kind of display more possible. Today, when you
search in a library catalog you are getting back a set of these rather
impenetrable unit records, and a fair amount of work would have to be
done to pull out the relationship data for display. This is why faceting
is looking so interesting because it pulls out and analyzes information
that usually stays hidden in the bibliographic records. I don't know if
similar software could create the display you desire.
kc
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Karen Coyle / Digital Library Consultant
kcoyle@kcoyle.net http://www.kcoyle.net
ph.: 510-540-7596 skype: kcoylenet
fx.: 510-848-3913
mo.: 510-435-8234
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Received on Mon Jul 30 2007 - 13:58:28 EDT