I wonder if rather than getting Tim to critique each different system
- much as this would be very helpful ;) - we could agree a tag and
interested parties coils blog and tag the results?
How about #catcrit?
On 15 Mar 2009, at 03:09, "Ross Singer" <rossfsinger_at_GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> Tim, I think this is fantastic way of exposing the problems with
> current library systems. Especially the way they generally display
> the MARC verbatim, basically.
>
> That being said, critiquing Horizon is sort of like me breaking down a
> video of me in a boxing ring with my two and a half year old. It's a
> terribly one-sided fight.
>
> We all know that the last generation OPACs suck out loud. It's why
> this list exists.
>
> I would be much more interested in seeing this treatment applied
> towards Primo, VuFind, AquaBrowser, Encore, etc. The supposed "next
> gen OPACs". After all, they're the systems we're all hanging our hats
> on, scrambling to migrate to, etc. I realize that you chose BPL for
> specific reasons, although you could probably take a stab at UMich's
> VuFind implementation to help with the familiarity.
>
> Here's my guess: design and "web" wise, these will fare considerably
> better (sessions in the URLs, general design, etc.) than your Horizon
> example.
>
> However, I'll also wager they'll all fail majorly when you begin to
> dissect how the records are actually displayed/used/etc. Interaction
> between records. Formatting of fields. There is probably very little
> departure, in reality, in the net result as long as they're still
> basically regurgitating MARC.
>
> Diane is absolutely right, we're really just putting a nicer finish on
> the turd until we stop thinking about "records" and "display intended
> to print on cards".
>
> -Ross.
>
> On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 4:27 PM, Tim Spalding <tim_at_librarything.com>
> wrote:
>> It seems to me that we go round and round on various issues. A lot of
>> it resembles a "religious debate"--a term of art in software and
>> design.
>>
>> One way to break religious debates is to talk about something
>> concrete. So, I'm going to plop something on the collective "table,"
>> offer a brief critique. Won't you join me?
>>
>> I've chosen the "detail" page of a book, the first "Obama" book that
>> came up in the BPL[1]. I propose to critique it as follows:
>>
>> *I'm going to critique the page, not the whole system; I want to keep
>> things focused. As such, I'm not going to critique the top part of
>> the
>> page, but just the part "below the chrome."
>> *I'm going to list everything I think is wrong with the page, and
>> offer brief commentart on it.
>> *They use the HIP OPAC, one of the most common, but not the worst.
>> *I punch because I love. I picked BPL because it is my favorite
>> public
>> library. I love them to pieces, and indeed I think their catalog is
>> better than many.
>> *This email is very long--10 typewritten pages. That's because the
>> catalog has a lot of problems!
>>
>> Here's the page: http://www.librarything.com/pics/blog/ngc4lib2.png
>>
>> ### LEFT SIDE
>>
>> My criticisms:
>>
>> 1. The page is session-based. That means we have to discuss it by
>> screenshot, it can't be spidered, it can't be bookmarked, it can't be
>> sent to a friend and so forth. In my opinion, this is a catastrophe
>> for libraries.[2]
>>
>> 2. No permalink. Despite #1, there are tricks to link to many (but
>> not
>> most) HIP pages, and other tricks that can link to all. The page
>> COULD
>> include a permalink, with icon--a familiar feature of sites like
>> Google Maps. It does not.
>>
>> 3. The "Holdings" section on the left is misleading. The divet and
>> other structure implies that the things underneath it are
>> subheadings.
>> I'm frankly uncertain if that's the intent. Maybe the list is of
>> "holdings" related to the item. If so, "Holdings" is a very weird
>> word. It's a weird word even in a librarian context--a link to a
>> review is not a "holding." And it's weirder in a non-librarian
>> context, where "holdings" doesn't mean anything at all.
>>
>> On further investigation I see that "Holdings" referred to the fact
>> that, along with all the other info, the page I was on had the
>> holdings info. The design is confusing.
>>
>> 4. The "Fiction and Biography" functions strangely. First, it's
>> meaningless--what am I to expect that it does?
>>
>> My first guess would be that it would take me to other examples of
>> Fiction and Biography. It does not. Instead, it takes me to a list of
>> headings, "Genre" and "Topics." Both have subheadings, like
>> "NonFiction" and "Politician." On Safari the headings--although
>> black--turn into links when you roll over them. On Firefox they
>> don't.
>> In neither do the links go anywhere.
>>
>> The problem is probably technical. Whatever.
>>
>> 5. "Library Journal Review" works. Mostly. I searched for the review
>> elsewhere, and Barnes and Noble has it. Barnes and Noble preserves
>> the
>> paragraph structure of the original, as well as italics and other
>> formatting. The BPL has it as one giant text lump.
>>
>> 6. "Summary" is somewhat confusing insofar as there is a "Summary"
>> field on the right, in the "book information area." The two are
>> different. The summary works, but it's also somewhat "undigested." It
>> ends with the non-sentence "a website where updates and comments may
>> be posted as the campaign progresses: http://obamapolitics.com Book
>> jacket."
>>
>> Why do libraries, which, if it stands for anything here, stands for
>> sophistication and exactitude of metadata, allow thesse unformatted,
>> half-gramattical text-blobs.
>>
>> 7. "Table of Contents" works pretty well. It's a bit odd, though,
>> insofar as the same content is presented in the "Contents" field of
>> the book-info-field.
>>
>> It took me a while to untagle the relationship between the two
>> fields,
>> though. It's non-obvious. Eventually I figured out that certain data
>> (eg., the introduction, page numbers) were stripped out and returns
>> replaced with "--". (See later for my rant against that idiotic
>> typographical device.)
>>
>> 8. "More by this author" works as you'd think, but there are still
>> problems:
>>
>> *Clicking on it takes you to other works by the author. In this case
>> there are some. In many other cases, there aren't. When there isn't,
>> it takes you to the record you are on! (Most users will record that
>> as
>> "I clicked on the link and nothing happened. So I did it again.
>> Nothing. So I left and went to Amazon where the website works.)
>> *The Last-First format is a fossil of the "dictionary catalog." In
>> other book contexts--book covers, spines, bookstore displays, Amazon,
>> B&N, LibraryThing, publisher websites, etc.--authors are First-Last.
>> Only bibliographies still use last-first, precisely because
>> bibliographies require "dictionary order." No such order is needed
>> here. It looks fussy.
>> *It's unclear to me why the author's first name needs to be followed
>> by "1969-." Not even bibliographies do that. It's probable that
>> libraries are in the pocket of the gravestone industry.
>>
>> 9. Subjects. Some problems:
>>
>> *Subjects are in Last-First format (eg., Obama, Barack). This is
>> unusual--elsewhere I see his name as First-Last. There must be a good
>> reason. Surely it is because it's an alphabetical list. Whoops, it's
>> not. There is no reason for it.
>>
>> *The links *look* hierarchical, but they aren't. Given "United States
>> -- Race relations -- Political aspects" you'd think you could click
>> on
>> any step of the hierarchy. You'd think wrong.
>>
>> *The links take you to a dictionary list of subjects, including the
>> one you clicked on. You have to click it again to get something. That
>> is, the link doesn't take you where you want to go, it takes you to a
>> list of thinks, including a link to where you want to go. Did humans
>> design this?
>>
>> *The use of "--" to indicate hierarchy is non-standard. The rest of
>> the information work uses ">." It's unclear why libraries think the
>> most basic web conventions must be ignored.
>>
>> *Whoever decided on using "--" in a web-product should spent five
>> minutes with the Chicago Manual or Words into Type. "--" is what
>> typewriters used for the em-dash. It didn't exist before typewriters,
>> and it has no reason to exist now, when every computer and most
>> cellphones are capable of the em-dash.
>>
>> *Since we're being persnickety, it's unclear why subjects end in
>> periods. They aren't sentences. Punctuation, like "--" and "." have
>> meanings. Misuse isn't a big deal, but it decreases confidence and
>> tires the eye.
>>
>> *2001- should be an en-dash. Okay, I'll stop.
>>
>> 10. "Browse catalog by name" works okay, but it's unclear why it gets
>> only one entry, and that's the author--who already got a link. Given
>> the term "browse" I'd think that the link would put me in the middle
>> of a millions-long list of books sorted by author. No. It does the
>> same thing as the "More by this author" link.
>>
>> 11. "MARC Display" is weird. But at least it's small. Now, onto the
>> main part of the page!
>>
>> ### MAIN PART
>>
>> 12. "Barack Obama : this improbable quest / John K. Wilson." Is weird
>> in at least four ways. Together they reinforce the impression that
>> the
>> library catalog is arcane and fiddly.
>>
>> *The string "Title [slash] Author" is a library convention. In other
>> situations, title and author are distinguished either typographically
>> (as on a cover) or with the words "by."
>>
>> *In real life (except in France), book titles employ capital letters.
>> As I've said before on this list, when LibraryThing started showing
>> library titles, users complained that the site was "broken."
>> Something
>> was causing book titles to lose their capitals. Funny? Alas, the
>> jokes
>> on libraries.
>>
>> *In real life, colons don't have spaces before them.
>>
>> *In real life, author-title lists don't end in periods.
>>
>> 13. All text from this point goes underlined when rolled over. But
>> it's not clickable. This makes no sense at all. If LibraryThing did
>> this, I'd have ten bug-reports inside of a minute. I wonder if people
>> report this, or if the general atmosphere of brokeness prevents it.
>>
>> 14. "Publisher," "Boulder, CO : Paradigm Publishers, c2008." What a
>> peculiar string. The publisher is "Paradigm Publishers" but their
>> location is listed first? And why call it "Publisher" when it
>> includes
>> publisher-town, publisher-state, publisher name, copyright symbol (in
>> case you thought it might be public domain?), and publication year.
>>
>> Order implies importance. On what planet is the publisher's location
>> the second-most important fact about this book?
>>
>> 15. "ISBN: 1594514763." Is this really the second-most important fact
>> about the book? To whom? I know it's shocking, but most readers don't
>> know what an ISBN is. The rest don't care.
>>
>> And ISBN *might* be a useful way for a knowledgeable user to jump
>> from
>> Amazon to a libray catalog. But they'd have to get the right edition.
>> The rest of the time, the ISBN is trivia for stockboys.
>>
>> 16. "Description: vi, 210 p. : ill. ; 24 cm." As others have said,
>> this is a meaningless jumble. It doesn't merit the title
>> "description." It's junk.
>>
>> The patron *might* want to know how long a book is--so "210 pages"
>> migtht be useful. I'd even be fine with "216 pages."
>>
>> The patron might also want to know that the book had photographs. It
>> would be better to know how many, or even to get a list of them.
>>
>> 24cm is wrong in about ten ways. First, although "the most European
>> city in America," Boston is still part of the USA. In the USA we use
>> inches, not centimeters. There's there's the issue of one
>> measurement.
>> Is can't be width. Is it height? Width? Maybe it's like TV and
>> computer monitors. That must be it.
>>
>> 17. "Target audience: Adult." This is useful here. There are a lot of
>> kids books about Obama. I'm glad this isn't one of them.
>>
>> 18. "Summary." Fine, except for point six, above.
>>
>> 19. "Contents." Fine, except for point seven, above.
>>
>> 20. "Bibliography: Includes bibliographical references and index."
>> This is marginally useful. For "bibliographical references," I'd use
>> the plain-jane word "bibliography."
>>
>> It's funny that this is spelled out in prose but "ill." isn't.
>> There's
>> probably some good reason.
>>
>> 21. The "Copy/Holdings information" box has some problems:
>>
>> *I'd love to be able to click on locations to find out where they
>> are.
>> Although a long-time Boston resident, "O'Bryant School of Mathematics
>> and Science" means nothing to me. I guess I'll have to ask at the
>> desk.
>>
>> *The "Collection: Nonfiction" confuses me. I wasn't aware libraries
>> were divided that way. In fact, they aren't. But there probably is a
>> fiction section, that includes *most* of the fiction.
>>
>> *Capitalization is almost random. "14 day loan" but "In Library"?
>> Why?
>> Or take the capitalization of the section header, "Copy/Holdings
>> information." The other place with a similarly-styled heading uses
>> title case, "Related Information." Small inconsistencies make a site
>> look sloppy.
>>
>> 22. The form below is literally backward. It's formatted like this:
>>
>> Format: ( ) HTML ( ) Plain text ( ) Delimited
>> Subject: __________________
>> Email to: __________________ [SEND]
>>
>> When I reach the third line, I gather it's an emailing form. Why
>> doesn't it look like almost all other email forms on the web--the
>> ones
>> that START WITH THE EMAIL ADDRESS? Also:
>>
>> *Whoever designed this form didn't look at how you email things on
>> any
>> other site! Do I need the subject field? If I do, why can't I write a
>> note.
>>
>> *What is "Delimited" anyway? I have no idea.
>>
>> *The form cuts off the title, into "Barack Obama : this improbable
>> quest / J". The form field allows only 40 characters, but is visually
>> larger. This is confusing and completely opposite how most web forms
>> work. Anyway, why are they only allowing 40 characters--bandwidth
>> costs?
>>
>> 23. "Next Reads." I gather Next Reads is much liked.[3] But this
>> "advertisment" feels intrusive and over-prominent. It certainly
>> doesn't fit in with the design at all. The line "Sign up for email
>> book suggestions in your favorite genre!" *may* relate to the icon
>> here, or it may not.
>>
>> 24. "Did you know? Many items held by the BPL are not listed in this
>> catalog. Find out about all of our catalogs."
>>
>> *This notice is not visually separated from the line above, about
>> NextReads. Are they all part of the same notice. All separate?
>>
>> *The notice is certainly unfortunate. If all their stuff isn't in the
>> catalog, they need something like this. But it certainly raises
>> doubts.
>>
>> ### Final Points
>>
>> 25. The design is unappealing and slapdash. Some examples:
>>
>> *The information architecture of the left-hand side is all weird.
>> I've
>> mentioned the divet and the "--"s in the subject. But what about the
>> stray horizontal line in between "Table of Contents" and "More by
>> this
>> author"? Is it necessary? Is it attractive? Did somebody's teenager
>> design this?
>>
>> *The "Add to My List" and "Hold this for me" buttons, although on the
>> far right, are somehow creating extra space between the book title
>> and
>> its information. To an untrained user it's just another tiny mark of
>> inferior quality. To the trained web developer it's evidence that
>> someone doesn't understand floats.
>>
>> 25. Font sizes
>>
>> *The most important information--the book info and the holdings
>> info--are in the smallest fonts. That's crazy.
>>
>> *Apart from that, font sizes and styles are slapdash. The title of
>> the
>> book is less prominent than "Related Information."
>>
>> 26. Accessibility
>>
>> *The page fails all levels of all accessibility tests. Five years
>> ago,
>> when I made school software, I paid close attention accessibility.
>> Governments all require it. How did libraries get to opt out?
>>
>> *Test aside, nobody has looked at basic accessibility issues--
>> semantic
>> coding, order of information, tab-order, alt-text, etc.
>>
>> 27. The great bullet problem
>>
>> Finally, as web developer I have to mention one thing that, when I
>> found it, made me laugh out loud--and I don't usually do that.
>>
>> The bullets on the left--the giant, ugly bullets that don't quite
>> align right--are not an unordered list (<ul><li>...</li></ul>, etc.).
>> They are instead a table, with two columns--someone's attempt to
>> produce a bulleted list, without using the HTML markup for... a
>> bulleted list!
>>
>> To get it, the list was "tableized." The left-hand column is for the
>> bullets. But instead of printing the unicode for a bullet, using a
>> graphic or wahtever, the left-hand column is comprised of
>> single-entry, no-content unordered lists. Apparently someone at
>> SirsiDynix thought that <li> </li> was a trick to get a bullet.
>>
>> [1] The BPL is having some sort of deep problem. Most of my searches
>> turn up page after page of blank records. This was the first non-
>> blank
>> one.
>> [2] Not being "on the web" is, in my opinion, the single most
>> important factor that drags libraries down in the internet age, and
>> therefore a great threat to library success, library jobs and indeed
>> to education and democracy. But hey, what do I know? Maybe the rest
>> of
>> the web is wrong and libraries are right!
>> [3] I don't know the product very well, but I am a fan of Novelist
>> and
>> its people.
>>
Received on Sun Mar 15 2009 - 12:48:16 EDT
