I have not been ignoring the discussions on our mailing list; please
do not consider me to be the absentee list owner. I only feel the need
to step in when things get ugly, when the discussion seems to be
between only two individuals, or the discussion is really off topic.
So far none of this has really been the case.
That being said, I would like to add my two cents:
1. NGC4Lib - The purpose of the list is/was to discuss issues
surrounding the idea of "'next generation' library catalogs". In
retrospect, the word "catalog" was not a very good one, but it is/was
the only word we had. The word "catalog" brings along with it so many
different connotations. Its meaning is too ambiguous. Since then the
phrase "discovery system" has been added to the vernacular to denote
the indexing of library content and its subsequent searching. Good
examples of this type of software is VUFind, AquaBrowser, Primo,
Blacklight, etc. In reality, all of these applications are indexers
(not databases), and most them are based on an open source tool called
Lucene. Add Web 2.0 features to your Lucene index of library content
and apparently you have a "'next generation' library catalog". Even
now these ideas are being blurred with the introduction of other
initiatives such as Summon, Primo Central, OpenPHI, and some of the
work I've heard about Ebsco. Other things are in the mix too including
Rochester's eXtensible Catalog (XC) and the DLF's Open Library
Environment (OLE). The sum of all of these things is expected to be
the topic of NGC4Lib.
2. Linked data - A lot of the discussion of late has surrounded the
concept of linked data. The idea is relatively simple. Make your data
available via HTTP, and within your data link it to other linked data.
Through such a process a "web" of content will make itself available
-- a web that can be read by computers, find relationships between
data that would be difficult for humans discover, and literally expand
the proverbial sphere of knowledge. Simply dumping our bibliographic,
authority, and holding information as MARC would accomplish this goal
but very poorly. Transforming it into MARCXML would be a step in the
right direction but not much. This is true for two reasons. First, the
MARC format is not XML, and therefore not easily parsed/understood by
the larger Internet community. It requires a knowledge of the "secret
code book" -- a knowledge of what 1xx, 245, and 6xx mean in the
contexts of a bibliographic or authority record. Second, and more
importantly, its data is too string based. The value for a 100 field
ought to be a key -- think unique identifier akin to a relational
database key -- not a name or title. These keys are the URIs of the
linked data world. I'm not sure what the best solution is, but I would
consider dumping our MARC records from our catalogs, transforming them
into some implementation of RDF, converting the values in the 1xx
fields, 6xx fields, 7xx fields, and 254 fields to the URIs from places
such as dbpedia.org or OCLC's authorities, and then let the Web do the
rest.
3. Collections and services - Suppose the linked data scenario
comes to fruition. Suppose our local "discovery systems" work
perfectly. What then? A person does a search. A computer suggests
additional items of interest. The next question is, "Great, give it to
me." Is that the sum of what we are about? With the increasing
availability of content on the Web, how is providing access to
information a niche librarianship can fill? It isn't. We don't create
content, and there are too many competitors. Publishers will
eventually provide direct access to their content. Open access
publishers will have their content on the Web. Heck, even the books
will be found in Google Books, the HaitiTrust, or the Internet
Archive. Access to content will not be the problem to solve. Instead
it will be on how to use, understand, and synthesize it within the
context of the user. This is a role libraries are more than able to
fill. We are expected to know our users. We know what classes they are
taking, and what classes they are teaching. We know what their
dissertation was on, and we know their major discipline of study. We
know they are in the business of government, making widgets, or saving
lives. Our users are looking for information to help them do their
work. We can provide the tools enabling them to do this work quicker,
easier, and more efficiently. It is not just about collections.
Everybody will have collections. It is about collections and services.
It is about putting the collections in context. Collections without
services are useless, and services without collections are empty. A
library needs to provide both, especially in a digital environment. I
think the "'next generation' library catalog" is an embodiment of this
idea.
--
Eric Lease Morgan
University of Notre Dame
Received on Tue Oct 27 2009 - 22:04:21 EDT