One of the things we've been working on is a way to classify e-pubs of
all types so that they are integrated into the call number-based
browsing functions. Most of our libraries either don't use call numbers
at all or suppress them so that they don't index or display (it is felt
that telling a user that an e-book can be found in a particular shelf
location is a disservice). This creates a second problem for them,
these resources aren't counted in any collection analysis reports that
are based on call numbers - a serious problem for accreditation, etc.
We did some work in our underlying ILS to add a separate set of call
number type codes - an alpha set that maps to the standard numeric set,
e.g., A=LC, B=Dewey, etc... For holdings display, the alpha-coded call
numbers are suppressed, but for indexing, discovery, and collection
analysis, they are fully functional. These means that, when providing a
virtual shelf browse function, the e-books are "interfiled" with the
print books, etc... We've always had this problem, long before e-books,
with other media. When audio and video use an accession-based call
number rather than a classification number, these same problems arise.
IMHO, everything in the collection should get all the "call numbers"
needed for subject access even it there is only one or none showing
shelving location. This way thing could be discovered in any number of
virtual shelves.
- Michele
On 10/5/2010 11:00 AM, Cindy Harper wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 5, 2010 at 10:59 AM, Cindy Harper<charper_at_colgate.edu> wrote:
>
>
>> Colgate University built an on-site ASRS in 2005 as part of renovating our
>> entire main library. During the 2 years of construction on the building,
>> our services were dispersed among several buildings on campus and the
>> high-use portion of the collection that remained available to our students
>> during that time was entirely housed in the ASRS, requested through our
>> online catalog, and delivered to our circulation point in utility vehicle
>> loads. Of course, we also made major use of the ConnectNY user-initiated
>> resource sharing and traditional ILL. There was user dissatisfaction at
>> first, but one thing we learned is that patrons were greatly pleased when we
>> made a public awareness campaign to show them how to virtually browse the
>> stacks in call-number order using the OPAC. The other thing we heard when
>> we moved back into our renovated building was that students were
>> disappointed that they had to go to the stacks and find the books
>> themselves! And faculty were disappointed when we stopped delivering
>> directly to their offices, of course - but we want them to come to the
>> library :) . When we opened the new building, we brought up the Encore
>> discovery system, and blended it into the classic OPAC site as our keyword
>> search (classic indexes are still available in other tabs). Encore doesn't
>> have a virtual call number browse feature, but we have asked for this as an
>> enhancement - either a linear browse of the shelves, or a hierarchical call
>> number facet drill-down.
>>
>> Cindy Harper, Systems Librarian
>> Colgate University Libraries
>> charper_at_colgate.edu
>> 315-228-7363
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Oct 5, 2010 at 10:01 AM, Emily Lynema<emily_lynema_at_ncsu.edu>wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I agree with Dan that it is a bit of a moot point to argue about the
>>> benefits of moving materials to off-site storage. It is absolutely going to
>>> happen. But here's the thing....it's been happening for years as we buy more
>>> and more e-books and digital collections. If the argument is that users need
>>> to be able to 'browse' the physical stacks, they've already been unable to
>>> discover digital materials in this way for some time now.
>>>
>>> But here's where I think this topic does tie in with NGC4LIB. The question
>>> we should be asking ourselves is "What are our patrons losing when we move
>>> our physical print materials off-site? Are there tools we can build to help
>>> them recover that usefulness in new ways?"
>>>
>>> It's for that exact reason that we are continuing to explore different,
>>> enriched ways to browse the collection virtually at NCSU, in addition to
>>> thinking about what enhanced delivery services we can offer to our patrons
>>> to make it easier and more reliable to get a book out of an automated
>>> retrieval system than it was to go find it in the stacks.
>>>
>>> I bet there are a lot of cool new discovery tools we could think about
>>> that way make both digital collections AND materials stored off-site
>>> accessible to our patrons.
>>> As for the use case that Tim pointed out, it seems like those materials
>>> should have been part of a reference collection of some sort. It goes
>>> without saying that as libraries contemplate major changes like these, our
>>> job is to be listening to our patrons so that we can learn what mistakes we
>>> might have made and remedy them. An interesting idea that has been tossed
>>> around here is to retain on open browsing shelves the materials most
>>> recently pulled from the ARS. Perhaps that would need to include materials
>>> most frequently pulled from the ARS, too.
>>>
>>> -emily
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2010 13:46:24 -0400
>>> From: Dan Scott<dan_at_COFFEECODE.NET>
>>> Subject: Re: CSU library finds 40% of collection hasn't circulated
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Oct 1, 2010 at 7:29 AM, Kyle Banerjee<banerjek_at_uoregon.edu>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> >>
>>>
>>>>>>> "We're going to move out the books that are never checked out, the
>>>>>>>
>>>>> ones
>>>>>
>>>>>>> that are never used anymore,"
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> I hope they're not relying exclusively on circ transaction data to
>>>>>
>>>> discover
>>>>
>>>>> what is "never used." I realize this may sound insane, but a lot of
>>>>> materials are actually used *in the library* without being checked out.
>>>>>
>>>> The
>>>>
>>>>> nature of the resource and the people who have a lot to do with this.
>>>>>
>>>>> Years ago, we did a major weeding and storage project at a place I
>>>>>
>>>> worked at
>>>>
>>>>> did something similar. Just to be safe, we had the shelvers look at our
>>>>> proposed list which contained 10's of thousands of items to see if any
>>>>>
>>>> of
>>>>
>>>>> them jumped out as things they recognized as materials that were used.
>>>>>
>>>> While
>>>>
>>>>> most were not, there were certainly a number that were.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>> That's not at all insane. In fact, we use our next-generation ILS
>>> (Evergreen - did y'all catch that valiant attempt to link this thread
>>> to the supposed topic of the mailing list?) to record in-house uses,
>>> and when we did our own PR-free move of items from the stuffed
>>> circulation stacks into storage this summer, we used a combination of
>>> lack of circulation since 1985 and lack of recorded in-house uses
>>> since 2003 to determine likely suspects for movement into storage.
>>>
>>> Of course, some patrons disobey the signs posted all around the
>>> library asking them not to reshelve the books and slip books back onto
>>> the shelves by themselves, evading an in-house-use statistic, but at
>>> some point you just have to accept that there is a possibility that
>>> one of those books will show up in your next generation catalogue with
>>> "Storage" in the copy location information and they'll have to ask
>>> someone to retrieve it for them. It seemed like a worthwhile risk for
>>> us to take, in return for breathing room on our stacks.
>>>
>>> -- Dan Scott Laurentian University
>>>
>>> --
>>> Emily Lynema
>>> Associate Department Head
>>> Information Technology, NCSU Libraries
>>> 919-513-8031
>>> emily_lynema_at_ncsu.edu
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
--
~NOTE EMAIL ADDRESS CHANGE TO FCLMIN_at_UFL.EDU~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Michele Newberry Assistant Director for Library Services
Florida Center for Library Automation 352-392-9020
5830 NW 39th Avenue 352-392-9185 (fax)
Gainesville, FL 32606 fclmin_at_ufl.edu
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Received on Tue Oct 05 2010 - 11:28:21 EDT