Home   |   Staff   |   List of Members   |   Site Map 
Boston Library Consortium
 Virtual Catalog Functionality Task Force
•  Meeting Schedule
 
•  Charge
 
•  Roster
 
•  Minutes
 
•  Reports
 

Minutes

April 11, 2002

Attendees: D. Keller, D. D'Almeida, J. Kolias, S. Andrews, S. Thompson Absent: L. Matson

Guest: Sonya Walters
  1. Charge was read
  2. Review Fretwell-Downing

    There was committee discussion on the Fretwell-Downing demo. Linda sent detailed evaluation points of the demo, and Sonya gave an update on the afternoon demo of Fretwell-Downing's ZPortal/VDX product.

  3. Evaluation Form

    Committee members finished creating the evaluation form. It was decided to make revisions by categorizing functionality and features under broad headings, in order of importance. The committee examined each item of interest in reviewing a product. Each one of these factors was discussed and dissected, so that anyone reading the evaluation form in the future would have no trouble understanding terminology. Individual vendors/products from the original form will be added to the final evaluation form once evaluations are complete. Susanne will draft and prepare the new form for committee review.

  4. Report for April 18th

    Susanne will prepare and send this report to the BLC. It will include the evaluation form, and a brief activity paragraph prepared by Diane.

  5. The next meeting originally scheduled for April 24th , with a SFX demo has been canceled and rescheduled to May 8th at 10 AM, location to be announced.
Agenda:

Read Charge
Continue review of products
Continue work on evaluation form
Discuss next steps
March 14, 2002

Attendees: Diane D'Almeida, Joan Kolias, Linda Matson, Susanne. Andrews, SandyThompson, Dorothy Keller

Guests (observers): Sonya Walters, Stephen Fulchino

1. Charge was read

2. Continue reviewing products

Susanne gave us a written and verbal summary of her findings for LinkFinderPlus. She spoke to Mary Sue Idding at Endeavor on 3/4/02. In summary, LinkFinderPlus is Oracle-based, is a stand-alone product used for linking to any databases with publisher-provided OpenURL linking for additional services such as full-text. Mary's comparison of SFX and LF+ suggested that they are similar with interface differences. George Mason University is an alpha/beta site that may be viewable at the end of April

For more detail see Susanne's report and/or the Endeavor site:www.endinfosys.com

And for Ex Libris' SFX:

Others:

  • Galileo: http://pluto.gsu.edu:80/cgi-bin/door/homepage.cgi?_id=12330118-1097764342-7742&_cc=1 . It doesn't look like they have a serial functionality - we will look further into this.

  • VIC - it doesn't look like it has a product developed for serials - couldn't see on their site. Suzanne will try to contact Tim Cole at UIUC for more information. They do have a form that can be filled out by users online

  • Orbis, is a library catalog that combines information from 18 academic libraries into a single unified database (virtual catalog): there does not seem to be a separate virtual serials catalog and ILL feature, but we will look further: http://orbis.uoregon.edu/ and,

  • Innovative Interfaces, INN Reach: http://www.iii.com/html/products/p_resource.shtml#catalog


    • Continue creating an evaluation form

    Discussion included terminology, deletions, additions, qualifiers. A revised form is available.

    3. Discuss next steps Demo at Boston Public - Fretwell-Dowling Work with Portal Group to invite vendors who have functionality we are analyzing Work on evaluation form Fill out evaluation forms for each vendor Identify any other vendors with potential systems

    Next Meeting:
    March 27, 2002; Fretwell-Downing demo at Boston Public Library; 10:00 - Location Room C05

    Future Meetings and Locations:

  • April 11, 2002; Wellesley, 10:00-1:00
  • April 18, 2002 - Report due
  • April 24, 2002; BPL, 10:00-1:00
  • May 14, 2002; Amherst 10:00-1:00
  • June 11, 2002; State Library (State House) 10:00-1:00
  • June 10, 2002 - Final Report due
    • February 25, 2002

    Attendees: D. D'Almeida, J. Kolias, L. Matson, S. Andrews, S. Thompson
    Absent: D. Keller

    1. Charge was read

    2. Look at web sites for some products under investigation:
    Marina, BorrowDirect, Rapid, Encompass, CrossRef, iSelect, LinkFinderPlus,

    3. Discuss the form we will use for evaluation

    4. Wrote report due in March

    Next Meeting: March 14 , 2002
    BU (green line BU Central) - 771 Comm Ave. - ask at reference desk

    Agenda:
    Read Charge
    Continue review of products
    Continue work on evaluation form
    Discuss next steps

    February 13, 2002

    Attendees: D. Keller, D. D'Almeida, J. Kolias, L. Matson, S. Andrews, S. Thompson
    Guests: Sonya Walters, Steve Fulchino, Joan Thompson

    1. Charge was read

    Steve Fulchino clarified what the March 1 report should contain: He said that the Management Council would like to see the following:

  • How you came up with recommendation
     
  • An evaluation form used to look at products
     
  • What we have been doing; describe the model, indicate what sources we are looking at for sources.

     
  • Recommendation of something to do for the near future, even if it is to continue with existing system, there is not new system, etc.
     

    2. Update on the Virtual Catalog Meeting

    Sonya talked about the Virtual Catalog Meeting held on Friday, Feb 8, 2002. She passed out a chart of what stages different institutions are. She noted that some libraries will be coming up live soon. The group went over the steps necessary to "go live" - the differences for your patrons and for outsiders.
    EpixTech: www.epixtech.com.au

    Sonya also talked about the self-service ILL service iSelect. It will be available for cross database searching for books, not articles.

    What the new version will look like (it might be ready at the end of 2002). ISelect will combine URSA and a user request; the second phase will have enhancements for staff. Sonya mentioned that the group reviewed the enhancement requests. She indicated that there would not be any immediate change to URSA in the near future. Don't know what or if they will develop the system for serials.

    The group also reviewed statistics. The statistics indicated usages were up (300-500 requests)

    3. Available integrated library system products

    Rapid
    Linda reviewed the Rapid (Colorado State) system. The way it is used is that staff uses Rapid to look for a source for the request from patron. This system is based on a serials union catalog database which they build. The records go down to the issue level; it is not virtual. The system is backend only, there is no patron use yet.

    Epixtech
    Dorothy reported on her phone calls about Epixtech. See handout: iLL Anytime, Anywhere and iSelect. This will enable patrons to do self selection of ILL. This is based on a Union list of serials, not a virtual catalog..

    There was a brief discussion about what the OpenURL is and does. Joan talked about it briefly noting that SFX used the OpenURL and how the metadata worked. Joan also noted that a number of vendors did not allow the search to go directly to the article level, but rather, to the Journal level. She also mentioned CrossRef as another tool that might be used in conjunction with this.

    Sandy Thompson provided the group with a citation to follow-up on: "Electronic Resources in Union Catalogs: URLs and Accessibility Issues" by J. Bean, N.Copeland in Electronic Resources in Union Catalogs (27(3/4), 2001 p. 33-

    4. Other products to investigate

    BorrowDirect- http://www.columbia.edu/cu/libraries/inside/projects/copy/ Linda will contact them. This system is for monograph borrowing only. BorrowDirect(CoPY) is a Columbia, Penn, Yale Document Delivery Project

    Rapid - http://www.library.unsw.edu.au/rapid.html While we were told that there is nothing available to look at, Linda will investigate.

    Endeavor Products - http://www.endinfosys.com/products.htm
  • LinkFinderPlus (Endeavor) - http://www.endinfosys.com/prods/linkfinderplus.htm OpenURL system - OpenURL system
     
  • EnCompass (Endeavor) - http://encompass.endinfosys.com - Cross database searching
     
  • Susanne will investigate.
     
    Marina - http://pac.pratt.lib.md.us/
    http://www.lib.umd.edu/ILL/Welcome.html
    http://www.umuc.edu/library/ill/ill.html

    Dorothy will look into this Virtual Library system and ILL used by Enoch Pratt Free Library and other Maryland libraries.

    SWIFt System - http://www.aclin.org/swift
    Linda will look at this system.
    Colorado State Library is looking to use this. See: "Colorado State Library Beta-Testing SWIFt System, M. Rogers. Library Journal March 15, 2001 126(15, p. 27 http://www.mlc.lib.mi.us/workshop/standards-oct01/bailey-hainer_presentation/

    Fretwell Downing - VDX (Virtual Document eXchange) Joan Thompson presented information on this ILL system. See the handout. She will set up a demo of their product for March Minnesota, Ontario Council, University of Toronto is using VDX

    ISelect
    Sonya will look further into this.

    CrossRef
    Diane will investigate.

    Joan will talk to Ex Libris about SFX and MetaLib

    5. Web Sites to look at:
    Ex Libris (URL) for MetaLib and SFX -
    http://demo.exlibrisgroup.com:4535/ALEPH/
    CIC VEL - http://www.vic.lib.il.us/
    http://lincoln.library.uiuc.edu:8000/
    http://www.cic.uiuc.edu/third_level/library_vel.html

    CrossRef - www.crossref.org
    Orbis - Oregon - http://orbis.uoregon.edu/
    Galileo - Georgia Tech - http://pluto.gsu.edu:80/
    Sign in as public access
    EnCompass - Voyager - http://encompass.endinfosys.com/whatisENC.htm

    6. Web Site looked at:
    The group went to the computer room to look at MetaLib and SFX. Joan did a quick demo of the two systems.

    7. Other Readings
    "Interlibrary Loan Products", Library Technology Reports v. 36 (no. 6), Nov/Dec 2000 (also available each year)

    "Assembling and managing virtual Libraries", Library Technology Reports v. 37 (no. 5), Sept/Oct 2001

    Library Systems Newsletter

    Computers in Libraries

    8. Other

    Other Comments:

  • We need to consider patrons who have a citation in hand. How to populate?
     
  • Full Text available - go there instead of getting a populated ILL form
     
  • What would it take to migrate serial information
     
  • What would it take to configure a new system, e.g., SFX or other OpenURL with local holdings?
     
  • What if we found a vendor willing to work with us to develop a system
     
  • What if we bought a system and later found a better one - better to wait?
     
    Fretwell Downing - During investigation and evaluation we still need to consider keeping the union list or not. We now spend $53,000 (which is what it costs to maintain) for the existing system.

    Next Meeting: February 25, 2002
    U Mass Medical Center
    Worchester - off Rt 9
    10:00 - 2:00

    Agenda: Read charge
    Look at web sites for products investigated
    Discuss the form we will use for evaluation
    Write report due in March


    January 25, 2002

    Attendees: D. Keller, D. D'Almeida, J. Kolias, L. Matson, S. Andrews, S. Thompson

    The group met and discussed the following 8 topics.

    Ground Rules
    The group decided that we would:

  • Meet only if we had a quorum of 4 people
     
  • Read the charge at the onset of each meeting
     
    Outcomes to meet charge
    Most of the meeting was spent discussing what we thought the charge is, a possible vision of how a "core" product might look and where to begin.

  • Outline a process to accomplish the charge - what steps to follow
     
  • Define what the charge really means
     
  • Identify and suggest what the Consortium's needs might be
     
  • Look at what now exists
     
    Union list of serials - having to create and load a MARC record for each new title; request through local ILL library office.
    New concept - to do a distributed search in a variety of library catalogs (virtual catalog) and make an unmediated request to the library for an article
  • We proceeded to dream up a vision of what we might ideally like to see for a system. This will be used as a basis for what we develop over the next few months. The scenario would include:
     
    This self-populating would alleviate the problem of misinformation being put on a form.

    An alternative would have to be determined if someone does not do a search in a database but wants to fill out a request form with the information in hand

    An assumption is made here - each library has holdings in their catalog

    Some questions started to be raised:

  • ejournals (aggregated are not necessarily broken down in cataloged)
     
  • ejournals (aggregated are not necessarily broken down in cataloged)

    Further discussion will revolve around this basic mode.

    Meeting schedule
    The group decided on meeting every other week for 2-3 hours
    Jan. 30 - 11-3:00 - BLC Celebration at Boston College
    Feb 13 - 10:00 - BPL

    Identify info/resources available (this will be next meeting agenda)All of us will research what systems might be available and bring samples for next meeting

    Learn more about individual members This was done at first meeting

    Determine roles
    Sandy will continue as facilitator
    Joan will scribe

    View web sites/companies providing online catalog products

    Set next meeting date and place

    Jan. 30 - 10-1:00 - BLC Celebration at Boston College
    Dorothy and Diane will do the group's presentation

    Next meeting
    Feb 13 - 10:00 - BPL
     
    		•
    Boston Library Consortium   700 Boylston Street, Room 317   Boston, MA 02117
    Tel: 617.262.0380   Fax: 617.262.0163   Contact Us
    Last update: 05/22/02