Reference Community Forum
University of Manitoba Libraries
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Table of Contents
Reference Forum Announcement / Page 2Agenda / Page 3
Participant List / Page 4
Library Department Descriptions:
Pat Nicols, Bison Services / Page 5
Lisa O’Hara, Electronic Resources Cataloguer / Page 7
Lynn Partington, Bibliographic Control / Page 8
Richard Jones, Tec-Net / Page 10
Jahred Whiklo, Web Developer, Libraries Electronic Technologies and Services (LETS) / Page 11
Laksh Khatter, Computer System Specialist-Training Officer, Libraries Electronic Technologies and Services (LETS) / Page 14
Muriel St. John, Reference Services, Law Library / Page 15
Mark West, Electronic Resources / Page 16
Val Ward, Acquisitions / Page 17
Notes from the Group Discussions:
Introducing Change / Page 19
Expectations of Users and Complications / Page 21
Collaborations / Page 22
Integration of Technology and Reference Services
Authentication / Page 23
Page 24
Additional comments / Page 26
Reference Community Forum
Thursday, April 26, 2007
9:00 – Noon
“Concourse Lounge”
Main Floor, UniversityCollege
“New Realities, New Relationships”
The incorporation of technology into library processes has had a tremendous impact on library staff, users and traditional boundaries among library departments.
Facilitated by Mark O’ Riley, Learning and Development Services, this Forum is designed to bring UML staff together to discuss and develop new methods of communication and collaboration between reference front-line staff and the library staff who build and maintain the UML’s technological infrastructure, including representatives of LETS, Bison Services, Bibliographic Control, Collection Management and Electronic Resources.
Please RSVP before April 20, 2007 to Muriel St. John:
University of Manitoba Libraries
Reference Community Forum
Agenda
9:00 a.m. – 12:00 Noon
9:00 – 9:10 a.m. / Introductory Remarks – Muriel St. John, Chair9:10 – 9:20 a.m. / Introductory Remarks - Mark O’ Riley , Facilitator
9:20 – 10:00 / Large Group Discussion –
What stands out from the unit presentations sent via email in terms of trends, strengths and challenges
10:00 – 10:30 a.m. / Coffee, Concourse Lounge, UniversityCollege
10:30 – 11:10 / Small Group Discussion -
Explore common issues and trends identified from the large group discussion
11:10 – 11:50 a.m. / Strategies and ways to move forward presented to the large group
11:50 - 12:00 Noon / Closing Remarks and Evaluation
List of Participants
1
Georgina Lewis - Dafoe Library & St. Paul’s College Library
Asako Yoshida - Dafoe Library
Jan Horner - Dafoe Library
Gaitree Boyd – Dafoe Library
Hal Loewen – NJM Library
Laksh Khatter – LETS, Dafoe Library
Richard Jones – LETS, Dafoe Library
Pat Nicholls – Dafoe Library
Regena Rumancik – E.K. Williams Law Library
Muriel St. John – E.K. Williams Library
Jim Blanchard – Dafoe Library
Laurie Blanchard – J. W. Crane Memorial Library, HSL Libraries
Lynne Partington – Dafoe Library
Lisa O’ Hara – Dafoe Library
Mark O’ Riley – Learning & Development Services
Bill Poluha – Sciences Library
Mark West - Electronic Resources
Richard Ellis – Dafoe Library & St. John’s Library
Mark Rabnett – NJM Library
Melissa Raynard – CondordiaHospital. HSL Libraries
Angela Osterreicher –J. W. Crane Memorial Library, HSL Libraries
Susan Heidebrecht – Agriculture Library
Val Ward – Acquisitions Department
Sheila Andrichs - Dafoe Library
Carol Budnick – Dafoe Library
Lyle Ford – Dafoe Library
Marie Speare – Sciences Library
Ganga DaKshinamurti - Management Library (Possibly)
Nicole Michaud-Oystryk – Dafoe Library
Jim Sutherland – Sciences Library
Ginny Aho – Dafoe Library
Jared Whiklo – LETS
Donna Breyfogle – Dafoe Library
1
In preparation for the Forum, the following library departments were asked to outline the main responsibilities, successes and future challenges for their area. These were distributed to all participants prior to the forum.
Pat Nicols,
BISON Services
Main responsibilities:
Without BISON, most work in the Libraries would come to a halt. Although there are provisions for continuing to loan materials to borrowers during temporary disruptions, there is no access to the collection, no ability to add additional titles and no means of paying for or recording the receipt of material without BISON.
BISON consists of several modules which can be grouped into three major areas: Cataloguing and the public catalogue, BISON Web; Circulation; and Acquisitions and Serials, each of which involve regular maintenance, running of reports and solving problems. On a daily basis, bibliographic records are loaded into the system, reports are run to update indexes, and BISON staff answer questions from libraries' staff and users about the use of BISON.
Circulation services requires the running and distribution of several reports on a daily basis, including overdue, recall and hold notices, financial reports, and loading and updating of patron data. Circulation is one of the primary interfaces with our users and involves numerous, complex and inter-related policies that are effected by the system. These policies and the procedures required to implement them require regular interaction between BISON Services and circulation staff in all 20 units.
Acquisitions and Serials Control involve far fewer staff than the other modules but are equally sophisticated and also involve the handling of large sums of money and interaction with other systems and staff on campus. There are regular reports and updates required and problem solving for both acquisitions and serials by BISON Services.
Challenges and Opportunities:
As I indicated in my presentation at the All Staff meeting last week, there have been many challenges to the value of the library catalogue and related services in the last few years. Nonetheless, BISON continues to be one of the busiest systems on campus and all forms of searching are used regularly:
This, however, does not mean that we should stop trying to improve BISON and several new features are planned (highlighting of keywords searched in the bibliographic record, “You found items in the following categories”, limiting by library to include electronic resources) and new services are being developed by SirsiDynix which we will look into purchasing, e.g. Director’s Stations (data mining and trend analysis software that extracts data from our Unicorn system, EPS/Rooms the new public access system from SirsiDynix which incorporates multi-database searching and a new add-on for the catalogue, faceted/visual searching which categorizes search results using many factors, such as Subject, Author or Publication Date.
Lisa O'Hara,
Electronic Resources Cataloguer
What's Going Well:
- we're obtaining batches of records with the purchases of electronic resources so that they can be batch-edited and added to BISON more quickly and efficiently
- we've just gotten access to OCLC Connexion so we can fix errors in our holdings in WorldCat
- we've automated the process for adding ejournals to the catalogue so that it will be updated monthly with additions and deletions, keeping it in sync with UMLinks and Citation Linker
Challenges:
- finding time to do everything!
- tasks are becoming more and more complicated, requiring staff with increased technical expertise and cataloguing-related training
- necessary information is sometimes hard to track down (for example, whether records are available with a particular collection purchased)
- many records didn't go into OCLC during the original batchload because of cataloguing "errors" (OCLC is very picky) and cleanup will take some time
Inter-relationships:
- BISON Services - work with Susanna and Pat to set up properties and profiles to batch-load records and run reports
- ER - get informationon when databases, ejournals and ebooks become available, information about consortial purchases
- LETS - work on numerous projects including New Books Lists, RSS feeds and blogs
- Digital Library Group - workon metadata for MSpace, Luna projects and Alouette Canada
- Reference - work on projects with individual staff members including New Books Lists, RSS feeds as well as Luna projects
- Collections - work on E-Library menu, information exchanged about record availability and suitability, WorldCat issues
Lynne E. Partington,
Head, Bibliographic Control
Positive Trends:
$staffing in BC is gradually growing to reflect the need to incorporate electronic resources into the workflow - 1 Electronic Resource Cataloguing Librarian & 1 dedicated LA IV position
$automated procedures are being introduced to streamline workflow
$pre-editing and then batch loading purchased records is proving an extremely efficient tool
$Examples from 2006/07 include:
$American Culture Series - 5,280 microfilm records
$E-books from various collections - 9,274 records
$MARCit! serial records - 16,984 records
$Unicorn=s Global Edit Feature is being used extensively in authority control work
$Examples from 2006/07 include:
$Name changes made automatically - 5,934 records
$Subject heading changes made automatically - 4,704 records
Challenges:
1. Database Cleanup
$all automated systems depend upon having accurate data available for access purposes, reporting purposes, etc. BISON is now an enormous database:
$bibliographic records - 1.6 million
$item records - 2.8 million
$all of these records have to be kept in sync and accurate
$we have to cope not only with incoming new records, but also with ongoing work created by the two ReCons of 1989-91 and 1993-94 for which cleanup was never funded
$in addition, barcoding was never completed, especially in the largest collection housed in Dafoe where approximately 50,000 Dewey and several more thousand LC items were never barcoded
$also, every time we migrate to a new system the existence of quick and dirty ReCon records and non-barcoded materials undermines the migration, creates massive cleanup projects for cataloguing staff, and frustrates all BISON users
$statistics from the last two years for monographic and serial record corrections made in BC:
$ Mono. Problems Corrected Serial Problems Corrected
2005/0661,279 90,923
2006/0764,539 40,050
1
2. Gift Cataloguing
$the OCLC/LTS contract for 25,000 items per year is inadequate for the Libraries= needs but, to date, funding has not been available to increase this amount
$since new purchases take priority over gift materials, fewer gifts can be sent
$in 2006/07 the fewest number of gifts were sent since we started outsourcing:
$2001/02 6,898 gifts
$2002/03 9,432 gifts
$2003/04 12,953 gifts
$2004/05 5,803 gifts
$2005/06 3,709 gifts
$2006/07 2,723 gifts
3. Annex Preparation
$some work has already begun to identify and catalogue and/or barcode selected items
$we expect this work to increase dramatically over the coming year and Annex projects will have to be fitted in with our ongoing work - probably at the expense of stopping some of our current services
$looking at it from a different angle, Annex preparations can be viewed as an opportunity in that they will involve some cleanup of BISON problems and, as I constantly tell my staff when they get discouraged, AEvery little bit helps!@. Everything we catalogue or cleanup means that an item in the Libraries has been made accessible to our users
Richard Jones, Tec-Net
Technical Support and Network Services (Tec-Net) continues to improve the security, stability and performance of the computing systems available to the University of Manitoba Libraries. Our greatest strength continues to be our people. A flexible, conscientious and knowledgeable technical support team coupled with a state-of-the-art remote desktop management system provides the University of Manitoba Libraries with outstanding online support for librarians, support staff and our faculty and student patrons, both on-campus and off.
Special, one-time capital funding in each of the last two fiscal years has enabled the replacement of almost all of the obsolete computers, both public and staff, in the Libraries, as well as providing for upgrades to specialized equipment in Archives and Special Collections (a large-format flatbed scanner), Microforms (two fiche/film reader/scanners) and Digital Libraries Planning and Development (six production servers). Four libraries (Law, Management, Architecture/Fine Arts and St. Paul’s) have benefited from the installation of new, network cable plants and active components as part of Information Services and Technologies’ (IST) Building Network Upgrade Fund. The design and installation of wireless networks in these facilities is also, underway.
The most significant challenges, now, include the improvement of network infrastructure to the satellite hospital libraries, the cost of renewal for Libraries information technology, ongoing maintenance costs for this equipment and the development and provision of training materials specific to Libraries IT. As these technologies progress, rapidly and relentlessly, ensuring that Tec-Net staff stays abreast of new developments is crucial for our ongoing success and the success of the Libraries as a whole, in meeting the needs of its patrons. Suffusing our efforts will be a focus on accessibility and ergonomics.
Opportunities for Tec-Net to improve current and create new services do exist. Microsoft Office2007 and the Vista operating system will be assessed for compatibility with current Libraries applications. Current technology in self-check systems will also be evaluated. The libraries in Music, Agriculture and St. John’sCollege will undergo network upgrades within the timeframes of this iteration of the rolling plan. Wireless networks will follow in these locations. Patron Printing Systems will be deployed in IST computer labs to provide student laser printing. There will be ongoing development of the LETS Web site in the RedDot content management system and the nTreePoint news and events aggregator.
Jahred Whiklo,
Web Developer, Libraries Electronic Technologies and Services (LETS)
Digitization
Digitization is an important process in the Libraries as it removes requirement of physical proximity and allows us to expand the resources available to Distance Ed students and the public at large. It also helps to preserve some of our more delicate resources by handling them once to create a digital copy and then not have to worry about or limit access to some of our more interesting resources.
My role as Web Developer differs with each digitization project from project manager, application developer, database designer (Winnipeg Tribune) to server administrator and application support/development (Manitobia).
Each project is different in the purpose of digitization, the size of the collection to be digitized and the desired outcome (full-text searching, educational interface, browsing by different facets) and so the project team can change drastically.
Opportunities:
●Providing access to the public to new resources or in a new way, possibly for the first time ever brings recognition to the University. (Archives & Special Collections' Arctic Blue Books Online was the first copy available fully online.)
●The new technologies involved create new opportunities for learning and expanding my skill set.
●A lot of materials are just interesting and I enjoy perusing them while working on design and function.
Challenges:
●Copyright, do you have copyright or some set of rights. Does that include electronic? Many don't. Can you find who has copyright to make a request?
●Technologies change quickly, but one constant is that digitization takes storage space. So you need to have a way to quickly and easily add more space, and the amount of space is increasing as it becomes cheaper and faster to digitize. (Winnipeg Tribune 645MB, Manitobia 319,000MB)
●Funding becomes an issue as digitization is either outsourced or we need dedicated staff to perform the scanning and image manipulation. Hardware costs for display, searching and storage also need to be part of the discussion.
Libraries' Website
The Libraries' website is becoming the primary mode of communicating and interacting with patrons as they spend less time physically in the libraries and expect to be able to access more of our resources from home 24 hours a day. They therefore also expect to be able to access support specifically for these resources and also general reference assistance on their own terms.
The Virtual Reference service is one example of a way for patrons to get live, on-demand assistance from anywhere (and hopefully in the long run anytime).
My role is to facilitate changes to our site, to make possible the “easiest” (defined as quick and quiet) path from patron to information. To listen to the needs/desires of staff and administration and to make suggestions as to possible solutions. Then to implement the agreed upon solution (or partial solution) as quickly and in as an affordable manner as possible.
To this end, some recent and upcoming actions are:
●Changes in BISON Web to make SFX enabled journals available with their OpenURL.
●The database list was recently modified to start sharing subject areas with the E-Journal list.
●Usability testing will hopefully be started this fall, to see how patrons use our site to get to the information they want.
●Blog and Wiki servers set up.
Opportunities:
●Interact with staff and patrons to get a sense of how they a) use the site b) want to use the site, and get a different point of view.
●Examine new ideas from other institutions and explore how they are trying to support their patrons (Georgia Tech's Umlaut).
●Learn new technologies in the course of working on improving access. (Blog and Wiki software)
Challenges:
●You only hear when it really doesn't work. Determining if silence means they are happy or just muddling through.
●Moving quickly to use the technologies our patrons prefer.
●Designing for undergraduates, graduates, faculty and staff, usually in a single interface.
Laksh Khatter, B.Sc.
Computer System Specialist-Training Officer
Libraries Electronic Technologies and Services (LETS)
As a Computer Support Specialist and more specifically Training Officer I am responsible for manning the help desk from time to time and also providing training for the library staff on issues relating to the use of technology.
The libraries are evolving and adapting to the fact that technology is in every facet of our lives. More and more people are using “E-library” and online resources. The information is not only static (books) but very fluid (internet) and evolving at an exponential rate. In the midst of all these technological changes, the Libraries staff is playing catch-up.