The Library Problem:

In March of 2006 my wife Mary and I owned about 3,500 books. We both have eclectic interests, voracious appetites for knowledge, and a great love of used bookstores. The problem was that we had no idea what books we had or where any of them were. We lost books all the time, cursed late into the night digging through piles for that one book we knew must be there, and even bought books only to find that we already owned them. There were books on random shelves, books on the floor, we were tripping over books when we walked up and down the stairs. In short, we had a mess.

(via)

Ellyssa Kroski‘s Librarian’s Guide to Creating 2.0 Subject Guides is good introduction for Librarians who think know “there has to be a better way.” But why no mention of blogs and blogging tools? (I’m still really happy that when you search our catalog for something, a subject guide for that term appears (if we have one that’s relevant)).

library, libraries, subject guides, 2.0, lib20, library 2.0

Our intention is to feature “a series of books that challenge our beliefs and test our commitment to free speech,” but on this post about Holocaust denial I found myself unwilling (and unable) to link to the free, online PDF full text of David Irving‘s Hitler’s War. And when we discovered it wasn’t in our collection (though it may have been lost/stolen, not replaced, and the record deleted), we decided not to purchase it.

Sometimes books are challenged. Sometimes they’re just not purchased.

bbw, bbw2007, banned books week, library, libraries, dilemma, holocaust denial

Whose Library Is It Anyway?: A Visit to the Lenox

[tags]library, libraries, humor, lennox library[/tags]

THE LENOX LIBRARY

What is this?

This, dear, is the great Lenox Library.

What is it for?

Nobody knows.

But I thought you said it was a library.

So I did.

Then there must be books in it

Perhaps.

Why is it called the “Lenox” Library?

Because it was founded and given by Mr. James Lenox.

Given to whom?

To the city of New York.

Oh! then it is a public library?

Yes, dear.

How delightful! Why it must be very useful to students and the reading public?

Very.

But why are the doors locked?

To keep people out.

But I thought you said it was a public library?

So I did.

Then how can they keep people out?

By locking the doors.

But why?

To keep the pretty books from being spoiled.

Why! Who would spoil the pretty books?

The public.

How?

By reading them.

Gracious! What are all those brass things on the roof?

Cannon, dear.

What are they for?

To blow the heads off students who want to get in.

Why! and see those gallows!

Yes, dear.

And people hanging!

Certainly, sweet.

Who are they?

Students who got in.

But is there no way of getting into the library without being shot or hanged?

Yes, sweet.

How?

By writing an humble letter of application to the kind Lord High Librarian.

Well?

He will refer you to the 1st Assistant Inspector of Character.

And then?

It will go to the Third Deputy Examiner of Morals.

Next?

He will pass it on to the Comptroller of Ways and Means.

And he?

He will, after mature deliberation, send it to the Commercial Agency.

What for?

To get a proper understanding of the applicant’s solvency.

Well?

Then it comes back for the monthly meeting of the Sub-Committee on Private Inquiry.

Why?

To ascertain if the applicant has any real necessity for consulting any particular book in the library.

And suppose he has?

Why, then the paper goes to the Sub-janitor.

And what does he do?

He finds out if the Astor or the Mercantile Libraries have the book.

And if they have?

He tells the applicant to go there and consult it.

But if they have it not?

Then the application goes to the Commissioner of Vital Statistics.

For what purpose?

To ascertain if the applicant is still living.

And if he is?

At the next annual meeting of the Board of Directors, if there is a quorum present, which sometimes happens, he will get a ticket entitling him to admission between the hours of two and three on a specified day.

But if the applicant is busy on that day at that hour?

He forfeits his ticket.

But how’s the public benefited by this “public” library?

Ask the Trustees.

Source: Life, 17 January 1884. Reprinted in Harry Miller Lydenberg, History of the New York Public Library (New York: New York Public Library, 1923), 113–115.

A little more than two years after I realized how (really) bad the problem was and about 18 months after I prototyped my solution, our new library website, catalog, and knowledgebase launched last week — just in time for the fall semester opening.

It’s all built on Scriblio, includes a very simple new books list that you can narrow by subject and get via RSS. And if you search for subject areas like anthropology, economics, english writing, or any of a few dozen other topics, you’ll find our librarians’ subject guides listed at or near the top to help you out. You can also use the facets, clustered metadata shown in the right sidebar that reflect the aggregated results of that search†, to easily explore the collection or find the exact resource you need.

This started out simply, but the distance from prototype to working, um, product is difficult, dangerous, and frustrating. Still, when successful, it’s also wonderfully gratifying. And none of this would have happened without the help and support of a number of friends and colleagues both inside and outside the my library (callouts: Zach, Matt, Lichen, Jessamyn, Jon, Elaine, David, Anne, Dwight, Chris, PSU, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and a lot of fellow library bloggers who’ve shared stories, spread the word, and helped make magic).

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

One more thing: This site isn’t perfect, but it’s a library catalog we can fix. Tell me what’s wrong, or better yet, download the software, join the list, and let’s work on it together so we can all have a better system.

† a set of facets can show you that anthropology is related to history, sociology, and ethnology, and help you narrow any of those subjects down to field work, methodology, or study and teaching.

library, libraries, lib20, library 2.0, Plymouth State University, Lamson Library, website, launch, Scriblio, WPopac

I was honored to be a panelist at the LITA/ALCTS CCS Authority Control in the Online Environment Interest Group presentation of “Authority Control Meets Faceted Browse.”

What is faceting? Why is it (re)emerging in use? Where can I see it in action? This program is intended to introduce the audience to facet theory, showcase implementations that use faceted approaches for online catalogs, and facilitate discussion on the relationship between structured authority data and this type of navigation.

Kathryn La Barre of University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign explained the theory, while NCSU’s Charley Pennel, Vanderbilt’s Mary Charles Lasater, and I each described its implementation in Endeca, Primo, and Scriblio respectively. Scriblio is an open source project that has less than one FTE working on it, so it’s an honor to see it compared against commercial offerings, especially NCSU’s groundbreaking work.

My slides are online in QuickTime and PDF form, and I was proud to be able to show off the new public beta of the Lamson Library website and catalog, based on Scriblio.

I should be careful to point out that faceting is a theory of cataloging and classification, while clustering is the technical process of aggregating and reporting relevant metadata in search and browse screens. The difference is that Scriblio doesn’t impose rules on our cataloging practice, it simply supports clustering the metadata to make it easier to find the resources we’re looking for.

If anything, the importance of authority control increases in faceted/clustered search and browse systems, but it is a matter of exchanging one set of technological constraints for another. Card catalogs, with their alphabetical access and physical affordances (or limitations) demanded cataloging practice that is in some ways at odds with the very different affordances and limitations of faceted/clustered search and browse.

Among current implementations, clustering does well with subjects, but poorly with authors. Looking at the cardinality of those facets, it’s easy to understand the problem:

(statistics from the Lamson Library (beta) catalog.)

The number of unique authors compared to the number of total authors is very high, while a large number of subjects are represented by a small number of unique headings. Still, some authors are well suited to faceted browse, and their emergence in a result set could be mined to help users further refine their searches. Example: J. K. Rowling is an obvious top author in searches for both “harry potter” and “j k rowling”. Her statistical “pop” in the results might be worth looking at and worth leveraging elsewhere.

As currently implemented, however, clustered results most help the user who doesn’t know the proper terms for her field of interest. A user searching “sociology of education” is likely to be interested in materials cataloged under “educational sociology,” and clustered search navigation works well in that and similar circumstances.

clustering, faceting, faceted search and browse, authority control, library, library 2.0 lib20, libraries, Scriblio, presentation, LITA, ALCTS

Part of the Transformation Track, Transforming Your Library, and Your Library’s Future, with Technology, program coordinators Alan Gray and John Blyberg (both of Darien Public Library) described it like this:

Technology can transform your library and its services, as it is transforming the lives of your patrons. From do-it-now technology improvements to next-generation implementations, from software to SOPACs, from in-your-face competition to over-the-horizon transformations, three accomplished experts will instruct, enlighten and challenge you to use technology to make your library more relevant to your patrons — today and tomorrow.

I was among Lori Ayre, who showed how automation solutions can transform your physical library, and Roy Tennant, who addressed issues of technology leadership. My own presentation (slides available in QuickTime and PDF) focused on how we can leverage web technologies to build valuable online libraries that serve our communities.

Your library is more than books…your website should be too

Recent attention to our catalogs is leading to much needed improvements in their usability, findability, and remixability, but a catalog does not reflect the full breadth of programs, services, and answers our users value. We need to look carefully at our entire web presence and leave nothing behind.

Your website is not a marketing tool…it’s a service point.

Our users don’t care about us, they care about what we can do for them. We need to go beyond describing the resources available in our brick and mortar branches and deliver easy to use, self service resources online. Every search is a question, we need to deliver answers.

Culture is local…so are our libraries.

Libraries face stiff competition from publishers, online and local retailers, and even other libraries in delivering mass culture materials to users, but each library stands alone in its efforts to preserve and disseminate locally unique resources. Local history is a good place to start, but libraries that become experts in helping local businesses or community groups become finable and usable online will be well valued.

Examples

• A catalog mockup that gives more than just a list of matching books.
• A live beta of Plymouth State University’s new website and catalog that tries to answer questions asked in the search. Search for “reserves” (or “course reserves” or a variety of other forms) and it directs you to the course reserves form or to the reserves request forms for instructors. Search for “anthropology” and it directs users to our subject guide and to our Ask a Librarian service.
• Tamworth Library is posting (anonymized) answers on their website to questions that come in from patrons, such as this one about what gardening materials are in the collection. Posting like that helps answer questions for users who might ask a search engine but haven’t asked their librarians about. And because the library’s events are such an important feature of their services, the events calendar is posted in the sidebar to every page and available as RSS.
• Tamworth’s website has also become an important feature of the community (take a look at these comments), and their hoping to put online the unique pieces of local history in their collection. Thomas Ford Memorial Library in Western Springs has shown how much patrons near and far appreciate libraries for exposing local materials with their obituary index.
• And the engagement of the community in a local history collection can enrich our knowledge of events and places that official historians didn’t record. The comments at Beyond Brown Paper, a collection of photos from a paper manufacturer in northern New Hampshire, reveal the rich history of the mill, the town, and its people.

library, libraries, transformation, lib20, library 2.0, ALA, presentation

Two books that just happened to be sitting next to eachother in the LC files:

001        47029455
003     DLC
005     20050826211147.0
008     761229s1946    xx            000 0 dut
010    _a   47029455
020    _a940.544
035    _a(OCoLC)2652163
040    _aDLC
       _cPBm
       _dDLC
042    _apremarc
050 00 _aD763.N42
       _bR64
100 1  _aToonder, Jan Gerhard,
       _d1914-
245 14 _aHet puin aan de Rotte,
       _cdoor J. Gerhard Toonder.
260    _aAmsterdam,
       _bA. J. G. Strengholt
       _c[c1946]
300    _a95 p.
       _billus.
       _c27 cm.
651  0 _aRotterdam (Netherlands)
       _yBombardment, 1940.

Note the 600 series fields above and below.

001        47029622
003     DLC
005     20050415202653.0
008     731204s1947    nyua     b    001 0 eng
010    _a   47029622
020    _a0820601128
035    _a(OCoLC)754199
040    _aDLC
       _cOY
       _dDLC
042    _apremarc
050 00 _aTP300
       _b.W4 1947
082    _a662.1
100 1  _aWeingart, George W.
       _q(George Washington),
       _d1871-
245 10 _aPyrotechnics /
       _cby George Weingart.
250    _a2d ed., rev. and enl.
260    _aBrooklyn :
       _bChemical Pub. Co.,
       _cc1947.
300    _axii, 244 p. :
       _bill. ;
       _c23 cm.
500    _aPub. 1937 under title: Dictionary and manual of pyrotechny; 1939 under title: Pyrotechny;
              a practical manual for manufacturers of fireworks, signals, flares and pyrotechnic displays;
              1943 under title: Pyrotechnics, civil and military.
500    _aIncludes index.
504    _a“List of pyrotechnical books”: p. 232-233.
650  0 _aFireworks.

library, libraries, next to eachother, fireworks, pyrotechnics, bombardment, proximity, shelf

The most selfish thing about submitting a manuscript late is asking “When is it going to be out?” So I’ve been waiting quietly, rather than trouble Judi Lauber, who did an excellent job editing and managing the publication.

Ryan and Jessamyn each contributed a chapter, and I owe additional thank yous to the full chorus of voices that answered so many of my questions, participated in interviews, and generally made the book/journal/thing what it is.

The official announcement features a quote from Richard Stallman, the founding father of the Free and Open Source software movement.

In the 70s, computer users lost the freedoms to redistribute and change software because they didn’t value their freedom. Computer users regained these freedoms in the 80s and 90s because a group of idealists, the GNU Project, believed that freedom is what makes a program better, and were willing to work for what we believed in.

He’s speaking of software, code, but his words harmonize well with the founding purpose of libraries. A hundred years ago we embarked on a period of library construction unmatched in our previous history. We may mistakenly identify the period with the source of funding, Andrew Carnegie funded thousands, but Carnegie’s spoken belief that individuals could elevate themselves and build a stronger republic through libraries was alive in the zeitgeist.

Today, as the World Wide Web becomes ever more interwoven with the fabric of our fleshy lives, libraries have new roles and responsibilities. Just as we architected public libraries of brick and stone in the past, we must to build and support a public information architecture for the future. Open source software not only serves libraries’ immediate economic interests, such software is also aligned with the larger public mission and philosophy of libraries.

Yes, I’m a partisan, for both free — free as in free speech — and open source software and for libraries.

libraries, library, LTR, Library Technology Reports, F/OSS, open source, free software, freedom, lib20, library 2.0

What a difference a year makes? Jessamyn was among those sharing her stories of how technology and tech staff were often mistreated in libraries, but there’s a lot of technology in this year’s ALA program (including three competing programs on Saturday: The Ultimate Debate: Do Libraries Innovate, Social Software Showcase, and Transforming Your Library With Technology.

And still, not all is well. Ryan Deschamps seems to have hit the button with a post from April of this year. It’s one of the most thoughtful and reasoned posts I’ve seen on the matter, so I’m calling the whole thing a must read, but here are a few quotes:

technology problems are ultimately organizational culture problems. How can something that seems to some to be a “no brainer” seem so high-level risk to others?

…

Technology has reached a stage that any idea to implement a technology ought to begin with a “yes.”

I mean it. Begin with a “yes,” then work through the barriers or fit the idea into a list of priorities after. No, that does not mean “implement new technology NOW!” It means “give us techies the benefit of the doubt and then determine if something is not sustainable, too resource-intensive or whatnot after we have had the opportunity to show you it can be successful.”

Say “yes” and then say “let me see the model or plan” and then criticize it on its merits. Then do a 5-minute Google or Wikipedia search to find out what we are trying to do. Say “yes” first, then ask the hard questions and when the idea falls off the rails say “ok — let’s look at this for another time.”

…

We are dying to flex our muscles, because we have been working hard at building them. Starting with “no” is like telling us we are fat in our jeans. We know we are not. We know we are sexy, in-demand and turning heads everywhere we go. You will not teach us humility, it will be through action, mistake and consequences that we will gain that virtue. You might as well let it happen. Library staff will be retiring in the near future — more than mere working bodies, you will be losing experience in your organizations. You need to be building that stuff up in your staff lickety-split. This is what performance management is all about.

This is a dangerous suggestion, but a simple fact: the libraries that so many people have spent their careers building will soon be falling into the hands of these brash, indiscrete punks who think they look so good in their jeans. We have an opportunity to adopt technology while we still have a rich supply of institutional knowledge, or we can wait until that knowledge is gone and pray it works.

The later option is more exciting. If successful, the younger generation will be able to say they did it alone, and if it fails, the older generation can point out how flawed the young turks were from the start. But if libraries fail, if inexperience leads to disorganized libraries that get closed for lack of funding, then who really wins?

What’s your transition plan? How are you adopting technologies that serve your patrons while also building experience in the next generation of library leaders?

library, libraries, lib20, library 2.0, experience, transition, technology, attitudes toward technology, management, business continuity

It’s been more than a year since I first demonstrated Scriblio (was WPopac) at ALA Midwinter in San Antonio. More than a year since NCSU debuted their Endeca-based OPAC. And by now most every major library vendor has announced a product that promises to finally deliver some real improvements to our systems.

My over-simplified list said that our systems failed us in the categories of usability, findability, and remixability, and now people are asking me what I think about what I’ve seen from the vendors so far.

In general, they all include improved search results, and everybody seems ready to address comments and user-tagging, though the system vendors seem to be leaving findability to OCLC’s WorldCat efforts.

What’s missing, I fear, is remixability.

Remixability is the quality of a system or data set to be used for purposes the original designers or owners didn’t predict or intend. If I can define one buzzword with another, remixability is what allows mashups.

In 1971, in the earliest days of ARPAnet, Ray Tomlinson showed his friend a project he’d been toiling on on the sly: email. “Don’t tell anyone! This isn’t what we’re supposed to be working on,” he’s reported to have said.

In a different world, with a slightly different set of circumstances, the at sign on our keyboards might be lost. If he had had to ask his bosses for permission, or if the simple structure of that nascent internet was less open, Tomlinson would have been finished before he’d even gotten started. But as it turned out, Tomlinon was able to remix computers from mathematical machines to communication devices.

Fellow remixer Tim Berners-Lee explains it well:

Twenty-seven years ago, the inventors of the Internet designed an architecture which was simple and general. Any computer could send a packet to any other computer. The network did not look inside packets. It is the cleanness of that design, and the strict independence of the layers, which allowed the Internet to grow and be useful. It allowed the hardware and transmission technology supporting the Internet to evolve through a thousandfold increase in speed, yet still run the same applications. It allowed new Internet applications to be introduced and to evolve independently.

When, seventeen years ago, I designed the Web, I did not have to ask anyone’s permission. The new application rolled out over the existing Internet without modifying it. tried then, and many people still work very hard still, to make the Web technology, in turn, a universal, neutral, platform. It must not discriminate against particular hardware, software, underlying network, language, culture, disability, or against particular types of data.

These innovations resulted not from management directive, but inspired moments urged along by a supportive network architecture. The value of the internet was built on it’s remixability.

There are two ways to look at mashups of today, like Flickr Colr Pickr. Some see them as amusements and question who would build such things, others wonder how they can build systems that are as open to reimagining as Flickr.

And while some remixes might be simple amusements, others can be much larger. Flickr user Dan Cat, who imagined putting Flickr photos on the map (and built a mashup that let Flickr users do just that), ended up being hired by the company to build those features into their official site. Amazon, meanwhile, says remixers — including the 180,000 registered Amazon Web Services developers — account for almost a third of their sales.

The lesson is that when you open up the tools of remixing, people will use them, and the innovations that result will offer value even for non-remixers.

Today, we’re likely to invest in the software architecture of our libraries on a scale that matches the expansion during the Carnegie era. We might do well to think about one of the remarkable features of that period:

The Carnegie libraries were important because they had open stacks which encouraged people to browse. The open stacks were more democratic. People could choose for themselves what books they wanted to read. The libraries were meant to be for people of all walks of life.

The crisis in library systems arose because the people who build them and those who pay for them couldn’t imagine them in any other way. Open, remixable systems will allow patrons of tomorrow the opportunity to build the information solutions we can’t now imagine.

Is remixability in your next RFP?

remixability, mashups, library, library systems. l2, lib20, library 2.0, libraries, api, soa

Speaking Thursday at the Boston Library Consortium‘s annual meeting in the beautiful Boston Public Library, my focus was on the status of our library systems and the importance of remixability.

My blog post on remixability probably covers the material best, but my slides are online as both an animated QuickTime and PDF.

BPL, BLC, boston library consortium, boston public library, presentation, remixability, library, libraries, library systems, l2, lib20, library 2.0

It’s sort of late by now, and others have been offering their congratulations to me for a while (thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you), but I only just got the paper copy myself and this morning had a chance to browse the list.

Mover & Shaker alumnus John Blyberg asked me if I preferred moving or shaking better, but now that I’ve seen the names and read the profiles, I can say I’m just proud to be among such a distinguished group.

Congratulations all, and thank you to all who nominated me. I am honored.

congratulations, lib20, libraries, library, library 2.0, library journal, movers and shakers, thank you

MetroNaps started business in 2004 with a boutique in NYC’s Empire State Building, selling 20 minute naps for $14 bucks. The company has slowly been opening franchises around the world, but MetroNaps co-founder Arshad Chowdhury says overwhelming interest from office folks who wanted to install the pods on-site as an employee perk. So the company redesigned the pods to fit through the smaller doors common to office environments (trust me, retail doors are big), and has started selling direct.

Now the company is targeting universities, claiming that “90% of all US college students get inadequate sleep. As a result, students nap in class, in computer labs, and in busy common spaces. With a MetroNaps Pod installation, you can provide an appropriate place for resting.” Indeed, for about $10,000 each (I got a quote, it’s a real number), you can put pods in your campus center or library.

Who’s tried these things? Do they live up to the buzz? Who will be first with one (or more) in their library?

libraries, library, metronaps, metronaps pod, nap, pod, pods, public services, rest, sleep

This sign on a computer in the Paul A. Elsner Library at Mesa Community College caught Beth‘s eye and garnered a number of comments, including one from theangelremiel that seems to mark one of the most elusive aspects of Library 2.0.

they know that none of their classes require gaming

Excerpting the above as a simple declarative may not be fair, but it gets to the point. Let’s say they “know” (that is, let’s say they think they know) that none of the courses requires gaming. Making that claim cuts out the student’s role in her own education and asserts that the only things that matter are those in the course syllabi.

What of the questions students may ask? What of the group study opportunities afforded by IM? Are students only allowed to study contemporary culture from a distance, reading about it in “approved” journals?

Our students know the limits of our knowledge, do we?

The problem isn’t in having computers dedicated to academic use (and for academic users), the problem is in narrowly defining “academic.” Heh, and are there any limits to what counts as “research?”

Thanks to Michael for sharing.

Beth Hoffman, academic, academic use, lib20, libraries, library, library 2.0, sign, signs, though shalt not, verboten

I expected a record that looked like this:

LEADER 00000nas  2200000Ia 4500
001    18971047
008    890105c19079999mau u p       0uuua0eng
010    07023955 /rev
040    DLC|cAUG
049    PSMM
050    F41.5|b.A64
090    F41.5|b.A64
110 2  Appalachian Mountain Club
245 14 The A.M.C. White Mountain guide  ba guide to trails in
       the mountains of New Hampshire and adjacent parts of Maine
246 13 AMC White Mountain guide
246 13 White Mountain guide
246 13 A.M.C. White Mountain guide
260    Boston,|bThe Club,
300    v.  bill., maps (some fold., some col.) ;|c16 cm
362 0  1st-     ed.; 1907-
500    Title varies slightly
651  0 White Mountains (N.H. and Me.)|xGuidebooks

but instead got a record that looked like this:

00939cas  2200265Ia 4500001001300000003000700013005001700020008004100037020001500078040001800093050001600111110003100127245012200158246003000280246002600310246003200336246003000368260005500398300005700453362003600510500002700546650001100573651007300584999001600657
ocm18971047
OCoLC
20020918102844.0
890105c19079999mau u p       0   a0eng
  a0910146489
  aDLCcAUGdNHS
  aF41.5b.A64
2 aAppalachian Mountain Club.
14aThe A. M. C. White Mountain guide :ba guide to trails in the mountains of New Hampshire and adjacent parts of Maine.
13aAMC White Mountain guide.
13aWhite Mountain guide.
13aA.M.C. White Mountain guide
13aAMC White Mountain guide.
  aBoston, Mass. :bAppalachian Mountain Club,c1983.
  a550 p.bill., maps (some fold., some col.) ;c16 cm.
0 a1st- ed.; 1907- ; 25th ed. 1992
  aTitle varies slightly.
  aHiking
0aWhite Mountains (N.H. and Me.)xDescription and travelxGuide-books.
  aCL000018321

(some of the non-printable characters have been replaced with newlines for readability.)

After staring at that record for entirely too long, forgetting about it for a while, then returning again to think about how unreadable it was, then forgetting about it again, then taking one last look, I had that *duh* moment that made me realize what I should have seen on first glance: this is a MARC record that hasn’t had its directory parsed.

So here’s my short-but-handy-and-hopefully-usefull-to-somebody-sometime code to parse the directory and then the rest of the record. It assumes $records is an array of records.

foreach($records as $record){
	$temp = explode('', $record);
	$dir = $temp[0];
	$record = substr($record, (strlen($dir) + 1));

	$dir = substr($dir, 24);
	$dir_field = NULL;
	while($dir){
		$dir_field[] = substr($dir, 0, 12);
		$dir = substr($dir, 12);
	}

	$record = str_replace('', '|', $record);
	$marc = NULL;
	foreach($dir_field as $field){
		if(ereg_replace('[^0-9]', '', $field)){
			unset($temp);
			$len = substr($field, 3, 4);
			$pos = substr($field, 7, 5);
			$field = substr($field, 0, 3);
			$temp = substr($record, $pos, $len);
			if($field < 10)
				$temp = '  |'. $temp;
			$marc .= trim($field .'|'. $temp) .“\n”;
			$marc_array[$field] = $temp;
		}
	}
	echo $marc;
}

The actual output of that code on that record is this:

001|  |ocm18971047
003|  |OCoLC
005|  |20020918102844.0
008|  |890105c19079999mau u p       0   a0eng
020|  |a0910146489
040|  |aDLC|cAUG|dNHS
050|  |aF41.5|b.A64
110|2 |aAppalachian Mountain Club.
245|14|aThe A. M. C. White Mountain guide  ba guide to trails in the mountains of New Hampshire and adjacent parts of Maine.
246|13|aAMC White Mountain guide.
246|13|aWhite Mountain guide.
246|13|aA.M.C. White Mountain guide
246|13|aAMC White Mountain guide.
260|  |aBoston, Mass.  bAppalachian Mountain Club,|c1983.
300|  |a550 p.|bill., maps (some fold., some col.) ;|c16 cm.
362|0 |a1st- ed.; 1907- ; 25th ed. 1992
500|  |aTitle varies slightly.
650|  |aHiking
651| 0|aWhite Mountains (N.H. and Me.)|xDescription and travel|xGuide-books.
999|  |aCL000018321

It includes a little bit of fudging that my other MARC parsing code demands, but works and is readable.

code, libraries, library, marc, marc directory, parsing, php, raw marc

MAIUG 2006 Philadelphia: Designing an OPAC for Web 2.0 (interactive QuickTime with links or static PDF)

Web 2.0 and other “2.0” monikers have become loaded terms. But as we look back at the world wide web of 1996, there can be little doubt that today’s web is better and more useful. Indeed, that seems to be the conclusion millions of Americans are making, as current estimates show over 200 million users in the US, including 87% of youth 12-17.

Web 2.0 isn’t driven by technology, it’s driven by that critical mass of users. And while social software and AJAX enabled web applications get most of our attention, people are turning to the internet for some very mundane everyday activities that were little more than science fiction in 1996. The commonality of internet banking, for example, reflects the trust users now have in the security and reliability of online services.

But the web has weathered so much hype and hyperbole that it may be difficult to recognize its arrival as a true cultural force. Computing has become so common that children often learn to type before they learn to write. And the instant, self-service access to worlds of information and services is changing industries — a fact we can see clearly in the decline of the role of travel agents, even while air travel continues to grow.

Kevin Kelly, in a Wired Magazine story described this apparent blindness:

The accretion of tiny marvels can numb us to the arrival of the stupendous. [thanks to Josh Porter for alerting me to this]

So the question of how to design a web OPAC for today is a question of how to design an information service in a world rich with information services and filled with users who make information seeking — though not necessarily at libraries — part of their everyday lives.

note: this is an update of my IUG2006 presentation.

Mid-atlantic innovative users group, iii, lib 2.0, libraries, library, library 2.0, library catalog, maiug, maiug2006, online catalog, opac, opac 2.0, presentation, web 2.0, web opac, wpopac

I certainly don’t mean this to be as snarky as it’s about to come out, but I love the fact that Isaak questions my claim that linkability is essential to online discussions (and thus, communities) with a link:

• Linkability Fertilizes Online Communities
  I really don’t know how linkability will build communities. But we really need to work on building support platforms for the public to interact with the library and promote social discussions, whether offline or online. Currently, the only way for such interactions is through the High Browse Online blog, but even then, there are not much discussion going on. Maybe librarians need to go in more often to post useful comments. And we might need to read this to find out how to solicit more comments on the blog. [link to High Browse blog added -- Casey]

The big challenge here is to realize that the entire web is an online community, unbounded by geography or even the narrow confines of a single website. And I’m not sure I could point to a better example of that than Isaak’s post. Rather than comment at my blog, he instead posted on his — with a link back to mine.

But hey, you’ve gotta love that they’re hosting rock shows in the library.

book discussions, book talk, community, conversations, durable link, findability, lib20, libraries, library, library 2.0, library systems, linkability, online community, permalink, social software

A bibliographic instruction quiz we used to use asked students how many of Dan Brown’s books could be found in our catalog. The idea was that attentive students would dutifully search by author for “brown, dan,” get redirected to “Brown, Dan 1964-,” and find three books. Indeed, the expected answer was “three.”

As it turns out, my library has all four of Dan Brown’s published books, including the missing Digital Fortress. The problem is that three books are cataloged under the more common Brown, Dan 1964-, but Fortress was cataloged under Brown, Danielle.

The problem is that cataloging is imperfect.

Yeah, it takes some marbles to say that, but the fact is that cataloging is a human endeavor. Humans make mistakes. The challenge we face is to build systems that tolerate error, and then make it easy to fix those errors when discovered.

catalog, cataloging, error, errors, findability, keyword search, libraries, library, opac, search, searching, usability

A couple questions about my API to convert 10 digit ISBNs to 13 digits pointed out somethings I failed to mention earlier.

First, the API actually works both ways. That is, it identifies and validates both 10 and 13 digit ISBNs on input, and returns both versions in the output. Example: 0811822842 and 978081182284-8.

And, as yet, I have no user agreement or usage policy. Except for the disclaimer — don’t blame me if it’s broke — I’m leaving this open (though I’ll probably have to figure something out for future APIs).

Finally, if all you want is a one-time conversion of a list of ISBN’s, you might find Dave Pattern’s solution a bit easier.

update: EdJohnston‘s notes about why the ISBN1013 API can’t be linked from the Wikipedia ISBN page.

api, conversion, converter, international standard book numbers, isbn, isbn-13, isbn1013, libraries, library, web service

David Kane asked the web4libbers:

Can anyone tell me what the conversion between ISBN-10 and ISBN-13 is, please. I need to write a little conversion program. Anything in PHP, for example.

Answers:

“There is already an online converter: http://www.isbn.org/converterpub.asp;” some pointing at Wikipedia on ISBNs, Bookland, and EANs; John Blyberg’s PHP port of the PERL ISBN-10/13 tool; some explanation that you have to watch the check digit, and discussion about why you’d need to do all this conversion.

Finally, Tim asked:

Someone should offer single and batch converstion as a free API, not an online form and an offer to have a “representive” call you for larger jobs.

Does anyone want that, or shall I?

And I answered:

http://api.wpopac.net/v1/isbn1013/0811822842 changed: http://api.scriblio.net/v01a/isbn1013/0811822842

Same usage as xISBN and thingISBN. Returns empty result on invalid ISBNs.

Based on Blyberg’s code, incorporates some changes, may not be accurate. Poke at it, break it. Report findings, but don’t blame me if it returns incorrect results (I will try to fix the code/service, though).

Geeky extra: anybody know the Lat and Lon to Bookland? I’d really like to put this post on the map.

bookland, conversion, converter, ean, international standard book numbers, isbn, isbn-13, isbn1013, libraries, library, web service, xisbn

LCE2006 was a success. Let me quickly join with the other participants to offer my appreciation to John Blyberg and Alan Grey for all their work planning the event, as well as Darien Public Library director Louise Berry and the rest of the library for hosting the event.

Side note: Darien is a beautiful town, but we all have to learn to pronounce the name like a local.

Michael Golrick and John Blyberg each have a number of photos on Flickr, and I’m jealous of those like Lichen Rancourt who can live-blog events like this. I’m still digesting what I learned, but at least I can wash it down with a sip from my new LCE mug.

Further discussion will continue, as always, in the blogosphere, in the L2 Wiki, and just about anywhere else librarians gather.

In addition to all that material, let me offer some screenshots and notes from my short preface to the discussion about OPACs. (And, I hope my words were clearer than the pictures snapped of me at the time — vis: one and two).

camp, darien public library, future libraries, lce, lce06, lce2006, lib20, libcamp, libraries, library, library 2.0, library camp, library camp east, unconference

In the list of things I should have done a month ago is an item about making my hotel reservations for Library Camp East 2006. Fortunately, John Blyberg notes that Alan Gray has arranged for a special rate Doubletree Hotel in Norwalk, not far from the site of the event.

camp, darien public library, lib20, libraries, library, library 2.0, library camp, library camp east, unconference

Library Camp East 2006 is set for September 25 at Darien Public Library in Darien CT.

It’s an unconference, so the content is determined by the participants, and judging from the names on the signup page (John Blyberg and Jessamyn sound excited), there will be a lot of good discussion.

camp, darien public library, lib20, libraries, library, library 2.0, library camp, library camp east, unconference

Arthur Schopenhauer is suggested to have said:

Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first it is ridiculed, in the second it is violently opposed, in the third is regarded as self-evident.

If the reaction to Karen Calhoun‘s report to the Library of Congress on The Changing Nature of the Catalog and its Integration with Other Discovery Tools is any guide, libraries are stuck firmly in the second stage.

The most recent denial comes from an Inside Higher Ed story titled “Calling Melvil Dewey” which strikes out at both Calhoun’s report and the recent cataloging changes by the LoC.

My comment there remarks:

Among all the negative and alarmist coverage I’ve seen of Calhoun’s report and the LoC’s proposed cataloging changes (this included), I have yet to see anybody refute the premise or suggest a workable alternative.

Our patrons value our institutions in many ways, but amidst budget and technological pressures that threaten to eliminate libraries, our blind insistence on “business as usual” isn’t one of them.

Really, though, how are we supposed to take seriously an article that tells us “most librarians rely on the Library of Congress cataloguing copy pretty much wholesale,” then sounds the alarm at Calhoun’s suggestion that copy cataloging be streamlined? And, about that Dewey reference in the title? On the one hand the man was an unabashed progressive reformer of libraries, on the other he’s said to have held very repressive social values. Which side of Dewey is being invoked here?

reform, progress, library of congress, LoC, Melvil Dewey, Karen Calhoun, series authority records, cataloging changes, library, libraries, lib20, library 2.0, discovery tools