Progressive Enhancement for Library Catalogues

I've just been reading Progressive Reduction, a post on LayerVault about a technique they use  when designing web apps.

The principle goes something like this...
When new users start with the app the interface has lots of helping hands; signposts showing how to do things. For instance, the buttons might have an icon and a label.  As people use the app more and more those signposts start to recede out of the design. After you have used a feature a number of times, for example, maybe the label drops out and the button only has an icon. Keep using the app and the icon might subtly change to be less obvious. The idea being that less clutter on the interface allows users to be more productive, but only once you know how the app works.

I started thinking about how this design principle might be implemented in library catalogues.

The Inside Out Library

I've just been reading a recent post by Lorcan Dempsey that I wanted to share. Discovery and discoverability, go read it...

Two sections particularly resonated with me.

If I want to know if a particular book exists I may look in Google Book Search or in Amazon, or in a social reading site, in a library aggregation like Worldcat, and so on. My options have multiplied and the breadth of interest of the local gateway [ie. the catalogue] is diminished: it provides access only to a part of what I am potentially interested in.

Essentially, discovery increasingly happens outside the library, especially for public libraries for whom the stock in trade has been recreational reading. So where does that leave the future of public libraries?

The challenge is not now only to improve local systems, it is to make library resources discoverable in other venues and systems, in the places where their users are having their discovery experiences.These include Google Scholar or Google Books, for example, or Goodreads, or Mendeley, or Amazon. It is also to promote institutionally created and managed resources to others.

This is what Dempsey is calling the inside out challenge for libraries.

And this is where I see a real opportunity for libraries;  in unique local collections - material that is unavailable elsewhere and that has particular interest to people with connection to our location and community.

Don't get me wrong. Supporting recreational reading and learning needs as well as local groups and events will remain the major focus of public libraries for some time. But we need to be looking at making our local collections accessible to the network. This is our niche market. Something that we have that can't readily be satisfied elsewhere. 

This means digitisation programs and associated metadata creation.  I don't mean MARC records either. We need to look at making collections available on the web with high quality metadata that can be easily indexed by network discovery tools.  We need to embrace high quality web design, search engine optimisation and open data.  

Let's move away from entrusting the creation, indexing, hosting and discovery of our records to 3rd party commercial services simply so we don't have to do it ourselves.  Let's engage partners to help build these digital collections in ways that allow libraries retain control over the structural design, the quality control and the licensing of the content.

Let's build these collections with APIs and open feeds that allow the content to be harvested into our catalogues and discovery layers, and make it possible for them to be discoverable by Google. Let's encourage others to mash them with other data to create cool new things that we can't even imagine.

That's the future library I want to see.

Slides from my Lightning Talks at #RISG2012

Here are the slides from a talk I gave today at the Reference @ the Metcalfe Seminar at the State Library of NSW.  If you view it on Slideshare you can get my speakers notes as well.

Honestly though, for more sensible coverage of what I'm talking about you would be better off reading this post.

Open Library Data

View more Presentations from Martin Boyce on Slideshare.

Open Library Data: an Invitation

Since attending Digital December at the State Library of NSW last year I've been contemplating how libraries can collaborate on sharing their data.  This post is an attempt to explain the concept of open data to those unfamiliar with the term, along with an invitation to anyone who would like to get involved.

Digital December: The Wrap Up

Photo Credit: Ellen Forsyth (@ellenforsyth)

What a thought provoking day we had today at the State Library for Digital December, a seminar featuring Michael Lascarides (@mlascarides), John Allsopp (@johnallsopp) and Tim Sherratt (@wragge).

Here are my Top Five Take Aways from today.

1. Local content is where libraries have pulling power.
   Your users can't get this stuff anywhere else and it's interesting.
2. The best way to expose your collection is one item at a time.
   A digital narrative can be a powerful discovery interface. Telling a story with passion using one item from your collection is a great way to encourage people to explore more deeply.
3. Obliterate the line between physical & digital.
   Which items in your collection wanted to be something else all along?
4. Make sure you're not getting in the way of the passion of you users.
   The catalogue is a great place to have a conversation about books. Your data is a great source of material for developers. Don't put policies and protocols in place that discourage users from collaborating with you and each other.
5. Data is fuel for the imagination.
   Don't worry about the format. Release your data because you can't possibly imagine what others will do with it!  Folk will work with it however you provide it.

And just as a bonus, here's my thoughts from discussions about how to encourage the use of all this data we're trying to open up.

• Think about what data you have that might be of interest.
• Arrange for volunteers & community programs to help libraries turn content and collections into data.
• Annual library hack day (perhaps a collaborative project across libraries). Ideas are as important as building apps.
• Seed developer interest in your data with a proof of concept or even better, finished projects (maybe you have to pay for this) . Show them you value this stuff!

If you went along I'd love to hear what you got out of the day in the comments...