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The Evolving Role of the Librarian: Trends and Issues in Technology and collection Management

Marshall Breeding Independent Consult, Author, Founder and Publisher, Library Technology Guides http://www.librarytechnology.org/ http://twitter.com/mbreeding. The Evolving Role of the Librarian: Trends and Issues in Technology and collection Management. Offline Technology Conference.

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The Evolving Role of the Librarian: Trends and Issues in Technology and collection Management

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  1. Marshall Breeding Independent Consult, Author, Founder and Publisher, Library Technology Guides http://www.librarytechnology.org/ http://twitter.com/mbreeding The Evolving Role of the Librarian: Trends and Issues in Technology and collection Management Offline Technology Conference Feb 15, 2013

  2. Library Technology Guides www.librarytechnology.org

  3. Each Library Type Distinctive • Academic – Public – School – Special • Academic: Emphasis on subscribed electronic resources • Public: Engaged in the management of print collections • Dramatic increase in interest in E-books • School: Age-appropriate resources (print and Web), textbook and media management • Special: Enterprise knowledge management (Corporate, Law, Medical, etc)

  4. Academic Library Issues • Greater concern with electronic scholarly articles • Management: Need for consolidated approach that balances print, digital, and electronic workflows • Access: discovery interfaces that maximize the value of investments in subscriptions to scholarly articles and research materials

  5. Public Library Issues • Greater concern for e-books and general article databases • Management: Need for consolidated approach that balances print, digital, and electronic workflows • Emphasis on technologies that engage users with library programs and services

  6. Key Context: Libraries in Transition • Academic Shift from Print > Electronic • E-journal transition largely complete • Circulation of print collections slowing • E-books now in play (consultation > reading) • Public: Emphasis on Patron Engagement • Increased pressure on physical facilities • Increased circulation of print collections • Dramatic increase in interest in e-books • All libraries: • Need better tools for access to complex multi-format collections • Strong emphasis on digitizing local collections • Demands for enterprise integration and interoperability

  7. Key Context: Technologies in transition • Client / Server > Web-based computing • Beyond Web 2.0 • Integration of social computing into core infrastructure • Local computing shifting to cloud platforms • Application Service Provider offerings standard • New expectations for multi-tenant software-as-a-service • Full spectrum of devices • full-scale / net book / tablet / mobile • Mobile the current focus, but is only one example of device and interface cycles

  8. Key Context: Changed expectations in metadata management • Moving away from individual record-by-record creation • Life cycle of metadata • Metadata follows the supply chain, improved and enhanced along the way as needed • Manage metadata in bulk when possible • E-book collections • Highly shared metadata • E-journal knowledge bases (KnowledgeWorks / 360 Core) • Great interest in moving toward semantic web and open linked data • Very little progress in linked data for operational systems • AACR2 > RDA • MARC > RDF (recent announcement of Library of Congress)

  9. Changing Role of Librarians • Libraries must adapt strategically to new realities imposed by changes in society, publishing, and higher education • Librarians needed more than ever before • Librarians must adapt in the way they carry out their roles • Same strategic goals and values • New skills and workflows • All roles in the library: • Cataloging / Acquisitions • Circulation • Reference

  10. Reference services • Reshaped by easy access to information • More of an emphasis for higher-level research assistance • Opportunity to become involved more closely with researchers

  11. Acquisitions / Technical services • Dramatic change from print to electronic • Dominant role of electronic vs print • Need management processes and automation systems able to support electronic, digital, print • General shift toward knowledge-base driven management processes • Electronic resource management based on profile of subscriptions, with granular holdings derived from knowledge bases. • New automation systems offering comprehensive resource management: • Library Services Platforms

  12. Cataloging • Shift from traditional cataloging to metadata management • Leverage core skills of detailed description and organization • Adapt to new metadata schemes • Print materials: MARC21, etc • Digital materials: Dublin Core • Images: VRA

  13. Open Linked Data • Increasing interest and involvement of libraries in the semantic web • Important to adapt from self-contained bibliographic records to a fully linked environment • Library resources based on linked data • VIAF: linked authority data • Fast: Faceted access to subject terminology • WorldCat.org (embedded linked data using schema.org)

  14. New cataloging rules • AACR2 > RDA • Resource Description and Access • Intended to be more suitable for linked data environments • Small step toward the semantic Web

  15. New Bibliographic Environment • MARC not well suited to modern discovery and management environments • Originally designed to transfer bibliographic records between mainframes • Can be expressed in XML: MARCXML • New initiative to create new carrier for bibliographic records based on RDF • Library of Congress Initiative for Bibliographic Transformation • Bibframe.org

  16. Changes in workflow • Moving away from item-by-item description • Need to manage collections in bulk • Lifecycle approach to metadata • Basic Vendor records (Onix) • Full / Provisional record with full bibliographic description and inventory management • Enhance with cover images • Enhance with abstracts, Table of Contents, etc • Enhance with Full Text

  17. Navigating changes • Build on core skills and values • Must adapt to new metadata formats and cataloging conventions • Changes will happen with increasing frequency

  18. Collection Development • New formats, more complexity, more opportunity • Need data to make intelligent decisions about what items to acquire • Management of e-resources critical

  19. Providing access to collections • More complexity, more formats • Need tools to provide access to all types of library materials

  20. Cooperation and Resource sharing • Limited resources and finite collections drive strategic efforts to share resources • Local, regional, Global • Effortson many fronts to cooperate and consolidate

  21. Automation support for Resource sharing • Increased emphasis on shared infrastructure • Isolated systems make resource sharing inefficient • Many regional consortia merging (Example: suburban Chicago systems) • State-wide or national implementations • Software-as-a-service or “cloud” based implementations • Many libraries share computing infrastructure and data resources

  22. Major trend in Information Technology Few organizations have core competence in large-scale computer infrastructure management Essentially outsourcing of server housing and management Usually based on a consumption-based business model Most new automation products delivered through some flavor of cloud computing Many flavors to suit business needs: public, private, hybrid Cloud Computing

  23. MultiTennant SaaS is the modern approach One copy of the code base serves multiple sites Software functionality delivered entirely through Web interfaces No workstation clients Upgrades and fixes deployed universally Usually in small increments Software as a Service

  24. SaaS provides opportunity for highly shared data models WorldCat: one globally shared copy that serves all libraries Primo Central: central index of articles maintained by Ex Libris shared by all libraries implementing Primo / Primo Central KnowledgeWorks database of of e-journal holdings shared among all customers of Serials Solutions products General opportunity to move away from library-by-library metadata management to globally shared workflows Data as a service

  25. Open Systems • Achieving openness has risen as the key driver behind library technology strategies • Libraries need to do more with their data • Ability to improve customer experience and operational efficiencies • Demand for Interoperability • Open source – full access to internal program of the application • Open API’s – expose programmatic interfaces to data and functionality

  26. Mobile Computing

  27. Challenge: Disjointed approach to information and service delivery • Library Web sites offer a menu of unconnected silos: • Books: Library OPAC (ILS online catalog module) • Articles: Aggregated content products, e-journal collections • OpenURL linking services • E-journal finding aids (Often managed by link resolver) • Subject guides (e.g. SpringshareLibGuides) • Local digital collections • ETDs, photos, rich media collections • Metasearch engines • Discovery Services – often just another choice among many • All searched separately

  28. ILS Data Online Catalog Search: Scope of Search • Books, Journals, and Media at the Title Level • Not in scope: • Articles • Book Chapters • Digital objects • Web site content • Etc. Search Results

  29. Discovery Interface search model ILS Data Digital Collections Search: Local Index ProQuest Search Results EBSCOhost MetaSearch Engine … MLA Bibliography ABC-CLIO Real-time query and responses

  30. Differentiation in Discovery • Products increasingly specialized between public and academic libraries • Public libraries: emphasis on engagement with physical collection • Academic libraries: concern for discovery of heterogeneous material types, especially books + articles + digital objects

  31. Web-scale Index-based Discovery ILS Data (2009- present) Digital Collections Search: Web Site Content Institutional Repositories Aggregated Content packages Search Results Consolidated Index … E-Journals Reference Sources Pre-built harvesting and indexing

  32. Citations / Metadata > Full Text • Citations or structured metadata provide key data to power search & retrieval and faceted navigation • Indexing Full-text of content amplifies access • Important to understand depth indexing • Currency, dates covered, full-text or citation • Many other factors

  33. Challenge for Relevancy • Technically feasible to index hundreds of millions or billions of records through Lucene or SOLR • Difficult to order records in ways that make sense • Many fairly equivalent candidates returned for any given query • Must rely on use-based and social factors to improve relevancy rankings

  34. Challenges for Collection Coverage • To work effectively, discovery services need to cover comprehensively the body of content represented in library collections • What about publishers that do not participate? • Is content indexed at the citation or full-text level? • What are the restrictions for non-authenticated users? • How can libraries understand the differences in coverage among competing services?

  35. The rise of e-books • Academic libraries: e-books included in aggregated content packages • E-books used primarily for research and consultation, not long reading • Public Libraries: Subscriptions to e-book services that provide an outsourced collection of loanable e-books • K-12 Schools, Colleges, Universities: interest in electronic textbooks

  36. Integrating e-Books into Library Automation Infrastructure • Current approach involves mostly outsourced arrangements • Collections licensed wholesale from single provider • Hand-off to DRM and delivery systems of providers • Loading of MARC records into local catalog with linking mechanisms • No ability to see availability status of e-books from the library’s online catalog or discovery interface

  37. AppropriateAutomation Infrastructure • Current automation products out of step with current realities • Majority of library collection funds spent on electronic content • Majority of automation efforts support print activities • Management of e-content continues with inadequate supporting infrastructure • New discovery solutions help with access to e-content • Library users expect more engaging socially aware interfaces for Web and mobile

  38. Fundamental technology shift • Mainframe computing • Client/Server • Cloud Computing http://www.flickr.com/photos/carrick/61952845/ http://soacloudcomputing.blogspot.com/2008/10/cloud-computing.html http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-10-2001/jw-1019-jxta.html

  39. Almost all library automation vendors offer some form of “cloud-based” services Server management moves from library to Vendor Subscription-based business model Comprehensive annual subscription payment Offsets local server purchase and maintenance Offsets some local technology support Library Automation in the Cloud

  40. Moving legacy systems to hosted services provides some savings to individual institutions but does not result in dramatic transformation Globally shared data and metadata models have the potential to achieve new levels of operational efficiencies and more powerful discovery and automation scenarios that improve the position of libraries overall. Leveraging the Cloud

  41. Is the status quo sustainable? • ILS for management of (mostly) print • Duplicative financial systems between library and campus • Electronic Resource Management (non-integrated with ILS) • OpenURL Link Resolver w/ knowledge base for access to full-text electronic articles • Digital Collections Management platforms (CONTENTdm, DigiTool, etc.) • Institutional Repositories (DSpace, Fedora, etc.) • Discovery-layer services for broader access to library collections • No effective integration services / interoperability among disconnected systems, non-aligned metadata schemes

  42. Comprehensive Resource Management • No longer sensible to use different software platforms for managing different types of library materials • ILS + ERM + OpenURL Resolver + Digital Asset management, etc. very inefficient model • Flexible platform capable of managing multiple type of library materials, multiple metadata formats, with appropriate workflows

  43. Libraries need a new model of library automation • Not an Integrated Library System or Library Management System • The ILS/LMSwas designed to help libraries manage print collections • Generally did not evolve to manage electronic collections • Other library automation products evolved: • Electronic Resource Management Systems – OpenURL Link Resolvers – Digital Library Management Systems -- Institutional Repositories

  44. Library Services Platform • Library-specific software. Designed to help libraries automate their internal operations, manage collections,fulfillrequests, and deliver services • Services • Service oriented architecture • Exposes Web services and other API’s • Facilitates the services libraries offer to their users • Platform • General infrastructure for library automation • Consistent with the concept of Platform as a Service • Library programmers address the APIs of the platform to extend functionality, create connections with other systems, dynamically interact with data

  45. Library Services Platform Characteristics • Highly Shared data models • Knowledgebase architecture • Some may take hybrid approach to accommodate local data stores • Delivered through software as a service • Multi-tenant • Unified workflows across formats and media • Flexible metadata management • MARC – Dublin Core – VRA – MODS – ONIX • New structures not yet invented • Open APIs for extensibility and interoperability

  46. New Library Management Model Unified Presentation Layer Search: Self-Check /Automated Return Library Services Platform ` Digital Coll Consolidated index Discovery Service ProQuest API Layer StockManagement EBSCO … Enterprise ResourcePlanning Smart Cad / Payment systems JSTOR LearningManagement AuthenticationService Other Resources

  47. Questions and discussion

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