Re: IUG meeting proposed discussion - records with URLs

[Virginia Scheschy <scheschy@xxxxxxxxxx>]

This is an important issue for libraries and library vendors.  I was
impressed with Alfred's solution -- good information, nicely displayed. 
We have what we think of as an interim solution for electronic journal
access at University of Nevada, Reno, and it's based on a file created
from a spreadsheet.  However, what works with a few hundred electronic
journal titles sometimes becomes unmanageable when you have a few thousand
titles.

Electronic journals are still new to many of our users.  It's a good thing
to try to feature them prominently to promote them and get people to give
them a try.  However, ultimately it seems they should be integrated into
the online catalog as are our other resources rather than exist as a
separate list or database.

But I still see the value of some enhancements to the online catalog to
assist in managing electronic journals.  We're trying to do something like
that now by adding information to local fields in the Innopac
records.  Examples include ILL restrictions; also information about the
content provider, the consortium through which we may subscribe, and the
access provider.  We want to be able to pull lists, for example, of all
Elsevier electronic journal titles, or everything we get through BCR or
Minitex, or everything we access through ECO or through Los Alamos
National Laboratory's Science Server.  

Using Innopac to manage electronic journals will enhance the value of the
system for all of us.  

Virginia

On Thu, 6 Apr 2000, Alfred Kraemer wrote:

> I have a feeling many of those who responded to Linda's message so far
> maintain growing lists of e-journals within Innopac, outside of Innopac,
> and -in most instances- both places, or even more.
> 
> I'm hopeful that those who attend the discussion at the IUG will summarize
> for the list.
> 
> A few weeks back we looked at several options to better facilitate access to
> electronic journals. Like many other III libraries -and not only III
> libraries for that matter- we wound up using a separate spreadsheet/database
> for that purpose.
> We did not think that we could provide key information on electronic
> journals in a clear, easy to interpret fashion through the online catalog
> (or through the online catalog only) especially: information about access
> restrictions, range of full-text for electronic journal.
> 
> Another problem was the lack of good option to display a complete, separate
> list of e-journals from Innopac. I'm aware that some III libraries have
> creatively used III options (e.g. series index) to be able to retrieve a
> listing of ejournals. Gettysburg College has devised an interesting
> approach.
> 
> Well, I'll stop short here before going into a list of things why we do not
> use our Innopac as the basis for our e-journal 'administration'. In all
> fairness, however, I don't know of any library system that has managed to
> provide the needed administrative and display features for e-journals.
> 
> By the way, after exploring several options, we opted to add the following
> ejournals list: http://www.lib.mcw.edu/html/independent/ejs.html .
> 
> Although it contains more information than our old list and is created by a
> Perl script from a spreadsheet, I also would like to believe that this is a
> temporary makeshift solution and that library system vendors would provide a
> way to produce something similar.
> 
>  Alfred Kraemer
> Head, Technical Services
> Medical College of Wisconsin Libraries
> 8701 Watertown Plank Road
> Milwaukee, WI 53226
> 
> Phone: 414-456-4273
> E-Mail: akraemer@xxxxxxxxxx
> 
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> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Xudong Jin <xdjin@xxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <INNOPAC@xxxxxxxxxx>; <innopac@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, April 06, 2000 11:22 AM
> Subject: Re: IUG meeting proposed discussion
> 
> 
> > At Ohio Wesleyan we are facing a similar situation. I would also be
> > interested in participating in a discussion on this.
> >
> > Xudong Jin
> > Head of Technical Services
> > Ohio Wesleyan University
> > Delaware, OH 43015
> > 740-368-3258
> > 740-368-3222 (fax)
> > xdjin@xxxxxxxxxx
> >
> > At 02:16 AM 4/6/00 -0500, Linda Bills wrote:
> > >I would be interested in meeting (perhaps as a Birds of a Feather)
> > >with a small group of people to talk about how the catalogs we have
> > >on III can be used as databases of URLS to be used in our webpages.
> > >I would like to see if we can come up with definitive needs that
> > >could be discussed with III as a suggestion for product development
> > >that would have a market -- something that there is enough agreement
> > >on that they would find it attractive to develope.  (I have already
> > >presented my ideas on this subject to III, and I am interested to see
> > >if there are other, better ways to do this, or other ways we can
> > >leverage our existing III database.  Here is the basic theme I am
> > >working with (stop here if you don't like essays).
> > >
> > >We catalog all of our paid web resources and many free resources on
> > >our III database.  We also have links to these resources, in many
> > >cases, from various more narrative webpages -- and given that we are
> > >a consortium, there may be 3 or more links to the same resource.
> > >Naturally it has occured to us how efficient it would be if we could
> > >maintain the URL only in the III database and somehow pluck it from
> > >III into our webpages as needed.
> > >
> > >Right now we accomplish this by having our webpage URLs go to our III
> > >bib record, from which the user clicks the 856-produced link.  It's
> > >good for upkeep but a bit confusing for the user.  We would also like
> > >to be able to construct more tailored dynamic webpages (a la Cold
> > >Fusion type stuff) using our III database of websites instead of
> > >having to transfer info from there to another database for a
> > >web-based application.  The basic model here is what CORC is doing
> > >with their database + Pathfinders, but on a local level.  We have the
> > >database, we maintain it on the III system for its value as part of
> > >our catalog; we would like to leverage that if we can.
> > >
> > >We see several possibilities here -- that III could develop
> > >something, or that we could use other products like Cold Fusion, or
> > >CORC.  That we could transfer records around.... We do not have any
> > >programming resources in our Consortium that could be easily
> > >commandeered to do intensive local development.
> > >
> > >So, I would like to do a reality check with others who are working in
> > >this area to see what's out there and how people are working with it.
> > >
> > >Please let me know if you are interested.
> > >
> > >Thanks,
> > >
> > >Linda
> > >Linda G. Bills           Tri-College Library Automation Coordinator
> > >lbills@xxxxxxxxxx      Bryn Mawr, Haverford and Swarthmore Colleges
> > >(610) 526-5294           Canaday Library, Bryn Mawr College
> > >(610) 526-7480 fax       101 N. Merion Ave.
> > >                          Bryn Mawr, PA  19010
> > >
> > >
> >
>