12/2000 ZIG Meeting
Library of Congress
Virtual Library Services -- Pat Stevens, OCLC, facilitator
Notes provided by Les Wibberley, with contributions from
Leif Andresen and Matt Goldner
(updated: 2/1/01)
Introduction to Session
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speaker: Pat Stevens
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Pat is director of product planning and strategy at OCLC
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chair of NISO Circulation Interchange protocol committee
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deploying virtual libraries
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increasingly means mega libraries
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users want/need broader access
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infrastructure too costly to duplicate
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local level service remains critical
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funding is local, for local community
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local library knows the user
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large investment in legacy systems that need to be integrated into seamless
whole, at least from user perspective
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standards required that allow
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creation of mega services and collections
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support real library services with a local touch
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standards repertoire today
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z39.50
- iso ill
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soon niso NCIP
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emerging work on library directories
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NISO update
- draft standard for trial use expected in late december
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meeting for interested implementors
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january 15th in wash. dc as part of ALA
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next meeting late feb in san diego
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expected meeting in early May in UK
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applications
- where the rubber hits the road
- meld multiple standards into useful services
- multiple models needed - no single model is adequate for all application
needs
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what's the correct standards activity?
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platforms
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profiles
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implementors guidelines
Parallel Searching - Performance Issues
speaker: Sebastian Hammer, Index Data
- general consulting company doing lots of z39.50 consulting work
- lots happening in Denmark right now with z39.50
- common framework for access to libraries in Denmark being addressed
- union catalogs
- have had a union catalog in denmark for several years
- individual libraries replicate their bib and location data into common
catalog
- supports ill
- virtual union catalog
- replaces central repository with a gateway providing standardized access
to the various catalogs
- users access gateway, which accesses the individual catalogs
- addressed the scalability, performance issues relating to the feasibility
of this concept for denmark
- the tests
- single user interface to multiple servers
- issues of performance explored; why does it slow down with more servers
- test environment constructed to explore
- created server pools (picked 100 fastest target servers)
- built client which created log of transactions and performance data,
written in C, using YAZ toolkit
- ignored user interface issues, not relevant
- the test software will be made available in the public domain for review
and comment
- results
- expected to find a problem as number of servers increased
- started running against all 100 servers, result in 5 seconds, much to
surprise
- essentially no issue found with multiple servers; what next?
- scalability in terms of raw performance is excellent
- any slow response time in multiple servers was due to slow response time
by the slowest server
- issues
- server performance and scaling
- reliability
- quality of service - what is acceptable?
- service requirements
- merge - needed to really be useful
- de-dup
- sort - avoid download entire result sets from all servers
- can do large-scale parallel searching
- hybrid union catalog
- leverage existing union catalog already built in denmark
- address weaknesses of union catalog
- once records found, send off precise searches to individual libraries
to get recent information for availability of specific item
- discussion
- difference between union catalog vs distributed search model
- possibility of future distributed cataloging model
- Ralph questions re single physical union catalog, fed by multiple library
catalogs using z39.50
- note: this is essentially how OhioLink works?
Integration of ILL and Z39.50
speaker: Leif Andresen
- danZIG vision:
- integrated network based on communication standards with the functionality
raised to a level, where all other electronic connection between library
systems are unnecessary (vision)
- danzig profile specifies full list of search attributes used in danish
libraries
- 50 bib-1 use attributes
- 26 dan-1 use attributes
- based on spec of danmarc2 fields and sub fields for each use attribute
- z39 holdings schema
- z39 holdings schema, version 1.1 of july 2000
- present request for holdings
- present request from client includes OID for z39 holdings schema and
holdings ESN
- bridge building to ILL
- holding info includes identification for all levels
- bib level, bib Part, physical item
- Z39.50/ILL profile 1 is basis for danZIG model
- ILL over z39.50
- z39 used to move ill transactions from client to target
- ill transaction is routed through z39 target with no task database
- transaction ID in the ill request identify the pending request, not task
ID
- ill transaction can use other routes
- Timescale
- implementations of holdings for production in 3-4 months
- first test-implementations of integrated ill in 2001
Questions
- special index specified for national union catalog
- but indexing for a given attribute is specified
- Do all libraries need to implement all 76 attributes?
Answer: No. Only if a library indexes a marc tag shall it use the specified
attribute. E.g. BIB-1 1086 AGROVOC are only implemented in the union catalog
and a few libraries.
Smart Resource Sharing Systems
Barbara Shuh, Matt Goldner, speakers
- NISO committee on NCIP protocol
- Inter-lending Scenarios
- for how family of communication standards interrelate in the real world
- Z39.50, ILL and NCIP
- 1st scenario
- outgoing z39.50 gateway out to virtual canadian union catalog from a
given university
- holdings found at various libraries
- check directory system, additional information for library
- go to first choice for holdings, due to common membership in consortium
- do NCIP item lookup based on information from Z39.50 search
- NCIP over http
- returns circulation status back
- can find out about how many requests and holds have been placed on
it
- response says the holdings is on hold
- send ill request to another destination
- will do auto item lookup and check circulation data
- this response says it is lost
- try national library - ill request to national library
- manual search, with message back, responding a couple of days later
- uses z39.50 to find resources, NCIP protocol, ill to request
- Q: how did this look to the user?
- patron scenario
- searches union catalog via z39.50
- user accesses directory for information on policy of access, etc.
- directory is a hole right now
- recent progress made on the directory
- schema for ill policy directory developed now
- this is interlibrary loan policy repository right now, not a Z39.50
directory, but could be integrated into it
- concept of using an x500 directory proposed
- now thinking about using ldap directory instead
- or thinking about doing it via xml?
- a vendor offered to build an ldap server, and maintain it. proof
of concept created
- now planning to go with ldap server for loan policy
- would be straightforward to add z39.50 server info to this
- would be much more difficult to add z39.50 explain information to it
- Q: race between NCIP vs holding schema?
- NCIP focuses on circulation issues, and is different from holdings
schema
- could do it either way.
- Item lookup needs some holdings information
- NCIP may be based on just a bar code lookup
- what will Bath do?
- need to stop and look at this
- there are entire applications where z39.50 isn't being used at all
- in z39.50 there is a search attribute to search for available items
only
- NCIP overlaps a bit with Z39.50
- issues request for item
- system uses NCIP lookup and response to the target circulation system
- then the same scenario of trying to borrow from multiple sources
- in fact, the patron is interacting with an application, which is doing
all of these interactions in the background
Matt Goldner
- another scenario
- patron at Yale can search both columbia and penn simultaneously
- yale has it, goes to yale, yale goes to penn, penn doesn't have it
- yale has an ill request outstanding to penn
- launches z39 searches against multiple databases
- ldap search against library directory service
- matches up business rules
- sends out lending request via ill, gets response back
- ill dept. receives the response, and tells borrowing system that received
- patron notified, local system checks out the book, book checked back in
- local ill returns item
- item deleted using NCIP from local system
- this is what is being requested from libraries
Reference Services, speaker: Linda White, Library of Congress
- another member of group of librarians working on a reference service
- Collaborative Digital Reference Service (CDRS)
- library quality reference services meets the web
- the challenge
- new researchers, growth of resources, etc.
- resources and tools
- internet, lots of search engines
- library resources, long lasting, continues growth, print and electronic,
standard indexing tools, perpetual info
- researchers want...
- provide seamless access to global resources
- collect knowledge base of Qs and As searchable
- 3 pilots run to date
- collaborative service, lead by library of congress
- 40+ members currently
- scaling up, investigating portal technology
- where to next
- one-step shopping for finding resources, ILL
- issues
- working paper on CDRS by NLC
- need enhanced ZURL
- could use Item Order request
- or could submit ILL request
- 3 process areas:
- reference process: ask answer
- catalogue process: verify, locate
- delivery process: ILL, document delivery
- Questions
- Diane Kresch is director of this project
- use of live chat?
- no not yet
- some partners are doing live chat for 24 hour support
- use live roles, like ILL model
- what do they want the zig to do to help
- help format an answer to be interpreted and used
- Ray: session tomorrow on z39.50 url, which may address the need
- the answer of where the resources are that are useful depends on where
the user is located, for example
- there is some work being done on this
Virtual Library Development: Case Studies, Slavko Manojlovich
- consortium formed of libraries to collaborate on lending materials
- some requests weren't appropriate for requests
- searches didn't have necessary level of granularity
- required level 1 of Bath profile as solution (consortium)
- Did some education on Bath profile
- indexing adjusted to conform with Texas profile
- worked on refining precision
- these are bibliographic known item searches
- vendors involved are very slow in upgrading their servers to adhere
- testing tool being used
- CrossNet product which confirms compliance
- excellent logging capabilities to look at what is going on
- supports xml using open archives transport dtd
- Slavko will post information on his server for testing Bath-1 compliance
- 2nd project:
- Austin area virtual library - several organizations in same area with
no other relationship
- key is recall in this case - people not sure what they are looking for
- tracking down libraries and what servers they have, and how to access
- gateway prototype
- test server at texas state library
- portal-style of interface - catalog search plus other information
- can search catalog, virtual library, external web sites, etc.
- auxiliary information added along with the bibliographic information
resulting from the search
- Questions:
- About retrieving XML data
- XML DTD is included in the returned record in this case
- Ray: this issue has still not been resolved