Next Generation Catalogs: What Do Users Think? Conclusions from the beluga Project Anne Christensen State and University Library Hamburg, Germany IFLA Satellite Meeting Emerging trends in technology Libraries between Web 2.0, semantic web and search technology Florence, August 20, 2009

Agenda Short introduction to NGCs beluga – a German NGC project Results and conclusions from user research

Short introduction to NGCs

beluga – a German NGC project

Results and conclusions from user research

The next generation catalog… - aka Catalog 2.0, 0PAC 2.0, (social) discovery tool -

… improves searching & allows browsing

… combines data from different sources

… makes metadata re-usable – for machines and humans

… features user-generated metadata & content

... leverages new models for bibliographic data

… offers user experience

Next Generation Catalogs Hall of Fame Make Buy

Catalog 2.0 in Hamburg State and University Library Hamburg + 7 other libraries from the Hamburg area November 2007 – October 2010 348.000 € grant from E-Learning Consortium Hamburg

Search interface indexed with Solr, normalization format: Dublin Core Google-like simplicity first stab at visualization

Results list Relevance ranking Facetted Browsing

Full view Similar titles Availability information from ILS Export to other platforms and in different formats Mashups

So, what do users think?

„ What I really like is that you actually involve people who are going to suffer from the system.“

Results from focus groups and usability tests

Create lists Share lists „ My lists are pretty intimate!“   „ I don‘t want to do all the work for people.“

Users want more metadata.

They seem to be waiting for FRBR (or something like it). „ Can‘t you just sort of put all those editions on one page?“

Mashup with Amazon „ Need to make up my own mind“  „ What really matters: The tables of content“

User-generated content „ Would only contribute on course website“ 

 Opinions of fellow students and professors matter.

But: The social stuff happens elsewhere.

Library catalogs as aggregators?

They don‘t trust us to be like Google. „ Where is the advanced search button?“

„ How do I know if I picked the right term“ People have high expections regarding the „search experience“ „ Who defines how the lists are sorted?“

Relevance Ranking Spell checking Controlled vocabulary   

Faculty and students seek serendipity. „ I love finding stuff I wasn‘t looking for in the first place“

Facets New titles Circulation statistics   

Students want to be given starting points for their subjects. „ Why isn‘t there some sort of pre-selected bibliography?“

Library catalogs as knowledge hubs. (Or even dating services)

Visualizations provide a better „User Experience“

Research from other projects shows similar results:

Personalization Content Enrichment User-Generated Content Search Experience Discovery User Experience Export Options       

Personalization

Content Enrichment

User-Generated Content

Search Experience

Discovery

User Experience

Export Options

Anyway: Rethinking the catalog is worth the effort.

Thank you! Anne Christensen E: [email_address] W: http:// beluga.sub.uni-hamburg.de Links: http://delicious.com/christensen/ifla2009it

Anne Christensen

E: [email_address]

W: http:// beluga.sub.uni-hamburg.de

Links: http://delicious.com/christensen/ifla2009it