Contemporary metadata principles and standards tended to result in document-centric rather than data-centric; human-readable rather than machine-processable metadata. In order for libraries to create and harness shareable, mashable and re-usable metadata, a conceptual shift can be achieved by adjusting current library models such as Resource Description and Access (RDA) and Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) to models based on Linked Data principles. In relation to technical formats, libraries can leapfrog to Linked Data technical formats such as the Resource Description Framework (RDF), without disrupting current library metadata operations. This paper provides six key recommendations for libraries and standards agencies. These include rising to the challenges and embracing the opportunities presented by current technological trends, adopting minimal requirements of Linked Data principles, developing ontologies, deciding on what needs to be retained from current library models, becoming part of the Linked Data cloud, and developing mixed-metadata (standards-based and socially-constructed) approaches. Finally, the paper concludes by identifying and discussing five major benefits of such metadata re-conceptualisation. The benefits include metadata openness and sharing, serendipitous discovery of information resources, identification of zeitgeist and emergent metadata, facet-based navigation and metadata enriched with links.

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Linked data for libraries: benefits of a conceptual shift from library-specific record structures to RDF-based data models

Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR), is the title of a report prepared by an IFLA study group and published in 1998. The term “FRBR” is used to refer both to the report and to the conceptual model described in that report. The FRBR report defined the user tasks find, identify, select, and obtain; developed the FRBR conceptual model to describe bibliographic data; and mapped the user tasks to the bibliographic data. The FRBR model is based on entity-relationship modeling and identifies three groups of entities. Group 1, consisting of work, expression, manifestation, and item is the most fully developed. Group 2 consists of persons and corporate bodies. Group 3 consists of entities that can serve as subjects but that belong to neither Group 1 nor Group 2. The FRBR model has generated both theoretical discussion and applied research, and has affected the modeling of authority data, the development of cataloging rules, and the design of systems for the display of bibliographic data. Although there are unresolved issues associated with the FRBR model it still provides hope for a useful organization of the bibliographic universe

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Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR)

One of the presumed advantages of next-generation library catalogue interfaces is that the user experience is improved—that it is both richer and more intuitive. Often the interfaces come with little or no user-facing documentation or imbedded "help" for patrons based on an assumption of ease of use and familiarity of the experience, having followed best practices in use on the Web. While there has been much gray literature (published on library Web sites, etc.) interrogating these implicit claims and contrasting the new interfaces to traditional Web-based catalogues, this article details a consistent and formal comparison of whether users can actually accomplish common library tasks, unassisted, using these interfaces. The author has undertaken a task-based usability test of vendor-provided next-generation catalogue interfaces and Web-scale discovery tools (Encore Synergy, Summon, WorldCat Local, Primo Central, EBSCO Discovery Service). Testing was done with undergraduates across all academic disciplines. The resulting qualitative data, noting any demonstrated trouble using the software as well as feedback or suggested improvements that the users may have about the software, will assist academic libraries in making or validating purchase and subscription decisions for these interfaces as well as help vendors make data-driven decisions about interface and experience enhancements.

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Comparative User Experiences of Next-Generation Catalogue Interfaces

The use of learning technologies is becoming ubiquitous in higher education. As a result, there is a pressing need to develop methods to evaluate their accessibility to ensure that students do not encounter barriers to accessibility while engaging in e-learning. In this study, sample online units were evaluated for accessibility by automated tools and by student participants (in sessions moderated and unmoderated by researchers), and the data from these different methods of e-learning accessibility evaluation were compared. Nearly all students were observed encountering one or more barriers to accessibility while completing the online units, though the automated tools did not predict these barriers and instead predicted potential barriers that were not relevant to the study participants. These data underscore the need to carry out student-centered accessibility evaluation in addition to relying on automated tools and accessibility guideline conformance as measures of accessibility. Students preferred to participate in unmoderated sessions, and the data from the unmoderated sessions were comparable to that from the more traditional moderated sessions. Additional work is needed to further explore methods of student-centered evaluation, including different variations of unmoderated sessions.

Evaluating e-learning accessibility by automated and student-centered methods

This reviews the main themes of the book. Symbolization and logic can be invaluable allies in the organization of information. Symbolic logic can be a notation for concepts, and, in turn, concepts can be used for assigned indexing. Representation in logic reveals many of the relations between concepts. In turn, this facilitates the construction of graphs of topics which show the relations between the indexing keys. It also assists with the construction of more general graphs of bibliographical relationships. Many of the indexing concepts will be compounds and thus will be searchable or accessible via their components. Additionally the constituent concepts in the indexing concepts will themselves often have types or kinds. These types or kinds amount to facets or faces. Thus, indexing or classification, can often be faceted. And faceted classification enables faceted search and retrieval. Search for suitably tagged Information Objects can be faceted. Using concepts for indexing provides an approach for addressing the information retrieval concerns of synonymy and homography. One important area of information retrieval that symbolic logic does not assist with is that of citation analysis or link analysis (where the citations or links are made by humans).

Logic and the Organization of Information

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of an academic library's implementation of a discovery layer (VuFind 1.0 RC1) as a next‐generation catalogue, based on usability testing and an online survey.Design/methodology/approach – Usability tests were performed on ten students (eight undergraduates, two graduates), asking a set of 14 task‐oriented questions about the customized VuFind interface. Task completion was scored using a simple formula to generate a percentage indicating success or failure. Changes to the interface were made based on resulting scores and on feedback and observations of users during testing. An online survey was also run for three weeks, to which 75 people responded. The results were analyzed, compared and cross‐tested with the findings of the usability testing.Findings – Both the usability testing and survey demonstrated that users preferred VuFind's interface over the classic catalogue. They particularly liked the facets and the richness of the search results...

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Usability Testing of VuFind at an Academic Library

Understanding FRBR: What It Is and How It Will Affect Our Retrieval Tools, Arlene G. Taylor. Copyright (c) 2007 by Arlene G. Taylor. Reproduced with the permission of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc., Westport, CT.

FRBR and the History of Cataloging

On Dentographs, A New Method of Visualizing Library Collections

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Libraries and Archives Augmenting the World

Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) dates from 1998, but Implementing FRBR in Libraries is only the fourth book on the subject, following a special issue of Cataloging & Classification Quarterly edited by Patrick Le Boeuf and published as Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR): Hype or Cure-all? (2005); Arlene Taylor’s collection Understanding FRBR: What It Is and How It Will Affect Our Retrieval Tools (2007); and FRBR: A Guide for the Perplexed by Robert Maxwell (2007). Events have outstripped the book in two areas (Resource Description and Access (RDA) and the Semantic Web) but thorough research by the authors combined with the sedate pace of FRBR work means it is still accurate, complete, relevant, and useful. It has three goals: “to provide an overview of the current status of FRBR development, to identify the key FRBR issues that need to be addressed, and to point to future directions of FRBR development.” It succeeds on all three, most especially the first, in a very structured and methodical way. The book is one outgrowth of the 2006–2010 research project led by Zhang and Salaba, professors at the School of Library and Information Science at Kent State University: “FRBR-Based Systems to Effectively Support User Tasks and Facilitate Information Seeking” (http://frbr.slis.kent.edu/). Part of that work was a Delphi study (an iterative method of surveying experts in a field to arrive at a consensus of what is important), and they nicely integrate and summarize its results here. The survey is fully described in Zhang and Salaba’s “What Is Next for Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records? A Delphi Study” (The Library Quarterly 79, no. 2 (April 2009): 233–255) if the reader seeks more. The authors divide FRBR’s current state into five parts: the model itself and how it is reviewed and revised; FRBR-related standards such as RDA; how FRBR is applied to different materials and collections; FRBR-aware software and systems; and research and user studies. Each of those has its own chapter, and they are wrapped by introductory and concluding chapters.

William Denton

Papers

Usability Testing of VuFind at an Academic Library

FRBR and the History of Cataloging

On Dentographs, A New Method of Visualizing Library Collections

Libraries and Archives Augmenting the World

A Review of “Implementing FRBR in Libraries: Key Issues and Future Directions”