Ariadne gallery

Hita-Hita: Open Access and Institutional Repositories in Japan Ten Years On

lisrw — Wed, 10 Jul 2013 17:03:28 +0000

Ikuko Tsuchide, Yui Nishizono, Masako Suzuki, Shigeki Sugita, Kazuo Yamamoto and Hideki Uchijima introduce a number of ideas and projects that have enhanced the progress of the Open Access movement and institutional repositories in Japan over the last ten years.

In Japan, Chiba University established the country's first institutional repository, CURATOR [1] in 2003. Since then, over the last 10 years or so, more than 300 universities and research institutions have set up repositories and the number of full-text items on repositories has exceeded one million [2]. All the contents are available on Japanese Institutional Repositories Online (JAIRO) [3] operated by the National Institute of Informatics (NII) [4] in Japan.

Mining the Archive: eBooks

lisrw — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 19:21:11 +0000

Martin White looks through the Ariadne archive to track the development of ebooks.

My definition of being rich is being able to buy a book without looking at the price. I have long since lost count of the number of books in my house. The reality is that if I did carry out a stock-take I might be seriously concerned about both the total number and the last known time I can remember reading a particular book. Nevertheless I have few greater pleasures than being asked a question and knowing in which of our two lofts one or more books will be found with the answer. On many occasions I have found a definitive answer much more quickly than using Google.

The Potential of Learning Analytics and Big Data

lisrw — Mon, 08 Jul 2013 20:07:14 +0000

Patricia Charlton, Manolis Mavrikis and Demetra Katsifli discuss how the emerging trend of learning analytics and big data can support and empower learning and teaching.

‘Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.’ Attributed to Albert Einstein

DataFinder: A Research Data Catalogue for Oxford

lisrw — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 20:23:22 +0000

Sally Rumsey and Neil Jefferies explain the context and the decisions guiding the development of DataFinder, a data catalogue for the University of Oxford.

In 2012 the University of Oxford Research Committee endorsed a university ‘Policy on the management of research data and records’ [1]. Much of the infrastructure to support this policy is being developed under the Jisc-funded Damaro Project [2]. The nascent services that underpin the University’s RDM (research data management) infrastructure have been divided into four themes:

The Tablet Symposium

lisrw — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 14:32:10 +0000

Ryan Burns reports on a one-day symposium on tablet computers, e-readers and other new media objects held at the University of Sussex on 10 April 2013.

The Tablet Symposium [1] brought together researchers and practitioners to examine questions about uses of tablet computers and e-readers across many walks of life, including academic, artistic, pedagogical, corporate and everyday contexts.

The Wellcome Library, Digital

lisrw — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:52:03 +0000

Christy Henshaw and Robert Kiley describe how the Wellcome Library has transformed its information systems to support mass digitisation of historic collections.

Online access is now the norm for many spheres of discovery and learning. What benefits bricks-and-mortar libraries have to offer in this digital age is a subject of much debate and concern, and will continue to be so as learning resources and environments shift ever more from the physical to the virtual. In order to maintain a place in this dual environment, most research libraries strive to replicate their traditional offerings in the digital world.

Book Review: Powering Search - The Role of Thesauri in New Information Environments

lisrw — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Leonard Will reviews a comprehensive survey of the literature on the use of thesauri in information search processes and interfaces.

Powering Search is a comprehensive review and synthesis of work that has been done over the past 50 years on the use of thesauri to make searching for information more effective. The book does not discuss the principles and practice of construction of information retrieval thesauri in any detail, but concentrates on the search process and on the user interface through which a searcher interacts with a body of information resources. It is written clearly: each chapter begins and ends with a summary of its content, and the first and last chapters summarise the whole book. There are copious references throughout and a full index.

As the author says in his conclusion:

'This book has taken a new approach to thesauri by critiquing the relevant literatures of a variety of communities who share an interest in thesauri and their functions but who are not, it should be noted, closely collaborating at this time – research communities such as library and information science, information retrieval, knowledge organization, human-computer interaction, information architecture, information search behavior, usability studies, search user interface, metadata-enabled information access, interactive information retrieval, and searcher education.'

One consequence of these disparate approaches is that terminology varies across communities: there are many interpretations of the meaning of facet, category, keyword or taxonomy, for example, which the author acknowledges, but he then uses these terms without saying precisely what definition he gives them.

Information Search Processes

Chapters 2 and 3 review studies on how people go about searching for information, leading to the perhaps self-evident conclusion that there are two types of approach. If a specific and well-defined piece of information is sought, people will amend and refine their queries in the light of initial results to get closer to what they seek. On the other hand, if the search requirement is less well defined, a browsing or 'berrypicking' approach is adopted to explore a subject area, picking up and assembling pieces of information and changing the destination as the exploration progresses. Both these approaches use an iterative procedure, within which a thesaurus can serve to make a search more precise, in the first case, or to show the broader context, in the second.

Chapter 4 deals with thesauri in Web-based search systems, and gives several examples of thesauri in digital libraries, subject gateways and portals, digital archives and linked data repositories. This is one way of grouping these examples, but it is not clear that there is any distinction in principle between the way thesauri can be used in each of them, or indeed in search interfaces to other types of document collections. The main distinction, which is not fully addressed, is whether the information resources being searched have been indexed with terms from the thesaurus being used, or whether the thesaurus is just a source of possible terms for searching the text, and possibly the metadata, of documents. More weight needs to be given to the statement in the introduction to ISO 25964 -1:

'If both the indexer and the searcher are guided to choose the same term for the same concept, then relevant documents will be retrieved. This is the main principle underlying thesaurus design ...'

In fact the book generally talks about terms rather than the approach taken by the current standards of considering unambiguously defined concepts, with terms just serving as convenient labels for these. Each concept may have many labels by which it can be retrieved, including one chosen as preferred for each language covered by the thesaurus.

Book Review: Information Consulting - Guide to good practice

lisrw — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 19:57:38 +0000

Martin White reviews a book written by three experienced consultants that seeks to support information professionals in setting themselves up as consultants.

I’ve been working in information consultancy for over 35 years and not regretted for a moment my choice of career. It’s taken me to over 30 countries and the opportunity to work with an amazing array of organisations in temperatures ranging from 47C to minus 25C. I’ve had project meetings on the top floor of the United Nations building, on a boat anchored in the harbour at Cannes, a luxury hotel in Oman and in a London convent. I’ve flown on HP’s corporate jet, had lunch with Henry Kissinger and was inside the IMF in Washington on 9/11.

Book Review: University Libraries and Space in the Digital World

lisrw — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 21:23:02 +0000

Hugh Murphy reviews a collection of essays which charts the development and impact of the physical library space and its use in our digital world.

Despite the economic adversity faced by many academic bodies and their libraries, there are still some institutions lucky enough to be in a position to refurbish, extend or commission a new building. University Libraries and Space in the Digital World is undoubtedly for the many people involved in such projects, but is quite clearly designed for a wider readership too. This is a good thing, as it would be hard to think of a library user or staff member who is not affected by the issue of library space.

Book Review: Marketing Your Library’s Electronic Resources

lisrw — Thu, 27 Jun 2013 15:14:42 +0000

Lizz Jennings reviews a concise and practical guide to marketing library e-resources which offers the busy professional a structured approach to planning a successful campaign.

Marketing Your Electronic Resources immediately strikes the reader as a very practical book. With wide margins for notes and easy reference, a large section giving examples of best practice, and the main text extending over just 100 pages, this book is designed for busy practitioners. For many librarians tasked with marketing, this kind of work forms a small part of the whole of their role and this short, practical guide is pitched very much at this type of reader. It is not sector-specific, although many of the examples are drawn from public and academic librarie

Engaging Researchers with Social Media Tools: 25 Research Things@Huddersfield

lisrw — Thu, 27 Jun 2013 20:52:47 +0000

Graham Stone and Ellen Collins investigate whether 25 Research Things, an innovative online learning programme, could help researchers understand the value of Web 2.0 tools.

This article explores whether an online learning course can help academic researchers to become more familiar with social media tools, and seeks to understand how they can put them to use within their research and teaching activities. It does so by considering the development, implementation and evaluation of a pilot Web 2.0 course, 25 Research Things, an innovative online learning programme developed at the University of Huddersfield, which gives researchers a structured way to engage with selected Web 2.0 tools.

JABES 2013

lisrw — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 12:11:53 +0000

Marlène Delhaye reports on the two-day annual conference organised by the French Agence Bibliographique de l’Enseignement Supérieur (ABES) held in Montpellier, France over 14-15 May 2013.

In what has now become something of a tradition, the ‘Corum’ Congress Centre in Montpellier, France, hosted the twelfth in the series of the Journées de l’Agence Bibliographique de l’Enseignement Supérieur (ABES - Higher Education Bibliographic Agency) [1].

KAPTUR the Highlights: Exploring Research Data Management in the Visual Arts

lisrw — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 17:50:23 +0000

Leigh Garrett, Marie-Therese Gramstadt, Carlos Silva and Anne Spalding describe the exploration of the importance and nature of research data in the visual arts and requirements for their appropriate curation and preservation.

KAPTUR (2011-13) [1], funded by Jisc and led by the Visual Arts Data Service, was a collaborative project involving four institutional partners: the Glasgow School of Arts; Goldsmiths, University of London; University for the Creative Arts; and the University of the Arts London. Research data have in recent years become regarded as a valuable institutional resource and their appropriate collection, curation, publication and preservation as essential. This has been driven by a number of internal and external forces, and all UK Research Councils now require it as a condition of funding [2]. As a result, a network of data repositories has emerged [3], some funded by research councils and others by institutions themselves. However, at the outset of the project, research data management practice within the visual arts appeared to operate rather ad hoc with none of the specialist arts institutions within the UK having either implemented research data management policies [4] or established research data management systems. KAPTUR sought to:

investigate the nature of visual arts research data;
make recommendations for its effective management;
develop a model of best practice applicable to both specialist institutions and arts departments within multidisciplinary institutions; and
apply, test and refine the model of best practice across the four institutional partner institutions.

This paper outlines the background and context of the project; explores the nature of visual arts research data; details the outcomes of the user and technical review; and describes the work which underwent within the partner institutions around policy formation and staff engagement.

Led by the Visual Arts Data Service (VADS), in collaboration with the Glasgow School of Art, Goldsmiths College, University of the Arts London and University for the Creative Arts, and funded by Jisc, KAPTUR [1] sought to ‘...discover, create and pilot a sectoral model of best practice in the management of research data in the [visual] arts.’ [5].

Recent years have witnessed an increasing recognition across the Higher Education sector that research data are a valuable resource and therefore its appropriate curation and preservation are essential. In addition, wider societal and political forces meant that research councils, teams and researchers were coming under increasing pressure to make publicly funded data freely available. As such the publication of research data was increasingly becoming a requirement of funding, for example the Arts and Humanities Research Council [6] and Medical Research Council [7]. Equally important was the need for increased data transparency, and to enable researchers to access existing datasets to test the validity and reliability of the data and associated research methods; to reinterpret the data; and to preserve the data for future scrutiny. In response, many universities, for example the University of Edinburgh, had established institutional research data management systems to support the deposit and preservation of research data, whilst others were in the process of piloting services, for example the University of Leicester, and establishing policies and procedures which actively support researchers to manage their data effectively, such as Canterbury Christ Church University and Northumbria University. In addition, many of the research councils themselves had established repositories, for example the UK Data Archive at the University of Essex, which curates research data in the social sciences and humanities, and the Natural Environment Research Council, which supports a network of data centres across its disciplinary areas.

However, given the emerging landscape, at the outset of the project it was clear that very little was known about the collection, curation and usage of research data in the visual arts: none of the specialist arts institutions had research data management policies or infrastructure in place and evidence collected at the time indicated that practice was at best, ad hoc, left to individual researchers and teams with limited support or guidance. Little work had been undertaken to understand the distinctive and varied nature of research data in the visual arts, and even less to understand how these data could be collected, curated, preserved and exploited, or their potential impact assessed.

By its very nature, research in the visual arts is highly complex and varied, often comprising a wide variety of outputs and formats which present researchers, repository managers and institutions with many discipline-specific difficulties. The methods and processes which generate this research are just as varied and complex. Research endeavour in the visual arts relies heavily on the physical artefact: sketchbooks, logbooks, journals, and workbooks. Alongside these data, a wide range of related project documentation and protocols are also created. While technology may offer considerable potential to support the safe storage and preservation of research and related data, and to enhance access, the highly distinctive nature of the visual arts and its research methods also present enormous technical problems with regard to formats, standards, roles and responsibilities, and policies.

eMargin: A Collaborative Textual Annotation Tool

lisrw — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 17:20:45 +0000

Andrew Kehoe and Matt Gee describe their Jisc-funded eMargin collaborative textual annotation tool, showing how it has widened its focus through integration with Virtual Learning Environments.

In the Research and Development Unit for English Studies (RDUES) at Birmingham City University, our main research field is Corpus Linguistics: the compilation and analysis of large text collections in order to extract new knowledge about language. We have previously developed the WebCorp [1] suite of software tools, designed to extract language examples from the Web and to uncover frequent and changing usage patterns automatically. eMargin, with its emphasis on manual annotation and analysis, was therefore somewhat of a departure for us.

The eMargin Project came about in 2007 when we attempted to apply our automated Corpus Linguistic analysis techniques to the study of English Literature. To do this, we built collections of works by particular authors and made these available through our WebCorp software, allowing other researchers to examine, for example, how Dickens uses the word ‘woman’, how usage varies across his novels, and which other words are associated with ‘woman’ in Dickens’ works.

What we found was that, although our tools were generally well received, there was some resistance amongst literary scholars to this large-scale automated analysis of literary texts. Our top-down approach, relying on frequency counts and statistical analyses, was contrary to the traditional bottom-up approach employed in the discipline, relying on the intuition of literary scholars. In order to develop new software to meet the requirements of this new audience, we needed to gain a deeper understanding of the traditional approach and its limitations.

The Traditional Approach

A long-standing problem in the study of English Literature is that the material being studied – the literary text – is often many hundreds of pages in length, yet the teacher must encourage class discussion and focus this on particular themes and passages. Compounding the problem is the fact that, often, not all students in the class have read the text in its entirety.

The traditional mode of study in the discipline is ‘close reading’: the detailed examination and interpretation of short text extracts down to individual word level. This variety of ‘practical criticism’ was greatly influenced by the work of I.A. Richards in the 1920s [2] but can actually be traced back to the 11^th Century [3]. What this approach usually involves in practice in the modern study of English Literature is that the teacher will specify a passage for analysis, often photocopying this and distributing it to the students. Students will then read the passage several times, underlining words or phrases which seem important, writing notes in the margin, and making links between different parts of the passage, drawing out themes and motifs. On each re-reading, the students’ analysis gradually takes shape (see Figure 1). Close reading takes place either in preparation for seminars or in small groups during seminars, and the teacher will then draw together the individual analyses during a plenary session in the classroom.

Book Review: The Information Society - A Study of Continuity and Change

lisrw — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 20:03:56 +0000

Muhammad Rafiq offers us a detailed review of a work, now in its sixth edition, which examines the information society, its origin, development, its associated issues and the current landscape.

The Information Society offers a detailed discussion on the concept and dynamics of the information society from a historical perspective to the present era of information societies.

ECLAP 2013: Information Technologies for Performing Arts, Media Access and Entertainment

lisrw — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 20:46:57 +0000

Marieke Guy reports on the second international conference held by ECLAP, the e-library for performing arts.

The beautiful city of Porto was the host location for ECLAP 2013 [1], the 2nd International Conference on Information Technologies for Performing Arts, Media Access and Entertainment. Porto is the second largest city in Portugal after Lisbon and home of the Instituto Politécnico do Porto (IPP), the largest polytechnic in the country, with over 18,500 students.

Book Review: The New Digital Scholar - Exploring and Enriching the Research and Writing Practices of NextGen Students

lisrw — Sat, 06 Jul 2013 20:34:48 +0000

Julia Robinson reviews a substantial and timely collection of essays related to the research and writing practices of NextGen students. Expressing a call for change in the way educators approach Information Literacy teaching, this book invites the reader to redefine, re-evaluate and reflect on what we think we know about students’ research practices today.

McClure and Purdy bring together a mix of perspectives, from librarians and lecturers to professors and programmers, to give voice to the very timely concern in Information Literacy (IL) teaching, that we are not equipping our students for the future as we hoped. So-called NextGen students are engaging with information online in their personal, social and educational lives in ways that are shaping new approaches to and conceptions of research. At the same time, those teaching IL, whether librarians or writing instructors, are basing lesson plans and interventions on traditional pedagogies, arguably unfit for a research landscape so altered by the pace and change of information technologies. Students, IL instructors and academics occupy different spaces in the digital environment and work at cross-purposes. Traditional IL instruction has encouraged students to understand information sources in binary terms, right or wrong, leaving them disoriented and disengaged as they undertake research. Students should instead be encouraged to see research as a recursive conversation. IL instructors need to collaborate with academics to reposition themselves in this conversation and join students in their digital space at the point of need.

Structure and Content

The book is divided into four parts and sixteen chapters (see Appendix for full Table of Contents). In the introduction ‘Understanding the NextGen Researcher’, McClure and Purdy set out their premise that NextGen students are prolific writers, readers and researchers, using a multitude of digital technologies to engage in these activities simultaneously, and:

Because digital technologies intertwine research and writing, this book takes as its premise that we – as professionals from a variety of fields – cannot ignore, marginalize (sic), or leave to others the commitment to understand and help the new digital scholar. In its four parts, this collection explores the facets of that commitment. (p.2)

Part One: NextGen Students and the Research Writing ‘Problem’ moves through defining Information Behaviour (Chapter 1), giving a history of the research paper (Chapter 2), identifying key IL frameworks (Chapter 3) and introducing deep learning (Chapter 4). All of these chapters set the scene by providing a broad theoretical basis and shared language with which the reader can access the rest of the book.

Most interestingly, McClure defines Information Behaviour as separate and distinct from Information Literacy. He bases his argument on the American Library Association definition of IL, where information-literate people ‘recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information’ [1]. However, he reframes the ALA’s definition, instead describing it as:

A set of abilities requiring individuals to (my emphasis) recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information. (p.20)

McClure goes on to argue that if IL is a finite set of skills or abilities then Information Behaviour ‘is concerned with the complex processes and influences on the information seeker’ (p.20). Whilst his intention to highlight behaviour is laudable, he adapts the definition of IL to make his point. Indeed, many readers in the UK would see a focus on behaviour and influence as inherent to IL, and already accounted for within the term. For example, the SCONUL Seven Pillars Model of Information Literacy states that:

Information literate people will demonstrate an awareness of how they gather, use, manage, synthesise and create information and data in an ethical manner and will have the information skills to do so effectively. [2]

Information skills are separate here too, but they are part of IL, they do not constitute IL itself. The focus on how accounts for behaviour. Conceptions of IL are detailed and discussed throughout the book along with related but distinct terms such as Digital Literacy, Multiliteracies (both Chapter 7), Digital Agency (Chapter 9), Hyperliteracy (Chapter 13) and Technological Literacy (Chapter 16).

Developing a Prototype Library WebApp for Mobile Devices

admin — Mon, 10 Jun 2013 13:33:09 +0000

Jason Cooper and Gary Brewerton describe the development of a prototype WebApp to improve access to Library systems at Loughborough University for mobile devices.

Reviewing Loughborough University Library’s Web site statistics over a 12-month period (October 2011 – September 2012) showed a monthly average of 1,200 visits via mobile devices (eg smart phones and tablet computers). These visits account for 4% of the total monthly average visits; but plotting the percentage of visits per month from such mobile devices demonstrated over the period a steady increase, rising from 2% to 8%. These figures were supported by comparison with statistics from the Library’s blog, where, over the same period, there was also a steady increase in the percentage of visits from mobile devices. This increase was on a smaller scale than the Web site, rising from 0.5% up to 4%.

Having identified this increase in the usage of mobile devices, it was decided to investigate ways to support mobile access more effectively. As part of this investigation, the Library's Systems Team undertook the development of a prototype mobile app.

Deciding the Prototype's Features

The first task undertaken was to produce a list of functionality that could be included in the Library WebApp. The list was based upon current Library services and consisted of the following:

Support library catalogue searching
Display opening hours (pulled from the Library Web site so data can be maintained in one location)
Display current item loans, requests and holds
- Indicate overdue items
- Indicate recalled items
- Offer option to renew loaned items
- Offer option to cancel requests for items
Reading lists
- Ensure module list displays all modules for which the user is registered
- Should handle multiple levels of reading lists
- Include thumbnails
- Include library holding information
Display current room/PC bookings
- Display list of bookings including resource name, start time and end time for each booking.
- Offer option to cancel a room/PC booking
- Offer option to make a room/PC booking
Display upcoming library events (pulled from the Library Web site)
- Include both upcoming workshops and events
Display library news (taken as a feed from our Library blog)
Offer feedback option

After reviewing this list, it was decided to leave out the searching of the Library Catalogue feature as the Library's discovery tool (Ex Libris’s Primo [1]) was scheduled for a number of updates that would improve the support of mobile devices. Therefore it was decided to wait and see how the improved mobile interface performed before deciding how to integrate it into the mobile app.

Additionally it was decided not to implement a number of the other features, those that would either require new APIs to be created for other systems or those that would alter the information stored in the other systems. These features would be carried forward for implementation in a future version of the mobile app. Consequently features excluded from the pilot version were:

library catalogue searching
the option to renew loaned items and cancel requested items
the option to make or cancel a room/PC booking

WebApp versus Native Apps

An important early decision was whether to create the Mobile App as a WebApp or as a number of native apps? A native app is one that is developed in the native language for the platform (Objective-C for iPhone/iPad devices, Java for Android devices, etc) and usually delivered via an app-store (iTunes for Apple, Google Play for Android, etc). A WebApp is developed in HTML5 and JavaScript, being delivered to the mobile device via the World Wide Web.

There are pros and cons to developing a mobile app as a native app or as a WebApp. Native apps have full access to a mobile device's resources but need to be developed as a separate app for each platform on which they are to be made available. Conversely developing a mobile app as a WebApp restricts the resources that can be accessed to those available to the device's Web browser, although a single developed WebApp can work on multiple platforms.

Book Review: Crisis Information Management

lisrw — Sat, 06 Jul 2013 21:26:52 +0000

Emma Tonkin offers a review of a thought-provoking overview of crisis informatics.

In her introduction to this collection, Hagar [1] – who coined the term ‘crisis informatics’ [2] - begins by providing the following definition of the term ‘crisis’ (taken from Johnston, The Dictionary of Human Geography, 2002 [3]) - ‘an interruption in the reproduction of economic, cultural, social and/or political life’. This book discusses crises as diverse as wartime disruption, earthquakes, fires, hurricanes, viruses and terrorist activity.

Augmented Reality in Education: The SCARLET+ Experience

lisrw — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 17:38:54 +0000

Laura Skilton, Matt Ramirez, Guyda Armstrong, Rose Lock, Jean Vacher and Marie-Therese Gramstadt describe augmented reality in education case studies from the University of Sussex and the University for the Creative Arts.

Augmented reality, a capability that has been around for decades, is shifting from what was once seen as a gimmick to a bona fide game-changer. [1]

Augmented Reality (AR) has been listed in the Horizon Reports, key predictors of the potential impact of new technology on education. The 2011 Report [1] sparked the idea for an innovative project - SCARLET: Special Collections using Augmented Reality to Enhance Learning and Teaching.

Bring Your Own Policy: Why Accessibility Standards Need to Be Contextually Sensitive

lisrw — Mon, 08 Jul 2013 18:13:42 +0000

Brian Kelly, Jonathan Hassell, David Sloan, Dominik Lukeš, E A Draffan and Sarah Lewthwaite argue that rather than having a universal standard for Web accessibility, standardisation of Web accessibility practices and policies needs to be sufficiently flexible to cater for the local context.

Initiatives to enhance Web accessibility have previously focused on the development of guidelines which apply on a global basis. Legislation at national and international levels increasingly mandate conformance with such guidelines. However large scale surveys have demonstrated the failure of such approaches to produce any significant impact.