a great look at the value of libraries

I know I'm late in the game here, but Brian over at Swiss Army Librarian did a very interesting calculation of library-vs-retail costs to the community. The results are very heartening, and something any library might want to prepare with their own numbers, in order to prove to their boards and communities the notably significant value of their worth!

this is an amazing publicity campaign

Nice job, Atlanta Fulton PL.

electronic catalogs

There is something deeply, deeply flawed with an ILS where I can type in "The Sound and the Fury" (in quotes!) and the book copy of the work is #10 on the results page (at least the first result was related to Faulkner; I cannot seem to reproduce the input, but I swear I looked up either the author or title at one point where the first result to come up was a book titled "Onassis"...of course, if I try to look up that work, it's impossible to find). I was so frustrated having to scroll down to find the results for things I'd typed in perfectly. I cannot understand what sort of search algorithm this software is performing on its database, but it seems as if there is something seriously off. I don't know if it's SirsiDynix itself (the ILS software creator), or if it's just that Connect (one of CT's library consortiums) hasn't upgraded its software to the latest & greatest, but I intend to find out. Somehow. Sometime. And do something about it.

I am so tempted to apply for one of the developer jobs in Utah, but...1. it's Utah, and 2. I vowed I'd never go back to being a code monkey again. That's why I moved to librarianship - I wanted to get out of the mire of endless lines of C++ (or Java, or etc.). But at the same time, I have this feeling that I've got a great stradding-the-fence skill set which would be awesome to use to improve electronic catalogs. I love databases. I just don't know if I want to code them for the rest of my life. But I know we can make them do what we need them to do...which to me includes returning the appropriate search results. Hrm.

ch-ch-ch-changes

Wow, it certainly is really interesting working on such an "alive" memorial: we're archiving something that is still in the process of being created, and therefore is in constant flux. Even a memorial which I had worked on only a month ago has had a complete overhaul; it must be because the victim's loved ones had had their meeting with the VOICES offices in the interim. It was actually really fantastic to see: what caught my eye first was the changed profile picture (the new one is much better!), but what truly made me feel a warm glow was how much more information had been added about this person: more tributes, and so much more information in general. It's so nice to see the effect of having one's loved ones get to share their memories. I wish I could see such changes happen for all the victims, but alas, that would be difficult to track. I feel lucky enough to have been able to notice this one. What a truly interesting project this is turning out to be, on so many levels.

quick update/response

Because I am in the Dunkin Donuts at the Student Center, and therefore can't use my laptop (don't ask), I am using my phone. Because I am using my phone, I can't seem to comment on blogs. So I am going to do that here, because I just read Kyle's post & I liked her point that it's okay that it's the last class, because we are setting up these great foundations for the next 599 class - I love that!

Also, I forgot that today was picture day...and I've been up since 5:30...eep. Haha.

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coming close to the end

I cannot believe that tomorrow is our last class. It feels like we just got started on this project, and I'm loath to leave it. Which probably means I will be doing my best to continue volunteering with VOICES as I move into my next semester of school.

But, before moving forward, let me back up and reflect on the class which we had last Saturday. I felt it was VERY productive. Not only in the little things - I was happy to have reorganized the Person type entry page so that it seemed to more intuitively relate to the data we were entering - but also the discussions we engaged in were SO satisfying. And this, despite that many of them felt unresolved, to an extent! But just to know that everyone was struggling with the same issues when it came to assigning certain information into tags, for instance. It was good to consolidate the Job Title & Profession fields, even though that wasn't necessarily the optimal option.

I'm also excited to see how the other work is coming along: Kyle's layout, Molly's lightbox, and Frank's wiki work, to name a few things. Everyone has worked so hard on this project. I'm also looking forward to the future when we truly adopt tagging, to see where that will take the entries and the searching capabilities. And most of all, I am anxious to see if & when people ultimately comment on the content, adding yet another layer (and more brains) to the mix, so that even more ways to use and synthesize the content can be explored.

This weekend, I hope that we can finally set up a cohesive exhibit, in order to see everything fall into place. Even if we only get one or two done, just to see where this project is headed will be helpful - and inspirational, I can imagine. Once I see all of the elements of our work coming together, I believe I will become even more eager to get involved in the project for the long-term. I feel so invested already. I can't imagine leaving it all tomorrow, and I don't plan to.

(late in coming) reflections on last class

I got sick almost immediately following our last class (it had nothing to do with the class itself, I swear!), so my apologies that I'm going to try to comment on it now, almost a week later.

What I remember most about it was our very interesting discussion/mini-debate on what ought to go into the tags of any item we are archiving. People made some excellent points for and against certain things. I thought it was a good idea to avoid putting anything in which one could already find in the metadata. What I'd especially like to see in there would be tags we talked about relating to someone's affiliation outside of their work: schools they attended, groups they were involved in, etc. This would help give a more comprehensive picture of each individual and allow for someone to look them up via other routes than the typical ones which are currently recorded by the 9/11 Living Memorial (as comprehensive as it is).

While looking for some other instances where issue this might have been discussed, I stumbled across this very interesting site. Also, does anyone have access to Wiley articles? Because this one looks particularly interesting/appropriate.

I also REALLY enjoyed digging into the database files, more than I thought I would; I'm looking forward to doing a bit more of that. It even made me consider wanting to look for work which might bridge my training between computer & library science: I am thinking perhaps I can find something in consulting which would allow me to use my database knowledge and combine it with the need in libraries and archiving for technical people who have some actual knowledge of libraries. Exciting!