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Reminder: MetaLib open discussion this afternoon: <br><br>
Wednesday, 15 Feb, 3-4:30pm, SML Lecture Hall<br><br>
See below for details. -Audrey<br><br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Colleagues,<br>
<br>
Apologies for cross-postings.<br><br>
I am writing to invite you to a discussion about MetaLib. The
MetaLib Transition Group would like to present to you recent changes to
the MetaLib interface, the results of usability studies, and some
recommendations for additional modifications to our presentation of
materials within MetaLib. We would like to hear your comments about
MetaLib and get feedback about the proposed additional changes. See
below for meeting times and places. I hope you can attend.<br>
<br>
This email also includes background information about MetaLib, usage
statistics and a summary of recent changes. <br>
<br>
I look forward to seeing you in February. <br><br>
-Audrey Novak <br>
For the MetaLib Transition Group:<br>
Alan Solomon, Audrey Novak, Jan Glover, Jennifer Weintraub, Julie Linden,
Katie Bauer, Karen Reardon, Kalee Sprague, Melissa Wisner<br>
<br>
<b>Meeting Times and Place:<br>
</b>Monday, 13 Feb, 3-4:430pm, SML Lecture Hall<br>
Wednesday, 15 Feb, 3-4:30pm, SML Lecture Hall<br>
<br>
<b>Background and Status:<br>
</b>MetaLib was made available to the public in a soft rollout (i.e., no
publicity, no promotion by staff) in June 2005. Readers access it from
the Frontdoor Database and Articles page
-(<a href="http://www.library.yale.edu/databases/">
http://www.library.yale.edu/databases/</a>). <br>
<br>
All active DBOW databases are included within Metalib with full
descriptive records. Additions and changes to DBOW are manually
transferred to MetaLib monthly by staff in IS&P. Updates from
ExLibris to the MetaLib Central Knowledge Base of resources (the CKB) are
also applied monthly to Metalib. Typically these updates make a handful
of additional resources offered at Yale searchable within MetaLib <br>
<br>
Yale’s resources consist of 117 Search and Display databases (meaning
they can be both searched in MetaLib and the results displayed in the
Metalib interface as well), 38 Search and Link (searched in MetaLib, but
the results link sends the user to the “native” interface of the
database) and 491 Link only databases (the user must search in the native
interface). If a user wishes to use the “Multi-Database Search”,
they can only use this with “Search and Display” and “Search and Link”
databases, not with the “Link only databases.<br>
<br>
During the first 6 months of MetaLib use in this soft implementation
state approximately 22,000 searches were conducted across resources
available through Quicksearch, 3500 searches were conducted across
resources presented in Multi-Database search, and 350 users logged into
MetaLib. (Note that Yale readers can search in MetaLib without logging
in). MetaLib was used approximately 15,000 times since June. During
the Fall semester, average usage was 28.1/day in Sept, 142.6/day in Oct
and 200.6 /day in Nov. <br>
<br>
Also during this half year the MetaLib Transition Group implemented
several changes to the interface. These changes were made as a result of
the installation of ML 3.13 and usability studies. They include:
<ul>
<li>Implementing the Summary Page in Quicksearch and Multi-database
search. This interactive page displays during the search process. From it
users can go directly to results before they search is completed. More
importantly, it presents result set size from each database before
records are displayed. This change eliminates the problem of not being
able to easily tell the size of the result set.
<li>Creating the ALL subcategory within each category. ALL is an
alphabetical list of all the resources mapped to all the subcategories
within a single category. With ML3.13 we were able to present an ordered
list of resources within the ALL subcategory. In ML3.12 the list
could not be ordered so we did not create this subcategory.
<li>Renamed the Orbis+Morris+NHFPL Quicksearch subcategory from“Local
Catalogs” to “Local Books.” Patrons did not understand the term
“Catalog.”
<li>Removed the Subject searching option. Usability studies suggest that
patrons are selecting it instead of Keyword and resources frequently do
not support it so it fails.
<li>To make it easier for patrons to find holdings (Call#) information,
particularly for Orbis, within the full record display we removed
bibliographic level LC and Dewey numbers, moved the link to local
holdings data to the top of the record and re-labeled it Holdings/Call#,
and moved the link to the native interface to the bottom of the full
record and re-labeled it Database.
<li>Changed the default display in Find Database to Brief View (database
name and brief description) from Table View (just database name) in
response to usability study results.
<li>Changed the Added to My Research icon to Added – Check “My Research”
in an effort to make clear that this function works something like a
Bookbag.
</ul><b><br>
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