Technology in Academic Libraries

TOOLS, PROCESSES, AND

PRODUCTS
 Technology Topics
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Systems & Methods

Resources & Services
Devices & Device Related Issues
Social Networking & User-Generated Content
Policy Issues
 Purpose of Technology
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The ends?
Increased productivity for both user and staff
 24/7/365 access and availability

The means?
 Application of evolving technologies evidenced by
 modernization
 transformation
 decentralization
 Life Cycle
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We employ life cycles to implement and manage IT

as an infrastructure:
Planning
 Strategic and long term plans
 Technology plan
Budgeting
 Initial Costs
 Cost models and financing, such as buy or lease?
 Recurring Costs
 Life Cycle
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Investigation
Negotiation/Acquisition
Installation
Training
Evaluation
 Does it work?
 How do we know?
Upgrade, migrate, or replace
 Life Cycle
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Operations
 Staffing
 Increasingly skilled
 Internal relationships with other campus information technology
providers
 Licensing of access and availability
 Use of proxies
Accountability
 How do you measure and report a “hit”?
 Life Cycles
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The most important aspect of the life cycle is the

ongoing evaluation of the effectiveness and efficiency
of the system
 must be aware of when it is time to consider upgrade, migrate,
replace or abandon
 Keep a technology beyond its usefulness and you lose both
effectiveness and efficiency
 As a result: accountability and credibility suffers
 IT: Modernize and Transform
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Modernization and transformation

 important and visible concepts
Modernization
 Use of computers to replicate tasks
 such as acquisitions, cataloging, circulation
 Idea is to improve efficiencies
Transformation
 Fundamentally altering the nature of the organization and/or
the services it provides
History of Technology
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IN ACADEMIC LIBRARIES
 Historical Overview: 1960s-70s
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Libraries offered some of the first public access to
technology:
 Dummy terminals connected to mainframes which
supported workflow of backroom operations or created
systems of local inventory
 Development of databases that could store massive amounts
of information centrally which could be accessed worldwide.
 Dialog becomes first commercial online database in 1972
 Historical Overview: 1970s-80s
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• Local inventory systems built on ordering, acquisition, and

cataloging of materials= move to integrated library systems
 Commercial development of library systems
 Library systems became “off-the-shelf”, using parameter tables
to locally customize systems to modernize applications, such as
circulation
 Historical Overview 1980s
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 Minis and Microcomputers

 Use of CD-ROMs for bibliographic data by a librarian (Murphy
– BiblioFile)
 Networking
 OS appears – UNIX
 Serial internal from muxes to terminals
 Computer labs became common on college campuses
 Productivity software leading to office suites
 IT: Transformation
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1990s: Transformation Begins

Transformation
 Fundamentally altering the nature of the organization through
these capabilities
 Examples:
 Providing user access to full text content stored remotely from the
library
 Distance education opportunities
 IT: Transformation
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Microcomputers and supermicros

 Now called multiprocessors
Internet to colleges via NSF grants
GUIs (Macs and Windows)
Web browsers (Mosaic  Firefox)
ISPs (dialups such as AOL)
Full text availability
 IT: Transformation
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E-everything (books, journals, reserves, etc.)

Wireless networks
Mobile ubiquitous phones
Client/servers
 Simple definition: client requests and server provides over
standard communication protocols
 IT: Transformation
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Hand helds
Digital libraries
Customized access
 My library portal
Movement of reference into virtual

Transformation = application of learning/user

centered technology
 IT: Transformation
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We could not achieve transformation

without:
Standards
 NISO Z39.2: Bibliographic Information Interchange
Format (MARC)
 NISO Z39.50: Information Retrieval Application Service
(interoperability)
 TCP/IP: Terminal Control Program/Internet Protocol

 HTTP

 SGML (HTML and XML)

 IT: Transformation
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Integrated Library System

 All modules share a single bibliographic database
 Share a common command language
 Changes in one module are immediately reflected in all other
modules which use that information
The OPAC is an example of a transformational
application to “user centered” technology.
 IT: Decentralization
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Movement from automating staff and backroom

functions to providing direct services to end users
through technology
Reduce staff mediation and replace with end user
empowerment
 IT: Decentralization
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As a result of decentralization:
The library is “virtual”
 Resources available 24/7/365
 Not the same as a digital library

Reduced or, in some instances, eliminated barriers

and boundaries of geography and time
 Distance education (Asynchronous)
 Digital reference
 IT: Decentralization
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Decentralization also impacts:

Instruction technology
 Becomes much more complicated
 Transformational to learning and teaching
Information literacy
 Skills are needed by users to effectively access, retrieve AND
evaluate information, especially its quality
 IT: Decentralization
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Authentication
 Need to authenticate remote users to comply with information
vendor licenses
 Often done through proxy servers, many mounted on ILS (use
of patron records)
Security
 Application of firewalls
 Why? To ensure continuity of services to end users
 Times, They Are A Changing …
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Because of modernization, transformation and

decentralization, the academic library has changed,
evidenced in part by its:
 organizational structure
 staffing
 fear of the unknown and uncertainty
 position descriptions
 communication methods
 services offered (remote access; proxies, etc.)

 cooperation with other information services

 IT: Change
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Management issues and challenges must be dealt

with or we will become extinct
 Accountability and evaluation
 Assessment of student learning outcomes
 Perceptions:
 University administrators really think that everything is on the
Web
 Also think that libraries are becoming ghost towns
It trends & Challenges
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LOOKING TO THE FUTURE

 Trends and Challenges
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Systems and Methods
 Catalog- Next generation catalogs
 http://sccl.bibliocommons.com/
 http://cat.danburylibrary.org/
 Discovery-to-delivery tools
 Customization/personalization
Devices
 Smartphones/handhelds/ebooks
 Location-based services (privacy issues)
 Pushing content to mobile devices
 Designing (webpages, apps, etc) for mobile devices
 Trends and Challenges
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Resources, Publishing, & Services

 Libraries as publishers
 Digitization opportunities and challenges
 OpenURL (connecting to accessible material)
 Metadata harvesting
 Metasearching
 http://www.dogpile.com
 BC Library Holmes (
http://library.bc.edu/F?local_base=BC_CATALOG)
 Automated Reference
 Semantic Web
 Hakia (http://hakia.com)
 Gaming Technology
 Trends and Challenges
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Social Media and User-Generated Content

 Preservation of new media (end-user content)
 Citizen journalism
 Participation- e.g. tagging library content
 Trends and Challenges
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Policy Issues
 Digital divide
 Privacy is dead (?)
 Open source/content/access
 Copyright
 Self-publishing
 Openness, sharing content
 DRM
 The Future
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The so what: focus has, and will continue to shift

from the place (the library) to providing services
directly to the clientele (in anyplace)
 IT is Cyclical ….
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Modernize Transformation

then
We modernize a transformation
 an example: PDFs over full text ASCII
That, in turns, leads to another transformation.
 Therefore, the ultimate
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future is:
Virtual Reality
 Sit at home and physically browse a book remotely stored
 Eliminates the criticism “well, I can’t read it in bed …”
 Contextual experience
 3D reference chats
We may never leave home ……. except for the need
of the “human moment”
 IT: System
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Information technology is a means to an end, not
the end in itself. It is a tool to improve
efficiencies and to increase effectiveness