The document discusses various library discovery tools that aim to provide a single search interface for library collections, allowing users to search local resources as well as articles, books, and other materials from publishers and other libraries, though the tools often fail to fully deliver on the promise of discovery due to limitations in content coverage and indexing.

1. University library
Discovery tools: a rearguard action?
Lukas Koster
Library Systems Coordinator
Library of the University of Amsterdam
@lukask – l.koster@uva.nl
ELAG2012, Palma de Mallorca, May 18, 2012

2. YES
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 2

3. Disclaimer
It’s just me
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 3

4. Discovery?
Columbus discovers America
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5. Discover!
The Free Dictionary:
Determine the existence, presence, or fact of something
Become aware of something, usually accidentally, find unexpectedly
Make a new finding, see for the first time
Serendipity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/monkeymyshkin/2331128659/
http://freedictionary.org/?Query=discover
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6. Unknown unknowns
“There are known knowns; there are things we know we
know.
We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we
know there are some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns – there are things we
do not know we don't know.”
Donald Rumsfeld, February 12, 2002 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_are_known_knowns
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtkUO8NpI84
Unknown knowns http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiPe1OiKQuk
“The things that we know, but are unaware of knowing”
Slavoj Žižek http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unknown_known
Things we could have known, but don’t know
Things that others know, but we don’t know (Lukas Koster)
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7. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/22116/22116-h/22116-h.htm
Columbus was looking for:
NOT India known known Continent was NOT new:
a new route to India known unknown As old as Europe
Known to inhabitants unknown known
He found:
Found before by Chinese, Vikings, Turks,….
A ‘new’ continent unknown unknown
Became aware only later
Named after someone else!
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8. Discovery is relative
Context is important
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9. Library Discovery Tools
Product Vendor Open Software + Shared index Software + Local Hosted API
Source local index Shared index
Primo/Primo Central Ex Libris x (Primo) x (Primo Central) x x x x
WorldCat Local OCLC x x x
Summon SerialsSolutions x x x
Aquabrowser SerialsSolutions x x x x
EDS EBSCO x x x
Encore Innovative x x
Endeca Endeca x x ?
VuFind OS x x x
LibHub SemperTool OS/Sub x x x x x
Meresco Seecr OS x x x
eXtensible Catalog OS x x x
http://www.librarytechnology.org/discovery.pl
https://sites.google.com/site/urd2comparison
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10. Library Discovery Tools
Ex Libris Primo: “is a one-stop solution for the discovery and delivery of local and remote
resources, such as books, journal articles, and digital objects.”
OCLC WorldCat Local: “delivers single-search-box access to more than 922 million items
from your library and the world's library collections. It connects people to all your library's
materials—electronic and digital and physical—as well as to the delivery services that get
them what they need.”
EBSCO EDS: “creates a unified, customized index of an institution’s information resources,
and an easy, yet powerful means of accessing all of that content from a single search box.”
SerialsSolutions SUMMON: “enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full
breadth of content found in library collections—from books and videos to e-resources such
as articles.”
VuFind: “search and browse through all of your library's resources by replacing the
traditional OPAC to include: Catalog Records, Locally Cached Journals, Digital Library Items,
Institutional Repository, Institutional Bibliography, Other Library Collections and Resources ”
GoogleScholar: “provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one
place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts
and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories,
universities and other web sites ”
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 10

11. Library Discovery Tools
Ex Libris Primo: “is a one-stop solution for the discovery and delivery of local and remote
resources, such as books, journal articles, and digital objects.”
OCLC WorldCat Local: “delivers single-search-box access to more than 922 million items
from your library and the world's library collections. It connects people to all your library's
materials—electronic and digital and physical—as well as to the delivery services that get
them what they need.”
EBSCO EDS: “creates a unified, customized index of an institution’s information resources,
and an easy, yet powerful means of accessing all of that content from a single search box.”
SerialsSolutions SUMMON: “enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full
breadth of content found in library collections—from books and videos to e-resources such
as articles.”
VuFind: “search and browse through all of your library's resources by replacing the
traditional OPAC to include: Catalog Records, Locally Cached Journals, Digital Library Items,
Institutional Repository, Institutional Bibliography, Other Library Collections and Resources ”
GoogleScholar: “provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one
place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts
and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories,
universities and other web sites ”
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 11

12. Library Discovery Tools
Ex Libris Primo: “is a one-stop solution for the discovery and delivery of local and remote
resources, such as books, journal articles, and digital objects.”
OCLC WorldCat Local: “delivers single-search-box access to more than 922 million items
from your library and the world's library collections. It connects people to all your library's
materials—electronic and digital and physical—as well as to the delivery services that get
them what they need.”
EBSCO EDS: “creates a unified, customized index of an institution’s information resources,
and an easy, yet powerful means of accessing all of that content from a single search box.”
SerialsSolutions SUMMON: “enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full
breadth of content found in library collections—from books and videos to e-resources such
as articles.”
VuFind: “search and browse through all of your library's resources by replacing the
traditional OPAC to include: Catalog Records, Locally Cached Journals, Digital Library Items,
Institutional Repository, Institutional Bibliography, Other Library Collections and Resources ”
GoogleScholar: “provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one
place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts
and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories,
universities and other web sites ”
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 12

13. Library Discovery Tools
Ex Libris Primo: “is a one-stop solution for the discovery and delivery of local and remote
resources, such as books, journal articles, and digital objects.”
OCLC WorldCat Local: “delivers single-search-box access to more than 922 million items
from your library and the world's library collections. It connects people to all your library's
materials—electronic and digital and physical—as well as to the delivery services that get
them what they need.”
EBSCO EDS: “creates a unified, customized index of an institution’s information resources,
and an easy, yet powerful means of accessing all of that content from a single search box.”
SerialsSolutions SUMMON: “enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full
breadth of content found in library collections—from books and videos to e-resources such
as articles.”
VuFind: “search and browse through all of your library's resources by replacing the
traditional OPAC to include: Catalog Records, Locally Cached Journals, Digital Library Items,
Institutional Repository, Institutional Bibliography, Other Library Collections and Resources ”
GoogleScholar: “provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one
place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts
and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories,
universities and other web sites ”
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14. Library Discovery Tools
Ex Libris Primo: “is a one-stop solution for the discovery and delivery of local and remote
resources, such as books, journal articles, and digital objects.”
OCLC WorldCat Local: “delivers single-search-box access to more than 922 million items
from your library and the world's library collections. It connects people to all your library's
materials—electronic and digital and physical—as well as to the delivery services that get
them what they need.”
EBSCO EDS: “creates a unified, customized index of an institution’s information resources,
and an easy, yet powerful means of accessing all of that content from a single search box.”
SerialsSolutions SUMMON: “enables a familiar web-searching experience of the full
breadth of content found in library collections—from books and videos to e-resources such
as articles.”
VuFind: “search and browse through all of your library's resources by replacing the
traditional OPAC to include: Catalog Records, Locally Cached Journals, Digital Library Items,
Institutional Repository, Institutional Bibliography, Other Library Collections and Resources ”
GoogleScholar: “provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one
place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts
and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories,
universities and other web sites ”
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15. Library Discovery Tools
End user functionality Content types Content sources
one-stop books items from your library
discovery journal articles the world's library collections
delivery digital objects all your library's materials
single-search-box videos an institution’s information resources
unified, customized index articles full breadth of content found in library
accessing catalog records collections
web-searching journals your library's resources
search digital library items institutional repository
browse scholarly literature institutional bibliography
theses scholarly literature
abstracts academic publishers
court opinions professional societies
online repositories
universities
web sites
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16. Library Discovery Tools
A one-stop single-search-box web based solution for searching, browsing, discovery and
delivery of print and digital publications and objects available from library collections,
institutional resources and academic publishers, using a unified index
One-stop
Discovery and Delivery
Unified index
Publications
Library and institutional resources
Academic publishers
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17. Library Discovery Tools
Parties involved Commercial
Public ‘Not (so) commercial’
Academic System Open source
Research vendor
Library
Content Creator
provider Publisher
Aggregator
Customer
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18. Content
Library
Catalogues
Institutional Journals
repositories
Databases
Institutional
databases
Same old content Content
provider
Nothing new, nothing unexpected here
Nothing to discover
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19. Content
System
Library
vendor
Catalogues
Institutional Journals
repositories Contract
Databases
Institutional
“Local” index databases
“Shared” index
Content
provider
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20. Content
System
Library
vendor
Journals
Contract
Databases
“Shared” index System
Content vendor
provider
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21. Libraries think they buy access to articles and information
Library
Publisher
Publishers only sell them services

22. Dave Pattern
...can you really see us renewing the subscription for this database? http://www.daveyp.com/blog/archives/1722

23. Content discovery?
Same content types as before: publications
Known knowns
Same content sources as before: catalogues, databases, journals
Less content: technical, political, commercial obstacles
Unknown knowns
Known unknowns
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24. Discovery?
No new, unexpected, accidental findings
No discovery
Except that libraries discover:
There are lots of errors in their own data
Their workflows are not fit for unified indexing
Publishers don’t care about libraries, science, knowledge
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25. New silos
Primo Central
Summon Index
Super silos
Local silos
Primo 1 Primo 2 Summon 1 Summon 2
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26. End user functionality
One unified front end
Setting context
Before the search After the search
Subject/discipline search Refine search results
Scoped search Drill down
Facets
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27. Known item search
Book, article
Known known I know the book is in the library
Known unknown I know the article, but not where it’s available
Unknown known?
No discovery desired!
Search on Title , Title + Author
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30. Subject/discipline search
Discovery: find new stuff within subject area
Requires uniform classification by subject of each item
In Local and Shared index
Problematic
Not widely available
Highly desired by subject librarians!
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31. Scoping searches to disciplines mapped to the individual item level
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34. The reality is:
One to one topics from data source “as is”
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35. Scoped search
Limit search context in advance
Catalogues
Institutional Journals
“Local” index repositories
Databases “Shared” index
Institutional
databases
Locations
Collections Local or Shared index
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39. Broad search
Default: search ‘everything’
No limit of search context in advance
No tabs, no locations, no collections prefilter
Limit results afterwards
Drill down
Facets
Largest chance of finding something unexpected
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42. Related information
Find related results while browsing results list
By same author Unknown unknowns
From same period Unknown knowns
About similar subjects
Books and articles are a huge obstacle to find
related information.
You actually have to read them to find
pointers to other useful information sources.
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43. Related information
Recommender systems
Based on analysing usage statistics
Loans
Downloads
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46. One unified front end
All individual library search front ends replaced
by one institutional front end
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47. One unified front end
Focus on
The Library as the place to find all you need
Local Collections, subscriptions
Introverted perspective
lat ion
= iso
ion
eg rat
Int
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48. One unified front end
Customers don’t care where they find stuff
Institutional affiliation is only needed for delivery….
The Model
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49. Slide from Tony Hirst's "A105 - Visionary Views" session at ILI2010
Dave Pattern http://www.daveyp.com/blog/archives/1722

50. BruceMay 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 50
Heterick http://www.casalini.it/retreat/2012_docs/heterick.pdf

51. What’s new?
Response time: fast
Unlimited search scope (within limited set)
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52. What’s old?
No unified multilingual subject search
No unified unambiguous author search
Limited set
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53. ?
Time for the Big Question
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54. Bibliotekssystem som begrepp - är det
yesterday’s news?
• Är det t.o.m så att det ” The Big Question here is: do we
need discovery systems based on
börjar bli dags (på riktigt)
centuries old physical library and
att luckra upp innehållet i publishing practices?
våra isolerade
bibliotekssystem (på riktigt) Or do libraries need to really go and
och låta vår data interagera look elsewhere and make use of new
med omvärldens data (på online information sources and
riktigt)? linked open data technology?
[Lukas Koster]
Kristin Olofsson, March 27 2012 http://www.kb.se/dokument/Libris/inspirationsnm%C3%B6ten/Front%20till%20librisinsp.pdf

55. May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 55

56. Rearguard action?
Rückzugsgefecht achterhoedegevecht
combat d’arrière-garde
reträttstrid
azione di retroguardia
accion de retaguardia
baktroppen handling
týlovou akci
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57. Rearguard action:
The Free Dictionary:
rearguard [‘rɪə,gɑːd]
n
1. (Military) a detachment detailed to protect the rear of a military formation, esp in retreat
2. an entrenched or conservative element, as in a political party
rearguard action
a. an action fought by a rearguard
b. a defensive action undertaken to try to stop something happening or continuing
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/rearguard
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58. Rearguard actions
Content providers
Libraries
System vendors
Customers
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59. Rearguard actions
Content providers, publishers, aggregators
Protect commercial position
Business model based on 19th century conditions
Peer review
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60. Rearguard actions
Libraries
Promote local physical collection
Protect organisational position
Focused on publications
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61. Rearguard actions
Library system vendors
Protect commercial position
Dependent on content providers and libraries
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62. Rearguard actions
Customers
Conditioned by existing situation
Publications: go to the library
Anything else: go to Google, YouTube, FaceBook
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63. Rearguard actions
Open acces Linked open data
Nanopublications Social media
Web
Customer
Collaboratories
Datasets
Libraries Publishers
Vendors Information
New Bibliographic Framework
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 63

64. Forward!
The Web…the Final Frontier…
To explore strange new worlds…
To boldly go where no one has gone before
Unknown unknowns
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65. May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 65

66. Examples!
New Bibliographic Framework
Webscale Next Generation ILS
Research information
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 66

67. New Bibliographic Framework
http://www.loc.gov/marc/transition/news/framework-103111.html
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68. New Bibliographic Framework
No local data sources for bibliographic data
Summon 2
Primo 1 Summon 1
Primo 2
Discovery tools need to work with shared linked data sources
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69. Webscale Next Generation ILS
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70. Webscale Next Generation ILS
Same old business model
Same old content
Same old silo structure
New technical infrastructure
Shared cataloguing (new??)
Integration of print and electronic
Back office workflows
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71. Same old silos
Alma
Intota
Super silos
Local silos
Primo 1 Primo 2 Summon 1 Summon 2
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72. Webscale Next Generation ILS
Should be focusing on new Bibliographic Framework
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73. Research information
Person
Publication
Person
Research project
Review
Organisation
Publication
Dataset
Discovery tool, OPAC Research information system
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74. Research information
http://twitter.com/jamestoon/statuses/195423498649346048
James Toon @jamestoon
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75. Informal assessment of
the need for a discovery
tool, January 2012
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76. Assessment Outcomes
Two different use cases:
Research staff: one unified interface
General public: promote KNAW collections
Research staff :
Needed: Subject area prefilter
OR:
Just use Web of Science/Google Scholar, etc.
No real return on investment
No need for organisation-wide discovery tool right now
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 76

77. Solutions
http://www.slideshare.net/wilbanks/wilbanks-nfais
John Wilbanks @wilbanks
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78. Solutions
Front end tools:
Semantic/linked data search
Search ‘trusted’ global data sources
Resolve stored URIs on the fly
Process metadata schemas
Infrastructure:
Publish Linked Open Data
Add links
Use persistent URIs
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79. Google Knowledge Graph
http://googleblog.blogspot.in/2012/05/introducing-knowledge-graph-things-not.html
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80. All library data
No silos All scholarly publications
? ?
Primo 1 Primo 2 Summon 1 Summon 2
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81. Open up!
May 18, 2012 Discovery tools: a rearguard action? ELAG2012 81

82. Publishers
Open access, share data
Libraries
Shift focus to information, curation
System developers/vendors
Provide general linked Information systems
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83. Real discovery is not a frontend issue,
it’s an infrastructure issue
http://www.flickr.com/photos/distillated/4019168148/
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