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Re-Using Today's Metadatafor Tomorrow's Research:Five Practical Examples forEnhancing Access to DigitalCollectionsElías Tzoc aa Miami University Library , Oxford, OH, 45056Published online: 18 Mar 2011.

To cite this article: Elías Tzoc (2011) Re-Using Today's Metadata forTomorrow's Research: Five Practical Examples for Enhancing Access to DigitalCollections, Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship, 23:1, 43-55, DOI:10.1080/1941126X.2011.551094

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1941126X.2011.551094

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Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship, 23: 43–55, 2011Copyright C© 2011 Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 1941-126X print / 1941-1278 onlineDOI: 10.1080/1941126X.2011.551094

RE-USING TODAY’S METADATA FOR TOMORROW’SRESEARCH: FIVE PRACTICAL EXAMPLES FORENHANCING ACCESS TO DIGITAL COLLECTIONS

Elı́as Tzoc

According to the Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections,a good collection is broadly available and avoids unnecessary impedi-ments to use. Two challenges, however, are the constant change in users’expectations and the increasing volume of information in local reposito-ries. Therefore, as academic and research institutions continue to workon providing online access to primary source materials, they need to inte-grate effective interaction methods among digital objects, metadata, anduser interface. This article provides an overview of the implementationof five features for customizing digital collections Web sites: AutoSuggest,TagCloud, A-Z List, Share-It, and CalView.

Keywords: Re-indexing metadata, parsing XML files, digital collections, Webcus-tomization

In early 2008, the Miami University Libraries began creating a digitalarchive as part of a long-term program to make Miami’s historical docu-ments freely available online for the benefit of students, faculty, alumni,researchers, and the interested public. This digital archive project moti-vated the digital initiatives team to perform an exploratory evaluation ofpopular and effective Web features that can help users search, browse, anddiscover the content of multiple collections using a single interface.

Digital collections consist of digital objects, metadata, and a user in-terface. The integration and effective interaction among those three layerscan produce a Web site that can respond to users’ requests with contentand features that help them satisfy their goals (Mulder & Yaar, 2006).During the process of customizing the interface for our digital collections’Web site, we learned that the ability to re-index metadata is a key stepfor enhancing the discoverability of digital collections. Once a description

Elı́as Tzoc, Miami University Library, Oxford, OH 45056. E-mail: tzoce@muohio.edu

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(metadata) is available, the next step is to reuse this data in a way thathelps users find or discover content. The new features were initially im-plemented in the Miami Digital Archive Web site, where they consistentlyranked among the most popular pages. As a result, the features are nowpart of the default Web customization in more than 12 collections. Thisarticle provides an overview of the evaluation and implementation of fivefeatures: AutoSuggest, TagCloud, A-Z List, Share-It, and CalView.

We hope this work can contribute to the library community’s ongoingeffort to provide easy access to unique and special collections. The exam-ples also include a link to online Web forms wherein users can upload,test, and create their own Web customization. After all, the ultimate goalof Web customization for digital collections is to determine the importanceand relevance of content so that today’s metadata can work for tomorrow’sresearch.

LITERATURE REVIEW

With the constant changes and improvements on popular sites such asGoogle, Amazon, Flickr, YouTube, and Wikipedia, Web developers mustconstantly revise, evaluate, and test new features that can enhance theoverall user experience. Librarians and information professionals workingon digital collections also need to evaluate and implement new optionsfor increasing the discoverability of their collections. According to theFramework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections, “A goodcollection is broadly available and avoids unnecessary impediments touse” (National Information Standards Organization, 2007). This statementalso implies that digital librarians or Web developers need to continuallyevaluate and implement new customization or discoverability methods ontheir Web sites.

The study of Web customization began more than a decade ago whena group of computer engineers prototyped Cyberbrowser for customizinginformation on the Web (Berghel et al., 1999). They also described the“dynamic creation of HTML pages from databases as an alternative modelfor information customization.” This approach is similar to what Seeman(2004) described as the ability to “encapsulate knowledge without furtherburden to the author.” As protocols and tools for interoperability improve,more librarians need to explore dynamic methods for creating new layersof discoverability during the process of loading pages.

In the process of evaluation of Web customization for digital collections,it is imperative to consider how the new features can support effective Webnavigation as it plays a major role in shaping our experiences on the Web(Kalbach, 2007). For the early evaluation process, we found it useful to

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Re-using Metadata for Enhancing Access to Digital Collections 45

discuss the feasibility of the 14 mechanisms of navigation presented in thebook Designing Web Navigation. Of course, not every mechanism workswell for digital collections, in part because of unique digital objects suchas maps or manuscripts.

Having access to the current literature is a key step in learning aboutthe new trends. The next step is to gain the skills to build those Webcustomizations based on existing metadata. Two challenges, however, arethe constant change in users’ expectations and the increasing volume ofinformation in local repositories. Perhaps this is why some people havealready suggested that librarians should acquire more programming skills.For instance, Stuart (2010) argued that “to keep pace with informationchanges and the needs of users, librarians need some programming skills.”

EVALUATION

As mentioned earlier, our evaluation process started with a reading ofseveral mechanisms of navigation presented by Kalbach. Then we pre-selected five mechanisms: paging navigation, breadcrumb trails, tag clouds,A–Z indexes, and drop-down menus. We knew that given the variety andamount of data we had, these specific options would definitely help usersbrowse the growing content in the digital archive. We also thought it wouldbe helpful to have a search box on the front page that used autosuggestfunctionality similar to Google’s search box.

After the initial brainstorm session, we decided to create a set of pro-totype pages with the new features, which allowed us to re-think both thebenefits of the project and the amount of work involved in implementingthese changes. The prototyping exercise allowed us to look at the metadatafiles and decide which fields could be used for generating the content ofthe new browse-and-search features. In late 2008, we finished with the firstevaluation activity, and we selected three features: TagClouds, A-Z List,and AutoSuggest. Almost a year later, after some positive feedback fromcolleagues at conference and poster presentations, we decided to add twonew features: Share-It and CalView. The five features are the results ofinternal test and regular evaluation of external Web sites.

The workflow for creating and implementing these features involvedthree major activities:

• Working with the metadata team to either add new metadata orreorganize existing metadata

• Exporting required metadata fields from either CONTENTdm orDSpace

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• Writing programming code, using a scripting or transforming lan-guage (e.g., PHP), to generate new HTML files

For implementing or enhancing any of the five features described in thisarticle, a basic knowledge of PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript is helpful.

IMPLEMENTATION

For the implementation process, it was necessary to do some deep readingof tutorials and documentation files on topics such as CONTENTdm Webcustomization, Manakin for DSpace (Philips et al., 2007), and PHP forcreating dynamic Web pages. Additionally, it was very important that wehad access to a local and external network of colleagues also interestedin the technical area of librarianship as they provided feedback during theimplementation process. The overall implementation was a great learningexperience and, because there is always room for improvement, we decidedto share the PHP code so that others can use and enhance it (Figure 1).

Exporting Metadata Fields

The first step is to export a custom XML metadata or a tab-delimited fileusing the CONTENTdm admin Web interface or a DSpace-OAI process.This is where you decide which fields contain relevant information aboutindividual records. Metadata fields such as title, description, or subjectusually provide meaningful and contextual information about a collection;therefore, these fields are top candidates for creating new search and browseoptions. A custom metadata file exported from CONTENTdm will looklike that seen in Figure 2.

Once the file (e.g., export.txt) is saved on your computer, you can usethe online form available at http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/1 togenerate and test your own examples. You can also download a copy of thePHP script files, customize, and run it locally.

Creating a Search Feature: AutoSuggest

As you type into the search box, you will get suggestions based on actualrecords. This element is similar to the “Did you mean?” feature that offersalternative spellings for search queries, except that it works in real time(Figure 3).

• Open your browser and go to the AutoSuggest online form:http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/2

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Re-using Metadata for Enhancing Access to Digital Collections 47

Figure 1. Summary of the five features described in this article.

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Figure 2. Example of a CONTENTdm XML metadata. (Color onlineonly.)

• Upload the exported XML file (export.txt).• Click on the Submit button, and you should see an AutoSug-

gest html page; when you start typing, you should start gettingsuggestions.

• Save the page as a new Web page file that should download fourfiles: autosuggest.html, autosuggest.css, as.js, and as content.js.

• Edit the html to add sections such as a header or footer. Mostimportant: To edit the html code for the search box, you willneed to specify the page and settings for displaying results inyour local system. For CONTENTdm users, you may need onlyto change the domain name (e.g., http://digitalcollection/cdm4/results.php).

• Edit the CSS file to match your current digital collection’s colorsand font settings.

Figure 3. Example of the AutoSuggest search box.

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Re-using Metadata for Enhancing Access to Digital Collections 49

Creating Three Browse Features

Browsing is useful when actual search terms are unknown; it is also an ex-cellent way to sample the content of a system or learn new and unexpectedthings. The three browse features are TagCloud, A-Z List, and CalView.

TagCloud

A tagcloud provides a quick visual representation of the more important(popular) items in a given collection. Tagclouds are particularly good fordynamic and large collections (Figure 4).

• Open your browser and go to the TagCloud online form: http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/3

• Upload the exported XML file (export.txt).• Paste the URL or text string required to display results in your

local system. For CONTENTdm users, you can use the sametext provided in the form; just change the name-server and thecollection alias.

• Specify how many tags you want to display on the new page.Current options are 10, 25, 50, 75, or 100.

• Click on the Submit button and you should be able to see a newTagCloud html page. At the top of the page, you will see a messagestating the number of tags being displayed and the total numberof tags for this collection based on the exported metadata file.

• Save the page as a new Web page file that should download twofiles: tagcloud.html and tagcloud.css.

• Edit the html to add sections such as a header or footer.• Edit the CSS file to match your current digital collection’s colors

and font settings.

Figure 4. Example of a TagCloud.

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Figure 5. Example of an A-Z List.

A-Z List

An A-Z list is an alphabetical index to topics and keywords found through-out a Web site. Because of its popularity, most users are familiar with thisnavigation tool (Figure 5).

• Open your browser and go to the A-Z List online form: http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/4

• Upload the exported XML file (export.txt).• Paste the URL or text string required to display results in your

local system. For CONTENTdm users, you could use the sametext provided in the form; just change the name-server and thecollection alias.

• Click on the Submit button and you should be able to see a newBrowse by Subject html page; for collections with larger lists, thealphabetical navigation bar at the top of the page should help togo to specific sections of the page.

• Save the page as a new Web page file that should download twofiles: list-a-z .html and list-a-z.css.

• Edit the html to add sections such as a header or footer.• Edit the CSS file to match your current digital collection’s colors

and font settings.

CalView

A 12-month calendar view provides browsing by date. For larger collec-tions, users have the ability to pre-select by decade and year. It takes a datein the ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD; Figure 6).

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Re-using Metadata for Enhancing Access to Digital Collections 51

Figure 6. Example of a 12-month calendar view. (Color online only.)

For this example, we need a tab-delimited file from DSpace, which willinclude a date field and the handle (shortcut for individual records). Thefile should look like that in Figure 7:

• Open your browser and go to the CalendarView online form:http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/5

• Upload the exported tab-delimited file (export.txt).• Enter the URL for your name-server (e.g., http://digital.lib.

muohio.edu/).• Click on the Submit button and you should see a Calendar View

html page; the two drop-down menus will let users select bydecade and year.

Figure 7. Example of a DSpace tab-delimited file with two metadatafields: date and handle. (Color online only.)

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Figure 8. Illustration of the Share-It feature. (Color online only.)

• Save the page as a new Web page file that should download twofiles: calendar.html and calendar.css.

• Edit the html to add sections such as a header or footer.• Edit the CSS file to match your current digital collection’s colors

and font settings.

Creating a Share Feature: Share-It

As users access your collection, they will have the option to share yourimages with appropriate credit. One benefit of having content that otherscan share is that your audience can share your information across theirnetworks (Figure 8).

• Open your browser and go to the Share-It page: http://staff.lib.muohio.edu/∼tzocea/links/6

• Identify the file that your system uses to display images.• Open the file and move your cursor to the line where you want to

add the share button.• Copy and paste the JavaScript code—and modify as needed.• Upload an image you want to use as a Share-It button.• Save the edited page and you should see the image that activates

a pop-up window with the code for embedding images and twometadata fields into blogs or external Web sites.

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Re-using Metadata for Enhancing Access to Digital Collections 53

LESSONS LEARNED

Developing a deep understanding of the system that your library uses isfundamental to the process of implementing new discoverability features.Another important component is a combination of available resources andtime for testing and implementing changes to your digital collections’ Website. A close collaboration with your metadata team is also crucial, as ishaving a good understanding of the type of metadata available at the itemlevel. The major lessons learned can be summarized in five areas:

• Options for exporting custom metadata files: CONTENTdm 5.xprovides an option for exporting even the administrative fields,which is a convenient feature for this type of customization.DSpace 1.6 also provides a configurable OAI-PMH Dublin Coreoutput. When none of those built-in options works, it becomesnecessary to have a good understanding of how to access thebackend database. Although this latter option can be a bit morecomplicated, it can also be more customizable.

• Creating external files from scratch: Having the ability to createnew and system-independent Web pages can help create html filesthat are compliant with Web standards and use correct seman-tic markup and CSS layouts. Creating external files can also beimportant for reusing the same technique for different systems.

• Identifiers for linking Web widgets: As the content of digital col-lections continues to grow, there is a greater need for presentingdifferent but closely related pieces of data pulled from differentsources into a single interface. This type of data relationship canbe accomplished only if key identifiers are presented in the meta-data at the item level.

• Web usability and feedback: Adding new customized pages toyour digital collection’s Web site automatically forces you to re-vise the acceptance or usage of those pages. This type of feedbackcan be very useful for the statistics sections of annual reports orgrant applications. For formal usability studies, we are now in theearly planning of an eye tracking study.

• Ongoing need for trying something new: As happy as we are withthe results of the work presented here, we have to accept that forthe ever-changing Web environment, what works today may notwork tomorrow; therefore, the exercise of constantly reviewingnew trends is not only necessary but a good technique that canlead to some interesting discoveries. With the growing popularityof mobile devices, one of the major trends for many of us in thenear future will include mobile applications.

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CONCLUSION

Because most institutions continue to work on digital projects and contentis in different formats, digital librarians and information professionalsneed to design more user-friendly interfaces regardless of which digitalmanagement system they use.

As stated in the evaluation section of this article, the actual creation andimplementation of much of the work required some basic-to-intermediateknowledge of PHP (scripting language) and XML (extensible markup). Agood understanding of these two languages can greatly benefit the workin the area of digital libraries. The increasing number of library projectsusing open-source systems such as WordPress or Drupal should be anencouragement to librarians and information professionals to gain expertisein PHP and jQuery. Additionally, a good understanding of Unix or Linuxcommands can also make a big difference, especially in executing batchprocesses.

Finally, the ultimate goal of this article is to share with a broader com-munity some of the work that the Digital Initiatives Department at MiamiUniversity of Ohio has done in the last few years. The foregoing five fea-tures are just a few examples of many possible Web customizations thatcan be implemented in digital collections’ Web sites. The five search-and-browse features have been evaluated in terms of number of views andaverage time on page. Further usability testing is part of the future plan. Infact, usabilla seems to be a strong software candidate for this project.

REFERENCES

Berghel, H. et al. (1999). Cyberbrowsing: Information customization on the Web.Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50, 505–513.

DSpace Foundation. DSpace: An open-source software released by MIT. RetrievedSeptember 24, 2010, from http://www.dspace.org/

Kalbach, J. Designing Web navigation: Optimizing the user experience. Beijing,China: O’Reilly Media, 2007. Retrieved August 23, 2010, from http://proquest.safaribooksonline.com

Miami University Libraries. Miami digital archive. Retrieved from September 24,2010, http://digital.lib.muohio.edu/portal/

Mulder, S., & Yaar, Z. The user is always right: A practical guide to creating and usingpersonas for the Web. Berkeley, CA: New Riders, 2006. Retrieved August 17, 2010,from http://proquest.safaribooksonline.com

National Information Standards Organization. A framework of guidance for buildinggood digital collections. Retrieved June 26, 2010, from http://www.niso.org/publications/rp/framework3.pdf

Online Computer Library Center, Inc. CONTENTdm: Digital collection manage-ment software. Retrieved September 24, 2010, from http://contentdm.org/

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Phillips, S., Green, C., Maslov, A., Mikeal, A., & Leggett, J. (2007). Manakin: Anew face for DSpace. D-Lib Magazine, p. 13. Retrieved August 3, 2010, fromhttp://www.dlib.org/dlib/november07/phillips/11phillips.html

Seeman, L. (2004). The semantic Web, Web accessibility, and device independence.ACM International Conference Proceeding Series 63, 67–63. Retrieved August 17,2010, from http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=990669

Stuart, D. (2010). Programming skills could transform librarians’ roles. ResearchInformation, Retrieved July 26, 2010, from http://www.researchinformation.info/features/feature.php?feature id=245

Usabilla B. V. Usabilla: A usability testing application. Retrieved September 24,2010, from http://usabilla.com/

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