GESIS Dr. Maximilian Stempfhuber Head of Research and Development Social Science Information Centre, Bonn, Germany How to deal with heterogeneity when building the CRIS of tomorrow? Keep the Best – Forget the Rest?

2 GESIS GESIS: Short Introduction  German Social Science Infrastructure Services  Centre for Survey Research and Methodology (ZUMA), Mannheim  Central Archive for Empirical Social Research, University of Cologne (ZA)  Social Science Information Centre, Bonn (IZ)

3 GESIS GESIS: Mission Statement GESIS provides services in support of social science research including the development and supply of databases with information on social science literature and research activities as well as the archiving and provision of survey data from social research

4 GESIS IZ: Short Introduction The Social Science Information Centre (IZ)  Builds databases on literature, research projects and institutes  Distributes information via portals, hosts, CD-ROM, printed publications and personalized search services  Does research in information technology, information retrieval and UI design

5 GESIS Agenda  Heterogeneity – The Users  Heterogeneity – The Domains  Heterogeneity – The Data  Heterogeneity – The Data Providers  Standards – A Solution?  We Need a Model!  Examples for Current Activities  Conclusion

6 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Users (1) Who will use a CRIS?  Researchers  Teachers and scholars  Decision makers (local, national, EU, …)  Funding agencies  Companies  Journalists  …

7 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Users (2) Are all users the same? Domain skills General skills Researcher? Company? Scholar?

8 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Users (3) Users evolve:  From novices to domain experts  From casual users to power users  … Users switch:  Between simple questions and complex problems  Between different search strategies  … And users communicate

9 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Users (4) What do we have to provide?  Adequate support for all user groups  “Data in context” becomes information  Dynamic, adaptive and adaptable systems  All the functions – but only when needed  Intelligent and integrated systems  …

10 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Domains Are all domains the same?  Traditions (scientific process)  Use of information technology  Sharing of knowledge and data (raw data, scientific discourse, pre-print serves, electronic vs. printed publications)  Scientific output (quantity)  Perception by the public  “Valuable” (who will request / pay for their output)  …

11 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Data (1) Users need different data  Reference databases  Full text documents / online ordering  Project information  Raw data (surveys, timeseries data, specimen,...)  People, teams, institutes, networks ...

12 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Data (2) Even the same data can be different:  Languages  (Meta-)Data structures  Content analysis and indexing  Storage systems  Retrieval models  User interfaces  Free vs. liable for costs / public vs. scientific use ...

13 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Data Providers (1) Who are they?  Authors  Research institutes  Information centres and libraries  Funding agencies  Decision makers (local, national, EU, …) ...

14 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Data Providers (2) Do they all have the same goals?  Recognition by the community  Administration of current research  Reports to boards / proof of excellence  Services to the community  Strategic planning ...

15 GESIS Heterogeneity – The Data Providers (3) How do they differ?  Willing to document research and results  Providing metadata and/or “real” data  Providing direct access  Providing different media and formats  Commercial vs. non-commercial  Willing to cooperate ...

16 GESIS Standards – A Solution? (1) Are standards really feasible?  A single schema for every data type?  A single indexing language for all domains?  A single architecture for information systems?  A single communication protocol?  A single authentication authority?  A single …?

17 GESIS Standards – A Solution? (2) Where are the problems?  Long time for defining standards  Investments in other (own) standards  Every day a new “standard”  It’s not “my” standard!  Where is my competitive edge?  Are Dublin Core and OAI really useful?  Do I have the resources to support the standard?  Do I have to change my IT?  Will I lose some information forever?

18 GESIS Standards – A Solution? (3) Where do standards help?  Communication  Date exchange  Creating new resources  Connecting resources (local to global)  Common user experience  Universal access

19 GESIS Standards – A Solution? (4) But still they are just single standards! How do we choose the best standard? Will everyone switch to the standard?

20 GESIS We Need A Model! (1) No! We need a model to connect them! © IBM

21 GESIS We Need A Model! (2) Models...  For the user experience  To cope with structural heterogeneity  To cope with semantic heterogeneity  To identify and connect objects  For connecting distributed systems  For making cooperation possible... based on common standards!

22 GESIS Examples for Current Activities Current activities dealing with heterogeneity:  MORESS  infoconnex (  Vascoda (

23 GESIS Cooperation in MORESS (1) Mapping of Research in European Social Sciences and Humanities  25 countries participating  Project leader: European University Association (EUA)  April 2003 – May 2005  Cataloguing country-specific information sources (e. g. databases)  Thematic (relevant to FP6) mapping of research teams and experts

24 GESIS Cooperation in MORESS (2) Organizational infrastructure:  Central catalogue of information sources, fed by project partners  Common metadata model  Common classification  Open software platform (DBClear), also for building new information sources  Live linking to information sources

25 GESIS Cooperation in MORESS (3) Results:  Catalogue accessible by the public  New information collections  Meta-Search over selected sources  Map of European research on a selected FP6 topic  Platform for future activities towards the ERA

26 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (1) Information Network “Education – Social Sciences – Psychology”  Multidisciplinary information portal  Reference databases (phase 1)  Linking to full text (e.g. journal articles)  Pay-per-View / One-Stop-Shop for commercial content  Domain-specific and cross-domain search

27 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (2)  Treating heterogeneity of database structures and indexing  Novel user interfaces, e. g. for cross- database searches  Additional content: library catalogues, clearinghouses, research projects, institutes, scholarly materials, … (phase 2)  Linking of database objects (phase 2)

28 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (3) Education Social Sciences Psychology User‘s query User interface layer Query processing Heterogeneity Query mapping standard specific Result presentation

29 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (4) Education Social Sciences Psychology SWD Mapping of vocabularies

30 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (5) Cross-database search

31 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (6) Results from multiple databases

32 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in infoconnex (7) Database-specific result presentation

33 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in Vascoda (1)  German portal for scientific information  Combining „Information Networks“ and „Virtual Libraries“ initiatives  Reference databases with full text linking and online ordering + clearinghouses  No authentication or billing  Integrated search, but domain-specific results  Cluster and cross-domain searches

34 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in Vascoda (2)  Integration of research projects, data and other materials planned  No treatment of heterogeneity right now!  How can quality of results be guaranteed with multidisciplinary databases (e.g. library catalogues)?

35 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in Vascoda (3)

36 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in Vascoda (4)

37 GESIS Multidisciplinarity in Vascoda (5)

38 GESIS Current Research: Heterogeneity / IR  Stepwise query refinement with cross-concordances  Statistical transfers of query terms  Dynamic user interfaces for cross- database searches  Merging and ranking of results

39 GESIS Current Research: Novel UIs

40 GESIS Conclusion To build a model for the CRIS of tomorrow should be the primary task of

41 GESIS The End Thank you for your attention! Maximilian Stempfhuber