Electronic Magazines: Issues in Implementation Brian Kelly UK Web Focus UKOLN University of Bath UKOLN is funded by the Library and Information Commission, the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) of the Higher Education Funding Councils, as well as by project funding from the JISC and the European Union. UKOLN also receives support from the University of Bath where it is based. Acknowledgements to Bernadette Daly, Editor of Exploit Interactive (1998-9) Aims: Describe approaches to publishing a web magazine aimed at European library / information community Share experiences Describe other approaches Provide advice to those wishing to publish web magazines Aims: Describe approaches to publishing a web magazine aimed at European library / information community Share experiences Describe other approaches Provide advice to those wishing to publish web magazines

2 Contents Background The User's View Searching The Editor's View Other Interesting Approaches Conclusions

3 About UKOLN UKOLN: UK Office for Library and Information Networking Based at University of Bath Awareness and Advisory Services UK Web Focus Interoperability Focus Public Library Networking Focus Awareness and Advisory Services UK Web Focus Interoperability Focus Public Library Networking Focus Research Interests Metadata Distributed libraries UK and EU project work Research Interests Metadata Distributed libraries UK and EU project work Dissemination Events (workshops, seminars, etc.) Publications Web Magazines Dissemination Events (workshops, seminars, etc.) Publications Web Magazines

4 Experiences UKOLN publishes two web magazines, with a third due to be launched shortly Exploit Interactive First published in May 1999 Four issues to date Funded by EU Telematics For Libraries Programme Exploit Interactive First published in May 1999 Four issues to date Funded by EU Telematics For Libraries Programme Ariadne First published in January issues to date Originally funded by eLib Long-standing first generation web magazine Ariadne First published in January issues to date Originally funded by eLib Long-standing first generation web magazine Cultivate Interactive To be released in a few months Funded by EU DIGICULT Programme (covers museums, archives and library areas) Cultivate Interactive To be released in a few months Funded by EU DIGICULT Programme (covers museums, archives and library areas)

5 Ariadne Ariadne: 22 issues published Jan Dec 1999 Published every 3 (originally 2) months HTML pages created using HTML authoring tool (HoTMetaL, FrontPage, etc.) Apache web server on Unix

6 Exploit Interactive Exploit Interactive: 4 issues published (every three months) Informs communities on Telematics for Library projects Aims to provide quality content, be innovative and be standards compliant NB: Little funding for software development!

7 Exploit Int. Architecture Exploit Interactive: Runs on a Windows NT server Microsoft SiteServer software used Why? Gain experiences of NT-based information system in order to help in advisory role Make use of shrink-wrapped solutions to minimise software development Investigate whether standards-based solutions can be implemented in a Microsoft environment Resources Funding for 0.5 FTE over 2 years Editor, project manager plus bought-in systems support effort

8 The User View (1) Exploit Interactive: Sub-menu pages for Features, Regular Columns, etc. Context-sensitive navigational bars Links from all pages to: –Main entry point –Issue entry point –Editorial –Features menu –Regular Columns menu –News and Events page –Et Cetera menu –Search facility D

9 The User View (2) Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) used to: Define margin settings Define fonts Background for headings Benefits of Cascading Style Sheets: Ease of maintenance (appearance defined in single file) Re-use of resources Performance Accessibility D

10 Behind The Scenes Behind the Scenes: Article fragments used and assembled into HTML resource using ASP (Active Server Pages) ASP server script used for server-side includes (SSIs) and for manipulating variables article_title="The CULIVATE project" issue_num="1" Exploit issue : … Citation Details, Exploit Interactive Assignment of variables Use of variables

11 The File Store The file store structure for a typical article is shown below default.aspassembles fragments and processes variables content.ssicontent – simple HTML fragment citation details (based on author and title variables) article_defaults.ssi author, title, etc. variables figure-1.gif cultivateissue4 citation.ssi resources Some files stored next to article Others stored in central area (parameter passing) Some files stored next to article Others stored in central area (parameter passing)

12 The Bigger Picture In order to minimise maintenance, we want to store scripts, CSS files, etc. once and include them as appropriate Read article variables Read issue variables Read global variables Define HTML DTD Exploit Interactive issue : Create DC metadata Navigational bar Include content Include citation … Read article variables Read issue variables Read global variables Define HTML DTD Exploit Interactive issue : Create DC metadata Navigational bar Include content Include citation … default.asp

13 Problems - Style Sheets Cascading Style Sheets (CSS): Separates content from presentation Reduces maintenance Simplifies HTML (no complex tables, clear.gif hacks, etc.) Accessible resources But Netscape (esp.) implements CSS very badly: Images can float over text Too much white space around tables Problems in printing Other minor differences

14 Solution to CSS Problems In order to address CSS problems: "User-agent" negotiation used to include simpler CSS file to Netscape users Uses a single SSI fragment Tables stored in single table cell – a hack  Should images be included with conditional SSI? Also use to allow different style sheet for printing

15 Searching Exploit Interactive enables UKOLN to demonstrate its research interest in metadata: Capabilities of SiteServer search facility investigated Fielded searches provided. Can search by Author, Title, Abstract and full text Uses Dublin Core (DC) metadata DC metadata (HTML format) created using ASP fragment Can easily create metadata in other formats (e.g. RDF)

16 Errors The 404 error message has been tailored: Exploit Interactive look and feel Embedded search facility Tailored message: The link to this resource is incorrect – please inform web master or You have entered an incorrect URL

17 Extending the Web Site The web site is being extended to provide more than simply access to information Experiment to search a project's web site, from an article about the project Evaluation of discussion software to enable readers to comment on articles

18 The Editor's View Development work which may not be noticeable by readers includes: Promotion of the web site Making sure that people know about the magazine and can easily find it Checking the web site Ensuring that the web site works, is accessible and conforms to appropriate standards Auditing the web site Monitoring the popularity of the web site and being pro-active in maximising popularity

19 Web Site Promotion Promotion of web site addressed by: Having own domain name: Note shorter variants (e.g. exploit.org, exploit.com, etc.) are not available. Having short, easily-cited URLs: Note use of server default file name to avoid longer and possibly confusing file name and extension:

20 Finding The Web Site Aim: We want web site and articles to be indexed by search engines and catalogued by directories Approaches: Articles contain "AltaVista" metadata (generated as described for DC metadata) Internal links to directory, avoiding links to.asp extensions Use of robots.txt file and tag to avoid indexing of unnecessary resources (e.g. statistics, etc.)

21 Submission to Search Engines Exploit Interactive resources submitted to search engines – see 1.New issue URL submitted to AltaVista 2.Evaluation of Submission software 3.Creation of single page containing links to all articles

22 Does It Work? Exploit Interactive articles: First (out of 421,122) for "exploit" in AllTheWeb Fourth for "news exploit"in Google Fourth for "(electronic and paper) near delivery" in AltaVista Exploit Interactive articles: First (out of 421,122) for "exploit" in AllTheWeb Fourth for "news exploit"in Google Fourth for "(electronic and paper) near delivery" in AltaVista Note: Searches found from referrer logs

23 Notification of a New Issue Notification of new issues is sent to several mailing lists. But what about readers who aren't on the mailing lists? We now provide a notification service of new issues using Netmind

24 Checking The Web Site Prior to release of new issue we use: SiteServer Analysis to check broken links Bobby software to check accessibility of web site Summary On 10 January 1999: 906 pages 5,180 internal links 1,818 external links 0 broken links Web site passes Bobby accessibility test Summary On 10 January 1999: 906 pages 5,180 internal links 1,818 external links 0 broken links Web site passes Bobby accessibility test

25 Broken Links – Whose Problem? Internal links are responsibility of editors But what should be done with broken links in articles? Fixed: the web master is responsible for providing a quality web site Nothing: articles should be left as is Flagged (and perhaps fixed): giving reader an indication of original status Our approach: Authors provide links as references with visible URLs External links indicated by icon Icon and link change if link is broken Display external links in new window (personalised option?) Our approach: Authors provide links as references with visible URLs External links indicated by icon Icon and link change if link is broken Display external links in new window (personalised option?)

26 Checking The Web Site (2) In issue 4 we provided a service for the readers to check for and enhance access to articles: Translation Service HTML Validation Accessibility Check … The link to further information is stored as a single SSI file, allowing changes to be made just once

27 Auditing The Web Site We use SiteServer Analysis to provide statistics In issue 4 evaluated third-party services which provide (e.g): Last 10 visitors to page Profile over time Referrer for last 25 visitors Third-party Service Issues: Performance Dependency on 3 rd party Open vs. restricted access to statistics NOTE: Comparison of Nedstat and SiteMeter can be easily made due to use of SSI fragments

28 Who's Linking To Us The LinkPopularity.com web site is used to: Provide information on numbers of links to web site Monitor growth in nos. of links Identify friends Spot gaps Information on links to web site and nos. of resources indexed is useful and is being monitored regularly

29 The eLib Programme eLib programme funded several e-journals – see Much can be learnt from the experiences of the eLib projects

30 Other e-journals: EPRESS eLib-funded project which provides an administrative system (rather than a publishing one) for refereed academic journals Addresses (time-consuming) administrative issues Used by Sociological Research Online and Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation See

31 Other e-journals: D-Lib D-Lib magazine: Currently mirrored at 4 locations including UKOLN Is making use of DOIs (Document Object Identifiers) Each article has DOI which provides persistent, location-independent identifier "Handle" system can return multiple values e.g /december99-gladney can return five URLs Interesting idea for the future (resolution by proxy or browser plugin) Use of multiple values could be used for related resources (e.g. metadata, translation, etc.) Exploit Interactive is considering a similar approach

32 Other e-journals Library and Information Studies departments are active in producing e-magazines and exploring various issues For example see Information Research, published by the Department of Information Studies, Sheffield Univ. I-M/is/publications/infres/ircont.html

33 Exploit Interactive's Key Features Exploit Interactive uses (normalised) resource fragments for: Server-side scripts Navigational elements Standard text fragments CSS Separation of Content / Navigation / Functionality is useful for: Ease of maintenance Introduction of new functionality (e.g. print all articles, personalisation)

34 Challenges Use of resource fragments: Requires advance planning Some complications in use of authoring tools Some complications in validating resource fragments (no compilers to spot, say, unassigned variables) Useful to have a programmer's or DBA perspective (identification of reusable fragments) In addition use of ASP variables / file-based fragments means: NT-dependencies (until Open ASP matures) Difficulties in managing variables which are defined in scripts

35 Future Developments Make use of article and navigation fragments to provide a configurable interface Navigational bar: Located: Top and bottom Side (in frame or embedded) Configurable: Sections of interest cf MS Office 2000 Navigational bar: Located: Top and bottom Side (in frame or embedded) Configurable: Sections of interest cf MS Office 2000 References & Related Links As above References & Related Links As above

36 Future Developments Ideas for the future: Variables stored in database (NB: performance issues) Use of XML For Metadata and Articles (e.g. news items) Would also like to provide enhanced searching (structured browsing): Search issue 1 & issue 3 Search Regular Columns Search Regular Columns in issue 1 Search for articles about EU projects Counts nos. of articles in these categories

37 Future Developments Processing articles is time-consuming. Would like to automate processes: c:/docs/article.doc Enter document Browse Document Type MS WordHTML Abstract Keywords TAP, digitisation, … Replace submission by web form Automate conversion to HTML Author submission of keywords metadata Automated upload to draft area for editor review Programme: ELIBEU (5 th Framework) EU (4 th Framework)

38 Conclusions To conclude: Exploit Interactive has shown the benefits of an architecture based on: –Resource fragments –Style Sheets –Server-side scripting –Resources in neutral format to enable reuse It is possible to provide an innovative, standards- based solution on an NT platform Similar solutions also possible on Unix (e.g. PHP) We look forward to further developments based on use of database technologies / XML Questions welcome