OPAC & F EDERATED S EARCH September 2007 Meeting Purpose: reach a final decision regarding the Aquabrowser product and/or define next steps for this topic

W HY C HANGE ( FROM LAST MEETING ) Existing deficiencies of significant impact Unable to search multiple database resources Unable to easily search and use the existing database resources and the catalog Lack of basic customer friendly functionality no spell check no relevancy ranking confusing and ineffective search mechanism (avoid the huh factor) ????????????

E FFORT S COPE – GENERAL COMMENTS RSS feeds will be available for the catalog A search feature for the databases will available on MyLibrary PACS At branch locations will display coolview Decisions will be finalized for A-Z and Marc records Google can be used to search the District catalog Spell check will be functional (may need more detailed definition) Faceted searching will be in place Federated search of 50 district databases will be operational Relevancy ranking will be applied for searches Customer reviews??? (in this release)

REFRESHER Aquabrowser is the leader in alternative OPAC solutions Did address our the top identified deficiencies Group saw value in Aquabrowser but struggled with how to present a return on investment and how to justify cost wanted FORMAL written response from Aquabrowser to questions Had some reservations about customer acceptance

W HAT O PTIONS A RE THERE A GAIN ? Next OPAC upgrade with Horizon When the upgrade will occur (vendor is saying end of this year) Endecca (not really an option) Resold by TLC 3 installs 3-5 times the cost of Aquabrowser and requiring 5 programmers for a year+ to implement Primo Has one installation (two months ago there were none)

Q UESTIONS FOR AB Are there completed installations for Horizon? Yes How many installations are in place? 164 (of which 102 are live) Are there customers with Webfeat express completely installed? Yes How many Webfeat express installations are completed? King County is the is the first although there are about 6 in total for all AB/Webfeat versions. Any Horizon and Webfeat installations completed Not yet

V ENDOR I NFORMATION Number of employees: 20 Number of installations in queue: 40 installs in process When was the first AB version released: 2000 Releases are generally annual Wouldn’t share company revenue information but aid annual library journal survey in April of each year includes this.

I NSTALLATION Q UESTIONS Can discover animation be hidden? Yes Can discover be moved to the right? Yes What training assistance is available? 2 hours of web training for staff Onsite training can be purchased for $1,200/day min two days+expenses (so say $4k total) Top two ‘hitches’ to be aware of Library be prepared to answer a number of profiling decisions Library staff will need to output MARC records Support is 24x7, 7 days a week at no additional charge

T EAM C OMMENTS F ROM L AST M EETING Everyone generally liked the interface but was concerned about patron reactions Did discuss they can use the classic view Should it be the default view (will additional click be an annoyance) May require clean up in the catalog for a clean mind map Have spell check but didn’t see it working as expected in any installations Did see improved search results Although it integrated the database search, patrons still would be required to log in in order to get them

O PTIONS Move forward with AB and Webfeat to have available for new libraries Hold and revisit in summer 2008 to reassess options Where’s PRIMO at OPAC upgrade (symphony) from Sirsi Status of Aquabrowser Endecca and others that might be new Encore (III) – no known installs at this time Move forward with just the federated search implementation (Webfeat or serial solutions) QUESTIONS??? – what is needed to make decision