1. The Canadian Linked Data Initiative: Charting a Path to a Linked Data Future Marlene van Ballegooie | Juliya Borie | Andrew Senior NASIG 2016

2. Outline Library linked data context Formation of the Canadian Linked Data Initiative Working group activities Current challenges and opportunities Looking forward

3. Changing Course in Technical Services After many years of cataloging according to AACR2 and MARC, real change is in sight – LC announced the Bibliographic Framework Transition Initiative in October 2011 – BIBFRAME draft released November 2012 – Early BIBFRAME experimentation No longer a question of if the MARC standard will be replaced, but when

4. Linked Data Becomes More ‘Real’ Library of Congress Pilot (2015) Forty LC catalogers tested BIBFRAME for bibliographic description Created BIBFRAME descriptions for multiple formats and languages Aim of the project – What works and what doesn’t – Suggest enhancements – Provide feedback

5. Linked Data for Production (LD4P) Aims to transition technical services production workflows to ones based in Linked Open Data (LOD) Multi-institutional – Stanford, Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, Princeton, Library of Congress Andrew W. Mellon funded

6. BIBFLOW Project BIBFLOW = BIBframe + workFLOW UC Davis University Library and Zepheira Funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences (IMLS) Investigating models for migrating essential library workflows to a BIBFRAME/LOD ecosystem

7. Pivotal Moment ALA Technical Services Directors of Large Research Libraries (Big Heads) 2015 – Discussion focused on Linked Data initiatives – Three Canadian top 25 ARLs – No Canadian institution could contribute substantially to the conversation Canadian initiatives were small and dispersed A coordinated Linked Data effort was needed

8. Call to Action Access Conference, Toronto, September 2015 Day long meeting with invited experts Top 5 Canadian Research Libraries – University of Toronto – University of British Columbia – McGill University – Université de Montréal – University of Alberta

9. Meeting Outcomes Agreement to collaborate Communication plan Development of working groups to focus on various aspects of Linked Data training and production Addition of Library and Archives Canada, Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales du Québec and Canadiana.org to the initiative

10. Why the Canadian Linked Data Initiative? Recognition that no one institution can do it alone Nationally advancing knowledge and practice Benefit from the strengths of each institution Canadian institutions have a long tradition of collaboration

11. Working Groups

12. Re-Thinking What We Do…

13. …and how we do it

14. Steering and Planning Committee Associate University Librarians and working group chairs provide overall guidance and leadership Shared web space for documentation Monthly conference calls Vision and enthusiasm

15. Grants Working Group Working towards obtaining funding for a Linked Data Summit SSHRC Connections grant application Linked Data Summit planned for October 2016 in Montreal

16. Education and Training Working Group Aims to explore the theory and practice of linked data, with the goal of creating a collaborative environment in which to develop and share training opportunities and resources.

17. Resource gathering on linked data teaching sessions: – Linked Data Training Documentation – Bibliography Core concepts in Linked Data – Connecting – vocabularies/ontologies from other communities – Linking – URIs – Opening – through RDF Following LC Linked data training: – https://www.loc.gov/catworkshop/bibframe https://www.loc.gov/catworkshop/bibframe Education and Training Working Group

18. Learning together, collaboration (with each other and with other group), sharing, training Zepheira “Practical Practitioner” training for some sites At the University of Toronto: Presentations to staff and senior management BIBFRAME Interest Group (to stimulate conversations and awareness amongst staff) Education and Training Working Group

19. Future goals: – Develop a set of best practices for linked data – Design basic session plans for institutions to use – Compile content for online modules – Investigate possibility of interactive components to go along with modules (i.e. videos, quizzes)

20. Digital Projects Working Group To explore possibilities for collaboration around Linked Data for digital projects – Student publications – Theses and dissertations – Historical postcards Investigating building a collaborative digital collection around the theme of Canada’s 150th

21. Groupe de travail Francophone Articulating the need for French language documentation – Assistance in translation of Linked Data documentation Identify the specific needs of the francophone community with regards to authorities and identifiers

22. Identifiers Working Group Group aims to tackle projects related to the enhancement of legacy data with URIs Metadata enhancement will lead to a better transformation into a Linked Data in the future Focused on both MARC and non-MARC metadata

23. Reconciliation of authorities with external datasets University of Toronto – To date, 2.8 million authorities matched to 6.3 million URIs – Addition of URIs to MARC authorities Université de Montréal – Adding URIs to authority records for faculty members – Exploring how to push data to discovery layer Identifiers Working Group Projects

24. Experimenting with URIs in MARC $0 Enhancement and translation using BIBFRAME tools Closely following work of the PCC Task Group on URIs in MARC – https://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/bibframe/TaskGrou ps/URI-TaskGroup.html https://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/bibframe/TaskGrou ps/URI-TaskGroup.html Identifiers Working Group Projects

25. Retrofitting digital collection metadata with Linked Data elements Discovery and Early Development of Insulin collection – Reconciliation of authors, subjects, format, place names, language, dates – Using OpenRefine with RDF extension to transform into Linked Data

26. Identifiers Working Group Projects Explore how tools can be incorporated into metadata production workflows Linked Data Tools: – OpenRefine – MARCEdit BibNext Tools – Catmandu – Karma – RIMMF

27. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group Creating data, where to start? What tools available to create sample data? Working group struck in September 2015 to investigate options, particularly Library of Congress developed BFE (BIBFRAME Editor) Watched developments from LC test pilot and participating library testbed http://www.loc.gov/bibframe/

28. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group BIBFRAME Editor - Code published on GitHub https://github.com/lcnetdev/bfe https://github.com/lcnetdev/bfe Public demo site http://bibframe.org/tools/editor/#http://bibframe.org/tools/editor/# Communication and advice from LC Began creating sample data Triplestore? SPARQL endpoint?

29. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group BIBFRAME Scribe developed by Zepheira – https://github.com/zepheira/bibframe-scribe https://github.com/zepheira/bibframe-scribe Public demo site: – http://editor.bibframe.zepheira.com/static/ http://editor.bibframe.zepheira.com/static/

30. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group Steps forward, steps backward... Leveraging Uniform Resource Identifiers BIBFRAME Editor and local installation – No out-of-the-box data saving functionality – Format of presentations – Connecting to a triplestore (Fuseki) – Developer assistance

31. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group Fuseki

32. BIBFRAME Editor Working Group Watching new BIBFRAME 2.0 Vocabulary – http://www.loc.gov/bibframe/docs/index.html http://www.loc.gov/bibframe/docs/index.html Future enhancements wish list: – French interface – Adding other BIBFRAME “Profiles” and lookups for Canadian authority datasets

33. What is Missing? IT Working Group – Integration of Linked Data into digital repositories – Development of programming expertise in a Linked Data environment – Connection between metadata creation and consumption User Experience Working Group – How does Linked Data impact user experience?

34. Opportunities and Challenges

35. Opportunities Cross institutional knowledge sharing – Breaking out of institutional bubble – Strengthen the relationships between institutions Splitting into working groups – Cover more ground than you can on an individual basis More prepared for the future – Technical services as a whole

36. Big Picture Challenges How do we get all units of the library on board? How do we scale this project across 9000 km, multiple cultural institutions, and in two languages? How do we fund this transformation in Canada?

37. Individual Challenges Time – How do we make this experimentation part of “what we do”? – Making the mental shift to a linked data way of thinking Managing expectations – There is no quick fix…it is going to be a lengthy journey Overcoming knowledge gaps – Steep learning curve

38. Where We Want to Be

39. On the Radar Working in coordination with other library units and vendors – System migrations – Digital collection creation – Archives – Vendor systems and metadata

40. Enriching Discovery Addition of Linked Data elements in discovery interfaces Leveraging the richness of our metadata Connecting library data to the open web in meaningful ways

41. Constantly Learning Building a culture of learning Roll out modules for staff education Keep the blue sky thinking happening... stimulates imagination and creativity Planning a Linked Data Summit in Montreal October 24-26, 2016

42. m.vanballegooie@utoronto.ca juliya.borie@utoronto.ca andrew.senior@mcgill.ca