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River Campus Libraries Find Articles Fourth Generation Design For Federated Searching at the University of Rochester Brenda Reeb, Usability David Lindahl, Digital Initiatives
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Agenda Serial Failure Metasearch User Centered Design Process Culture and Politics Generations of Design Technology
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Serial Failure Students cannot find articles Students overwhelmed with database names, contents, and search protocols Students insist on search simplicity Eliminate the complexity of information retrieval Technologies exist to make it simpler Politics exist to make it complex
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Serial Failure Design Responses Don’t make undergraduates choose anything before searching Don’t expect users to read anything before searching Forgiving search box tolerates single words, multiple words, Boolean, “ “ phrases. Assume relevance ranking
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Serial Failure “Serial Failure” The Charleston ADVISOR, Vol. 5., no. 3, 2004. Jennifer Bowen, Judi Briden, Vicki Burns, David Lindahl, Brenda Reeb, Melinda Stowe, Stanley Wilder.
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Metasearch What is metasearch? Federated Search Single user interface to multiple databases Simultaneous searching across resources Merged results Metasearch technology: Metasearch product with UI Connectors OpenURL Linking
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Usability group Content group Design group Key tasks Test results Prototypes Issue-Responses Design iterations Test results User Centered Design Process
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Usability group Design group Content group Highest No other goal than to represent the user. Medium Competes with standards, technology, time and money Medium Competes with exhaustive content, complex tasks GroupUser Focus
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User Centered Design Process Artifacts of design process “Issue response” document Usability results Key task list Regular meetings (design = usability) Project specific meetings (usability=content and content=design)
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Design Group Reorganized in 2001 Lives in the Digital Initiatives Unit ¼ FT UI designer (MS, Computer Science) 1 FTE graphic designer (BA, Graphic Design) 1 FTE developer Manages issue/response process
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Design Group Perspective on Site Design “Hide the technology” Consistency across library website Task-oriented pathways Usability testing program Perspective on Page Design Essential components Prioritize Simplify Style guidelines
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Universal Design Section 508 Web Style Guide Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines Page Editors’ Checklist “Universal design is the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.” Ron Mace Design Group http://www.section508.gov/ http://webstyleguide.com/ http://usability.gov/guidelines/ http://www.library.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=623 Style Guidelines
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Knowledge of databases Partial knowledge No knowledge needed Mapping your search to a subject takes you away from your natural path Find Articles Clusters (courses) Google Databases by Subject Databases A-Z Design Group User pathways
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Design Group Models For Finding: Google 1.Enter keywords 2.Browse results by title and snippet 3.View full text
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Design Group Models For Finding: FRBR FRBR User Tasks Find Identify Select Acquire FRBR = Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records More information: http://www.ifla.org
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Design Group 1.Enter keywords and select databases 2.Select databases or “SHOW ALL” 3.Select a result 4.View metadata 5.Select a full text source 6.View full text online Encompass UI
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Design Group 1.Enter keywords and select databases 2.Select databases or “SHOW ALL” 3.Select a result 4.View metadata 5.Select a full text source 6.View full text online Encompass UI
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Design Group 1.Enter keywords 2.Select a result 3.View full text online Find Articles UI Generation 3
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Design Group Search Select Article Full Text (Gather) FRBR Tasks: Find Identify Select Acquire Mapping the Find Articles UI to FRBR Generation 3
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Content Group Multiple content groups, one for each project Any number of members (1-?) Every department participates - cataloging, circulation, reference, etc. Created and disbanded as needed Observe some tests
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Content Group Content group activities: Define key tasks Select appropriate content Apply experience and education to the iterative design process Observe some tests Interpret usability results Raise issues, not design solutions
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Content Group What is a key task? Key tasks are defined as frequently asked items, frequent actions or navigation to parent/child pages. Example key tasks: Find a known article. Find a known journal. Find an article on a specific topic. Find articles on a multidisciplinary topic. Find a specific journal collection.
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Content Group Find Articles Content Group Collect issues Categorize Technology issues (website, SFX, ILL, Databases OPAC) Building, shelving & organizational Issues Subscription issues Citation problems Basic research help Librarians Create scenarios Address issues
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Usability Group Usability Program Began 2001 7 staff trained as usability testers Over 20 projects, large and small Testers volunteer for projects Reading, conferences, practice Vendor co-development
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Usability Group Usability team activities: Manage key task process Design and conduct tests Maintain a “lab” Communicate results to staff and public
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Manage key task process Usability Group
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Key taskTest question Find a known journal Find an article in the Journal of Fish Biology. Find a journal collection Your friend told you there is a collection of political science journals called JSTOR. Where is it? Usability Group Manage key task process
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Usability Group Design and conduct tests Mental model test Heuristic test Card sort test Assessment test (Click path) Scenario test
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Usability Group Picture of our lab
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Usability Group Communicate results
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Students say: “I need an article!” Librarians say: “Select a database” “This database has 435 journals in it.” “These journals are peer reviewed.” “Choose basic or advanced.” “These journals predate the Civil War.” Culture and Politics
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Student culture Connect at courses, not at academic disciplines Meet them where they are Students attend POL250 – “Conflict in Democracies” They do not relate to Political Science. They do not envision themselves as political scientists. Sustainability Distributed workload (all bibliographers participate) Dynamic, database-driven pages
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Culture and Politics Expect these accusations! Simple designs dumb down the site Testing 3 users is not enough “I have to wonder if usability testing - especially for money - proves very useful input” No one told me about this Where is your report? This is so subjective!
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Culture and Politics Try these responses: Inform Page design process document Don’t leave home without the toolkit Neilson’s Alert Boxes Pages from Don’t Make Me Think Engage Observe tests Publish results
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Generations of Design Generation 0
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Generations of Design Generation 1
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Generations of Design Generation 2
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Generations of Design Generation 2
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Generations of Design Generation 3
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Generations of Design Generation 3
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Generations of Design Find Subject clusters Course clusters Catalog (CUIPID + Web Services) Identify and Select Relevance Sorting (Evolving Metasearch) Metadata (Abstracts on selection screen) Results navigation Obtain Direct to full text (via shared knowledge base) Holdings information / maps (integration with catalog) Generation 4
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Generations of Design Subject Clusters Pre-selected databases Search boxes anywhere Course Pages Connects undergrads to library resources Top-5 resource Usability success Course Clusters Generation 4
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Technology Meta-search Technology and Standards Find Z39.50 SRW/SRU and CQL (NISO MetaSearch Init.) XML Gateway Identify/Select OAI Obtain OpenURL SFX, LinkFinder, Serial Solutions
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Technology Meta-search Issues Speed and Reliability Connectors Index vs. Meta-search Ease of use Database selection Abstracts on selection screen Full text availability One click to full text Quality of results How search terms are applied Database selection Relevance sorted results and de-duping
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Technology Search Select Article Full Text (Gather) Library Web Server ERA Server Subscription Database XSLT User Page with Full Text XSLT XML HTML
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River Campus Libraries Questions? Fourth Generation Design For Federated Searching at the University of Rochester Brenda Reeb, Usability David Lindahl, Digital Initiatives
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