1. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Advantages and Challenges Weiling Liu Director, Office of Libraries Technology University Libraries University of Louisville

2. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Introduction How to locate a copy of an article?  Select a database that provides full-text  Search the database for the article  Search OPAC to find out if it is available in print when it is not available online  Fill out a form to get it through interlibrary loan when it is not available online nor in print locally Challenges for end-users:  Different user interface and various search capabilities  Changes of institutional subscriptions  Changes within aggregated collections OpenURL and Link Resolver came into place for removing these barriers

3. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Objective To share my reading and understanding about OpenURL Link Resovlers, their advantages and challenges in practice, and our implementation experience at University of Louisville

4. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Outline  What is OpenURL and Link Resolver?  OpenURL Link Resolver mechanism  Advantages  A Case Study  Challenges  Implementation of a Link Resolver (SFX) at the University of Louisville  Summary and Conclusion

5. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers What is OpenURL? A framework, NISO standard (ANSI/NISO Z39.88 – 2004) It includes two parts: 1. syntax for packaging metadata and identifiers describing information objects 2. syntax for pointing to a user-specific resolver that can accept this packaged data, combine it with user information, and resolve the data into actual links

6. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers What Is a Link Resolver? A link resolver accepts an OpenURL as input and interprets it, applying “ as much logic as they can ” and then offering “ the user a menu showing a range of possibilities ” and services Source (OpenURL Link) Link Resolver Menu of services (Targets)

7. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Link Target - Library OPACs Link Target - E-Resources Link Target - Inter Library Loan Link Resolver – where context-sensitive linking service is processed Target – where linking lands (must have a link- to syntax that supports the service) Link Target - Web search Engine OpenURL Sources A&I databases E-Journal Articles (References) E-print archives (OAI) Electronic theses and dissertations (ETD) Library OPACs Local data repositories OpenURL Link Resolver Mechanism Source – where linking starts (must be OpenURL enabled)

8. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Examples - OpenURL (line break is added for readability) url_ver=Z39.88-2004& url_tim=2003-0410T13%3A57%3A15TZD& url_ctx_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Actx& ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8& ctx_id=10_1&ctx_tim=2003-04-10T13%3A56%3A30TZD& rft_id=info%3Adoi%2F10.1045%2Fjuly99-caplan& rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal& rft.genre=article&rft.aulast=Caplan&rft.aufirst=Priscilla& rft.issn=1082-9873&rft.volume=5&rft.issue=7/8&rft.date=1999& rft.atitle=Reference+Linking+for+Journal+Articles& rfe_id=info%3Adoi%2F10.1045%2Fmarch2001-vandesompel& rfe_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal& rfe.genre=article&rfe.aulast=Van+de+Sompel&rfe.aufirst=Herbert& rfe.issn=1082-9873&rfe.volume=7&rfe.issue=3&rfe.date=2001& rfe.atitle=Open+Linking+in+the+ Scholarly+Information+Environment+using+the+OpenURL+Framework& rfr_id=info%3Asid%2Fdlib.org%3Adlib

9. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Examples – Link Resolver The examples from California Institute of Technology demonstrate that besides full text service, a link resolver can also direct a user to the following:  Library ’ s Catalog Holdings  Inter-Library Loan  Reviews (e.g. Amazon)  Abstracts  Reference Management (e.g. EndNote)  Web Services (e.g. Library ’ s FAQ)  Web Search (e.g. Google) http://library.caltech.edu/openurl/Documents/Demo.htm

10. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Advantages For users:  “ Complete coverage ” for the user (Turner, 2004), which avoids “ dead ends ” (Schneider 2001)  “ Appropriate copy ” (McDonald, 2004) For Library staff:  Decreasing the time spent by ILL in filling items that the library does have access to, or redundant article copies  More statistics can be gathered, thus increase the use of those less popular ones

11. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers A Case Study A study conducted at California State University shows:  End-user perceptions: More Full text  Librarian perceptions: More Accurate Results “ For many librarians and end-users, all of it is SFX. They most often encounter problems that have nothing to do with the system itself, but those problems nevertheless help erode confidence in the system, driving down its perceived success ” (Wakimoto, 2006)

12. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Challenges Challenges:  Objects with ID (ISSN, ISBN, or DOI) vs. without ID  Different Levels of OpenURL Compliance Out-bound linking available from  All items (e.g. Wilson)  Non-full text items only (e.g. EBSCO) In-bound linking to a target at  Database level (e.g. LEXIS-NEXIS)  Journal level (e.g. ERIC Full Text*)  Volume level (e.g. Haworth Press **)  Issue level or article level with DOI (e.g. University of Chicago Press ***, † )  Article level (e.g. EBSCOhost ****)  Subscribed Resources vs. Free Resources

13. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Examples - Wilson

14. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Examples - EBSCO

15. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Challenges (continued) What Librarians Need to Do:  More Full Text Collections  Good OpenURL Compliant Resources  Up-to-date Central Knowledge Base (CKB)  Service Menu Customization  User Education  What to Consider When Acquiring/Developing an OpenURL Link Resolver

16. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers  What to Consider When Acquiring/Developing an OpenURL Link Resolver Flexibilities for Service Menu Customization CKB Update Frequency Number of Databases (sources and targets) Supporting titles with or without IDs (e.g. ISSN, ISBN) OpenURL COinS Challenges (continued)

17. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Implementation of SFX at UofL University of Louisville (UofL) Libraries  Six libraries  Integrated Library System (ILS): Voyager  Collections: 2 million volumes  Electronic Resources: Database: more than 200 E-Journal: about 20,000 titles Journal Finder – SFX link resolver  Acquiring system in May 2004  “ Soft ” launch in Noember 2004  Full launch in July 2005  Currently 66 targets (30,660 links) are activated in CKB

18. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers SFX Link Resolver- A-Z List

19. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers SFX Link Resolver- Category

20. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers SFX Link Resolver- Citation Linker

21. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers SFX Link Resolver- Service Menu Shown all the time

22. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers Summary and Conclusion “ the promise of the OpenURL is tantalizing indeed ” (Grogg, 2006.) Such seamless integration of resources is so conceptually simple, but robust, scalable, open systems of reference linking are enormously complex. By providing OpenURL linking services, “ librarians and vendors are under increasing pressure from their constituents to provide yet more full text with 100 percent seamless accuracy. ” (Wakimoto, 2006)

23. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers References and Readings  Grogg, Jill E. "Thinking About Reference Linking." Searcher 10.4 (2002):56-61.  Grogg, Jill E. "Introduction." Library technology reports 42.1 (2006):5-7.  Van de Sompel, Herbert and and Patrick Hochstenback. "Reference Linking in a Hybrid Library Environment, Part 1: Frame works for Linking." D-Lib magazine 5.4 (1999)  McDonald, Steven and Van de Velde, Eric F. "Resource Integration in the Library: The Lure of Linking." Library journal 129.6 (2004):32-34.  Turner, Steven. "Resource Integration in the Library: Link-Resolvers and Federated Searching." Mississippi libraries 68.3 (2003):63-66.  Schneider, Karen G.. “ SFX: a Linkalclous Service. ” American Libraries 32.6 (2001):118-119.  Wakimoto, Jina Choi; Walker, David S. and Dabbour, Katherine S. “The Myths and Realities of SFX in Adcdemic Libraries.” The Journal of Academic Librarianship 32.2 (2006):127-136.  http://www.niso.org/committees/committee_ax.html http://www.niso.org/committees/committee_ax.html  http://library.caltech.edu/openurl/StandardDocuments/KEV_Guidelines- 20041209.pdf http://library.caltech.edu/openurl/StandardDocuments/KEV_Guidelines- 20041209.pdf  http://library.caltech.edu/openurl/Standard.htm http://library.caltech.edu/openurl/Standard.htm  http://www.niso.org/standards/standard_detail.cfm?std_id=783 http://www.niso.org/standards/standard_detail.cfm?std_id=783  http://ocoins.info/ http://ocoins.info/

24. ADL Seminar, Beijing 8/14-16/06OpenURL and Link Resolvers THANK YOU! Weiling Liu w.liu@louisville.edu w0liu001@gwise.louisville.edu