A new start - Phase 2

Finally. Phase 1 - the redesign of the current website - was completed on time (and on-budget!), with the new site rolled out by mid-August. Blogging came to halt in the rush to completion, and hasn't resumed. Until now.

Just to recap: The project plan of last summer outlined 3 phases to the Library's restructuring of what we've come to call its 'web platform' (as distinct from 'web site', to emphasize the infrastructure-related, generated nature of ultimate product): an interim site redesign, to correct cumulative problems and issues; an intermediate phase to move the bulk of the site's content to a database, to improve its overall maintainability and adaptability; and a concluding phase that would make use of the database to generate content and services in a variety of formats for diverse interfaces (utilizing XML and a certain amount of handwaving).

So (better late than never) this picks up again with Phase 2 - the transformation of the site from a collection of html files to a set of database records. One strategy for accomplishing this is to make use of a Content Management System (CMS), and this may in turn be a single step route to implementing phase 3 as well. But this is a complex and somewhat entangled issue at this point, associated as it is with a number of other initiatives, projects, themes, concepts and schemes, all bubbling away on various burners. Here's a page (DOC file) of some notes on this - a first step, perhaps, toward a project plan for the next phase.

A working draft

... of the new top page and four 2nd level pages.

Still alive!

Well, it's been over a month since the last post -- I'll try to keep things more up to date hereafter. Feel free to help with blogging suggestions or comments!

Project Plan

Here, finally, is a project plan -- as a word document. I'll link to it on the side bar too, so that it won't scroll off the page.

Tasks and time line for this summer's site redesign:

Tasks:

• Set up project email list: web-group@interchange.ubc.ca
  
• Set up project web log ("blog"): "Nodal" at ubclibweb.blogspot.com
  
• Gather input re: current site deficiencies and possible improvements
  
• Produce a structural mockup of front page to address deficiencies
  
• Extend mockup to all layers of site affected by the changes
  
• Gather feedback re: these mockups
  
• Flesh out mockups with design elements (stylesheets and graphics)
  
• Test redesign on selected users
  
• Gather feedback re: designed site
  
• Finalize top level design
  
• Finalize site as a whole, including all new or changed pages
  
• Cut-over to new site
  

Timeline:

Apr 4: First meeting with the Library feedback group to introduce the project, and discuss current deficiencies

May 15: "wireframe" mockup in place for initial informal feedback

May 30: Second meeting with feedback group, focusing on the structural mockup

Jun 14: Initial design applied to structural frame and mockup made functional; early testing with user representatives

Jun 14: Meeting with Administration Group for project approval

Jun 17: Announcement of project and implementation schedule via lib-all

Jun 26: Third meeting with feedback group, focusing on site look and feel

Jul 16: Top levels of site look and feel ready for instructional material revisions (e.g., new screenshots, etc.)

Jul 26: Final meeting with Administration Group re: site look and feel

Aug 15: Site finalized but for essential, last-minute changes -- announced to public on current website

Aug 27: Cut-over to new site.

"Information Architecture" email list

I just wanted to let you know about this interesting list, well populated by librarians, on the abstract topic of "information architecture" -- here are its archives.

The "Public Knowledge Project" as a source of project ideas

From Sheryl Adam:

The PKP site, run by John Willinsky, (Pacific Press Professor of Literacy Technology, Department of Language and Literacy Education), UBC is always doing something interesting. It's worth looking at
on a regular basis.

Of interest for our project is the Research Support Tool, which is a nice example of what searching multiple resources simultaneously can be.

http://www.pkp.ubc.ca/demos/rsttour/index.html


The Research Index currently includes just 200 articles, (as far as I know, from freely available webjournals) but plans to "invit[e] all of the journals in education to participate in this open-access indexing system, and will then go on to build a version, funding permitting, for the social sciences trolls freely available web journals and indexes like a citation index."

Have a look at

http://www.pkp.ubc.ca/demos/edindex/index.html


I have reservations about this site, because it doesn't mention that it is limited to unlicenced databases (ie ERIC (FREE) but not academic Search ELITE, etc.), that folk wanting to do a really exhaustive search will have to go elsewhere. But it's just a demo, so hey . . .

Policy.ca is an interesting example of a database for web resources
http://www.policy.ca/search.php3

While we might not want to use any of these as a model for our own project, they are important *new* things that will be around, in some form or another, when our new website debuts and as it develops.

Sheryl

Comments working again!(?)

The "Comments" feature of the blog (see the link at the bottom right of each post) is actually supplied by a "third party", which is usually just an interested and generous individual. Which means that the functionality can occasionally go down or even disappear altogether, and it looks like that happened to our first attempt at providing online feedback.

However, we're trying again, using a service called "YACCS". Give it a try -- send us feedback!

Catching up on blogging:
An "announcement" field

From Merry Meredith:
I like the "announcement" field at the bottom of the Yale University site,
because it's discrete, yet eye-catching because it changes, and it allows
for a fair amount of text---

See http://www.yale.edu/

To aid the process of setting up a new A-Z page (or pages), as well
as remove some of the eresource links from the main page, here's
a set of Academic Library websites for indexes and databases that
have features that might be of interest:

• U. of Miami
  
• U. of Toronto
  
• U. of Alberta
  
• U. of S. Florida
  
• Northwestern
  
• Boston U. (subject only!!)
  
• Harvard (note use or URN server, also navigational JS)
  
• Princeton splits up eresources; also includes microforms, CDs
  

And so on ...

After looking at 20-25 Canadian and US libraries, few or none don't have:

• a title search, and in some cases a description search, of eresources
  
• subject breakdowns, using anywhere from 15 - 50 or more subjects
  

Example library web sites, consolidated

I thought it would be useful to try to gather together at least most of the examples that have come up so far. In looking through them, I noticed that most appeared to follow a fairly general pattern in which "core" resources and services would be gathered in the centre of the page and organized into columns, usually categorized, while "peripheral" or utility links would be arranged around the page edges (header, footer, or margins). A few, however, in varying ways, didn't seem to follow this pattern.

Here's the list of the more or less conventional page structures:

Columbia

Dalhousie

MIT

Simon Fraser

UBC

University of Georgia

University of Miami

University of South Florida (Virtual Library)

University of Washington

University of Western Australia

Yale

And here are the less conventional:

Harvard

University of Alberta

University of Toronto

University of Victoria

Personally, though I'm often a fan of the unconventional, I'm not sure the sites in the latter category work as well as the former. But let us know your thoughts!

Naming problems

This is an email posted to the Web4Lib list summarizing responses to a question regarding how to name article indexes ("journal article databases"). (It's where I found the link to the MIT redesign project in the entry below.) One key passage:

I think there is one interesting trend from libraries that have been doing lots of "card sort" type tests, and that is to create a big sub section of the web site and to put the Library Catalog (Find Books) together with Journal Databases (Find Articles) and Journal Lists (Find Journals). Some people are calling this "Search Our Collections" (This is the MIT Libraries' term - Nicole Hennig has excellent notes on their library's web site redesign at http://macfadden.mit.edu:9500/webgroup/project.html), some are calling it "Resources" (The Simmons library site does this http://www.simmons.edu/libraries/) and another term is "Research Tools." However, the big negative response to this approach from librarians is that this sometimes means the removal of a prominent link to the library catalog
on the front page (depending on the design).

Also note the link to this list of possible names.

MIT's Web Site Redesign Project

A very interesting record of a similar site redesign from about a year ago. Here's the result ("released" June 25, presumably 2001).

Among other things, they evaluate other Library sites -- including UBC's. I couldn't find the results of the evaluation, but here's a list of the criteria they used.

Example Library Site

I thought the Dal Libraries site balances the teaching/instructional elements with the known item tools such as the catalogue etc. I also like the 'look' and the non-java option! Also, nice subject access to resources.

Notes From April 4/02 Meeting

Here is a summary of the April 4th session.

• Notes from Web Re-structuring Meeting (Word doc)
  

More Example Sites

Here's a list of example sites that I've had kicking around in my bookmarks for awhile. I've listed them here not necessarily because they're great sites but, because each one addresses one of the issues raised in our re-structuring feedback session on April 4.

• Columbia University's LibraryWeb
  (news, spotlight, online forms front & center...homepage covers a lot of ground...many links)
  
• University of Miami Libraries
  (note flattened catalogue on homepage)


• Miami University Libraries' Ask a Question
  (virtual reference...notice that access to this service appears on all sub-pages on the site)


• Austin Peay State University's Ask a Librarian
  (more virtual reference)


• University of Toronto Library
  (note e-Books & e-everything on homepage & how to find shortcut box)

Navigation: An Example Site

Check out The Yale University Library site. The site that makes good use of primary & secondary navigation. The site is broken out into 4 main categories (Research Tools, About the Library, Libraries & Collections, and Library Services) and within each of those categories are a number of sub-categories. Visit a sub-page (Reasearch Tools, for example) and you'll see 2 lines of navigation at the top of the page. The top line reflects the 4 main categories with the bottom line representing the sub-categories within categoriy you've selected. As well, each main category, and its sub-categories are colour-coded, for easy recognition. I think this works well because it gives the user a window into the site's information architecture. Also, this may help users learn how to use the site effectively because the conceptual links between the parts of the site are fairly transparent.

I also like the extensive Quick Links on the homepage...listing services users may want quick & easy access to. Some of the services accessible from here are: ask a reference question, renew your books, request materials from other libraries. Very user focussed.

Check out the access to the catalogue (with full functionality) right on the homepage!

And, from a purely design point of view, the site is beautifully designed. The images that rotate on the homepage are pulled from various historical & special collections held at Yale. Like our site, Yale lists current news on the homepage although it can appear below the scroll bar on some screens.

It's at the 3rd level of the site that the look & navigation scheme fall apart. Specifically, most of the branch/library location pages don't follow the template for the rest of the site (for example, the Astronomy Library). At this point, for me as a user/browser, the site loses its seamless navigation (ie., on some of the branch sites it's not obvious how to get back to the main Yale library site or some of the main resources).

Another Example Site

The University of Georgia Libraries site has an interesting collection of subject guides. Each particular subject (not clear on what defines these, though they're obviously discipline related) presents a list of "Recommended Resources: try these first", as well as a set of checkboxes to select further resources on the topic by resource type (e.g., indexes, dictionaries and encyclopedias, government publications, etc.).

I also like their Virtual Reference Shelf, enough to make a link to it from our Internet Search Tools page. It has some local resources but also a good variety of general purpose reference tools.

GAO Report on XML Implementation within US Govt Agencies (PDF)
(from Gary Price's Virtual Acquisition Shelf and News Desk)

This is an interesting assessment of the current state of XML standards, that I think bears upon the vision of using XML as the structure underlying our Web platform. It brings up an interesting variation on an old problem: standards vs. diversity (the latter including innovation, local needs, special cases, etc.). The problem is typically addressed in one of two ways -- either through a "top-down" imposition or a "bottom-up" convergence. The appendix of the report includes a couple of letters from agencies that seem to illustrate the different approaches.

Last Redesign

Sorry to keep playing with the look -- I'm intrigued by this ability to easily redesign a page (& ideally a site), but it's a bit disconcerting, so I won't keep fussing with it (the last look just seemed a little constricted).

Design Guides

Erwin sends along the following site suggestions:

NYPL Online Style Guide - advocates
XHTML (as a transition to XML) and CSS

A List Apart - weekly Web design 'zine

More on Site Usability

This was found at The Shifted Librarian: "Lessons Learned" in redesigning the National Cancer Institute's CancerNet site.

Blogrolling!


Hey, we got linked by the Shifted One -- Dean, it was your suggestion that caught her eye. Thanks, Jenny!

This is kind of unexpected, but it's a feature that's integral to the blog phenomenon, and illustrates some of the differences of this whole mode of communication.

XML in Libraries

I wanted to point out this email list, XML4Lib -- here's it's description and info about how to subscribe, and here's it's archive. (I'm finding checking the archive easier than subscription for these things lately.)

And here's an example of the kinds of things you can find on this list: a Library of Congress site on "next generation" Z39.50 projects, in particular the SRW (Search/Retrieve Web service) initiative which builds on Z39.50 using XML-based web services.