Digital Libraries David Rashty 1 Digital Libraries A

Digital Libraries David Rashty 1 Digital Libraries

“A library is an arsenal of liberty” Anonymous 2 Digital Libraries

Contents • Introduction • Technical considerations – Interoperability – Supporting technologies • User interface design • Examples • Conclusion 3 Digital Libraries

Introduction First steps and related concepts 4 Digital Libraries

Introduction What is a digital library? 5 Digital Libraries

Introduction A digital library… is composed of four main components: 1. a collection of digital objects; 2. information referring to those objects; 3. a structure for presenting information; 4. interaction elements. 6 Digital Libraries

Introduction Related fields Natural language processing Library science Information science Human computer interaction DL Multimedia systems 7 Database management Digital Libraries Networking and communications

Introduction Related concepts • User interface – The point of contact between human and machine. • Data mining – Extraction of new data or partial information from a database. • Information retrieval – Popping up information (not data) from a database according to users needs. 8 Digital Libraries

Technical considerations Interoperability and Supporting technologies 9 Digital Libraries

Interoperability Definition • Digital libraries are collections of separately developed entities that are put together in order to facilitate access to information. • The central concern of interoperability is to connect such entities in a functional and efficient way. 10 Digital Libraries

Interoperability Design questions • What are the basic technologies that enable sharing information between different systems? • What is the best networking technology for intercomponent communication ? • Data formats, document models, languages, protection functions? 11 Digital Libraries

Interoperability Evaluation criteria • The following criteria identify well integrated systems: – High degree of component autonomy; – Low cost of infrastructure; – Ease of contributing components; – Ease of using components; – Task complexity supported by the system; – Scalability in the number of components. 12 Digital Libraries

Supporting Technologies An industrial design example • Design activities and interaction structure that characterize the industrial engineering design process. Pejtersen, A. M. Semantic Information Retrieval. Communications of the ACM, April 998 13 Digital Libraries

Supporting Technologies An industrial design example • Technologies and design considerations for the industrial engineering design process: – In addition to common interaction capabilities with information sources, engineers have to be able to judge the sources of information for their reliability and trustworthiness. – A strong commitment to knowledge management is an important feature of industrial engineering systems: engineers need access to previous cases and the distributed human knowledge in the organization. – The system must provide exploration by analogy. – The system must be built around a transparent interface with various functional capabilities. 14 Digital Libraries

User interface design Best practices 15 Digital Libraries

User interface design Design concerns • Digital libraries must provide search and retrieval systems such that users can navigate information space easily. • Users must feel comfortable and receive continual feedback from the system in order to get what they are looking for. • Design for globalization demands special attention to usability problems. 16 Digital Libraries

User interface design Design concerns • Some results from usability studies: – Designers must provide a clear overview of the digital library layout. – The DL must provide facilities to filter search results and save queries for additional refinements. – Search criteria should include simple and advanced searches. – Searches and retrieval of documents should be fast. 17 Digital Libraries

User interface design Design concerns • Some results from usability studies: – Users expect digital libraries to provide many of the features found in a traditional library such as broad coverage of many topics, readable text, etc. – Users want to search by author, keyword, title, journal, year and volume. – Users want search results to be presented as PDF, HTML or plain text. – The DL must provide good help facilities. – Provide cues for guiding the search process. 18 Digital Libraries

Examples Implementations 19 Digital Libraries

Examples ACM Browsing and search possibilities as well as bookmark service for subscribers. Help facilities and information about usage and the system. 20 Digital Libraries

Examples ACM Search by author, title, terms. Each one offers a number of options. Options for limiting the search (filtering). 21 Digital Libraries

Examples IEEE Easy access to search options as well as clear exposition of the objects in the library. Users have a bird’s eye view of the content in the library. 22 Digital Libraries

Examples IEEE Search by terms and options on the scope of the search. Users can see the main elements of the search space. 23 Digital Libraries

Examples NCSTRL Search, options and direct access to their archives. Simple search options. Search by author, title and abstract as well as sorting preferences. 24 Digital Libraries

Conclusion Research directions and conclusions 25 Digital Libraries

Conclusion Research directions More usable and efficient user interfaces Interoperability solutions for the global library Intelligent techniques for searching, browsing and information retrieval 26 Digital Libraries

Conclusions • Digital libraries are among the most complex existing forms of information systems. • Access to information today is simpler and the sources are many. Building effective DL will help people to deal with this situation by guiding them in the process of information search and retrieval. • The future of the web depend on interface designers being capable of developing methods of reducing frustration and anxiety for the users. 27 Digital Libraries

Conclusion References • www. dlib. com: Online magazine on DL • www. acm. org: Digital library of the ACM • www. computer. org: Digital library of the IEEE 28 Digital Libraries