Endeca and faceted browsing Giving the user a

Endeca and faceted browsing: Giving the user a useful catalog Scott Warren NCSU Libraries South Carolina Library Association Annual Meeting June 7, 2007 NCSU Libraries

Outline 1. Problem and Context 2. Online searching, shopping, and examples 3. Demo 4. Faceted Navigation 5. Implementation Challenges 6. Facet Usage Statistics 7. Reflections NCSU Libraries

The Context NCSU Libraries

Online Catalogs "Most integrated library systems, as they are currently configured and used, should be removed from public view. “ - Roy Tennant, CDL NCSU Libraries

What is the problem? • Existing catalogs are hard to use: – known item searching works pretty well, but … • users often do keyword searching and get large result sets returned in system sort order (last in, etc. ) • catalogs are unforgiving on spelling errors, stemming • Authority searching completely mystifying NCSU Libraries

Catalog metadata is buried • Subject headings are not leveraged in searching • they should be browsed or linked from, not searched • Data from the item record is not leveraged • should be able to filter by item type, location, circulation status, popularity NCSU Libraries

Word of the Day for Saturday, May 5, 2007 • moil MOYL, intransitive verb: • 1. To work with painful effort; to labor; to toil; to drudge. 2. To churn or swirl about continuously. 3. Toil; hard work; drudgery. 4. Confusion; turmoil. NCSU Libraries

What’s the big picture? • Improve the quality of the library catalog user experience. • Exploit our existing metadata infrastructure (make MARC work harder). • Build a more flexible catalog tool that can be integrated with discovery tools of the future. NCSU Libraries

What is Endeca? • Software company based in Cambridge, MA • Search/information access technology provider for a number of major e-commerce websites • Developers of the Endeca Information Access Platform NCSU Libraries

Why Endeca? • Customized relevance ranking of results • Better subject access by leveraging available metadata through facets • Improved response time • Enhanced natural language searching through spell correction, etc. • Browse NCSU Libraries

A question • “How is the new generation of library catalog being developed? ” • informed and enhanced by search technologies developed outside of the library • based on how our users know how to search, not on how we want them to search • What does search look like for our users? NCSU Libraries

Examples NCSU Libraries

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Faceted Navigation on the Web NCSU Libraries

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Facet Value NCSU Libraries

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Faceted Navigation in Libraries NCSU Libraries

Demonstration NCSU Libraries

Faceted Navigation NCSU Libraries

What is Faceted Navigation? NCSU Libraries

What is Faceted Navigation? • Search and browse in a single interface • Facets can vary in scope – What is the item about? – What kind of item is it? – Where is it? • Enables users to narrow results • Macroscopic behavior of results set • Clues to being on the right path NCSU Libraries

Origins of Facets • 1930 s Ranganathan • Colon Classification NCSU Libraries

Cartesian Coordinates NCSU Libraries

Coordinate System Format (Branch 1, History, Book) Book LCSH DVD Art History (Branch 1, History, Book) (Branch 2, History, DVD) Multiple records could be associated with each coordinate point. Each point is associated with at least one record. Branch 1 Branch 2 (x, y, z) (Library, LCSH, Format) Library NCSU Libraries

Another way to think about it • 11 dimensional lattice space • All points associated with at least one item/record • Records can be associated with > 1 point • • Keyword search selects subset of points with word(s) in record Facets shown are those dimensions corresponding to the points in that set (nonzero values). • Choosing a facet value is equivalent to slicing through the multidimensional lattice on a plane along that facet value and reducing the lattice’s dimension by 1. • Choose enough facets and you will get down to a few items (never a null set) NCSU Libraries

Implementation NCSU Libraries

Implementation Challenges • Facet selection • Interface design • Data issues NCSU Libraries

Endeca at NCSU • Endeca used to improve the discovery portion of the library catalog • Endeca software indexes 1. 6 million MARC records exported nightly from Sirsi Unicorn ILS • Backend functions of ILS remain intact NCSU Libraries

Facets Implemented at NCSU • • • Availability Author Library Format Language • • • LC Classification Subject: Topic Subject: Genre Subject: Region Subject: Era • Browse: New NCSU Libraries

Facet Selection NCSU Libraries

Interface Design • Iterative approach using wireframes • Eight major revisions in a four month period • Still lots of room for improvement NCSU Libraries

Technical Overview • Endeca co-exists with Sirsi. Dynix Unicorn ILS and Web 2 online catalog • Endeca handles keyword search • Web 2 handles authority search and detail page display • Endeca indexes MARC records exported nightly from Unicorn • Endeca = discovery portion of the ILS NCSU Libraries

Technical Overview Information Access Platform NCSU exports and reformats Data Foundry Parse text files Raw MARC data MDEX Engine Indices Flat text files HTTP NCSU Web Application NCSU Libraries

Technical Overview Offline - Nightly NCSU exports and reformats Data Foundry Parse text files Raw MARC data MDEX Engine Indices Flat text files HTTP NCSU Web Application NCSU Libraries

Technical Overview Always Online NCSU exports and reformats Data Foundry Parse text files Raw MARC data MDEX Engine Indices Flat text files HTTP NCSU Web Application NCSU Libraries

Implementation Team • Seven member team – 5 IT staff, – 1 cataloging librarian, – 1 reference librarian • Timeline – License / negotiation: Spring 2005 – Software acquisition: Summer 2005 – Implementation: Aug 2005 to Jan 2006 NCSU Libraries

Data Issues • ILS data with MARC-8 encoding => Text data with UTF-8 encoding • Data consistency between ILS and Endeca catalog indexes (updates!) • Data issues revealed by exposing metadata (ex: subject headings) in facets NCSU Libraries

Outcomes NCSU Libraries

Added search tools • Automatic spell correction • “Did you mean…” suggestions – Automatic stemming – Bookmark-ability NCSU Libraries

True browse • Regain ability to browse catalog without entering any search terms NCSU Libraries

July 06 – Jan 07 NCSU Libraries

Dimension Value Requests New NEW 56, 286 Format Book 16, 188 LC Classification Q - Science 12, 462 Library Textiles 11, 160 Library D. H. Hill 11, 060 Availability Available 9, 276 Library Online Resources 8, 164 LC Classification T – Technology 8, 052 Subject: Topic History 7, 915 Format Online 7, 858 LC Classification P - Language and literature 7, 005 LC Classification H - Social Sciences 6, 953 Language English 6, 854 Subject: Region United States 6, 298 Format Journal, Magazine, or Serial 4, 621 NCSU Libraries

Usability testing • 10 undergraduate students – 5 with new Endeca-based interface – 5 with old catalog interface – Identical searching tasks • Data collected – Task difficulty/failure – Task duration NCSU Libraries

Usability testing NCSU Libraries

Usability testing • For students, relevance ranking is key. – July 06 – Jan 07: ~19% continued to page 2 • Faceted navigation is intuitive, even for students who don’t use it. • Beware of library jargon – “keyword anywhere”, “keyword in subject” • User behavior is influenced by previous experience. NCSU Libraries

Reflections • Faceted navigation enables new ways to discovery resources • Library collections often contain rich descriptive metadata… exploit this! • We have much to learn about how to optimize these interfaces for the user • Great for collection analysis NCSU Libraries

Analyzing collections NCSU Libraries

Conclusions NCSU Libraries

Features Not Supported • Work level aggregations / roll-up • Customization / personalization • Folksonomies / user contributed content • Recommender functionality • Shopping cart functionality NCSU Libraries

Quick. Search NCSU Libraries

Future directions • Experiment with FRBR search/display through partnership with OCLC. • Integrate catalog w/other tools through web services: – Open. Search, RSS • Enrich catalog through external web services: – book jackets, reviews, etc. – Amazon/OCLC • Build modular shopping cart functionality. • Use Endeca to index local collections. NCSU Libraries

Big Issues • Benchmarking – Just how much better is it? For whom? When is it not better? • Natural Language – Revolutionary War problem • Experimenting – What is the optimal interface? – Power Search? NCSU Libraries

Big Wins • Relevance ranking • Speed / performance • Locally managed presentation interface • Persistent parameter based entry points • Proving it could be done NCSU Libraries