Friday, November 03, 2006

ECIUG '06: Beyond the OPAC - Providing Additional Avenues to the Catalogue

Mike Cunningham
Web Services Librarian
Cambridge Public Library
  • web sites vs. opacs...how to drive traffic to your opac and within opac
  • RSS feeds, php with mysqul database
  • create lists for new items, export to text file, delete field names, save as ANSI, opne in phpmyadmin...etc...
  • opac enrichment and reviews...link new movies to imdb...embed relevant booklists from an extrenal ColdFusion aplication
  • can reference external javascript files in botlogo wwwoptions...all automated links, slicker than Syndetics
  • reviews incorporated into opac...also kids' and teens' sites
  • in-house build reviews system...cheaper / simpler than iii's
  • can also use javascript to remove stuff from the opac, for eg. "kill call # linking" which confuses patrons...removes the hyperlink tag...nice!
  • alternate opac search via z39.50 (eg. Ann Arbour, Plymouth State...OPAC massaged in to a wordpress format...slick)
  • Hot Items list at AADL...criteria = # of holds...John Blyber's blog comment re analyzing holds...didn't work for Cambridge...used "view outstanding holds", then:
    • sent to email
    • save email as text
    • Perl script
    • retrieve bib # and # of holds
    • online form
    • Cold Fusion
    • access d-base
  • Book cover browser...nice...
    • inspiration from itunes' cd cover browse
    • used Yahoo Carosel and Reflections JS
    • hot book cover browser...purple eye icon on "new books, cds, and more" page...check it out here
  • thankfully, Cambridge is all about SHARING...has policy to share code for all this nifty stuff
  • see his complete presentation here
  • check out Mike's blog

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