"...Then Success is Sure"

"All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure."

Mark Twain

Rare Book Exhibit Meeting As promised, we had our Rare Book Exhibit Meeting. Both my coworker and I showed Michelia examples of virtual exhibits we liked. We decided to forge ahead with the interactive presentation/PowerPoint examples we had. Now that that’s settled, we start on the actual doing. Because my coworker is in charge of the Rare Book Collection and has a more intimate knowledge of the contents, she’ll be compiling the content. I’ll work on the technical aspects like creating the website/PowerPoint, etc. I’m excited to get started! I’m sure some staff will be happy to interact with some of our collection virtually. 

Rare Book Database Update As of the end of this week, I have upload a total of 2975 images which equals a total of 138 books. 

They Published Where?!: Analyzing Faculty Publications for Scholarly Communications Assessment I watched another on-demand video from the 2020 ER&L Conference. This one was about predatory publishers. It was a great introduction to analyzing various publishers. The presenter also shared some of their top resources to use when looking into whether or not a publisher may or may not be legitimate. 

2020 koha-US Annual Conference September 22-24 was the koha-US Conference. I watched a few sessions as I was able. There was a session on the second day that walked through the steps of the advanced editor. Though, I don’t catalog all that often, I think it would be impressive to go into the advanced cataloger and type in things like I know what I’m doing. But since I don’t, know what I’m doing that is, I watched the session. It seems pretty easy and I think the term “advanced” is a bit of a misnomer. I think the more you use it, the more you understand how it works and the faster you get with the keyboard shortcuts. I also watched a session titled, Very Very Basic jQuery. Though I don’t particularly know what I would need to use jQuery for in koha, the session was helpful because I’ve never used jQuery in my life and the presenter did a very good job of breaking it down. 

Introduction to R for Libraries Part 1 This week was a week of webinars, I guess. I watched the first in a three-part series on using the statistical software R for libraries. My boss asked me last week if I was familiar with the program. Though I had heard of it in undergrad, I never had the chance to actually use it. She’s interested in seeing if R can help make sense of the different reports from COUNTER4 and COUNTER5 where the data is structured differently. I reached out to an old professor and she said that she did think R would be able to do what we are looking for. So even though my boss is in charge of the reporting and all that I wanted to look further into it. I stumbled across this webinar and thought, “what a coincidence - let’s watch”. The presenter is very good. He explains all the parts of the software, what they do, what they might be used for, etc. He even made handouts and...can I just say, swoon? There is nothing more exciting than a well-done presentation. I still need to watch the other two sessions to get a better understanding of how he specifically uses the software for his library though. 

Online Together koha-US 2020 Conference

 

Today is Day 2 of the koha-US virtual conference. I just finished watching the Catalogers, Advance! session and I'm very excited to add and use a macro. I haven't used the Advanced Editor in koha because I'm very intimidated. But I do love me some keyboard shortcuts. Though, I don’t catalog all that often, I think it would be impressive to go into the advanced cataloger and type in things like I know what I’m doing. But since I don’t, know what I’m doing that is, I watched the session. It seems pretty easy and I think the term “advanced” is a bit of a misnomer. I think the more you use it, the more you understand how it works and the faster you get with the keyboard shortcuts. 

I also watched a session titled, Very Very Basic jQuery. Though I don’t particularly know what I would need to use jQuery for in koha, the session was helpful because I’ve never used jQuery in my life and the presenter did a very good job of breaking it down.

"Action has Magic, Grace, and Power in It"

 

"Whatever you think you can do or believe you can do, begin it.
Action has magic, grace, and power in it." 

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 

Reference Interview This week I had a patron come into the library looking for our collection of Linux Journals. I asked them if they were looking for a particular article and they told me that they just wanted to browse the magazines. When we found the journals, I again asked them if there was something specific they were looking for. They then told me that they were going to be in charge of troubleshooting Linux computers. They were trying to get some basic knowledge on Linux and wanted to so some research prior. I told them about our O’Reilly eBooks & Learning Platform that sounded perfect for the type of research they were looking for. Our O’Reilly account gives staff access to ebooks on UX, computer languages, and more and has online video tutorials as well. Before they left the library, I told them that I had created an O’Reilly account for them so that they could see the books and videos available. I also told them that if they did find a book on Linux that they were interested in but that we didn’t have, we could also request material through interlibrary loan. This was one of my first chances to really dig into what a patron was really looking for. It also helped solidify the fact that many people think they know what they want, but aren’t aware of the many offerings available to them that might be better suited for their needs. This interaction also made me feel more confident in the fact that even though I don’t know what a lot of staff members are doing here (I can’t add without a calculator), I do know ways in which to help them achieve their goals. 

Rare Book Database This week I worked on adding subjects to the Rare Book database. I looked up each book’s call number in the Library of Congress and used the main subject to divide them easily. Those that had more specific subjects were added as well. And of course, photographing the books has continued. 

Book Club Once a month the library has a Book Club meetup. Because of the pandemic, we have been doing them virtually. This month was an open book month where attendees were able to discuss any and all books that they have been reading in their free time. And boy do some of these people read and have a lot of free time. I have a hard time reading two books at once. I don’t like doing it because then I’ll get my plots and characters mixed up. But there were people in Book Club who are reading like 10 books, it felt like. Going round-robin took up a little over the hour allotted, but it was really interesting to hear what people are reading and what they are learning as a result of their reading. 

Video Tutorial This week I finished, and submitted, a video transcript for editing. The tutorial, Using the My Tools Features in ASTM Compass will show staff the tools available on the ASTM Compass platform that might make their research and collaboration easier. Bookmarking, adding annotations, and tracking standards changes are all discussed in the tutorial. 

Primo As I mentioned before, one of my tasks was cataloging IHS Engineering Workbench standards into Koha so that they would show up in Primo. About halfway of inputting all the records, we realized that they were not showing up in Primo because I wasn’t inputting an 001 field. Once we figured that out we asked ByWater to create a way to automatically fill the 001 field with the biblio number that is produced after the record is saved. ByWater was able to do that so when I went to search an IHS standard this week, I was expecting to see it in the search results. But surprise! The standards still were not showing up. I reached out to my boss and we had a quick meeting about it. After some digging, My boss found that I hadn’t put an indicator in the 856 field. She manually added a 4 to a record and now we wait until our records get harvested and uploaded to Primo. We should know by next week if this is indeed the issue. If it is, then I assume we can ask ByWater to once again run a batch operation to add the “4” indicator to the 856 field. I would then go into my IHS EW framework and add the “4” as a default entry so that next time it will already be filled in and ready for input. 

IEEE Xplore Webinar: Search Strategies to Optimize Your Research Time This week I watched a webinar on the IEEE Xplore platform. I haven’t used the platform before but I know that this platform will be one that I should create a video tutorial for so I wanted to be ahead of the game and learn tips, tricks, and the basics in preparation. This webinar was so good. The presenter knew what she was talking about, was a great speaker, and the whole presentation was just done so well. There were a few things that seemed really cool about the platform like being able to download equations and it is easy to see what kind of content is trending. 

OpenAthens Odysseys: Implementation Challenges & Lessons Learned at Texas Medical Center Library & University of Toledo This webinar was originally presented at the ER&L 2020 Conference earlier this year but I recently signed up for free access to their videos. I decided to watch this one because we will be moving to OpenAthens later in the year and I wanted to hear what some other organizations had to say about the process. The biggest takeaway for me was to expect it to take longer. The two organizations' timelines for implementation seemed doable. But then you see just how long the process actually took and you go...Oh. Though in fairness the two organizations are much larger than SwRI is and have many more accounts so I’m sure that had a big part in how smoothly the implementation went. 

"Nothing Contributes so Much to Tranquilize the Mind"

Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash

"Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose."

Mary Shelley 

Rare Book Collection After resolving the issues of the database last week, this week I spent my time correctly uploading images as their own records. As of today, I have uploaded 1,980 images representing 100 books. Not quite halfway, but close. I also decided to add author portraits so that users can put a face to a name. 

A coworker is currently compiling a bibliography of the entire collection, so when she is finished I’ll be able to simply paste the author biographies into the database. She is also writing summaries on the importance of the book itself which can then be added to the database as well. 

Airtable’s layout is not conducive to fields with long text. Long titles, author biographies, and summaries are shown in part and include an ellipsis to indicate to the user that not all the information is visible. However, Airtable does allow for expanded records. When a user clicks on a tile, the expanded view will show all the information contained within the fields. Because of this feature, I am considering creating cover images that include the complete book title so users can quickly find books of interest. 

For the public gallery, the fields that will be visible to users are: Book Title, Author, Author Portrait, Birth-Death Date, Author Biography, Year Published, Publisher, Book Importance, Subject, Language, and Book Images. 

Rare Book Exhibit Last week, my boss told me and a coworker that we would have a meeting later in September to discuss ideas on creating a virtual exhibit. During normal (non-COVID) times, the library partners with a staff member to create an exhibit highlighting the importance of the rare book collection. The presentation usually focuses on a few books important in their field and that have had an impact on staff’s research and projects. Because many staff are still working-from-home, we are brainstorming ideas to bring a virtual experience to those not on campus.

I did a quick Google search of virtual exhibits and found that they run the gamut. Museums and exhibits in Google Arts & Culture are very well done. These are usually very well-known institutions. Then, there are other exhibits that are created with website platforms such as Squarespace and WordPress. Still others are a simple text-and-image webpage, no fancy scripts included. With everyone having to think creatively, there are many inspirations to draw from. 

One that particularly caught my attention was a YouTube video tutorial on how to get your students to create an interactive presentation using Google Slides. It was so cool! I played around with PowerPoint and found that the same idea could be applied. I have created a demo presentation for our meeting. Though the interactive PDF might not be selected for the final presentation, I’m thrilled to have learned a new tool for creating more interesting presentations. 

"Without Work One Finishes Nothing"

"Without work, one finishes nothing." 
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Scopus Certification After six weeks of video tutorials, modules, and quizzes, I have completed my Scopus Certification. Yay! I dabbled in Scopus before the course so that I could create video tutorials, however, the course did help put realistic scenarios into context. For example, I knew that Scopus allowed one to compare sources but being able to concretely say that one can decide where to publish by comparing sources is a more specific example of use. I also liked that Scopus provided one-sheets for various audiences. Though some of the audiences aren’t relevant to SwRI, it still helps to see examples of outcomes that can be tailored to specific users. The course was very helpful overall. I was only slightly disappointed that the API module wasn’t more detailed but I know that they are a beast in their own right. It wouldn’t be fair to expect everyone taking the course to have the background knowledge of APIs to dive deeply into them. The course gave great examples of API use and even highlighted developer tutorials and examples for further research. 

LibGuides Analytics SwRI has its own special fiscal calendar with subperiods that I won’t claim to understand but that I liken to broadcast calendars. August 28th was the end of another month which means that this week I ran my LibGuides asset statistics. Each video tutorial I create gets uploaded to LibGuides as an asset along with the transcripts. At the end of each month, I run a report to see which tutorials were viewed the most during the month. This month, the featured video tutorial was How to Save Searches & Set Alerts in Google Scholar so it’s probably no surprise that it had the most views. My Getting Started with ASTM Compass video was approved, so that was also uploaded to LibGuides this week. 

1:1 Meeting My boss and I had our 1:1 meeting on Tuesday where we discussed course expectations, project updates, and any other issues or concerns. She mentioned that we will have a meeting later in September to discuss ways to showcase a virtual rare book exhibit. Brainstorming activated.

Rare Book Database I worked on the database side of the Rare Book Collection this week. I am using Airtable to catalog and showcase the Rare Book Collection. While looking through the gallery, I noticed that the images were not in the correct order. I want users to get as close to a “real” experience as possible so I want the images to display spine, front cover, pages front to back, then the back cover. However, the images were not correctly ordered in the database. I started to manually rearrange the images but quickly decided that there had to be an easier way of automating the task. After some Googling, I saw that unordered uploading was a common problem in Airtable. However, someone had created a script that could be run to automatically sort the image field. On the discussion thread, I noticed that someone mentioned it was bad practice to upload multiple images to one record. They stated that all images should be its own record and should then be linked to the relevant record. At first, I didn’t think this practice relevant to our purposes for the database but upon further reflection, I came to the conclusion that the user had a valid point. 

By uploading each image as its own record and then linking it to a relevant record, all records (and the data within them) would be more organized. Also, by uploading each image as its own record - new collections could be created easily without having to reupload the same image. For example, to get the database up and running I want to link all of a book’s images to the Book Title table. But if we ever wanted to create a new collection (such as Scientific Illustrations), all we would need to do is link the image record that is already in the database to a new parent record. 

This new system of organization meant that I had ended up deleting a table and creating a new one called Edited Images. The table, Public Book Gallery is now linked to the tables Edited Images and Author Info. By linking in this manner, any changes made to the Author Info table gets automatically updated in the Public Book Gallery. And by having the Edit Images table, at any point in the future, a new table can be created and easily linked to the images for a new gallery. 

With one problem solved, I then set about uploading all the images I had previously deleted to the newly created Edited Images table. However, when I started linking them I noticed that I had problems in my original naming convention. I have been naming images Book Title page number or identifier (e.g. Micromagentics p4; Micromagnetics title page). This created problems because the title page usually ends up being the last image when sorted alphabetically. To remedy this, I looked up ways in which I could quickly and easily sequentially rename all files in a folder. I found an easy way to perform the task in Windows. However, the task meant that all images would be renamed to the same title and a sequential number would be added to the end (e.g. Micromagnetics 1; Micromagentics 2). Renaming all of the images in this manner would make uploading to Airtable quick and easy. 

However, renaming the images in this way would make it more difficult for staff to find appropriate photos. Though my original naming convention can use some work, staff can search the folder for keywords (e.g. text, figures, plate). I feel that being able to search for features of the images is an important component of the collection. This means that the sequential renaming shortcut would not work in the situation. To solve the problem I have renamed the image with a digit leader (e.g. 01 - Micromagnetics title page; 02 - Micromagentics p4). This naming convention is not the prettiest but will allow the images to be sorted numerically so that they end up showing in the order I want them to. 

Thankfully, Airtable allows the primary field to be a formula. With some Googling, I applied a formula to the primary field that keeps the imported image name. Grouped by a feature (such as book title) and then sorted alphabetically, the images can be linked in the appropriate order. And because the original name also contains features of the image, one can search the database with a keyword and will still be able to yield relevant results.