Final Reflection (IRLS675-Unit 13)

This is your final blog post. Discuss your experiences this semester and summarize what you think are the most important concepts and lessons learned:

This was a great class! I really enjoyed downloading the different digital repository programs (Drupal, DSpace, Eprints, and Omeka), working with them, and determining which would be a best fit for my collection. Having a project based on us choosing the focus is really key in getting students to invest in the project. While I chose one of these programs for my particular collection, I also know that other programs might be better suited for other types of collections. In looking at the programs, I focused mostly on usability (how easy is it to create and upload metadata), customization (how complicated is it to tailor the site to my specifications), and presentation (how good does the site look?).

I've learned several things this semester, but I found the hands-on tech assignments the most valuable part of the course and the most fun! I can now create a new virtual machine without reading the installation directions, I can troubleshoot most problems on my own, and I know that I need to take snapshots frequently (there was a situation where my building lost power and reset my computer, thus losing all of my Omeka install because I didn't save the current state).

It was a little weird taking IRLS671 at the same time since Botticelli taught that course and the management section of this course, so I often couldn't remember which course a topic was talked about in. This was kinda good in terms of connecting management and tech aspects in a holistic way. However, it was somewhat frustrating from a student perspective when completing assignments and such. It would have been better, imo, if the management part of this course just got included in 671 instead of a separate part of this course.

Pre-Installed VMs? (IRLS675-Unit 12)

Although the files are large, it’s possible to create a working virtual machine for download and playback in your Virtualization software (although in practice, it’s almost as much work and sometimes difficult to troubleshoot). In your blog, discuss the possibility of downloading a pre-installed VM versus building your own, from a learning and pedagogical perspective. Would preconfigured solutions provide more time to concentrate on the collection? Or, do you think you are losing the opportunity to learn about how a repository is structured and modified by not building it from scratch? Would you have a preference for one or the other with respect to your current computer skills and learning preferences?

I'm personally a fan of building our own systems. While it's sometimes a pain because it takes a bit of time, it's really gotten into my head how the process works (without staring at the instructions every two seconds). I value the depth of knowledge that building our own machines gives us. I would even go so far as to say that giving us pre-installed machines would be detrimental to the purpose of the DigIn program and deprive us of valuable learning experience.

Comparing Omeka, EPrints, DSpace, and Drupal (IRLS675-Unit 11)

Each program has their pros and cons. Drupal is extremely customizable, but takes some time to organize it and it looks more like a general website. DSpace's default settings lend themselves better to digital collections and looks more like a repository out of the box, but it hard to customize. EPrints didn't have a lot of music collections to use as examples and appears to need lots of customization to make it look good. Currently, I like Omeka the best because it has lots of metadata fields, looks good from a user perspective, and makes it easy to play sound files in the browser. Ease of use, customization, and look are all important to me in deciding which platform works best with my collection.

Data Harvesting (IRLS675-Unit 10)

Review the list of service providers at http://www.openarchives.org/service/listproviders.html and also http://gita.grainger.uiuc.edu/registry/services/. Review at least three or four of your choosing. Try some searches, and also see if you can identify the collections they draw from (there's usually a link somewhere to the list of contributing collections).

I chose to harvest the UCLA Archive of Popular American Music (6082 records), the Kansas City Sheet Music Collection (887 records), and the University of Illinois Library at Urbana-Champaign's Online U.S. Sheet Music Database (94304 records, omg!). It appears that they each draw only from their own collections housed in the university since I didn't find a list of providers and the items just pointed to the university pages.

In your blog, discuss what you think makes a good (useful) federated collection and why and how the service providers you selected did (or did not) create a good (useful) service. Some sites index metadata from a very large number of repositories. Why might this be a good thing? Or, why might this not be such a good thing?

There are both advantages and drawbacks to large federated collections. For instance, if you are doing a project on a certain subject, it could be useful to search across databases to get the information you need. However, with lots of data comes lots of metadata that may not always match up across collections. If a collection does not index by subject (or uses a different subject vocabulary), it may be overlooked in a subject search. Also, too many results are often hard to sift through to find exactly what you're looking for. Solid metadata (the more the merrier) and controlled vocabularies make for better federated collections. For example, the UCLA database was very complete and offered additional information in the description field. However, the other two databases offered very little other than title, creator, and date, which wasn't as useful for searching.

Catalog Record Difficulties (IRLS675-Unit 9)

Creating a catalog record is expensive -- some estimates range from $50 to well over $100 per record. It's also not easy to create good metadata that is consistent enough so that queries across repositories (or even across different catalogers) return precise results. Discuss briefly the challenges you are having cataloging your items in terms of subject listings, key words and tags, categories and other facets. How are you approaching the problem of consistency (or are you)?

Cataloguing seems easiest in Drupal so far since I can easily customize the metadata and utilize some folksonomic tagging as well. My experiences with DSpace and EPrints has been less than satisfactory due to the complex customization systems. I feel that most of my collection would be easily searchable when I have my final product, although with tags there is always the risk of misspellings and such. While I'm the sole manager of the repository, it will be fine, but it would be a lot more complex if it was open to the public. This is an area I need to think about more before creating my final repository.

EPrints Install (IRLS675-Unit 8)

I thought the EPrints install was pretty straightforward. It was faster than drupal, but slower than Dspace for me. I successfully branded my EPrints site using the second method (tried the first and it didn't work for some reason), where I edit the main file to point to my logo. I also installed the "glass" theme, but it doesn't look noticeably different, so I'm not sure if it didn't work or if it's just not very unique. So far, EPrints seems difficult to customize, mostly because of the lack of good tutorials. It seems that the EPrints online community is not as large or as dedicated to helping out new users.

Tech Savvy (IRLS675-Unit 7)

This week when trying to customize my DSpace repository, I realized how much more work I have to do to become tech savvy in this environment. I've learned a crazy amount of stuff so far in the DigIn courses, but I'm realizing now that I need to spend more time beyond/after the course to get into the advanced skills and culture of these programs. For instance, I need to brush up on my html and take it to the next level in order to create custom forms for inputting my data. I can see that this path in librarianship will be a lifelong learning experience.