Code4Lib Journal

The new issue of the Code4Lib Journal is now available. Plenty of informative articles. For instance:

• Indexing Linked Bibliographic Data with JSON-LD, BibJSON and Elasticsearch by Thomas Johnson
• Metadata Analysis at the Command-Line by Mark Phillips
• Building a Library App Portfolio with Redis and Django by Jeremy Nelson

Code{4}lib Journal

The latest issue of the Code{4}lib Journal has some articles of interest.

HTML5 Microdata and Schema.org
Jason Ronallo

On June 2, 2011, Bing, Google, and Yahoo! announced the joint effort Schema.org. When the big search engines talk, Web site authors listen. This article is an introduction to Microdata and Schema.org. The first section describes what HTML5, Microdata and Schema.org are, and the problems they have been designed to solve. With this foundation in place section 2 provides a practical tutorial of how to use Microdata and Schema.org using a real life example from the cultural heritage sector. Along the way some tools for implementers will also be introduced. Issues with applying these technologies to cultural heritage materials will crop up along with opportunities to improve the situation.

Using VuFind, XAMPP, and Flash Drives to Build an Offline Library Catalog for Use in a Liberal Arts in Prison Program
Julia Bauder

When Grinnell College expanded its Liberal Arts in Prison Program to include the First Year of College Program in the Newton Correctional Facility, the Grinnell College Libraries needed to find a way to support the research needs of inmates who had no access to the Internet. The library used VuFind running on XAMPP installed on flash drives to provide access to the Libraries’ catalog. Once the student identified a book, it would be delivered from the Libraries to students on request. This article describes the process of getting VuFind operating in an environment with no Internet access and limited control of the computing environment.

Improving the presentation of library data using FRBR and Linked data
Anne-Lena Westrum, Asgeir Rekkavik, Kim Tallerås

When a library end-user searches the online catalogue for works by a particular author, he will typically get a long list that contains different translations and editions of all the books by that author, sorted by title or date of issue. As an attempt to make some order in this chaos, the Pode project has applied a method of automated FRBRizing based on the information contained in MARC records. The project has also experimented with RDF representation to demonstrate how an author’s complete production can be presented as a short and lucid list of unique works, which can easily be browsed by their different expressions and manifestations. Furthermore, by linking instances in the dataset to matching or corresponding instances in external sets, the presentation has been enriched with additional information about authors and works.

Presenting results as dynamically generated co-authorship subgraphs in semantic digital library collections
James Powell, Tamara M. McMahon, Ketan Mane, Laniece Miller, Linn Collins

Semantic web representations of data are by definition graphs, and these graphs can be explored using concepts from graph theory. This paper demonstrates how semantically mapped bibliographic metadata, combined with a lightweight software architecture and Web-based graph visualization tools, can be used to generate dynamic authorship graphs in response to typical user queries, as an alternative to more common text-based results presentations. It also shows how centrality measures and path analysis techniques from social network analysis can be used to enhance the visualization of query results. The resulting graphs require modestly more cognitive engagement from the user but offer insights not available from text.

On Dentographs, A New Method of Visualizing Library Collections
William Denton

A dentograph is a visualization of a library’s collection built on the idea that a classification scheme is a mathematical function mapping one set of things (books or the universe of knowledge) onto another (a set of numbers and letters). Dentographs can visualize aspects of just one collection or can be used to compare two or more collections. This article describes how to build them, with examples and code using Ruby and R, and discusses some problems and future directions.

Code4Lib Journal

Issue 13 of the Code4Lib Journal has been published. Partial contents:

• ISBN and QR Barcode Scanning Mobile App for Libraries
  Graham McCarthy and Sally Wilson
  This article outlines the development of a mobile application for the Ryerson University Library. The application provides for ISBN barcode scanning that results in a lookup of library copies and services for the book scanned, as well as QR code scanning. Two versions of the application were developed, one for iOS and one for Android. The article includes some details on the free packages used for barcode scanning functionality. Source code for the Ryerson iOS and Android applications are freely available, and instructions are provided on customizing the Ryerson application for use in other library environments. Some statistics on the number of downloads of the Ryerson mobile app by users are included.
  
  
• Using Web Services for a Mobile OPAC
  Denis Galvin and Mang Sun
  The purpose of this paper is to discuss the creation and intended evolution of the Rice University mobile online public access catalog (OPAC). The focus of the article is on how SirsiDynix’s Symphony Web Services can be used to create a mobile OPAC.
  
  
• Look What We Got! How Inherited Data Drives Decision-Making: UNC-Chapel Hill’s 19th-Century American Sheet Music Collection
  Renée McBride
  Have you inherited a digital collection containing valuable, but inconsistent metadata? And wondered how to transform it into a usable, quality resource while accepting that it can’t meet your idea of perfection? This article describes such an experience at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Library with its CONTENTdm-based 19th-Century American Sheet Music Collection, addressing issues such as field construction, the use of controlled vocabularies, development of a project data dictionary, and metadata clean-up.
  
  
• From ISIS to CouchDB: Databases and Data Models for Bibliographic Records
  Luciano Ramalho
  For decades bibliographic data has been stored in non-relational databases, and thousands of libraries in developing countries still use ISIS databases to run their OPACs. Fast forward to 2010 and the NoSQL movement has shown that non-relational databases are good enough for Google, Amazon.com and Facebook. Meanwhile, several Open Source NoSQL systems have appeared.

Related articles

• The Code4Lib Journal - Issue 13 (journal.code4lib.org)
• Applying Lessons from 8 Things We Hate About IT to Libraries (journal.code4lib.org)

Latest Code4Lib Journal

The fourth issue of Code4Lib Journal is now available. Articles include:

• Auto-Populating an ILL form with the Serial Solutions Link Resolver API by Daniel Talsky
• Mining Data from ISI Web of Science Reports by Alfred Kraemer
• Unveiling Jangle: Untangling Library Resources and Exposing them through the Atom Publishing Protocol by Ross Singer and James Farrugia
• LibraryH3lp: A New Flexible Chat Reference System by Pam Sessoms and Eric Sessoms
• OpenBook WordPress Plugin: Open Source Access to Bibliographic Data by John Miedema
• The Library Search Engine: A Smart Solution for Integrating Resources Beyond Library Holdings b y Karin Herm and Sibylle Volz
• BOOK REVIEW: Two Books about FRBR, Compared by Christine Schwartz

Code4Lib Journal

The 2nd issue of Code4Lib Journal is now available. Plenty of good articles.

Code4Lib Journal

The Code4Lib Journal has released the first issue. Lots of good stuff there.

• Beyond OPAC 2.0: Library Catalog as Versatile Discovery Platform by Tito Sierra, Joseph Ryan, and Markus Wust
• Facet-based search and navigation with LCSH: Problems and opportunities by Kelley McGrath
• Communicat: The Next Generation Catalog That Almost Was… by Ross Singer

Are just some of the papers.