Improving Library Web Services With AJAX and RSS

1
Improving Library Web Services With AJAX and RSS

• Hongbin Liu, Yale UniversityWin Shih, University
  of Colorado at Denver
• LITA National Forum 2006, Nashville, TN

2
Speaking of Library Web Services, Where Are We?

• User-friendly web site
• Usability
• Accessibility
• Analyzing user needs
• Organizing information
• Designing navigation, systems labeling and
  searching function
• Graphic design

3
Speaking of Library Web Services, Where Are We?

• Web sites with static webpages
• Database-driven websites

4
Ever Heard Web 2.0?

• What is exactly Web 2.0 anyway?
• Web 2.0 is a term often applied to a perceived
  ongoing transition of the World Wide Web from a
  collection of websites to a full-fledged
  computing platform serving web applications to
  end users. Ultimately Web 2.0 services are
  expected to replace desktop computing
  applications for many purposes.---
  en.wikipedia.org

5
Ever Heard Web 2.0?
6
Web 2.0 Has Taken Hold

• 9.5 million citations in Google
• But there's still a huge amount of disagreement
• Some people decrying it as a meaningless
  marketing buzzword
• Others accepting it as the new conventional
  wisdom.

7
Something in Common

• Tagging (Flickr, YouTube)
• User Reviews (Amazon, Netflix)
• Great User Engagement

8
Blogging

• One of the most highly touted features of the Web
  2.0 era is the rise of blogging.
• A blog is just a personal home page in diary
  format. But it drives an entirely different
  delivery, advertising and value chain.

9
Blogs in Library Sphere

• As a technology, it can be dated back as early as
  1993.
• Many libraries start to provide blogs through
  their library web sites.
• Peter Scotts list of Library weblogs
• Yale University Cushing/Whitney Medical Library

10
Blogs Library Marketing

• Whats New - Promote Library Events
• New Books, E-journal or Database
• Subject guides, new resources or web sites
• Course-specific resources
• An effective way to invite visitors to come back
  to the library website over and over again.

11
Blogs CMS Drupal

• Drupal, Plone, etc.
• aadl.org

12
Think outside of the
box

• Users dont come to visit the library website
  unless they have to.
• Fewer users come to visit the library physically.
• Fewer users visit the library website.

13
Whats Users World?

• Google
• Yahoo!
• MSN
• Myspace
• Sorry, no library.

14
From MyYahoo! to MyLibrary

• MyYahoo! 8 yearshome page personalization
• MyLibrarya user-centered, customizable
  interface to collections of library resources.
• More than three dozen libraries have implemented
  MyLibrary and similar systems.

15
Examples of MyLibrary

• MyLibrary_at_Cornell
• MyLibrary_at_NCState

16
Why MyLibrary

• The LITAs Top Technology Trends Committee noted
  in January 1999 that Library users who are Web
  users . . . expect customization, interactivity,
  and customer support.

17
Problems With MyLibrary

• Narrowly adopted
• Low percentage of users set up full profiles
• Low percentage usage of MyLibrary pages
• An irrelevant MyLibrary is a burden
• Nobody recommends if the adoption rate is less
  than 10.

18
Something New

• Google --- Google/IG Google launched its
  homepage personalization service on May 5, 2005
• Microsoft --- Start.com Microsoft launched its
  homepage personalization service on June 3, 2005

19
Google/IG

• Google/IG allows to you to personalize your
  homepage with all the news and information you
  could ever want.
• It's very similar to My Yahoo! but, it does it a
  lot better.
• Offers RSS support which means you can add any
  RSS feed to your Google/IG.

20
Start.com (Microsoft)

• Comparable to Googles IG.
• Features include
• a drag and drop interface
• easy addition of RSS feeds
• integration with Google or MSN Search.
• remove any content
• increase or decrease the number of columns
• change the basic look of the page

21
Why Personalize?

• The reason is very simple if you keep users with
  your personalized homepage, they will more likely
  come back often. In the case that they set up the
  personalized homepage as their desktop homepage,
  they surely will visit you everyday.

22
From Google/ig, Start.com to Mylibrary

• A Google/IG-like library personalized home page
• Whats behind Google/IG Start.com?

23
RSS feeds, aggregator Ajax

• What is RSS feedsRSS is a format for syndicating
  news and the content of news-like sites
• What is RSS aggregatorRSS-aware programs
• What is Ajax(Asynchronous JavaScript and XML)

24
About RSS

• Is the most significant advance in the
  fundamental architecture of the web since early
  hackers realized that CGI could be used to create
  database-backed websites.
• Allows someone to link not just to a page, but to
  subscribe to it, with notification every time
  that page changes.
• Being used to push notices of new blog entries,
  stock quotes, weather data, and photo or video
  availability.

25
About Ajax

• Not a technology in itself
• But a term refers to the use of a group of
  technologies together to create interactive web
  applications
• A key component of Web 2.0 applications such as
  Flickr, Google/ig, Basecamp.

26
About Ajax

• HTML (or XHTML) and CSS for presenting
  information
• Document Object Model manipulated through
  JavaScript to dynamically display and interact
  with the information presented
• XMLHttpRequest object to exchange data
  asynchronously with the web server. (XML is
  commonly used, although any text format will
  work, including preformatted HTML)

27
About Ajax

• Ajax applications use web browsers that support
  the above technologies as a platform to run on.
• Browsers that support these technologies include
  Mozilla, Firefox, IE, Opera, Safari, and
  Konqueror.

28
Uses of Ajax

• Real-time form data validation
• Autocompletion
• Sophisticated user interface controls
• Refreshing data on the page
• Server-side notifications

29
Pros and Cons of Ajax

• More user interactions
• Speedy at which an application runs and responds
  to user interaction.
• Rich web browsing experience.

30
Pros and Cons of Ajax

• Complexity
• Requires users to have JavaScript enabled in
  their browser.
• Debugging.
• Viewable Source.

31
Ajax is Picking up the Trend

• Many popular applications
• Google/IG, Google Mail, Google Map,
• Flickr (Yahoo!)
• Start.com (Microsoft)
• more

32
A Google/ig Style Mylibrary

• RSS feeds RSS aggregator Ajax
• "Google/ig" style Yale Medical Library

33
Conclusion

• Think from outside of the box
• Technology is a tool

34
Reference

• Tim OReilly, What Is Web 2.0 Design Patterns
  and Business Models for the Next Generation of
  Software, retrieved on August 25, 2006.
• Greg Murray, Asynchronous JavaScript Technology
  and XML (AJAX) With Java 2 Platform, Enterprise
  Edition, retrieved on August 25, 2006.

35
Questions?

• Hongbin LiuCushing/Whitney Medical Library
• Yale University
• New Haven, CT 06520-8014Hongbin.Liu_at_yale.edu203
  -785-3969
• Win Shih
• Denison Memorial Library
• University of Colorado at Denver and Health
  Sciences Center
• 4200 E. 9th Ave, A003
• Denver, CO 80262 win.shih_at_uchsc.edu303-315-864
  9