Evaluation of an Integrated Library System

DOST come up with a system that would provide a single entry point to all library collections and to other information within the DOST System, ScINET-Phil Integrated Library Management System is developed. The system is in accordance with the international standards, specifically based on USMARC formats. It aims to create a Library system that will possess the combined features of ISIS and ILMS library system that are being used today by most agencies in DOST.

DOST-ScINET-PHIL Integrated Library Management System (SILMS) is a consortium of all the libraries and information centers under the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), including the regional offices and some of the Provincial S&T Centers (PSTCs). It composed of 21 agencies under the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).

It seeks to organize and coordinate the information sourcing and sharing in the DOST system. Its general objective is to promote and improve the flow and use of science and technology (S&T) information through resource sharing and networking.

DOST-ScINET-PHIL Integrated Library Management System (SILMS) is composed of 6 modules, namely:

Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC)
Acquisitions Module
Library Holdings Management/ Cataloging Module
Patron Management Module
Ciculation Management Module
Admin and Security Management Module

Here are some of the screen shots of each modules to give you an idea what it looks like.

Front Module

OPAC Module

Acquisition Module

Circulation Mgmt Module

Holdings Module

Library Holdings Module

Patron Module

Press Release Module

Evaluation:

Cost – As part of DOST I could say that were lucky enough because we don’t have to worry about buying an Integrated Library System because DOST provide us an Integrated Library System for our library and it’s called DOST-ScINET-PHIL Integrated Library Management System (SILMS). In the case of cost of hardware and other PC components, in my opinion it wouldn’t be a problem since our own agency and other agencies as well have computers in their own libraries and it meet the specific requirements for the installation of the SILMS Software

 

Maintenance – For the orientation, training, configuration and installation of the SILMS software, DOST particularly STII staff is the one in charge in doing that for all other DOST agencies and if any problems occurred we can contact them anytime to assists us in our needs. Although it will take some time before they could respond because DOST-STII main office is in Bicutan and Quezon City based will have to wait for awhile for their assistance.

 

Ease of Use/Friendliness – PHIVOLCS SILMS is just newly installed in our library, just a month ago, I managed to browse its interface and I could say that its easy to manipulate and navigate with just a slight problem, it has too many drop down boxes that I need to fill up and understand its functionality. Some of the drop down boxes are useful some are not, so if you don’t know its functionality, you’ll end up filling it up with information that is not needed.

 

Accessibility -  Anyone can access the SILMS OPAC because its web based and it will be helpful to the users’ who want to make sure that the item they want is available in the library and at the same time they know where to find the item, especially in DOST System where mostly of the agencies are based in Bicutan and if any case the item you want is not available in Bicutan based agencies and its available in Quezon City based agencies it’s a  waste of time to go to Bicutan because you thought the item was there and in the end the it’s not there and its available in Quezon City based, so online SILMS OPAC would be very helpful.

 

Modules – When it comes to modules and sub modules, all of them where installed all at once, we don’t have to worry about buying other modules and sub modules because all of them where installed.

 

All in all in terms of performance, the system as a whole received good marks.

Laguna’s Dayout!?!

Critique on the use of web-based information retrieval system.

Looking for information in the web is becoming a habit for internet users. The effectiveness of the web was challenge by the its size and heterogeneity over traditional information retrieval. Variety of information is available through web although your not sure about its content, validity and the quality of information you will find in the web unless it come from a reliable web source like proquest and other database.

The information that you found on the web come from all over the world and distributed all over the world. Another thing anyone can access and edit the information on the web that is why the content of the web is sometimes questionable. The frequency is another factor because one moment you saw the information that you want the next day its gone or sometimes its hard to look for it in the web.

The good thing about web is its easy to access and the instant information it can provide, like what they say “just a click away”. If you have internet to your house or a nearest computer shop you can have the information that you want right away instead of going to library and browse the books and journal one by one.

One has to remember the difference between reliable and unreliable information distributed all over the web by means of information sharing, seeing that anyone can publish on the web, it is essential to evaluate the credibility of the information distributed in the web before using it.

In my personal experience i only used web when I’m looking for basic information but when I’m doing a research or a paper i see to it that aside from the web i also get to take a look or at least read a book about the topic i want to know, reading a book, journals or dissertation about a certain topic will help you to have a full grasp of the things that you wanna know instead of the web. Web information retrieval is one way of the finding information in easiest way but when its comes to validity and quality of the information it provides, I’m not quite sure about that.

Critique on the use of online and digital media

Using the two most effective and popular information sources such as CD-ROM and online search services have corresponding advantages and disadvantages. CD-ROM has progress into a cheap, easy to use and powerful depository for all kinds of multimedia information. . Ease of use for CD-ROM is one of its key features, and because CD-ROM endow with speed and high capacity, custom-designed user interface can readily be applied to simply data access to the point that a pre-schooler can easily use it and it became one of the hottest in the market. Buying a CD-ROM is as simply buying a magazine or book unlike online.

 

 

The difficulty of using CD-ROM is disc are static and unchanging, their content rapidly becomes outdated. Another one is from the fact that user must have a computer and a CD-ROM reader in the location where on wants to use the information on the disc, this means that the information is not portable and it can only be used where the CD-ROM player is available. One more thing only one user can used and access information on the disc.

 

Online services on the other hand, have boosted its reputation by offering up-to-minute access to massive libraries and news feeds. The emergence of online services is one of the big success stories in the new media. The appeal of its services is unlimited that’s why Bill Gates called it “information at your fingertips”. The information offered in online services is more current compared to CD-ROM that’s why people preferred them than CD-ROM.

 

The ongoing restraint of online services is it is expensive and finding relevant information online is often frustrating and time consuming. The difficulty of accessing online search services is because it works on subscription basis and to get information online you must subscribe to a service in advance. Added to that is sometimes the service provider of the online search service is so slow.

 

I used CD-ROM when I’m looking for a specific topic because looking for information on the topic that I want online can be tedious, since there are tons of information out there and of course looking each one of them can be time consuming unlike CD-ROM. What I don’t like about CD-ROM in my own personal opinion is its interface many said that online interface is much more difficult than CD-ROM but on my part I disagree on those findings, for me I find online interface much easier to use than CD-ROM.

 

Forum on the Effective Searching Strategies and a CRITIQUE!

Title: Strategies in Effective Searching of Information

Speaker: Dr. Angelina P. Resurreccion

Date: July 16, 2008

Abstract of the seminar:

The forum is about providing strategies and techniques when searching information on the web and at the same time provideng examples of online sites that are useful and credible when searching for information on the net.

Reaction:

Based on the title of the forum, Im excited because I’ll definetely will be learning something new and I bet it will be extremely useful specially now that I currently taking up my Master’s, so having to know the searching teachniques when looking for information is reallly helpful, but I end up being disappointed, though im really sorry to say that, all of those things that she discussed is, we already know and the forum just become a refresher to all of us.

I have to admit that I didn’t learn anything new from that forum, some of us are talking about our class LIS 260, teaching us about new technologies like web 2.0, library 2.0, etc and she’s lecturing the things that we already know, those things were taught to us when we were undergraduate students. I have to emphasize that during the open forum, she couldn’t give a proper answer to a simple question, even us know the answer to the question but I guess she don’t know how to answer it, or maybe explain it to us.

All in all, its still good to have a refresher of the things you learned before, I guess I expect more from her that’s why in the end I didn’t get what I expect. Well I do get to have some new sites to visits, thanks to her.

My top 3 web 2.0 technologies that can be used in the libraries!

The first on my lists is…

RSS – which stands for Rich Site Summary, I choose this because, this type of technology will help the librarians to alert patron to new acquisitions, library events, exhibitions, changes in hours, etc, with this kind of technology librarians becomes instant publisher in easiest way.

Libraries that have RSS in their sites, can used it to connect their subscriber to feeds the sites that library harvested like providing links  to the web that is useful and appropriate to the interest of the users. Having RSS in the library is the users don’t have to log in to the site to look for the information that they want. The benefit of having this technology is the information is fed right away instead of waiting for another day to have it. 

Libraries are starting to discover that RSS is one way of providing new services as soon as possible and reaching out to the patrons.

RSS can be created in the libraries in variety of ways like:

New addition to the library catalogs

New programs/events in the libraries

Press release and media advisories

Library closing, including emergency closing

Library job opening

Subscribe to a few professional RSS feeds and share with library staff on the library intranet.

Second to my list is…

Podcasts

It will be nice to used this kind of technology to dissiminate news and information, can be used for library tours so the students would not be bored on listening to the speaker, Story hours for kids it’s a new way of telling kids a story.

Podcasts can also be used

1.       Promoting the library – this will help the library to promote their new materials.

2.       You can also used podcasts for book reviews and reading incentive programs overviews.

3.       Sharing school news, librarian can used this technology to disseminate information and to increase community involvement beyond the library walls.

 

And last but not the least is…

Youtube – hoping that this kind of technology used in libraries will build a good relationship. If you want to reach the mass with less effort and easy way YOUTUBE would be one of the perfect technologies to use. Want the distance education to know what libraries look at and what’s in your collection the answer again to this question is YOUTUBE. YouTube is the most popular internet television or video distribution site on the Internet

Youtube is for free so anyone can upload video clips and share them with friends, family and the whole world. YouTube is a social software application that could drastically transform how we look at library instruction and training . . . if we let it

Using this technology to promote your library is amazing. It has a feature that allows you to add a video to a blog, or it allows you to send video to a cell phone so the access is so easy.

On top, when you add new material to the site, it can be set up to notify the patron of your new material immediately. There is also an RSS feed to notify patrons of new content. You could also make tutorials to teach your students how to use databases and put them on YouTube and make a link of the video to your website so anyone can view it and it will also help in  promoting your library.

The 3 web 2.0 technologies that I choose show that this type of technologies can be used to help develop libraries, provide services, and meet the needs of the users. Do not be frightened to use and try this service to improve your library. This is so far an additional way of directing the patron back to the main resources we provide for them, letting them know that the library is able to keep up with the 21st century.

What is Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and Librarian 2.0

Title of the Article: What is Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and Librarian 2.0

Author:

Publisher:

URL:

            www.LibraryCrunch.com

            www.Wikipedia.com

            www.Squidoo.com

            www.zephoria.org

            www.tametheweb.com

 

Abstract of the article:

 

Where living in the world where information continuous to grow and continually evolving technology, web rapidly changing and when web 2.0 is introduced some of the people are not fully aware of it. Some of us didn’t know that these have been around for sometime and we just have to used and understand them to be able to use them properly. Web 2.0 is about making information available to local social contexts and giving people the flexibility to find, organize, share and create information that is readily accessible (zephoria.org). Library 2.0 it’s  about embracing those ideas and technologies that can assist libraries in delivering services to these groups, and its about participation – - involving users in service creation and evaluation, its also an operating model that allows libraries to respond rapidly to market needs (squidoo.com). While Librarian 2.0 is the guru of the information age and the “strategy guide” for helping users find information, gather knowledge and create content.

 

           

Three things I learned from my Reading Assignment:

 

 

1. I realized that the sites I often visited like wikis, blogs and youtube are called Web 2.0 and there’s such thing as Librarian 2.0 and Library 2.0.

 

2. I learned that when I’m blogging or leaving a comment on some blogs, I didn’t realized that I’m actually sharing some information to other people that might benefit them, and the way I shared the information, you can actually called it web 2.0.

 

3. Web 2.0 also is a way of information sharing, a communication and collaboration between two or more people, it’s a different way of sharing information the way it was before like within the library walls (i.e. borrowing books and asking information from librarians). 

 

 

Implications of the new things I learned to my work/ to me as a person:

 

1. Implication of what I read to me as person is I have to have some traits of librarian 2.0 so I can be a good strategy guide to the users, I read that there are traits that librarian 2.0 must have like librarian plans for their users so I have to plan and made some proposals for services, materials and outreach on user needs and wants.

2. To my work, I realized that our library must now embark on using web 2.0 applications we if want to prove that we are just as relevant like other information providers and we need to start on delivering information and services that meet the modern user’s expectations.

3. I agree on what Jenny Levine said that by using web 2.0 applications don’t mean that we have to abandon traditional way of providing information to the users in the library it only means that were just adding some interactive features that lets the users contribute and collaborate with us. It means using tools and protocols the rest of the world using so that we can integrate into their environments, not forcing them to conform to ours. 

Boolean Search & Retrieval

Title of the Article: Boolean; Boolean Search & Retrieval

Author:

Publisher:

URL: www.wikipedia.com

          www.about.com

          http://searchenginewatch.com

 

Abstract of the article:

 

           

Using World Wide Web / Internet when looking for certain information can be tedious because you have to browse each information that search engine retrieve and analyze which one suit your information needs but by using Boolean Operators like AND, OR and NOT make searching less mind-numbing and at the same time you have more control over the precisions of the searches. Boolean OR by using this operator it will retrieve records in which AT LEAST ONE of the search terms is present. Boolean AND, in this search, it will retrieve records in which BOTH of the search terms are present and Boolean NOT will retrieve records in which ONLY ONE of the terms is present.

 

 

Three things I learned from my Reading Assignment:

 

 

1. Internet contain vast information but by using Boolean operators it can sharpen the focus of your research and searcher can more precisely describe exactly what information is needed.
2. Boolean operators are somewhat precise and this offers the searcher greater control and transparency over what is retrieved and at the same time what information matches their query and what is not.
3. Boolean operators help lessen the tedious task of locating information in a database.

 

Implications of the new things I learned to my work/ to me as a person:

 

1. As a person, I’m now familiar with the effective ways of searching the net in less tedious ways.
2. In my line of work this reading assignment taught me the ways of implementing each of the Boolean operators on the search engine that i used so that I could find more relevant information.
3. By using Boolean operators when I’m looking for certain information it either widen or narrow the search categories it retrieve, it’s a good thing in some ways because I’ll have enough information to browse but at the same time it’s a waste of time, so I could say that it has its advantages and disadvantages when using Boolean operators.

 

Inside a computer – how it works!

Title of the Article: Inside the computer – how it works

Author: Morley, Deborah and Parker, Charles.

Publisher: Thomson Course Technology

URL:

American Heritage Dictionary.com

Wikipedia.com

Understanding Computers 11^th ed. (book)

Abstract of the article:

Computer is a device that receives, processes, and presents information. It has four primarily operations which are Input (data encoding into the computer) Processing (performing operations on the data) Output (presenting results) and Storage (data can be permanently stored here and for future used).

Computers consists of several different units which each have their own special function and these are CPU (Central Processing Unit, a logic machine that can execute computer programs), Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU)a digital circuit that performs arithmetic and logical operations. The ALU is a fundamental building block of the central processing unit (CPU) of a computer. Memory (A computer’s memory can be viewed as a list of cells into which numbers can be placed or read) and Input/Output (I/O),I/O is the means by which a computer receives information from the outside world and sends results back. Devices that provide input or output to the computer are called peripherals .

Three things I learned from my Reading Assignment:

1. I learned that computer is defined as a programmable electronic device that accepts data, performs operations on that data, presents the results, and can store the data or results as needed.

2. Computers plays a major part in our daily lives, we live in the world where everything that we do involves using computer or communication devices.

3. Computers are everywhere, some computers can be used as telephone, television, stereo and computers with the help of Internet make our daily jobs easy like paying bills on line, buying things on line, plan vacation, email, check news and weather report and everything.

Implications of the new things I learned to my work/ to me as a person:

1. I realized that sometimes its impossible to do some work without computer being involved in the process, for the main reason that it makes our job less tedious and m,ore easier with the help of this kind of technology.

2. Implication of computer to my work is so big, it makes my work easier and faster, not only in performing library tasks like cataloging but it also helps me in doing some research, some paper works, presentation and other things.

Evaluation of Information Retrieval System

Title of the Article: Evaluation of Information Retrieval System

Author:

Publisher:

URL:nlp.stanford.edu/IR-book/pdf/08eval.pdf

http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/Keith/pdf/Chapter1.pdf

Journal of the American Society for Information Science. 50(12): 1051-1063, 1999.

Abstract of the article:

The need to store and retrieve written information became increasingly important over centuries, after the computers were invented people realized that they could be used for storing and retrieving amounts of information. IRS helps the users to retrieve information from a wide range of information collection.

The most common issue in IRS is the relevance of the information it retrieve because relevance is the attribute or criterion reflecting the effectiveness of exchange of information between people (i.e. Users) and IRS in communication contacts based on valuation by people (JASIS,1999). Another issue raised in IRS is the effectiveness of the information retrieve and it is measured in terms of precision (the proportion of retrieved information which are relevant) and recall (the proportion of relevant information retrieved.

Three things I learned from my Reading Assignment:

1. With the advent of computers, it became possible to store amounts of information and finding useful information from such collections became necessity that’s why we need IRS to provide access to books, journals and other document

2. It helps me to determine ways on how to teach and inform others on how to use them.

3. The traditional ways of evaluating IRS relies on the measures of recall and precision for assessment of system effectiveness.

Implications of the new things I learned to my work/ to me as a person:

1. Knowing how to evaluate IRS help me to understand how to build a better IRS for our institution and at the same time meet the needs of our employees and other users outside our institution.

2. The articles that i read raised some issues regarding the effectiveness and relevance of the information provided by IRS and because of those key issues it help me to realized that i still need to evaluate our institution IRS and raised some questions like – does our IRS provide the needs of the users, does our IRS provide relevant documents that satisfy the query of the searchers and other things.