I don't think that's an abuse. I consider <dlf:holdings> to be for
information about a "holdingset", or some collection of "items", while
<dlf:item> is for information about an individual item.
I think regardless of what you do you are being over-optimistic in
thinking that if you just "do dlf", your stuff will interchangeable with
any other clients or servers "doing dlf". The spec is way too open-ended
for that, it leaves a whole bunch of details not specified and up to the
implementer. For better or worse. I made more comments about this in
the blog post I referenced earlier.
Jonathan
Owen Stephens wrote:
Thanks Dave,
Yes - my reading was that dlf:holdings was for pure 'holdings' as opposed to
'availability'. We could put the simpleavailability in there I guess but as
you say since we are controlling both ends then there doesn't seem any point
in abusing it like that. The downside is we'd hoped to do something that
could be taken by other sites - the original plan was to use the Juice
framework - developed by Talis using jQuery to parse a standard availability
format so that this could then be applied easily in other environments.
Obviously we can still achieve the outcome we need for the immediate
requirements of the project by using a custom format.
Thanks again
Owen
On Thu, Oct 21, 2010 at 4:28 PM, Walker, David <dwal...@calstate.edu> wrote:
Hey Owen,
Seems like the you could use the <dlf:holdings> element to hold this kind
of individual library information.
The DLF-ILS documentation doesn't seem to think that you would use
dlf:simpleavailability here, though, but rather MARC or ISO holdings
schemas.
But if you're controlling both ends of the communication, I don't know if
it really matters.
--Dave
==================
David Walker
Library Web Services Manager
California State University
http://xerxes.calstate.edu
________________________________________
From: Code for Libraries [code4...@listserv.nd.edu] On Behalf Of Owen
Stephens [o...@ostephens.com]
Sent: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 12:22 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Help with DLF-ILS GetAvailability
I'm working with the University of Oxford to look at integrating some
library services into their VLE/Learning Management System (Sakai). One of
the services is something that will give availability for items on a reading
list in the VLE (the Sakai 'Citation Helper'), and I'm looking at the
DLF-ILS GetAvailability specification to achieve this.
For physical items, the availability information I was hoping to use is
expressed at the level of a physical collection. For example, if several
college libraries within the University I have aggregated information that
tells me the availability of the item in each of the college libraries.
However, I don't have item level information.
I can see how I can use simpleavailability to say over the entire
institution whether (e.g.) a book is available or not. However, I'm not
clear I can express this in a more granular way (say availability on a
library by library basis) except by going to item level. Also although it
seems you can express multiple locations in simpleavailability, and multiple
availabilitymsg, there is no way I can see to link these, so although I
could list each location OK, I can't attach an availabilitymsg to a specific
location (unless I only express one location).
Am I missing something, or is my interpretation correct?
Any other suggestions?
Thanks,
Owen
PS also looked at DAIA which I like, but this (as far as I can tell) only
allows availabitlity to be specified at the level of items
Owen Stephens
Owen Stephens Consulting
Web: http://www.ostephens.com
Email: o...@ostephens.com
Telephone: 0121 288 6936
