I would point out, too, that Encore (the example given) is not one of the major 
discovery systems.  The 'Big Four' discovery services, as they are often 
called, are those developed by OCLC, Ex Libris, Serials Solutions, and Ebsco.

Encore is really a different kind of system.  It has no aggregated article 
index of its own.  Rather, the system is designed to integrate your local 
catalog results with article results from an external service, either via 
Innovative's own federated search system or, more recently, from Ebsco 
Discovery.

In that way, Encore is a lot more like VUFind, in fact, than the Big Four 
discovery services, in so far as you can integrate article results from a 
discovery service (currently Summon and Primo Central) into VUFind as well.

To my mind, then, there's little reason to run both VUFind and Encore 
(specifically).  Damien, I think, provided a good case for why you might want 
to run VUFind in conjunction with a true discovery service: that is, to have 
greater control over the local catalog results and the interface.  Other 
institutions are doing similar things with Blacklight or their own systems.

--Dave
-------------------------
David Walker
Director, Systemwide Digital Library Services
California State University
562-355-4845


-----Original Message-----
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
Jonathan Rochkind
Sent: Monday, May 06, 2013 10:47 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] discovery layers question

I think you first need to be clear about what you would be trying to do by 
using a hosted discovery product simultaneously with VuFind. What would be the 
goals, why would you be doing this, what are you trying to accomplish?  Would 
you be offering both Encore and a VuFind implementation as alternate services 
for your users to use? Or would they be combined somehow? How would you want to 
combine them?

You need to be clear on this internally, on what you're trying to do, to have 
any hope of success.  Being clear about that when you ask a question on the 
list will also elicit more useful answers; I'm not really entirely sure what 
you're asking.

On 5/6/2013 1:39 PM, Donna Campbell wrote:
> Dear Colleagues,
>
> Is anyone in using VuFind as well as one of the major webscale 
> discovery layers (e.g., Encore)? If so, what complications do you encounter?
>
> Cordially,
>
> Donna R. Campbell
> Technical Services & Systems Librarian
> (215) 935-3872 (phone)
> (267) 295-3641 (fax)
> Mailing Address (via USPS):
> Westminster Theological Seminary Library P.O. Box 27009 Philadelphia, 
> PA 19118  USA Shipping Address (via UPS or FedEx):
> Westminster Theological Seminary Library
> 2960 W. Church Rd.
> Glenside, PA 19038  USA
>
>

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