Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Thank you so much for all the replies, these are all very helpful! When building the prototype for this particular page listing digitized collections, I had put Digital Collections as the header out of habit essentially because I know that's what we call them. The group working on the page is going to do some more thinking about the labeling. (To give some more info on what we were trying to do: this is a list of collection-level records for collections Cornell has digitized. Cataloged digitized collections can definitely be found along with everything else in the catalog. The purpose of the list is to highlight these collections and to perhaps make them easier to find. We don't have a digital collection facet in our Blacklight catalog yet, though we like how Stanford has set theirs up. These collections can be cataloged as a variety of different formats as well - databases, websites, books, etc. so there really isn't an obvious way to look at or narrow your search to them in the catalog. It might be that the page won't get a lot of use because the collections can be discovered in the catalog, but it will be available if someone would like to see a list of such things.) On Thu, Mar 19, 2015 at 7:57 AM, McDonald, Stephen steve.mcdon...@tufts.edu wrote: My question would be, why are you trying to keep them separate? Why not group them all together? People don't want to have to look all over the place to find what they want. They want it all in one place.
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
My question would be, why are you trying to keep them separate? Why not group them all together? People don't want to have to look all over the place to find what they want. They want it all in one place.
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 9:51 AM, Laura Krier laura.kr...@gmail.com wrote: I think too often we present our collections to students through the framework of our own workflows and functional handling of materials This. We also try too hard to convey distinctions that aren't important to users for the sake of technical accuracy. As a result, we sometimes introduce problems that are worse than what we were trying to solve in first place. There is also the issue that many people find library materials through mechanisms other than the library provided silos -- particularly networked resources. In reality, significant percentage of these users don't even realize they're using the library. kyle
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
And what percentage try the web before they come you your search, knowing from experience you separated all the data into some silos with obscure names. I settled on one overall search with facets in the result. Dave Caroline
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
I agree that articles is incomplete, but I also think sometimes we shoot ourselves in the feet trying to be totally comprehensive in how we describe things, and end up confusing people. What students think they want are articles so we should use that term as a pointer to our databases. Good instruction can help them understand all the different kinds of resources available to them. As far as digital collections go (and whatever print special collections we have) the key is helping students understand what primary source materials are and why they might use them. The format isn't as relevant, in my opinion. I personally prefer to call all our primary source collections Special Collections or primary source collections without immediately differentiating between digital and print. I think too often we present our collections to students through the framework of our own workflows and functional handling of materials and less in terms of what they might be used for by students. It would be interesting to wipe out our current categorizations and really re-think how we present resources in terms of their functions for research and teaching. Just my $0.02. :-) Laura On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 9:42 AM McCanna, Terran tmcca...@georgialibraries.org wrote: Agreed - most patrons are usually confused by all of those terms (including databases) and aren't going to care about the differences between them, they just want the content. Articles is understandable, but incomplete - Articles and Other Online Resources is inclusive and easier to understand, but too long. I usually go with something like Online Resources to try to balance the understandability with the intent. Terran McCanna PINES Program Manager Georgia Public Library Service 1800 Century Place, Suite 150 Atlanta, GA 30345 404-235-7138 tmcca...@georgialibraries.org - Original Message - From: Erik Sandall esand...@milibrary.org To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:34:03 PM Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
[CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
... one more comment is that I'm generally disappointed when I go to a digital collections web site and it's not acutally digitized Collections, but more individual items or parts of collections. So are you suggesting that all the digitized things are making up a Collection? Or that you've really digitized full collections of material? Or are you trying to describe Digitized Collection Material? I like being specific so would want to use the latter term - realizing that it's not catchy. Kari -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Kari R Smith Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:25 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources And if you are including born-digital material from your library or Archives and special collections, then you'll want to figure out a way to describe those digital collections as well (and as different than digitized physical material). Digital Archives would not, in my opinion, be considered to be electronic resources. Kari Smith On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
And if you are including born-digital material from your library or Archives and special collections, then you'll want to figure out a way to describe those digital collections as well (and as different than digitized physical material). Digital Archives would not, in my opinion, be considered to be electronic resources. Kari Smith On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Agreed - most patrons are usually confused by all of those terms (including databases) and aren't going to care about the differences between them, they just want the content. Articles is understandable, but incomplete - Articles and Other Online Resources is inclusive and easier to understand, but too long. I usually go with something like Online Resources to try to balance the understandability with the intent. Terran McCanna PINES Program Manager Georgia Public Library Service 1800 Century Place, Suite 150 Atlanta, GA 30345 404-235-7138 tmcca...@georgialibraries.org - Original Message - From: Erik Sandall esand...@milibrary.org To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:34:03 PM Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Hiya. I've performed a handful of jargon card sorts in several libraries. Digital Collections has never been one that's on the table, but IMHO, good labels should be future friendly - and complicating our collection with electronic, digital, or online is an uphill battle. Rather, present Collections as a whole if you have to - in which some of the items happen to be digital. It's like this audiobook versus e-audiobook nightmare. We have found that in these cases, an audiobook is an audiobook - sometimes it's on CD, other times it's accessible through Overdrive. Electronic resources are pretty meaningless to folks who are accustomed to resources that are predominately electronic anyway. Resources should suffice. My two cents! :) Michael @schoeyfield #libux.co -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Laura Krier Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:52 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources I agree that articles is incomplete, but I also think sometimes we shoot ourselves in the feet trying to be totally comprehensive in how we describe things, and end up confusing people. What students think they want are articles so we should use that term as a pointer to our databases. Good instruction can help them understand all the different kinds of resources available to them. As far as digital collections go (and whatever print special collections we have) the key is helping students understand what primary source materials are and why they might use them. The format isn't as relevant, in my opinion. I personally prefer to call all our primary source collections Special Collections or primary source collections without immediately differentiating between digital and print. I think too often we present our collections to students through the framework of our own workflows and functional handling of materials and less in terms of what they might be used for by students. It would be interesting to wipe out our current categorizations and really re-think how we present resources in terms of their functions for research and teaching. Just my $0.02. :-) Laura On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 9:42 AM McCanna, Terran tmcca...@georgialibraries.org wrote: Agreed - most patrons are usually confused by all of those terms (including databases) and aren't going to care about the differences between them, they just want the content. Articles is understandable, but incomplete - Articles and Other Online Resources is inclusive and easier to understand, but too long. I usually go with something like Online Resources to try to balance the understandability with the intent. Terran McCanna PINES Program Manager Georgia Public Library Service 1800 Century Place, Suite 150 Atlanta, GA 30345 404-235-7138 tmcca...@georgialibraries.org - Original Message - From: Erik Sandall esand...@milibrary.org To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:34:03 PM Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
We have basically found the same thing as Michael. We just recently ran some user research on separate groups of librarians and students with significant portions dedicated to just this question. We did a card-sort activity and I also had them write Œbest guess¹ definitions or Œwhat they would expect to find if they clicked on' for terms like 'digital collections', 'electronic resources', Œdatabases', etc. The students and the librarians both had different conceptions of the terms. We might go back with some different exercises to see if we can't try to tease out some different ideas, though I don¹t know that we¹ll get better results than what Michael or others have suggested. ‹Jason -- Jason Eiseman Head of Technology Services Lillian Goldman Law Library Yale Law School PO Box 208215 New Haven, CT 06520-8215 jason.eise...@yale.edu On 3/18/15, 2:19 PM, Michael Schofield mschofi...@nova.edu wrote: Hiya. I've performed a handful of jargon card sorts in several libraries. Digital Collections has never been one that's on the table, but IMHO, good labels should be future friendly - and complicating our collection with electronic, digital, or online is an uphill battle. Rather, present Collections as a whole if you have to - in which some of the items happen to be digital. It's like this audiobook versus e-audiobook nightmare. We have found that in these cases, an audiobook is an audiobook - sometimes it's on CD, other times it's accessible through Overdrive. Electronic resources are pretty meaningless to folks who are accustomed to resources that are predominately electronic anyway. Resources should suffice. My two cents! :) Michael @schoeyfield #libux.co -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Laura Krier Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:52 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources I agree that articles is incomplete, but I also think sometimes we shoot ourselves in the feet trying to be totally comprehensive in how we describe things, and end up confusing people. What students think they want are articles so we should use that term as a pointer to our databases. Good instruction can help them understand all the different kinds of resources available to them. As far as digital collections go (and whatever print special collections we have) the key is helping students understand what primary source materials are and why they might use them. The format isn't as relevant, in my opinion. I personally prefer to call all our primary source collections Special Collections or primary source collections without immediately differentiating between digital and print. I think too often we present our collections to students through the framework of our own workflows and functional handling of materials and less in terms of what they might be used for by students. It would be interesting to wipe out our current categorizations and really re-think how we present resources in terms of their functions for research and teaching. Just my $0.02. :-) Laura On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 9:42 AM McCanna, Terran tmcca...@georgialibraries.org wrote: Agreed - most patrons are usually confused by all of those terms (including databases) and aren't going to care about the differences between them, they just want the content. Articles is understandable, but incomplete - Articles and Other Online Resources is inclusive and easier to understand, but too long. I usually go with something like Online Resources to try to balance the understandability with the intent. Terran McCanna PINES Program Manager Georgia Public Library Service 1800 Century Place, Suite 150 Atlanta, GA 30345 404-235-7138 tmcca...@georgialibraries.org - Original Message - From: Erik Sandall esand...@milibrary.org To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:34:03 PM Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
When I did testing to see if patrons knew what digital collections meant, they generally clicked on the databases link. No one I tested with clicked on digital collections at all even when they were supposed to, and never chose that instead of databases. Still musing about solutions--my main solution has been to improve keywords so the digitized collections will show up in searches. Margaret Heller Digital Services Librarian 773-508-2686 On Mar 18, 2015, at 11:24 AM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources
Very interesting conversation as we are currently in the process of conducting usability testing on our website, and teens were tasked with finding an article on a current event. Almost unanimously, they had no idea where to go. Those who did navigate to the current events section under Research only clicked on the one database that used the word articles in the description, even though Opposing Viewpoints is front and center on the page and (to a librarian) the best database for the job. So whatever terminology we use, we will make sure it is obvious that articles can be found there. Lennis B. Sullivan Digital Services Librarian Virginia Beach Public Library lbsul...@vbgov.com (757)385-0145 -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Erik Sandall Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 12:34 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] talking about digital collections vs electronic resources Most patrons won't understand the meanings of digital collections and electronic resources. We should use terminology that they would use. My brain is a fog this morning so I don't have any brilliant suggestions at the moment. There is likely to be UX-type research about this in the current literature. Databases is probably better, for example. Articles is probably even better than databases. For what it's worth... /Erik -- Erik Sandall, MLIS Electronic Services Librarian Webmaster Mechanics' Institute 57 Post Street San Francisco, CA 94104 415-393-0111 esand...@milibrary.org On 3/18/2015 9:25 AM, Matt Sherman wrote: I haven't done any testing on that, but your understanding it the conventional on in the field. On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Derek Merleaux derek.merle...@gmail.com wrote: I've always been inclined to use digital collections to talk about a collection of things that have been digitized or perhaps including born digital things that are part of a collection in an archival sort of way. I prefer the term electronic resources for the databases and other things... -Derek On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Jenn C jen...@gmail.com wrote: Hi- We're having a discussion about some web site labeling and navigation. We have a list of digital collections which are collections that contain items we've digitized. There was concern expressed that we have something labeled digital collections patrons might think that includes databases and other items. Has anyone done user testing around this or have any experience/ideas about how to handle the difference between these? Thanks! jenn
