Re: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC – how should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)

[Genny Engel]

We use RFID, a lot.  It's been insanely fabulous for reducing repetitive stress 
among our staff.  We circulate about 3 million items a year, which translates 
into about 6 million times somebody needs to check something in or out.  We 
have patron self-checkout at some branches but by no means all.  As someone 
observed earlier, the situation in the circulating collections in a public 
library is rather different vs. a research collection in an academic library.  
For that matter, in our non-circulating collections I don't believe we've RFID 
tagged anything.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Chris 
Fitzpatrick
Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2014 4:53 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC – how 
should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)

So this thread started from talking about RFID ( "i'm interested!" ) to
talking about augmented reality ( "uh, ok, now less interested...") to
talking about standards ( "oh no, not again.." ) to talking about c4l (
"yep." )

So, are people using RFID? A lot? Is it working, or did it make life
hellish?

b,chris.



On Wed, Oct 8, 2014 at 10:54 AM, Ross Singer  wrote:

> I guess there’s “what do you mean by ‘C4L'” and “what do you mean by
> ‘standards’” that need to be clarified here.
>
> Cary is right, this list/community/whatever is definitely well represented
> by people who sit on formal standards committees or are involved in the
> organizations that create them, etc.
>
> But I think more important is the “what do you mean by ‘standards’”
> question: C4L has definitely spawned several specifications (COinS, UnAPI,
> etc.) and (in my mind) has been under-utilized in this arena for a few
> years.  You’ve got a gathering of smart, like-minded people: if you want to
> create a spec, solicit your idea, start a mailing list, follow the ROGUE
> ’05 rules [1], and let a thousand specifications bloom.
>
> We’re generally in need of a spec, not a standard, I’ve found (although
> they’re definitely not mutually exclusive!).
>
> -Ross.
> 1. http://wiki.code4lib.org/Rogue
>
> On Oct 7, 2014, at 7:17 PM, Salazar, Christina <
> christina.sala...@csuci.edu> wrote:
>
> > OH NO! (shudder) I’m pretty sure no one is suggesting a "formalized c4l"
> AGAIN - we've been there done that, relatively recently too.
> >
> > I think what we're talking about is a way to represent c4l interests in
> standards making bodies.
> >
> > And just for my own edification, if you're saying c4l IS represented in
> standards making bodies, please tell me who do I talk to? For instance on
> the RFID thing, who can I talk to in order to find out HOW and IF this
> conversation is happening with American standards making bodies?
> >
> > Or do you mean INDIVIDUALS who participate in c4l are represented in
> standards making bodies?
> >
> > Christina
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of
> Francis Kayiwa
> > Sent: Tuesday, October 07, 2014 11:07 AM
> > To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
> > Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC –
> how should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)
> >
> > On 10/07/2014 02:03 PM, Cary Gordon wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >  NISO (and LITA, ASIS&T,
> >> etc.) are quite well represented on this list, and I don't believe
> >> that a formalized c4l would give us any more say in standards that we
> have already.
> >
> > +1
> >
> >
> > ./fxk
> >
> >
> > --
> > You single-handedly fought your way into this hopeless mess.
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Fwd: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC – how should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)

[Genny Engel]

This is disturbing to me.  I thought we had agreed not to mention the C4L 
Illuminati.




-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Maura 
Carbone
Sent: Tuesday, October 07, 2014 11:54 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Fwd: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android 
and NFC – how should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)

I feel like someone needs to design a C4L Illuminati t-shirt for C4L 2015.

On Tue, Oct 7, 2014 at 2:42 PM, Cornel Darden Jr. 
wrote:

> Hello,
>
> C4l illuminati, I like it!
>
> Thanks,
>
> Cornel Darden Jr.
> MSLIS
> Library Department Chair
> South Suburban College
> 7087052945
>
> "Our Mission is to Serve our Students and the Community through lifelong
> learning."
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> > On Oct 7, 2014, at 1:30 PM, Cary Gordon  wrote:
> >
> > I mean that there are plenty of individuals on the c4l list who are
> > involved at various levels with various standards bodies, NISO being the
> > most well represented. I was not referring to the shadowy c4l illuminati
> > society that controls everything.
> >
> > Cary
> >
> > -- Forwarded message --
> > From: Salazar, Christina 
> > Date: Tue, Oct 7, 2014 at 11:17 AM
> > Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC –
> how
> > should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)
> > To: CODE4LIB@listserv.nd.edu
> >
> >
> > OH NO! (shudder) I’m pretty sure no one is suggesting a "formalized c4l"
> > AGAIN - we've been there done that, relatively recently too.
> >
> > I think what we're talking about is a way to represent c4l interests in
> > standards making bodies.
> >
> > And just for my own edification, if you're saying c4l IS represented in
> > standards making bodies, please tell me who do I talk to? For instance on
> > the RFID thing, who can I talk to in order to find out HOW and IF this
> > conversation is happening with American standards making bodies?
> >
> > Or do you mean INDIVIDUALS who participate in c4l are represented in
> > standards making bodies?
> >
> > Christina
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of
> > Francis Kayiwa
> > Sent: Tuesday, October 07, 2014 11:07 AM
> > To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
> > Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Forwarding blog post: Apple, Android and NFC –
> how
> > should libraries prepare? (RFID stuffs)
> >
> > On 10/07/2014 02:03 PM, Cary Gordon wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >  NISO (and LITA, ASIS&T,
> >> etc.) are quite well represented on this list, and I don't believe
> >> that a formalized c4l would give us any more say in standards that we
> > have already.
> >
> > +1
> >
> >
> > ./fxk
> >
> >
> > --
> > You single-handedly fought your way into this hopeless mess.
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Cary Gordon
> > The Cherry Hill Company
> > http://chillco.com
>



-- 
Maura Carbone
Digital Initiatives Librarian
Brandeis University
Library and Technology Services
(781) 736-4659
415 South Street, (MS 017/P.O. Box 549110)
Waltham, MA 02454-9110
email: mau...@brandeis.edu

Re: [CODE4LIB] Canvas Fingerprinting by AddThis

[Genny Engel]

We have had, for some time now, a section in our privacy policy explaining what 
services we use and giving links to opt out.

http://sonomalibrary.org/governance/library-policies/privacy-statement


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Eric 
Hellman
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2014 3:37 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Canvas Fingerprinting by AddThis

I blogged this.

http://go-to-hellman.blogspot.com/2014/08/libraries-are-giving-away-user-privacy.html

Do libraries even realize they're doing this?

Eric

On Aug 13, 2014, at 4:28 PM, Jimmy Ghaphery  wrote:

> Interesting thread,
> 
> AddThis is certainly everywhere (5 percent of the top 100,000
> websites--ProPublica), often in contrast to an organization's stated
> privacy policies.
> 
> Here's three examples of use within OCLC and their products:
> http://oclc.org/research/people/follow.html
> ContentDM: http://www.contentdm.org/help6/custom/configure9.asp
> WorldCat.org:
> http://www.worldcat.org/title/jazz/oclc/25048293&referer=brief_results
> 
> For kicks I just did a Google Advanced search for AddThis limited to the
> .edu domain, wow.
> 
> What is the alternative for libraries looking to promote their services out
> into the polluted ocean of the internet where everyone else is swimming?
> 
> --Jimmy
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Aug 13, 2014 at 2:33 PM, Gary McGath  wrote:
> 
>> On 8/13/14 1:22 PM, Eric Hellman wrote:
>>> It seems that Code4Lib hasn't discussed this., though the news is 2
>> weeks old. It seems that there are libraries using social share tools from
>> AddThis", a company that has been using a technology called "Canvas
>> Fingerprinting" to track users.
>>> 
>>> In other words, it looks like libraries are giving away the user-privacy
>> store.
>>> 
>>> For example, AddThis is used by my public library's Polaris catalog
>> (BCCLS).
>>> 
>>> I'd be interested to learn how widespread this is.
>> 
>> It's pretty widespread in general, but I don't know how many libraries
>> are using it, or why.
>> 
>> It's a concern regardless of absolute numbers, because it targets people
>> who are concerned about being tracked and have taken steps to make
>> cookies less effective. (For example, I discard cookies at the end of
>> each browser session, making long-term tracking ineffective.)
>> 
>> It isn't "virtually impossible to block"; mapping addthis.com on the
>> client computer to 127.0.0.1 (using /etc/hosts on Linux and Unix
>> machines) does a nice job of it. But anyone who uses it really is
>> betraying the user's trust.
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Gary McGath, Professional Software Developer
>> http://www.garymcgath.com
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Jimmy Ghaphery
> Head, Digital Technologies
> VCU Libraries
> 804-827-3551

Re: [CODE4LIB] Call for proposals to host Code4Lib Conference in 2015

[Genny Engel]

How about this?

http://www.poll-maker.com/poll77925x33144cAe-3



Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of anna 
headley
Sent: Wednesday, March 26, 2014 11:03 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Call for proposals to host Code4Lib Conference in 2015

The proposal lists 3 potential weeks. How will the timing be determined?
How can those of us with preferences state them?

Thanks!
Anna



On Wed, Mar 19, 2014 at 2:44 PM, Tom Johnson  wrote:

> Thanks Becky!
>
> The local committee already has wheels turning.  Trey Terrell, Ryan Wick,
> Hui Zhang, and I will all be in Raleigh, and happy to chat with you all
> about our plans for next year.
>
> Tom Johnson
> Digital Applications Librarian
> Oregon State University Libraries & Press
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 19, 2014 at 11:41 AM, Becky Yoose  wrote:
>
> > Hello everyone,
> >
> > The LA contingency fought the good fight, but alas it was not meant to be
> > for #c4l15. The remaining proposal from the Portland contingency[1] still
> > stands, and the Portland folks are ready to start planning.
> >
> > Congratulations to Portland, and we'll see you there in 2015!
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Becky
> >
> > [1] http://osulp.github.io/code4lib-pdx/
> >
> > On Fri, Mar 14, 2014 at 8:17 AM, Becky Yoose  wrote:
> >
> > > Hi everyone,
> > >
> > > We have an update on the call for conference hosting proposals for
> > #c4l15!
> > > Currently we have one and a half proposals. The half proposal is from
> LA,
> > > where the hard working folks have hit this thing called "Red Tape". We
> > have
> > > been asked to give a small extension to them to cut through said Red
> > Tape,
> > > which the general consensus on the code4libcon list was a "+1" to
> moving
> > > their deadline to Tuesday, March 18th.
> > >
> > > We're looking at opening up voting around Wednesday, March 19th. In the
> > > meantime, we'll keep you updated if there's any new information.
> > >
> > > Happy Pi Day,
> > > Becky
> > >
> > > -- Forwarded message --
> > >
> > > Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Call for proposals to host Code4Lib Conference
> in
> > > 2015
> > > To: CODE4LIB@listserv.nd.edu
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Hi Friends,
> > >
> > > Just a friendly reminder that the deadline to submit proposals for
> > Code4Lib
> > > 2015 is midnight PST March 12th. So if you haven't gotten your
> proposals
> > in
> > > you still have a month. Information for submitting a proposal is below.
> > >
> > > Thanks
> > > Rosy
> > > On Jan 29, 2014 4:05 PM, "Rosalyn Metz"  wrote:
> > >
> > > > The Code4Lib Community is calling for proposals to host the tenth
> > annual
> > > > Code4Lib Conference in 2015. Prior to submitting a proposal we
> > recommend
> > > > reviewing the conference hosting web page [1] and How To Plan a
> > > Code4LibCon
> > > > on the wiki [2] to learn more about the kind of venue the community
> > seeks
> > > > and the responsibilities involved with hosting the conference.
> > > >
> > > > The deadline for proposals is midnight PST Wednesday March 12th,
> 2014.
> > > The
> > > > decision will be made by a popular vote. Voting will begin on or
> around
> > > > Friday March 14th, 2014 and will continue until midnight PST March
> > 26th,
> > > > 2014. The results of the vote will be announced Thursday morning at
> the
> > > > Code4Lib conference 2014 and emailed out to the listserv.
> > > >
> > > > You can apply by making your pitch to the Code4Lib Conference
> Planning
> > > > list [3] and linking to your proposal on the 2015 Hosting Proposals
> > wiki
> > > > page [4]; attention to the criteria listed on the conference hosting
> > page
> > > > is appreciated. Good luck!
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ---
> > > > Have a look at past proposals for ideas.
> > > >
> > > > 2014 Winner:
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> >
> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1amxzn4xs26ILszZek5nIEEfd4qHNfLjp1BAc5CU5YKw
> > > >
> > > > 2013 Winner:
> > > > http://tigger.uic.edu/~kayiwa/code4lib.html
> > > >
> > > > 2012 Winner:
> > > > https://sites.google.com/site/code4lib2012seattle
> > > >
> > > > Footnotes
> > > > 1. http://code4lib.org/conference/hosting
> > > > 2. http://wiki.code4lib.org/index.php/How_To_Plan_A_Code4LibCon
> > > > 3. code4lib...@googlegroups.com
> > > > 4. http://wiki.code4lib.org/index.php/2015_Hosting_Proposals
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> >
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic Library Website Question

[Genny Engel]

I don't know how different this is for public vs. academic libraries, but we 
get 35% of our traffic from search.  So being searchable on the open web is 
kind of critical.

If you're not in a position to get these numbers for your own site, you could 
check with some peers at other institutions and find out what percentage of 
their traffic comes through search.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Lauren 
Magnuson
Sent: Tuesday, December 17, 2013 12:41 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Academic Library Website Question

Agree - you'd still need evidence to convince the powers that be.  To get
some data to that end, maybe some snapshot usability observation where you
sit down a handful of users at a computer (better yet, on a tablet/mobile
device) and ask them to find the library's website (ensuring that the
browser doesn't default to university.edu).  Observe their strategy - do
they go to university.edu and click around, or do they Google?  Or do they
use the university.edu search box (which is often a Google site search,
playing by the same rules)?

If your users are Googling, having that data in hand might provide an
argument that your page should be Google-able and you should have some more
visibility/control.  Or you could set up some dummy sites and Google bomb
yourself :).  (Joking.  Kind of.)

-Lauren

Re: [CODE4LIB] image gallery management software recommendations

[Genny Engel]

At one point I was trying out the Gallery module for Drupal.  The module is for 
integrating the otherwise standalone Gallery.  

http://galleryproject.org/

I ended up going with something else for Drupal, but in a standalone situation, 
I'd definitely give Gallery another look.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Ken 
Irwin
Sent: Thursday, November 07, 2013 12:44 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] image gallery management software recommendations

Hi all,

I'm working on a project for which we're looking for some image gallery 
management software (ie, upload, organize, tag, etc.) that's a standalone piece 
of software: ie, not part of a larger CMS like WordPress, Drupal, ContentDM, 
etc.

We'd of course like something that is simple, awesome, and free. (We might 
settle for two of the three...) The only absolute requirement is that it needs 
to run on a Linux/Apache server. PHP/MySQL would be preferred, and something 
with a responsive front-end would also be nice.

The world appears to be teeming with such things of various quality; I thought 
I'd ask you all for recommendations rather than just try to wade through the 
masses of junk.

Any ideas?
Thanks
Ken

Re: [CODE4LIB] Tool to highlight differences in two files

[Genny Engel]

There's a list here that may be more along the lines of what you're seeking.

http://webapps.stackexchange.com/questions/11547/diff-for-websites


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
Wilhelmina Randtke
Sent: Tuesday, April 23, 2013 3:19 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Tool to highlight differences in two files

That helps a lot, because it's for websites which is what I want to compare.

I am looking for changes in a site, and I have some archives, but tools for
merging code are too labor intensive and don't give a good visual report
that I can show to a supervisor.  This is good moving forward, but doesn't
cover historical pages.

I was hoping for something where I could call up two pages and get a visual
display of differences for the display version of html, not the code.

-Wilhelmina

On Tue, Apr 23, 2013 at 5:14 PM, Pottinger, Hardy J. <
pottinge...@missouri.edu> wrote:

> Hi, I'm not sure if you're really looking for a diff tool, so I'll just
> shout an answer to a question that I think you might be asking. I use a
> variation of the script posted here:
>
> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1494488/watch-a-web-page-for-changes
>
>
> for watching a web page for changes. I mostly only ever use this for
> watching for new artifacts to appear in Maven Central (because refreshing
> a web page is pretty dull "work").
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> --
> HARDY POTTINGER 
> University of Missouri Library Systems
> http://lso.umsystem.edu/~pottingerhj/
> https://MOspace.umsystem.edu/
> "Do you love it? Do you hate it? There it is, the way you made it."
> --Frank Zappa
>
>
>
>
>
> On 4/23/13 3:24 PM, "Wilhelmina Randtke"  wrote:
>
> >I would like to compare versions of a website scraped at different times
> >to
> >see what paragraphs on a page have changed.  Does anyone here know of a
> >tool for holding two files side by side and noting what is the same and
> >what is different between the files?
> >
> >It seems like any simple script to note differences in two strings of text
> >would work, but I don't know a tool to use.
> >
> >-Wilhelmina Randtke
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Adding Twitter to Google Analytics

[Genny Engel]

You shouldn't have to do any setup for basic counts to show up.  Traffic coming 
directly from Twitter or Facebook ought to be appearing under 
   Traffic Sources -> Social -> Overview


From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Kimberly Silk 
[kimberly.s...@rotman.utoronto.ca]
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 11:13 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Adding Twitter to Google Analytics

Hi Everyone,

I am running a wordpress-powered web site and use Google Analytics to measure 
our traffic. I would like to set up Analytics so that it measures traffic 
coming from Twitter and Facebook. I see that Google Analytics can be set up to 
track social interactions, but I'm feeling overwhelmed by the instructions on 
how to set it up 
(https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/gajs/gaTrackingSocial?hl=en_GB).

Have any of you successfully set this up? Care to share your tips?

It would be wonderful if there was a simple edit to the WP code, or a plugin - 
am I dreaming?

Many thanks,
Kim

-
Kimberly Silk, MLS
Data Librarian, Martin Prosperity Institute
Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto
105 St. George Street, Suite 9000
Toronto, ON M5S 3E6

President, SLA Toronto Chapter

Office: 416-946-7032 <-- New!!!
Mobile: 416-721-8955
kimberly.s...@martinprosperity.org
@kimberlysilk

www.martinprosperity.org
Twitter: @MartinProsperit

Re: [CODE4LIB] Imaging Hosting Services

[Genny Engel]

We've only used archive.org for this type of service.  We've had a good 
experience with them.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of DYV
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 12:40 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Imaging Hosting Services

Hello All,

We are considering an image host for a special collection.
The collection would be private and only viewable via links added to  and
searched through our online catalog (InMagic)
Has anyone used either of the following and had a positive experience:

   - ImageShack
   - Flickr Pro or Nonprofits(Flickr/Yahoo)
   - WebLife Photo (Earthlink)


These are the ones recommended to me thus far.

We're looking to upload around 6 gig of files.

I'd appreciate any insight any of you might have.

Peace
Desiree Yael Vester
Caretaker, OPAC Coordinator
Lesbian Herstory Archives <http://lesbianherstoryarchives.org/>

Re: [CODE4LIB] You are a *pedantic* coder. So what am I?

[Genny Engel]

I feel that this is true.  However, the more languages I learn, the more I find 
myself doing embarrassing things like trying to update a JavaScript file and 
then realizing I'm actually writing in PHP or C++.  If only my brain had an 
automatic language gearshift.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Justin 
Coyne
Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2013 9:59 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] You are a *pedantic* coder. So what am I?

Ian, I have to caution against taking the attitude "we only code in what we
already know".  Of course you are going to be able to hit the ground
running faster in what you are expert in.  Putting on the blinders is a
great way to become irrelevant in the technology sphere.  If you want to be
a better coder, there is no better way than to learn a new language, and
actually do a project in it. The insights you find in doing this will make
you a better coder when your go back to doing whatever it was you were
doing before.

-Justin


On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 11:53 AM, Ian Walls wrote:

> Agreed.  Each language has its own strengths and weaknesses.  Pick the one
> that works best for your situation, factoring in not only what the
> application needs to do, but your and your team's level of experience, and
> the overall community context in which the project will live.  The
> peculiarities of a given languages truth tables, for example, can easily
> get washed out of the calculation when you consider what languages you know
> and what platforms your institution supports.
>
>
> -Ian
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of
> Ethan Gruber
> Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2013 12:45 PM
> To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
> Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] You are a *pedantic* coder. So what am I?
>
> Look, I'm sure we can list the many ways different languages fail to meet
> our expectations, but is this really a constructive line of conversation?
>
> -1
>
>
> On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 12:40 PM, Justin Coyne
> wrote:
>
> > I did misspeak a bit.  You can override static methods in Java.  My
> > major issue is that there is no "getClass()" within a static method,
> > so when the static method is being run in the context of the
> > inheriting class it is unaware of its own run context.
> >
> > For example: I want the output to be "Hi from bar", but it's "Hi from
> foo":
> >
> > class Foo {
> >   public static void sayHello() {
> > hi();
> >   }
> >   public static void hi() {
> > System.out.println("Hi from foo");
> >   }
> > }
> >
> > class Bar extends Foo {
> >
> >   public static void hi() {
> > System.out.println("Hi from bar");
> >   }
> > }
> >
> > class Test {
> >   public static void main(String [ ] args) {
> > Bar.sayHello();
> >   }
> > }
> >
> >
> > -Justin
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 11:18 AM, Eric Hellman  wrote:
> >
> > > OK, pedant, tell us why you think methods that can be over-ridden
> > > are static.
> > > Also, tell us why you think classes in Java are not instances of
> > > java.lang.Class
> > >
> > >
> > > On Feb 18, 2013, at 1:39 PM, Justin Coyne
> > > 
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > To be pedantic, Ruby and JavaScript are more Object Oriented than
> > > > Java because they don't have primitives and (in Ruby's case)
> > > > because classes
> > > are
> > > > themselves objects.   Unlike Java, both Python and Ruby can properly
> > > > override of static methods on sub-classes. The Java language made
> > > > many compromises as it was designed as a bridge to Object Oriented
> > programming
> > > > for programmers who were used to writing C and C++.
> > > >
> > > > -Justin
> > > >
> > >
> >
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Stand Up Desks

[Genny Engel]

I got a set of manually adjustable table legs for $50 and a used door for $5 to 
make into my desk at home.  The manual adjustment is done leg by leg, so it 
doesn't work for periodically adjusting the height throughout the day -- what 
it's good for is if you just need an unusual height desk.
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=11205&site=ROCKLER

Some years back, I found that using a kneeling-style chair some of the time 
helped a lot.  I couldn't use it all the time because then my knees would get 
sore!

If there's room in your office, you can add a cycle desk for about 5% of the 
cost of that elliptical desk.  Only works with a laptop/tablet, not a full-size 
desktop+monitor+keyboard.  It makes a GREAT break from the regular desk.
http://fitdesk.net/


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Will 
Clarke
Sent: Thursday, February 07, 2013 10:10 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Stand Up Desks

I got my anti-fatigue mat for $56 - http://amzn.to/14VqrJu

For a mere $4749.99 you can get an elliptical desk :)

http://www.beyondtheofficedoor.com/RA-Lifebalance.php

Re: [CODE4LIB] Zoia

[Genny Engel]

Guess there's no groundswell of support for firing Zoia and replacing her/it 
with a GLaDOS irc bot, then?

*Sigh.*

Genny Engel


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
Andromeda Yelton
Sent: Friday, January 18, 2013 11:30 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Zoia

FWIW, I am both an active #libtechwomen participant and someone who is so
thoroughly charmed by zoia I am frequently bothered she isn't right there
*in my real life*.  (Yes, I have tried to issue zoia commands during
face-to-face conversations with non-Code4Libbers.)

I think a collaboratively maintained bot with a highly open ethos is always
going to end up with some things that cross people's lines, and that's an
opportunity to talk about those lines and rearticulate our group norms.
 And to that end, I'm in favor of weeding the collection of plugins,
whether because of offensiveness or disuse.  (Perhaps this would be a good
use of github's issue tracker, too?)

I also think some sort of 'what's zoia and how can you contribute' link
would be useful in any welcome-newbie plugin; it did take me a while to
figure out what was going on there.  (Just as it took me the while to
acquire the tastes for, say, coffee, bourbon, and blue cheese, tastes which
I would now defend ferociously.)

But not having zoia would make me sad.  And defining zoia to be
woman-unfriendly, when zoia-lovers and zoia-haters appear to span the
gender spectrum and have a variety of reasons (both gendered and non) for
their reactions, would make me sad too.

@love zoia.

Andromeda

Re: [CODE4LIB] Stats and public wireless devices

[Genny Engel]

We use a captive portal (FirstSearch by Patronsoft: 
http://patronsoft.com/firstspot/) but we don't require a login.  We do require 
clicking an Agree button on our terms of use.  

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Walter 
Lewis
Sent: Tuesday, December 18, 2012 4:11 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Stats and public wireless devices

I know this is more of a hardware question than a code question but I suspect 
that a few of the folks that have other systems roles might be able to steer me 
in the right direction.

We're looking to replace the public wifi in the library, by itself nothing 
remarkable.

The key requirement after reliable connectivity, is the ability to produce some 
level of statistics relative to "usage".  (I know: lies, damned lies and usage 
statistics).  We don't run a proxy or any other system that the public need a 
login to use.  I expect a fair number of connections that would just be staff 
walking in with a smart phone or other device.

After the laughter subsides, any thoughts as to a suitable device?

Walter

Re: [CODE4LIB] livestream suggestion

[Genny Engel]

To livestream our Library Commission meetings we went with ... wait for it ... 
Livestream.  Yes, it's a thing.

http://new.livestream.com/plans

The reason we did that is because the folks who are taping the meetings are 
used to working with them.  We did not do an explicit comparison shop.


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x1581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Nate 
Hill
Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2012 6:45 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] livestream suggestion

Can anyone suggest the most wonderful high quality ad-free live streaming
service I could use at my library?
Happy to pay some $ for a subscription, but only for the most bestest.
Thanks
N

-- 
Nate Hill
nathanielh...@gmail.com
http://4thfloor.chattlibrary.org/
http://www.natehill.net

Re: [CODE4LIB] Mobile device usage (iOS vs. Android)

[Genny Engel]

I'm not surprised at all.  The market trend report coverage generally runs at 
least nationwide, if not worldwide.  An enormous amount of the worldwide 
Android adoption is due to non-US mobile device purchases.  But locally, I see 
the majority of our mobile access coming from iPads and iPhones.  

There have always been a lot of Apple device users in our user population.  At 
the same time that most US websites were getting under 10% of their visits from 
Macs, we were getting 15 - 20%.  It's increased since then.  Our usage now 
looks like:

1. Windows  53.78% 
2. Macintosh  30.42%
3. iOS  10.25%
4. Android   4.27%
5. Linux   0.58%
6. (not set)  0.52%
7. BlackBerry   0.08%
8. Windows Phone0.04%


General trends only go so far in telling you about your own audience.

Genny Engel
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us


From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Park,Go-Woon 
[gop...@nwmissouri.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2012 1:23 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Mobile device usage (iOS vs. Android)

I am wondering if any of you can share wisdom of interpreting the mobile
device usage statistics. The market trends predict that the number of
Android devices are exceeding iOS devices. In my campus, the visits
using iOS devices are over 70% of total mobile usage. It is even up from
over 65% last year. I feel odd with this unusually high number. Any
thought?

Sarah Park

[CODE4LIB] GA vs User-Agent RE: [CODE4LIB] Browser Wars

[Genny Engel]

I actually have no idea what Google Analytics looks at to decide the user 
agent.  Certainly not my server logs ;) It might throw away the declared 
User-Agent entirely and rely on its own flavor of browser-sniffing, on the 
theory, why bother with the User-Agent at all if you're going to run your own 
tests for all the other attributes:
https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/dimsmets/system


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Robert 
Berry
Sent: Friday, July 13, 2012 7:37 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Browser Wars

To be fair, I think this information isn't likely to be *that*
inaccurate. Most people don't count 'the User-Agent header of your HTTP
requests' alongside their age or income.

MJ Ray  writes:

> Genny Engel wrote:
>> Interesting, Safari has just pulled into the lead over here.
>
> You can't know that.  With so many browser and proxies mangling the
> User-Agent for various reasons (User-Agent Switcher to get a nicer
> mobile-style experience on a small screen, or randomUserAgent to stop
> the evil empire tracking you through browser fingerprinting, to give
> two examples), reading the User-Agent header from your logfiles is a
> suggestion or hint of what's reading your site, not a definitive
> result.
>
> What's in the logs is basically reader-submitted.  You don't believe
> people to all tell the truth when they tell you their age or income,
> so please don't believe them about their browsers!
>
> I predict we will see much more volatility in these results as
> more people install the obvious plugins to get a nicer and safer
> browsing experience.
>
> Regards,

Re: [CODE4LIB] Browser Wars

[Genny Engel]

Interesting, Safari has just pulled into the lead over here.

1.  Safari  29.82%
2.  Internet Explorer   27.73%
3.  Firefox 24.69%
4.  Chrome  12.88%
5.  Android Browser  3.32%

But that is not counting the library computers, which default to IE8 or in some 
cases Public Web Browser (!).  We got a hundred IE6 visits last month - a tiny 
percentage, but they're still out there.

As a public library, we avoid putting up barriers to access, and I try to be 
very careful about that with our website.  It's a public accommodation, after 
all. 

Nowadays, I am starting to feel like the lack of a mobile site is such a 
barrier, because almost 10% of visits are coming from mobile devices.  Not 
having a mobile site for that 10% feels a little like finding out 10% of our 
library patrons use wheelchairs, then building steps in front of the door.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Aaron 
Collier
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2012 8:41 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Browser Wars

Firefox is the leader on our stats, but I think that's mostly because it is the 
default browser on almost any campus system. IE is close behind though while 
mobile browsers are the most sparse. 

I guess the old "develop in firefox, test in IE" still holds true. 



Aaron Collier 
Library Academic Systems Analyst 
California State University, Fresno - Henry Madden Library 
559.278.2945 
acoll...@csufresno.edu 
http://www.csufresno.edu/library 

- Original Message -
From: "Brig C McCoy"  
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU 
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2012 8:28:03 AM 
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Browser Wars 

Hi... 

This is from the last six weeks from one of my public-facing websites. 
Definitely not going to drop MSIE support for the website at this rate: 

# #reqs #pages browser 
1 18137 827 MSIE 
8651 437 MSIE/8 
7400 277 MSIE/9 
1866 52 MSIE/7 
193 42 MSIE/6 
16 16 MSIE/5 
11 3 MSIE/10 
2 1809 441 Safari 
1128 299 Safari/533 
202 58 Safari/534 
214 54 Safari/7534 
79 23 Safari/6533 
41 4 Safari/530 
13 3 Safari/531 
3 906 260 Netscape (compatible) 
4 1287 182 Firefox 
442 114 Firefox/13 
408 34 Firefox/12 
139 11 Firefox/10 
163 6 Firefox/3 
28 6 Firefox/14 
11 5 Firefox/9 
6 2 Firefox/4 
12 2 Firefox/6 
4 1 Firefox/15 
8 1 Firefox/7 
5 1164 175 Chrome 
718 111 Chrome/19 
409 61 Chrome/20 
23 1 Chrome/9 
4 1 Chrome/10 
1 1 Chrome/5 

...brig 


On 7/12/2012 9:33 AM, Michael Schofield wrote: 
> Ever since Microsoft announced the new IE auto-update policy, the 
> blogosphere is fussing. This is definitely important (and good) news, but 
> sites-Smashing Magazine has three articles on it in the last few days-are 
> really pushing the "drop IE support," and "its literally slowing the 
> internet down." I'm down, but that attitude-especially for libraries-isn't 
> really the right one to have. It is, IMHO, an old view. A smart design 
> strategy with progressive enhancement can deliver content to . everyone - 
> which should be the priority for non-prof / [local-]government web presences 
> over flare. Right?-- 
Brig C. McCoy bmc...@kckpl.org 
Network Services Coordinator 
Kansas City, Kansas Public Library 
625 Minnesota Avenue 
Kansas City, KS 66101 
tel 913-279-2349 
cel 816-885-2700 
fax 913-279-2271 

Re: [CODE4LIB] whimsical homepage idea

[Genny Engel]

The number of currently available cardigans could then be displayed along with 
the temperature gauges.  Now you also have to interface this whole thing with 
the item status in the catalog, which will of course have to contain cardigan 
records.  You could use NCIP to grab the status, but I'm not sure what the 
standard cardigan metadata would include.

Genny Engel


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Maryann 
Kempthorne
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2012 9:56 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] whimsical homepage idea

Why not a cardigan checkout?
Maryann

On Tue, May 1, 2012 at 6:23 PM, Kyle Banerjee  wrote:
> [stuff on where to get sensors deleted]
>
> Depending on how many you need, wireless sensors for weather stations could
> make more sense (you can run them on different channels to prevent
> interference). Plus you can use the weather software to generate graphs,
> upload data, etc.
>
> kyle
>
> --
> --
> Kyle Banerjee
> Digital Services Program Manager
> Orbis Cascade Alliance
> baner...@uoregon.edu / 503.999.9787

Re: [CODE4LIB] Metadata

[Genny Engel]

I think this is a rather different situation from the one libraries commonly 
deal with, where there is a pretty clear distinction between data representing 
the full text of a 189-page book by Author X, and the descriptive data that is 
made up by catalogers or publishers, and is not part of Author X's work at all. 
 In addition, it is somewhat useful to distinguish between full-text data and 
descriptive metadata because the nature of the work you can do with these two 
types of data can be so very different.

You simply can't use the average library catalog to look up Author X's novel 
that starts with the sentence "So a string walks into a bar."  The actual data 
(the novel) is not in the catalog (which is composed only of metadata).

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Nate 
Vack
Sent: Monday, February 13, 2012 7:57 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Metadata

My take on this discussion, coming from a research lab: Metadata isn't meta.

For example, in recordings of, say, blood pressure over time, it's
common to think about things such as participant identifiers,
acquisition dates, event markers, and sampling rates as "metadata,"
and the actual measurements as "data."

But really: those meta things aren't ancillary to data analysis;
they're essential in keeping analyses organized, and often important
parameters in running an analysis at all.

Breaking things down into data versus metadata I think, encourages a
false (and not very interesting) dichotomy. If information has a use,
call it what it is: data. Store everything that's useful.

If you don't yet have a use in mind for your data, then you have a
place to start working :)

-n

Re: [CODE4LIB] Koha in the Running

[Genny Engel]

Todd, you might want to check out Marshall Breeding's annual ILS survey results:

http://www.librarytechnology.org/perceptions2010.pl

He compiles responses from many hundreds of libraries re: open source and 
proprietary ILSs.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
todd.d.robb...@gmail.com
Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2012 10:20 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Koha in the Running

Hello all,

I'm curious to know of this lists current thoughts on Koha as an ILS. Where
would you rank it among the various options, open source and vendor?

Cheers,

Tod

PS: If this has been addressed recently and I just happened to miss it in
the archives: my apologies.

-- 
Tod Robbins
iSchool GSA Crew
MLIS Candidate 2012
University of Washington

Re: [CODE4LIB] institutional fair use policies for digitized image collections

[Genny Engel]

My favorite source for this kind of information is the Library of Congress, 
home to both the partly-digitized and publicly viewable Prints & Photographs 
Collection, and the U.S. Copyright Office.

They have posted a lengthy discussion, with links to many other resources:
http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/195_copr.html

See section 3 for how the Library itself determines which images to display 
publicly.  The implication is that they do a rights analysis for everything 
they post (!) but you might want to contact them by email or phone to inquire 
further.  http://www.loc.gov/rr/askalib/ask-print.html


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Derek 
Merleaux
Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2012 10:39 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] institutional fair use policies for digitized image 
collections

I'm working with some folks at my institution to open up policy on
fair use and online digital collections. Our counsel has made it clear
that we'll see more success if we can point to examples from other
large digital collections. A lot of surveying of copyright and TOS
pages from many online collections has given me a good general idea
what collection posters are telling their patrons about fair use, but
I need some examples of what administrators are telling the collection
posters about what they can and can't claim (esp. in regards to
collections open to the world that may contain large numbers of orphan
works). It does seem clear that many have decided that a
low-resolution digital image of a collection item (even if that item
might be in copyright) is ok w/in the spirit of fair use if it's
clearly posted for educational purposes. I just need some
documentation of that policy.

What I'm hoping to find is documentation (internal or otherwise) that
basically states, "we think it's legally ok (for fair use or other
reasons) to post online a digitized image of a collection object even
if there's a chance that object is under copyright protection."

If there is any chance you could point me in the direction of such
documentation or someone who would know how to locate it I would be
much obliged.


Derek Merleaux

Re: [CODE4LIB] Obvious answer to registration limitations

[Genny Engel]

You realize, of course, that the only possible response to this is to propose 
that OCLC host a new spinoff unconference to handle the overflow:  BaCon.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-


I'd love if we had one or more hosting proposals for #c4l13 that
suggest tinkering with, or scrapping, the formula.  Otherwise this
thread will end the way many of our threads do, by fading into a
series of bacon and OCLC jokes, which are then rehashed year after
year.

Re: [CODE4LIB] copyright/fair use considerations for re-using Seattle World's Fair images

[Genny Engel]

Seattle Public Library's website has a collection of Seattle World's Fair 
images.  One record includes the following:

 Contributing Institution   Seattle Center Foundation: owner, scanning, and 
metadata; The Seattle Public Library: metadata

 Rights Management  To order a reproduction or to inquire about 
permissions, email i...@seattlecenter.org or call 206-684-7345.

I'm guessing you could use that as the general method to inquire about any 
other Seattle World's Fair image.


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Simon 
Spero
Sent: Friday, December 09, 2011 2:46 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] copyright/fair use considerations for re-using Seattle 
World's Fair images

I believe that this is might be the case for many images, the site also
lists their local LAM partners for the 50th anniversary (which is next
year).  Might be possible to get logo rights, or possible even some nifty
retro-future image from their collections

Simon

On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 4:03 PM, BRIAN TINGLE <
brian.tingle.cdlib@gmail.com> wrote:

> these guys might own the copyright
> http://seattlecenter.org/
>
> https://www.facebook.com/pages/1962-Seattle-Worlds-Fair/106938462090
>
> On Dec 9, 2011, at 12:53 PM, Doran, Michael D wrote:
>
> > Hi Trish,
> >
> > Thank you for the referral.  I looked through that but I don't think my
> intended use (an unofficial code4lib conference t-shirt) can be categorized
> as teaching, research, or study. ;-)  I may do a one-off copy for myself.
> >
> > -- Michael
> >
> >> -Original Message-
> >> From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of
> >> Trish Rose-Sandler
> >> Sent: Friday, December 09, 2011 1:56 PM
> >> To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
> >> Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] copyright/fair use considerations for re-using
> >> Seattle World's Fair images
> >>
> >> Michael,
> >>
> >> If you think your use falls under Fair Use you may find the recently
> >> released document from the Visual Resources Association useful
> >>
> >> *Statement on the Fair Use of Images for Teaching, Research, and
> Study*. *
> >> http://www.vraweb.org/organization/pdf/VRAFairUseGuidelinesFinal.pdf*.
> >>
> >> Trish Rose-Sandler
> >> Data Analyst, Biodiversity Heritage Library Project
> >> http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/
> >>
> >>
> >> On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 1:45 PM, Beanworks  wrote:
> >>
> >>> I think what Cary is trying to say is "welcome to the fun world of
> >>> copyright!"
> >>>
> >>> No, you shouldn't assume copyright was not renewed. You will need to
> >>> determine (1) who the copyright holder is/was and (2) whether the
> >> copyright
> >>> has lapsed. This is not always an easy task, which is why you need to
> >>> document your good faith efforts (which will, of course, be
> exhaustive).
> >>>
> >>> Carol
> >>>
> >>> On Dec 9, 2011, at 2:26 PM, Cary Gordon  wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Copyright law requires that you make a good-faith effort to find the
> >>>> copyright owners. If you document such effort and they sue you, this
> >>>> can weigh heavily in your favor. There are two obvious caveats: a) You
> >>>> can still get sued, not to mention annoying cease-and-desist letters;
> >>>> and 2) They could still win.
> >>>>
> >>>> Being that we are, for the most part, not art critics, you could
> >>>> consider creating original art. You might get mocked, particularly
> >>>> after a few beers, but that's just the way we roll. Of course, if you
> >>>> buy beer, that will reduce any mock risk.
> >>>>
> >>>> Cary
> >>>>
> >>>> On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 12:34 PM, Doran, Michael D 
> >> wrote:
> >>>>> I was hoping to re-use/re-purpose a couple of 1962 Seattle World's
> >> Fair
> >>> images found on the interwebs [1][2].  Both images were originally
> >> created
> >>> for souvenir decals.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> According to the U.S. Copyright Office's "Copyrights Basics" [3]
> >>> section on works originally created and published or registered before
> >>> January 1, 1978, &

Re: [CODE4LIB] Unwritten Rules, formerly Pandering for votes for code4lib sessions

[Genny Engel]

Can't.  The first rule of unwritten rules is ...

Genny 


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Wilfred 
Drew
Sent: Thursday, December 01, 2011 12:51 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Unwritten Rules, formerly Pandering for votes for 
code4lib sessions

If it is that important, it should be written down!

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Chris 
Cormack
Sent: Thursday, December 01, 2011 3:36 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Unwritten Rules, formerly Pandering for votes for 
code4lib sessions

On 2 December 2011 09:33, Munson, Doris  wrote:
> As a relative newcomer to this list, I second the idea that any offenders be 
> contacted off list with an explanation of any unwritten rules they 
> unknowingly violate.  I suggest this becomes one of c4l's unwritten rules.
>
>
I totally just unwrote that down

Chris

Re: [CODE4LIB] web spam block less awful than Captcha?

[Genny Engel]

I am very wary of relying on CSS to hide a field the user is never supposed to 
see.  I have on more than one occasion seen an "invisible" error message 
displaying inappropriately because there was a failure to load or interpret the 
CSS.

For including a hidden field in a form that only bots will fill out, I like to 
start with a commented-out field, with a nice irresistible fieldname such as 
url.  This right away gets rid of about 90% of spam submissions and does not 
appear to have any accessibility side effects.


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Erin R 
White/FS/VCU
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2011 7:47 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] web spam block less awful than Captcha?

I'll second Dre's method here. We've used it with great success on our 
mobile website - it adds zero effort for users and we've had maybe one 
false positive since March 2010.

The field is input type="text" with CSS hiding it and its label from 
display. From my extensive googling it like as of JAWS 10 (released 2009), 
elements hidden by CSS aren't read, but I'm not sure about support from 
other readers. I'm assuming some kind of "skip" mechanism will be built in 
to WAI-ARIA too.

Spam catcher - do not complete this 
field 


--
Erin White
Web Applications Developer, VCU Libraries
804-827-3552 | erwh...@vcu.edu | http://library.vcu.edu/




From:   Ken Irwin 
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Date:   10/24/2011 10:35 AM
Subject:Re: [CODE4LIB] web spam block less awful than Captcha?
Sent by:Code for Libraries 



This is an intriguing approach, Dre. I wonder how to render this 
non-problematic for folks with screen-readers too. You could just say 
"leave this field blank" but that's sort of weird too. Is there a WAI-ARIA 
approach that would get screen readers to hide this field too? 

I'm looking into Mollom too -- looks like that could work in a few areas 
of our site.

Thanks all!
Ken

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
Andreas Orphanides
Sent: Monday, October 24, 2011 10:13 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] web spam block less awful than Captcha?

 
Here's a method that's by no means foolproof but is practically zero cost 
(you may be using a version already). Disclaimer -- I have not actually 
tested this to any extent:
 
Include a text input field in your form that needs to be blank for the 
form to validate in the back end. Keep the field hidden with CSS (or 
z-indexed behind another element, size set to zero, etc). Users will never 
see it, so their forms will validate; I doubt that most spambots are 
sophisticated enough to check whether a form field is hidden or obfuscated 
before filling it in. Then silently reject submissions with that field 
filled.
 
I am not sure whether this would cause any problems with tab navigation, 
screen readers or other assistive technologies, but you may be able to do 
something to sidestep those issues On the other hand, captcha brings 
its own host of accessibility problems.
 
One other disadvantage is that this might be hard to implement in a 
CMS-based form plugin. But if you're coding forms the old-fashioned way, 
it's worth a shot.
 
-dre.
 
 

Re: [CODE4LIB] screen scraping

[Genny Engel]

Another reason to check with the webmaster, all legalities aside, is that their 
top ten list might actually be being built on an RSS feed, but for whatever 
reason they don't offer it directly as a feed (or they do, but it wasn't 
obvious to you where that feed was to be found).  They might prefer you grab 
the feed rather than scrape the screen.  I don't actually have any feed-based 
pages on our site that aren't also available as feeds -- but some people might. 
 Also, for usage statistics reasons, I'd rather have bots hitting the feeds 
instead of the pages.

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Nate 
Hill
Sent: Sunday, October 02, 2011 7:23 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] screen scraping

A question: what are the 'rules' around screen scraping?
If one site doesn't offer an RSS feed and you want to grab (for example)
their weekly top ten list with a script and then redisplay it on another
site, is that bad form?  Or even illegal?
Thanks-
Nate


-- 
Nate Hill
nathanielh...@gmail.com
http://www.natehill.net

Re: [CODE4LIB] mysql subquery response time

[Genny Engel]

Well, not being a MySQL whiz myself, I thought maybe the query was being 
needlessly slowed down by having DISTINCT specified in both parts of the query. 
 In testing a similar query on one of my databases, the double DISTINCT query 
did run quite slowly. I tried modifying it to a form like this: 

SELECT distinct institution from renewals
WHERE institution not in
(SELECT institution FROM `renewals` WHERE snap_date < '2011-07-01')

It ran much faster.  But, so did rerunning the original query. 

There is a page in the MySQL documentation about some limitations and some 
optimizer issues with subqueries:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/subquery-restrictions.html

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Ken 
Irwin
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2011 9:41 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] mysql subquery response time

Hi all,

I've not done much with MySQL subqueries, and I'm trying right now with what I 
find to be surprising results. I wonder if someone can help me understand.

I have a pile of data that with columns for "institution" and "date". 
Institution gets repeated a lot, with many different dates. I want to select 
all the institutions that *only* have dates after July 1 and don't appear in 
the table before that. My solution was to do a first query for all the 
institutions that DO have dates before July 1
SELECT distinct institution FROM `renewals` WHERE snap_date < '2011-07-01'

And then to do a SELECT query on all the institutions:
SELECT distinct institution from renewals

And then try to do a NOT IN subquery subtracting the smaller query from the 
larger one:

SELECT distinct institution from renewals
WHERE institution not in
(SELECT distinct institution FROM `renewals` WHERE snap_date < '2011-07-01')

...only it doesn't seem to work. Or rather, the query has been running for 
several minutes and never comes back with an answer. Each of these two queries 
takes just a few milliseconds to run on its own.

Can someone tell me (a) am I just formatting the query wrong, (b) do subqueries 
like this just take forever, and/or (c) is there a better way to do this? (I 
don't really understand about JOIN queries, but from what I can tell they are 
only for mixing the results of two different tables so I think they might not 
apply here.)

Any advice would be most welcome.

Thanks
Ken

Re: [CODE4LIB] Advice on a class

[Genny Engel]

When I was in library school, the programming classes there were in C (this was 
quite a while ago!).  I've found it actually quite useful to have that 
background when learning things like JavaScript, PHP, and even VB. They all 
build on the concepts I originally learned from C. [Note:  this does not work 
at all as a basis for learning Perl.  Nothing does.]

C++ might be a better choice if you want to start off with a grounding in 
object-oriented programming.  Or maybe Java.  I'm about to start the C++ course 
at the local junior college.  Which reminds me to mention, it probably doesn't 
matter which programming course you take right now -- if you then go through 
life taking more programming classes like I do!

Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of David 
Mayo
Sent: Tuesday, July 26, 2011 12:12 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Advice on a class

If you're looking to do web programming, C is probably not going to directly
benefit you - it's not that it's a bad language to learn, or that it doesn't
have uses, but you'd probably be better off trying to improve your PHP or
RoR skills.

That being said, if you need to get lower-level knowledge of how memory
management and other close-to-the-metal concerns work, a decent C course
wouldn't be a bad thing at all.

If you're an autodidact, there are some good resources available on the web
- I can work up a list, and I'm sure other people have suggestions.  I also
have a fondness for O'Reilly's *Programming PHP*, if you want to pick up a
book.  I've heard really good things about The Pragmatic Programmer's Ruby
book, but Ruby isn't (thus far) something I've worked with, so that's
secondhand advice.

- Dave

On Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 2:54 PM, Lepczyk, Timothy wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I work in a digital library and am transitioning to something more like a
> programmer and less like a librarian.  My strengths are in xslt and unix,
> but I've been working some with php and ruby on rails.  I'm trying to learn
> as much as I can, and am considering enrolling in an intro to C programming
> class (free through my university's night school).
>
> Is this worthwhile, or should I focus my attention elsewhere?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Tim Lepczyk
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Programmer Orientation to Library/Lib Sci

[Genny Engel]

Reminds me of a joke about someone new to libraries, whose ideas kept getting 
shot down because "that doesn't work with the way LC does it."  Finally the 
exasperated new person asks, "Who is this Elsie and how come everybody does 
what SHE wants?"

Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
www.sonomalibrary.org
707 545-0831 x581

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Laura 
Smart
Sent: Wednesday, July 20, 2011 2:48 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Programmer Orientation to Library/Lib Sci

Perhaps at minimum a glossary of acronyms commonly tossed about by
catalogers?  

Re: [CODE4LIB] TIFF Metadata to XML?

[Genny Engel]

Guess it depends on whether they actually followed any kind of standard in 
encoding the data in the TIFF files.

http://www.metadataworkinggroup.com/pdf/mwg_guidance.pdf


Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
www.sonomalibrary.org
707 545-0831 x581


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Edward 
M. Corrado
Sent: Monday, July 18, 2011 7:40 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] TIFF Metadata to XML?

Thanks for all the suggestions. I know have multiple ways to get an
XML file... now I only need to figure out which fields map to what.

Edward

On Mon, Jul 18, 2011 at 9:57 AM, Dave Rice  wrote:
> Try exiftool with the -X flag to get RDF XML output.
> Dave Rice
> avpreserve.com
>
> On Jul 18, 2011, at 9:18 AM, Edward M. Corrado wrote:
>
>> Hello All,
>>
>> Before I re-invent the wheel or try many different programs, does
>> anyone have a suggestion on a good way to extract embedded Metadata
>> added by cameras and (more importantly) photo-editing programs such as
>> Photoshop from TIFF files and save it as as XML? I have > 60k photos
>> that have metadata including keywords, descriptions, creator, and
>> other fields embedded in them and I need to extract the metadata so I
>> can load them into our digital archive.
>>
>> Right now, after looking at a few tools and having done a number of
>> Google searches and haven't found anything that seems to do what I
>> want. As of now I am leaning towards extracting the metadata using
>> exiv2 and creating a script (shell, perl, whatever) to put the fields
>> I need into a pseudo-Dublin Core XML format. I say pseudo because I
>> have a few fields that are not Dublin Core. I am assuming there is a
>> better way. (Although part of me thinks it might be easier to do that
>> then exporting to XML and using XSLT to transform the file since I
>> might need to do a lot of cleanup of the data regardless.)
>>
>> Anyway, before I go any further, does anyone have any
>> thoughts/ideas/suggestions?
>>
>> Edward
>

Re: [CODE4LIB] Trends with virtualization

[Genny Engel]

I *had* the entire computer lab go down when the network failed once.  That's 
when I switched it all to local desktops.  The security was way easier to 
manage with a hosted desktop (I basically didn't have to manage it at all) but 
we weren't set up to offer any alternative when the network server hiccupped.   
It took me a lot of time to learn how to set up adequate security on an 
individual desktop, but once I got a good profile set up, I copied the image to 
all the other PCs and we were set.  There weren't any equipment cost 
differences either way, as I recall.

On moving things to the cloud, I'm still leery, especially after that Amazon 
thing a few months ago.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1379474/Web-chaos-Amazon-cloud-failure-crashes-major-websites-Playstation-Network-goes-AGAIN.html



Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
www.sonomalibrary.org
707 545-0831 x581

-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of 
Madrigal, Juan A
Sent: Monday, July 11, 2011 8:21 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Trends with virtualization

Its true what they say, history does repeat itself! I don't see how
virtualization is much different from
a dummy terminal connected to a mainframe. I'd hate to see an entire
computer lab go down should the network fail.

The only real promise is for making web development and server management
easier.

Vmware is looking to make thing easier with CloudFoundry
http://cloudfoundry.org/ along
with Activestate and Stackato http://www.activestate.com/cloud

I definitely want to take those two out for a test run. Deployment looks
dead simple.

Juan Madrigal


Web Developer
Web and Emerging Technologies
University of Miami
Richter Library





On 7/11/11 10:38 AM, "Nate Vack"  wrote:

>On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 9:46 AM, Karen Schneider 
>wrote:
>
>> My down-home-country-librarian observation that I always tack on (with
>> plenty of disclaimers) is "If virtualization were the answer, we'd see
>>more
>> of it by now."
>
>This.
>
>Various vendors have been pushing the "run all your desktops in the
>server room and export your I/O over ethernet" solution for a long
>time. Heck, X11 does exactly this, and it's as old as the original
>Macintosh.
>
>I suspect the problems partly come down to the end-user experience
>(performance, customizability, etc) and partly the fact that making an
>environment truly truly homogeneous is not completely realistic in
>most environments. Once you've gone the "everything will be
>virtualized" route, making one desktop setup just a little different
>(adding custom hardware, etc) is nearly impossible.
>
>So it winds up making more sense to find a solution that lets you
>cost-effectively manage lots of desktops, because that solves your
>actual business needs, not what IT wishes your business needs were.
>
>That, and the fact that the parts of desktop hardware that usually
>fail tend to be the things people spend time touching with their dirty
>fingers and pouring their coffee on. Disks and motherboards do fail,
>but if you've done your homework right, you should be able to swap
>another one in within minutes -- and thin clients can fail, too. So
>virtualizing doesn't get you out of the business of heading out to
>replace gear.
>
>And desktop PCs are dead cheap and you can buy them from anyone.
>Custom virtual solutions usually want you to source from one vendor.
>
>That said: we do love virtualization for delivering Windows apps to
>Macs and Linux clients. Sometimes, there's just no substitute for SPSS
>on Windows.
>
>-n

[CODE4LIB] FW: [dpla-discussion] DPLA Beta Sprint: Announcement, Video, and Instructions

[Genny Engel]

Reposting for anyone who's not on the DPLA list and thinks this sounds like a 
fun project.

Genny

From: Rebekah Heacock [mailto:rheac...@cyber.law.harvard.edu]
Sent: Friday, May 20, 2011 12:27 AM
To: dpla-discuss...@eon.law.harvard.edu
Subject: [dpla-discussion] DPLA Beta Sprint: Announcement, Video, and 
Instructions

Good morning,

The Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) Steering Committee is delighted to 
announce today a Beta Sprint that aims to 
surface innovations that could play a part in the building of a digital public 
library.

Full announcement: 
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/newsroom/Digital_Public_Library_America_Beta_Sprint
Submission Instructions: http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/dpla/
Short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrmO-qUzjxM

The Beta Sprint seeks, ideas, models, prototypes, technical tools, user 
interfaces, etc. - put forth as a written statement, a visual display, code, or 
a combination of forms - that demonstrate how the DPLA might index and provide 
access to a wide range of broadly distributed content. The Beta Sprint also 
encourages development of submissions that suggest alternative designs or that 
focus on particular parts of the system, rather than on the DPLA as a whole.

The DPLA Steering Committee is leading the first concrete steps toward the 
realization of a large-scale digital public library that will make the cultural 
and scientific record available to all. The DPLA planning initiative grew out 
of an October 2010 meeting at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, which 
brought together over 40 representatives from foundations, research 
institutions, cultural organizations, government, and libraries to discuss best 
approaches to building a national digital library. Subsequent workshops in 
March and May have addressed the content, scope, and technical aspects of a 
DPLA.

"As the DPLA planning initiative moves forward, we are optimistic that the DPLA 
community and public can help us think about what a DPLA might look like, in 
practical - and perhaps unexpected - ways, as platform, architecture, 
interface, and beyond," said John Palfrey, chair of the DPLA Steering 
Committee. "We hope geeks and librarians, especially, will join forces to 
develop beta submissions in support of this initiative."

"The Beta Sprint is where the dream of a seamless and comprehensive digital 
library for every person begins to grapple, technically and creatively, with 
what has already been accomplished and what still need to be developed," said 
Doron Weber, Vice President of Programs at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and a 
Steering Committee member. "The DPLA represents the broadest coalition of 
stakeholders ever assembled who are dedicated to free and universal access to 
knowledge for all, and the Beta Sprint will help us kick off an 18-month 
program to construct, brick by digital brick, this beautiful new edifice."

For inspiration, Beta Sprint participants might consider the general approach 
taken by initiatives whose leaders are on the DPLA Steering Committee, such as 
the Internet Archive, 
Public.Resource.Org, the Hathi 
Trust, American 
Memory, and others, as well as the 
Europeana project and the national digital libraries in the Netherlands, 
Norway, and South Korea.

Submission instructions and more information are available at 
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/dpla, where you can also watch a short 
video about the Beta Sprint. 
Statements of interest must be received by June 15, 2011. Final submissions 
will be due by September 1, 2011.

A review panel appointed by the Steering Committee and composed of experts in 
the fields of library science, information management, and computer science 
will review Beta Sprint submissions in early September. Creators of the most 
promising betas will be invited to present their ideas to interested 
stakeholders and community members during a public meeting in Washington, DC.

--
Rebekah Heacock
rebekahheacock.org | @rebekahredux | +1-617-384-9141 
| Skype: rebekah.heacock
Berkman Center for Internet and Society | 
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/rheacock

Re: [CODE4LIB] Japanese earthquake destruct

[Genny Engel]

Thank you for posting this info, Takanori.  I'll pass it along.  Here in 
California the people of Japan are very much in our thoughts.  I hope you and 
your library will be fine!

Genny Engel


From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Takanori 
Hayashi [takanor...@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, March 12, 2011 8:36 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Japanese earthquake destruct

Hi, folks,

As all know, great earthquake and tsunami attack East Japan Area (Also
my library).
Many libraries has earthquake destruct.
Now, Code4Lib Japan members and other librarians manage and distribute
of destruct information about any libraries.
http://www45.atwiki.jp/savelibrary/pages/1.html

NHK is broadcasting Japanese information by Ustream
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-world-tv
Google provide Crisis response service, if your friend in Japan status
is unknown, I recommend use Person Finder and Disaster message boards
provide by telephone careers.
http://www.google.co.jp/intl/en/crisisresponse/japanquake2011.html

And send response to Japanese librarian by twitter, using hachtag #jishinlib

Thank you for very kindness message from all member of c4l by twitter
or other, and sending rescue team form USA and other countries.

Please don't worry, hacker is never die :-)

--
Takanori HAYASHI
Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Research Information Technology Center

Re: [CODE4LIB] PHP vs. Python [was: Re: Django]

[Genny Engel]

I think the significant attributes of most programming languages are adequately 
summarized here:
http://james-iry.blogspot.com/2009/05/brief-incomplete-and-mostly-wrong.html


From: Code for Libraries [code4...@listserv.nd.edu] on behalf of William Sexton 
[will.sex...@duke.edu]
Sent: Friday, October 29, 2010 7:24 AM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU
Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] PHP vs. Python [was: Re: Django]

I use Python and Django extensively, and think they're both great. That said, 
also great is the very funny keynote by former flickr engineer Cal Henderson at 
DjangoCon 2008, titled "Why I Hate Django," which is on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6Fr65PFqfk

When he showed the slide I had to admit that the statement

"-".join(array)

is kind of a goofy way to do that, though maybe not "unforgivable." Whenever I 
use join() now I chuckle a little in my mind.

It's good to step back and re-evaluate your favorite tools from time-to-time. 
If nothing else, the ability to analyze a platform for its suitability to a 
need is key.

Will


On Oct 28, 2010, at 9:38 AM, Thomas Bennett wrote:

> Having used Zope (python based) as our WEB server of choice since 1998 I am
> urged to express my opinion that if you do choose to use python in your
> projects then use a service designed for python use such as Zope, Django, et
> al.  Zope is normally run in front of Apache as a virtual host.
>
> If you are going to use python then Zope is an excellent choice for
> interacting with databases and using python to massage/manipulate results if
> you need complex results from the database data.  I like that you can write
> sql queries  just like you might use on the command line and save it as an
> individual object for use by any number of other objects.
>
> What may be a simple example to some is a tutorial quiz I wrote for the WEB.
> There are categories and each category has any number of questions along with
> the answers in the database.  In the management portion, the administrator can
> choose which categories are active and how many questions out of the total
> available to pull from each category individually.  When the quiz page is
> generated the correct number of questions are pulled randomly from the total
> active questions for each category, some questions can be set as inactive.
>
> There are "database connectors" for PostgreSQL, MySQL, Oracle, odbc, and
> others so you can choose any popular db or write your own connector.  And
> there are python libraries written for these databases which prove very
> useful.
>
> The main thing I like about python is that the syntax pretty much forces your
> code to be readable by others because indention is part of the syntax rather
> than semicolons, parens, etc.
>
> I don't know PHP in detail but am learning more quickly because the University
> is "forcing" all departments to move to Drupal and we will be running our site
> on Drupal within a year probably although some administrative tasks will still
> be running on our Zope server.
>
> Thomas
>
> ps: remember my point is that "IF" you choose to use python this supports its
> use with databases and scripting.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wednesday 27 October 2010 20:49:06 you wrote:
>> Olá, como vai?
>>
>> Luciano Ramalho  wrote:
>>> Actually, Python is a general purpose programming language. It was not
>>> created specifically for server side scripting like PHP was. But it is
>>> very suitable to that task.
>>
>> I'm not sure talking about what something used to be is as interesting
>> as talking about what it is. Both Pyhton and PHP can share whatever
>> moniker we choose (scripting-language, programming language,
>> real-time, half-time, bytecoded, virtual, etc.).
>>
 Not seen any scientific packages, but I've seen a few ray-tracers,
 although they're all demo apps and fun toys (although I think that
 applies to Python, too).
>>>
>>> No, that does not apply to Python. Python is widely used for hardcore
>>> scientific computing.
>>
>> I was referring to the ray-tracing part.
>>
>>> It is also the most important scripting language in large scale CGI
>>> settings
>>
>> Yes, Python is widely used for scripting up interfaces into other more
>> complex systems. But rarely is the core of the thing written entirely
>> in Python.
>>
 Maybe your Google-foo is weak. :)
>>>
>>> Or maybe he's just realizing that outside of server side web
>>> scripting, PHP is just not so widely used.
>>
>> Absolutely, and fair enough.
>>
>>> Having used both languages, I discovered that Python is easier for
>>> most tasks, and one reason is that the libraries that come with Python
>>> are extremely robust, well tested and consistent.
>>
>> Hmm. PHP is extremely robust and well-tested, but yes, it's not all
>> that consistent, especially not before version 5.2+. However, things
>> have moved on, and with release 6 around the corner things will be
>> tighter still. Just like the first versions of P

Re: [CODE4LIB] Facebook JSON results and the privacy problem

[Genny Engel]

Seems to honor privacy settings, though.  Otherwise 
http://graph.facebook.com/search?q=poopiness would retrieve WAY more records.
 
Genny Engel

>>> ranti.ju...@gmail.com 06/21/10 03:31PM >>>
For example:
http://graph.facebook.com/search?q=whatever 


ranti.

-- 
Bulk mail.  Postage paid.

Re: [CODE4LIB] Approaches to "Did You Mean" Query Spelling Suggestions

[Genny Engel]

I am not a fan of services that give spelling suggestions based on their own 
web-wide universe of terms.  It's better to suggest only terms that are 
actually found within the smaller universe of your own materials.  That way the 
user isn't offered a link that's guaranteed to get them zero results.  However, 
this only works if you're actually indexing the contents of all your sources 
into a local index -- not if you're dynamically retrieving the results from 
different sources.

I don't have personal experience with any of the options you list, but from 
briefly looking at them, I would be inclined toward Aspell since you'd control 
the dictionary.  

Ideally the dictionary would auto-populate from the index the search engine 
builds.  We use Thunderstone Webinator http://www.thunderstone.com for our 
website search and it uses its own index for the spelling suggestions.  It also 
lists in parentheses the number of results that match each suggestion.   
http://www.sonomalibrary.org/search 


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org



>>> cory_l...@ncsu.edu 04/30/10 06:55AM >>>
I'm exploring options for implementing a spelling suggestion or basic query 
reformulation service in our home grown search application (searches library 
website, catalog, summon, and a few other bins). Right now, my thought is to 
provide results for whatever was searched for 'as is' and generate a link for 
an alternate search -- sort of like what The Google does.  I am concerned only 
with correcting spelling errors, not so much with topically related search 
suggestions.

The 3 options I've found that seem worth further investigation are:

- Yahoo Search spellingSuggestion service: 
http://developer.yahoo.com/search/web/V1/spellingSuggestion.html 

- GNU Aspell: http://aspell.net 

- Ockham Spell service: http://spell.ockham.org/about/index.html . There is a 
thread on Code4Lib back in 2005 about this: 
http://serials.infomotions..com/code4lib/sru/?operation=searchRetrieve&version=1.1&stylesheet=/code4lib/sru/style.xsl&query=spelling+server
 

Anyone doing something like this? What tools are you using? What have you 
tried? What worked well? Have I overlooked an option that I should consider?

Thanks,

Cory


Cory Lown
NCSU Libraries
Raleigh, NC
cory_l...@ncsu.edu

Re: [CODE4LIB] PHP bashing (was: newbie)

[Genny Engel]

I think it's perfectly sensible to declare that there is one best language.  
Here is the current spec for it:
 
http://lolcode.com/specs/1.2
 
The only place where I seriously take issue with this language is in their 
misspelling of "kthxbai," but perhaps that is an internal joke sort of like 
Apache's mod_speling.


>>> Peter Schlumpf  03/25/10 12:17PM >>>
Programming languages as with many other things, are arbitrary.  They aren't 
carved into stone tablets -- they're all made up.  Some are better suited for 
certain problems than others.  If you don't like any out there, go invent your 
own.  To argue that one language is better than another is silly when at the 
end of the day, none of this stuff is real.

Re: [CODE4LIB] newbie

[Genny Engel]

Agreed -- I coded up many nice SQL injection vulnerabilities before I ever 
learned PHP.  As for Perl, anyone remember the notorious formmail.cgi from 
Matt's Script Archive?
 
For **web** programming specifically, it's critically important for newbies to 
get a grounding in security issues, regardless of the language being used.  
Also, in usability issues, accessibility issues, etc.  for anything that's 
actually going to get used by the public.  But really, that mainly applies if 
you're going to be developing a whole app complete with web-accessible front 
end.
 
If your interests aren't particularly in web development, you have a whole 
other set of potential issues to learn about, and I'm probably ignorant of most 
of them.  
 
My first language was C, which according to langpop.com [1] is still the most 
popular language around!  If you don't want to get bogged down in the web 
security issues, etc., then you might lean toward learning a general-purpose 
language like C or Java, rather than one designed for a specific purpose as PHP 
is for web development.
  
 
[1] http://www.langpop.com/
 

>>> yitzchak.schaf...@gmx.com 03/25/10 07:56AM >>>
On 3/24/2010 17:43, Joe Hourcle wrote:
> I know there's a lot of stuff written in it, but *please* don't
> recommend PHP to beginners.
>
> Yes, you can get a lot of stuff done with it, but I've had way too many
> incidents where newbie coders didn't check their inputs, and we've had
> to clean up after them.

Another way of looking at this: part of learning a language is learning 
its vulnerabilities and how to deal with them.  And how to avoid 
security holes in web code in general.

Re: [CODE4LIB] Rails Hosting

[Genny Engel]

I have used Sonic.net for the past 10 years because it is run by geeks.  
Haven't done any Rails on it, but you can build pretty much anything you want 
on standard tools & languages (Perl, PHP, Python, C, Ruby, etc.).   For tech 
support, they have their own newsgroup hierarchy where questions get answered 
by authoritative sources, like their senior network & server admins or the 
company founder.  Also, they recently added two new ways to get their MOTD:  
twitter and  this cracks me up ... gopher ;) 

> 
> Hi,
> 
> I was curious if anyone could recommend a hosting service that they've
> had a good ruby on rails experience with. I've been working with
> bluehost but my experience has not been good. You need to work through
> a lot of hoops just to get a moderately complicated rails application
> properly. The applications we are looking at deploying would be
> moderately active, 1,000 -2000 visits a day. Thanks for any comments in
> advance.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Kevin Reiss
> 
> 
> 
> 

 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 
 

Re: [CODE4LIB] XForms editor for EAD

[Genny Engel]

The closest thing I'm aware of is the EAD Toolkit.
http://www.cdlib.org/inside/projects/oac/toolkit/

 

>>> ewg4x...@gmail.com 07/06/09 05:33AM >>>
Hi,

I'm curious as to whether anyone on the list has worked on or knows about
any web-based XForms application for creating and editing EAD Finding Aids.
I would like to add an editor into an administrative interface for an open
source EAD/VRA Core application I am developing.  I'm aware of a mods editor
that runs under the Orbeon tomcat application, but the only XForms editor I
have seen for EAD is one dated 2006 that runs in proprietary Windows
software--not in a web form.

Thanks,
Ethan Gruber
University of Virginia Library

Re: [CODE4LIB] MySQL Stop Words

[Genny Engel]

Once I read a study where the document collection to be indexed was in a narrow 
technical field, and the goal was to present a search that quickly isolated 
ONLY the most relevant documents.  To this end, they stopworded everything that 
didn't sufficiently distinguish one document from another.   Their stopword 
list comprised some 30,000 terms!
 
If your goal, on the other hand, is to maximize recall at some expense of 
precision, beware of MySQL full-text MATCH because it dynamically computes new 
stopwords.  Note this little side note in section 11.8.1 of the manual:
 
For very small tables, word distribution does not adequately reflect their 
semantic value, and this model may sometimes produce bizarre results. For 
example, although the word "MySQL" is present in every row of the articles 
table shown earlier, a search for the word produces no results [ ... ] The 
search result is empty because the word "MySQL" is present in at least 50% of 
the rows. As such, it is effectively treated as a stopword. For large data 
sets, this is the most desirable behavior: A natural language query should not 
return every second row from a 1GB table. For small data sets, it may be less 
desirable. 
 
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> dclout...@co.marin.ca.us 05/29/09 11:26AM >>>
In building a search function for some of our internal documents in PHP
/ MySQL, I took a look at the default list of MySQL English language
stop words used in the natural language searching feature. The list is
actually quite extensive, and goes well beyond the typical list of "to
be" cognates, common prepositions, conjunctions, etc. It also includes a
large number of keywords that librarians or academic users might want to
search for. Here are a few examples:

available
appropriate
course
follow
former
novel

There are quite a number of other stop words that I think are suspect.
The full list of stop words is located here:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/fulltext-stopwords.html 

I guess the point is that if you're building a library application that
takes advantage of MySQL's fulltext searching features, you might want
to customize you stop words list on your MySQL installation if you think
your library users might want to search the word "novel".

- David

---
David Cloutman 
Electronic Services Librarian
Marin County Free Library 

Email Disclaimer: http://www.co.marin.ca.us/nav/misc/EmailDisclaimer.cfm 

Re: [CODE4LIB] Something completely different

[Genny Engel]

Also back to the original question, what is an ILS in the first place?
 
The discussion has focused on bibliographic records, but that's just one part 
of what's in the ILS in use at the library where I work.  I see one of the big 
problems with current ILSs being not so much the ILS per se, but library 
managers'/librarians' expectations that they should have a single core system 
that handles all the following functionality:
 
- maintaining a database of patron records with attached fine and fee 
information, which books they have out, what is waiting on the hold shelf for 
them, etc.
 
- maintaining a library accounting hierarchy with the ability to run reports 
like "it's halfway through the year and you've spent 90% of your budget for 
children's fiction"
 
- maintaining an acquisitions system so records for purchases are reflected 
into the accounting system and also as new bib records for on-order materials
 
- serials check-in so that missing issues can be claimed
 
- and of course a cataloging module and an OPAC.
 
Without the ability to support all the back-end processing and accounting, 
simply replacing the front-end OPAC and the bibliographic database does nothing 
to eliminate the need for an ILS, unless it also opens the way to feed data in 
and out of cheap off-the-shelf accounting and purchasing systems that aren't 
library-specific.  A lot of libraries still won't want to put together even 
that much out of parts, and will prefer an ILS, but if it were me, I think I'd 
look at reengineering some of the parts to become more interchangeable with 
stuff like standard accounting software.
 
I must admit I was kind of horrified when I first got here and found that all 
this functionality was resident in a single system.  No wonder these things are 
so honking expensive.
 
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us 
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org 
 


>>> njv...@wisc.edu 04/07/09 08:59AM >>>
On Sun, Apr 5, 2009 at 10:40 AM, Peter Schlumpf  wrote:

> I want to get back to simple things.  Imagine if there were no Marc records.  
> Minimal layers of abstraction.  No politics.  No vendors.  No SQL 
> straightjacket.  What would an ILS look like without those things?

Back to this original question, [...]

Re: [CODE4LIB] Notes from Tuesday's Plone/Zope breakout session, C4L 2009 c4l09

[Genny Engel]

I have heard this before, that Plone is better than Drupal for the end user / 
content contributor, and that people like the "inline editing."  I've been a 
little baffled comparing Drupal 6 and Plone because the editing features 
actually look about equally  ... er ...  not-quite-what-they're-gonna-want for 
our potential content contributors.   I'm not really getting what's more inline 
about Plone editing -- both have an Edit option that brings up a web form.  
Perhaps the divide between Drupal and Plone editing interfaces was 
significantly greater in earlier Drupal versions?  The only one I've really 
looked at in depth has been 6.  
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> schneide...@appstate.edu 03/09/09 11:00AM >>>


from Vignette ($ license, complicated end-user interface). Didn't have 
SDK's, hard to get content contributed.  Content contributor user 
interface (Drupal easier for programmers, sucks for end-user.) 

Re: [CODE4LIB] T-Shirt Design Contest

[Genny Engel]

My apologies to all.  I meant to reply to Jean, not to the entire list.

 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
gen...@sonoma.lib.ca.us
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> yitzc...@touro.edu 01/06/09 08:36AM >>>
Eek!  A humble request that submitters post graphics online rather than

attaching, as my box only holds 50M total...

-- 
Yitzchak Schaffer
Systems Librarian
Touro College Libraries
33 West 23rd Street
New York, NY 10010
Tel (212) 463-0400 x5230
Fax (212) 627-3197
yitzc...@touro.edu 

Re: [CODE4LIB] Web Statistics Software

[Genny Engel]

We use two products because each has its strengths.
 
a.  Ancient (4.x) version of WebTrends.  
Pluses: 
-  Since we have been using it since the last millennium, it's the
closest we can get to accurate trending over time on the usage of our
server.  
-  Unlike later versions of the same product, the license doesn't max
out after processing X number of page views.  So at this point it's
free.
-  Counts everything in the log files, so if I edit out certain lines
in the log files and rerun the reports, I can know % of usage from
in-house, Googlebot, Slurp, etc.
Minuses: 
-  Can no longer report on things like referring search engines (since
it's so old it doesn't know Google is a search engine).
-  Reporting capabilities are not as slick as Google Analytics.
-  Counts everything in the log files, so it's got a lot of noise data
if you just want to see what real non-bot users from outside the library
are doing.
 
b.  Google Analytics
Pluses:
-  Very nice reporting.
-  Easy setup, including configuring it to exclude internal use.
-  Free.
-  Requires JavaScript, which more or less automatically excludes
non-human bot hits from the reports.
Minuses: 
-  Someone else has our log data.
-  Haven't found any feature to combine multiple logs and report on all
3 public servers in a single report.
-  Requires JavaScript, which excludes reporting on usage from browsers
with JavaScript turned off/unsupported.
 
I looked around a number of other tools and found many of the exact
same pluses and minuses, as well as the rather staggering price of some
of the commercial offerings, many of which now also use the
JavaScript-ping-to-remote-server method.  Currently, I actually have
somewhat more faith in Google to keep our users' data private than I do
in the pricey analytics vendors, but this may be naive on my part.  At
any rate, using one log-based tool and one JavaScript-based tool is
working OK for us for now.
 
There's an archived webcast about analytics options specifically for
measuring web "visits" from outside the library here:
http://www.infopeople.org/training/webcasts/webcast_data/255/index.html

 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org 
 


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 11/11/08 12:52PM >>>
Library Code People:

1 - What do you use for your web statistics package?  Are you happy  
with it? Pros/Cons?

2 - What do you wish you used or had access to?

3 - Opinions on Specific Projects:

3.1 Piwiki/Mint

Piwik and Mint both seem pretty interesting to me because they solve  
some of the problems of "traditional" log file analysis (see
http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/the-limitations-of#comments) 
, while of course introducing their own set of problems:  given their 

reliance on a RDBMS to store each page load, there are some obvious  
scaling concerns for very high traffic sites, for example.

I wonder if anyone here has put either of these or similar systems to 

the test on high traffic (define in your own terms) sites.

3.2 Google Analytics and/or Urchin

Some libraries have incorporated Google Analytics into their privacy  
policies:
http://www.google.com/search?q=google+analytics+libraries+privacy&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

  .

So, anyone here passionate one way or the other?  Other Pros/Cons?

Of course, favorite resources, questions I should be asking and the  
like are welcomed and appreciated as well :).

In advance:  thanks!

Cheers,
-Chad

[CODE4LIB] Today at the Library WordPress plugin: advice?

[Genny Engel]

I've written my first WordPress plugin (woohoo!) that displays a "Today
at the Library" list of the current day's events.  I have the left
sidebar of our Library News blog set to call the plugin function, as
seen here:

http://sonomalibrary.org/news/

It's been suggested that I post this as a publicly available plugin, but
it's so kludgey it's not fit for public consumption -- I can't find a
WordPress hook that will call it, so I have PHP code in the sidebar to
call it.  Also, it's currently so specific to libraries with WebEvent
calendars it's not likely to have much audience.  In theory, it could be
generalized, but that would take some time.  Is it worth it?

I thought I'd check with the Code4Librs.  Anyone out there think this is
indeed worth pursuing and if so, want to take some time to help me
de-kludge?

Thanks a bunch.


Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org

Re: [CODE4LIB] creating call number browse

[Genny Engel]

Actually, I don't think this is ideal for a lot of people who prefer
browsing to searching.  The whole premise that you have to come up with
a query in the first place is the showstopper for some folks.  
 
There are browsers and there are searchers.  If your system starts with
a search box, the browse-oriented will put in a highly generic term like
History.  Faceted search can help them from there, as could LCSH lists
for that matter.  But if these same browse-oriented users constantly go
to the library and head straight for QA76.9 H85, well then, that's the
closest they really have to a "search" term.
 
Shelf browsing interfaces, as well as browseable image libraries
organized by collection, make sense to me for this reason.  I would
always like to see a search box available for the search-oriented, but
to me, one of the failings of the OPAC today is the absence of support
for the browse-oriented. 
 
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 
 

>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 10/01/08 05:21AM >>>

Ideally, the user should be able to run a query, retrieve a set of
items, sort them however he wants (by author, date, call number, some
kind of dynamic clustering algorithm, whatever), and be able to
methodically browse from one end of that sort order to the other
without any fear of missing something.

Keith


On Tue, Sep 30, 2008 at 6:08 PM, Stephens, Owen
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I think we need to understand the
> way people use browse to navigate resources if we are to successfully
bring
> the concept of collection browsing to our navigation tools. David
suggests
> that we should think of a shelf browse as a type of 'show me more
like this'
> which is definitely one reason to browse - but is it the only
reason?

Re: [CODE4LIB] Simulating off-campus for testing

[Genny Engel]

That's pretty much what we did here.  I signed us up for an account with
a local ISP, and our testing Mac is for testing how stuff looks in Mac
vs. PC (since 15% of our audience is on Macs) as well as for dialing up
to the ISP to see how stuff works from outside our network.  (Knowing
whether things actually work at all over dialup is also useful -- the
percentage of our audience on dialup Internet connections keeps
shrinking, but it's still not zero.) The ISP is also our registrar for
domain names like sonomalibrary.org and for a while supplied our T1
lines.
 
Genny Engel
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 09/17/08 10:15AM >>>
Hi Chris,

I'm not sure how your campus is set up, but our IT folks actually have
a separate account with a local ISP just for this purpose; they were
even nice enough to run a line into my office so I can plug in to test
off-campus resources.  Granted, if that doesn't already exists at your
campus, it may cost substantially more than $30/yr, but personally I
find it is a great way to test resources from "off-campus."

Cheers,
Adam Traub
Systems Librarian
St. John Fisher College
3690 East Avenue
Rochester, New York 14618
Phone:  (585)385-8382
Email:  [EMAIL PROTECTED] 


-Original Message-
From: Code for Libraries [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of
Chris Gray
Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 12:42 PM
To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU 
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Simulating off-campus for testing

There are a number of services we offer that behave differently for 
off-campus users vs. on-campus users (based on IP address) and testing

both behaviors is difficult while sitting on-campus.

I'm looking for an easy, reliable, and secure way to do this.

At the moment I'm doing a free 7-day trial of Anonymizer Anonymous
Surfing 
software ($30/yr), but I want to make sure I'm not missing any good 
alternatives.

Does anyone have any recomnendations or relevant experience?

Chris Gray
Library Systems
University of Waterloo
(hopeful future ex sysadmin firefighter %-)

Re: [CODE4LIB] Enterprise Search and library collection

[Genny Engel]

I did not have stellar results experimenting with a similar approach to
Eric's.  The crawler we use is from Thunderstone, and it does a fine job
of indexing web content with very nice relevancy ranking and "did you
mean" spell-check.  What I found when trying to let it loose against
multiple servers is, when it hits our OPAC, it sees several different
formats per record and ends up more than triple-indexing each title.  It
does have a lot of flexibility in the indexing options, though, so I
could try it again and set it to ignore URL patterns that refer to the
MARC display, etc.  Still, the total cost to index a couple million
pages (which would be needed in order to include all the records in the
OPAC plus the website pages plus the Syndetics added content) is a bit
of a steep one-time outlay.  I'm sure there's some other way to go about
this with Thunderstone's TEXIS rather than using their Webinator
product, but then you have a substantially higher development effort, I
think.  

Thunderstone now makes a faceted search (they call it parametric
search).  They also make search appliances at different capacity levels.
 Pricing is really pretty reasonable for what you get.
http://www.thunderstone.com/texis/site/pages/Products.html
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/11/08 07:36AM >>>
> In short, I think a Google Appliance is an expensive but viable
option.
Relative to other commercial products in the space, the GA or G-mini
is
actually very inexpensive.  Another option to add to Eric's list is
the
All Access Connector which adds MuseGlobal's fed search technology to
the Google appliance.  Of course, it also add $40K or more to the
total
price.
http://wire.jstirnaman.com/2008/05/23/federated-search-for-google-search-appliance/


Jason
-- 

Jason Stirnaman
Digital Projects Librarian/School of Medicine Support
A.R. Dykes Library, University of Kansas Medical Center
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
913-588-7319


>>> On 7/10/2008 at 10:25 PM, in message
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Eric Lease Morgan
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> At the risk of interpreting the original question incorrectly, we  
> have had decent success using the Google Search Appliance to  
> facilitate search across the enterprise (university):
> 
>* Buy the Appliance.
>* Feed it one or more URLs.
>* Wait for it to crawl.
>* Customize the user interface.
>* Allow people to use it.
> 
> While we haven't done so, it would not be too difficult to implement


> a sort of federated search within the Appliance's interface. This  
> could be done in a number of ways:
> 
>1. Acquire bibliographic data and
>   feed to directly to the Appliance
>   via the (poorly) documented SQL
>   interface.
> 
>2. Acquire bibliographic data, save
>   it as HTML files, and allow the
>   Appliance to crawl the HTML.
> 
>3. License access to bibliographic
>   making sure it is accessible through
>   some sort of API, and write a Google
>   OneBox module that queries the data,
>   and returns results as a part of a
>   normal Google Appliance search.
> 
> The larger Google Appliance costs about $30,000 but you purchase it,


> not license it. No annual fees. That will buy you the ability to  
> index 500,000 documents. When it comes to a bibliographic database  
> (such as a subject index or a library catalog) that is not really  
> very much.
> 
> We here at Notre Dame did implement Option #3, but it queries the  
> local LDAP sever to return names and addresses of people, not  
> bibliographic citations. [1, 2] I did write a OneBox module to query


> our catalog, but we haven't implemented it, yet. It will probably  
> appear as a part of the library's Search This Site functionality.
> 
> In short, I think a Google Appliance is an expensive but viable
option.
> 
> [1] Search for a name (ex: Hesburgh) at http://search.nd.edu/ 
> [2] OneBox source code - http://tinyurl.com/6ktxot 

Re: [CODE4LIB] perl recaptcha?

[Genny Engel]

More anecdote: I got rid of pretty much 100% of spam on our blog by
commenting out the URL input box.  Then add a few lines of code to the
comment processor:
 
if ($_POST['url']) {
 header('HTTP/1.0 406 Not Acceptable'); 
 exit;
}
 
If the post contains a URL it's a bot, since a human wouldn't be able
to submit a URL field.  What I don't know is whether all the bots
hitting our comment form happen to be WordPress-specific bots
preprogrammed to send a URL value, or if it's really true in a more
general sense that commenting out input fields is a good way to foil
bots.
 
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/01/08 02:00PM >>>
It's anecdotal, but since I added a little "What's two plus two" input
box to my forms, we hardly get any more form spam.  You could easily
switch the question each time, although I haven't had the need to.

We weren't getting hit once a minute, mind you, so you might be
attracting a better class of bots . . . .

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 10:36 AM, MJ Ray <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Thomas Dowling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> Does anyone know anything concrete about "cognitive" captchas?  I've
run
>> into anecdotal support for things like:
>>Enter the word "orange" 
> [...]
>> Are these known to work?  Or are they just clever guesses about
what
>> bots might not be able to figure out?
>
> There are mostly anecdotes because this stuff is hard to test
> properly.  I found they worked a little, but are just clever
guesses.
>
> "3.1 Logic puzzles
>
> The goal of visual verification is to separate human from machine.
One
> reasonable way to do this is to test for logic. Simple mathematical
> word puzzles, trivia, and the like may raise the bar for robots, at
> least to the point where using them is more attractive elsewhere.
>
> Problems: Users with cognitive disabilities may still have trouble.
> Answers may need to be handled flexibly, if they require free-form
> text. A system would have to maintain a vast number of questions, or
> shift them around programmatically, in order to keep spiders from
> capturing them all. This approach is also subject to defeat by human
> operators."
>
> Source: http://www.w3.org/TR/turingtest/#logic 
>
>
> As that last phrase hints, bots are not the only problem.  See
> http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/11/spammers_using.html 
> for example.
>
>
> Hope that helps,
> --
> MJ Ray (slef)
> Webmaster for hire, statistician and online shop builder for a small
> worker cooperative http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ http://mjr.towers.org.uk/

> (Notice http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html) tel:+44-844-4437-237
>



-- 
Andrew Darby
Web Services Librarian
Ithaca College Library
http://www.ithaca.edu/library/ 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 

Re: [CODE4LIB] ssh tunneling through a mysql dsn

[Genny Engel]

Have you tried changing the source port to e.g. 3307 so you avoid the
conflict with your localhost MySQL port?
 
 
 
 
Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org
 


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 06/25/08 05:59AM >>>
Is there anyway to support SSH tunneling through a MySQL DSN?

I would like to open a database connection to remote host through  
Perl's DBI. The remote database is MySQL, but the server hosting the  
database does not allow outside connections. Instead the systems  
administrators suggest first setting up a local SSH tunnel, and then  
making connections to the host. Something this:

   $ ssh -T -L 3306:mysql.example.org:3306 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
&
   $ mysql -h mysql.example.org

Alas, this option does not work for two reasons. First, I get prompted 

for my username after the first command and my shell crashes. Second, 

and more importantly, port 3306 is already in use on my local machine. 

The whole thing seems weird anyway.

Maybe I can configure tunneling in the DBD::mysql DSN? I see that  
DBD::mysql supports SSH, but I see no tunneling option:

   use DBI;
   $database = 'foo';
   $user = 'bar';
   $password = 'baz';
   $host = 'mysql.example.org';
   $dsn  = "DBI:mysql:database=$database;host=$host;mysql_ssl=1";
   $dbh  = DBI->connect( $dsn, $user, $password );

Am I missing something, or is there some trickery I can use with the  
definition of $host and/or $database?

-- 
Eric Lease Morgan
Head, Digital Access and Information Architecture Department
Hesburgh Libraries, University of Notre Dame

(574) 631-8604

Re: [CODE4LIB] coverage of google book viewability API

[Genny Engel]

Our request volume goes up all the time, as does the quantity of items
that patrons flip through and then abandon at the holds shelf.  The
better information they have up front before they make the request, in
theory, the lower the chance they'll request items that they then don't
pick up.

We recently added the Syndetics "enhanced content" that includes book
covers, selected first chapters, reviews, summaries, etc.
http://catalog.sonomalibrary.org
The patrons have been very happy with it, especially the book covers,
but it remains to be seen whether the additional content does reduce the
irrelevant-request volume.

This is a public library, so ymmv at academic libraries ...

Genny Engel


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/07/08 08:45AM >>>
I think Kyle brings up a great point. If we can get links to previews,
patrons will have a better understanding of what a book has to decide
if
they want to go to another library on campus to look at it, request it
to be
retrieved from off-site storage, ILL it, etc. This would be a very
useful
thing to many patrons, I think.

Edward

On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 11:10 AM, Kyle Banerjee
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

> > 0.2% full text? Yowch!
> >
> >  Do academic libraries with full-text versions of the book on
their
> >  shelves really want to point people to no-preview pages on
Google.
> >  That's like a dating site with no photos of the members, and the
> >  profiles omit everything but their favorite potato variety.
>
> At first, this whole thing reminded me of a few years back when
Amazon
> wanted libraries to load their inventory into catalogs. The idea was
> that letting people know an item that wasn't available in the
library
> could be bought from Amazon was a useful service. Not too many
> libraries were takers.
>
> 0.2% might even be better and worse than it looks. Worse in the
sense
> that it could be some random public domain garbage that there's
little
> or no demand for. However, at the end of the day the percentage of
> books available full text is far less important than if the ones
that
> are available are the ones that people want.
>
> On the other hand, if partial preview really is available for 6.2%,
it
> could be very useful for helping people decide if they need a book
at
> all. This has significant implications for ILL and circ costs over
the
> long haul. Presumably, the number of books with a preview available
> will increase dramatically with time.
>
> kyle
>

code4lib@listserv.nd.edu

[Genny Engel]

Actually, the whole reason my wrist is so bad is the stress on it from
writing out code -- wouldn't be so bad except for having to press down
hard to write it in triplicate through all that carbon paper.

Genny


>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/03/08 08:54AM >>>
..- .-.. .-..   .. .. --   --. --- .. -. --.   - ---   ... .- -.--
 .-
-... --- ..- -   -  .. ...   -  .-. . .- -..   .. ...   - 
.- -
-. --- -. .   --- ..-.   -.-- --- ..-   ... ..- ..-. ..-. . .-.   ..-.
.-.
--- --   .-. -- ..   -  .   .-- .- -.--   ..   -.. ---   .--  .
-.
..   ..- ... .   -- -.--   .--. .-. . ..-. . .-. .-. . -..   .. -. .--.
..-
-   -.. . ...- .. -.-. . .-.-.- .-.-.- .-.-.-

-- --   .--- .- ..-.


On 4/3/08 6:51 AM, "Walter Lewis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Sebastian Hammer wrote:
>> > A true hacker has no need for these crude tools. He waits for
cosmic
>> > radiation to pummel the magnetic patterns on his drive into a
pleasing
>> > and functional sequence of bits.
> Alas, having been doing this (along with my partners, the four
> Yorkshiremen) since the Stone Age ...
>
> We used to arrange pebbles in the middle of road into the relevant
> patterns (we *dreamed* of being able to afford the wire for an
abacus).
> Passing carts would then help "crunch" the numbers.
>
> Walter
> for whom graph paper, templates, pencils, 80 column punchcards
and
> IBM Assembler were formative experiences
>



===
Jeremy Frumkin
Head, Emerging Technologies and Services
121 The Valley Library, Oregon State University
Corvallis OR 97331-4501

[EMAIL PROTECTED]

541.602.4905
541.737.3453 (Fax)
===
" Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes
nothing. "
- Emerson

Re: [CODE4LIB] Usability evaluation of library online catalogues

[Genny Engel]

Hmm.  From the problems they identify, their proposed solution of adding
Ajax controls to a moded search, in my opinion, utterly misses the
point.  Moded searches (and moded interfaces generally) have long been
known to create usability problems.  Rather than providing a search that
works differently depending on the previously selected settings, it's
better to let the user choose their options on the fly, so they don't
have to remember to toggle off an old setting.

Many of the problems identified are things that are pretty easy to fix,
but every fix comes at a price.  On our catalog we set the "advanced"
search not to include the heading browse, so the problem identified in
this article with people trying to apply bibliographic-level limits to
heading-level indexes just doesn't occur.  The downside is, most people
don't find the heading browse ("Begins with ...") option when they do,
in fact, want an exact title.

It'll be interesting to see the findings when the researchers test
their proposed interface.



Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org



>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 02/04/08 11:05AM >>>
A New Zealand based study published by the ACM

White, H., Wright, T., and Chawner, B. 2006. Usability evaluation of
library online catalogues. In Proceedings of the 7th Australasian User
interface Conference - Volume 50 (Hobart, Australia, January 16 - 19,
2006). W. Piekarski, Ed. ACM International Conference Proceeding
Series, vol. 169. Australian Computer Society, Darlinghurst,
Australia, 69-72.

Money quote from abstract:

"The evaluation found severe usability problems with online
catalogues--we found so many problems we were forced to use a card
sorting technique to understand and classify the problems."

[CODE4LIB] PHP and Sybase

[Genny Engel]

Anyone have PHP on Linux/Apache talking to a Sybase database on another
server?  If so, are you using Easysoft ODBC?  Or have other options to
recommend?

Thanks,


Genny Engel
Internet Librarian
Sonoma County Library
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
707 545-0831 x581
www.sonomalibrary.org