Guide to the professional literature

Citation

(2007), "Guide to the professional literature", Online Information Review, Vol. 31 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/oir.2007.26431aae.001

Guide to the professional literature

This column is designed to alert readers to pertinent wider journal literature on digital information and research.

A User-Centred Design and Evaluation of IR InterfacesAhmed, S.M.Z., McKnight, C, and Oppenheim, C. in Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, Vol. 38, No. 3, 2006, pp. 157-72

This paper presents a user-centred design and evaluation methodology for ensuring the usability of IR interfaces. The methodology is based on sequentially performing: a competitive analysis, user task analysis, heuristic evaluation, formative evaluation and a summative comparative evaluation. These techniques are described, and their application to iteratively design a prototype IR interface, which was then evaluated, is described. After each round of testing, the prototype was modified as needed. The user-centred methodology had a major impact in improving the interface. Results from the summative comparative evaluation suggest that users’ performance improved significantly in our prototype interface compared with a similar competitive system. They were also more satisfied with the prototype design. This methodology provides a starting point for techniques that let IR researchers and practitioners design better IR interfaces that are both easy to learn to use and remember.

Strong copyright plus DRM plus weak net neutrality = digital dystopia?Bailey, C.W. in Information Technology and Libraries, Vol. 25, No. 3, 2006, pp. 116+

Three critical issues-a dramatic expansion of the scope, duration, and punitive nature of copyright laws; the ability of Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems to lock-down digital content in an unprecedented fashion; and the erosion of Net neutrality, which ensures that all Internet traffic is treated equally-are examined in detail and their potential impact on libraries is assessed. How legislatures, the courts, and the commercial marketplace treat these issues will strongly influence the future of digital information for good or ill.

Using OAI-PMH and METS for Exporting Metadata and Digital Objects between RepositoriesBell, J. and Lewis, S. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 268-76

This paper examines the relationship between deposit of electronic theses in institutional and archival repositories. Specifically the paper considers the automated export of theses for deposit in the archival repository in continuation of the existing arrangement in Wales for paper-based theses. The paper presents a description of software that makes use of the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) as the first stage in the automatic import and ingest of items between institutional and archival repositories. The implications of this approach on the management of the institutional repository are also considered. The paper shows that OAI-PMH is a useful approach to harvesting the metadata for items to be imported into an archival repository. This reduces the difficulty of maintenance of the import and export software components albeit at the possible expense of necessitating certain requirements on the management of the institutional repository.

Options for Putting CDS/ISIS Databases on the InternetBuxton, A. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 286-95

This paper reviews the variety of software solutions available for putting CDS/ISIS databases on the internet. To help anyone considering which route to take. It briefly describes the characteristics, history, origin and availability of each package. Identifies the type of skills required to implement the package and the kind of application it is suited to. Covers CDS/ISIS Unix version, JavaISIS, IsisWWW, WWWISIS Versions 3 and 5, Genisis, IAH, WWW-ISIS, and OpenIsis. There is no obvious single “best” solution. Several are free but may require more investment in acquiring the skills to install and configure them. The choice will depend on the user’s experience with CDS/ISIS formatting language, HTML, programming languages, operating systems, open source software, and so on.

Bibliographic Displays In Web Catalogs: Does Conformity to Design Guidelines Correlate with User Performance?Cherry, J.M., Muter, P. and Szigeti, S.J. in Information Technology and Libraries, Vol. 25, No. 3, 2006, pp. 154-62

The present study investigated whether there is a correlation between user performance and compliance with screen-design guidelines found in the literature. Rather than test individual guidelines and their interactions, the authors took a more holistic approach and tested a compilation of guidelines. Nine bibliographic display formats were scored using a checklist of eighty-six guidelines. Twenty-seven participants completed 90 search tasks using the displays in a simulated Web environment. None of the correlations indicated that user performance was statistically significantly faster with greater conformity to guidelines. In some cases, user performance was actually significantly slower with greater conformity to guidelines. In a supplementary study, a different set of forty-three guidelines and the user performance data from the main study were used. Again, none of the correlations indicated that user performance was statistically significantly faster with greater conformity to guidelines.

Research Note – How Often Should Reputation Mechanisms Update a Trader’s Reputation Profile?Dellarocas, C. in Information Systems Research, Vol. 17, No. 3, 2006, pp. 271-85

Reputation mechanisms have become an important component of electronic markets, helping to build trust and elicit co-operation among loosely connected and geographically dispersed economic agents. Understanding the impact of different reputation mechanism design parameters on the resulting market efficiency has thus emerged as a question of theoretical and practical interest. Along these lines, this note studies the impact of the frequency of reputation profile updates on co-operation and efficiency. The principal finding is that, in trading settings with pure moral hazard and noisy ratings, if the per-period profit margin of co-operating sellers is sufficiently high, a mechanism that does not publish every single rating it receives but rather only updates a trader’s public reputation profile every k transactions with a summary statistic of a trader’s most recent k ratings can induce higher average levels of co-operation and market efficiency than a mechanism that publishes all ratings as soon as they are posted. This paper derives expressions for calculating the optimal profile updating interval k, discusses the implications of this finding for existing systems, such as eBay, and proposes alternative reputation mechanism architectures that attain higher maximum efficiency than the, currently popular, reputation mechanisms that publish summaries of a trader’s recent ratings.

Repository Librarian and the Next Crusade: The Search for a Common Standard for Digital Repository MetadataGoldsmith, B. and Knudson. F. in D-Lib Magazine, Vol. 12, No. 9, 2006 www.dlib.org/dlib/september06/goldsmith/09goldsmith.html

Charged with selecting a metadata standard to use in their multi-million record digital repository, the authors studied the abilities of MARCXML, Dublin Core, PRISM, ONIX, and MODS to meet their requirements for granularity, transparency and extensibility. This paper describes their comparison of these formats, states their selection, describes their principles of use, and evaluates their experiences over the two years the repository has been in operation.

The Evolution of Corporate Web Presence: A Longitudinal Study of Large American CompaniesHeinze, N. and Hu, Q. in International Journal of Information Management, Vol. 26, No. 4, 2006, pp. 313-25

This paper presents the results of a six-year longitudinal survey of the Websites of Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 companies. Using the technology acceptance model (TAM) and impression management theory as guidance, and eight design and functional measures, the authors found that S&P 500 companies have gone through remarkable transformation in their Web presence during the evaluation period of 1997-2003, signified by increasing levels of information, interactivity, and service offered at their Websites. There is a continuing trend towards increasing numbers and types of features offered, suggesting that large companies are placing greater importance on customer orientation to their Websites in an effort to create positive impressions about their companies and to induce consumer acceptance of their e-commerce technology.

Digital Preservation in the Context of Institutional RepositoriesHockx-Yu, H. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 232-43

This paper discusses the issues and challenges of digital preservation facing institutional repositories and to illustrate the Joint Information Systems Committee’s (JISC) view on institutional repositories and its key initiatives in helping UK institutions address these issues. Digital preservation is a complex process and there are still many unsolved issues which make it a challenging task for institutional repositories. However, the wide deployment of institutional repositories also provides new opportunities for digital preservation. Much could be done to consider digital preservation from the outset, to involve the authors and to embed digital preservation into repository workflow, which will ease the later preservation tasks. A number of ongoing JISC-funded projects are briefly reported which explore different models for the provision of digital preservation services for institutional repositories. These models may be a way forward to tackle collectively the issue of long-term preservation within the setting of institutional repositories. Depending on the outcomes of the projects, further investigation and implementation could be undertaken to test the models.

From Librarian to Digital CommunicatorHuwe, T.K. in Online, Vol. 30, No. 5, 2006, pp. 21-6

Huwe describes librarians who are putting themselves at the forefront of emerging online information technologies and, by doing this, making themselves indispensable to their institutions in ways that then open up opportunities for the delivery of more traditional library services. The technologies range from ListServs to Wikis, Blogs and Podcasts. Some prove successful, and some not.

A Dynamic Approach to Make CDS/ISIS Databases Interoperable over the Internet Using the OAI ProtocolJayakanth, F., Maly, K., Zubair, M. and Aswath, L. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 277-85

There are many bibliographic databases that are being maintained using legacy database systems. CDS/ISIS is one such legacy database system. It was designed and developed specifically for handling textual data. Over the years, many databases have been developed using this package. There is, however, no mechanism supported by the package for seamless interoperability of databases. The open archives initiative (OAI) addresses the issue of interoperability by using a framework to facilitate the discovery of content stored in distributed archives or bibliographic databases through the use of the OAI Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH). The protocol is becoming a de facto standard for interoperability of DLs. Many of the legacy database systems that are in use today, to the best of our knowledge, for various reasons, are not CAI-compliant. This makes it difficult for the legacy databases to share their metadata automatically. There are two possible approaches to make legacy databases OAI-compliant – static and dynamic. This paper discusses the dynamic approach to make CDS/ISIS databases OAI-compliant. The dynamic approach is a simple way to make legacy databases OAI-compliant so that they become interoperable with other OAI-compliant Us.

The Effects of Trust-Assuring Arguments on Consumer Trust in Internet Stores: Application of Toulmin’s Model of ArgumentationKim, D. and Benbasat, I. in Information Systems Research, Vol. 17, No. 3, 2006, pp. 286-300

A trust-assuring argument refers to “a claim and its supporting statements used in an Internet store to address trust-related issues”. Although trust-assuring arguments often appear in Internet stores, little research has been conducted to understand their effects on consumer trust in an Internet store. The goals of this study are: to investigate whether or not the provision of trust-assuring arguments on the website of an Internet store increase consumer trust in that Internet store; and to identify the most effective form of trust-assuring arguments to provide guidelines for their implementation. The results indicate: providing trust-assuring arguments that consist of claim plus data or claim plus data and backing increases consumers’ trusting belief but displaying arguments that contain claim only does not and; trust-assuring arguments that include claim plus data and backing lead to the highest level of trusting belief among the three forms of arguments examined in this study. Based on the results, we argue that Toulmin’s (1958) model of argumentation is an effective basis for website designers to develop convincing trust-assuring arguments and to improve existing trust-assuring arguments in Internet stores.

Privacy Protection In Data Mining: A Perturbation Approach for Categorical DataLi, X.B. and Sarkar, S. in Information Systems Research, Vol. 17, No. 3, 2006, pp. 254-70

To respond to growing concerns about privacy of personal information, organisations that use their customers’ records in data-mining activities are forced to take actions to protect the privacy of the individuals involved. A common practice for many organisations today is to remove identity-related attributes from the customer records before releasing them to data miners or analysts. We investigate the effect of this practice and demonstrate that many records in a data set could be uniquely identified even after identity-related attributes are removed. We propose a perturbation method for categorical data that can be used by organisations to prevent or limit disclosure of confidential data for identifiable records when the data are provided to analysts for classification, a common data-mining task. The proposed method attempts to preserve the statistical properties of the data based on privacy protection parameters specified by the organisation. We show that the problem can be solved in two phases, with a linear programming formulation in Phase I (to preserve the first-order marginal distribution), followed by a simple Bayes-based swapping procedure in Phase 11 (to preserve the joint distribution).

User-Centered Design of a Web Site for Library and Information Science Students: Heuristic Evaluation and Usability TestingManzari, L. and Trinidad-Christensen, J. in Information Technology and Libraries, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp. 2006, 163-9

This study describes the life cycle of a library Web site created with a user-centered design process to serve a graduate school of library and information science (LIS). Findings based on a heuristic evaluation and usability study were applied in an iterative redesign of the site to better serve the needs of this special academic library population. Recommendations for design of Web-based services for library patrons from LIS programs are discussed, as well as implications for Web sites for special libraries within larger academic library settings.

Health Information: Does Quality Count for The Consumer? How Consumers Evaluate the Quality of Health Information Materials across a Variety of MediaMarshall, L.A. and Williams, D. in Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, Vol. 38, No. 3, 2006, pp. 141-56

An aspect of the information literacy of health information consumers is explored, in particular whether and how they evaluate the quality of health information on the Internet and in printed formats. A total of 32 members of patient support groups in Northeast Scotland were recruited to take part in information review groups (a variation of focus group methodology) where discussion focused on a set of health information materials. Data analysis revealed 15 ways in which the participants evaluated quality. The two most important indicators of quality were organisational authority and the use of plain language. They did not find many of the indicators of evidence-based information. Participants demonstrated lack of confidence about their ability to select quality health information and relied on pre-selection by authoritative sources (libraries, support groups, health professionals) and distrusted the Internet.

Librarian Publishing Preferences and Open-Access Electronic JournalsPeterson, E. in E-JASL: The Electronic Journal of Academic and Special Librarianship, Vol. 7, No. 2, 2006 http://southernlibrarianship.icaap.org/content/v07n02/petersone01.htm

Peterson’s six-question survey found that, while 80 per cent of authors had considered publishing in an open access journal and 42 per cent had actually done so, only 48 per cent said the following statement was false: “Usually I do not publish in free electronic journals because they are viewed by myself or by my institution as ‘lesser’ than established journals titles.” Moreover, when asked to “rate each of these items when selecting a journal to publish your article”, only 7 per cent said that “Free/Open-Access on the Internet” was very important and only 28 per cent said it was important. Peterson concludes that “The written comments indicate that OA titles are not yet on par with their paper/electronic subscription based counterparts. OA editors need to ensure that their journals are peer reviewed, indexed, and of general high quality. Permanence in and of itself can also lend credibility to the title. It also appears that librarians think that even if the journal is indexed and peer reviewed, the editors can do a better job of marketing the title so that more librarians are aware of this new venue for publishing”.

Content Management for the Virtual LibrarySalazar, E. in Information Technology and Libraries, Vol. 25, No. 3, 2006, pp. 170-5

Traditional, larger libraries, can rely on their physical collection, coffee shops, and study rooms as ways to entice patrons into their library. Yet virtual libraries merely have their online presence to attract students to resources. This can only be achieved by providing a fully functional site that is well designed and organised, allowing patrons to navigate and locate information easily. One such technology significantly improving the overall usefulness of Web sites is a content management system (CMS). Although the CMS is not a novel technology per se, it is a technology smaller libraries cannot afford to ignore. In the fall of 2004, the Northcentral University Electronic Learning Resources Center (ELRC), a small, virtual library, moved from a static to a database-driven Web site. This article explains the importance of a CMS for the virtual or smaller library and describes the methodology used by ELRC to complete the project.

Repositories for Research: Southampton’s Evolving Role in the Knowledge CycleSimpson, P. and Hey, J. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 224-31

This paper provides an overview of how open access (OA) repositories have grown to take a premier place in the e-research knowledge cycle and offer Southampton’s route from project to sustainable institutional repository. The evolution of institutional repositories and OA is outlined raising questions of multiplicity of repository choice for the researcher. A case study of the University of Southampton research repository (e-Prints Soton) route to sustainability is explored with a description of a new project that will contribute to e-research by linking text and data.

Design and Development of an Institutional Repository at the Indian Institute of Technology KharagpurSutradhar, B. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 244-55

This paper describes how an institutional repository (IR) was set up, using open source software, at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kharagpur. Members of IIT can publish their research documents in the IR for online access as well as digital preservation. Material in this IR includes instructional materials, records, data sets, electronic theses, dissertations, annual reports, as well as published papers. This opens up the world of scholarly publishing in a way that causes re-examination of many of the current practices of scholarly communication and publishing. This paper provides evidence on how to set up an IR and how to create different communities and, under each community, many collections using the DSpace software.

Evaluating the Consistency of Immediate Aesthetic Perceptions of Web PagesTractinskya, N., Cokhavia, A. and Kirschenbaum, M. in International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Vol. 64, No. 11, 2006, pp. 1071-83

The article discusses a series of studies on people’s ability to rate the aesthetic qualities of Web pages. The research finds that people are consistent in their own judgement but that this determination tends to differ from one individual to another. The authors also look at “design characteristics” that might affect perception across a broad scale.

Personal Name Identification in the Practice of Digital RepositoriesXia, J.F. in Program – Electronic Library and Information Systems, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2006, pp. 256-67

This paper proposes improvements to the identification of authors’ names in digital repositories, based on analysis of current name authorities in digital resources, particularly in digital repositories, and analysis of some features of existing repository applications. The paper finds that the variations of authors’ names have negatively affected the retrieval capability of digital repositories. Two possible solutions include using composite identifiers that combine author name, publication date, and author affiliation, and also asking authors to input the variants of their name, if any, at the time of depositing articles.

A Strategic Case for E-Adoption in Healthcare Supply ChainsZheng, J.R., Bakker, E., Knight, L., Gilhespy, H., Harland, C. and Walker, H. in International Journal of Information Management, Vol. 26, No. 4, 2006, pp. 290-301

This paper examines whether a strategic case for e-commerce can be recognised and the factors that influence e-adoption, using e-business development models, a contingency approach and a stakeholder approach. The paper explores the link of e-commerce with strategy and the potential strategic benefits, risks and problems. This paper analysed e-adoption in four diverse healthcare supply chains in the context of the English National Health Service (NHS). The fieldwork showed there is of limited use of e- in supply chains; there are key problems associated with perceived benefits and costs by different actors both within organisations and within the chain. The paper proposes a framework to link the case for e-commerce with the achievement of strategic objectives across three inter-related domains-health, supply and business.