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Fourth Generation Design For Federated Searching at the University of Rochester

Brenda Reeb, UsabilityDavid Lindahl, Digital Initiatives

Agenda

Serial Failure Metasearch User Centered Design Process Culture and Politics Generations of Design Technology

Serial Failure

Students cannot find articles Students overwhelmed with database names,

contents, and search protocols Students insist on search simplicity Eliminate the complexity of information retrieval Technologies exist to make it simpler Politics exist to make it complex

Serial Failure

Design Responses Don’t make undergraduates choose anything

before searching Don’t expect users to read anything before

searching Forgiving search box tolerates single words,

multiple words, Boolean, “ “ phrases.

Assume relevance ranking

Serial Failure

“Serial Failure” The Charleston ADVISOR, Vol. 5., no. 3, 2004. Jennifer Bowen, Judi Briden, Vicki Burns, David Lindahl, Brenda Reeb, Melinda Stowe, Stanley Wilder.

Metasearch

What is metasearch? Federated Search Single user interface to multiple databases Simultaneous searching across resources Merged results

Metasearch technology: Metasearch product with UI Connectors OpenURL Linking

Usability group

Content group

Design group

Key tasksTest results

PrototypesIssue-Responses

Design iterationsTest results

User Centered Design Process

User Centered Design Process

Usability group

Design group

Content group

HighestNo other goal than to represent the user.

MediumCompetes with standards, technology, time and money

MediumCompetes with exhaustive content, complex tasks

Group User Focus

User Centered Design Process

Artifacts of design process “Issue response” document Usability results Key task list Regular meetings (design = usability) Project specific meetings (usability=content and

content=design)

Design Group

Reorganized in 2001 Lives in the Digital Initiatives Unit

¼ FT UI designer (MS, Computer Science) 1 FTE graphic designer (BA, Graphic Design) 1 FTE developer

Manages issue/response process

Design Group

Perspective on Site Design “Hide the technology” Consistency across library website Task-oriented pathways Usability testing program

Perspective on Page Design Essential components Prioritize Simplify Style guidelines

Universal Design Section 508 Web Style Guide Research-Based Web

Design & Usability Guidelines

Page Editors’ Checklist

“Universal design is the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.” Ron Mace

Design Group

http://www.section508.gov/ http://webstyleguide.com/

http://usability.gov/guidelines/ http://www.library.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=623

Style Guidelines

Knowledge of databases

Partial knowledge

No knowledgeneeded

Mapping your search to a subject takes you away from your natural path

Find ArticlesClusters (courses)Google

Databases by Subject

Databases A-Z

Design Group

User pathways

Design Group

Models For Finding: Google

1. Enter keywords2. Browse results by title

and snippet3. View full text

Design Group

Models For Finding: FRBR

FRBR User Tasks Find Identify Select Acquire

FRBR = Functional Requirements for Bibliographic RecordsMore information: http://www.ifla.org

Design Group

1. Enter keywords and select databases

2. Select databases or “SHOW ALL”

3. Select a result4. View metadata5. Select a full text

source6. View full text online

Encompass UI

Design Group

1. Enter keywords and select databases

2. Select databases or “SHOW ALL”

3. Select a result4. View metadata5. Select a full text

source6. View full text online

Encompass UI

Design Group

1. Enter keywords 2. Select a result3. View full text online

Find Articles UI

Generation 3

Design Group

Search SelectArticle

FullText

(Gather)

FRBR Tasks:• Find• Identify• Select• Acquire

Mapping the Find Articles UI to FRBR

Generation 3

Content Group

Multiple content groups, one for each project Any number of members (1-?) Every department participates - cataloging,

circulation, reference, etc. Created and disbanded as needed Observe some tests

Content Group

Content group activities: Define key tasks Select appropriate content Apply experience and education to the iterative

design process Observe some tests Interpret usability results Raise issues, not design solutions

Content Group

What is a key task?

Key tasks are defined as frequently asked items, frequent actions or navigation to parent/child pages.

Example key tasks:

• Find a known article.• Find a known journal.• Find an article on a specific topic.• Find articles on a multidisciplinary topic.• Find a specific journal collection.

Content Group

Find Articles Content Group

Collect issues Categorize

Technology issues (website, SFX, ILL, Databases OPAC) Building, shelving & organizational Issues Subscription issues Citation problems Basic research help Librarians

Create scenarios Address issues

Usability Group

Usability Program Began 2001 7 staff trained as usability testers Over 20 projects, large and small Testers volunteer for projects Reading, conferences, practice Vendor co-development

Usability Group

Usability team activities: Manage key task process Design and conduct tests Maintain a “lab” Communicate results to staff and public

Manage key task process

Usability Group

Key task Test question

Find a known journal

Find an article in the Journal of Fish Biology.

Find a journal collection

Your friend told you there is a collection of political science journals called JSTOR. Where is it?

Usability Group

Manage key task process

Usability Group

Design and conduct tests Mental model test Heuristic test Card sort test Assessment test (Click path) Scenario test

Usability Group

Picture of our lab

Usability Group

Communicate results

Students say:“I need an article!”

Librarians say: “Select a database” “This database has 435 journals in it.” “These journals are peer reviewed.” “Choose basic or advanced.” “These journals predate the Civil War.”

Culture and Politics

Culture and Politics

Student culture

Connect at courses, not at academic disciplines Meet them where they are

Students attend POL250 – “Conflict in Democracies” They do not relate to Political Science. They do not envision themselves as political scientists.

Sustainability Distributed workload (all bibliographers participate) Dynamic, database-driven pages

Culture and Politics

Expect these accusations! Simple designs dumb down the site Testing 3 users is not enough “I have to wonder if usability testing - especially

for money - proves very useful input” No one told me about this Where is your report? This is so subjective!

Culture and Politics

Try these responses: Inform

Page design process document Don’t leave home without the toolkit

Neilson’s Alert Boxes Pages from Don’t Make Me Think

Engage Observe tests Publish results

Generations of Design

Generation 0

Generations of Design

Generation 1

Generations of Design

Generation 2

Generations of Design

Generation 2

Generations of Design

Generation 3

Generations of Design

Generation 3

Generations of Design

Find Subject clusters Course clusters Catalog (CUIPID + Web Services)

Identify and Select Relevance Sorting (Evolving Metasearch) Metadata (Abstracts on selection screen) Results navigation

Obtain Direct to full text (via shared knowledge base) Holdings information / maps (integration with catalog)

Generation 4

Generations of Design

Subject Clusters Pre-selected databases Search boxes anywhere

Course Pages Connects undergrads to

library resources Top-5 resource Usability success

Course Clusters

Generation 4

Technology

Meta-search Technology and Standards Find

Z39.50 SRW/SRU and CQL (NISO MetaSearch Init.) XML Gateway

Identify/Select OAI

Obtain OpenURL SFX, LinkFinder, Serial Solutions

Technology

Meta-search Issues Speed and Reliability

Connectors Index vs. Meta-search

Ease of use Database selection Abstracts on selection screen Full text availability One click to full text

Quality of results How search terms are applied Database selection Relevance sorted results and de-duping

Technology

Search SelectArticle

FullText

(Gather)

LibraryWeb Server

ERA ServerSubscription

Database

XSLT

User

Page withFull Text

XSLT

XML XML

HTML HTML

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Fourth Generation Design For Federated Searching at the University of Rochester

Brenda Reeb, UsabilityDavid Lindahl, Digital Initiatives