Moving Libraries to the Cloud
1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Roy Tennant, Senior Program Officer, OCLC
Andrew Pace, Executive Director, Networked Library Services, OCLC
Nice slides showing app layers (wish they’d post their slides)
Data layer
app layer
XML layer
TechEssence.info for API library info
check worldcat.org/devnet
can pull worldcat searches as XML and remix
xISBN for FRBRizing
MAshed Libraries UK – hackfest
Worldcat hackathon NYPL
OCLC bootcamp for Code4Lib
Visualizing Worldcat Holding
thesecretmirror.com/code/api-fun-visualizing-holdings-locations
Compare Everywhere app for android phone includes library for books through Wordlcat API
(usage spiked after introduction – importance of mobile and of freeing data for machine use)
Andrew:
Why can’t we move the lib workflow to the network?
Chris Anderson- web is all about scale
started with resource sharing… the licensed journal lit….. cataloging…. consortial…. (open source ILS? universal circ policies? Pines?)
sharing cloud storage of google scanned documents
webscale computing helps invert the 70/30 ratio 70% building infrastructure, 30% propelling biz forward
Libs have concentrated on diffusion and syndication
now we’re seeing concentration…. shared discovery layer…. ERM/knowledge base…. repository…..
Eventually ALL library management workflow
do things at scale, in the cloud
Ebay did well:
1. Simplify features of commercial transaction
2. provided platform to allow buyers/sellers to industrialize workflow
3. reap benefits by scaling this up
Library Scale 166 billion transactions per year, 5000 transactions per second
OCLCs goal: build a service capable of that….
when using social networks, need scale…. social networking content would not work so well with just a few library users….
but we still want to handle our metadata locally
practical web scale for libs – looking for efficiency
despite our huge investments, we appear small and fragmented in comparison to search engines
a webscale strategy would provide libs with the ability to just focus on propelling biz dforward
lib management workflow isn’t unique– can stop treating it as such
extend what we’ve done for library users, we can do for staff as well
concentration creates network effects, opens up new world of processes of resource sharing
a single networked source for vendors/providers, e-resources identities, bib item-level details
reports w/real details (financial, collection, circulation)
fund codes, bulk purchases, collection shifting, consolidation patron notifications, identity management
More notes:
http://cil2009reporter.blogspot.com/2009/03/day-one-track-d-moving-libraries-to.html
Comments (2)
Did you like this presentation? Was it too OCLC heavy? Did you come away with a pretty solid understanding of cloud stuff? I am considering making a presentation proposal on cloud computing both in general and also how I did something at my local institution, but don’t know if it’s something people would dig or not.
This presentation was thought provoking. A lot of people summed it up as “oh, OCLC wants to own all of our data”. I don’t think it’s entirely an inaccurate assessment, but I also think there is some merit to what they were suggesting– that a lot of processes are the same in libraries the whole world over, and it makes sense to scale them to the web in such a way that libraries can focus on service provision– not on everyone cataloging, marking, maintaining an OPAC, etc. Also– I liked his point about how we would turn up in search engines more if we banded our resources together, but because we’re so fractured we don’t appear as the resource of choice.
I think what you’re talking about would be different, and yes– I do think there is room for more cloud computing presentations at library conferences. I would probably go!