Lessons from Taking the MLIS 7505 Course (2012)

MLIS 7505, Applied Library Technologies has given me a better understanding of the new systems being used by Libraries and Information Centers to server users needs and provide innovative services that will help create dynamic communication through Web 2.0 technologies.  Getting direct experience using the CMS program Joomla was a great learning experience.  I had not explored RSS feeds before and it was important to understand what they do and where they can be created.  I enjoyed doing a research paper with my colleagues and I find those group projects to be good exercises in shared work project, which helps me prepare for the real world workplace work.  The individual third project was helpful in terms of really understanding the differences and commonalities of Digital Libraries and Digital Repositories.   The Maymester lends itself to an accelerated but enjoyable learning experience and I have to thank D. Yang for doing a great job in choosing excellent assignments and providing resources that teach to the subject.  Thanks to all my fellow students for sharing your experiences and opinions as well, I think we learn a lot from one another.

 Best Dominique

Final Assignment: Content Management Systems and Libraries

For our final project we had a group project and we decided to explore the use of Content Management Systems and their roles in libraries and information centers.  They provide a new system that creates web sites that can create dynamic looks and services but also allow for more of its stakeholders to create content.  To read the entire paper you can access it through Google Documents in the following link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EBT6-FjuA6PQQjxiXIwfHHoHxsex6nZRjMTjidh2XsE/edit?pli=1

Researching Eight Digital Libraries and Digital Repositories

I chose to complete option two for assignment three and research four digital libraries and four institutional repositories. I chose the following collections: Hathi Trust Digital Library, Mountain West Digital Library, Calisphere, Chronicling America, DSpace@Cambridge, OAIster Database, and Econpapers.

This was a valuable exercise because I learned about the different types of digital libraries and repositories. First, I found it interesting that many had a certain niche or Geographic area that they specifically covered. The lesson here seems to be find an area that needs objects to be digitized and become a leader in that area so users looking for that specific type of information will look there. This strategy also allows the digital libraries working similar areas able to pool their resources in one database creating a powerful group of resources. There were other examples where of large institutions, such as Universities, that had a lot of resource under their control have undertaken digitization projects for open access. I was surprised that most resources are accessible with out providing a login in many cases but other cases resources are kept only for certain users with permissions. Also it was interesting (but not surprising) that all had important metadata standards.