USMAI

University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions

User Interface Task Group Meeting Minutes

Tuesday, November 7, 2006

Notetaker: England

Attending: Lenore England (UMUC), Sean Henry (FSU), Laura Wrubel (ITD), Heidi Hanson (ITD), Linda Seguin (UMBC), Cindy Todd (UM), and Tierney Lyons (HSHSL)

Topic 1: Approve minutes of October 3rd meeting

The minutes from the October 3, 2006 meeting were approved.

Topic 2: New Titles Catalog (Hanson)

McGill University New Titles feature

How will this look in our catalog?
We decided that the desirable features are as follows (see also: UITG NewBooksCatalog wiki page)

Want to have the new titles feature on the tool bar
If in a campus catalog (base), search that catalog's new items. A date stamp for an item has to be associated with a campus.
Will want to have an explanation of what the new titles in the catalog means.
Terminology:
- Name of this catalog? New titles or ?
- Wording of description? McGill has the following wording: "The New Titles Catalog contains the new books, maps, microforms, media, and music added to the catalog in the last six months."
Should we include new e-books, for instance, NetLibrary? We thought that they should be included, but is this technically possible?
What about MARCIVE loads?
Want to do a new items section with links to time periods when new titles have been added.
Need both advanced and basic search screens. Suggested that we default to advanced search screen. Is this possible?
Can the screen guide the user to more advanced searches without a keyword search?

The plan is to get the new titles feature ready by holiday break for review by USMAI.

Topic 3: Authorities in the catalog (Hanson)

All work is planned to be wrapped up around March 2007 and released with Aleph version 18. Usability testing (see also UITG wiki page)

What scenarios to test?

Browse results screen; there was also discussion on to get users to this screen. For example from a bib record, have users click on a subject or author heading.
Feedback on "i" button - do patrons know what this means?
Walk through the screen -what does this mean?
Authorities record layout - (LC or MESH)

Topic 4: Interface change proposals:

E-Book format limiter in catalog (Todd)
The term E-books could be inserted alphabetically between Children's/Juvenile and Electronic Resources (all). The Common Command Language equivalent for E-books is wty=(BK and EO). Staff and other users can already limit using CCL but few know how to do this. Having the format term E-Book would preconstruct the search limiter for the patron who would then only need to choose it from the format dropdown menu.

We decided that this can be done. It will be put in the test catalog and sent out to COI.
Change to renewal screen in the OPAC (Todd)
AST recommends that the following text be added: "Overdue fines may apply". Presently, users can renew books that are overdue and are not recalled or considered lost. Although an overdue fine may be generated at the point of renewal, it is not applied until the book is returned, and that's confusing to the user.

We decided to put text after the current renewal information text on the renew screen. It will be put into the test catalog and sent out to COI.

Topic 5: OPAC Reports (Hanson)

There was a review of information on the workplan page on OPAC reports: Workplan

And a review of the blog notes on user stats suggestions: User Stats Suggestions (password protected)

Other suggestions for reports: UITG Wiki page

Are patrons clicking on the i button?
Full view record views?
All locations availability or individual campus availability?
MARC displays?
Search shortcuts used?
Help and other links at the top?
Breakdown of the searches (menu options)?
Command searching?

Also: Other institutions PAC statistics wish lists?

Topic 6: ERIC II update (Wrubel and Seguin)

Laura:
Multiple 856s are now displaying in the Find It Menu, as mentioned in the e-mail sent out on November 6, 2006. They are working on an issue on the display of titles, which are off when the first link does not have a title.

Linda:
URLs were deleted in the test catalog that are already available through the Find It menu. ERIC will ask for feedback from the COI and will further explain why they are doing the deletions. ERIC understands that access to government documents needs to be available for unafffiliated users. They will work with UITG and other consortial task groups on display issues.

Topic 7: Schedule meetings for 2007

Laura set up 2007 meeting schedule from a main UITG page: Meeting Schedule

The meeting in January will be on the 9th, and the meetings will alternate between College Park and HSHSL.

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