Computers in Libraries: March 21

In the following three posts, I will provide a brief synopsis of sessions I attended at the Computers in Libraries Conference in Washington, D.C. this past week. It was a pretty awesome conference, and I would recommend any e-resources or web librarians attend. I also enjoyed that it was a conference full of technology librarians, so none of us really wanted to meet new people.

I went to 4 sessions the first day.

Strategic Approaches to Mobile:

Presented by a reference librarian, a systems librarian, and a vendor, this session focused on doing environment scans of existing mobile interfaces, library user analysis for smartphones / tablets, what libraries can learn from business created mobile interfaces, and three ways to make a mobile site (stylesheet, mobile website, and native app). I learned so much in this session. I think mobile website development is key. I hope to use what I learned here to create a mobile website or stylesheet redirect for my library website this summer.

Getting Ready for the Semantic Web

This session taught listeners about the basic differences between the existing web and the semantic web, how RDA as a standard would enable library information to work on the semantic web, and current projects in libraries to work with the semantic web. I knew the least about semantic web and programming, so I learned the most at this session. I enjoyed learning about the cataloging standards, and how the semantic web will change searching.

• RDA: uses FRBR and FRAD standards
• Open Metadata Project (OMR): RDA vocab is published on the OMR
  http://rdvocab.info/
• MulDiCat: Authoritative IFLA standards translated into different languages
  http://iflastandards.info/
• OCLC’s Faceted Application of Subject Terminology (FAST)
  http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/fast/default.htm
• OCLC’s Virtual International Authority File (VIAF)
  www.oclc.org/research/activities/viaf/

Getting to Know HTML5 and CSS3

An introduction to changes in markup languages hosted by a head of technical services at a Montana university. This session covered changes in tags, how HTML5 will work with the semantic web, HTML5 and microdata, HTML5 and media formats, Javascript API (application programming interface) compatibility, CSS3 response to web design trend changes, and tools to play with the changes. This session as really interesting, and it answered many of my questions about HTML5. I don’t do much of the website backend programming at my library, but it will help me understand what our IT staff does. I belive it will also enable to me code my own mobile website or mobile redirect stylesheet, which is something I hope to implement soon.

• http://pinboard.in/u:jasonclark/t:cil-html5/
• Marcotte, E. (2010, May 25). Responsive web design. A List Apart, 306. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from http://www.alistapart.com/articles/responsive-web-design/
• Ronallo, J. (2012, February 2). HTML5 microdata and schema.org. code4lib. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/6400

Quick Quantifiable QR Codes

This session had too many presenters, in my opinion. The presenters (all academic librarians) discussed how to make QR codes, the importance of shortening the URL, using Google URL shortener to track analytics, and ways to use the QR code. Some of the ideas I liked were a QR code in the stacks that leads to LibGuides to help the student research, a QR code in the stacks that leads to a list of comparable ebooks (merging print and electronic), and using QR codes in place of print maps.

I do have more detailed notes, if anyone is interested!