Much-anticipated Windows 10 Upgrade

Over the summer, Library IT will begin to update the staff computers from Windows 7 to Windows 10, throughout Yale University Library (YUL).  A major goal of this upgrade is to remain consistent with Yale’s ITS effort to migrate computers to Windows 10 campus-wide. Windows 10 is currently the latest production version supported by Microsoft; support for Windows 7 will end in January 2020. This upgrade will only affect staff computers; an upgrade to service computers and specialized equipment will occur at a later date in Phase 2.

Continue Reading Much-anticipated Windows 10 Upgrade

Voyager Update: Module Testing Results

As you may know, Yale University Library is upgrading its Voyager Integrated Library System (ILS) from 8.1 to 10.0 this coming month. The upgrade from Voyager 8.1 to 10.0 introduces new features and fixes in all modules and will enable the reevaluation of workflows across units to realize the benefits of the newer software version. A great deal of planning and effort has gone into this upgrade to insure the smooth transition to Voyager 10.0 over the semester break. 
The Voyager ILS comprises three primary modules: acquisitions, cataloging, and circulation. The system also contains a public user interface known as the Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC).  Additionally, there are tools and modules used by specific staff within the library for specific administrative functions, inlcuding system administration and bulk data processing. The Voyager Upgrade team is working to test each module for new features and to confirm uninterrupted workflow.
The Voyager Upgrade site is the place to find out about project announcements and project development.  You can also subscribe to get Voyager updates in your inbox.  There are two new Voyager Upgrade Blog posts. The first post is about Cataloging and Authorities Testing Results by Patricia Thurston, Voyager User Group Chair and Cataloging Testing Group Lead. The post details the collaborative work the Cataloging & Authorities testers did with the Acquisitions Testing Group, to insure our current workflows could continue. They tested the cataloging module under the assumption of keeping current workflows, until after implementation. Voyager 10 has significant enhancements that can be explored later. Read more about results of their work.
The second post is about the Acquisitions Module Testing Results by Diane Napert, Acquisitions Testing Group Lead. The post chronicles the work the Acquisitions Testing Group did to verify current workflows with the acquisitions module. They discovered two bugs and some missing workflow settings in the test version of Voyager 10. Read more about the results of their work.

Please feel free to reach out via email directly to Patricia Thurston, Voyager User Group Chair,  at  patricia.thurston@yale.edu  or  Steelsen Smith, Project Manager for Upgrade, at steelsen.smith@yale.edu with any comments, questions, or concerns.

Update on ArchivesSpace PUI

Many of you may be familiar with YFAD, the Yale Finding Aids Database. The Library developed YFAD locally several years ago, and the system is showing its age. After a few years of intense technical development, a new discovery interface for ArchivesSpace is available for implementation. Yale implemented ArchivesSpace as an archival management tool for staff several years ago, and with it for the first time, a standard tool used across almost all libraries, museums, and galleries on campus with archival materials. The extension of the ArchivesSpace platform to include a public user interface will provide new opportunities for systems integration, more seamless staff workflows, and an improved user experience for researchers.

The project at Yale to implement the ArchivesSpace discovery had a three month preplanning process, involving the project sponsors and administrative stakeholders. Melissa Wisner, Senior Systems Librarian in Library IT, serves as the Project Manager. Mark Custer, Archivist and Metadata Coordinator at Beinecke, serves as an ex officio member due to his role as Project Manager for the technical development and design phase. The project is sponsored by E.C. Schroeder, Director of Beinecke Library and Associate University Librarian, and Chris Weideman, Director of the Department of Manuscripts and Archives, and has a roster of approximately 30 staff members, and a larger number of stakeholders.

There is significant work to accomplish along with preparations for changes before the debut of the new service to users. The plan is to begin with a soft-rollout of the new discovery interface, while continuing to keep YFAD available. There will be a period when both tools are available through the Library website as final adjustments are made for the transition from YFAD to ArchivesSpace. As of today, the project team anticipates an early 2018 soft-launch.

The following working groups comprise the ArchivesSpace project team:

  • Public User Interface Enhancements & Ideas, led by Alison Clemens
  • Data Cleanup & Enhancement, led by Alicia Detelich and Christy Tomecek
  • Staff Training & Documentation, led by Emily DiLeo
  • Technical Integrations, led by Steve Wieda
  • Usability & Accessibility, led by Jenn Nolte
  • Marketing & Branding, led by Mike Morand

Several different tools to organize and manage the work and communication of the project are being used: Asana for the project plan, a Slack channel for day-to-day project team communication, Google Drive for file sharing, GitHub, and the local Yale ArchivesSpace email distribution list. Monthly updates on progress will be sent to Yulib. Project team members will post details about the project and aspects of project management to the Yale ArchivesSpace blog on a regular basis.

The monthly All Project Member/Stakeholder meetings are open to everyone with an interest in the new user interface, special collections, or an interest in teaching users about finding aids, archives, and special collections at Yale. The meeting for October is Tuesday Oct. 31 in Bass Library L01 & L02 from 3-4pm.

For more information about the ArchivesSpace project, visit the YAMS LibGuide or the ArchivesSpace blog. This month’s post by Melissa Wisner focuses on project management: Implementing the ArchivesSpace PUI: A Before Action Review.

Zoom Cues YUL

After the completion of YUL’s thorough desktop video conferencing pilot project this past spring, Zoom was the clear choice. As a result,  YUL’ s Zoom license went live on June 19th and pilot participants were automatically transferred over to the new YUL license.

Library IT plans to roll out the necessary equipment, headsets and webcams, for staff members using Zoom, in a phased approach. Working with Supervisors, Library IT plans to identify the first wave of staff members to receive the service and required equipment. These staff members have a demonstrated need for Zoom for their daily business activities. Those staff members not receiving equipment in this first phase will receive it at later date this coming fall.

Zoom Equipment
Possible headset choices available to staff

Library IT’s Support Technician, Reon Keller,  held  “Show and Tell” events for staff to become familiar with the three options available for headsets.  Library IT is also working to identify whether your workstation is already equipped with a camera as well as staff with a preexisting Zoom account. Though the Zoom application and plugins can be installed by user, LIT will work with ITS to schedule a push of the Zoom application to all YUL staff workstations. This will ensure all YUL workstation are configured to readily launch Zoom for all YUL staff.

The Zoom Rollout is expected to be completed by mid-fall, with some services available sooner for staff who already have equipment in place. If you have any questions about Zoom and its implementation please feel free to reach out to Beatrice Richardson at Beatrice.Richardson@Yale.edu or Cindy Greenspun at Cindy.Greenspun@Yale.edu.

Staff Publications Gets a New Home

Library IT is currently working on a project to move the staff directory and profiles from a legacy part of our web space into Drupal,  Yale’s  content management system. Library IT’s summer interns, Annissa Carter, Bryana Kilpatrick, and Jhoselyn Jara, have replicated the staff profiles in Drupal. The Publications section of the Staff Directory will be moved to a different service — Researcher Profiles.

Researcher Profiles is a service providing Yale faculty, students and staff, a place to showcase their curriculum vitae and other academic work. It is supported by Yale University Library and open to any Yale community member.  Moving to Researcher Profiles offers many benefits, you can:

  • Add much more to your profile than just publications
  • Add in your CVs, list presentations, papers and articles
  • Create external links to content hosted elsewhere

Researcher Profiles presents an excellent way to have all of your work located in one place.

Researcher Profiles is search engine optimized, allowing search engines to discover and promote your information easily. Another key benefit is access to your dashboard. Your dashboard provides qualitative information about your content, from this information you can measure your content’s readership and traffic data, giving you an excellent way to measure the interest in your content.

Researcher Profiles is a companion service to EliScholar, a digital platform for scholarly publishing at Yale. EliScholar allows researchers and other interested readers anywhere in the world to learn about and keep up to date with Yale scholarship. Administered by the Yale University Library, EliScholar contains materials selected by participating departments, schools, centers, and institutes at Yale. Users have access to materials in EliScholar free of charge. Some materials are restricted use by Yale community members only.

If you have any questions, please email Steve Wieda at Steve.Wieda@Yale.edu or Jenn Nolte at Jenn.Nolte@Yale.edu.

Links to Resources:

New Staff Publications series in EliScholar: http://elischolar.library.yale.edu/yul_staff/

Desktop Video Conferencing

Last year, a pilot project was conducted to evaluate desktop video conferencing solutions for YUL.  The pilot has been completed and based on the selection criteria and the experiences of pilot participants, Zoom Video Conferencing is the clear choice.  For those of you who participated in the pilot project, thank you.  Thanks also to Beatrice Richardson for leading the pilot and Library IT staff for providing support.

A project to implement Zoom for desktop video conferencing on YUL staff computers has been initiated. Library IT will soon acquire licenses and configure Zoom Video Conferencing services.  In the coming months equipment will be provided as needed (camera & headsets) for staff computers.  The project is expected to be completed by mid-fall, with some services available sooner for staff who already have equipment in place.

While the Zoom license may also be used in some conference rooms and streaming scenarios, there are other Library IT initiatives underway to identify solutions for lecture-capture and connected conference rooms.  Equipment for conference rooms and lecture halls will be outside the scope of this project focused on the deployment Zoom for desktop video conferencing.

From the entire Library IT team, we wholeheartedly thank everyone who participated in the pilot.  A summary report from the pilot is here: https://collaborate.library.yale.edu/librarian/Shared%20Documents/Library%20IT/2017_05_26_VCFinalReport.pdf

If you have any further questions about the pilot, please don’t hesitate to reach out to Beatrice or Dale.

Video Conferencing pilot at Yale University Library

Women using headset and webcam
Women using headset and webcam – via LogiTech blog (http://blog.logitech.com/)
Library IT seeks to provide a desktop video conferencing solution to help support those who are in distant and disparate locations and need to meet and collaborate. This is a unique opportunity for Library staff to help shape and inform Library IT’s selection and configuration of what will be Library’s video conferencing service.
Library IT will conduct preliminary evaluations of 4 video conferencing utilities:
  • Zoom
  • BlueJeans
  • Adobe Connect
  • Skype for Business
We are seeking volunteers who will provide feedback to inform our final decision. Volunteers will answer survey questions that will measure ease of use, reliability, integration into the YUL computing culture, and network feasibility for each solution.
Volunteers will receive a web cam, a headset and training for each of the video conferencing utilities. We are ready to invite 100 volunteers to help conduct the evaluations.  Volunteers will be asked to commit the following:
  • Volunteers must commit to conducting or participating in 3 to 4 video conferencing events per week.
  • Volunteers must commit to completing a brief survey after each video conferencing event.
How long will the pilot be conducted? 
The pilot will last 4 months, one month evaluation for each video conferencing utility.

Can all members of existing or new groups and/or committees participate? 
Yes, priority will be given to staff whose groups and/or committees would like to participate.  We strongly encourage groups such as these to participate in this pilot!
To volunteer, please fill out the Video Conferencing Volunteer Form.
We thank you in advance for your time and participation in this valuable pilot phase of video conferencing at YUL!

Emerging Technologies Discussion : Programming without Coding using IFTTT and Zapier

This Friday May 27th, join Cindy Greenspun, Tara Kennedy and Jenn Nolte in Bass L01 from 1:30pm-2:30pm for a short presentation on professional and personal uses of IFTTT (If This Then That) and Zapier to automate and optimize productivity without using a single line of code.

The presenters will share examples of their uses of IFTTT and Zapier in their work, and then shift into an open discussion of how other workflows in the Library could potentially benefit from using these services.

Some example uses:

log an email into a spreadsheet

send any picture tagged with #yalelibrary on Facebook to Flickr

Streaming available at https://greet.yale.edu/emergingtech/ 

The presentation and discussion will be recorded and archived here:

https://yale.box.com/v/emergingtech

A chat option will be available for those participating remotely.

See you there!

Findit Integration in Quicksearch

The Quicksearch Implementation Team, working with a number of staff in Library IT, is beginning the integration of Findit in Quicksearch!  Two groups of stakeholders will initially vet plans for the integration of Findit – an ad-hoc group of Findit stakeholders, and the User Experience Advisory Group.  The integration of Findit will be based on queries against the Findit solr index.  Findit results will appear in Quicksearch in their own bento box, tentatively labeled “Digital Collections”.  An intermediary search results page will allow users to narrow their search using facets.  When a user clicks on an individual digital object title, they will go to the object page in the native Findit interface.   They can then use bread crumbs, full text searching, and other features that are native to Findit.  As has been the case with Orbis, Morris, and Articles+, the native Findit interface will still be available from the Library Front Door.  The project is estimated for completion in mid-late April.  A round of user studies will shortly follow the production implementation.

 

Yale ITS Moving Drupal to the Cloud

On Tuesday, February 16, Yale ITS created a test instance of the Library’s Drupal website in the new Acquia cloud environment.  Library IT will have two months to test the site’s content, performance, and robustness.  If all the tests go well, the Library’s Drupal website will move to the Acquia cloud at the end of the test period.

The Acquia cloud is a new cloud-based computing platform that Yale ITS is using to relieve some of its dependence on locally-hosted architecture.  Yale ITS has told Library IT that the Acquia-hosted Drupal site will be faster, more responsive, and more robust than the current locally-hosted Drupal site.