July 20, 2020
- Lillianne Keaney
NOTES
JSTOR Forum User Group Meeting
July 20, 2020
Attendees: Joanne Donovan (Schlesinger/ICAWG), Bill Connor (FAL /ICAWG), Maggie Hale (Imaging /ICAWG), Johanna Kasubowski (Design /ICAWG), Lilli Keaney (Houghton /ICAWG), Christopher Hyde (FAL), Ann Whiteside (Design), Nanni Deng (FAL), Sherrie Tuck (Schlesinger), Bettina Smith (Dumbarton), Carol Chiodo (Widener)
Intro remarks (Joanne Donovan, chair of ICAWG):
Image Cataloging and Access Working Group has been tracking a few system issues that we thought the user community should be aware of, namely:
- Harvest issues - nightly harvests from Forum to Harvard discovery systems were regularly experiencing failures that required catalogers to frequently republish, at this time the issue should be self correcting in that if a harvest fails one night, it will get picked up in the next harvest automatically. It is still recommended that catalogers check images in HOLLIS Images (HI) as sometimes a “successful” harvest will skip a few images. This primarily seems to be a local problem to FAL. Images should appear in HOLLIS Images in the afternoon the next day after publishing.
- Group record functionality - at this time it is not possible to publish new group records or edit old group records. This issue is still under investigation by LTS.
- We track all issues and bugs and are preparing for an eventual reharvest which we hope will fix a number of incorrect/buggy issues in HI like duplicate titles, missing record IDs, etc.
- Harvest issues - nightly harvests from Forum to Harvard discovery systems were regularly experiencing failures that required catalogers to frequently republish, at this time the issue should be self correcting in that if a harvest fails one night, it will get picked up in the next harvest automatically. It is still recommended that catalogers check images in HOLLIS Images (HI) as sometimes a “successful” harvest will skip a few images. This primarily seems to be a local problem to FAL. Images should appear in HOLLIS Images in the afternoon the next day after publishing.
- Other initiatives/projects:
- We worked with Amy Deschenes to conduct Image Research interviews
- Wanted to learn if HDC could replace HOLLIS Images - Doesn’t replace it right now; missing some functionality
- Key takeaway: Researchers start with Google Images – we should rethink if we want our data to be exposed to Google Images
- Wanted to learn if HDC could replace HOLLIS Images - Doesn’t replace it right now; missing some functionality
- Vitaly Zakuta met with working group re: IIIF redesign
- Learn more on the IIIF Redesign Project wiki page
- Learn more on the IIIF Redesign Project wiki page
- We invited Jennifer Jubinville from LTS to discuss ongoing system issues and LTS support
- We worked with Amy Deschenes to conduct Image Research interviews
Introductions followed by an open discussion centered around the following questions:
Has your use – or your library’s use – of JSTOR Forum changed since we began working remotely?
What is the current focus of your work in JSTOR Forum?
Are there any current frustrations / issues you are having with the system?
Are there additional features / functionality you would like to see in JSTOR Forum? In HOLLIS Images?
What are your thoughts on the use of HOLLIS Images for teaching online? Do you anticipate increased use of your collections?
A few highlights of the discussion:
- Most attendees noted that their use of Forum has increased since we have started working from home.
- Forum training is available - feel free to reach out to any ICAWG member to arrange
- Publishing issues remain a frustration for many of us
- How can data in Forum be used for computational scholarship - we don’t really know but if anyone has examples, we’d love to see them!
- Are people interested in more user group meetings?
- Most attendees noted that their use of Forum has increased since we have started working from home.
Notes by Johanna Kasubowski and Lilli Keaney