Library Technology Guides

I had the opportunity to attend both of the meetings between the ILS-Discovery Interface Work Group and the developer community convened by the Digital Library Federation. This group aims to create a standard interface between integrated library systems and the discovery interfaces, often called next-generation library catalogs, that have become increasingly popular as libraries struggle to find ways to replace older OPACs. Have a more standardized approach for the ways that these systems interact will hopefully result in less work for developers as they create new products and for libraries as they adopt them.

I wrote an article for Information Standards Quarterly, published by NISO, called "Progress on the DLF ILS Discovery Interface API: The Berkeley Accord" that provides a brief summary of the project's intentions and accomplishments.

NEXT-GENERATION LIBRARY CATALOGS, or discovery interfaces, represent a major trend in library automation. Commercial and open source development of these products abounds. As more libraries become interested in providing interfaces into their collections using applications other than the online catalog module packaged with their integrated library system, improved interoperability is one of the key issues they face. The current deployments of discovery interfaces largely depend on interactions with the ILS dependent on proprietary interactions with the local ILS requiring considerable expertise and effort. The Digital Library Federation (DLF) aims to foster a more standardized environment where discovery interfaces can work with any given ILS through a uniform set of application programming interfaces. continue reading...

Marshall Breeding Oct 10, 2008 15:04:48 Link to this thread