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Web Operational Management Group

Minutes of the Meeting of June 28, 2006
1:00 - 2:30 pm, Porter 428

Present: Chris Gray, Esther Millar, Bill Oldfield (facilitator), Dan Sich (recorder), Charles Woods

Regrets: Marina Wan

  1. Minutes of joint meeting with LibWebReview May 30, 2006

    Accepted with minor changes.

  2. Business Arising

    None

  3. Agenda review

    Add #8. DSpace
    Add #9. Firefox
    Add #10. Blogging & podcasting reports
    Add #11. Meeting times
    Add #12. Around the table

  4. Membership

    Welcomed Dan.

    ACTION: Charles will make Dan a member of webmaint.

    ACTION: Esther will make necessary alterations in Contribute.

    Linda Hastings' departure means that we're missing graphics support.  Should we look for graphics support, or is this just a LibWebReview need?  Linda's departure also means we're one member short.  Should we look for an additional member, or stick with a smaller membership?

    ACTION: Ask Marina if there was any more interest (e.g., from outside of ISR) when she solicited for new members approx 1 month ago.

  5. Summer Contact Schedule, phone extension changes

    See http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/staff/webops/private/vacations06.html
    Both Esther and Bill will be away the week of July 10.  Charles will cover Contribute concerns during this period.

    ACTION:  Esther will send an email requesting that requests for changes to the website be sent to WebOps during this period.

    Phone extensions must be changed the week of August 8, 2006. WebOps will remind people to change their phone extensions on their web pages of responsibility (instructions to be included) and that they should go to facilities with any questions.

    ACTION: Charles will follow up with facilities re. any possible forgiveness period during which time it is possible that a warning message may be provided to callers who omit the initial "3" (similar to what Bell is doing for callers who omit the initial "519").

  6. Google Analytics

    See http://www.google.ca/analytics

    Charles has experimented. Google Analytics collects use information and enables analysis. We can gain an understanding of how users get to our pages, how they use our pages; which browsers, browser versions, platforms, screen resolutions and connection speeds our users are using.  We can combine these for analysis.  There are export options.

    ACTION:   WebOps should consider this over the next few weeks, then discuss at a future meeting.

    ACTION: Charles     will add the Google Analytics code to our top 15 pages as identified by FastStat.

    ACTION:  Charles will ask Greg Sennema to give Bill, Chris and Dan access to WLU Library's Google Analytics.

    Possible concern:  Would this permit Google Analytics to track our patrons' IP addresses?  Could this information be obtained by the FBI vis a vis the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (aka USA PATRIOT Act of 2001)?

    ACTION:  Chris will look into javascript to see what it is doing.

  7. Primo

    OCUL is looking at Primo, the federated search interface by Exlibris.  OCUL is also looking at Verde (Exlibris's ERM).  Little information is available on Primo. It is designed for users looking for library resources. Primo is designed to bring together the speed of internet search engines and the authority of library information resources, the two seemingly disparate qualities identified in an OCLC study.  The emphasis is on access and searching.

    It is similar to Google or Amazon in its search functionality.  Primo uses RSS feeds for custom searches, blogging, tagging, social bookmarking.  The emphasis is on users, not on librarians.  Primo includes book covers from the Amazon database.  Primo has faceted browsing:  results are broken-down by subject and author.  Primo is fast because it pre-caches our data.

    Concerns: Exlibris needs to build a meta search product.  Exlibris's support to purchasers has been criticized.

  8. DSpace

    DSpace was enthusiastically received by the univeristy's eTheses group, as a replacement for the current eTheses platform.  It appears that UW Library will probably use DSpace for our eTheses.  A co-op student (Adam) has been hired to work on DSpace for this purpose.  See http://train2.lib.uwaterloo.ca:8080.

  9. Firefox

    Firefox was requested for staff workstations.  One possible concern is that Firefox's automatic security updates can't be done without Systems' machine-by-machine intervention.

    ACTION:  Bill, Charles & Chris will revisit this concern with Systems Managers, and inquire as to the next staff machine image update.

  10. Blogging & podcasting reports

    Reports on blogging (by Rachel Caldwell) and podcasting (by Christy Branston, Rachel Caldwell and Dan Sich) were distributed by Mark Haslett.

    Updates since the reports' publications include:
    * Michael Holmes to set up 5 virtual machines containing ViewletBuilder (and other expensive software).  (ViewletBuilder is a piece of screencasting software.)
    * iTunes and Juice will be included in the next staff workstation image.

    ACTION:  WebOps members are asked to familiarize themselves with these reports by the next meeting.

  11. Meeting times

    Changed to 1:00-2:30.

    ACTION: Esther will ask Rose to change room bookings.

    ACTION:  Marina will change BookIt entries.

  12. Around the table

    Nothing
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June 23, 2010