Journal of Digital Information static repository http://oaiscotland.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/gateway/cgi-bin/gateway.cgi/hairst.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/repositories/jodi1.xml 2.0 oaiscotland@cdlr.strath.ac.uk 2006-03-07 no YYYY-MM-DD oai_dc http://www.openarchives.org/OAI/2.0/oai_dc.xsd http://www.openarchives.org/OAI/2.0/oai_dc/ oai:jodi0001 2006-03-07 The World Wide Web - Past, Present and Future Tim Berners-Lee Texas A&M University Libraries 1996 Tim Berners-Lee was awarded a Distinguished Fellowship of the British Computer Society on July 17, 1996 at the new British Library in London. The following is a transcript of his presentation. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i01/BernersLee/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0002 2006-03-07 An empirical comparison of the usability for novice and expert searchers of a textual and a graphic interface to an art-resource database Andrew Dillon and Min Song Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 The present paper reports an experimental test of a prototype graphic and textual search interface for a university database on art-resource works. Novice and expert searchers were tested on both interfaces with performance assessed in terms of search speed and accuracy. Verbal protocols and navigation strategies were also examined. Experts performed significantly faster than novices though both user groups performed slightly (but not significantly) faster with the graphical interface. Furthermore, the graphical interface significantly reduced navigation effort. While there were no significant task accuracy differences, novices failed to complete more searches with the textual interface. Implications of these results for search interfaces to digital resources are briefly discussed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i01/Dillon/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 1 Usability of digital information oai:jodi0003 2006-03-07 Scholarly Communication and the Digital Library: Problems and Issues Stephen P. Harter Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 This paper considers a range of definitions for a digital library from the perspective of scholarly communication and the properties of a traditional research library. It then explores some of the problems and issues involved in creating and maintaining a digital library, depending on the characteristics one wants it to have. The paper stresses the need to consider the requirements of scholarship and research as we build the digital libraries of the future. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i01/Harter/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 1 Digital libraries Information management oai:jodi0004 2006-03-07 Open Hypermedia: Systems, Interoperability and Standards Uffe Kock Wiil Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i02/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 2 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0005 2006-03-07 A Critique of the Open Hypermedia Protocol Kenneth M. Anderson, Richard N. Taylor and E. James Whitehead Jr. Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 The Open Hypermedia Protocol is a proposed standard for enabling the interoperability of client applications with open hypermedia systems. This paper presents the protocol at a high-level of detail, performs an analysis of its strengths and weaknesses, and makes specific recommendations for improvements to the protocol. In addition, the paper records how a new version of the protocol is evolving. The arguments and recommendations of this paper are based on the information presented in [1] and [29] as well as the results of the discussions held on the protocol at the following events: the Second International Workshop on Open Hypermedia Systems (OHS2.0), the December 1996 Open Hypermedia Working Group Meeting (OHS2.5), the Third International Workshop on Open Hypermedia Systems (OHS3.0), and the September 1997 Open Hypermedia Working Group Meeting (OHS3.5). http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i02/Anderson/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 2 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0006 2006-03-07 OHRA: Towards an Open Hypermedia Reference Architecture and a Migration Path for Existing Systems Stuart Goose, Andy Lewis Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 The open hypermedia research community recognised that to make progress on defining a protocol to enable third party applications to access open link services, it was necessary to first establish a reference architecture for open hypermedia systems upon which to base discussions. In this paper we argue that there is a need to extend yet further the scope of these requirements. We propose an overall architecture for the integration of existing open hypermedia systems in a distributed and collaborative model, and provide a clear evolution path towards achieving this goal. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i02/Goose/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 2 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0007 2006-03-07 Towards a Common Reference Architecture for Open Hypermedia Kaj Grønbæk and Uffe Kock Wiil Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 This paper contributes to an ongoing effort on standardizing open hypermedia system architectures and communication interfaces. Open hypermedia systems share the property of being able to provide non-hypermedia applications with hypermedia structuring and navigation capabilities. This support is currently provided in many different ways. To be able to standardize communication interfaces, it is necessary to develop common understanding of the different architectures of existing systems and to develop a common reference architecture for open hypermedia systems. A reference architecture should provide a common language for the design of open hypermedia systems in terms of architectural elements and interfaces. The paper identifies a number of important requirements and characteristics for open hypermedia systems and examines some of the most well known open hypermedia architectures and reference models. The analysis illuminates the commonalties and differences in terminology and architectural elements. The analytical results are used to propose common terminology and a common reference architecture for open hypermedia systems (CoReArc). CoReArc identifies several different architectural elements and communication interfaces for potential interface standardization. Interface standardization may be achieved through a single physical protocol with several suites or topics or through several independent protocols. CoReArc can be used to identify and discuss the different communication interfaces of an open hypermedia system. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i02/Gronbak/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 2 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0008 2006-03-07 A Vision for Open Hypermedia Systems Peter J. Nürnberg and John J. Leggett Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 Currently, the Open Hypermedia Systems (OHS) Working Group claims three main areas of interest: scenarios, reference architectures, and protocols. The discussions over scenarios of OHS use are supposed to inform the work on OHS reference architectures, which in turn is supposed to enable the development of an Open Hypermedia Protocol (OHP) that will allow clients of one OHP-compliant OHS to use services of other OHP-compliant OHS's. In this paper, we start from existing proposals for an OHS reference architecture and an OHP. We then present a number of scenarios that motivate modifications to these existing proposals. These modifications primarily include adding the notion of an open structure processing layer to the reference architecture and adding a fixed minimal set of guaranteed services to the protocol. We then present our resultant reference architecture and protocol proposals. Our proposals are based on current working group proposals, but incorporate the modifications suggested by our scenarios. Finally, we conclude with some comments on the process we used to derive our proposals, an evaluation of current progress of the OHS Working Group, and suggestions for future directions. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i02/Nurnberg/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 2 Hypermedia systems open hypermedia systems (OHS), open hypermedia protocol (OHP), structural computing oai:jodi0009 2006-03-07 The Philological Workstation BAMBI (Better Access to Manuscripts and Browsing of Images) Sylvie Calabretto and Andrea Bozzi Texas A&M University Libraries 1998 This paper presents the results of the European project LIB-3114 for Digital Libraries called BAMBI (Better Access to Manuscripts and Browsing of Images). The project has produced a hypermedia system allowing historians, and more particularly codicologists and philologists, to read manuscripts, transcribe manuscripts, write annotations, and navigate between the words of the transcription and the matching piece of image in the numerized picture of the manuscript. After an introduction on the objectives of the project and the related works, the second part is devoted to the description of the functions and the design of the Philological Workstation. The third part describes how the international standard HyTime (Hypermedia/Time-based Structured Language) has been used as a modelling language to describe works on manuscripts (description, transcription, annotations, links, ...). Finally, the architecture of the BAMBI workstation is presented. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i03/Calabretto/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 3 Hypermedia systems Information management digital libraries, hypermedia, ancient manuscripts, HyTime, Philological workstation oai:jodi0010 2006-03-07 Towards Universal Serial Item Names Robert D. Cameron Texas A&M University Libraries 1998 The Universal Serial Item Name (USIN) scheme is proposed as a framework for a single global namespace of articles and other contributions published in organized serial collections. Requirements for USINs are analysed with an emphasis on the use of USINs in scholarly communication. A uniform naming model is described based on the hierarchical naming of serial publications and the hierarchical numbering of serial items. A number of concrete design ideas for USIN syntax are presented. A USIN Global Registry and a USIN Global Database are proposed and analysed in terms of specific architectural features that interact to meet the requirements of publishers, librarians and scholars. Applications of the USIN concept to literature research, document retrieval, bibliography preparation and addressing the 'broken links' problem of the World Wide Web are considered. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i03/Cameron/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0011 2006-03-07 Café Jus: an Electronic Journals User Survey Hazel Woodward, Fytton Rowland, Cliff McKnight, Carolyn Pritchett and Jack Meadows Texas A&M University Libraries 1998 During 1996, the number of scholarly periodicals available in electronic form increased rapidly. The Café Jus project took advantage of this critical mass of electronic journals to mount a major user study with taught postgraduate students, research students and staff in various disciplines at Loughborough University. The main conclusions were that low-level technical problems are still a deterrent to the use of electronic journals; that people prefer not to read at length on screen, but printing out is slow; that commercial publishers tend to follow the lead of technology rather than consider the convenience of their users; that at present there is a significant need for user training, exacerbated by the variety of publishers' interfaces and their speed of change; and that free journals using HTML are preferred to commercial journals using PDF for convenience of reading, but they are likely to be regarded as of lower academic quality. The implications of these results for publishers and for the future of electronic journals are discussed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i03/Woodward/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0012 2006-03-07 Hypertext Functionality: introduction to the special issue Helen Ashman, Harri Oinas-Kukkonen and Michael Bieber Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0013 2006-03-07 Supporting Software Development in Virtual Enterprises John Noll and Walt Scacchi Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 This paper presents recent developments in a distributed semantic hypertext framework called DHT that supports software development projects within virtual enterprises. We show how hypertext functionality embodied in DHT solves the practical problems of project coordination. These include collaborative data sharing in a virtual enterprise of distributed teams, integrating existing tools and environments, and enacting software processes to coordinate development activities for teams across wide-area networks.In particular, we describe how software process enactment can be achieved within a virtual enterprise without centralized mechanisms. This is when the process description is represented as a user-navigable hypertext graph the nodes of which associate process steps, staff roles and associated tools with designated software products. Overall, these capabilities provide support for coordinating software development projects across a virtual enterprise of teams connected via the Internet. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/Noll/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems project coordination, distributed hypertext, software process enactment, tool integration, Internet oai:jodi0014 2006-03-07 On Two Approaches to Software Repositories and Hypertext Functionality Harri Oinas-Kukkonen and Gustavo Rossi Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 This paper discusses the use of hypertext functionality in software engineering environments (SEEs). We discuss some of the outstanding problems in the construction and use of SEEs and software repositories, and show that by using hypertext it is possible to enhance their functionality. The integration of hypertext into this kind of software system poses several challenges in design and implementation, however. Two different approaches for implementing hypertext functionality are presented. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/Oinas-Kukkonen/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0015 2006-03-07 Designing Computational Hypermedia Applications Gustavo Rossi, Daniel Schwabe and Alejandra Garrido Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 This position paper analyses the problem of extending computational applications with hypermedia, from a design point of view. It focusses on the design of evolvable and easy-to-maintain applications combining hypermedia features with more conventional application behavior. The object-oriented hypermedia design method (OOHDM) is the conceptual basis of our approach. Using the visual tools provided by OO-Navigator, an object-oriented support environment for OOHDM, it is possible to construct computational hypermedia applications applying the concepts of the OOHDM. Also, the problem is analysed from a higher abstraction level. Design patterns are introduced and it is shown that they are a powerful tool to record and reuse designers' experience. A set of patterns for hypermedia applications that address problems both at the architectural, navigational and interface levels are presented. A reference architecture for computational hypermedia applications is outlined and further work in this area is discussed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/Rossi/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0016 2006-03-07 Supporting Collaborative Analysis and Design with Hypertext Functionality Albert M. Selvin Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 Many research efforts and several commercial products have attempted to harness the potential of argumentation-based hypertext tools to enhance the design process. Yet few researchers have reported successful applications of this technology in industry settings. This paper reports on Conversational Modeling, a technique that has been used successfully in a number of collaborative systems analysis, requirements gathering and work process redesign projects in a telecommunications company. The success of the technique appears to be due to the combination of hypertext functionality, a structured modeling framework, and group facilitation strategies. The combination of these elements addresses some of the difficulties reported in the design rationale literature with regard to argumentation-based hypertext tools. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/Selvin/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems issue-based information systems (IBIS), hypertext functionality (HTF), design rationale, computer-supported collaborative work, business process redesign, argumentation oai:jodi0017 2006-03-07 Cooperative Hypermedia Management Systems J. Verbyla and C. Watters Texas A&M University Libraries 1999 The benefits of including hypertext functionality in application systems have become widely accepted. Users expect applications to provide browsing and linking capabilities to augment search and command capabilities. Three approaches to providing such environments are feasible. The first two of these involve retrofitting hypertext functionality to third-party applications, and building an 'open' hypertext system that manages the integration of third-party applications with hypertext. The third approach involves building a task-oriented environment that enables a hypertext management system to be constructed, building block style, using third-party applications as building units that cooperate in the delivery of the required functionality. The paper argues that the last of these approaches, cooperative hypermedia management systems, is the most realistic. A model for such systems is described. Issues involved in designing and building such systems are discussed and examples presented. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i04/Verbyla/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 4 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0018 2006-03-07 Performance Issues in Digital Information Systems: introduction to a special issue Ethan V. Munson Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i05/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 5 Information management oai:jodi0019 2006-03-07 Memory Scalability in Constraint-Based Multimedia Style Sheet Systems Terry Cumaranatunge and Ethan V. Munson Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 Multimedia style sheet systems uniformly use a constraint-based model of layout. Constraints provide a uniform mechanism for all aspects of style managementand layout and are better-suited to non-textual media than flow models. We have developed a prototype style sheet system, Proteus, and have used it with a variety of document types, including program source code. This work has exposed a critical performance problem in constraint-based style sheet runtime systems: memory usage. Existing constraint systems treat cached attribute values and constraints as first-class objects, each with its own storage. Program syntax trees are very large and the constraint data for a medium-sized source file can easily consume tens of megabytes of main memory. This scalability problem would be exposed by any document of any type containing thousands of objects. We present here a new constraint-based runtime system that is substantially faster and dramatically more space-efficient than its predecessor, which had first-class constraint objects. The improved performance is the result of exploiting important common cases and a sophisticated constraint representation that allows considerable sharing of information between individual constraints. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i05/Cumaranatunge/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 5 Information management oai:jodi0020 2006-03-07 Efficiency Considerations for Scalable Information Retrieval Servers Ophir Frieder, David A. Grossman, Abdur Chowdhury and Gideon Frieder Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 We review a variety of techniques to improve efficiency in information retrieval. Given the increasing volumes of data that are available electronically, understanding and using such techniques is critical. We address several efficiency concerns, but our primary focus is on index processing since it dominates the computational demands of information retrieval. Given the importance of index processing, in addition to a general overview we include some recent index maintenance results. These results demonstrate that by delaying the updating of the index when additional documents are introduced to the collection, efficiency is improved without noticeably degrading the effectiveness of information retrieval. We conclude with an overview of parallel processing in information retrieval. Since users cannot tolerate lengthy response times, searching large text databases requires vast computational resources. Parallel processing is currently the only means to support these demands. We focus on only those approaches that are currently commercially viable. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i05/Frieder/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 5 Information management oai:jodi0021 2006-03-07 Performance and Scalability of a Large-Scale N-gram Based Information Retrieval System Ethan Miller, Dan Shen, Junli Liu and Charles Nicholas Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 Information retrieval has become more and more important due to the rapid growth of all kinds of information. However, there are few suitable systems available. This paper presents a few approaches that enable large-scale information retrieval for the TELLTALE system. TELLTALE is an information retrieval environment that provides full-text search for text corpora that may be garbled by OCR (optical character recognition) or transmission errors, and that may contain multiple languages. It can find similar documents against a 1 kB query from 1 GB of text data in 45 seconds. This remarkable performance is achieved by integrating new data structures and gamma compression into the TELLTALE framework. This paper also compares several different types of query methods such as tf.idf and incremental similarity to the original technique of centroid subtraction. The new similarity techniques give better performance but less accuracy. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i05/Miller/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 5 Information management oai:jodi0022 2006-03-07 A Pragmatics of Links Susana Pajares Tosca Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 This paper applies the linguistic theory of relevance to the study of the way links work, insisting on the lyrical quality of the link-interpreting activity. It is argued that such a pragmatic approach can help us understand hypertext readers' behavior, and thus be useful for authors and tool-builders alike. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i06/Pajares/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 6 Hypermedia systems Hypertext criticism hypertext, pragmatics, link, context, inferences, movement of meaning, linguistics oai:jodi0023 2006-03-07 Hypertext to Knowledge to Workflow Roy Rada, Antonios Michailidis, Christian Frosch, Ming Lei Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 The engineering hypothesis is that a hypertext-like, collaborative authoring system can provide an appropriate infrastructure for a knowledge and workflow management system. A hierarchical, hypertext infrastructure with typed, multi-attributed nodes provides the platform. People perform their scheduled activities by creating nodes in the system and they comment on one another's work. Such a system has been designed and built, as documented here. The engineering result suggests new issues for the design of the next generation of the system. The experimental hypothesis is that people will use such a system to manage knowledge and work. Knowledge management has been successfully supported in a software engineering team. Workflow management was only partly supported for these software engineers in part because they often relied on informal working methods that did not match well the scheduling capabilities of the system. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i06/Rada/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 6 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0027 2006-03-07 Hypernews and Coherence Martin Engebretsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 This essay seeks to illuminate certain fundamental aspects of textual and cognitive coherence in the production and reading of hypertexts in general and hypernews in particular. A division into intranodal, internodal and hyperstructural coherence helps to clarify concepts and also seems to reflect certain distinctive features of hypertext as a concept representing a linguistic level above the text level. Likewise, van Dijk's conceptual distinction between macro- and superstructures proves to be useful for demonstrating how axial and networked hyperstructures respectively may maintain, strengthen or weaken various forms of textual coherence. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i07/Engebretsen/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 7 Hypertext criticism hypertext, coherence, hypernews prototypes, information structures, linguistics oai:jodi0028 2006-03-07 Wreader's Digest - How To Appreciate Hyperfiction Anja Rau Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 Compared to its age - or youth - hyperfiction is a rather well-theorized genre. Hyperfiction-criticism either praises its subject as evolved print-text and better realization of contemporary literary theory - or deplore its - allegedly - low literary quality. What is missing, however, are in-depth readings of digital fiction that deemphasize theory and try to appreciate this new genre for what it has to offer. In this "paper", I will read two hyperfictions that are not among the two or three canonized texts that are relatively well-known and often-quoted. Both John McDaid's Uncle Buddy's Phantom Funhouse and Sarah Smith's King of Space deal with central issues of hypertext-theory - in content as well as formally. They are about agency and sense-making, ironically deconstructing mainstream theory's claims that digital, hyperlinked texts activate readers into a de-facto author-position. They are also representations of contemporary life that may be difficult to read at first but also make strangely adequate and enjoyable texts for today's readers. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i07/Rau/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 7 Hypertext criticism oai:jodi0031 2006-03-07 Hypertext Syntagmas: Cinematic Narration with Links Adrian Miles Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 Christian Metz's semiotic analysis of cinema is described in relation to hypertext narrative. Connections between film narrative syntagmas and hypertextual syntagmas are explored, with an emphasis on the contextual and pragmatic nature of these structures. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i07/Miles/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 7 Hypertext criticism oai:jodi0036 2006-03-07 A Child's Game Confused: reading Juliet Ann Martin's oooxxxooo Jill Walker Texas A&M University Libraries 2000 This is a hypertextual essay about and around a cycle of poems by Juliet Ann Martin: oooxxxooo. It's an interpretation of the poems, a reading. It's also about playing with the medium and with writing. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i07/Walker/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 7 Hypertext criticism oai:jodi0037 2006-03-07 Having the Right Connections: the LIMBER Project Ken Miller and Brian Matthews Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 As with any journey, you have to make the right connections if you want to reach your desired destination. The goal in the LIMBER project is to facilitate cross-European data analysis independent of domain, resource, language and vocabulary. The paper describes the expertise, associations, standards and architecture underlying the project deliverables designed to achieve the project's ambitious aims. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/Miller/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Information discovery oai:jodi0041 2006-03-07 Augmenting Thesaurus Relationships: Possibilities for Retrieval Douglas Tudhope, Harith Alani and Christopher Jones Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper discusses issues concerning the augmentation of thesaurus relationships, in light of new application possibilities for retrieval. We first discuss a case study that explored the retrieval potential of an augmented set of thesaurus relationships by specialising standard relationships into richer subtypes, in particular hierarchical geographical containment and the associative relationship. We then locate this work in a broader context by reviewing various attempts to build taxonomies of thesaurus relationships, and conclude by discussing the feasibility of hierarchically augmenting the core set of thesaurus relationships, particularly the associative relationship. We discuss the possibility of enriching the specification and semantics of Related Term (RT relationships), while maintaining compatibility with traditional thesauri via a limited hierarchical extension of the associative (and hierarchical) relationships. This would be facilitated by distinguishing the type of term from the (sub)type of relationship and explicitly specifying semantic categories for terms following a faceted approach. We first illustrate how hierarchical spatial relationships can be used to provide more flexible retrieval for queries incorporating place names in applications employing online gazetteers and geographical thesauri. We then employ a set of experimental scenarios to investigate key issues affecting use of the associative (RT) thesaurus relationships in semantic distance measures. Previous work has noted the potential of RTs in thesaurus search aids but also the problem of uncontrolled expansion of query term sets. Results presented in this paper suggest the potential for taking account of the hierarchical context of an RT link and specialisations of the RT relationship. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/Tudhope/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0042 2006-03-07 MetaNet - A Metadata Term Thesaurus to Enable Semantic Interoperability Between Metadata Domains Jane Hunter Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 Metadata interoperability is a fundamental requirement for access to information within networked knowledge organization systems. The Harmony international digital library project [1] has developed a common underlying data model (the ABC model) to enable the scalable mapping of metadata descriptions across domains and media types. The ABC model [2] provides a set of basic building blocks for metadata modeling and recognizes the importance of 'events' to describe unambiguously metadata for objects with a complex history. To test and evaluate the interoperability capabilities of this model, we applied it to some real multimedia examples and analysed the results of mapping from the ABC model to various different metadata domains using XSLT [3]. This work revealed serious limitations in the ability of XSLT to support flexible dynamic semantic mapping. To overcome this, we developed MetaNet [4], a metadata term thesaurus which provides the additional semantic knowledge that is non-existent within declarative XML-encoded metadata descriptions. This paper describes MetaNet, its RDF Schema [5] representation and a hybrid mapping approach which combines the structural and syntactic mapping capabilities of XSLT with the semantic knowledge of MetaNet, to enable flexible and dynamic mapping among metadata standards. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/Hunter/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0044 2006-03-07 Networked Knowledge Representation and Exchange using UML and RDF Stephen Cranefield Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper proposes the use of the Unified Modeling Language (UML) as a language for modelling ontologies for Web resources and the knowledge contained within them. To provide a mechanism for serialising and processing object diagrams representing knowledge, a pair of XSLT stylesheets have been developed to map from XML Metadata Interchange (XMI) encodings of class diagrams to corresponding RDF schemas and to Java classes representing the concepts in the ontologies. The Java code includes methods for marshalling and unmarshalling object-oriented information between in-memory data structures and RDF serialisations of that information. This provides a convenient mechanism for Java applications to share knowledge on the Web. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/Cranefield/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Information discovery Information management oai:jodi0046 2006-03-07 Reading Hypertext and the Experience of Literature David S. Miall and Teresa Dobson Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 Hypertext has been promoted as a vehicle that will change literary reading, especially through its recovery of images, supposed to be suppressed by print, and through the choice offered to the reader by links. Evidence from empirical studies of reading, however, suggests that these aspects of hypertext may disrupt reading. In a study of readers who read either a simulated literary hypertext or the same text in linear form, we found a range of significant differences: these suggest that hypertext discourages the absorbed and reflective mode that characterizes literary reading. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i01/Miall/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 1 Usability of digital information hypertext, literary reading, images, links, empirical studies, absorption, style oai:jodi0047 2006-03-07 Why Are Users Banner-Blind? The Impact of Navigation Style on the Perception of Web Banners Magnus Pagendarm and Heike Schaumburg Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 It has been observed that contradictory results have been found regarding the perception of banner advertisements on the Internet. While some studies found that recall and recognition scores for banners were at a satisfactory level, others observed that banners are almost generally overlooked. In this study, it is argued that the opposing results might be explained by differences in navigation style (aimless browsing versus goal directed searching). To test this hypothesis, 32 subjects were presented with a Web site containing a number of banners ads. Half the subjects were asked to search for specific information, while the other half was instructed just to explore the site as they wished. In a subsequent recall and recognition test, subjects from the aimless browsing group performed significantly better than subjects from the information search group. Results are discussed with regard to the supposed underlying processes of perception and information processing. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i01/Pagendarm/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 1 Usability of digital information oai:jodi0050 2006-03-07 Hypertext Criticism: introduction to a special issue Susana P. Tosca Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i07/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 7 Hypertext criticism oai:jodi0052 2006-03-07 Semantic Problems of Thesaurus Mapping Martin Doerr Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 With networked information access to heterogeneous data sources, the problem of terminology provision and interoperability of controlled vocabulary schemes such as thesauri becomes increasingly urgent. Solutions are needed to improve the performance of full-text retrieval systems and to guide the design of controlled terminology schemes for use in structured data, including metadata. Thesauri are created in different languages, with different scope and points of view and at different levels of abstraction and detail, to accommodate access to a specific group of collections. In any wider search accessing distributed collections, the user would like to start with familiar terminology and let the system find out the correspondences to other terminologies in order to retrieve equivalent results from all addressed collections. This paper investigates possible semantic differences that may hinder the unambiguous mapping and transition from one thesaurus to another. It focusses on the differences of meaning of terms and their relations as intended by their creators for indexing and querying a specific collection, in contrast to methods investigating the statistical relevance of terms for objects in a collection. It develops a notion of optimal mapping, paying particular attention to the intellectual quality of mappings between terms from different vocabularies and to problems of polysemy. Proposals are made to limit the vagueness introduced by the transition from one vocabulary to another. The paper shows ways in which thesaurus creators can improve their methodology to meet the challenges of networked access of distributed collections created under varying conditions. For system implementers, the discussion will lead to a better understanding of the complexity of the problem. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/Doerr/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Information discovery oai:jodi0053 2006-03-07 Networked Knowledge Organization Systems: introduction to a special issue Linda Hill and Traugott Koch Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i08/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 8 Information discovery oai:jodi0055 2006-03-07 Hypermedia and the Semantic Web: A Research Agenda Jacco van Ossenbruggen, Lynda Hardman and Lloyd Rutledge Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Until recently, the Semantic Web was little more than a name for the next-generation Web infrastructure as envisioned by its inventor, Tim Berners-Lee. With the introduction of XML and RDF, and new developments such as RDF Schema and DAML+OIL, the Semantic Web is rapidly taking shape. This paper gives an overview of the state-of-the-art in Semantic Web technology, the key relationships with traditional hypermedia research, and a comprehensive reference list to various sets of literature (hypertext, Web and Semantic Web). A research agenda describes the open research issues in the development of the Semantic Web from the perspective of hypermedia research. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i01/VanOssenbruggen/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Information discovery oai:jodi0058 2006-03-07 Enabling Dissemination of Meta Information in the Usenet Framework Christopher Lueg Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The paper discusses a transparent and flexible way to disseminate meta information within the global conferencing system, Usenet news. Examples of such information are ratings for Usenet articles or information about the behavior of other users. In particular, the paper describes how the Usenet "overview'' mechanism was modified to disseminate meta information to off-the-shelf Usenet clients. Experiences with the modified overview mechanism are discussed by example of two fully working prototype implementations disseminating social navigation information and collaborative filtering ratings to Usenet clients. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i01/Lueg/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 1 Information management oai:jodi0060 2006-03-07 RDF Declarative Description (RDD): A Language for Metadata Chutiporn Anutariya, Vilas Wuwongse, Kiyoshi Akama and Ekawit Nantajeewarawat Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 RDF Declarative Description (RDD) is a metadata modeling language which extends RDF(S) expressiveness by provision of generic means for succinct and uniform representation of metadata, their relationships, rules and axioms. Through its expressive mechanism, RDD can directly represent all RDF-based languages such as OIL and DAML-family markup languages (e.g., DAML+OIL and DAML-S), and hence allows their intended meanings to be determined directly without employment of other formalisms. Therefore, RDD readily enables interchangeability, interoperability as well as integrability of metadata applications, developed independently by different communities and exploiting different schemas and languages. Moreover, RDD is also equipped with computation and query-processing mechanisms. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Anutariya/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Information discovery Metadata, RDF, RDF Schema, RDF Declarative Description, RDD language. oai:jodi0061 2006-03-07 zetoc: a Dublin Core Based Current Awareness Service Ann Apps and Ross MacIntyre Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 zetoc is a current awareness service for UK Higher and Further Education providing Z39.50 access to the British Library's Electronic Table of Contents database of journal articles and conference papers. The zetoc database, updated daily, may also be searched via a World Wide Web interface. An alerting service provides tables of contents by email for new journal issues when they are loaded. The current version of zetoc is Z39.50 Bath Profile compliant and can provide Dublin Core records encoded in XML in answer to Z39.50 search requests. An enhanced version of zetoc, currently a prototype under development, will hold the data within an XML repository, using Dublin Core as the basis of the metadata schema. This paper describes the encoding of bibliographic records for journal articles and conference papers in Dublin Core, and the interoperability between Dublin Core and other bibliographic standards. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Apps/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Digital libraries Information discovery Dublin Core, bibliographic citations, metadata standards, current awareness. oai:jodi0063 2006-03-07 METAXPath Curtis E. Dyreson, Michael H. Bohlen and Christian S. Jensen Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper presents the METAXPath data model and query language. METAXPath extends XPath with support for XML metadata. XPath is a specification language for locations in an XML document. It serves as the basis for XML query languages like XSLT and the XML Query Algebra. The METAXPath data model is a nested XPath tree. Each level of metadata induces a new level of nesting. The data model separates metadata and data into different dataspaces, supports meta-metadata, and enables sharing of metadata common to a group of nodes without duplication. The METAXPath query language has a level shift operator to shift a query from a data level to a metadata level. METAXPath maximally reuses XPath hence the changes needed to support metadata are few. METAXPath is fully compatible with XPath. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Dyreson/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Information discovery Metadata, Query language, XML, XPath oai:jodi0064 2006-03-07 Multilingual Access to Dublin Core Metadata of ULIS Library Danyang Wen, Tetsuo Sakaguchi, Shigeo Sugimoto, and Koichi Tabata Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 With the recent Internet expansion, people all over the world can access more and more document databases. As Unicode has become more popular, the environment for multilingual retrieval has improved to some extent. However, there are still numerous problems to be solved, such as multilingual input and display. This paper proposes a system for retrieving ULIS Japanese metadata. The system provides convenience for overseas users for multilingual access by solving these problems and by indicating candidates for translated words and Boolean queries based on the statistics of the system's behavior. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Wen/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Information discovery Multilingual Access, Dublin Core Metadata, Cross-Language Information Retrieval oai:jodi0065 2006-03-07 What Terms Does Your Metadata Use? Application Profiles as Machine-Understandable Narratives Thomas Baker, Makx Dekkers, Rachel Heery, Manjula Patel, and Gauri Salokhe Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 The SCHEMAS Registry aims at providing a selected and annotated overview of metadata vocabularies and their use in application environments. Based on harvested metadata in RDF (Resource Description Framework), the registry allows users to explore links between "namespace schemas", which declare standard definitions of metadata terms, and "application profiles" - RDF statements about the use or adaptation of namespace terms for particular domains, services, or projects. Where instance metadata does not follow standard namespaces or explicit data models, this style allows implementors to assert an explicit mapping to standard terms. Registering profiles can help harmonize metadata usage in particular domains and, in the longer term, could provide a machine-processable basis for automating crosswalks and conversions. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Baker/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Information discovery Metadata, Semantic Web, RDF, Application Profiles oai:jodi-0070 2006-03-07 Selected Bibliography of Hypertext Criticism Susana Tosca and Jill Walker Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/bibliography.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0071 2006-03-07 Inappropriate Format][ing][: Craft-Orientation vs. Networked Content[s] Mez Breeze Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Breeze/craft_or_network.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0072 2006-03-07 Learning From the Review Culture of Fan Fiction Julianne Chatelain Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Chatelain/fanfic.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0073 2006-03-07 Learning from Science Fiction Criticism: Excessive Candour Julianne Chatelain Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Chatelain/scifi.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0074 2006-03-07 Hypertext Criticism: Writing about Hypertext Susana Tosca and Jill Walker Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/editorial.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0075 2006-03-07 A Body of Criticism Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/critbody.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0076 2006-03-07 Critic as Reader Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/critread.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0077 2006-03-07 The ABC Ontology and Model Carl Lagoze and Jane Hunter Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper describes the latest version of the ABC metadata model. This model has been developed within the Harmony international digital library project to provide a common conceptual model to facilitate interoperability between metadata ontologies from different domains. This updated ABC model is the result of collaboration with the CIMI consortium whereby earlier versions of the ABC model were applied to metadata descriptions of complex objects provided by CIMI museums and libraries. The result is a metadata model with more logically grounded time and entity semantics. Based on this model we have been able to build a metadata repository of RDF descriptions and a search interface which is capable of more sophisticated queries than less-expressive, object-centric metadata models will allow. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Lagoze/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Digital libraries Information discovery Metadata, Modeling, Ontologies oai:jodi-0077 2006-03-07 Is More Criticism Inevitable? Just Breathe Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/inevitable.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0078 2006-03-07 Author-generated Dublin Core Metadata for Web Resources: A Baseline Study in an Organization Jane Greenberg, Maria Cristina Pattuelli, Bijan Parsia and W. Davenport Robertson Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper reports on a study that examined the ability of resource authors to create acceptable metadata in an organizational setting. The results indicate that authors can create good quality metadata when working with the Dublin Core, and in some cases they may be able to create metadata that is of better quality than a metadata professional can produce. This research suggests that authors think metadata is valuable for resource discovery, that it should be created for Web resources, and that they, as authors, should be involved in metadata production for their works. The study also indicates that a simple Web form, with textual guidance and selective use of features (e.g. pop-up windows, drop-down menus, etc.) can assist authors in generating good quality metadata. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Greenberg/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Digital libraries Information discovery author-generated metadata, NIEHS, Dublin Core, metadata evaluation oai:jodi-0078 2006-03-07 A Role of Criticism in the Information Age Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/infoage.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0079 2006-03-07 A Scholar's Nightmare Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/nightmare.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0080 2006-03-07 Misguided Search for Truth Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/truth.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0081 2006-03-07 Warning: Escaping Tyranny May Lead to Insecurity Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/unread.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0082 2006-03-07 Why Hypertext Criticism? Richard E. Higgason Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Higgason/whycrit.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0083 2006-03-07 Getting Your Hands On It Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/access.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0084 2006-03-07 A Metadata Kernel for Electronic Permanence John A. Kunze Texas A&M University Libraries 2001 This paper presents a streamlined metadata record format designed to support the permanence of network discoverable objects. It starts with the Dublin Core consensus and distills out a subset of four semantic buckets - a metadata kernel - that balances the needs for adequate identification of persistent objects and for low cost metadata generation. To minimize the burden of creating, understanding, and manipulating data in those buckets, a very simple record format has been designed, called an Electronic Resource Citation (ERC). The basic ERC can be parsed by two lines of Perl code. Beyond permanence support, the ERC design suggests quite a new path for the ongoing development of simple metadata; readers familiar with the current evolutionary challenges may find the ERC to be simpler, and yet more complete, compact, extensible,and international than the Dublin Core. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/Kunze/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Digital libraries Information discovery persistent identifier, permanence,simple metadata, stub records, preservation oai:jodi-0084 2006-03-07 Criticism: Honing the Craft Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/criticism.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0085 2006-03-07 Center for the Study of Digital Libraries, Texas A&M University Center for the Study of Digital Libraries, Texas A&M University Texas A&M University Libraries 1997 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v01/i01/amdiglib/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 1 Number 1 Digital libraries oai:jodi-0085 2006-03-07 The Economic Mirror Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/economics.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0086 2006-03-07 Where Are the Electronic Grassroots? Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/electronicroots.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0087 2006-03-07 Grassroots Support Literature Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/linearroots.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0088 2006-03-07 What Are We Asking For? Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/readers.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0089 2006-03-07 You Can Get There From Here Deena Larsen Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Larsen/smallsteps.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0090 2006-03-07 Linking in Context Samhaa R. El-Beltagy, Wendy Hall, David De Roure and Leslie Carr Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 This paper explores the idea of dynamically adding multi-destination links to Web pages, based on the context of the pages and users, as a way of assisting Web users in their information finding and navigation activities. The work does not make any preconceived assumptions about the information needs of its users. Instead it presents a method for generating links by adapting to the information needs of a community of users and for utilizing these in assisting users within this community based on their individual needs. The implementation of this work is carried out within a multi-agent framework where concepts from open hypermedia are extended and exploited. In this paper, the entities involved in the process of generating and using 'context links' as well as the techniques they employ to achieve their tasks, are described. The result of an experiment carried out to investigate the implications of linking in context on information finding, is also provided. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i03/El-Beltagy/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 3 Hypermedia systems Information discovery Links, link generation, dynamic linking, open hypermedia, information finding, navigation assistance, software agents, context oai:jodi-0090 2006-03-07 New Criticism Necessary? Bill Marsh Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Marsh/newcriticism.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0091 2006-03-07 Points for Hypermedia Critics Bill Marsh Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Marsh/pointsforcritics.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0092 2006-03-07 Optimal User-Centered Knowledge Organization and Classification Systems: Using Non-reflected Gray Codes Robert M. Losee Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Existing library classification systems, such as the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) system and the Library of Congress Classification system, are generally considered effective at bringing similar documents together. For example, the DDC system is widely used to classify books in libraries and increasingly is being used for online applications, such as browsing Online Public Access Catalogues (OPACs) and Cooperative Online Resource Catalogs (CORCs), and will probably see increasing use in digital libraries. Based on theoretical considerations, a classification system consistent with the Gray code provides an optimal organizing principle for documents; it can be used to classify knowledge, as can the classification systems commonly used in both paper and digital libraries. What is the relationship between a theoretically optimal Gray code-based classification system and the existing classification systems? We suggest that the non-reflected Gray code provides a basis for ordering documents that is more consistent with existing classification systems than is the more frequently discussed reflected Gray code. This provides both a theoretical basis for existing techniques and a standard by which document organizing systems in digital libraries may be compared, evaluated and improved. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i03/Losee/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 3 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi-0092 2006-03-07 There's No Need to Bite the Breast Adrian Miles Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Miles/breast.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0093 2006-03-07 Intent is Important (a sketch for a progressive criticism) Adrian Miles Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Miles/intent.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0094 2006-03-07 Reviewing versus Criticism Adrian Miles Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Miles/reviewing&criticism.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0095 2006-03-07 Digital Art Criticism Jenny Weight Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Weight/digitalartcriticism.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0096 2006-03-07 Digital Magic Jenny Weight Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Weight/digitalmagic.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0097 2006-03-07 Introduction to a Special Volume on Metadata: Selected papers from the Dublin Core 2001 Conference Traugott Koch and Stuart Weibel Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i02/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 2 Information discovery oai:jodi-0097 2006-03-07 Futurology Jenny Weight Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Weight/futurology.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi-0098 2006-03-07 Phenomenology and Digital Information Jenny Weight Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i03/Weight/phenomenology.html Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 3 oai:jodi0100 2006-03-07 Hypertext Structure as the Event of Connection Adrian Miles Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Hypertext linking is regarded as a key element of identifying or building hypertext structure. However, links provide a nonlinguistic excess that has generally been under-theorised in hypertext criticism. When combined with the role of teleological contextualisation in interpretation links have been largely misunderstood. This paper utilises the example of cinema in relation to hypertext to explore alternative conceptions of links and the relation of meaning in hypertext to narrative teleology suggesting connections to other practices of argument that may be relevant to structure. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i03/Miles/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 3 Hypertext criticism cinema, hypertext structure, hypertext collage, hypertext montage oai:jodi0101 2006-03-07 Many Outputs - Many Inputs: XML for Publishers and E-book Designers Terje Hillesund Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 This essay questions the XML doctrine of "one input - many outputs". In the area of publishing the doctrine says that from one book one can produce many formats and end-products. Supported by insights of linguistics and experiences of writers and editors, I shall claim this assertion to be basically wrong. By examining the main properties of XML I will further, in contrast to the doctrine, argue that XML and related technologies add to the complexity of publishing. New media, new formats and new genres will, powered by XML, lead publishers into a new and challenging state of "many outputs - many inputs". http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i01/Hillesund/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 1 Information management oai:jodi0103 2006-03-07 Designing the User Interface for the Físchlár Digital Video Library Hyowon Lee and Alan F. Smeaton Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 A framework for designing video content browsers that are based on browsing keyframes and are used in digital video libraries is presented. Based on a review of existing ideas and systems, we derive a design space to compare existing browser interfaces and to specify new interface ideas in a more systematic way. This design space is used to illustrate three distinctive video browser interfaces we have developed. Results and analysis of user testing on these browsers are also presented, informing refinements and further insights into video browser design. These browsers have been integrated into an experimental digital video library called Físchlár, currently widely used within our university campus. Obtaining usage information from this system allows us to develop some of the desirable features in future interfaces to digital video libraries. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Lee/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries Hypermedia systems Usability of digital information digital video, video browsing, multimedia, user-interface design, analytic design oai:jodi0104 2006-03-07 Virtual Telescopes in Education Susan Hoban, Marie desJardins, Nora Farrell, Priyang Rathod, Joel Sachs, Suryakant Sansare, Yelena Yesha, John Keating, Bart Busschots, Johanna Means, Gilbert Clark, Louis Mayo and Willard Smith Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Virtual Telescopes in Education is providing the services required to operate a virtual observatory comprising distributed telescopes, including an interactive, constraint-based scheduling service, data and resource archive, proposal preparation and review environment, and a VTIE Journal. A major goal of VTIE is to elicit from learners questions about the nature of celestial objects and the physical processes that give rise to the spectacular imagery that catches their imaginations. Generation of constrained science questions will assist learners in the science process. To achieve interoperability with other NSDL resources, our approach follows the Open Archives Initiative and the W3C Semantic Web activity. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Hoban/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0105 2006-03-07 Experimental User-Centered Evaluation of an Open Hypermedia System and Web Information Seeking Environments Michail Salampasis and Konstantinos I. Diamantaras Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 This paper presents an experimental user-centered evaluation of two hypermedia system architectures, each representing a different interaction model and information-seeking environment. The first system is a hypermedia digital library based on the World Wide Web. This system represents an interaction model in which information seekers consistently use a single interface (i.e. a Web browser) to access different information seeking strategies (ISSs). The second system is a similar library (in terms of content and organisation) that is based on an agent-based Open Hypermedia System (OHS). This library encourages an interaction model in which multiple user interfaces and information seeking strategies may be used in a more parallel fashion. Several researchers have suggested that information seeking may be more effective in systems that allow the parallel use of multiple information seeking strategies. On the other hand, the ease of use of the simple click-and-go-to interaction model introduced by the Web and the consistency of its interface appears to be more attractive for most information seekers. The aim of this paper is to examine and discuss these hypotheses critically. Although general conclusions cannot be drawn from the experiment, the results present some useful indications. A first indication is that information seeking environments that support multiple seeking strategies through multiple interfaces may be more effective and efficient for some information seeking tasks. Also, results taken from a questionnaire given to users of the OHS indicate that complex interaction models may not be prohibitively difficult to use, even for inexperienced information seekers. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Salampasis/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries Hypermedia systems Usability of digital information oai:jodi0106 2006-03-07 Federated Searching Interface Techniques for Heterogeneous OAI Repositories Xiaoming Liu, Kurt Maly, Mohammad Zubair, Qiaoling Hong, Michael L. Nelson, Frances Knudson and Irma Holtkamp Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Federating repositories by harvesting heterogeneous collections with varying degrees of metadata richness poses a number of challenging issues: (1) how to address the lack of uniform control for various metadata fields in terms of building a rich unified search interface, and (2) how easily new collections and freshly harvested data in existing repositories can be incorporated into the federation supporting a unified interface? This paper focuses on the approaches taken to address these issues in Arc, an Open Archives Initiative-compliant federated digital library. At present Arc contains over 1M metadata records from 75 data providers from various subject domains. Analysis of these heterogeneous collections indicates that controlled vocabularies and values are widely used in most repositories. Usage is extremely variable, however. In Arc we solve the problem by implementing an advanced searching interface that allows users to search and select in specific fields with data we construct from the harvested metadata, and also by an interactive search for the subject field. As the metadata records are incrementally harvested we address how to build these services over frequently-added new collections and harvested data. The initial result is promising, showing the benefits of immediate feedback to the user in enhancing the search experience as well as in increasing the precision of the user's search. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Liu/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0107 2006-03-07 Digital Archive Network for Anthropology Jeffrey T. Clark, Brian M. Slator, William Perrizo, James E. Landrum, III, Richard Frovarp, Aaron Bergstrom, Sanjay Ramaswamy and William Jockheck Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The Digital Archive Network for Anthropology (DANA) is a federation of distributed, interoperable databases, each with specific content of value to archaeology, physical anthropology and ethnology. DANA will include two-dimensional imagery and accurate, three-dimensional models of material objects (i.e. artifacts and fossils). These models can be variously manipulated to be viewed from all angles, and are sufficiently precise to allow for a range of detailed measurements. This network will allow reliable, "anytime, anywhere" access to content and services for education and research. The project is currently funded by the National Science Digital Libraries (NSDL) program (NSF 2001), with the goal of developing and implementing a digital libraries collection for anthropological materials. This presentation describes the DANA project, with a focus on the real contributions and potential benefits that derive from the use of information technology to advance research and education in anthropology. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Clark/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries 3D modeling, anthropology, archaeology, cultural heritage, databases, digital libraries, distributed computing oai:jodi0109 2006-03-07 Linked Active Content for Digital Libraries for Education David Yaron, D. Jeff Milton and Rea Freeland Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The goal of the CreateStudio development environment is to catalyze the creation of interactive learning experiences for digital libraries. CreateStudio supports creation of linked active content, which builds on the hypertext paradigm by extending it to support active content. This is done by allowing content to specify a dynamically loaded software viewer and by supporting links that pass messages between different viewers. By promoting separation of content from software, linked active content provides a powerful strategy for creating and organizing collections of active online learning experiences. For example, separating simulations and visualizations from other components enables them to be more easily repurposed to meet the needs of a diverse audience of educators and students. In addition, this strategy leads to an authoring paradigm that supports contributions from a more diverse audience, including especially those who have substantial classroom and pedagogical expertise but lack programming expertise. This is done by building on instructors' familiarity with simple Web design. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Yaron/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0110 2006-03-07 Atmospheric Visualization Collection: Developments in the NSDL Christopher Klaus, Keith Andrew Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The Atmospheric Visualization Collection is one of the NSF National STEME Digital Library projects, which seek to develop the digital library through novel collaborative methods. This project is based on research-oriented data collected from the Department of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement program. It seeks to establish educational materials that are appropriate for all levels of learning while incorporating interactive assessment and development activities. Learning activities include online and offline tools for visualization and manipulation of atmospheric data, interfaces for independent learning, educational units that include streaming video and hypothesis testing, and code development opportunities. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Klaus/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries digital libraries, atmospheric visualization, user interfaces, lesson plans oai:jodi0112 2006-03-07 Active Netlib: An Active Mathematical Software Collection for Inquiry-based Computational Science and Engineering Education Shirley Moore, A.J. Baker, Jack Dongarra, Christian Halloy and Chung Ng Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The efficient application of scientific computing techniques requires specialized knowledge of numerical methods and their implementation in mathematical software libraries that many students, scientists and engineers, working beyond the already strenuous demands of their particular field, must struggle to achieve. Active Netlib addresses this problem by creating an active collection of executable mathematical software deployed on computational servers and accessible over the network from familiar desktop client interfaces. The Netlib mathematical software collection is being extended in a number of ways to support this project. The NetSolve client-server system provides an active interface to the contents of Netlib by constructing network-accessible objects with executable content from the software packages in Netlib. The NetSolve adaptive solver interface guides the user in selecting appropriate software, in setting parameters correctly, and in interpreting numerical results. In addition, Active Netlib provides mechanisms that enable resource users to become resource providers by dynamically uploading and deploying their own software applications, which are reviewed before becoming part of the moderated publicly available collection. It is hoped that Active Netlib will grow to be a worldwide collection of executable mathematical software, as well as scientific and engineering applications, that is both drawn upon and contributed to by researchers, educators and students. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Moore/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0114 2006-03-07 Thematic Real-time Environmental Distributed Data Services (THREDDS): Incorporating Interactive Analysis Tools into NSDL Ben Domenico, John Caron, Ethan Davis, Robb Kambic and Stefano Nativi Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The overarching goal of Unidata's Thematic Real-time Environmental Distributed Data Services (THREDDS) is to provide students, educators and researchers with coherent access to a large collection of real-time and archived datasets from a variety of environmental data sources at a number of distributed server sites. The datasets will be conveniently accessible from a collection of THREDDS-enabled data analysis and display tools. THREDDS will provide real-time data delivery via reliable, event-driven "push" technology as well as transparent access to datasets using "pull" systems that make it possible to access data on remote servers as if they were on the user's own computer. The system will be built on a set of software components and data servers that are already in operation or under development. The heart of THREDDS is metadata contained in publishable inventories and catalogs (PICats). The creation, publication and distribution of PICats will be facilitated by the discovery system and services provided by DLESE. For example, sites receiving real-time environmental data can create PICats describing data products automatically as they arrive using decoders and crawlers. On the other hand, since PICats do not have to reside on the server with the data, researchers will be able to create PICats for online publications that point to datasets residing on several data servers. Similarly, educators will incorporate PICats of illustrative datasets into modules that also include tools for data analysis and visualization, and students will be able to use PICats to point to datasets related to their research projects, just as they now use URLs to point to relevant documents. This paper presents an overview of THREDDS and an update on the current status. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/Domenico/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0119 2006-03-07 CHANT (CHinese ANcient Texts): a comprehensive database of all ancient Chinese texts up to 600 AD Che Wah Ho Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The CHinese ANcient Texts (CHANT) database is a long-term project which began in 1988 to build up a comprehensive database of all ancient Chinese texts up to the sixth century AD. The project is near completion and the entire database, which includes both traditional and excavated materials, will be released on the CHANT Web site (www.chant.org) in mid-2002. With more than a decade of experience in establishing an electronic Chinese literary database, we have gained much insight useful to the development of similar databases in the future. We made use of the best available versions of all texts, noting variant readings in footnotes. The biggest problem we encountered is the inclusion of rare and obsolete Chinese characters. For excavated materials, we also have to incorporate a considerable number of inscriptions in the original oracle bones and bronze forms. Since we started building the database, information technology has advanced so rapidly that we had to upgrade the technical devices already in use in the database. Unification of different sub-databases is also a daunting task. To maintain our competitive edge over free online Chinese databases, we need to continue developing new databases employing the existing ones. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i02/Ho/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0120 2006-03-07 Moving into XML Functionality: The Combined Digital Dictionaries of Buddhism and East Asian Literary Terms Charles Muller and Michael Beddow Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 A report on the new developments in the online Digital Dictionary of Buddhism and CJK-English Dictionary, focusing on their implementation in XML.The paper is in two parts: 1) Project Manager's Report, by Charles Muller, and 2) Delivering CJK Dictionaries from Pure XML Sources: A Developer's Perspective, by Michael Beddow. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i02/Muller/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0121 2006-03-07 Linking Chan/Seon/Zen Figures and Their Texts: Problems and Developments in the Construction of a Relational Database Michel Mohr Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Issues related to the construction of a database on Buddhist historical figures and their written legacy are discussed in the paper, which deliberately takes the researcher's point of view, reviewing concrete examples rather than elaborating on technical issues. One part of the IRIZ "Zen Knowledge Base" project initiated by Urs App is to establish a unique ID number for each Chan/Seon/Zen figure, thereby enabling each author to be linked with the extant documents. The primary stages of this project having now been completed, the paper presents some initial results and working hypotheses, and reflects on wider issues related to the digitization of Buddhist research materials. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i02/Mohr/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0122 2006-03-07 An Evaluation of Document Keyphrase Sets Steve Jones and Gordon W. Paynter Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 Keywords and keyphrases have many useful roles as document surrogates and descriptors, but the manual production of keyphrase metadata for large digital library collections is at best expensive and time-consuming, and at worst logistically impossible. Algorithms for keyphrase extraction like Kea and Extractor produce a set of phrases that are associated with a document. Though these sets are often utilized as a group, keyphrase extraction is usually evaluated by measuring the quality of individual keyphrases. This paper reports an assessment that asks human assessors to rate entire sets of keyphrases produced by Kea, Extractor and document authors. The results provide further evidence that human assessors rate all three sources highly (with some caveats), but show that the relationship between the quality of the phrases in a set and the set as a whole is not always simple. Choosing the best individual phrases will not necessarily produce the best set; combinations of lesser phrases may result in better overall quality. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Jones/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Digital libraries Information discovery digital libraries, automatic keyphrase extraction, author keyphrases, subjective evaluation oai:jodi0123 2006-03-07 Chinese Buddhist texts for the new Millenium - The Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association (CBETA) and its Digital Tripitaka Christian Wittern Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 This paper deals mostly with work by the Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association (CBETA) in preparing an electronic edition of a large collection of Chinese Buddhist texts. A short opening section about the history and significance of these texts is followed by a sketch of the digitization efforts prior to the CBETA project. The main part of the paper provides some background on the organizational structure and aims of CBETA, and then describes key aspects of the CBETA project, which are, among others: focus on quality assurance of existing electronic data, not foremost on input; reliance on open standards like the TEI Guidelines, XML and Unicode. The paper closes with an assessment of open questions, including the different formats for distribution of texts currently used by CBTEA, the reasons for their choice and the problems encountered. This will also touch on some more general questions concerning the distribution and continuing development of electronic ressources. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i02/Wittern/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0132 2006-03-07 Interactional Digital Libraries: introduction to a special Volume on Interactivity in Digital Libraries Anita Coleman and Maliaca Oxnam Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v02/i04/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 2 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0153 2006-03-07 Web Page Layout: A Comparison Between Left- and Right-justified Site Navigation Menus James Kalbach and Tim Bosenick Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The usability of two Web page layouts was directly compared: one with the main site navigation menu on the left of the page, and one with the main site navigation menu on the right. Sixty-four participants were divided equally into two groups and assigned to either the left- or the right-hand navigation test condition. Using a stopwatch, the time to complete each of five tasks was measured. The hypothesis that the left-hand navigation would perform significantly faster than the right-hand navigation was not supported. Instead, there was no significant difference in completion times between the two test conditions. This research questions the current leading Web design thought that the main navigation menu should be left justified. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Kalbach/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Usability of digital information Web site usability, Web page layout, navigation oai:jodi0154 2006-03-07 Macro Approaches to Digital Searching and Secondary Research Jonathan Mendel Levitt Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The use of digital information can be approached from more than one angle. The main emphasis over the past decade has been on making a few basic tools (for instance, browsers and search mechanisms) powerful, versatile and easy to use. Coleman and Oxnam (2002) suggest both improving the usability of current tools and developing new ones. This article suggests focusing on the use of tools for searching digital information. The power of a search mechanism depends not only on how it is constructed but also on how it is used. Coleman and Oxnam ask: "How can interactional digital libraries enhance and augment human capabilities?" I ask a related question: "How can we use current tools such as search mechanisms more effectively?" Coleman and Oxnam wrote their article in the form of a challenge to JoDI readers, authors and researchers in the realm of interactional digital libraries. In a similar spirit, this article can be considered an initial investigation of this question. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Levitt/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Digital libraries oai:jodi0156 2006-03-07 Map-Based Horizontal Navigation in Educational Hypertext Peter Brusilovsky and Riccardo Rizzo Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 The paper discusses the problem of horizontal (non-hierarchical) navigation in modern educational courseware. It considers why horizontal links disappear, how to support horizontal navigation in modern hyper-courseware, and looks at our earlier attempts to provide horizontal navigation in Web-based electronic textbooks. Map-based navigation -- a new approach to support horizontal navigation in open corpus educational courseware -- which we are currently investigating, is presented. We describe the mechanism behind this approach, present a system, KnowledgeSea, that implements this approach, and provide some results from a classroom study of this system. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i01/Brusilovsky/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Horizontal navigation, electronic textbooks, similarity navigation, concept-based navigation, map-based navigation, Self Organizing Maps oai:jodi0157 2006-03-07 Towards Modular Access to Electronic Handbooks Caterina Caracciolo Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper reports an ongoing project aimed at providing an exemplary architecture for an electronic dissemination environment for scientific handbooks. It focuses on a way of facilitating navigation through and access to electronic handbooks by using a WordNet-like concept hierarchy consisting of synsets (sets of synonyms) that are connected to each other and to external sources by semantic relations for navigational purposes. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Caracciolo/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 Information management oai:jodi0160 2006-03-07 E-Book Technology and Its Potential Applications in Distance Education Norshuhada Shiratuddin, Monica Landoni, Forbes Gibb and Shahizan Hassan Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The potential for distance learning students to use e-books is explored. E-books are gaining wider interest since the introduction of portable electronic reading devices and software-based readers that provide users with more realistic book reading experiences. The paper discusses where to acquire e-book technology, and how to create e-books. It also reports an evaluation to test the usability of different types of e-book compiler software. By using one of the compilers, the use of e-books to improve the interaction between educators and distance learning students in terms of access to teaching and learning materials and submission of assignments is also demonstrated. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Shiratuddin/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 Digital libraries oai:jodi0161 2006-03-07 E-nhance Lectures Larissa Naber and Monika Köhle Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 Ever more lecturers find themselves forced to Web-enhance their courses out of economic pressure or prestige. Universities trapped between rising student numbers and decreasing budgets are turning to e-learning as the one-stop solution, with little concern for student or teacher needs. An e-(nhanced) learning environment can only be successful if it fulfils students' and lecturers' needs alike. The student needs to be supported in various stages of learning, whereas the lecturer cannot afford to spend more time on generating lecture support materials. Investigation of lecturers' and students' requirements resulted in the concept and design of e-ULE (e-Usable Learning Environment), a university-level teaching and learning environment with a strong focus on usability. To ensure learning materials are helpful for students in any learning situation, from gaining an overview to providing reference, an equally usable authoring tool is required: e-ULE's authoring system is geared towards a typical lecturer, without requiring an undue amount of IT or pedagogical skills, but offers support for academic workflow by supporting tasks like literature research and integration, and collaborative editing in large groups (e.g. with students). Following a usability engineering approach, all features of the e-ULE learning environment are derived from user requirements and usability tests. The main parts of the environment are currently at "proof of concept" stage. The system is open source and relies on several prominent open source projects. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Naber/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 Information management oai:jodi0162 2006-03-07 E-education in the UK Ruth Wilson Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper outlines the results of a survey, by the EBONI project, of lecturers' use of and attitudes to electronic teaching and learning material, providing a snapshot of the current situation in UK higher education. Differences in the extent and type of e-content usage between academic disciplines, and lecturers' intentions for the future, are discussed. Based on an analysis of their hopes and concerns, recommendations are made for increasing the development, usage and effectiveness of electronic content. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Wilson/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 oai:jodi0163 2006-03-07 Personalising Electronic Books James Ohene-Djan and Alvaro A.A. Fernandes Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper addresses how hyperdocuments, accessible via electronic books (e-books) which are read using the World Wide Web, can be endowed with features that personalise the interaction process that takes place between the reader and the e-book. A novel, abstract approach to modelling the personalisation of hyperdocuments is introduced. This approach aims to make available features that allow readers to interact with these documents in a manner much closer to that with paper-based documents. The research is based on a formal characterisation of personalisable hyperlink-based interaction. This characterisation is unique in formally modelling a rich set of user-initiated personalisation actions that allow users to come closer to satisfying their specific, often dynamic, information retrieval goals. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Ohene-Djan/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0164 2006-03-07 Use and Abuse of Reusable Learning Objects Pithamber R. Polsani Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The term Learning Object, first popularized by Wayne Hodgins in 1994 when he named the CedMA working group "Learning Architectures, APIs and Learning Objects", has become the Holy Grail of content creation and aggregation in the computer-mediated learning field. The terms Learning Objects (LOs) and Reusable Learning Objects are frequently employed in uncritical ways, thereby reducing them to mere slogans. The serious lack of conceptual clarity and reflection is evident in the multitude of definitions and uses of LOs. The objectives of this paper are to assess current definitions of the term Learning Object, to articulate the foundational principles for developing a concept of LOs, and to provide a methodology and broad set of guidelines for creating LOs. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/Polsani/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 Information management oai:jodi0165 2006-03-07 XML: One Input - Many Outputs: a response to Hillesund Norman Walsh Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 Hillesund (2002) argues that XML does not and cannot fulfil the often touted benefit that it allows authors and publishers to create documents that can be effectively presented in a variety of formats; that the "doctrine of 'one input - many outputs' ... is basically wrong." This Letter defends the position that XML is an effective technology, in fact the most effective technology in widespread use, for producing multiple output formats from a single input document. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i01/Walsh/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 1 Information management oai:jodi0167 2006-03-07 Chinese Collections in the Digital Library: introduction to a special issue Brian Bruya Texas A&M University Libraries 2002 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i02/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0168 2006-03-07 Strategic Positioning Options for Scientific Libraries in Markets of Scientific and Technical Information - the Economic Impact of Digitization Andreas Geyer-Schulz, Andreas Neumann, Annika Heitmann and Karsten Stroborn Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 As a key resource of the 21st century, information goods might displace industrial goods as key drivers of markets. The foundation of the economic prosperity of developed countries is not only based on the efficient conversion of information to knowledge, but also in imparting this knowledge in the educational system. In this context, scientific libraries play a decisive role as a provider of scientific and technical information (STI). After introducing the 2-3-6-concept, an analysis concept based on a special value chain, the paper examines the roles of the different players - author, scientific library, publisher, bookstore and scientific association - involved in the production of STI. A structural model for the value chain of the STI market is developed to analyse in detail the opportunities for scientific libraries offered by technological progress within the current economic, legal and regulatory framework. The analysis reveals that none of the players can be expected to stay within their historical core competencies. Due to technical developments and associated changes in the structure of transaction costs, each player can cover more fields of value-adding activities. The roles of the different players are merging more and more. Further, analysis of current direct and indirect monetary flows reveals considerable potential for conflict. As a consequence, players such as university libraries need to reconsider their strategic position in order to persist in the STI market. The paper proposes paths for possible strategic repositioning of university libraries. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Geyer-Schulz/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0169 2006-03-07 Towards a Core Ontology for Information Integration Martin Doerr, Jane Hunter and Carl Lagoze Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 In this paper, we argue that a core ontology is one of the key building blocks necessary to enable the scalable assimilation of information from diverse sources. A complete and extensible ontology that expresses the basic concepts that are common across a variety of domains and can provide the basis for specialization into domain-specific concepts and vocabularies, is essential for well-defined mappings between domain-specific knowledge representations (i.e. metadata vocabularies) and the subsequent building of a variety of services such as cross-domain searching, browsing, data mining and knowledge extraction. This paper describes the results of a series of three workshops held in 2001 and 2002 which brought together representatives from the cultural heritage and digital library communities with the goal of harmonizing their knowledge perspectives and producing a core ontology. The knowledge perspectives of these two communities were represented by the CIDOC/CRM [31], an ontology for information exchange in the cultural heritage and museum community, and the ABC ontology [33], a model for the exchange and integration of digital library information. This paper describes the mediation process between these two different knowledge biases and the results of this mediation - the harmonization of the ABC and CIDOC/CRM ontologies, which we believe may provide a useful basis for information integration in the wider scope of the involved communities. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Doerr/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0170 2006-03-07 Emerging Tools for Evaluating Digital Library Services: Conceptual Adaptations of LibQUAL+ and CAPM Fred Heath, Martha Kyrillidou, Duane Webster, Sayeed Choudhury, Ben Hobbs, Mark Lorie and Nicholas Flores Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper describes ways to examine how digital libraries are valued by their users, and explores ways of permitting the allocation of resources to areas of user-identified need. Pertinent models from marketing, economics, and library assessment and evaluation are reviewed, focussing on the application of the LibQUAL+(tm) and CAPM methodologies. Each methodology, which was developed independently, provides a useful framework for evaluating digital library services. The paper discusses the benefits of a combined methodology that would provide even greater potential for evaluation of digital library services. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Heath/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0173 2006-03-07 Building a Business Plan for DSpace, MIT Libraries' Digital Institutional Repository Mary R. Barton and Julie Harford Walker Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper presents an overview of the methodology and results of the MIT Libraries' business plan development project for DSpace (http://www.dspace.org/), MIT's digital institutional repository. The introductory section includes a description of DSpace, the objectives of the business plan project, and the current status of the DSpace project. The methodology section explains the process and tools with which the business plan was developed. The remainder of the paper describes the results of the business plan project, including the DSpace service definition, the cost model, potential funding sources, and future DSpace plans. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Barton/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries digital libraries, institutional repository, scholarly communication oai:jodi0175 2006-03-07 Adaptive Organization of Tabular Data for Display Robert M. Losee Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 Tabular representations of information can be organized so that the subject distance between adjacent columns is low, bringing related materials together. In cases where data is available on all topics, the subject distance between table columns and rows can be formally shown to be minimized. A variety of Gray codes may be used for ordering tabular rows and columns. Subject features in the Gray code may be ordered so that the coding system used is one that has a lower inter-column subject distance than with many other codes. Methods by which user preferences may be incorporated are described. The system optionally may display unrequested columns of data that are related to requested data. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Losee/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Digital libraries browsing, tables, Gray code, visualizing data, adaptive interfaces, relational databases, information retrieval oai:jodi0177 2006-03-07 Scholarly Associations and the Economic Viability of Open Access Publishing John Willinsky Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper considers a number of economic issues that scholarly associations are confronting in moving their journals online, with a focus on the possible viability of an open access or free-to-read format. It explores the current content overlap between subscription-based and open access sources, and considers how these redundancies favor open access publishing and indexing. It utilizes the tax returns for 20 US non-profit scholarly associations to analyze current publishing revenues against costs, arguing that the associations could make up the loss of revenue posed by the open access publishing model through cost savings and other revenue sources, while serving their membership better through the increased readership in an era of declining subscriptions. While the decision to publish journals in an open access format is by no means simply an economic one, the viability of open access publishing warrants serious consideration by scholarly associations that are currently determining what this new medium may mean for the circulation of knowledge. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Willinsky/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0178 2006-03-07 Counting the Costs of Digital Preservation: Is Repository Storage Affordable? Stephen Chapman Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The Harvard University Library and the Online Computer Library Center, Inc. (OCLC) each manage centralized repositories optimized for long-term storage of library collections. Both organizations fully recover operational expenses by charging owners annual rates for managed storage services, regardless of materials use. The Harvard Depository assesses rates for analog storage per billable square foot. The OCLC Digital Archive assesses rates per gigabyte for storage of digital objects. Formats are significant, but not sole factors in determining preservation costs in these models. Owners' definitions of content integrity and tolerance for risk, which can change over time, are also important variables in the complex equation of preservation costs and affordability. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Chapman/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0179 2006-03-07 Towards a General Relation Browser: A GUI for Information Architects Gary Marchionini and Ben Brunk Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 The paper presents the case of ongoing efforts to develop and test generalizable user interfaces that provide interactive overviews for large-scale Web sites, portals, and other partitions of Web space. The interfaces are called Relation Browsers (RB) because they help people explore the relationships across different attribute sets, thus enabling understanding the scope and extent of the corpus through active exploration of different "slices" defined by different attribute value juxtapositions. The RB concept is illustrated through discussion of six iterations over a five year period that included laboratory usability studies, a field test, and implementations with a variety of data management problems. The current application to design concepts in a digital government setting is discussed, and the concept of the RB as the basis for an interface server is presented. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i01/Marchionini/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 1 Usability of digital information oai:jodi0180 2006-03-07 Implementation Challenges Associated with Developing a Web-based E-notebook Yolanda Jacobs Reimer and Sarah A. Douglas Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 As people increasingly turn to the World Wide Web to help them manage their daily tasks, they engage in the process of information assimilation (IA). IA refers to the gathering, editing, annotating, organizing, and saving of Web information, as well as the tracking of ongoing Web work processes. Although evidence suggests that IA is a critical process for Web users, it is currently not well supported by existing browsers and other software applications. The lack of adequate software support for IA may be attributed to implementation difficulties associated with developing general Web-based applications. In addition, usability must be a major priority in the development of interactive systems to support IA. The NetNotes prototype, a Web-based e-notebook, represents a limited solution to the problem of developing software to support IA. NetNotes works in conjunction with a specific Web domain, deals with a limited number of Web components, and requires minor server-side modifications. Despite these limitations, however, the NetNotes implementation exposes some of the key technical problems associated with implementing Web-based software, it successfully incorporates a number of critical IA requirements, and it is robust enough to be used in future experimental evaluations. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i03/JacobsReimer/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 3 Usability of digital information oai:jodi0220 2006-03-07 E-education: Design and Evaluation for Teaching and Learning Monica Landoni and Paloma Diaz Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v03/i04/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 3 Number 4 oai:jodi0229 2006-03-07 Economic Factors of Managing Digital Content and Establishing Digital Libraries Simon Tanner Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 Digital libraries oai:jodi0231 2006-03-07 Merging Metadata and Content-Based Retrieval Dave Deniman, Tamara Sumner, Lynne Davis, Sonal Bhushan and Jackson Fox Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 Educational digital libraries employ resource discovery systems that are aimed at providing educators and learners with curriculum materials to support learning in both formal and informal settings. The article describes a "hybrid" educational resource discovery system, which combines metadata and content-based retrieval methods. This hybrid system was implemented and evaluated in the context of the Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE). A pilot study was conducted to compare this hybrid system with an existing metadata-based system, with the aim of finding out if the hybrid system helps educators locate relevant resources with less effort. The results of the study suggest that the hybrid system decreased the variability in the number of user actions required to locate learning resources. The hybrid system interface featured embedded links, pointing to inner pages within a larger compound learning resource; study participants made use of these embedded links to locate individual learning objects. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i03/Deniman/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 3 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0234 2006-03-07 The Future of Mathematical Text: A Proposal for a New Internet Hypertext for Mathematics Robert Mayans Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The Internet has transformed the practice of mathematical writing, and mathematical texts of all kinds are moving online. But the fundamental change to come in mathematical publication is not just moving print forms to electronic documents, but recreating mathematics in a new architecture: a hypertext that reflects the deep unity and universality of mathematics, that can grow and diversify as mathematics changes. It is argued that hypertext is a natural representation of mathematical thought, with its deep interconnection of ideas, the need for constant revision, and the multiplicity of viewpoints. The design of a hypertext must take into account how mathematics is structured and how it is understood: its internal consistency, the need for preparation and review, and the importance of strong tool support for reading and writing text. A high-level design is proposed, combining structured and network hypertext, with a simple link and editorial structure, and design issues concerning language representation, medium- and high-level structure, editorial policy, administration, and technology are examined. A hypertext of sufficient quality and usability will powerfully influence how mathematics is taught, communicated and used, in the classroom, in the workplace and in research. This change in how the Internet is used is not primarily technical: it is the extension of current technology towards a new goal. Gaps and weaknesses of the design are discussed, as well as possible solutions, and a plan to implement the hypertext on the Web is developed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Mayans/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0236 2006-03-07 proXimity: Walking the Link Simon Harper, Carole Goble and Stephen Pettitt Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Our society is consistently told that the world is becoming increasingly connected, that the Internet can join physically disparate people by means of email, Web sites, and chatrooms, and that the one 'must have' is a personal domain name; in effect, that the virtual should be more respected than the physical. People are led to believe that computers, with the 'net' as their focus, are their portal to other worlds, their communication mechanism to remote peoples, 'blogging' their primary form of self expression. All this is in part true, but we think there are fundamental issues that are not addressed. The focus on only the virtual is skewing our perception to over-estimate the Web's importance. The increased complexity inherent in all large systems will become too great for many users as the Web develops and grows. The local environment, often most pertinent to the user, is currently completely ignored with regard to dynamic information giving. The Web's focus on information belies the fact that the world is also composed of physical artifacts. Therefore, we think that the next direction for the Web is the conjoining of the physical and virtual. We suggest that they must be connected because without a physical presence the virtual world cannot attain its full potential. To reduce the complexity and stress placed on the user, the Web should relate to the users' physical location and real-world artifacts encountered to make meaningful choices about what information is currently useful or required. In effect, the user acquires a real-world centric view of the Web in which the Web conforms to reality, not reality to the Web. The primary goal of our system, 'proXimity', is to augment realities by giving hypertext, and thus the Web, a physical presence in the real world. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Harper/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Mobile Hypermedia, Semantic Web, Mobility, Dynamic Ambient Networks, Universal Access and Control oai:jodi0237 2006-03-07 Integrating Reading and Writing of Documents P. J. Brown and Heather Brown Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Computer users have become accustomed to the writing of documents being regarded as a separate activity from the reading of documents. We believe that this division is unnecessary and limits the effectiveness of virtually every computer user. It is time for a rethink of underlying concepts. A key concept for integrating reading with writing is a general mechanism for annotation. This general mechanism can be combined with hyperlinking to create a single unifying super-concept that provides a base for integrating reading and writing. The paper explains the underlying ideas, and describes the results of a small experiment that supported the viability of the super-concept. We believe that the super-concept might possibly provide the foundations for a revolution in thinking about documents, which would benefit everyone. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Brown/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0238 2006-03-07 The Connectivity Sonar: Detecting Site Functionality by Structural Patterns Einat Amitay, David Carmel, Adam Darlow, Ronny Lempel and Aya Soffer Texas A&M University Libraries 2003 Web sites today serve many different functions, such as corporate sites, search engines, e-stores, and so forth. As sites are created for different purposes, their structure and connectivity characteristics vary. However, this research argues that sites of similar role exhibit similar structural patterns, as the functionality of a site naturally induces a typical hyperlinked structure and typical connectivity patterns to and from the rest of the Web. Thus, the functionality of Web sites is reflected in a set of structural and connectivity-based features that form a typical signature. In this paper, we automatically categorize sites into eight distinct functional classes, and highlight several search-engine related applications that could make immediate use of such technology. We purposely limit our categorization algorithms by tapping connectivity and structural data alone, making no use of any content analysis whatsoever. When applying two classification algorithms to a set of 202 sites of the eight defined functional categories, the algorithms correctly classified between 54.5% and 59% of the sites. On some categories, the precision of the classification exceeded 85%. An additional result of this work indicates that the structural signature can be used to detect spam rings and mirror sites, by clustering sites with almost identical signatures. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i03/Lempel/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 3 Hypermedia systems Information discovery Web graphs, link analysis, Web IR oai:jodi0243 2006-03-07 A Personal Information and Knowledge Infrastructure Integrator K. Andrew Edmonds, James Blustein and Don Turnbull Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The Next Big Thing is being grown organically, cultivated by software developers and pruned by personal Weblog publishers. The rising Weblogging space of the Internet is looking more like traditional hypertext than the Web of the 1990s. The ways in which Weblogging has evolved beyond the previous limitations of the Web as hypertext, and the ways Weblogging is evolving towards common-use hypertext destined to play a critical role in everyday life, will be explored. We have a vision of a universal information management system built on extending the traditional hypertext framework. In our utopian future, everyone will use tools descended from today's blogs to structure, search and share personal information, as well as to participate in shared discussion. We begin by expressing a vision of common-use hypertext for information management and interpersonal communication. This vision is grounded in the rapid evolution of Weblogs and known issues in information systems and hypertext. The practical implications of who will use these systems, and how, is expanded as usage scenarios for Weblogs now and in the future. After recapping the current issues facing the Weblogging community, we look to the long-range implementation issues with optimism. Our system is forward-looking yet realistic. The activities the system will support are extrapolated from recent developments in the online community, and most of the sketches of implementation are based on current approaches. It is of more than passing interest that the features we extrapolate were all described by Nelson as early hypertext ideals. Of particular interest is that the features are now being implemented because of perceived immediate need by communities of interest. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Edmonds/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0246 2006-03-07 Ubiquitous Metainformation and the WYWWYWI Principle Joseph Catanio, Nkechi Nnadi, Li Zhang, Michael Bieber and Roberto Galnares Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Computer systems should provide what you want, when you want it (the WYWWYWI principle, pronounced "why why why"), but they frequently do not. Our research encourages a new philosophy of design based on the WYWWYWI principle, and the tools for authors to provide this easily. Comprehensive metainformation embodies the WYWWYWI principle. Metainformation includes the structural relationships, content-based relationships, user-declared link-based relationships, and metadata around an element of interest. Combined, the metainformation goes a long way towards establishing the full semantics for (the meaning of and context around) a system's elements. We take a three-pronged approach to providing metainformation on a grand scale. First, we provide a systematic methodology for systems analysts to determine the relationships around elements of interest in their information domains - relationship analysis. Relationship analysis will result in a comprehensive set of a domain's structural relationships. Second, we provide a Metainformation Engine, which automatically generates sets of structural and content-based relationships around elements of interest as links, as well as metadata within static and virtual documents. Third, we provide an infrastructure for widespread link-based services within both static and virtual documents. This approach provides the inspiration as well as a sound foundation for a ubiquitous embracing of the WYWWYWI principle in the everyday systems people use, both on the Web and beyond. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Catanio/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0247 2006-03-07 The Next Big Thing: Adaptive Web-Based Systems Paul De Bra, Lora Aroyo and Vadim Chepegin Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 At the ACM Hypertext Conference a panel discussed "The Next Big Thing Inc." in the area of hypertext and hypermedia. The Web has been the "Big Thing" during the past 10 years, but its success has also made it very difficult to find the appropriate information in an ocean of over 3 billion pages. Whereas search engines achieve incredible precision, they suffer from the same "one size fits all" approach that characterizes the Web sites they index. The paper defends the position that personalization, and in particular automatic personalization or adaptation, is the key to reach the goal of offering each individual user (or user group) the information they need. During the panel discussion there was debate about whether the user should always have access and control over the entire (hypertextual) information space. There were different views on whether the "right" to all the information is best guaranteed by offering tools that reduce the information space the user perceives so that the user can actually find and reach the information, or by offering unfiltered access to an ocean of information in which everything is available but in which perhaps nothing can be found. We argue in favor of adaptation but at the same time point out flaws in the way adaptive hypermedia has been used until now. The paper then proposes a new, modular adaptive hypermedia architecture that should lead to adaptive Web-based systems as the "Next Big Thing" indeed. In this architecture, different applications can collaborate in creating and updating a user model. Shared user model servers are not just needed for adaptive Web sites, but are also the key to enabling the development of ambient intelligence. (Many small systems then need to work together and base their actions on common knowledge about their user(s).) Sharing user models can of course cause a "big brother" problem. Legislation is already in place to protect users' privacy by placing legal limits on the kind of user modeling and sharing of user models that is allowed. The paper briefly reviews the legal issues of user modeling and adaptation in order to provide not just a future outlook based on "wild imagination" but based on a realistic vision of what will not only become technically possible but also of what will be "acceptable". http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/DeBra/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0248 2006-03-07 The Next Big Thing: From Hypermedia to Datuments Peter Murray-Rust and Henry S. Rzepa Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The concept of a datument as a hyperdocument for transmitting and preserving the complete content of a piece of scientific work is introduced. Currently the scientific publishing process loses almost all of the information environment that the author creates or possesses. It is shown that datuments can record and reproduce experiments and act as a lossless way of publishing science. This is illustrated with specific examples drawn from scientific documents and molecular science, showing how a datument containing molecular coordinates can be viewed in various styles and how typical documents deriving from organic and physical chemistry and expressed in XML can be transformed using XSLT. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Murray-Rust/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Digital libraries Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0249 2006-03-07 The Indirect Authoring Paradigm - Bringing Hypertext into the Web Hartmut Obendorf Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Building hypertext systems to provide the required functionality to write hypertexts has always been a goal of hypertext research. The parallel development of hypertext research prototypes and the World Wide Web has resulted in repeated attempts to replace the Web or offer world-wide all-purpose services to augment the Web with "missing" functionality. The paper argues that focusing on the development of tools that offer support to hypertext authors for specific tasks is a necessary first step for the introduction of sophisticated hypertext features into the Web. Following a brief history of interaction with the Web, we demonstrate why authoring tools for the Web are a critical target for efforts to extend the use of hypertexts in the Web. We introduce indirect authoring as a label for a shared characteristic of different approaches that try to reduce the complexity and cognitive overhead involved in authoring hypertext. Drawing on this analysis, we lay out some consequences for hypertext research. We provide pointers to projects that have started to experinment with indirect authoring, and list immediate research questions. Developing a diversity of task-oriented authoring tools to reduce the cognitive overhead for authoring hypertexts could change the face of the Web. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Obendorf/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0250 2006-03-07 Re-visiting the Valuing and Pricing of Digital Geographic Information Roger Longhorn and Michael Blakemore Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Geographic information (GI) comprises all information with a location attribute, e.g. addresses, administrative boundaries, and topographic data describing the natural and built environment. GI is very expensive to collect, process and maintain, yet ever easier to disseminate cheaply via Web-based services and products. Various studies from developed nations around the world show that GI plays a crucial role in underpinning whole economies and delivering efficient government, indicating that it should be used as widely as possible. Much GI is collected by local and national government for specific purposes. How such public sector information (PSI) is made more widely available for other uses and to other users, and at what price, has created heated debate and led to the adoption of diverse PSI charging regimes in different countries. The purpose of this paper is to re-examine the dogma inherent in the bi-polar viewpoints at the heart of the charging debate, from the perspective of economic reality and diverse public information policy cultures. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i02/Longhorn/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 2 oai:jodi0251 2006-03-07 Writing the Web Angelo di Iorio and Fabio Vitali Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Ted Nelson's Xanadu remains an influential example of the way a world wide hypertext system should have been, allowing free access to hypertext pages for content customization and editing. This is still impossible or unacceptably difficult on the World Wide Web. Yet, the Web cannot be replaced, given the amount of data and tools that rely on its basic protocols and languages. The vision presented here is of an evolution of the Web where, within the current framework of technologies and tools, every Web page can be edited and customized, links can be created, and collaboration can be set up. In a way, this is a vision of Xanadu coming to life again, but within the framework of Web technologies, styles and tools. It is a vision of the best possible approach to a fully writable, distributed hypertext system within the limitations of real-life protocols. This writable web, already partially available with blogs and wikis, is enhanced through the implementation of xanalogical storage to take care of individual changes to documents, and mechanisms for transclusions. IsaWiki, a client-server system being developed at the University of Bologna, is presented and shown to adhere to this vision of the writable web, and as being a first step in that direction. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/DiIorio/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0253 2006-03-07 You've Got Hypertext m.c. schraefel, Leslie Carr, David De Roure and Wendy Hall Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The paper considers possible "future everyday hypertext systems". To ground the discussion, we look first at the functional and conceptual definitions of hypertext that have evolved in the hypertext research community. We then consider these definitions against the Web, the best known current everyday hypertext, but one that the hypertext community has regarded as only partially a hypertext system at best. We propose, however, that a full, rich hypertext is alive and well and living in an equally successful everyday system: that system is email. We look at how email meets the criteria, both functionally and conceptually, for rich hypertext. We then use email-as-hypertext as our touchstone for assessing future hypertext systems. In particular, we consider the newest system on the Web event horizon, the Semantic Web, and show how the potential hypertextness of the Semantic Web has been anticipated by pre- and co-Web hypertext research systems. We consider how, if informed by the attributes of our email model, the Semantic Web may be able to break away from the limited hypertext model of the Web to become a rich, everyday hypertext system like email. We present three current hypertext research efforts that use the Semantic Web platform to show how these may be seen to embody such email-like hypertext qualities. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/schraefel/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0254 2006-03-07 Unified Hyperstructures for Bioinformatics: Escaping the Application Prison Adam Moore and Tim Brailsford Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The Next Big Thing in hypertext will be unifying different applications in bioinformatics through the ZigZag paradigm, allowing this field to live up to its promise of revolutionising the pharmaceutical industry. The paper outlines ZigZag, Ted Nelson's unique hyperstructural paradigm, and illustrates how, by examining a current bioinformatics task such as structure/binding prediction, the application of this novel paradigm has the potential to revolutionise bioinformatics completely by allowing a unified approach to a task currently fulfilled by fragmented data and applications. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Moore/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0255 2006-03-07 Towards a Semantic Web for Culture Kim H. Veltman Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Today's semantic Web deals with meaning in a very restricted sense and offers static solutions. This is adequate for many scientific, technical purposes and for business transactions requiring machine-to-machine communication, but does not answer the needs of culture. Science, technology and business are concerned primarily with the latest findings, the state of the art, i.e. the paradigm or dominant world-view of the day. In this context, history is considered non-essential because it deals with things that are out of date. By contrast, culture faces a much larger challenge, namely, to re-present changes in ways of knowing; changing meanings in different places at a given time (synchronically) and over time (diachronically). Culture is about both objects and the commentaries on them; about a cumulative body of knowledge; about collective memory and heritage. Here, history plays a central role and older does not mean less important or less relevant. Hence, a Leonardo painting that is 400 years old, or a Greek statue that is 2500 years old, typically have richer commentaries and are often more valuable than their contemporary equivalents. In this context, the science of meaning (semantics) is necessarily much more complex than semantic primitives. A semantic Web in the cultural domain must enable us to trace how meaning and knowledge organisation have evolved historically in different cultures. The paper examines five issues to address this challenge: i) different world-views (i.e. a shift from substance to function and from ontology to multiple ontologies); ii) developments in definitions and meaning; iii) distinctions between words and concepts; iv) new classes of relations; v) dynamic models of knowledge organisation. These issues reveal that historical dimensions of cultural diversity in knowledge organisation are also central to classification of biological diversity. New ways are proposed of visualizing knowledge using a time/space horizon to distinguish between universals and particulars. It is suggested that new visualization methods make possible a history of questions as well as of answers, thus enabling dynamic access to cultural and historical dimensions of knowledge. Unlike earlier media, which were limited to recording factual dimensions of collective memory, digital media enable us to explore theories, ways of perceiving, ways of knowing; to enter into other mindsets and world-views and thus to attain novel insights and new levels of tolerance. Some practical consequences are outlined. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/Veltman/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Information discovery oai:jodi0257 2006-03-07 Reengineering Thesauri for New Applications: the AGROVOC Example Dagobert Soergel, Boris Lauser, Anita Liang, Frehiwot Fisseha, Johannes Keizer and Stephen Katz Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Existing classification schemes and thesauri are lacking in well-defined semantics and structural consistency. Empowering end users in searching collections of ever increasing magnitudes with performance far exceeding plain free-text searching (as used in many Web search engines), and developing systems that not only find but also process information for action, requires far more powerful and complex knowledge organization systems (KOSs). The paper presents a conceptual structure and transition procedure to support the shift from a traditional KOS towards a full-fledged and semantically rich KOS. The proposed structure also complies with other interoperability approaches like RDFS and XML in the Web environment. AGROVOC, a traditional thesaurus developed and maintained by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, serves as a case study for exploring the reengineering of a traditional thesaurus into a fully-fledged ontology. We start the process of developing an inventory of specific relationship types with well-defined semantics for the agricultural domain and explore the rules-as-you-go approach to streamlining the reengineering process. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/Soergel/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0263 2006-03-07 Building Semantic Tools for Concept-based Learning Spaces: Knowledge Bases of Strongly-Structured Models for Scientific Concepts in Advanced Digital Libraries Terence R. Smith, Marcia L. Zeng and the ADEPT Project Team Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Applying conventional principles of knowledge organization, representation, and other semantic tools, we have constructed a model for scientific concepts and employed knowledge bases and visualization tools to represent knowledge concerning scientific concepts. Strongly-structured models, such as the integration of a taxonomy (or thesaurus) with metadata (or attribute-value pairs) and domain-specific markup languages, as well as specialized models for learning scientific concepts, focus on such attributes as objective representations, operational semantics, use, and interrelationships of concepts. All of these play important roles in constructing representations of knowledge in most domains of science. Instructional activities for undergraduate teaching and learning are greatly facilitated with the use of such integrated semantic tools. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/Smith/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0265 2006-03-07 KOS at your Service: Programmatic Access to Knowledge Organisation Systems Ceri Binding and Douglas Tudhope Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The lack of standardised access and interchange formats for knowledge organisation systems (KOS) are a barrier to their interoperability and wider use in automated Web and retrieval applications. Programmatic access to thesaurus (and other types of KOS) resources requires a commonly agreed distributed service protocol, building on lower-level standards, such as Web services. This paper reflects on our experiences in building a Web demonstrator of some novel thesaurus browsing and search tools, developed as part of a research project on the role of the thesaurus in controlled vocabulary retrieval applications. The Web system provides dynamically generated interface components for finding terms and browsing the thesaurus, building a query and returning ranked results using term expansion from a collections database. We designed a custom application programming interface of lower-level thesaurus functions to support the various user interface requirements of the application demonstrator. Based on our experience with developing the system, we review the literature on protocols for distributed access to thesauri and offer suggestions for further development of thesaurus service protocols. The FACET project, its semantic expansion and ranked result, multi-concept matching capabilities are briefly outlined. We provide a detailed description of key elements of the Web demonstrator and their rationale, together with a discussion of the data elements required by the different interface components. Existing proposals (Ceres, Zthes and ADL) for thesaurus service protocols are reviewed. The paper concludes by reflecting on lessons from constructing the Web demonstrator and implications for separating the service protocol from the interface. We argue that basing distributed protocol services on the atomic elements of thesaurus data structures and standard relationships is not necessarily the best approach. Client interfaces with similar components to the Web demonstrator require a service-oriented approach, with base services that group primitive KOS data elements (via their relationships) into composites. This leads to a proposal for a novel, unified semantic expansion service, which can be used both for specifying composite display formats and for query expansion services. Thesaurus (KOS) representations and service protocols for retrieval are closely linked. A service protocol should be explicitly expressed in terms of a well defined but extensible set of KOS data elements and relationships. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/Binding/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Information discovery oai:jodi0268 2006-03-07 How IT Mediates Organizations: Enron and the California Energy Crisis Hamid R. Ekbia Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Market activity, understood as the outcome of arms-length interactions among calculative agents, often involves asymmetries due to the capability of some agents to impose events, actions, and relations that others have to take into account. Information and communication technologies are playing an increasingly significant role in amplifying such capability, and to explain this role we need frameworks that take agents as entangled within the web of relations and connections that make it possible for them to mobilize technologies along with other allies such as people and organizations. Actor-network theory (ANT) is such a framework. The paper applies ANT to the study of Enron's involvement in California's energy market. It will show, from a social-informatics perspective, how technology was variously used, both as an intra- and extra-organizational device, to proliferate links, to enroll allies, to make image, and to amplify Enron's role in the energy market. In short, the paper will argue that IT mediated Enron in more than one way. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/Ekbia/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences oai:jodi0269 2006-03-07 ICT and the Deregulation of the Electric Power Industry: A Story of an Architect's New Tool Robb Klashner Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 Deregulation of electric power industry in the USA is an effort by the Federal and State governments to exercise power through the control of mission-critical infrastructure. This research asserts that information and communication technology (ICT) was necessary for this deregulatory effort, but ICT by itself is not sufficient to assure the success of deregulation. Using metaphors adopted from Kling and Scacchi's "web of computing", the paper shows how regulators attempted to change the social fabric in the electric power industry by using ICT to alter a complicated set of interdependencies and complementarities. Given the social and infrastructural nature of the research, web models are an effective mechanism to understand these complex relationships. In the paper, the basic web model is extended with architectural aspects to draw out the original connections with "urban infrastructure" and architecture. Ethnographic methods were used to gain a deep understanding of the ecology of the electric power industry. Data were collected over a nine-month period at a large utility's grid dispatch control center because these centers were the primary focal point of deregulatory efforts. Essentially, the paper is another data point indicating rational models are of little value outside tightly controlled circumstances. The paper's primary contribution, however, is intended for policy-makers changing ICT designs at an architectural level using regulatory mechanisms, and for ICT analysts who must map the resulting complex of ecological interrelationships into an integrated design. The resulting integrated ICT infrastructure is used to run the electric power infrastructure that information societies depend on in the most intimate way on a daily basis. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/Klashner/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences oai:jodi0270 2006-03-07 How Oke-Ogun Crosses the Digital Divide: Study of a Nigerian Rural Development Project Pamela McLean and Susan Johnson Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The dominant paradigm of information and communication technologies (ICTs) as an enabling force for socioeconomic progress informs most worldwide development projects and frames much of the literature that surrounds them. What is often missing in these accounts is the human factor; the people that make the technology work. This account of the history of the Oke-Ogun Community Development Network in rural Nigeria demonstrates how ICTs do not just "come" to a rural population, but are introduced and, with a great deal of work, are adapted in specific situations. The barriers and the work-arounds that are adopted to overcome infrastructural and cultural barriers to ICT and digital information use are recounted, and the full articulation of just what it takes to get - and keep - information flowing is revealed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/McLean/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences oai:jodi0271 2006-03-07 Ambient Intelligence: Changing Forms of Human-Computer Interaction and their Social Implications Mahesh S. Raisinghani, Ally Benoit, Jianchun Ding, Maria Gomez, Kanak Gupta, Victor Gusila, Daniel Power and Oliver Schmedding Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Ambient intelligence appears poised to cause remarkable changes in the way people live. With digital information, the ease of interaction between humans and computers can be greatly increased by broadening the interface media available and allowing for mobile and portable communication free of inhibiting wires and stationary units. Additionally, some forms of ambient intelligence allow computers to adapt to their user's preferences. The result of ambient intelligence is ultimately a more empowered computer with the benefits of added convenience, time and cost savings, and possibilities for increased safety, security, and entertainment. This technology has the potential to significantly impact business and government processes, as well as private life. The paper describes developments to date in ambient intelligence and its closely related counterpart, ubiquitous computing and communication. It discusses the driving forces behind this digital information technology, describes the equipment and devices involved, the obstacles to implementing ambient intelligence on a large scale in real-world scenarios, and considers the future outlook. The authors believe that the introduction of this digital information technology will have wide-ranging implications, which will for the most part be beneficial and valuable. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/Raisinghani/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences oai:jodi0272 2006-03-07 Vocabulary Mapping for Terminology Services Diane Vizine-Goetz, Carol Hickey, Andrew Houghton and Roger Thompson Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The paper describes a project to add value to controlled vocabularies by making inter-vocabulary associations. A methodology for mapping terms from one vocabulary to another is presented in the form of a case study applying the approach to the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) Thesaurus and the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH). Our approach to mapping involves encoding vocabularies according to Machine-Readable Cataloging (MARC) standards, machine matching of vocabulary terms, and categorizing candidate mappings by likelihood of valid mapping. Mapping data is then stored as machine links. Vocabularies with associations to other schemes will be a key component of Web-based terminology services. The paper briefly describes how the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) is used to provide access to a vocabulary with mappings. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/Vizine-Goetz/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0274 2006-03-07 Employee Resistance to Digital Information and Information Technology Change in a Social Service Agency: A Membership Category Approach Kathryn R. Stam, Jeffrey M. Stanton and Indira R. Guzman Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Responding to new government regulations about reporting data, a social service agency decided to require caseworkers to use laptop computers extensively, taking these devices with them on calls to clients. The resistance of caseworkers to this mandate and this change provided an opportunity to examine the phenomena of technology resistance. Initially rooting the study in known models for examining technology resistance, researchers found the need to expand upon these models to acknowledge other social aspects, as well as individual aspects to alterations in work behavior. Perceiving that professional identity was at issue, the study employed concepts from Kling's social aspects of computing and Schein's career anchor theory, and used qualitative methods including an adaptation of Sacks's membership category analysis method from the field of ethnomethodology that led to insights about the underlying causes of IT resistance among social service workers. The originality of this micro-level approach lies in its ability to explore moral aspects of professional and personal identity. The approach revealed, in this situation, that workers' resistance was based particularly on a local history of organizational dysfunction in addition to elements such as performance and effort expectancy, attitudes, and anxiety that is typically discussed in the information technology acceptance literature. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/Stam/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences technology acceptance, resistance, information technology change, ethnomethodology, membership categorization analysis, professional identity, social service agencies, employees oai:jodi0276 2006-03-07 A Text Categorization Technique based on a Numerical Conversion of a Symbolic Expression and an Onion Layers Algorithm Marios Poulos, Sozon Papavlasopoulos and Vasilios Chrissikopoulos Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The dramatic increase in the amount of content available in digital forms gives rise to large-scale digital libraries, targeted at millions of users. As a result, it has become a necessary to categorize large texts (documents). The paper develops a novel method where text categorization is achieved via a reduction in the original data information using numerical conversion of a symbolic expression and an onion layers algorithm. Three different semantic categories were considered and five texts selected from each category for submission to a text categorization procedure using the proposed method. The results and the statistical evaluation of this procedure showed that the proposed method may be characterized as highly accurate for text categorization purposes. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i01/Poulos/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 1 Digital libraries Information discovery text categorization, onion algorithm, computational geometry oai:jodi0278 2006-03-07 Critical Feature Method - A Lightweight Web Maintenance Methodology for SMEs Xiaoying Kong, Li Liu and David Lowe Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Security threats, dynamic business environments and the ambiguous multi-jurisdictional arrangements governing Internet businesses often impose urgent change demands on businesses operating on the Internet - demands which are not well handled by existing Web development approaches. The paper proposes a lightweight Web maintenance methodology for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) which is designed to effectively handle urgent change requests such as emergency situations that are common to Web systems. The methodology involved analysing the Web maintenance states and classifying these into three distinct states. The proposed process can be integrated with the normal evolution of Web systems. The methodology is underpinned by: a set of core values that emphasise collaboration between chief developer and the business executives; minimal feedback loops; close involvement of business executives; and rapid design focusing on identified critical features. Two rapid prototyping approaches are proposed as part of the methodology. The Critical Feature Matrix and Normal Feature Matrix are introduced to replace the onerous conventional documentation. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/Kong/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Information management oai:jodi0280 2006-03-07 AriadneTool: A Design Toolkit for Hypermedia Applications Susana Montero, Paloma Díaz, Juan Manuel Dodero and Ignacio Aedo Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The increasing size and complexity of hypermedia and Web applications puts stress on the need for using design models and methods whenever quality, usability, maintainability or reusability are critical. Moreover, to make the tasks of developers and designers more straightforward and effective, such models and methods should be supported by software tools providing explicit guidance during the development process as well as fast-prototyping. The paper introduces a design environment called AriadneTool that assumes the Ariadne Development Method (ADM). ADM proposes a systematic, iterative and user-centered approach to develop hypermedia and Web applications that deals with six design perspectives in an integrated way: navigation, presentation, structure, behavior, processes and access. The AriadneTool toolkit automates the ADM development process, offering interfaces to create the different products of the method. It also incorporates the use of ontologies to facilitate semantic support that allows for checking the consistency of modelling and for improving the users' understanding of the method. Once the designer has created the specifications of the system, the toolkit makes it possible to generate documentation concerning the system design, to validate the different products or to produce HTML, XML, SMIL and RDF implementation templates automatically. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/Montero/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Hypermedia systems Information management oai:jodi0281 2006-03-07 The PlumbingXJ Approach for Fast Prototyping of Web Applications Antonio Navarro, Baltasar Fernández-Manjón, Alfredo Fernández-Valmayor and José Luis Sierra Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The paper presents the PlumbingXJ approach for fast prototyping of hypermedia Web applications. PlumbingXJ is a process model driven by the use of the hypermedia-oriented model Pipe. Pipe is a formalised graphical notation that splits the characterisation of hypermedia applications into two parts: the contents graph and the navigational schema. The contents graph is focused on the contents of the application and their semantic relationships. The navigational schema is focused on the characterisation of the graphical user interface, and the navigational relationships among the elements of this user interface. Both components are related with the canalisation functions that describe the navigational interpretation of the contents and relationships in the user interface. In addition, Pipe presents a default browsing semantics that describes the behaviour of the application after an anchor has been selected. The use of the Pipe model at the conceptualisation stage of a well-known process model produces the Plumbing process model. Our approach uses a specialised Plumbing process model using XML and Java to materialize the Pipe structures at the prototyping stage, obtaining another process model called PlumbingXJ. The paper describes the graphical notation associated with Pipe, the Plumbing process model, and how the use of XML and Java at the conceptualisation stage in PlumbingXJ produces a viable approach for fast prototyping of Web applications. The XML and Java techniques are compared with several markup technologies available for the development of hypermedia and Web applications. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/Navarro/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Hypermedia systems Information management hypermedia, Web, hypermedia oriented model, process model, prototyping, XML, Java oai:jodi0282 2006-03-07 Managing Content with Automatic Document Classification Rafael A. Calvo, Jae-Moon Lee and Xiaobo Li Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 News articles and Web directories represent some of the most popular and commonly accessed content on the Web. Information designers normally define categories that model these knowledge domains (i.e. news topics or Web categories) and domain experts assign documents to these categories. The paper describes how machine learning and automatic document classification techniques can be used for managing large numbers of news articles, or Web page descriptions, lightening the load on domain experts. The paper uses two datasets, one with with more than 800,000 Reuters news stories and another with over 41,000 Web sites, and classifies them using a Naïve Bayes algorithm, into predefined categories. We discuss the different parameters and design decisions that normally appear when building automatic classifiers, including, stemming, stop-words, thresholding, amount of data and approaches for improving performance using the structure in XML documents. The methodology developed would enable Web based applications or workflow systems to manage information more efficiently, i.e. by assigning documents to topics automatically or assisting humans in the process of doing so. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/Calvo/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Information discovery Information management oai:jodi0283 2006-03-07 WIED: A Web Modelling Language for Modelling Architectural-Level Information Flows Rachatrin Tongrungrojana and David Lowe Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The ability to reliably and consistently develop systems that utilise Internet and Web technologies has become increasingly important. These systems are typically both functionally complex and information-rich, and have a number of unique characteristics that should imply specific changes to the development processes, methods and models that are adopted. One aspect that has received increasing attention is information modelling for these applications, particularly with respect to aspects such as navigation models and their relationships to the underlying content. These models have typically focussed on modelling at a relatively low-level, however, and have failed to address higher-level aspects, such as architectural and even business process modelling. The paper introduces a formal information modelling set which can be considered as a companion to to an existing modelling language - WebML - that facilitates information modelling at this higher level of abstraction. We argue that this modelling approach will provide a clearer connection between an understanding of business models and processes, and the lower-level designs typically represented in existing models. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/Tongrungrojana/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Information management oai:jodi0286 2006-03-07 New Applications of Knowledge Organization Systems: introduction to a special issue Douglas Tudhope and Traugott Koch Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i04/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 4 Information discovery oai:jodi0290 2006-03-07 Experiences of Educators Using a Portal of Aggregated Metadata Sarah L. Shreeves and Christine M. Kirkham Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Open Archives Initiative Metadata Harvesting Project sought to test the viability of a search portal containing aggregated metadata for cultural heritage resources harvested using the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH). Metadata was collected from 39 providers, including museums, archives, libraries, historical societies, consortiums, and digital libraries. Some resources existed in digital formats, such as .JPG images. Other resources were analog objects and were represented digitally through the metadata. The paper documents a pilot user test with a small group of K-12 teachers-in-training. The users were asked to use the portal to locate primary source materials for use in the classroom. The results highlight the challenges posed by aggregations of heterogeneous metadata for both users and service providers. Areas for further investigation and approaches for more in-depth studies are suggested. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/Shreeves/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0291 2006-03-07 The Use of Visual Artifacts in the User-Informed Development of an Educational Digital Library Collection Michael Khoo Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Digital libraries are complex sociotechnical artifacts. As such they will be understood and treated in different ways by the different groups that interact with them. The different understandings of these groups will be rooted in the differing tacit, underlying 'technological frames' that they will have of digital libraries as technologies. In cases where developers and users are both involved in the development of digital library collections, and where the frames of developers and users differ significantly, this can result in difficulties in the collection development process. It is important, therefore, to acknowledge that such differences can exist between developers and users, and to find ways to identify, describe, and mediate them. The paper describes the case of the Digital Water Education Library (DWEL). DWEL was an example of community-led collections development, in which users - in this case educators - were involved in the design and development of its collection. An ethnographic and communications-based analysis of DWEL's organizational communication revealed the existence of different technological frames among the developers and the users of DWEL, differences which impeded the progress of the project. These differences were exacerbated by the project's distributed organizational structure and reliance on network communication technologies for the bulk of its organizational communication. The paper describes how these differences were mediated, in part through the sharing of 'boundary objects' - graphic representations of the project's structures and processes - among the developers and users, and how these representations subsequently informed the development of an online tool that represented some of the developers' knowledge to the users. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/Khoo/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries anthropology, boundary objects, case study, digital libraries, ethnography, organizational communication oai:jodi0293 2006-03-07 MERLOT: A Model for User Involvement in Digital Library Design and Implementation Flora McMartin Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 MERLOT is an international consortium comprised of over 20 institutions and systems of higher education and industry partners who collaborate to produce a premier online community where faculty, staff, and students from around the world share online learning materials and pedagogy. MERLOT's mission is to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning by expanding the quantity and quality of peer-reviewed online learning materials that can be easily incorporated into faculty-designed courses. Created in 1997 by the California State University, in 1999 MERLOT expanded by inviting other partners to participate in creating and implementing MERLOT as a free, Web-based resource for higher education. MERLOT emphasizes both the quality and review of materials as well as services for the broad community it serves. MERLOT's partners are integral to the functioning of MERLOT and its services, from initial design and testing to deployment and management. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/McMartin/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0295 2006-03-07 Implementation Challenges Associated with Developing a Web-based E-notebook - Addendum on Related Work Yolanda Jacobs Reimer and Sarah A. Douglas Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v04/i03/JacobsReimer/addendum/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 4 Number 3 Usability of digital information oai:jodi0297 2006-03-07 MatDL: Integrating Digital Libraries into Scientific Practice Laura M. Bartolo, Cathy S. Lowe, Louis Z. Feng and Brook Patten Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Digital repositories can be catalysts for new knowledge by providing information space and tools to facilitate the work of students, educators, or scientists. The NSF NSDL Materials Digital Library (MatDL) is adapting existing open source "tools", such as an image gallery and a version control system, to meet the needs of users within the materials science community. The tools are being modified to make submission to MatDL an easy step within a user's existing workflow and to avoid redundant effort. These satellite services provided by MatDL are intended to become an integral part of the user's "laboratory or workspace". The paper investigates whether digital repositories can expand their communities and collections by building tools that integrate a digital repository into researchers' workspaces. In the long term, it is anticipated that making submissions to MatDL an easy part of users' regular workflow will increase the likelihood that users will submit resources to the repository. Ultimately, the goal of integrating a repository into users' workspaces is to enhance the impact between research and education. Initial experience of providing these tools and responding to user feedback through MatDL is discussed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/Bartolo/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries materials science, digital libraries, user workflow, open source tools, participant involvement oai:jodi0298 2006-03-07 A Cosmology for a Different Computer Universe: Data Model, Mechanisms, Virtual Machine and Visualization Infrastructure Theodor Holm Nelson Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The computing world is based on one principal system of conventions -- the simulation of hierarchy and the simulation of paper. The article introduces an entirely different system of conventions for data and computing. zzstructure is a generalized representation for all data and a new set of mechanisms for all computing. The article provides a reference description of zzstructure and what we hope to build on it. From orthogonally connected data items (zzcells) and untyped connections (zzlinks), we build a cross-connected fabric of data (zzstructure) that is visualizable, interactive, and programmable. zzstructure does not have a canonical string representation, as is usual. It is essentially spatial. It is based on criss-crossed lists of cells which are assigned to dimensions. Along these dimensions the cells are viewable, traversible, and subject to operations. This leads to programming mechanisms built on this fabric; a virtual interactive machine (zzvim) built on these mechanisms; new visualization techniques built on the data fabric and mechanisms; and proposed new formats for the general representation of documents and arbitrary structure -- perhaps less biased than XML. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/Nelson/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0303 2006-03-07 Fault-tolerant Fulltext Search for Large Multilingual Scientific Text Corpora Wolfram M. Esser Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 In the work reported here, we present a new way of performing fault-tolerant fulltext retrieval on large text corpora, such as scientific encyclopedias. The weighted pattern morphing (WPM) technique introduced in this paper overcomes disadvantages of both the popular edit distance measure and the Soundex code approaches, yet keeping their flexibility. This algorithm handles phonetic similarities; common typing errors such as omission or transposition of letters, and inconsistent usage of abbreviations and hyphenation. After showing how WPM can be implemented efficiently, we present a novel method of how the weights of the internal penalty matrix can be automatically adjusted for even better results. Though the described technique can be applied without prior knowledge of actual user patterns, re-examination with a large number of online-user's patterns proves the portability of this fine-tuning approach. We further show how shifting the penalty matrix from one language to another can be accomplished. The described WPM technique is integrated into a large commercial pharmaceutical encyclopedia CDROM, an online dermatological encyclopedia, and an online-reference encyclopedia of parasitology research, thus also proving its "road capability". http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i01/Esser/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 1 Digital libraries Information discovery oai:jodi0304 2006-03-07 The Power of Partnering: The Cooperative Creation of Digital Collections Kathleen Foulke, Nancy Milnor, Melissa Watterworth and Thomas Wilsted Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 The use of consortia and partnerships has increased significantly over the past decade as a result of the increasing complexity of developing projects in a digital world. Funding agencies have acknowledged this by directing support to multi-institutional projects. Some agencies have gone so far as to establish categories that require multi-institutional applicants. Partnerships of disparate institutions provide opportunities for learning and growth. The paper describes one such partnership, Connecticut History Online, and investigates the value and significance that partnering plays in creating a successful digital product. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/Foulke/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0305 2006-03-07 Designing Adaptable Learning Resources with Learning Object Patterns Ray Jones Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Constructing courses of study from learning objects is an attractive proposition, but for this to be feasible learning objects need to be designed to be reusable. While considerable work has been done in producing technical standards to promote compatibility in learning objects, more work is required in designing learning objects for reuse. Aspects of cohesion, coupling and freedom from specific contexts can be used in designs to help ensure that learning objects are reusable, and these aspects can be captured as design patterns that may be employed to produce reusable designs for learning objects. However, the requirements for reusability may be in conflict with those for effective learning so the patterns used must ensure that the learning objects constructed are adaptable to different contexts and remain pedagogically sound within those contexts. The paper shows how patterns can be used to create learning resources that are both reusable and adaptable. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i01/Jones/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 1 Information management oai:jodi0308 2006-03-07 Supporting Community Inquiry with Digital Resources Ann Peterson Bishop, Bertram C. Bruce, Karen J. Lunsford, M. Cameron Jones, Muzhgan Nazarova, David Linderman, Mihye Won, P. Bryan Heidorn, Rajeev Ramprakash and André Brock Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Today there are a number of fields that address the need to develop better means of employing information and communication technologies (ICTs) to help communities achieve their goals. Digital infrastructure and repositories are widely created to support the activities of educational, workplace, and scientific communities, as well as virtual communities of interest that may center on topics as diverse as entertainment, crisis management, and health. However, the research and development of ICTs faces numerous challenges. Community inquiry theory can help address some of these challenges. The Inquiry Page project supports a set of ICTs that have been developed by a community of inquiry in order to support communities of inquiry. The paper presents the theory of community inquiry and illustrates how inquiry theory can influence the research and development of ICTs and their adoption and use within real communities. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/Bishop/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0309 2006-03-07 Digital Text Cycles: From Medieval Manuscripts to Modern Markup Terje Hillesund Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 The paper argues that the current implementation of digital publishing is a minor step in a long development of digital text cycles. Rather than being a revolution, the digital transformation of text is an evolutionary process heavily influenced by social and cultural factors. The paper introduces the concept of a "text cycle". An examination of basic features of paper-based text cycles and features of digital text cycles demonstrates that digital technology has a potential for change that far exceeds that of the "Gutenberg revolution". However, by applying a historical perspective, I will try to show how the deep and enduring cultural heritage of print is impeding the radical potential of digital texts. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i01/Hillesund/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 1 Social consequences oai:jodi0310 2006-03-07 Future Visions of Common-Use Hypertext: introduction to a special issue Helen Ashman and Adam Moore Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i01/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 1 Hypermedia systems oai:jodi0312 2006-03-07 Information Design Models and Processes: introduction to a special issue David Lowe Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i02/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 2 Information management oai:jodi0313 2006-03-07 Capturing Content for Virtual Museums: from Pieces to Exhibits Bradley Hemminger, Gerald Bolas and Doug Schiff Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 Virtual museums provide ways to capture the content of a real museum in a digital (electronic) form and make this digital form more universally available. This paper describes a novel method for digitally recording not only individual museum pieces, but entire museum exhibits (consisting of one or more rooms or spaces). The methodology allows anyone with access to the Internet or a PC to experience anywhere, anytime, any part of the museum's collection or exhibits (past, present and future). Users can explore the museum exhibits in a virtual reality that is both spatially accurate and visually compelling. All objects and 3D scenes are seen in precise full color photographic quality detail. The scene and objects are polygonal meshes representing the surfaces of objects. This permits making measurements directly on the scene with millimeter precision. The methodology, its application to capturing museum exhibits, and examples of exhibits recorded using this technique are described. This work is part of the Virseum project (http://ils.unc.edu/bmh/virseum) at the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC). In addition to the capture of items and exhibits for virtual access, this methodology opens the door for many other applications, including capturing a record of an exhibit for archival purposes and for communication between curators, and for the design of virtual (never physically implemented) exhibits and pieces based on actual pieces and settings. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i01/Hemminger/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 1 Digital libraries oai:jodi0315 2006-03-07 Digital Libraries and User Needs: Negotiating the Future Anita Coleman and Tamara Sumner Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i03/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0322 2006-03-07 Social Aspects of Digital Information in Perspective: introduction to a special issue Roberta Lamb and Susan Johnson Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v05/i04/editorial/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 5 Number 4 Social consequences oai:jodi0324 2006-03-07 Searching and Browsing in a Digital Library of Historical Maps and Newspapers Steve Jones, Matt Jones, Malcolm Barr and Te Taka Keegan Texas A&M University Libraries 2004 Digital libraries can empower end users through on-line provision of previously inaccessible materials, synergistic integration of related information collections, and tailoring of access mechanisms for target user groups. In this paper we describe the HistoryMap system that supports access to digitised collections of historical maps and newspapers, integrating searching and browsing between the two. We report on our solution to providing place name searching across maps that vary in accuracy, scale and orientation, and how newspaper text is dynamically reconfigured to include hyperlinks to maps containing given locations. Both the user interface and software architecture of the system are described, as are a usability study of the system and discussion sessions with target end users. Although some surface level usability problems were revealed by the study, target users of the system are enthusiastic about its potential. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i02/Jones1/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 2 Digital libraries digital libraries, historic archives, cross-collection access oai:jodi0330 2006-03-07 The Dublin Core Metadata Registry: Requirements, Implementation, and Experience Harry Wagner, Stuart Weibel Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 Metadata registries are an important digital library research area with the promise of satisfying the needs of metadata designers, practitioners, and users. This paper describes the deployment experience involving the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) metadata registry [1] and discusses the opportunities and prospects for metadata registries as part of the evolving Web-based metadata infrastructure. The motivation and architecture of the DCMI registry are discussed. Benefits and beneficiaries are described, as well as barriers to installation and adoption of metadata registry technology. In addition, prospects for further development are discussed. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i02/Wagner/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 2 Information discovery oai:jodi0332 2006-03-07 Separation of Concerns: a Web Application Architecture Framework Xiaoying Kong, Li Liu and David Lowe Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 Architecture frameworks have been extensively developed and described within the literature. These frameworks typically support and guide organisations during system planning, design, building, deployment and maintenance. Their main pupose is to provide clarity to the different modelling perspectives, abstractions, and domains of consideration within system development. In dpoing so they allow improved clarity with regard to the connections between the different models, and the selection of models tht are most likely to capture salient features of the system. In this paper we present an Architectural Framework which takes into account the specific characteristics of web systems. The framework is based around a two dimensional matrix. One dimension separates the concerns of different participants of the web system into perspectives. The second dimension classifies each perspective into development abstractions: structure (what), behaviour (how), location (where) and pattern. The framework is illustrated through examples from the development of a commercial web application. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i02/Kong/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 2 Information management oai:jodi0350 2006-03-07 Secure Embedded Data Schemes for User Adaptive Multimedia Presentation Neelu Sinha Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 In this Digital/Internet Age, digital multimedia holds an unlimited potential, and virtually all forms of media content, including books, video games, music and software are now available for digital distribution. Digital multimedia libraries, comprising a large amount of such digital media (the so-called Digital Intellectual Property), in the form of images, video, audio and graphics are rapidly growing. Also, due to the unprecedented growth of the World Wide Web, vast amounts of multimedia data is readily available leading to an explosion of multimedia and hypermedia database creation and sharing. Digital information embedding techniques for various types of media, for a variety of applications including digital libraries, museum cataloging, medical and healthcare industries, digital preservation systems, educational systems and personalization systems, are of significant interest in two areas. Firstly, these are useful for the realization of efficient database indexing schemes and customization, which in turn lead to efficient tools for the organization, retrieval, adaptive presentation, and distribution of digital media content. Secondly, these are useful in developing tools to protect, detect and verify ownership and/or usage rights for the Digital Intellectual Property and also the tracking of these in the distribution medium. In either of these applications, information embedding schemes which allow for a detailed level of source description, and which are robust to some of the distortions encountered in the distribution medium (e.g., JPEG compression for images), are particularly attractive. This paper presents an overview of multimedia presentation adaptation through the use of robust information descriptors and a novel information embedding technique for digital images that allows for significantly higher information throughput and increased robustness compared to many of the existing techniques. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i04/Sinha1/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 4 oai:jodi0355 2006-03-07 Metadata and Data Quality Problems in the Digital Library Jeffrey Beall Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 This paper describes the main types of data quality errors that occur in digital libraries, both in full-text objects and in metadata. Studying these errors is important because they can block access to online documents and because digital libraries should eliminate errors where possible. Some types of common errors include typographical errors, scanning and data conversion errors, and find and replace errors. Errors in metadata can also hinder access in digital libraries. The paper also discusses the responsibility for errors in digital documents and offers suggestions for managing digital library data quality. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i03/Beall/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 3 Digital libraries oai:jodi0360 2006-03-07 A Model-driven Method for the Design and Deployment of Web-based Document Management Systems Federica Paganelli and Maria Chiara Pettenati Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 Most existing Document Management Systems (DMSs) are designed according to an approach which is technology-driven rather than based on standard methodologies. Related shortcomings are vendor dependence, expensive maintenance and poor interoperability. Information model-driven methodologies could help DMS designers to solve these issues. As a matter of fact, information models can provide a technology-independent abstract representation of information systems' functionalities. Based on standard formalisms, they are useful to designers to describe the managed domain and to developers to understand and develop the modeled entities according to a standard methodological approach. However, while information models are commonly used by software designers for the design of information systems, such as databases and digital libraries, their use in DMS design is still in its infancy. This paper provides a contribution in this research area proposing a method for Web-based DMS design based on an information model, named Document Management and Sharing information Model (DMSM). We have also developed a set of tools, the DMSM Framework, that provides designers with DMS design and deployment facilities. Based on this instrumental support, the proposed method facilitates the design and fast prototyping of DMSs, dealing with requirements of open standard compliance, cost effectiveness and uniform access to heterogeneous data sources. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i03/Paganelli/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 3 Information management oai:jodi0362 2006-03-07 The INVENT framework: Examining the role of information visualization in the reconceptualization of digital libraries Karl V. Fast and Kamran Sedig Texas A&M University Libraries 2005 The objective of this paper is to show how information visualization can play an important and catalytic role in the reconceptualization of digital libraries as interactive knowledge environments. Information visualization has long been described as a beneficial and promising technology for digital libraries. Today, however, few digital libraries rely on information visualization concepts and techniques. This is because the research agenda has been dominated by first-generation challenges, such as digitization, organization, preservation, and facilitating access through conventional search and browse interfaces. As a result, digital libraries are still conceptualized as curated, networked, and searchable document repositories. But new research directions are reconceptualizing them as interactive knowledge environments. This paper re-examines the role of information visualization in this reconceptualization. It introduces a new conceptual framework for digital libraries called INVENT: INteractive Visual ENironmenTs. The INVENT framework emphasizes the importance of rich interaction with representations of information, especially visual representations, for supporting cognitive and knowledge work activities. There are six elements in the framework: digital objects, representations, activities, interactions, actors, and ecologies. This paper suggests that these elements should be conceptual cornerstones in the knowledge environment conceptualization of digital libraries. http://jodi.tamu.edu/Articles/v06/i03/Fast/ Published in Journal of Digital Information Volume 6 Number 3 Digital libraries