Highlights from Mashup the Library

Mashup the Library! Highlights from the CARL IT Interest Group Workshop

The theme for the 4th Annual CARL Information Technology Interest Group Workshop, held on July 25, 2008, was Mashup the Library.

This workshop focused on exploring technology trends that have us remixing library and information resources in new and exciting ways. Drawing over 70 attendees from around the Bay Area, the day offered a full spectrum of speakers and demonstrations, and even a tour of the newly opened and innovative Harrington Learning Commons, Sobrato Technology Center and Orradre Library at Santa Clara University. This year’s workshop was held in their very elegant St. Clare Room.

First up was Rachel Smith, Vice President of NMC Services for the New Media Consortium, who directs the creation of the annual Horizon Report (a collaborative project of the NMC and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative). The Horizon Report identifies and describes emerging technologies that are likely to have a large impact on teaching and learning that goes on in higher education. Attendees enjoyed her approachable and energizing introduction to the six emerging technologies that have been identified in the 2008 edition of the report. Using a VUVOX collage, rather than traditional Microsoft PowerPoint, Rachel walked through this year’s forecast which included descriptions and applications of Grassroots Video , Collaborative Web, Data Mashups, Collected Intelligence, and Social Operating Systems.

Rachel also described the process for distilling the viewpoints of over 175 international members of the Horizon Report advisory board . There are no face-to-face meetings, all work is done online and documented in a wiki. View Rachel’s VUVOX collage, including links to examples of technology applications.

Next, Dr. Raymond Yee, a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s School of Information where he teaches the course "Mixing and Remixing Information" and author of Pro Web 2.0 Mashups: Remixing Data and Web Services , focused attendees on what mashup technology is and how it works. Using examples from Google Maps and the Cragislist website, Raymond demonstrated how Housing Maps creates a visual display of current home rental opportunities in various Bay Area locations. Other examples demonstrated were the LibraryLookup Project by John Ludel and Geotagging in Flickr using Google Maps. Additionally, Raymond explained how to create a mashup using Yahoo Pipes. His example used the New York Times World Section and Google Maps. Google Maps is a popular mashup visual resource. In fact, Google embraced this trend and released an API (application programming interface) that formalizes how people can use Google Maps for all sorts of mashups. Learn more about the work of Raymond Yee at his blog Data Unbound.

In the afternoon, attendees immersed themselves into even more examples and demonstrations of mashup technology. Jill Tinsley, a recent MLIS graduate from the University of Arizona, provided a survey of visual searching resources, including oSkope Visual Search, Aquabrowser, WebBrain, Tafiti, Viewzi, and SearchMe, to name a few.

This year’s Cool Tools! demonstrations included three exciting tools that utilized mashups and web 2.0 technologies. Virtual Shelf was demonstrated by UC Berkeley School of Information 2nd year Masters students Devin Blong & Jonathan Breitbart. This student project created for the Open Library Project (Internet Archive) allows users to visually explore online print collections. Harrison Dekker, Data Services Librarian at UC Berkeley’s Doe/Moffitt Library, got playful with Google’s versitile visualization tools for numeric data available in their web-based spreadsheet application. And Laura Moody, Music Librarian and CARL member from San Francisco State University, provided a tour of LibGuides, a new tool from Springshare that helps libraries use web 2.0 technology to organize and distribute subject and research guide resources (example from SFSU).

And if that wasn’t enough of a visual and informative feast, the day was capped off with an introduction and tour of the Harrington Learning Commons, Sobrato Technology Center and Orradre Library. SCU University Librarian Liz Salzer, our workshop host, described the opening of their new facility, and tour guides offered attendees a glimpse of the building, which includes their Automatic Retrieval System (ARS), reconfigurable collaborative spaces, casual lounge seating, video editing suites, educational experimentation rooms, a café, and much more.

This year’s workshop attendees carried away ideas and, hopefully, a new understanding of what mashup technology can do, and is already doing, for libraries.

Special thanks goes to the dedicated CARL members who help make these workshops happen:

Mari Miller, the original organizer of this IG who provided leadership for previous workshops of the past 3 years. Mari has finally received a break from being chair of this group, but continues to provide valuable program planning contributions. Thank you Susan Boyd, who was indispensable as our location coordinator in charge of all venue arrangements and making it possible for our being at the beautiful St. Clare Room.

Thanks to our program planners for handling all the details, big and small: Pam Howard, Ya Wang, Carol Pearce, Jackie Siminitus, John Wenzler , Christine Holmes, and Rob Boyd.

Sheila Cunningham
Ann Hubble
Co-Chairs, 2007-2008
CARL North IT Interest Group

Photos/Highlights from Mash Up the Library workshop

Check out photos taken during the recently held Mashup the Library workshop presented by the CARL North IT Interest Group. The 2CoolTools blog has a few posts about the event as does Paul Signorelli at the InfoPeople Infoblog.

Register for the CARL North IT workshop

CARL North IT Interest Group presents:

Mashup the Library: A Workshop on Mashup Technology and the Art of Remixing Library and Information Resources

When:
July 25, 2008
8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Location:
The NEW Harrington Learning Commons, Sobrato Technology Center and Orradre Library
St. Clare Room, Santa Clara University
Learn more about the center and view some photos taken during opening ceremony.

Tentative Schedule:

8:30-9:00: Morning Refreshments
9:00-10:30: 2008 Horizon Report: Key Emerging Technologies, Rachel Smith
10:30-10:45: Break
10:45-12:00: Web 2.0 Mashups: Making the Web Your Own, Raymond Yee
12:00-1:00: Lunch outside the Adobe Lodge
1:00-2:00 Information Visualization using Mash- ups and Web 2.0 Tools, Jill Tinsley
2:00-2:15: Break
2:15-3:15 "Cool Tools!" Demonstrations
3:15-4:00: Tours

Program:

Join us for a day of engaging speakers and cool demonstrations of mashups and information visualizations.

The 2008 Horizon Report: Key Emerging Technologies
Rachel Smith, New Media Consortium

The annual Horizon Report describes the continuing work of the New Media Consortium's Horizon Project, a research-oriented effort that seeks to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have considerable impact on teaching, learning, and creative expression
within higher education. This session will introduce the six technologies covered in the 2008 Horizon Report, the fifth in the series. Participants will explore examples in each category and
contribute to the ongoing Call to Scholarship with their own ideas and suggestions. The 2008 Horizon Report is available online at no cost.

Rachel Smith is Vice President, NMC Services for the New Media Consortium (NMC), an international consortium of more than 250 world-class universities, colleges, museums, research centers, and technology companies dedicated to using new technologies to inspire, energize, stimulate, and support learning and creative expression. She is recognized for her work in making new technologies approachable for higher education faculty and staff. She participates in the publication of the annual Horizon Report, which identifies emerging technologies that will have an impact on learning organizations.

Web 2.0 Mashups: Making the Web Your Own
Raymond Yee, Visiting Scholar, School of Information, UC Berkeley

The Web contains thousands of mashups that recombine everything including Google Maps, Flickr, Amazon.com, NASA, the New York Times, and Wikipedia with useful information about travel, finance, real estate, and more. By fusing elements from multiple web sites, mashups are often informative, useful, fun, and even transformative. This talk will show you about how to create and apply mashups to make sense of the web, especially in the context of libraries.

Raymond Yee is a data architect, consultant, trainer, and author of Pro Web 2.0 Mashups: Remixing Data and Web Services (Apress, 2008). He is currently a visiting scholar at the School of Information, UC Berkeley, where he teaches the course "Mixing and Remixing Information". Yee is also the Integration Advisor for the Zotero Project. While earning a Ph.D. in biophysics, he taught computer science, philosophy, and personal development to K-11 students in the Academic Talent Development Program on the Berkeley campus. As a software architect and developer, he focuses on developing software to support learning, teaching, scholarship, and research.

Information Visualization Using Mashups and Web 2.0 Tools
Jill Tinsley, MLIS candidate, University of Arizona

Visual searching is a new way to search existing databases. A visual search displays the information in a visual format rather than simply text-based results. This presentation will demonstrate many visual search tools available on the Internet, including mashups for
web search engines, databases, news, shopping, music, photos, social networking, and more. Included will be discussion of learning styles relating to visual searching and educational application of visual search methods.

Cool Tools! Demonstrations

Bookshelf Visualization
A mashup student project, from UC Berkeley's School of Information, creates a virtual bookshelf display of the Internet Archive's Open Source Books.
Devin Blong, MS candidate, UC Berkeley School of Information

Google Visualization Tools
New releases from Google Labs include two visualization tools - Google Charts and Spreadsheet Gadgets. Experience some applications and uses of these two new Google releases.
Harrison Dekker, Coordinator of Data Services, Doe/Moffitt
Libraries, UC Berkeley

LibGuides
LibGuides can help share library information and bring together several Web 2.0 applications into the research guide environment. The system helps librarians publish and share information online, while highlighting and promoting library resources and services to the community.
Laura Moody, Librarian, San Francisco State University

Tours!
Take a tour of Santa Clara University's new Harrington Learning Commons, Sobrato Technology Center and Orradre Library. Explore the architecture, furnishings, and state-of-the-art technology this new facility uses to remix the traditional library with a futuristic collaborative learning environment. View some photos taken during opening ceremony.

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Directions:
Driving directions and a map

Parking:
There is a $6 fee per car.

Enter Santa Clara University via the Palm Drive main entrance. Pick up a visitor parking pass at the attendant station. Be sure to let the attendant know you are coming to the CARLNIT workshop and they will direct to the 3rd floor parking area. More details about parking at SCU.

Cost:
Cost includes all-day workshop, morning refreshments and lunch

CARL Members: $50
Non Members: $65
Students: $30

Registration details:
Advance registration required by July 11, 2008.
Download and print the event flyer and registration form

Registration Questions? Contact Pam Howard, J. Paul Leonard Library, San Francisco State at 415-338-7395 or pjhoward@sfsu.edu.
No refunds after July 14, 2008
In compliance with the ADA/504 please direct your accommodation requests to Terry Hingston at(408) 554-6830, or call TTY-California Relay, at1-800-735-2929 at least 72 hours prior to the

Workshop details also at the CARL North IT Interest Group webpage.