Discovery Primo VE Committee: February 7, 2024

Discovery Primo VE Committee: February 7, 2024

Members attending: Andrew Belongea (COL), Allan Berry (UIC), Colin Koteles (COD), Matthew Short (NIU), Lindsey Skaggs (ISU), Laura Spradlin (IWU), Nathan Thebarge (TIU)

Members absent: Aimee Walker (JJC), Marlee Graser (SIUE), Jessica Gibson

Staff attending: Amy Maroso

Taking Minutes: Nathan Thebarge

Next up: Aimee Walker

  1. Review and approve previous minutes (Dec. 6, 2023)
    • Motion to approve - made by Andrew, Allan seconded
  2. Ongoing Work updates
    • Collection discovery webinar recap/comments
      • Webinar recording
      • Comments - was helpful thing to share with colleagues to get them up and running on creating collections
      • Showcase carousel - functionality is available and has begun to be deployed, a possible area for committee members to test out for future webinar. It may be covered in the CARLI office hours tomorrow. Since it was just released, more exploration is needed. Homework for committee - see how it compares to custom collections, both advantages and disadvantages.
    • Local resource types (Andrew)
      • Met with cataloging group, still ongoing work, has a better idea of the number of records needing to be addressed. On target to clean up audio and video records by the reindexing this summer.
      • Created definitions for cataloging models - spreadsheet shared.
      • Local fields (Matt/Jessica)
        • Wrote sevearl normalization rules for local fields, with the exception of media performance.
        • The Orbis Cascade consortium has posted details on their consortial local fields, helpful to build off of their work.
      • Dedup/FRBR (Jessica)
        • From Jessica’s email update:
          • Many, many fewer FRBR groups now
          • There are still at least two large FRBR groups of Bibles when searching the I-Share Union View or the “All I-Share Libraries” search slot in any institution’s Primo VE.
          • Many of these appear to be coming from local records in IZs that are not shared/linked to the NZ.  The semi-annual Primo VE reindex that was ready with the February release did not improve those at all
          • There seem to be a lot of special collections Bibles that are only in the IZs because libraries didn’t finish the work to add the Local Extensions and then reshare them back to the NZ. (This is a larger issue across I-Share with the special collections “workaround” we used at migration in 2020, not just with Bibles!)
      • Idea Exchange / “Vote stuffing” (Allan)
        • Ideas that got promoted were not those we were pushing for; those that did get promoted had
        • Ideas to prioritize:
          • Remove CDI constant expansion of results
          • Primo VE: Allow Exclusion of Institution Zone only records from Discovery Network/NZ Scope
          • Alma collections: Allow to add from network zone
        • Allan shared the graphic (text borrowed from Lindsey) to send out to encourage CARLI members to vote for ideas in Ex Libris Idea Exchange. Amy mentioned that the idea of “vote stuffing” was shared with CARLI staff who liaison with CARLI committees.
        • The idea that the library card page should list all loans is being moved from under review to planned
        • The consensus was that this looked good and Allan is going to proceed with it.
  3. New/ongoing discussion topics:
    • Search Ranking / Resource Recommendations
      • Spring webinar planning
      • Colin - at College of DuPage, over break, electronic resource team solicited input from subject specialists on 15-16 resources to add as resource recommender with key words associated. Usage from start date onward is going to be compared with previous usage to determine if it is getting used more. First phase is focused on databases and ebooks, second phase is going to focus on LibGuides and subject specialist contact. Focus is on resource recommender.
      • Allan - sent out communication to liaisons, going to meet with them later this month to pitch the idea to them. Questions - how to maintain a number of these resource recommenders. Possible idea - adding a spreadsheet to keep track of these and see what needs to be updated. Sustainability is an important consideration.
      • Laura - began testing resource recommendations, hoping to be able to link portfolio but does not seem possible. Lindsey has used custom resource type, but it becomes an issue with multiple access points with different coverages. Colin has added them using the same keywords while adding coverage dates to title in SpringShare.
      • On mobile phone, it collapses recommendations. It lists three resources across the top, probably wise to not have more than three.
      • Synonyms should be tested to make sure it is working as it should.
    • Search Ranking Configuration vs. Boosting Records in Blended Search Profiles
      • Laura - made a few adjustments to search ranking configuration to boost institution results. Blended search “local” includes network and institution zone records above CDI records. Laura has posted her notes to the committee folder. Testing demonstrated that it successfully put requestable only ebooks lower in the results and promoted IShare books. This could be a nice part of the spring webinar.
      • See previous Dec.6 meeting minutes for discussion
    • For Spring Webinar
      • Focus on three things - search ranking configuration, carousel, and resource recommender.
      • Date - mid- to late-June; committee members are going to mull over the specific date; June 25th possible date.
      • Homework - come with a snappy title for the workshop
    • Open access indicators for OA books in Primo VE -
      • Two issues - 1) How do we identify them and 2) is this something that CARLI catalogers could help with
      • Lindsey - she and her technical services team were not able to come up with a solution to this issue
      • Idea to consider, but not something we need to prioritize at this time.
      • See previous Dec. 6 meeting minutes for discussion
      • I-Share labeling - not much to do with this - question was where we needed to use IShare or could change the name. Something to consider - how to raise awareness of IShare for our students, possible idea for next year. Related idea - how to change language for things like IShare and Course Reserves.
        • See previous Dec. 6 meeting minutes for discussion
  4. New business
    • “Easy win” topic for next meeting:
    • Allan - trying to see what queries were used in searches, but results seemed suspect. Colin - having a staff-wide discussion on Primo VE analytics, will share if anything comes from that meeting. Overall, according to listservs and experience, the Primo VE analytics report results do seem to be suspect.
  5. Adjourn