Introducing MelvylT

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Introducing Melvyl-T

• Ellen Meltzer
• Cristina Campbell
• Felicia Poe
• CDL
• Spring 2003
• ellen.meltzer_at_ucop.edu

5/1/03
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Clarifying terms

• Melvyl-T is the Transition catalog T on the name
  will be removed August 1, 2003 (http//melvyl.cdli
  b.org)
• Legacy Melvyl refers to the current CAT and PE
  catalogs, to be discontinued August 1, 2003
  (http//www.dbs.cdlib.org/)

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Clarifying terms

• Legacy Telnet refers to the current version of
  the CAT and PE databases to be discontinued
  August 1, 2003
• New version of Telnet now on board at
  (telnet//melvyl.cdlib.org) and will continue
  indefinitely

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Clarifying terms

• Merging records grabbing all the records for
  the same item and bringing them into one display
  or base record
• Deduping records the process of removing
  duplicate records

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Display record

• The Display record is chosen through a very
  simple points system
• Each record in a merged group gets one point for
  every indexed heading (such as author, title, or
  subject)
• Those records with tables of contents notes (MARC
  505 fields) get an extra 3 points
• Electronic resources (856) get 5 points
• The Display record is the most complete of all of
  the records in the merged group

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Why the heck did we do this anyway?!
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Why we made the change

• Wanted to merge CAT PE
• Melvyls underlying technology was aging
• (not to mention aging programmers!)
• Many enhancements in web-based service delivery
  on the horizon
• New services can be delivered over time that
  wouldnt have been possible with legacy Melvyl

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Who advised us?

• 3 teams made up of campus librarians
• Database and Technology Team
• Education and Usability Team
• Services Team
• SOPAG advised us on policy decisions along the
  way
• Evaluation Liaisons
• Many other groups also gave specialized input

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Why were there delays in releasing the catalog?

• This was the first time Ex Libris worked on a
  project of this magnitude
• Much of the work was new development
• Logistics CDL and Data Center staff in Oakland,
  Ex Libris staff in Chicago, New York, and Israel

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Why legacy Melvyl Melvyl-T search results may
differ

• Melvyl-T has clean snapshots of holdings complete
  for all UC campuses
• Melvyl-T has complete records for all the UC
  campuses and is up-to-date for UCD UCSB
• Record loading schedules are different
• Indexing is different

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Why legacy Melvyl Melvyl-T search results may
differ

• The merging algorithm is different in the two
  catalogs
• The data is different in the two

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UCB UCLA
UCD
UCD UCLA UCSC
Display
Searching
Database Records
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Content of the catalogs is different

• CAT and PE have been combined
• Melvyl-T contains records for UC campuses plus
  California Academy of Sciences, California
  Historical Society, GTU, Hastings, LBL CRL
• CSL records will be in by 6/30/03 (monographs and
  serials)
• Melvyl-T will not include CULP and SERHOLD

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Why legacy Melvyl Melvyl-T search results may
differ--more on serials

• Catalogs for CSU, LLNL, Stanford and Getty will
  be accessed via links initially and eventually
  via a cross-database search engine
• These records will be more accurate up-to-date
  than in legacy Melvyl

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A word about Melvyl-T Telnet

• We love it, you love it, the faculty loves it,
  but
• Telnet software creators no longer supporting it,
  e.g., NCSA
• Its a submerging technology
• Telnet protocol is a potential security
  breachrisk for the host system
• Fulltext content not available via Telnet
• Request has much more functionality via the Web

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Telnets a little different

• Melvyl-T Telnet supports only basic search and
  display does NOT have all of legacy Telnet
  Melvyls features
• Request and Update not included in this version
  of telnet
• Records cannot be sorted as they can in the web
  version
• Once again CAT and PE are combined

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OK, so whats new and wonderful.
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Other new features, differences

• Circulation status for all campuses (incl. UCLA)
• Fastest searching is usually via keywords (NOT
  exact title, exact journal title, author last
  name first)
• Left-anchored true Browse (unlike legacy Melvyl)
• Use Browse for Authority recordscross refs are
  displayed here
• Search Words as Phrase

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Use Words as Phrase to hone in...
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Other new features, differences

• Truncation symbol is or ?
• Phrase/proximity searching
• Use with a number to retrieve records that
  contain terms within a number of words in any
  order, e.g., tom 5 jerry
• Use ! followed by a number for words in the same
  order, e.g., jerry !5 tom where jerry must come
  first

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Basic Search
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Advanced Search
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Command Search
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You can Browse by
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Or, browse by
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Browse
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Most recent search
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Most recent and previous searches
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Combining searches
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Combining Searches
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Combining searches
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Handling results

• Can display in Short, Long or Review formats
• Can sort by Author/title, Title, Date (most
  recent first)

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Records merging issuesreview

• When records are retrieved, they are merged or
  deduplicated on the fly
• There is a Display record
• Display record is decided upon by a numerical
  weighting factor which includes things like
  subject headings, if it has a ToC, if it is an
  online record

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Records merging issues

• If 300 individual records are retrieved, there
  may only be 120 to view after they are
  de-duplicated (happens behind the scenes)
• No problem!
• However, for large retrievals, the system only
  de-duplicates enough for you to see 1,000 records
• Example subject united states civil war reports
  a search result of 30,370 individual
  recordsNOT de-duped

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Records merging

• You can display and sort only the first 1,000
  deduped records (similar to receiving and
  displaying partial results in legacy Melvyl)

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Records merging impacts

• Records added most recently to the database are
  the first to be retrieved
• 1,000 records displayed may not be the most
  recently publishedtheyre the most recently
  added to the database
• SO, if your result set is higher than 1,000, this
  number can not be used as a count of distinct
  titles in the database

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Handling large search results, as all good
librarians know

• Look at some records, click on relevant subject
  headings
• Add another term to your search
• After looking at an item, use Browse to hone in
  on possible other items
• Apply optional limits
• Chunk up in time periods, e.g. 1990-2003

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Truncation issue
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Truncation Issues

• System allows you to truncate after only one
  letter
• Ex Search for (un otters) in one search box ?
  zero results
• Message is Your search term(s) found too many
  results. Please refine your search
• Try again in Advanced, search for un in one
  box, otters in the second box

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Avoiding truncation problems
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What are collections?

• Entire Collection
• Online Resources
• Scores
• Sound Recordings
• You can Browse within a collection

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Caution!
Displays work best with most recent versions of
Internet Explorer or Netscape (or others) IE 5.0
and above and Netscape 6.0 and above are
recommended To display non-Roman alphabets, you
must have a font that can display the
charactersAriel Unicode MS Some older browsers
and older computers can use non-Roman character
displays, but it may be necessary to download
fonts for individual languages one at a time.
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Caution!

• In some browsers when screen size (and hence font
  size) is much larger than the default settings,
  the entire Web page is not visible on the screen
• Result
• In Melvyl-T, horizontal scrolling is required to
  view right hand portion of the Advanced search
  screen, where the Results box is found
• Catalog users may believe their searches
  retrieved zero results if they cant see results
• Important for Melvyl-T other databases

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Saving Records

• To view saved records within a session, go to
  Print/Email, and select preview
• To save records across sessions, you must have
  first signed-in
• View each record in the Full Record format, click
  on Save Across Sessions
• Name the search folder you want to save them in

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Saving records

• Put them in the desired folder
• To see them again, go to My Workspace
• Click on Items Saved

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Updates My Workspace
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Overlap period

• April 2003 August 1, 2003
• Legacy Melvyl retires as of August 1, 2003
• How will we connect to each version of the
  catalog in the interim?

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Linking from UC-eLinks to Melvyl-T

• When will we start linking to Melvyl-T?
• Wanted to test initial load on Melvyl-T from
  day-to-day users
• Wanted to wait till end of the semester or
  quarter to make the changenot confuse our users
  with a new interface

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What will it look like?
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You can test out UC-eLinks with Melvyl-T

• http//www.cdlib.org/libstaff/sharedcoll/a-i-trans
  /sfxtest.html

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Where can I get more help?

• Help screens
• Guides
• http//www.cdlib.org/guides
• http//www.cdlib.org/libstaff/comm/outreach/
• Feedback

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Tell us what you think, and help us improve
Melvyl-T