University of Tennessee, Knoxville, School of Information Sciences, What, Where, When, and Who:

1. University of Tennessee, Knoxville, School of Information Sciences, What, Where, When, and Who: Redesigning the Reference Environment In Digital Libraries. Michael Buckland Samuel Lazerow Lecture, March 31, 2004 Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

2. In the old days, one could visit a the reference collection and make notes on. . . • What, When, Where, Who, Why, and How • using specialist genres of reference work: • Dictionaries and encyclopedias • Atlases and gazetteers • Chronologies and time-lines • Biographical dictionaries • etc. • This has become more difficult in a digital environment. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

3. Some related issues: Confusion over “genre”: What kind of a document? Simplistic notions of “multimedia.” Have digital libraries have been designed backwards? How could we re-design the functionality of a reference collection in a digital environment? Form should follow function. Based on work at Berkeley on designing search support, especially the challenge of searching across different media: text, image, numeric data, sound,… Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

4. WHAT? Searching by topic, e.g. Dewey, LCSH. • Two kinds of mapping in every search: • Documents are assigned to topic categories. • Queries have to map to topic categories • Also mapping between topic systems. • Obviously one would like to search seamlessly across multiple media, e.g. text corpora and socio-economic numeric data series. Is that possible? Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

5. Text Numeric datasets It is difficult to move between different kinds of document Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

6. Text THESAURUS Captions Numeric datasets Different media can be linked indirectly via metadata, but in this case you need to specify place also. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

7. Text THESAURUS Maps GAZETTEER Captions Numeric datasets Proper name control requires a gazetteer -- and latitude and longitude allow points on maps. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

8. WHERE? • People want to search by place! • For – • Mammals in Madagascar • Castles in Quercy • Hikes in the Himalayas . . . • . . . but libraries provide only weak support. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

9. Geographical search in library catalogs: • Place name in title – if present - and • Place names as / in Subject Headings (MARC 6XX$z, 651) • Search of other geographical clues not supported, e.g.: • Geographical scope note (MARC 043: n-us-id = Idaho) • Geographical codes in classification numbers, e.g. • the 7946 for San Francisco Bay in Dewey 917.94604 • No spatial relationships: Within / near / next / between. • Map interfaces not yet provided Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

10. Place names are problematic: - Variant forms: St. Petersburg, Санкт Петербург, Saint-Pétersbourg, . . . - Multiple names: Cluj, in Romania / Roumania / Rumania, is also called Klausenburg and Kolozsvar. - Names changes: BombayMumbai. - Homographs:Vienna, VA, and Vienna, Austria; 50 Springfields. - Anachronisms: No Germany before 1870 - Vague, e.g. Midwest, Silicon Valley - Unstable boundaries: 19th century Poland; Balkans; USSR. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

11. BUT places have coordinates: latitude and longitude. . . . and a GAZETTEER links places and spaces! A gazetteer is a place name authority file and . . . indicates what kinds of place: “Feature type” and . . . objectively specifies latitude and longitude and . . . disambiguates similar place names and . . . brings variant names together and . . . allows places to be displayed on maps. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

12. Project: “Going Places in the Catalog: Improved Geographical Access” (IMLS) http://ecai.org/imls2002/ Project objectives (1) Better use of data already in library catalog records for clarification of place and space; (2) Link online catalogs with online gazetteers; (3) Map display of search results; (4) Map interface for spatial queries; (5) Extend spatial queries beyond library to other resources relating to the same locality. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

13. Geo-temporal search interface. Place names found in documents. Gazetteer provided lat. & long. Places displayed on map. Timebar Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

14. Zoom on map. Click on place brings list of records. Click on record displays text. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

15. BUT better standards for gazetteer content and format needed. - Multilingual and multiscript entries - Specialists need specialized Feature Type Thesauri, e.g. Medieval Chinese administrative units; 200 feature types in British canal archaeology. Different kinds of Buddhist temple. - Always declare which thesaurus is being used - Short generic standard thesaurus for upward compatibility - “Preferred name” always a matter of local choice. - Time codes on records because places and names unstable - Harmonize geotemporal metadata across standards families Based on: “A Multilingual Gazetteer System for Integrating Spatial and Cultural Resources” (NSF-ITR funded) http://ecai.org/projects/gazetteer/ Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

16. WHEN?Places and place names have temporal aspects. Time period names resemble place names. - Ambiguous: Civil war, Renaissance, . . . which? - Unstable: The European War, The Great War, World War I - Periods have objective calendar dates as well as name - Dates can display in time-lines, chronologies. So Time period directory design resembling a gazetteer Place name Kind of place Where (lat./long.) When Period name Kind of period When (dates) Where Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

17. Geographical subject headings with "Civil war" as chronological subdivision Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

18. Catalog search for Civil War. Geo-temporal display of sets of results. Click on choice to retrieve documents. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

19. Text THESAURUS Maps GAZETTEER Captions Numeric datasets TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY Timeline Chronology Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

20. Place (and time) are broadly important across numerous tools and genres including, e.g. Language atlases. Library catalogs Biographical dictionaries. Bibliographies Archival finding lists Museum records, etc., etc. Biographical dictionaries are heavy on place and time: Emanuel Goldberg, Born Moscow 1881. PhD under Wilhelm Ostwald, Univ. of Leipzig, 1906. Director, Zeiss Ikon, Dresden, 1926-33. Moved to Palestine 1937. Died Tel Aviv, 1970. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

21. BIOG. DICT. Text THESAURUS Maps GAZETTEER Captions Numeric datasets TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY Timeline Chronology Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

22. BIOG. DICT. 2 BIOG. DICT. THESAURUS 3 Text 2THESAURUS 2 Text THESAURUS Maps GAZETTEER Captions Numeric GAZETTEER 2 etc datasets GAZETTEER 3 TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY Time line TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY 2 Chronology TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY 3 Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

23. Linking webpages to library catalogs, gazetteers, etc. Websites often contain bibliographies. Another option is to generate a live searches from the a webpage, using the Z39.50 protocol, to search for latest available resources about that topic or place. Example: See historic sites pages of ECAI Iraq portal of internet accessible resources relating to Iraqi antiquities. Clicking on link generates searches of major U.S. and U.K. research libraries for resources relating to that site. http://ecai.org/iraq/ Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004

24. Through - standards - good practice - interoperability an “intermediate infrastructure” like a traditional reference collection could be built and shared. Thank-you! Acknowledgments: National Science Foundation, Institute for Museum & Library Services, DARPA, and helpful discussions with Academia Sinica, Alexandria Digital Library project, and others. Lazerow Lecture, UTK, 2004