LITA Electronic Resources Management Interest Group NISOs IOTA Working Group January 7, 2011 Oliver Pesch, EBSCO Information Services

Overview Background – why focus on OpenURL quality Current focus – what is the problem space being tackled by the working group Status Looking forward Getting involved

Background Item-level linking became part of our vocabulary a decade ago as librarians worked to link users from the point of discovery to the content that was discovered. OpenURL and link resolvers provide a scalable solution to item level linking. Things dont always work as well as they should… …this is the subject of a 2008 study led by Adam Chandler investigating issues with his institutions link resolver. *Chandler, Adam Results of LAnnée philologique online OpenURL Quality Investigation: Mellon Planning Grant Final Report.

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) Item Level Linking: Before OpenURL

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) Item Level Linking: With OpenURL Link Resolver

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) Item Level Linking: With OpenURL Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) Item Level Linking: With OpenURL Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base Citation Full text 1 Citation details in OpenURL Citation details matched against collection to find appropriate link 2 Target link created often using citation data 3

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) Item Level Linking: With OpenURL Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base Citation Full text 1 Citation details in OpenURL Citation details matched against collection to find appropriate link 2 Target link created often using citation data 3 Citation: A, Bernand, et al. "A versatile nanotechnology to connect individual nano-objects for the fabrication of hybrid single-electron devices." Nanotechnology 21, no. 44 (November 5, 2010): pg Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 24, 2010). Citation: A, Bernand, et al. "A versatile nanotechnology to connect individual nano-objects for the fabrication of hybrid single-electron devices." Nanotechnology 21, no. 44 (November 5, 2010): pg Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 24, 2010). OpenURL: ?issn= &volume=21 &issue=44 &date= &spage=201 &title=Nanotechnology &atitle=A+versatile+nanotechnology+to+connect+ Individual+nano-objects+for+the+fabrication+of+ hybrid+single-electron+devices. &aulast=Bernand OpenURL: ?issn= &volume=21 &issue=44 &date= &spage=201 &title=Nanotechnology &atitle=A+versatile+nanotechnology+to+connect+ Individual+nano-objects+for+the+fabrication+of+ hybrid+single-electron+devices. &aulast=Bernand Target Link: Target Link:

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) OpenURL Linking Errors: Non-standard OpenURL Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base Citation Full text Citation details in OpenURL Citation details matched against collection to find appropriate link Target link created often using citation data OpenURL is not standard 1 Request Rejected! 2 2 No LINKS! 3 3 X X

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) OpenURL Linking Errors: Data elements missing Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base Citation Full text Citation details in OpenURL Citation details matched against collection to find appropriate link Target link created often using citation data OpenURL missing data elements 1 Item may not match knowledge base. OR elements missing for target link 2 2 Links missing or broken because of missing pieces 3 3 X X

Sources (discovery points) Targets (appropriate full text) OpenURL Linking Errors: Mistakes in data elements Link Resolver OpenURL Target Links Knowledge base Citation Full text Citation details in OpenURL Citation details matched against collection to find appropriate link Target link created often using citation data OpenURL has errors in data elements 1 Item may not match knowledge base. OR target links are invalid; OR, false matches 2 2 Links missing or broken because of bad data or WRONG links. 3 3 X X

Summary of possible problems: Current focus for iota Structure -- Bad OpenURL Completeness -- Data elements missing Accuracy -- Data elements wrong

IOTA Working Group Improving OpenURL Through Analytics (iota) Created in 2010 Basic Assumptions: –Results are achieved through an analytical investigation of how OpenURL links work. –Practical: Address the links generated by the OpenURL standard, not the standard itself. –Selective changes to OpenURLs will lead to significant improvement in linking success rate. Motto: "small changes. big improvements"

Desired Outcomes Develop community-recognized index for measuring the quality of OpenURL links generated by content providers. Produce qualitative reports that will help OpenURL providers quickly compare their OpenURL quality to that of their peers. Method: –fair; –transparent; –scalable across all OpenURLs and their providers.

Focus 1.Core elements: –Contained in IOTA's OpenURL reporting system; –9 million OpenURLs from libraries and providers. 2.Scoring system based on assumption: –Correlation exists between # of core elements ("OpenURL completeness") & ability of OpenURLs to link to specific content. 3.Weighting assigned to core elements: –Based on relative importance spage vs atitle issn vs jtitle doi/pmid vs date, etc.

Work in Progress Element weighting still in progress: –E.g., importance of identifiers (doi, pmid) vs bibliographic data (issn, volume, spage). Currently, IOTA focuses on OpenURLs from citation sources only. OpenURL quality is also influenced by: –knowledge base, –resolver, –full-text provider (target). High "completeness" score of OpenURLs not always indicative of "success" in linking to full texts –Combination of multiple indexes along linking nodes may provide more complete picture.

Status Project web site created 9 million+ OpenURLs loaded Initial set of reports available for analysis of data – publicly available Work underway on creating a completeness index Exploring options with KBART and other groups for looking at other aspects of OpenURL quality

IOTA Resources IOTA Project site BLOG TWITTER Hash Tag #nisoiota IOTA Project site BLOG TWITTER Hash Tag #nisoiota

How can I get involved in IOTA? If you are a vendor -- Look at IOTA data... or... Point your tech folks to our data This data is meant to help make improvements in your openURL linking. If you are a librarian -- Contribute data to IOTA Help spread the word to vendors More information on the IOTA project at:

Questions? Group More info...