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I struggled the most reading through this chapter of The Portable MLIS. As someone who does not have a very strong technological background, aside from the learning that naturally occurs when one has a computer from a fairly early age and must assimilate how to troubleshoot minor issues, dealing with designing information systems is particularly difficult for me. I do better when working with concrete examples, as in assisting in pioneering the new database in UT’s Visual Resources Collection as an art history MA student than I do with the theory behind it.
Judith Weedman’s text is about how to create information systems that are both comprehensive and user-friendly. She begins with designing a system of organization, explaining that this type of work requires that you have “in-depth knowledge of who will be using the system you design, and what their needs and abilities are…there is rarely one perfect solution” (2008). Having worked with a database in its infancy at the VRC, I know firsthand how complex this process can be when dealing with a real collection rather than a hypothetical one. The question of how to design a database that would accommodate the incredible variety in images was complex and only partially answered after the two years I spent there, despite hard work on the part of everyone involved, from the programmers to the collection staff and curator.
There are several steps Weedman would recommend taking in creating such a system. First is to define the problem – seemingly a straightforward process but one that becomes more complex as you look at each factor. “Who wants [the] system to be designed and why? What are the goals for the system? Who will the users be…” (2008)? Without understanding both the users and the purpose for the system, a successful solution cannot be found. Once the problem becomes more defined, designers can consider the range of metadata solutions for representing documents/objects in a system. Also vital is creating an effective search engine and, at each stage in the design process, evaluate how the design is working. Beta testing a system will highlight problems with the design that can then be ironed out before actual users discover them.
Once a system is designed and implemented, the librarian’s next task is to become expert at querying it. Systems have quite different search functions and what seems to be apparent in one may not work for another. I remember the substantial challenge with the “keyword” search in the VRC’s database. Some users understood this to be a search for a specific word in any field (title, author, medium, etc.) but in actuality it searched very specific keywords, such as “portraits” or “still life”. It took time to educate users on how the database worked so that they could effectively find what they were looking for with a minimum of effort. A librarian must also know what information is likely to be in a specific information system. A straightforward example is that one would not search the BHA (Bibliography of the History of Art) for an article on Shakespeare, unless you were specifically looking for topics such as images of Shakespeare or his plays, etc. That’s easy enough to recognize but between other databases the question may be more complex. Furthermore, being creative about how topics are worded is vital to finding the information sought.
The final component of information retrieval is evaluating how well a search engine finds the documents/objects that the user wants to find. A system needs to be user-friendly enough to find relevant information reasonably easily and with a minimum of effort. A system may contain massive amounts of useful information but if it is impossible to find because of a poor design, it serves no real purpose. By using effective design strategies, one would hope that the final design will have avoided this major pitfall. Studying information system design is vital to providing high-quality service to a collection’s users.
Weedman, J. (2008). Information Retrieval: Designing, Querying, and Evaluating Information Systems. In K. Haycock, B. E. Sheldon (Eds.), The Portable MLIS (p. 112-126). Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited.
