December 19, 2016 Meeting of Administrative Council

Bill Mischo, Tom Teper, Shuyong Jiang, Chris Quinn, Susan Avery, Sarah Williams, Mary Schlembach, Lisa Romero, Joanne Kaczmarek, Mary Laskowski, Kyle McCafferty, Tom Habing, Greg Knott, Jeff Schrader, Cherie’ Weible, John Wilkin

1.    International Strategies Working Group proposal division representation (Witt).

2.    Update and demo of Library Directory and Reference Referral database application (Habing)

John Wilkin, chair; Susan Avery, Tom Habing, JoAnn Jacoby, Shuyong Jiang, Joanne Kaczmarek, Greg Knott, Bill Mischo (for Mary Schlembach), Michael Norman (for Mary Laskowski), Lisa Romero, Jeff Schrader, Tom Teper, Sarah Williams

1.       International Strategies Working Group proposal division representation (Witt).

           Deferred to another meeting.

 2.       Update and demo of Library Directory and Reference Referral database application (Habing)

Tom shared a demo of the new Library directory. It brings together a number of different entities: it describes the Library units, the people in the Library and how they are associated with those units, and also the subject specializations and language expertise. This is partially driving certain aspects of the new web CMS. This gathers together the hours for the Library, who the unit head is and information about the units and people within the units. This is also going to be driving the reference referral system. Tom has met with that committee a number of times and will continue to meet with them.

 

This interface is intended for internal use. The public will gain this information through the web interface. Tom showed the raw data that will be fed to the web interface. Then others will turn this data into a responsive, accessible user interface. The idea is that the staff directory will be maintained in this database and then this database is used to drive the information anywhere else we want to display it.

 

Tom showed a listing of all the people working in the Library. The Library currently maintains this information in many places. There is an official database that Tom pulled information from. He also pulled information from the system that Bill Mischo developed at Grainger—the reference referral system. There is also active directory groups that we maintain. One of Tom’s rules for developing this is to not repeat information unless he has to. The only thing he stores in his database is the person’s netid. All other information is being pulled out of campus databases, i.e. Banner. The netids are currently maintained by individuals sending an OTRS to the IT Helpdesk to make changes. The intention is that people will be able to maintain their own records and unit heads will be able to go in and add or remove individuals from the unit pages.

 

This is already in a production state being used for the 4 pilot units that are having their websites redone. Those units are pulling information out of this database. As far as the reference referral, this database will be stabilized in 3-4 months. This is not intended to be the public interface, but the internal Library interface. The primary intention is that this is the one stop for all your unit organizational purposes.

 

John is concerned about getting commitments on the maintenance piece. He would like thought to be given to how we integrate formal responsibility for who is or is not in the Library. Also, we need a formal commitment on the languages and areas of expertise. Who will be responsible for these things?

 

Knott – evaluations – Developing a newer interface easier to use. Questions and format will not change. GA submissions in last week. Wage report under construction. Making their way through a number of projects.

 

Bill Mischo – The Web Team is working with 4 early adopter libraries (HPNL, Math, IAS MPAL) to move them from the OpenCMS content management system into WordPress and be operational by the second semester. See www.library.illinois/fyi to view the team members and the progress being made on each of the test sites. The conversion work is being done by a group of trained GAs in conjunction with unit staff, GAs, and librarians. Once the first group of libraries are finished, the Web Team will begin converting the remaining unit library sites, with an eye to finishing all the conversions in the summer of 2017.  The Team will meet with Divisions to gather questions and feedback. Please let Bill know if your unit would like to begin the conversion in January or early in the semester. The GA team will convert the unit page and several secondary pages for each unit to examine and provide feedback. The switchover to the WordPress pages will be accomplished using the reverse proxy server so that no URLs will change – with a few exceptions. Units can prepare by making sure your pages look the way you want them to.

 

Tom Teper – Residency Implementation WG – the group will be making a call out to the library tentatively scheduled for later this week for proposals for those positions. Four positions will be funded through central gift or endowment funds. If a unit wishes to fund a resident position through a grant or other funds (such as lapsing salaries), units can propose that as well. There will be strong encouragement for collaborations between units. These are visiting faculty positions overseen by a collective bargaining unit. These are two-year positions, starting August 2017. There is no opportunity for these positions to be made permanent.