Tag Archives: VALA2020

VALA2020 SC2 Shaw

Smart City Wide Collaboration – bringing a city together with Augmented Reality

VALA2020 SC2
Tuesday 11 February 2020, 2:45 – 3:50

Kerrie Shaw
  • City of Newcastle

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #sc2

View the presentation slides here:

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VALA2020 SC2 Shaw Slides 13MB
Abstract

Augmented reality in the city, all over the city! Promoting and displaying the cultural and heritage collections to the people using the spaces. Engaging with the people, using the collection outside the exhibition spaces, outside the building, in another reality! I HAD to get a job with a council whose goal this was! I wanted in. In March 2018 the position of Heritage Collections Digitisation Specialist with City of Newcastle Council was advertised. The door to my nirvana had opened and I leapt through it.

My presentation is a story of innovation; of bringing Newcastle’s heritage collections to life and the collaboration required to make it happen. This is a story of two strategies, Smart City and Library, being the catalyst for connecting Newcastle’s GLAM sector. It’s a story of experimentation, of learning and moving on; of failure. It’s a tale of how to regroup and reassess, fail again and then finally succeed with a product that shines.

To collaborate across the GLAM sector within your local government organisation can be a rewarding but interesting journey. To then add collaboration with other council directorates such as tourism, heritage planning, indigenous liaison, events management, IT, GIS, digital enterprises and smart city working groups is a whole new arena. Being new to the organisation had its advantages but also its problems.

By the time the conference dates are upon us the City of Newcastle will have an App with AR experiences all over the city. Experiences that have been built by council’s GLAM sector. These experiences will tell Newcastle’s stories, highlight its history and engage the users. Public art will come alive, artists will tell their stories and the past will breathe again, in another reality.

By using the collections held at the Local History Library and Museum we have not only added another layer to the history of the city but we have enabled access to items that are not usually seen and provided a platform for these items to have their time in the sun. By using content already in existence as commissioned for a VR experience by the city we have been able to quickly, easily and cost effectively activate several areas which otherwise could have taken years due to cultural sensitivities, logistics and budgets.

The inception, ongoing maintenance and growth of this project will be an example of technology integration, heritage display, public engagement, and of goodwill and co-operation that can be used as an example of success in collaboration.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 SC1 Yamaguchi

Librarian and coding: a new job opportunity

VALA2020 SC1
Tuesday 11 February 2020, 2:45 – 3:50

Masami Yamaguchi
  • Griffith University

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #sc1

View the presentation slides here:

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VALA2020 SC1 Yamaguchi Slides 4MB
Abstract

Ongoing technological enhancement is providing information professionals opportunities to engage in continuing professional development to keep up with new demand and challenges. Technology competencies are required in many parts of librarians’ role. For example, emerging technology has transformed the research landscape from 50 years ago. Now researchers in all academic disciplines are working with big and complex data. They require knowledge of working with data, what tools to use, and where to save data; these are all facets of the research data lifecycle with which librarians can assist.

Academic libraries, in particular, are evolving new services around research data to meet their clients’ needs. This means that ideally librarians need to acquire knowledge and skills regarding digital scholarship, including tools, storage methods, high-performing computers (HPC) and some level of coding to clean, analyse and/or visualise data.

This session looks at the example of a learning and teaching focused librarian within Library and Learning Services (LLS), Griffith University, who, being interested to learn Python coding, developed a small Python script as part of their professional development. The script reduced a significant amount of time required for a learning analytics task. It also reduced the risk of introducing human error.

Not all librarians are required to be able to code. Nevertheless, investing time to develop coding skills can have positive returns to the organisation as it has the potential to improve the data quality and efficiency of internal processes. The organisation may not recognise the benefit of librarians’ digital skills – yet.

Coding skills can be a good addition to core library skills, which can be beneficial to the organisation. To encourage librarians to develop coding skills, creating a new job title, such as coding librarian, research software librarian, or research tools librarian, could be a solution as a job title would make clear and easy to recognise the required skill set. Librarians’ roles have been evolving to accommodate technological transformation and clients’ needs. A new job title would contribute to raising the awareness of the importance of these skills, expanding professional development opportunities, and diversifying librarians’ career paths.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC1 Rundle

Making professional development less abstract

VALA2020 CC1 TABLE 1
Wednesday 12 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Hugh Rundle
  • newCardigan
Sae Ra Germaine
  • Linux Australia

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc1

Abstract

Professional development opportunities in the Australasian library and GLAM sectors hold largely the same shape they have for decades – a few large annual or biennial conferences, user-group meetings for specific tools and consortia, with the occasional one-day workshop for sector-specific needs.

Many libraries and other collecting institutions have seen their training and development budgets cut under various austerity regimes, whilst the vendor community that has been relied upon for sponsorship continues to consolidate, limiting exhibition and sponsorship opportunities. At the same time, new PD opportunities have been opened up by digital and online tools and technologies – for example over forty million people are registered with meetup.com, attending largely decentralised regular meetups and mini-conferences. What future do we want for the sector, and how should we create it?

This Critical Conversation will provide a space for Conference attendees to discuss the purpose of professional conferences and similar events and gain an understanding of the community’s needs and desires regarding future professional discussion and knowledge sharing.

Attendees will hear ideas and perspectives of other LIS and GLAM professionals both attending the conference and from the broader professional community.

This session will provide important data for a future discussion paper on the future of GLAM conferences. The session and subsequent report will be useful for GLAM professional associations and GLAM institutions in planning future conferences and/or alternative professional development events.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC4 Edwards

The challenge of finding better indicators for library use within Victorian Public Libraries using standardised technologies and approaches

This session is sponsored by Informit

VALA2020 CC4 TABLE 1
Thursday 13 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Tom Edwards
  • Wyndham City Library
Premal Niranjan
  • Yarra Libraries
Lloyd Brady
  • Municipal Association of Victoria

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc4

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VALA2020 #CC4 - Pre-Reading/Briefing Notes for Attendees 877KB
Abstract

Operating within our State’s Local Government Performance Reporting Framework (LGPRF), Victorian public libraries are faced with the challenge of creating evidence-based indicators that reflect the dynamic and multi-faceted modern service offerings of the sector across the state. This is effectively a challenge to tell the story of how Libraries change lives, using quantitative data as the narrative.

There is a recognition amongst professionals working within Victorian libraries that the current set of indicators used within the LGPRF are largely unsatisfactory and unrepresentative of 21st century libraries. One component of this is the measurement of ‘active’ public library usage, defined as “having borrowed a library collection item in the past 12 months” which omits much of the valuable activity that occurs within our vibrant public spaces (eg. Program attendance, PC usage, co-working and study etc.)

The ICT Special Interest Group of Public Libraries Victoria met in late 2018 to grapple with the problem of advocating for better indicators using the tools of technology. One working group (comprised of the authors) was formed to specifically examine the task of measuring the broadest and most compelling indication of library use with a reproduceable, standardized methodology. Implied in this is a technology that must be economical and accessible to all Victorian Public Libraries. The authors investigated several modern technological approaches to provide this data, including WiFi analytics and AI people counting solutions (the latter being a component of Jason Griffey’s “Measure the Future” open hardware project), however a satisfactory and reliable solution has not yet been found.

The authors seek critical input from others in the sector to assist in progressing our work to effectively measure active library use with emerging technologies.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC3 Gardner

Is it worth the time experimenting with a new skill in order to make a library’s task more efficient?

VALA2020 CC3 TABLE 3
Wednesday 12 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Julie Gardner
  • Victoria University
Graham Massey
  • Victoria University

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc3

Abstract

Taking inspiration from an xkcd cartoon, this Critical Conversation will examine the question – is it worth the time spent learning a new skill in order to make a library work task more efficient?

Although there are large scale library automation projects in libraries (e.g. automatic indexing, inter-linking library data) this presentation focusses on the many small scale tasks that librarians regularly undertake that are repetitive and/or time consuming in nature. Pressure on library budgets coupled with organisational restructuring mean that many libraries operate with fewer staff than previously. Potential automation of routine library tasks or using existing software more effectively holds the promise of workplace efficiency and improved productivity. Time consuming and repetitive tasks are good candidates for programming and can present opportunities to experiment with software features or try out new tools.

The problem however is the learning curve. It takes time to learn a new skill before it becomes useful, then there is the actual time it will take to write and test a program or to apply the new software. Library professionals are reluctant, or are unable, to find the time to explore and experiment with programming or other data techniques. It is hard to justify time spent learning how to use and record a macro for example when it might only take 5 to 10 minutes every month to copy and paste in an Excel spreadsheet.

We will look at a range of real life library tasks that were subsequently automated or improved by using a variety of coding and software tools. The examples are drawn from the functional library work areas of repository management, research data support, cataloguing and acquisitions. Techniques or tools utilised include XSLT, Open Refine, Python, Regular Expressions, and APIs.

We will attempt to quantify the trade-off between time spent making a task more efficient versus the time saved. However, this simple time trade off doesn’t take into account other potential benefits of automation. These other benefits such as professional development and elimination of human errors will also be explored.

When all is considered – is it worth your time?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC5 Tharmarajah

Can a chatbot help children learn to love to read?

This session is sponsored by Informit

VALA2020 CC5 TABLE 2

Thursday 13 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Meena Tharmarajah
  • State Library of NSW & Wriveted

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc5

Abstract

Australia’s first chat-bot designed to get kids reading was launched at the State Library of NSW on 8 November 2019. Scout is a fun, interactive robot that uses a conversational interface which helps children quickly discover books matched to their interests and general reading ability.

Scout was created by award-winning experience designer Meena Tharmarajah in collaboration with the State Library’s DX Lab. It assesses a child’s interests and reading level before dispensing a list of up to five books they will enjoy reading in The Children’s Library.

Meena is the creative force behind the ABC Play School iPad Apps (The Art Maker and Play Time) and spent a few months working on the chat-bot concept at the Library as a DX Lab Digital drop-in. She believes “all digital experiences should be both useful and enjoyable.”

“Scout is an experiment in understanding how children might find a book they will love to read. And really the people best equipped to provide insight on what will really work for children are the children themselves,” says Meena.

Meena consulted with the Library’s Learning team and ran design thinking workshops with Year 5 students from Balgowlah North Public School which helped inform the chat- bot experience, including the physical design. Meena says Scout is a great tool for librarians and could inform how a collection might be organised, but also the type of books that could be added to a collection.

Participants in this session will be asked to give critical feedback on:

  • The overall experience of using the Scout chatbot
  • The manner in which books have been tagged and then recommended
  • Data literacy activities that expose children to:
    – the language that can be used to describe and find books,
    – the impact those tags have on their ability to find books,
    – the impact ‘liking’ a book may have on future recommendations.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC6 Cormack

Indigenous data sovereignty and open source

This session is sponsored by Informit

VALA2020 CC6 TABLE 3
Thursday 13 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Chris Cormack

  • Catalyst IT

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc6

Abstract

This talk will start with introducing Indigenous Data Sovereignty, with particular reference to Māori Data Sovereignty and the work that Te Mana Raraunga are doing. It will then go on to discuss how, by using open source tools, we can exercise this sovereignty. This is important for libraries and other GLAM sector institutions to be aware of, as traditionally they have assumed they have sovereignty over data collected by them.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 CC2 King

Digital Dexterity: Curiosity, confidence, competence

VALA2020 CC2 TABLE 2
Wednesday 12 February 2020, 10.50-12.30

Sara King
  • AARNet

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #cc2

Abstract

This critical conversation seeks to understand the tension between the high curiosity in technology in the library sector versus the low confidence in digital skills that seems to exist within the profession, and what we might be able to do about it.

VALA2020 Plenary 2 Sheail

Data bodies in the library: from crustaceans to code

VALA2020 PLENARY SESSION 2
Tuesday 11 February 2020, 4:20 – 5:30

Dr Philippa Sheail
  • The University of Edinburgh
  • Lecturer, Digital Education

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #p2

View the video of the presentation on the VALAView channel and view the presentation slides here:

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VALA2020 Plenary 2 Sheail Slides 26MB
Abstract

This presentation builds on my ethnographic explorations of the contemporary research library, considering its historic and material foundations through to its digital architecture and data formations.

Through a rich description of a university library in 2020, I explore the library as both a built structure of historical and social significance, and as a digital infrastructure extending to a vast network of digital objects, environments, and publishing practices.

I foreground the ethical tensions around the use of library data – including its relationship to the ‘smart’ campus and the ‘shadow’ library – while also exploring the library’s role as a historically dense setting for academic practice. I conclude with a challenge to library futures, calling for a re-evaluation and reimagination of what – and who – makes a library.

Biography

Philippa Sheail is a Lecturer in Digital Education at the University of Edinburgh, and Programme Director for the MSc in Digital Education. Her research interests are interdisciplinary, based in the area of digital and higher education, but drawing on organisational theory, cultural geography, and social theories of time. Philippa has also been developing research in the library sector, with a particular interest in practices of organising in a research library context. Her Data Bodies in the Library project was developed in partnership with the University of Edinburgh Library and the National Library of Scotland.

 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

VALA2020 Plenary 1 Moriarty

Open as a Rule, Closed by Exception

VALA2020 PLENARY SESSION 1
Tuesday 11 February 2020, 9:30 – 10:40

Adam Moriarty
  • Auckland War Memorial Museum
  • Head of Collection Information and Access

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blog posts about this session: #vala2020 #p1

View the video of the presentation on the VALAView channel and view the presentation slides here:

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VALA2020 Plenary 1 Moriarty Slides 2GB
Abstract

In 2015 Auckland Museum started a journey which felt in many ways untested, unmoderated and unsure, but like all great adventures into the unknown, it was exciting. We were armed with a simple vision – to be “Open as a Rule, Closed by Exception”.

What would it look like if we shifted the paradigm of institutional control? If we let the people of the world find their own stories, pathways and connections to our human and natural heritage collections? What would it mean to our metrics, our reputation and would anyone even notice?

The ensuing years have broadened our understanding of what it is to truly open our collections and threw into question, what were we trying to achieve? This session will reflect upon mission fulfilment and what it means to truly be OPEN.

Biography

Adam Moriarty is the Head of Collection Information and Access Team at Auckland War Memorial Museum in New Zealand. For the past five years he has worked to open the multidisciplinary collections online in a way that their stories can be freely accessed and shared. As his own journey has unfolded it has led him to question the true purpose and validity of his work. His most recent endeavours have started him to reconsider the direction museums might take to fulfil their mission.

 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.