New & Noteworthy

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Hanson, H. and Stewart-Marshall, Z. (2013), "New & Noteworthy", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 30 No. 10. https://doi.org/10.1108/LHTN-10-2013-0066

New & Noteworthy

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New & Noteworthy

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Library Hi Tech News, Volume 30, Issue 10

Spyders play key role in technology-rich James B. Hunt Jr Library

There are Spyders to be found throughout the new James B. Hunt Jr Library on the North Carolina State University Centennial Campus, and they are getting rave reviews. Vista Systems’ Spyder X20s were selected by The Sextant Group, Inc. for a number of video processing tasks in the technology-rich library.

The Centennial Campus in Raleigh is home to the colleges of engineering, textiles and veterinary medicine. A 218,000 sq. ft. James B. Hunt Library is being called the library of the future for its stunning architectural presence and use of technology. It will house, upon completion, the campus library, the Institute for Emerging Issues (IEI) and numerous technology-intensive environments for faculty, students and visitors.

The Sextant Group was charged with providing AV and IT design services for the new building. They chose Spyders to fill the video processing needs for many multimedia displays. "There are five Christie MicroTile 4K walls throughout the building, so we needed a processor that could handle them," says Scott Frey, CTS-D systems designer for The Sextant Group. "There are also two auditoriums with blended multi-window projection, and Spyders were needed there, too."

A Christie MicroTile curved wall displays faculty and student work in the iPearl Immersion Theater. Another MicroTile wall in the Game Lab can be used as a single panorama or divided into multiple sections; it supports the study of digital games and offers a place to play for fun.

But Spyder’s reach extends even further. The Teaching and Visualization Lab boasts a 3D-capable 270° screen on three walls for 80 linear feet of display surface, ten projectors and a Spyder X20. In the creativity studio a white box-style theater/classroom features a large curved screen, two projectors, a Spyder and movable and writable walls. The creativity studio is "a flexible, collaborative space with multiple projection surfaces and limitless interactive opportunities for students – all with a single point source and control," Frey notes.

For every multimedia application in the new library "Spyder really fit our needs," he says. "It has great configurability and windowing and handles multiple formats. We can update and upgrade it, and it is one of the easiest to use of all the video processors on the market. Spyder has been looking and working great."

For more information on Vista Systems, visit their web site at: http://www.vistasystems.net

New Booktrack Chrome app lets writers add a movie-like soundtrack to any story

Booktrack™, the company that adds soundtracks to stories, has announced the launch of Booktrack Studio software that for the first time lets anyone add a synchronized soundtrack to digital text to provide an immersive, movie-like reading experience. Available from the Chrome Web Store, the free Chrome app allows writers to quickly embed music, ambient audio, and sound effects into their story that will play in synch with the storyline, paced to each individual’s reading speed.

Booktrack Studio delivers a more engaging and compelling reading experience for today’s new generation of digital readers. Writers can better share their creative vision by including background music that evokes a specific emotion or ambient audio that brings a scene to life, selecting clips from a database of more than 20,000 audio files. Imagine hearing a swelling symphony as warriors clash in a story or the sounds of a bustling marketplace as you read a Bangkok travel blog. Writers can then immediately self-publish their Booktrack title, instantaneously reaching new global audiences.

"For the first time, any writer can now add a synchronized movie-like soundtrack to their story to create a more engaging and immersive reading experience for their fans," says Paul Cameron, Booktrack co-founder and CEO. "Alarmingly, 33 percent of high school graduates never read another book. To change this, we are delivering a new and more captivating mobile reading experience developed for today’s connected generation that values self-expression and community."

Booktrack worked closely with Google to push the boundaries of HTML 5 and web audio to deliver advanced audio functionality in the Chrome browser. Writers can add soundtracks to any digital text, from a book or a short story to poetry or a travel blog. They can then immediately publish their amplified content on the Booktrack Bookshelf for anyone to read and listen to within the Chrome app.

"As with the film industry, technology innovation has the ability to provide an immersive experience to enhance the story and connection with the audience. I believe Booktrack has the ability to add the same dimension to the world of publishing – an obvious game changer," says Tom Greally, Booktrack Advisor and General Manager of Weta Digital, the Academy Award-winning visual effects company.

Consumers are responding strongly to Booktrack, making the initial app a top ten book app in 20 countries. The Smithsonian called Booktrack "a big leap forward," and the Atlantic described it as "a thrilling prospect." Mobile versions of Booktrack Studio and the ability for writers to sell their Booktrack titles will be coming soon.

For more information, visit: http://www.booktrack.com or follow @booktrack on Twitter.

Apache Software Foundation announces Apache™ Hadoop™ 2

The Apache Software Foundation (ASF), the all-volunteer developers, stewards, and incubators of nearly 150 Open Source projects and initiatives, has announced the availability of Apache™ Hadoop™ 2, the latest version of the Open Source software framework for reliable, scalable, distributed computing.

A foundation of Cloud computing and at the epicenter of "big data" solutions, Apache Hadoop enables data-intensive distributed applications to work with thousands of nodes and exabytes of data. Hadoop enables organizations to more efficiently and cost-effectively store, process, manage and analyze the growing volumes of data being created and collected every day. Apache Hadoop connects thousands of servers to process and analyze data at supercomputing speed. The project’s latest release marks a major milestone more than four years in the making, and has achieved the level of stability and enterprise-readiness to earn the general availability designation.

"Hadoop 2 marks a major evolution of the open source project that has been built collectively by passionate and dedicated developers and committers in the Apache community who are committed to bringing greater usability and stability to the data platform," said Arun C. Murthy, Release Manager of Apache Hadoop 2 and Founder of Hortonworks Inc. "It has been an honor and pleasure to work with the community and a personal thrill to see our four years of work on YARN finally coming to fruition in the GA of Hadoop 2. Hadoop is truly becoming a cornerstone of the modern data architecture by enabling organizations to leverage the value of all their data, including capturing net-new data types, to drive innovative new services and applications."

"What started out a few years ago as a scalable batch processing system for Java programmers has now emerged as the kernel of the operating system for big data," said original Hadoop creator and ASF Board member Doug Cutting. "Over a dozen Apache projects integrate with Hadoop, with ten more in the Apache Incubator poised to soon join their ranks."

Dubbed a "Swiss army knife of the twenty-first century" and named "Innovation of the Year" by the 2011 Media Guardian Innovation Awards, Apache Hadoop is widely deployed at enterprise organizations around the globe, including industry leaders from across the internet and social networking landscape such as Amazon Web Services, AOL, Apple, eBay, Facebook, foursquare, HP, LinkedIn, Netflix, The New York Times, Rackspace, and Twitter. Other technology leaders such as Microsoft, IBM, Teradata, SAP have integrated Apache Hadoop into their offerings. Yahoo!, an early pioneer, hosts the world’s largest known Hadoop production environment to date, spanning more than 35,000 nodes.

Apache Hadoop 2 reflects intensive community-development, production experience, extensive testing, and feedback from hundreds of knowledgeable users, data scientists and systems engineers, bringing a highly stable, enterprise-ready release of the fastest-growing big data platform.

New in Hadoop 2 is the addition of YARN that sits on top of the Hadoop distributed file system (HDFS) and serves as a large-scale, distributed operating system for big data applications, enabling multiple applications to run simultaneously for more efficient support of data throughout its entire lifecycle. The culmination of so many other releases in the Hadoop 2.x line, the most current release −2.2.0– is the first stable release in the 2.x line.

Features include support for:

* Apache Hadoop YARN, a cornerstone of next generation Apache Hadoop, for running both data-processing applications (e.g. Apache Hadoop MapReduce, Apache Storm, etc.) and services (e.g. Apache HBase).

* High availability for Apache Hadoop HDFS.

* Federation for Apache Hadoop HDFS for significant scale compared to Apache Hadoop 1.x.

* Binary compatibility for existing Apache Hadoop MapReduce applications built for Apache Hadoop 1.x.

* Support for Microsoft Windows.

* Snapshots for data in Apache Hadoop HDFS.

* NFS-v3 access for Apache Hadoop HDFS.

"The community has stepped up to the challenge of making Hadoop enterprise-ready, hardening the filesystem, providing high availability, adding critical security capabilities, and delivering integrations to enable consolidation of any kind or amount of enterprise data," said Aaron Myers, member of the Apache Hadoop Project Management Committee (PMC) and Engineer at Cloudera. "Today, with the announcement of Hadoop 2 and YARN, we’ve taken another step. Beyond the basic multitenancy customers have enjoyed for the past year, enabling them to mix batch, interactive and real-time workloads, they now have the ability to do so from within a stable foundational part of the Hadoop ecosystem. It is a testament to the community’s work that now every distribution of Apache Hadoop will enjoy these benefits, ensuring that customers can deliver the applications they need, on a single Hadoop platform."

"A large portion of the credit for this success is due to Apache’s open-source model, which has permitted a wide range of users and vendors to productively collaborate on a platform shared by all," added Cutting.

As with all Apache products, Apache Hadoop software is released under the Apache License v2.0, and is overseen by a self-selected team of active contributors to the project. A PMC guides the project’s day-to-day operations, including community development and product releases.

Apache Hadoop release notes, source code, documentation, and related resources are available at: http://hadoop.apache.org/

Code4Lib Journal issue 22: what libraries are bringing to the digital table

The Code4Lib Journal, issue 22, is now available. In the issue’s introduction, editorial committee member Sara Amato writes, "this issue, born during the long days of summer in the northern hemisphere, focuses on what libraries can bring to the digital table both in terms of special collections and metadata expertise. Articles range from an analysis of a large cross institutional collection of encoded archival description (EAD) finding aids, to mixing it up with Wikipedia and Authority records, to using Apache Hadoop, Apache Mahout and html5 to further institutional collections storage and discovery."

Articles in issue 22 include:

VIAFbot and the Integration of Library Data on Wikipedia (Maximilian Klein and Alex Kyrios).

This article presents a case study of a project, led by Wikipedians in residence at OCLC and the British Library, to integrate authority data from the Virtual International Authority File (VIAF) with biographical Wikipedia articles. This linking of data represents an opportunity for libraries to present their traditionally siloed data, such as catalog and authority records, in more openly accessible web platforms.

From finding aids to Wiki pages: remixing archival metadata with Remixing Archival Metadata Project (RAMP) (Timothy A. Thompson, James Little, David González, Andrew Darby, and Matt Carruthers). The RAMP is a lightweight web-based editing tool that is intended to let users do two things:

1. generate enhanced authority records for creators of archival collections; and

2. publish the content of those records as Wikipedia pages.

Thresholds for discovery: EAD tag analysis in ArchiveGrid, and implications for discovery systems (M. Bron, M. Proffitt and B. Washburn). The ArchiveGrid discovery system is made up in part of an aggregation of EAD encoded finding aids from hundreds of contributing institutions. In creating the ArchiveGrid discovery interface, the OCLC Research project team has long wrestled with what we can reasonably do with the large (120,000+) corpus of EAD documents. This paper presents an analysis of the EAD documents (the largest analysis of EAD documents to date). The analysis is paired with an evaluation of how well the documents support various aspects of online discovery.

Fedora Commons with Apache Hadoop: a research study (Mohamed Mohideen Abdul Rasheed). The digital collections digital repository at the University of Maryland Libraries is growing and in need of a new backend storage system to replace the current filesystem storage. Though not a traditional storage management system, we chose to evaluate Apache Hadoop because of its large and growing community and software ecosystem. This article examines the findings of our research study, which evaluated Fedora-Hadoop integration in the areas of performance, ease of access, security, disaster recovery, and costs.

Harnessing Apache Mahout to link content (LIM Chee Kiam, Balakumar Chinnasamy).

The National Library Board of Singapore has successfully used Apache Mahout to link contents in several collections such as its Infopedia collection of articles (http://infopedia.nl.sg). This article introduces Apache Mahout (http://mahout.apache.org) and focuses on its ability to link content through text analytic techniques.

For video streaming/delivery: Is HTML5 the real fix? (Elías Tzoc and John Millard) The general movement towards streaming or playing videos on the web has grown exponentially in the last decade. In this article, we report on the decision-making and early results in using the Kaltura video platform in two popular library platforms: CONTENTdm and DSpace.

Code4Lib Journal, issue 22: http://journal.code4lib.org/issues/issues/issue22

Small and rural US libraries provide access to critical resources for the digital age

Rural and small public libraries in the USA are community anchors, providing critical services and resources to meet a variety of local needs. A recently published Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) brief, The state of small and rural libraries in the USA, provides the agency’s first targeted analysis of trends for rural and small library services. The report gives an overview of the distribution, service use, fiscal health, and staffing of these important community assets. One of the report’s surprising findings is the sheer number of public libraries that can be classified as either small or rural.

The report finds that 6,098 libraries (77.1 percent of all public libraries) are small libraries and that overall 46 million people (15.4 percent of the population) are served by small libraries. Further the report finds that city libraries are being outpaced by their rural counterparts in providing access to broadband and e-books.

"This report is a must read for policymakers who are concerned about the health and vitality of rural America," said Susan H. Hildreth, Director of the IMLS. "Whether the issue is education, economic development, or access to broadband, small and rural libraries are important communications hubs for people in small towns and rural locations."

For this analysis, IMLS developed definitions for "small" and "rural," terms that lack widely accepted definitions when applied to public libraries. "rural" is defined using locale codes developed by the US Census Bureau for the National Center for Education Statistics to indicate any area outside of an urbanized area or urban cluster. "Small library" is defined as a public library with a legal service area population below 25,000 people.

The brief’s key findings include the following:

* Of the 8,956 public libraries in the USA in FY2011, 77.1 percent can be categorized as small. Almost half of all public libraries, 46.8 percent, were rural libraries. Their sheer number and broad distribution across the country speaks volumes about the value local communities place on library services.

* In FY2011, there were 167.6 million recorded visits to rural public libraries, a number that has increased by 4.2 percent over the past three years, and there were 301.2 million visits to small public libraries in FY2011, a three-year increase of 4.6 percent. The fact that service use continues to increase at these libraries at a time when other libraries are experiencing declines on a per capita basis is a further testament to their resilience and continued relevance to rural life.

* There were 49,048 publicly accessible computer terminals in rural libraries in FY2011, a three-year increase of 20.2 percent. In comparison to urban public libraries, rural libraries have higher per-capita levels of publicly accessible internet computers and e-books. Given the lag in broadband access in rural communities when compared to suburban and urban areas, this further emphasizes the strong role public libraries play in providing access to the critical digital resources that are directly related to twenty-first century skills.

For more research, data, and publications of the IMLS office of planning, research, and evaluation visit the IMLS webpage at: http://www.imls.gov/research

ECAR issues 2013 study of undergraduate students and information technology

EDUCAUSE Center for Analysis and Research (ECAR) has surveyed undergraduate students annually since 2004 about technology in higher education. In 2013, ECAR collaborated with more than 250 higher education institutions to collect responses from more than 112,000 undergraduate students about their technology experiences and expectations. The findings are distilled into four broad themes to help educators and higher education institutions better understand how students experience technology on their respective campuses and the ways in which new, better, or more technology can impact students’ relationship with information technology.

Among the key findings of the 2013 report:

* students recognize the value of technology but still need guidance when it comes to better using it for academics;

* students prefer blended learning environments while beginning to experiment with MOOCs;

* students are ready to use their mobile devices more for academics, and they look to institutions and instructors for opportunities and encouragement to do so; and

* students value their privacy, and using technology to connect with them has its limits.

Some of the actions ECAR recommends:

* Students expect their instructors – not others – to train them to effectively use the technology required for coursework (e.g. use of the CMS, hardware, and software – including specialty software and common productivity software). Instructors need support, encouragement, and possibly incentives to do so.

* Educate your students about MOOCs; most students are unaware of them. Institutions have a fleeting opportunity to contextualize MOOCs for students in a way that will mesh with the institution’s own MOOC strategy.

* Create (or update) a strategy for incorporating mobile device use into the classroom. Address the IT infrastructure barriers (such as a lack of convenient charging outlets and/or charging stations and insufficient network access) that keep students from using their devices effectively while on campus.

* Approach learner analytics purposefully and thoughtfully by adhering to information privacy principles. Collect data for a stated and transparent purpose in order to build students’ confidence in learner analytics activities.

Download the ECAR 2013 study: http://https://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERS1302/ERS1302.pdf

View the survey instrument and findings infographic at: http://www.educause.edu/library/resources/ecar-study-undergraduate-students-and-information-technology-2013

PIRUS code of practice: recording and reporting usage at the individual article level

The final, definitive version of Release 1 of the Publisher and Institutional Repository Usage Statistics (PIRUS) code of practice for recording and reporting usage at the individual article level has now been published and may be accessed on the PIRUS page of the Counting Online Usage of NeTworked Electronic Resources (COUNTER) web site. COUNTER is a multi-agency international initiative whose objective is to develop a set of internationally accepted, extendible codes of practice that allows the usage of online information products and services to be measured more consistently.

The PIRUS code of practice responds to the growing demand from scholars, funding agencies and publishers for a wider range of reliable measures of the impact of scholarly articles. Usage is an important measure of impact and the PIRUS code of practice provides a standard for recording, consolidating and reporting usage at the individual article level that can be easily implemented by COUNTER-compliant publishers and aggregators, as well as by repositories. This code of practice is an important outcome of the JISC-funded PIRUS project, whose overall aim was to assess the feasibility of recording, reporting and consolidating usage of individual journal articles hosted by publishers, aggregators, institutional repositories and subject repositories.

PIRUS builds on, and is consistent with, the COUNTER code of practice. COUNTER will be responsible for its ongoing development and management. Implementation of PIRUS is not a requirement for COUNTER-compliance, but publishers who wish to provide their authors and customers with reliable, consistent usage statistics at the individual article level are encouraged to adopt this new standard. PIRUS covers the following areas: article types to be counted; article versions to be counted; data elements to be measured; definitions of these data elements; requirements for data processing; content and format of usage reports. While this Release focuses on journal articles, its principles may be applied to other categories of content items that are well defined, and have sufficiently robust metadata associated with them.

The PIRUS standard has already been implemented for UK academic institutional repositories by IRUS-UK (http://www.irus.mimas.ac.uk/), a national service that enables UK institutional repositories to share and expose usage statistics based on the PIRUS standard. IRUS-UK collects raw usage data from UK institutional repositories and processes these data into PIRUS-compliant statistics.

PIRUS page of the COUNTER web site: http://www.projectcounter.org/pirus.html

NISO releases draft recommended practice on indexed discovery service for comments

The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) is seeking comments on the draft recommended practice Open Discovery Initiative (ODI): Promoting Transparency in Discovery. Launched in 2012, the NISO ODI aims to facilitate increased transparency in the content coverage of index-based discovery services and to recommend consistent methods of content exchange. This draft recommended practice provides specific guidelines for content providers on metadata elements, linking, and technical formats, and for discovery service providers on content listings, linking, file formats, methods of transfer, and usage statistics. The document also provides background information on the evolution of discovery and delivery technology and a standard set of terminology and definitions for this technology area.

"An increasing number of libraries, especially those that serve academic or research institutions, have invested in index-based discovery services as a strategic interface to all their resources," states Marshall Breeding, an independent library consultant and Co-chair of the ODI Working Group. "These libraries expect their uniquely licensed and purchased electronic content to be made available within their discovery service of choice. But it is often not clear which resources are available, which are indexed in full text, by citations only, or both, and whether the metadata derives from aggregated databases or directly through the full text. Libraries deserve a clear explanation of the degree of availability of their content in the available discovery services and they need usage statistics for access from the discovery tool."

"The domain of index-based discovery services involves a complex ecosystem of interrelating issues and interests among content providers, libraries, and discovery service creators," explains Jenny Walker, an independent consultant and Co-chair of the ODI Working Group. "The increasing use of indexed search as a primary means for library patrons to discover and access licensed content brings with it new requirements for industry practices that will ensure consistent provision of metadata, unbiased linking to source material, and neutrality of algorithms for generating result sets, relevance rankings, and link order. Specific guidelines around these issues are given in the ODI Recommended Practice."

"In addition to the recommendations in the current draft, the ODI Working Group has identified a number of actions for future work," states Nettie Lagace, NISO Associate Director for Programs. "NISO plans to support this follow-up effort to address such issues as collaborative discussion mechanisms, application programming interfaces, handling of restricted content, on-demand lookup, and interaction with COUNTER about usage statistics related to discovery services."

The draft recommended practice is open for public comment through November 18, 2013. To download the draft or submit online comments, visit the ODI webpage at: http://www.niso.org/workrooms/odi/

Ingram to support Chicago public library PDA pilot

Ingram Content Group Inc. has announced that the Chicago Public Library has selected its comprehensive library service solutions to support a large-scale patron driven acquisition (PDA) pilot for print books.

The innovative Chicago Public Library program puts the power of content selection into patrons’ hands. In a time of budget constraints and fiscal accountability, the patron driven print initiative streamlines content selection for the library and provides comprehensive tools to purchase books that are wanted books, saving valuable time and resources.

"It’s rewarding for us to support the Chicago Public Library’s PDA initiative, knowing that we are bridging the gap between what patrons want and what they have access to in their local library," said Dan Sheehan, Vice President and General Manager, Ingram Content Group library services. "By understanding the library’s large-scale needs and goals for the PDA program, we were able to implement a cost-efficient solution that is basically maintenance-free for the library, giving them freedom to focus on other areas."

The Chicago Public Library received a $300,000 grant from the Illinois State Library to conduct the PDA pilot over two years. The library selected Ingram to manage the innovative program. To launch the PDA pilot, Ingram created hand-tailored lists for adult fiction, non-fiction, and youth titles, and the bibliographic records for these books were added to the library’s online catalog. When an item is requested by a patron, a purchase is triggered, a report is generated for the library, and the library places an order with Ingram. At the conclusion of the project, Chicago Public Library will own approximately 13,000 new reading and informational materials.

Through its rich and current book collections, state of the art technology, and cultural and public partnerships, the Chicago Public Library is a thriving, engaged leader in Chicago’s diverse neighborhoods. With 80 locations, the library provides free access to a rich collection of physical and digital materials and is known for its high quality author discussions, exhibits, and programs for children, teens, and adults. Ingram has been a valued supplier to the Chicago Public Library for more than a decade.

More about the Chicago Public Library: http://www.chipublib.org/

More information about Ingram: http://www.ingramcontent.com

Understanding book usage patterns in academic libraries: research from OCLC, OhioLINK

"Consortial Book Circulation Patterns: The OCLC-OhioLINK Study" provides an interpretation of the book circulation patterns from the OhioLINK consortium and OCLC Research study. The article is scheduled for publication in the November 2014 issue of College and Research Libraries but a preprint (pdf) is available now.

Written by Edward T. O’Neill and Julia Gammon, the article outlines the study methodology, analyzes the data, and offers insights into the consortium-wide collection usage. The OCLC-OhioLINK study collected and analyzed circulation data for libraries within the consortium examining the circulation of 28,475,701 books from over 100 academic libraries. Circulation patterns analyzed include subject and language usage, as well as scattering, obsolescence and duplication.

Key highlights from the article include:

* Different types of libraries had similar circulation rates with an average annual circulation rate of 0.11 circulations per book.

* Most usage was generated by a relatively small proportion of books: 7.2 percent of manifestations produced 80 percent of circulation and over 80 percent of the manifestations did not circulate in the year observed.

* Few books were heavily used but a large proportion of the collection were rarely, if ever, used.

* Older books had a much lower circulation rate than new books but they continued to be used and are an essential part of research collections.

* Previous use is the best predictor of future use and could effectively help to identify additional books suitable for the depositories.

The results and conclusions from the study offer valuable insights for library collection planning, including library purchasing, storage considerations, and future usage prediction.

The data collected in the study were published in the report, OhioLINK – OCLC Collection and Circulation Analysis Project 2011.

For more information about the study, see the OhioLINK Collection and Circulation Analysis project activity page: http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/ohiolink.html

Read the preprint: http://www.oclc.org/research/publications/library/2011/2011-06r.html

Penguin Group to distribute eBooks to public libraries via B & T’s Axis 360

Baker & Taylor, the world’s largest distributor of digital and physical books and entertainment products, has announced that Penguin Group (USA) LLC’s ebooks are available to all public libraries and consortia using the Axis 360 digital media platform.

In Fall 2012, two Axis 360 libraries participated in a test program circulating select Penguin Group ebooks to patrons. As a result of the successful partnering with the Los Angeles Public Library and Cuyahoga County Public Library, Penguin is now making its full ebook catalog, including DK titles, available to all public libraries using Axis 360.

"We want to give our sincere thanks to the Los Angeles Public Library and the Cuyahoga County Public Library for participating in the test, whose outcome is that all public libraries will now be able to have access to high-demand content from Penguin Group," said George Coe, President of Baker & Taylor’s Library & Education division. "It speaks to Penguin trusting Baker & Taylor. And it’s an expression of Baker & Taylor’s long-standing relationship with the publisher community."

Baker & Taylor will make Penguin Group ebooks available to all public library customers through its comprehensive Title Source™ 3 selection and acquisitions tool. eBooks will then be available for patrons to discover, download and read through the Axis 360 digital media platform. Titles will also be incorporated into Baker & Taylor’s FirstLook new title notifications plans, and throughout the full range of collection development programs that Baker & Taylor provides its customers for title selection and fulfillment in physical and digital formats.

Axis 360 delivers digital audiobooks and ebooks for library users in EPUB, PDF and Blio formats to PC and Mac computers, laptops and netbooks, to smartphones and tablets running on Android and iOS, and to popular ereaders such as NOOK®, Sony Reader™ and Kobo™.

More about Axis 360: http://www.btol.com/axis360.cfm

3M Cloud Library introduces "Buy and Donate" program supported by Kobo

3M Library Systems is making the 3M Cloud Library eBook Lending System even more beneficial for participating libraries with a new "Buy and Donate" feature supported by Kobo, a global leader in eReading. The new program gives libraries the option to add a Buy and Donate button to their 3M Cloud Library web site. When patrons click the button, they will be taken to the Kobo Bookstore to finalize their digital book purchases. 3M will donate a portion of sales to the library for use in purchasing additional eBooks from the 3M Cloud Library. With library budgets under constant pressure, this additional revenue stream can be a valuable way to enhance collections.

"With this program, a portion of the profits from an eBook sale will be donated to the library," said Matt Tempelis, Global Business Manager for 3M Library Systems. "Kobo is a company that stands for Readers, and as such, emerged as the ideal partner for this initiative. We are excited to work with them to support libraries through eBook purchases."

In addition to helping bolster the relationship between patrons and libraries, the program also hopes to drive eBook traffic for publishers who are not yet participating in the library market. "This effort will help us engage with more publishers, and through added exposure in the Kobo eBook store, publishers will gain another avenue for readers to discover their eBook content," said Tempelis.

Now in use at approximately 400 libraries around the USA, the 3M Cloud Library is a turnkey system of digital content and in-library hardware, along with apps for borrowing and reading. Thousands of patrons have now discovered the ease of browsing, checking out and reading eBooks on their own devices or on a 3M eReader checked out from the library. This flexible solution allows patrons to check out or buy materials and read on the device of their choice – at home or on the go. The Buy and Donate feature will roll out in November to participating libraries.

More information: http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/library-systems-NA/library-technologies/ebook-lending/

In related news, Kobo announced in October that its Kobo Aura HD eReader has won the German Design Award 2014 in the Lifestyle Category. The Kobo Aura HD, the world’s highest-definition 6.8″ E Ink eReader, met the German Design Council’s criteria for high quality design, degree of innovation, functionally, and ergonomics. Standing out from 1,900 entries, the Kobo Aura HD represents up to 25 percent of Kobo’s eReading device sales and was named The Best eReader by the Wall Street Journal.

"At Kobo we are passionate about creating the best reading experience possible." said Pamela Hilborn, Vice President of Product and Design, Kobo. "With the Kobo Aura HD, we took our inspiration from the organic beauty of folded paper – so it’s designed to be visually beautiful yet still be extremely comfortable to hold for long periods of time. We couldn’t be more proud to be recognized by the German Design Council with this award."

The German Design Award will be presented to Kobo as part of the German Design Awards Gala on February 7, 2014 in Frankfurt. Between February 7 and March 14, the public will have a chance to vote for the winner of the Public’s Choice Award. Voting will take place at http://www.designpreis.de

Designed for the most passionate Reader, the Kobo Aura HD delivers a superior eReading experience with the highest resolution display available on the market in an E Ink eReader. At 265 dpi and 1,440×1,080 resolution, and with a 6.8″ Pear E Ink touchscreen, the Kobo Aura HD offers 30 percent more reading surface and the closest experience to print-on-paper. Images and text are showcased beautifully and the ClarityScreen+ delivers a crisp, clear and glare-free eReading experience. The display has the most durable E Ink eReader screen on the market as proven by an independent test that revealed the screen stood up to drops from 3″ up to 2.4 times better than the competition. The Kobo Aura HD was designed to fit perfectly in the Reader’s hand, just as a hardcover book does, offering a truly ergonomic design and immersive reading experience.

For more information: http://www.kobo.com

LEAP: Polaris Library Systems next generation library automation software

Polaris Library Systems has unveiled the development of a new product, LEAP, considered to be the next generation of library automation software. LEAP, a web application that brings the Polaris power and functionality to the user through a browser, can be used on a desktop, notebook, or tablet.

Polaris Library Systems, a provider of technology solutions for academic, private and public libraries, is developing LEAP with an eye towards the future. As mobile applications increasingly allow people to access information wherever they may be, Polaris’ web application will enable the embedded librarian who assists patrons anywhere inside or outside the library.

"Our new web application is device-independent; a librarian just points his or her web-enabled browser to access staff functions," said Bill Schickling, president and CEO, Polaris Library Systems. "LEAP builds upon the Polaris ILS foundation, extending functionality with a modern architecture that will serve librarians today and in the future."

Revealed at the 2013 Annual Polaris Users Group Conference, customers were able to see the easy-to-use functionality that LEAP offers. Built using HTML5 to work within a browser, the initial LEAP release focuses on member services, allowing librarians to connect with patrons away from the circulation and reference desks. Libraries will benefit immediately from a reimagined, intuitive user interface, designed for optimal flexibility in workflow.

LEAP is currently in the development phase, with a scheduled launch in spring 2014. Libraries interested in becoming part of the LEAP Partners Program, which allows early adopters first access to the new software once beta testing is complete, should contact mailto:communications@polarislibrary.com for more information.

For more information, visit: http://www.polarislibrary.com

OCLC acquires Dutch library systems provider HKA

OCLC has acquired the shares of Huijsmans en Kuijpers Automatisering (HKA), a Dutch organization that develops, implements, and manages systems for libraries, educational and cultural organizations.

The addition of HKA, which offers the Wise line of library systems and services, enhances and extends OCLC services for libraries in The Netherlands. OCLC currently manages the infrastructure for interlibrary loan for many Dutch libraries and offers cataloging services through the GGC, the Dutch shared cataloging system, and the WorldCat global shared cataloging system. OCLC and HKA staff will now work together to accelerate the development and delivery of innovative services for libraries.

"The talented HKA team, and the quality services they provide are an important resource for libraries in the The Netherlands," said Skip Prichard, OCLC President and CEO. "HKA’s innovative spirit and their commitment to libraries are an excellent fit for the OCLC cooperative. They will help us grow our services and further our mission of creating efficiencies and value for our library members in The Netherlands and beyond."

The HKA staff of 29 will continue activities from current locations in Paterswolde and Oss in The Netherlands. The Wise line of library systems, including bicatWise, will continue to be developed and maintained. Moving forward, the staff will also deliver new cloud solutions for the combined user base.

"We are extremely proud to become part of OCLC," said Henk Kuijpers, director at HKA. "by combining HKA’s knowledge of Dutch public libraries with OCLC’s expertise in cloud solutions, we can deliver a new generation of library systems for our users. This is not only a very important step for HKA but also for our libraries, who will benefit from this move with expanded and new services from OCLC." Mr Kuijpers, Jos Huijsmans and Paul Lucassen will continue as directors of HKA.

"HKA has created outstanding products and services, and has earned an excellent reputation in the Dutch library market," said Eric van Lubeek, Managing Director, OCLC EMEA. "We are pleased that OCLC and HKA will now work together to offer even more new solutions for libraries."

For more information on HKA, visit: http://www.bicat.com

MedOANet guidelines for open access policies for research organizations

The Mediterranean Open Access Network (MedOANet) project (http://www.medoanet.eu) has released guidelines for implementing open access policies for research performing and research funding organizations. The aim of the guidelines is the coordination of policy development in the six Mediterranean countries that participate in the project (France, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Turkey). They provide concise and targeted guidance for a harmonized approach towards policy development.

The MedOANet guidelines present the main concepts and issues with respect to open access, discuss the major steps that are necessary in the process of policy development, and present the important components of an institutional and funder policy. They also provide model policies for research performing and research funding organizations, and present best practices in policy development for research performing and research funding organizations.

The guidelines recommend:

* immediate self-archiving in repositories to be required upon acceptance for publication (author final version or publisher version);

* immediate open access to metadata and to full-text research outputs if possible (for universities, research centres, etc.);

* immediate open access to full-text research outputs with up to six months embargo periods (12 for SSH) for research funders;

* peer-reviewed research covered by the policy, especially journal articles, conference proceedings books/monographs;

* mandatory character of the policy, with compliance checked. Authoritative publication lists for institutions derived only from repositories; and

* minimally recommend that researchers deposit research data that underpin publications in repositories and formulate separate policies.

The purpose of the guidelines is to provide guidance in defining and implementing open access policies at national and institutional level and their coordination at regional level, based on existing best practices and in line with the European Commission’s Recommendation and Communication on access to and preservation of and dissemination of scientific information (2012) and the planning for Horizon 2020.

The MedOANet guidelines for implementing open access policies for research performing and research funding organizations will soon become available in all the languages of the six Mediterranean countries-partners of the project. The guidelines were first presented during the MedOAnet project’s European conference and are released on occasion of Open Access Week 2013.

Link to the English version of the MedOANet guidelines: http://medoanet.eu/sites/www.medoanet.eu/files/documents/MED2013_GUIDELine_dp_EN_ws.pdf

Heidi Hanson and Zoe Stewart-Marshall