ROADS Progress Report from UKOLN

For ROADS Executive Meeting, Institute of Learning and Research Technology (ILRT), University of Bristol, 15 October 1998.

Agenda: <URL:http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/roads/exec/next-meet/>

Work on ROADS at UKOLN has included the following:

1. Cross Searching Demonstrators

UKOLN host several demonstrators of the cross-searching functionality offered by the Whois++ and centroid support in ROADS version 2. There are currently three demonstrators available:

• A general demonstrator cross-searching seven subject services
• An engineering based demonstrator that cross-searches EEVL and EELS
• A demonstrator that cross-searches the eLib projects database and the British Library Digital Library Research Programme project database

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/roads/crossroads/>

2. DUBLINCORE template type

UKOLN have developed a simple DUBLINCORE template type. A draft version of this is available in the template registry. We have developed a sample ROADS database of descriptions of most Ariadne articles using this template. Searches on this database can be phrased in terms of DC elements. Results are displayed using DC elements:

<URL:http://roads.ukoln.ac.uk/roads-ariadne/cgi-bin/search.pl>

We will also use a ROADS DUBLINCORE database as the basis for embedding DC metadata into the eLib documents that we serve from the eLib pages:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/services/elib/>

This will be done using a server-side include script (SSI).

A short statement of compatability between ROADS and DC is available at:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/roads/interoperability/roads-dc.html>

3. eLib Projects database

UKOLN have updated the ROADS eLib projects database to include information about the phase 3 projects. This database is now included as the sample database in the ROADS version 2 release.

<URL:http://roads.ukoln.ac.uk/roads-elib/elib-search.html>

4. RECCI

UKOLN have produced a preliminary report for the ROADS Evaluation of Cataloguing in Connection to Interoperability (RECCI) study which based on a detailed review of 200 completed ROADS templates from four ROADS-based services (ADAM, History, OMNI and SOSIG). The report highlighted issues relating to the varied use of attribute separators and inconsistencies relating to the use of formats for names, languages and other elements:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/roads/recci/preliminary-report.html>

5. Cataloguing Guidelines

A new version of the ROADS Cataloguing Guidelines has been produced. This takes account of comments made by subject services and the findings of the RECCI study:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/roads/cataloguing/cataloguing-rules.html>

6. Presentations

MD gave a presentation on UKOLN metadata activity (including ROADS) at the META-LIB Workshop "Metadaten - neue Perspektiven für die Erschließung von Netzpublikationen in Bibliotheken" held at the Niedersächsischen Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen in Germany on 23 June 1998. Slides from the presentation are available at:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/presentations/goettingen/>

AP gave a presentation on "Metadata for the Web - RDF and the Dublin Core" at the UKOLUG 20th Conference held at the Manchester Conference Centre on 15 July 1998:

<URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/presentations/ukolug98/>

7. Current work:

Work in progress includes:

• Collection Description: UKOLN have been involved in a small working group looking at the issues of collection description. This work is primarily aimed at addressing the needs of eLib phase 3 Hybrid Library and Clumps projects. A note on work in progress is available at:

  <URL:http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/cld/wg-report/>

  One of the ways in which this work is expected to develop is the construction of a COLLECTION template type. This will enable ROADS to be used as the basis of a collection description database.

• Interoperability guidelines: UKOLN is in process of producing an overview of interoperability issues with specific reference to ROADS

• Centroid evaluation: As part of the 'interoperability guidelines' UKOLN will review the purpose and effectiveness of centroids. The review will be targeted at an informed but non-technical audience. We will address issues connected with keyword searching, specialist vocabularies. This will take into account work done as part of the TF-CHIC project.

• RECCI: UKOLN will generate and analyse statistics of ROADS template usage

• DC-6: On the metadata front, the forthcoming Sixth Dublin Core Metadata Workshop (DC-6) will be held at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC, on the 2-4 November. The main goal of this sixth workshop will be to consolidate the work of various Dublin Core working groups, to share implementation experiences and strategies of existing pilot implementations, and to address the key issues necessary to promote interoperability among Dublin Core implementations:

  <URL:http://www.oclc.org:5046/conferences/dc6/>

Maintained by: Michael Day, UKOLN.
Last updated: 14-Oct-1997