The Pantomime Horse:
synchronising the back and front
ends of EDS
Allison Carroll and Emma Coonan
At the starting gate
Our thinking
• “Mostly right” approach
• Permanent beta
• Coverage choices: not a one-stop-shop
LibrarySearch
Want less?
Want more?
UEA Library holdings
Catalogue only
Books and journals, in
print or electronic – but
not articles!
Full-text articles, ebooks and
books, conference papers,
reports and more
Beyond UEA’s
collections
Some results will only be
citations, not full text
Core principles
• Clear uncluttered interface
• Consistent and user-language labelling
• Straightforward navigation routes with as few clicks as possible
Gaining the edge
Recommendations
• Make ‘Resource type’ facet far more visible and comprehensible
• Show availability as well as classmark in results list view
• Distinguish e-books from books more clearly in results list view
Make ‘Resource type’ facet far more visible and
comprehensible
• Relabelling of facets
Resource Types → Show results for
Content Provider → Databases Searched
• Resource Type and Content Provider default to open
Show availability as well as classmark in results
list view
• Loan types & availability
(Aleph REST API)
Show availability as well as classmark in results
list view
• Print journals – information in 2 locations
Show availability as well as classmark in results
list view
• Print journals - Fix for export converts holdings and location statements into
a single 866 per HOL
Distinguish e-books from books more clearly in
results list view
• Removal of GMD “Electronic resource” - conflicted with icon for eBook
and skewed search results
• Removal of items with misleading “Location” information
Leaps and bounds
Find it faster
with Library Search
Post-live user feedback
• “On multiple occasions now I've gotten no results on books I know are in
the library (one of them is actually sitting on my desk right now).”
• “I can't find out how to look up journals on the library pages.”
• “I don’t understand ‘institutional account’ - is this not my UEA login? Can’t I
just log in with my UEA password?”
Post-live tweaking
• Guest access no longer catalogue only
• UEA catalogue records for EBSCO e-books no longer filtered out
• Pre-search resource selection “Articles” “book” = users still have difficulty
with facets
Post-live tweaking
• Guest access no longer catalogue only
• UEA catalogue records for EBSCO e-books no longer filtered out
• Pre-search resource selection “Articles” “book” = users still have difficulty
with facets
• Top menu links added to homepage
Post-live tweaking
• Guest access no longer catalogue only
• UEA catalogue records for EBSCO e-books no longer filtered out
• Pre-search resource selection “Articles” “book” = users still have difficulty
with facets
• Top menu links added to homepage
• SSO for EbscoHost/EDS account
Flying finish
Next year’s race…?
• Publication/ Full Text Finder
Next year’s race…?
• Publication/ Full Text Finder
• Author facet widget
Next year’s race…?
•
•
•
•
Publication/ Full Text Finder
Author facet widget
Further exploration with CustomLinks and ranking
Improve catalogue records
Next year’s race…?
•
•
•
•
•
Publication/ Full Text Finder
Author facet widget
Further exploration with CustomLinks and ranking
Improve catalogue records
Other EBSCO apps & widgets?
“I love it. So much better than primo.
I don't actually have a suggestion just
wanted to say thanks!
Great job, works on all my devices!”
2 June 2015
All photographs by TaylorHerring from the Flickr album
‘The London Pantomime Horse Race’,
licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
‘Miniature horse line art’ by Avery018 on DeviantArt
licensed under CC BY 3.0