UKOLN News

The Strategic Content Alliance (SCA) is a JISC initiative working to build a common information environment
where users of publicly funded e-content can gain best value from the investment
that has been made by reducing the barriers that currently inhibit access, use and reuse of online content. The SCA is currently investigating means of providing a set of principles and guidelines for best practice and has therefore organised a series of “home nation” forums. Brian Kelly of UKOLN will take part in a “Standards
Panel” at the SCA Home Nations event to be held at the Park Plaza, Cardiff, on 5 June 2008.

Booking is now open for the CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing Group (CIG)
Conference to be held at the University of Strathclyde, 3-5 September 2008. The Conference Programme and associated booking form are both available.

The Scaling Up Report presents the results of a JISC-funded scoping study to assess the feasibility of a federated model for data repositories in the domain of crystallography. It builds on earlier work in the eBank UK Project and has been based on a mix of desk-based
research, a consultation workshop and a series of interviews with stakeholders. The report was written by members of staff at UKOLN and the University of Southampton.

Delegates can now book to attend the Institutional Web Management Workshop 2008, a 3-day event for those involved in the provision of institutional Web services, to be held at the University of Aberdeen from Tuesday 22 – Thursday 24 July 2008. The theme of this year”s workshop is “The Great Debate”. You will be required to select your parallel sessions when registering so please read up in advance.

Ariadne Issue 55 is now available with articles on a wide range of topics including an application profile for images, an overview of current initiatives in standards for educational metadata, an Australian perspective on eResearch together with an article on
developments in institutional repositories in South Africa. John
MacColl considers the “co-operative imperative” upon research libraries
while Pete Williams, Katrina Dean, Ian Rowlands and Jeremy Leighton John
provide insights into digital behaviours and developments in personal digital
collections. There is also a description of current work in Intute”s
Integration Project; and how custom-built search engines can enhance the relevance of search results. Nick Lewis outlines the University of East
Anglia’s experience of implementing a new search and retrieval interface
for presenting the library catalogue. Alex Ball of UKOLN reports on this year”s KIM Conference while colleague Steph Taylor reviews a work investigating new ways to
understand the emotions of users. Emma Tonkin of UKOLN provides her views on a work giving an overview of two decades of research into computerisation movements.

Three vacancies have arisen at UKOLN: Research & Development Team Leader, Research Officer (Metadata Advocacy) and
Systems Developer (Repositories Integration). Details can be found on UKOLN”s vacancies page. The closing date for all three applications has been extended to 16 May 2008.