endeca: a faceted search solution for the library catalog kristin antelman & emily lynema unc...
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Endeca: a faceted search solution for
the library catalog
Kristin Antelman & Emily Lynema
UNC University Library Advisory Council
June 15, 2006
Overview
Why did we do this?
What is Endeca?
NCSU investment
Working with a non-library vendor
Assessing the results
Some user reaction
“The new Endeca system is incredible. It would be difficult to exaggerate how much better it is than our old online card catalog (and therefore that of most other universities). I've found myself searching the catalog just for fun, whereas before it was a chore to find what I needed.”
- NCSU Undergrad, Statistics
“The new library catalog search features are a big improvement over the old system. Not only is the search extremely fast, but seemingly it's much more intelligent as well.”
- NCSU faculty, Psychology
Why did we do this?
Existing catalogs are hard to use: known item searching works pretty well,
but … users often do keyword searching on topics and
get large result sets returned in system sort order catalogs are unforgiving on spelling errors,
stemming
Catalog value is buried
Subject headings are not leveraged in searching they should be browsed or linked from, not
searched Data from the item record is not leveraged
should be able to filter by item type, location, circulation status, popularity
How does Endeca work?
Endeca Information Access Platform co-exists with SirsiDynix Unicorn ILS and Web2 online catalog
Endeca indexes MARC records exported from Unicorn
Index is refreshed nightly with records added/updated during previous day
Endeca IAP overview
Raw MARC data
NCSU exports and reformats
Flat text files
Data Foundry
Parse text files Indices
MDEX Engine
NCSU Web Application
HTTP
HTTP
Endeca Information Access Platform
Client browser
Quick demo
http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu
Implementation team Information Technology (4)
Team chair and project manager – IT department head Technical lead - Java-trained librarian ILS Librarian – managing data extracts Technical manager – determining appropriate technologies
Research and Information Services (1) Reference librarian – experience with public services and OPAC
problems Metadata and Cataloging (1)
Cataloging librarian – identifying data for indexing and display; fixing backend data problems
Digital Library Initiatives (1) Interface development – mockups, usability, beta testing
Team met weekly during implementation (total of 40-60 hours)
Implementation timeline
License / negotiation: Spring 2005 Acquire: Summer 2005 Implementation:
August 2005 : vendor training September 2005 : finalize requirements October 2005 – January 2006 : design and
development January 12, 2006 : go-live date
It doesn’t have to be perfect!
Ongoing investments
Little ongoing work required for maintenance once application is deployed Infrequent data refreshing from ILS Version upgrades
6 member product team meets bi-weekly Lots of development ideas (as time / library
priorities afford)! Saving time previously invested in Web2
OPAC enhancement
MarcAdapter: a case study
NCSU implementation required local program to transform MARC data for Endeca
Endeca staff recognized effort required to duplicate this process at each library, and
Quickly created a MarcAdapter plugin for raw MARC data Ability to create local field mappings and special
case handlers Eliminate need for external MARC 21 translation
and file merging
Basic statistics (March – May 2006)
Requests by Search Type
Search -> Navigation
29%
Navigation 20%
Search 51%
Navigation statistics (March – May 2006)
Navigation Requests by Dimension
70,516
38,074
38,605
59,248
87,221
74,985
65,545
155,856
169,249
23,848
0 30,000 60,000 90,000 120,000 150,000
Author
Language
Subject: Era
Subject: Region
Library
Format
Subject: Genre
Subject: Topic
LC Classification
Availability
Requests
Navigation statistics (March – May 2006)
Navigation by Dimensions
Subject: Topic19%
Library11%
Format9%
Author9%
Subject: Genre8%
Subject: Region7%
Subject: Era5%
Language5%
New4%
LC Classification20%
Availability3%
Sorting statistics (March – May 2006)
Sorting Requests
Most Popular19%
Title A-Z13%
Pub Date53%
Author A-Z9%
Call Number6%
Other interesting tidbits… (March 2006)
Authority searching decreased 45% Keyword searching increased 230%
Caveat: default catalog search changed from title authority to keyword
~ 5% of keyword searches offered spelling correction or suggestion 3.1% - automatic spell correction 2.3% - “Did you mean…” suggestion
Usability testing
10 undergraduate students 5 with Endeca catalog 5 with old Web2 OPAC
Endeca performed as well as OPAC for known-item searching in usability test 89% Endeca tasks completed ‘easily’ (8/9) 71% OPAC tasks completed ‘easily’ (15/21)
Endeca performed better than OPAC for topical searching in usability test.
Topical searching tasks
Topical Task Success: Web2
Easy36%
Medium7%Hard
23%
Failed34%
Topical Task Success: Endeca
Easy58%
Medium17%
Hard3%
Failed22%
Average topical task duration
A relevance study
Are search results in Endeca more likely to be relevant to a user’s query than search results in Web2 OPAC?
100 topical user searches from 1 month in fall 2005
How many of top 5 results relevant? 40% relevant in Web2 OPAC 68% relevant in Endeca catalog
Future plans FRBR-ized displays FAST (Faceted Access to Subject Terms) instead of LCSH
Enrich records with supplemental Web Services content – more usable TOCs, book reviews, etc.
More integration with website search Use Endeca to index local collections
Thanks
http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/endeca
Emily Lynema, Systems Librarian for Digital Projects