LinkBaton (was: Open Source and Librarianship)

[Eric Hellman]

Part 2. Manifesto

In the thread on Open Source and Librarianship, Edward Wigg wrote 
lucidly about the structural barriers discouraging  ILS vendors from 
modularizing their systems. He is completely correct that external 
"interfaces" such as z39.50/ILL/EDI are inadequate for achieving true 
modularity in an ILS.

However, as the ILS becomes an iLS, (internet Library System) we have 
a whole new set of interfaces that can be, ought to be and must be 
exposed. We've already seen the web browser be integrated into the 
library environment as the universal user interface. The long term 
effect of this is that the closed, proprietary library computing 
environment is dead and buried. The open browser interface has opened 
the door; everything else is going through that door eventually.

The next crack in the closed library system occurred when the journal 
publishers realized that they could present their journals directly 
to the users with minimal intermediation by the libraries. This 
presented them with all sorts of new business models, new revenue 
streams, and new possibilities for connecting scholars to information 
and to each other. All of a sudden, the library has to fit  a large 
number of publishers into its information network environment.

It should not be so surprising that these offerings haven't fit in 
particularly well, after all, there are were no interfaces for them 
to fit into. But I feel that the response from libraries and their 
vendors of turning to aggregators for a fix to this rip in the 
closed, comfortable  system is not particularly healthy.

All sorts of information services that used to come on paper are now 
being turned into web sites. Catalogs, A&I databases, everything. 
Unfortunately, the only public interfaces these web sites have to 
talk to at libraries are those of the user's browser.

First among the new interfaces needed are the linking interfaces. A 
"Books in Print" database needs a way to link to the OPAC's record 
for a book. A scholarly journal needs to be able to link to the 
library's A&I databases. Even Amazon.com needs ways to connect to a 
user's library resources.

So now you see what we're trying to do with LinkBaton. LinkBaton's 
place in the Openly manifesto is that it's the first version of an 
internet interface that one part of a library can use to talk to 
other parts of a library.

The internet is THE path to open interfaces in the library. Open 
interfaces are THE way to modularizing systems.

You might think that talking through an "external" internet to local 
systems is inefficient. This may be true now but it is becoming less 
true every day; libraries are becoming less localized as well. And if 
you've ever tried to integrate a PERL program with a Java or C 
program, you'll have discovered that it's usually easier and more 
flexible to open an internet connection from one program to the other 
than it is to mess with pipes, ORB's, OLE etc.



Eric

Eric Hellman
Openly Informatics, Inc.
http://www.openly.com/           21st Century Information Infrastructure
LinkBaton: Your Shortcuts to Information  http://linkbaton.com/