project ockham

[Eric Lease Morgan]

This note simply brings to your attention an NSD Digital Library 
project called Ockham:

   http://ockham.org/

As briefly described in the most recent issue of D-Lib Magazine:

   The Ockham Initiative is building a framework for
   creating component-based digital library services and
   collections. The framework is essentially organized
   into two parts: a registry and a set of
   internet-available services. The registry is an
   application residing on a peer-to-peer network. Its
   primary purpose is to facilitate the discovery of
   digital library services and collections on the
   Internet. The set of internet-available services
   implements common digital library functions such as
   annotating, collecting, creating, deleting, editing,
   finding, organizing, reviewing, etc. They provide these
   functions through lightweight protocols such as the
   OAI-PMH or SRU/SRW— as well as through web services....

   http://dlib.org/dlib/november04/11inbrief.html#FOX

One of my primary responsibilities in Ockham is the implementation of 
an alerting (current awareness) service using National Science 
Foundation Digital Library information as content and SRU ("Sonne of 
Z39.50") as the means of creating user profiles. The beginnings of an 
implementation is available here:

   http://alert.ockham.org/

There you will find:

   * an outline of the proposed alerting process
   * links to source code
   * a rudimentary implementation of SRU
   * a to-do list

The National Science Foundation has spent lots of money over the past 
ten years building freely accessible digital library content and 
services specific to the mathematics and scientific communities. It is 
our tax dollars hard at work. All we as librarians have to do is 
collect the data and re-purpose it to fit the needs of our specific 
user groups. The Ockham efforts are one illustration of how we can make 
this happen.

-- 
Eric Lease Morgan
University Libraries of Notre Dame