[Web4lib] Federated search products

[David Walker]

>> Even when [the Metalib X-Server] does get there, 
>> however, who will have the time and skills to build 
>> an interface essentially from scratch. We don't.

Well, I guess we do, since we are building an interface from scratch
here at Cal State San Marcos using the Metalib X-Server -- as are three
or four other libraries.

But we are an early adopter of the X-Server.  As soon as we finish our
work here at San Marcos, we'll make our code open source (and I hope the
other X-Server libraries will as well), so that new libraries who are
interested in using the Metalib X-Server can start building their
interfaces from . . . well, some point after scratch.

It's actually not that difficult to make an interface against an
XML-based API.  A little code to pass information back and forth and
XSLT to make it pretty.

So I guess there's actually a middle point between commercial and open
source metasearch system -- and that is to have a group of libraries
sharing open source code for the interface to a system, while the vendor
maintains the underlying application and knowledgebase.

I think that can actually work out really well.  If I am going to spend
my time working on a metasearch system and sharing code, I would much
rather spend it on the interface (which is the most important part of
the system) than building Z39.50 and other types of connections.


--Dave

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David Walker
Web Development Librarian
Library
Cal State San Marcos
760-750-4379
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