« Tool libraries | Main | Publishing book lists out of the catalog onto your web site »

30 December 2005

Visual wall of books "what's new" display

UPDATE: See Jenny Levine's review of the virtual new bookshelf at the Allen County, Indiana public library.

New non-fiction at the Ann Arbor District Library, 30 December 2005 I wrote a half dozen lines of not very pretty code and turned the Ann Arbor District Library's new holding lists into a wall of books display for non-fiction and for fiction.  (I would have done DVDs and CDs too but the catalog doesn't have enough images to make it worthwhile.)

It was relatively easy to do because the catalog has an RSS feed.  The code is fragile - it will break on the slightest change to the catalog formatting - though I have a sneaking suspicion we can fix that with some relatively simple microformat coding.   The same principle should work with any catalog search, or with any other AADL feed (patron checkouts, holds, checkout history).

Technorati Tags: , , , , , ,

Posted on 30 December 2005 in Ann Arbor, Book covers, Books sorted by color, Collection development, Electronic collections, Library 2.0, Library mashups |

Comments

Om Jorunn calls this a "bibliotekhack" at http://andedam.org/2005/12/31/mer-hacking/ .

(Sorry, I don't understand the rest, for lack of translation tools.)

Posted by: Edward Vielmetti | 31 December 2005 at 10:34 AM

Great stuff!!! ... Love what AADL does ... I absolutely love the idea of giving patrons the ability to use whatever tools makes sense them and expand their abilities to change their lives ... keep doing it ... you folks are inspirations for all of us! Say "hi" to John for me ...

Posted by: Tim Rogers | 31 December 2005 at 11:02 AM

Ed, I would *totally* like to steal this idea for use on our site.

Maybe even make something like a coverpop for it...

Posted by: ejk | 31 December 2005 at 11:37 AM

Beautiful!

Posted by: Laura | 31 December 2005 at 11:39 AM

Very, very smooth. Your blog is fast becoming a daily read for me. Your ideas are wonderful! Can I ask...what ILS is Ann Arbor using?

Posted by: Patricia Uttaro | 31 December 2005 at 12:03 PM

ejk: steal away! I put one up on flickr as well with "hot titles", which looked nice too.

Patricia: Ann Arbor is using a heavily customized Drupal front end to an Innovative Interfaces catalog. John Blyberg's blog at http://www.blyberg.net/ has the most ongoing technical details; I don't recall reading a "build notes" style description of all that is involved.

Posted by: Edward Vielmetti | 31 December 2005 at 12:19 PM

Post a comment

If you have a TypeKey or TypePad account, please Sign In

Subscribe to Superpatron

Categories

What they're saying about Superpatron

  • So you've got Ed exploring the possibility space, and John working to enlarge that space, and together they've created a virtuous cycle of innovation. Now this is obviously an extreme example. You are not going to find a superpatron of Ed's caliber and a superlibrarian of John's caliber in every town. But I think the dynamic at work there can apply more broadly. And if it does, it will matter that these patrons and librarians are situated in a local context. (Jon Udell, Remixing the Library, GRL2020)
  • Der Supernutzer beschreibt 10 Möglichkeiten, der Bibliothek zu helfen....Den wichtigsten Punkt hat er vergessen, ihn aber selbst erfüllt. Sozusagen als Präambel könnte man also anführen:

    “Übe konstruktive Kritik an der Bibliothek. Ohne Resonanz können die Leute da drin nicht wissen, was Du willst.” Infobib.de

  • How come only some books in the Google Book Search have “find in a library” links next to them? Diglet asks, and gets an answer, sort of a lame one if you ask me. update: Kevin mentioned in the comments that it would be great to see this for all books in Google Books. I went to bed thinking “Oh yeah, I should look into that….” and while I was sleeping, Superpatron, aka Ed Vielmetti solved the crime, er problem, and created a Greasemonkey script (a plug-in that you can run with Firefox) that does this for Ann Arbor and can be modified for any library. (Jessamyn West)
  • Curse you Superpatron! t's way past my bedtime, but the Ann Arbor Superpatron has been planting ideas in my head again… (Dave Pattern)
  • Superpatron is a blog run by a patron. The author posts entries about events and articles relevant to the library community, but does it with a patron point of view. (North Texas Regional Library System)
  • The blogosphere's resident "awesomest patron ever," Edward Vielmetti, appears in an article in School Library Journal about how he wrote a script tweaking (ahem, improving) Google Book Search. Vielmetti's blog, Superpatron, is one I read daily and highly recommend to anyone in libraries looking to get a very smart user's perspective. (Librarian In Black)
  • When I wrote him back, I called him the “AADL Super Patron,” which is very coincidental, since he has been planning to create a blog with almost the same name. Today, Superpatron is live and I’m sure it will quickly be filled with Ed’s terrific ideas about making libraries more responsive to patrons’ needs. So hurry up and subscribe already, ok? (Meredith Farkas)
  • The Superpatron (faster than a speeding reference librarian…) posts a presentation on the use of del.icio.us for research. Steven Cohen, Library Stuff
  • I've talked about Edward Vielmetti here before, but I never had the right name for him. Now I do. He's Superpatron! (Jenny Levine)
  • Last fall, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I gave a talk entitled Superpatrons and Superlibrarians. Joining me for this week’s podcast are the two guys who inspired that talk. The superpatron is Ed Vielmetti, an old Internet hand who likes to mash up the services proviced by the Ann Arbor District Library. That’s possible because superlibrarian John Blyberg, who works at the AADL, has reconfigured his library’s online catalog system, adding RSS feeds and a full-blown API he calls PatREST. (Jon Udell)
  • Little did I know that when I pointed to Ed Vielmetti’s blog, I was not only coining a phrase, but providing the name for Ed’s brilliant new blog. Ed is that (unfortunately still) rare creature that not only groks the net in fullness, but also has use for his public library. (Eli Neiburger)
  • Die Ann Arbor District Library hat einen Nutzer, der sie liebt. Und nicht nur das, er schreibt darüber. Oliver Obst

upcoming.org

Archives

More...

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Blog powered by TypePad
Member since 08/2003