Catalogers and web usability

I'm still studying OCLC's new report: Online Catalogs: What Users and Librarians Want. I don't like their negative take on subject headings (page 52). Especially when the users in the survey ranked "more subject information" above "add summaries/abstracts" and "add table of contents." I would read that to mean that users find controlled subject vocabularies helpful.

But that aside, one of the issue the report highlights that seems to be a neglected area among catalogers is web usability. Usability is discussed on pages 50-51 of the report. Both web usability and information architecture are two new areas of study that we can learn a lot from as we rework how we catalog and create metadata for our users. Glad the report points that out!

Comments

[Jodi Schneider]

I'd make a distinction between subject headings (themselves) and subject-heading-powered display (e.g. "more subject info").

Thanks for the usability shout-out! I've yet to read the report, but looking forward to sitting down with it sometime.

[Chris]

Hi Jodi,

Good distinction. I was going to add that "more subject information" does not necessarily mean precooordinated Library of Congress subject headings. It could refer to tags, etc. No matter, good subject metadata is necessary in whatever form.

[arkham]

It's pretty sad that web usability and information architecture can be considered "new areas of study". I studied both in grad school (ok, I only finished in '06, but still, in web terms, that's forever).

A lot of the problems with our catalogs could be fixed by really applying usability and IA...unfortunately, being stuck with an ILS vendor's OPAC makes that really difficult. (and WorldCat Local will not solve the problem)

[Heidi Hoerman]

I've made a quick comment about this over at http://future4catalogers.wordpress.com/. Thanx, Christine.

[Chris]

Thanks, arkham. I've modified the post. Yes, I agree, not exactly "new."