Catalogue – your feedback so far
We knew that using the web as a feedback mechanism and engaging in online consultation was a pretty good idea but we are really pleased to see how good a job it does at connecting us with our customers and ideas. Already we've received a great tip that will help our Linux community (thanks Matt!), and have also received some valuable feedback and suggestions about the new catalogue.
Delivering an improved TPL online experience based on an engaging and honest discussion with our online audience is our goal and I think we’re off to a good start. We thank you for participating and commenting.
The team and I have been reviewing the feedback received over the past week from comments on this blog, sent to Answerline and gathered during our Beta Test of the catalogue last month. Thank you for taking the time to use the new catalogue and tell us what you think.
Here is a summary of your feedback so far.
Missed Holds – Why are these holds displaying? I picked up all my holds and How can I remove notices I no longer want?
This is a new feature. It allows you to see your missed holds, all holds not picked up since February 2008 are showing up in your account. We know this may be confusing, especially if you have placed a new hold on the same title. Unfortunately, you cannot remove them yourself, however, they will be cleared automatically on a regular schedule, so this situation is only temporary.
Your Account/Sign In takes you to the search screen instead of the account screen.
This issue is a high priority, and we are close to having a fix.
More personalized features like being able to track a "wish list" and enabling me to see my borrowing history.
These are both definitely on our list of desired features. Using the new "Link to This Page" feature you are now able to bookmark and copy links of items, as an interim step this may
be a useful alternative. And next year we will enable
you to share items directly to common social networks such as Facebook, Digg and Delicious. So, more is coming in this area in the near term and further out we hope to implement a fulsome TPL solution.
The holds list in Your Account no longer includes author, and you can't sort by author name.
You can see the author's name by clicking the link to the item record, but we understand that you also liked seeing this information on the account screen and being able to sort on it. The number of sortable columns presents a design challenge on the holds screen. We will investigate possible design changes that might allow us to add an author column.
Some of you would prefer to see all their account information on a single page instead of in tabs. Can it be a setting in Your Account?
Based on customer comments, usability testing, and beta testing, we have found that the majority of users prefer the tabbed display. There are no further levels of personalization possible at this time. We hope customers who prefer the single page layout are able to get used to the new layout and find it intuitive.
The Your Account summary screen listing for the number of holds does not include items that are in transit or on the pickup shelf. Some of you find this confusing/misleading, especially because in transit and pickup shelf items are included in the maximum number of holds allowed – it looks like you can place more holds, but you can't. We are working to improve the labelling to clarify this.
Screen width – some of you have report having to scroll horizontally to access the search buttons or other information. We are working on fixing this.
Why doesn't my name appear when I login anymore? - This feature was implemented to improve the privacy of customers who use the catalogue from public computers (e.g. from our library branches or internet cafés). In place of your name you can now display a 'ScreenName' which you can set in your account settings page. "For more information about this please see this FAQ.
Where are the links to "More by this author"/"More on this topic"?
When you click on "Full Details" to display the complete information for an item, the author and subject headings you see here are links that you can click to find more matching titles. (Note: if the result of clicking one of these links is just the same item record you were already looking at, that means there are no other titles matching the author or subject.)
Library Elf no longer works for my Toronto Public Library account.
We are aware of this problem and are not sure why the recent changes to our catalogue have impacted Library Elf, since we are still using the same technology we have had in place since February 2008. Library Elf is a private company not affiliated or officially supported by TPL. Email notification for holds and overdue items is available directly from your Toronto Public Library account. Enter your email address under the Account Settings tab to begin receiving email notices.
Known issues (e.g., slowness, date format, not being able to place holds on items you currently have checked out) – why haven't you fixed this stuff too?
We know these problems are significant. We are constantly working to improve our service. We will continue to keep you posted through this blog about ongoing updates about our efforts to improve the catalogue.
34 thoughts on “Catalogue – your feedback so far”
Just wanted to say thanks for your efforts, and particularly for being so open about it. Very refreshing.
First of all thank you all for your efforts and for listening to our comments.
There is only one thing I want to address. I believe that bolding text on rollover is almost always a very bad idea. Bold text takes up more space than normal text, which makes the visual picture for the user quite jarring when they rollover. We don’t expect text to change size suddenly. Color, yes; background color yes; but size is jarring.
Gabriela – thanks for the comment. You make a good point. We’ll look at it.
Thanks to Matt’s tip about getting the library to access quickly for Linux users!
Running Ubuntu Linux, I found that I had to run the following to do the equivalent of what Matt said, as the “echo” command (even via sudo) was giving a “permission denied.”:
sudo sysctl -w net.ipv4.tcp_window_scaling=0
Since I’m lazy and don’t like typing that every time I reboot, I added that line to the end of /etc/init.d/rc.local and the TPL website is as now as painless to access in Linux as it is in Windows!
torontopubliclibrary.ca seems very slow or not working (Saturday, December 20, 21:30 EST)
Hi John,
All Library online services were unavailable yesterday from about 5 PM to midnight. We were working on equipment related to the Library’s internet connection. It is available now.
Thanks,
Dara
Uh-oh.
Book links from my account listing and from searches do not work for me. Clicking on a link results in an item-not-found message.
Tried in Firefox 2 & IE 6, on Sat Dec 27.
more details re failing links from both account’s checked-out book list, and search results list:
in my checked-out list (10 books total), 4 books in the list — even though they are clickable like the other 6 — fail to link to an item detail page. The 4 books are:
(1) The trouble with physics : the rise of string theory, the fall of a science, and what comes next / 37131068033554
(2) Seven masterpieces of philosophy / 37131071591127
(3) The trial of Colonel Sweeto and other stories : a collection of the comic strips of the Perry Bible Fellowship / 37131081421018
(4) Botnets : the killer web app / 37131086308962
Clicking the link leads to an “Advanced Keyword Search” page with an error message at the top in the form:
“200850{CKEY}” found no matches in the library you searched.
The remaining 6 books in my checked-out list link to an item detail page as expected.
In addition, using Basic Search to locate the 4 mis-linked items by title fails also. The item title shows in the search results list, but clicking on it leads to another page of search results, with a message:
Item not found–perhaps the following list will help
Something very wrong today with searching? (Dec. 27) Catalog find the title, but when I click on it, it comes back with “Item not found, perhaps the following list will help”, and it’s a list from the catalog that is completely unrelated to my search item. I closed and reopened in a new window; same thing.
But overall, things have been much better. Wish you had thrown in the towel and started over sooner, but glad you did.
Re broken links and and searching problems, maintenance on our catalogue was performed last Wednesday through Friday. We are investigating the problems reported and will provide an update as soon as possible.
Thanks for establishing this blog – it’s a most welcome innovation.
I frequently order books out of the stacks at the Toronto Reference Library, but on many occasions (perhaps about half the time) the item lingers on my patron record as an outstanding request even though the item has long ago been returned to the Stacks. In addition, some of these items -but not others – then get logged to my record as “overdue” items, and I get told about it very time I visit a branch (even though the item is back in the stacks and the catalogue record for the item reflects this). And I, in turn, have to get a kind TRL librarian to come to my assistance. Can something be done to help Toronto Reference Library users with respect to these matters? There are wonderful resources in those stacks, but at the moment I think twice about ordering materials from them because of the problems that are triggered. Many thanks.
The library catologue is taking ages to open. Usually, when i use it, it doesn’t take more than 5 seconds, now it’s taking more than a minute and sometimes it wouldn’t even open at all. Also, can’t the library find a better time to update the catalogue
JSTOR article access from the Library Internet may have been affected by system/catalogue changes.
Back in December I could signon to a Library internet computer at the Fairview branch, search Google and select a hit that took me to:
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/443958
That page displaces an icon with the words “JSTOR article” as a link. In December when I clicked it, it took me to an error screen, which said something like: “Sorry, you do not have access to this article.” but there was also an option on that screen for institutional access, which I clicked on, which took me to the article in JSTOR, with the screen saying access via TPL. But now Jan 18, it takes me to a different error screen
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/action/jstor?sici=0195-6744%28199005%2998%3A3%3C251%3APOLAR%3E2.0.CO%3B2-3&doi=10.1086%2F443958
which doesn’t display the institutional access option.
Optimally, clicking on the JSTOR link should have worked directly, if not that then a second screen should give the institutional access option.
When I checked with one of the Fairview staff on Jan 17 they said that “database validation” from Google/internet has been working sometimes and sometimes not.
I am able to go through the Databases option to get into JSTOR and get the article, but it would be easier to able to look directly at JSTOR articles that are found via Google.
I have read that this works at various university library systems and it appeared from the staff comment above that it is supposed to work for the TPL system, so I was hoping this could be made to work again.
Clicking a JSTOR URL from Google from a TPL Internet terminal seems to work – which is good.
Further to my earlier post. When I tried
http://www.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-4294(199724)45%3A4%3C536%3ASIOTVP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-8&cookieSet=1
from Google, from a Fairview internet library session it does work. And the JSTOR screen shows “Your access to JSTOR provided by Toronto Public Library” which was what I was getting in December for the earlier case going through intermediate web pages.
So it appears some JSTOR access works and some does not. It would be good if all JSTOR access worked smoothly.
Hi Hari,
Thanks for your comments. We’ll look into the JSTOR issue and get back to you.
The JSTOR detailed description at the “Research Databases A-Z” TPL page might be misunderstood.
“JSTOR
Archive containing the complete backfile content of important scholarly journals in the fields of Arts, Science and the Humanities. Coverage begins three to five years previous to current editions.”
When I originally read the description I understood “Coverage begins three to five years previous to current editions” to mean
coverage starts about 2004 or 2006, so you would see articles from 2007 but not 1990.
As you saw in my earlier post, I am able to look at an 1990 article. Looking at the Wikipedia description of JSTOR I see that JSTOR does NOT provide the latest 3-5 years of a publication, in otherwords the reverse meaning.
I think it would be clearer to have the description say something like
“JSTOR
Academic database archive of old issues of important scholarly journals in the fields of Arts, Science and the Humanities.
Typically you must wait three to five years before an issue appears in this archive. The precise embargo period (“the Moving Wall”) depends on the agreement with the journal publisher. JSTOR was created for the use of universities and is important in the academic world. The JSTOR website is http://www.jstor.org“
How do I reliably get full text?
I use Article Search for all sources searching the string:”On being sad and mistaken: Mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments”
And I get:
1.On Being Sad and Mistaken: Mood Effects on the Accuracy of Thin-Slice Judgments.
Gray, Heather M.; Ambady, Nalini.
Journal of Personality & Social Psychology (0022-3514)
10/1/2002. Vol.83,Iss.4;p.947-961
Source: MasterFILE Premier
3 Identical records (s) in other databases
I then select “Limit to Full Text” and get
1.On being sad and mistaken: mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments.
Ambady, Nalini.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (0022-3514)
1 Oct 2002. Vol.83,Iss.4;p.947(15)
Source: Business and Company Resource Center
2 Identical records (s) in other databases
I click on the title and it takes me to
http://infotrac.galegroup.com/itw/infomark/1/1/1/purl=rc1_BIM_0_A92589120&dyn=5!xrn_1_0_A92589120?Z3950=1&sw_aep=tplmain
which just displays the abstract, not the full text. I see no option to view full text.
I so I check the other two databases
1.On being sad and mistaken: mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments.
Ambady, Nalini.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (0022-3514)
1 Oct 2002. Vol.83,Iss.4;p.947(15)
Source: Business and Company Resource Center
2.On being sad and mistaken: mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments.
Ambady, Nalini.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (0022-3514)
1 Oct 2002. Vol.83,Iss.4;p.947(15)
Source: Expanded Academic ASAP
3.On being sad and mistaken: mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments.
Ambady, Nalini.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (0022-3514)
1 Oct 2002. Vol.83,Iss.4;p.947(15)
Source: Academic OneFile
Again with the other two databases, only the abstract information is provided.
When the full text option is picked, only hits with the full text should be displayed.
The detail descriptions in the Research Databases should provide the probability of seeing full text articles as opposed to only abstracts.
You might consider trying to reduce costs by eliminating the duplication of paying for 3 different databases that each only have the abstract. Especially since I can use Google Scholar and get the abstract for free
http://psycnet.apa.org/?fa=main.doiLanding&doi=10.1037/0022-3514.83.4.947. A single database with full text would better than paying for 3 with abstracts.
Unfortunately, this publication is not part of the JSTOR coverage. JSTOR seems to provide full text directly.
Would someone be able to respond to my post of December 31? It continues to be the case that patron records are very often not updated when items are returned to the TRL stacks, even though the catalogue records for the items themselves are updated.
Many thanks.
James
Hi James, sorry for the delay in responding. When you place a stacks request, it shows up as a request in your account. The request message does not mean that the item is “checked out” to you – the association between you and the item ends as soon as the item is returned to the stacks. The requests that display in your account are cleared approximately every two months by an automated process.
I realize that this is not ideal, and not very clear. We’ll look into adding some wording to the account summary screen to explain what’s going on.
Sandra
Hi Hari,
We’re still looking into some of your questions about licensed database access. Here are some preliminary answers:
– Accessing JSTOR articles from Google on TPL computers: in theory, this should work, since JSTOR should recognize that your request is coming from a Toronto Public Library IP address. I’m not sure why you encountered some inconsistency with this. We’ll do some testing of our own to see if we can duplicate the problem.
– Re the database description of JSTOR: thanks for your suggestion; I’ve passed it along to the staff member responsible.
– Issue with limiting to full-text results in Article Search: we have reported this problem to our vendor.
– Duplicate results from different databases: yes, there is some duplication of coverage in our subscription databases. One reason for this is that TPL benefits from provincial consortia that purchase Ontario-wide access to databases – some of which duplicate some of the content in databases that TPL subscribes to on its own. We regularly reevaluate our database subscriptions, and I will pass on your comment about the article you were not able to obtain in full-text.
Thanks for your feedback, and especially for providing such clear and specific information.
Sandra
Could a search by ISBN be incorporated?
Hi Jason,
You can search by ISBN. Use the keyword search box.
Dara
Sandra, thanks for your response of Jan 26, 2009 at 16:48.
Just to clarify regarding “the article you were not able to obtain in full-text.” that article is just intended as a test case to illustrate the problem. I have no particular need for that particular article or journal. Is it possible that TPL has bought the rights to see full text and it is incorrectly failing to show me the full text from any of the 3 databases? Instead of it being a case where the Full Text filter option isn’t working properly?
Besides the issue of getting multiple abstract hits when I had selected Full Text, there is the issue of the library database descriptions not saying what the ratio of abtracts vs full text is and the general issue of why pay for databases that are abstract oriented (Toronto or Ontario level) especially if the library doesn’t have the actual issue in its collection – not much point in having the abstract if you can’t then look at the publication in the system (hardcopy of softcopy). My bias is not to pay for abstract databases for publications that the library does not have.
FYI, typically I am looking up these articles because they appear in the footnotes of library books, which quite often means the JSTOR Moving Wall has passed so if the journal is in JSTOR then I get to see it in full text (assuming I wasn’t able to find it first via Google).
Why does the Place Hold icon appear when all copies are reference copies?
For example,the icon appears for this book even though both copies are listed as TRL reference copies:
Multiversities, ideas and democracy
By: Fallis, George, 1947- | Year of publication: c2007. | Publisher: University of Toronto Press,
Toronto Reference Library
378.012 F12 Reference In Process In Process
Reference Main Ref 2nd Fl Reference Open Shelf In Library
Hi Hari,
The problem with Place Hold buttons showing up for items that you can’t place holds on is a known issue. For the specific book you mentioned, I think the problem is due to one of the copies of the book being “in process” – until the book has been processed and assigned to a reference location, the catalogue’s logic assumes that the new copy will be holdable, even though we can see that it has been purchased for the Reference Library and thus will not be available to borrow.
We’re aware that the unreliable display of Place Hold buttons is misleading and an annoyance for our customers, and we are working on ways of refining the logic that determines whether or not the buttons show up.
Sandra
Sandra
Thanks for the explanation about the Hold icon appearing when you cannot get a hold.
Is there a specific URL that I can go to which provides a search of known issues? Or a list? I had looked at this thread and seen several items about holds for your account, but I had not seen anything about the appearance of the icon when it shouldn’t appear.
Also is there a catalog search option that will reliably exclude all non-borrowable items eg exluding all reference, in process for reference, special collection reference, lost, no copies or missing books?
The closest I have found is
Advanced Search selecting the Branch option to pick
“All but Toronto Reference Library”
Hi Hari,
The list of known issues is here.
Right now, the “All but Toronto Reference Library” option is the best way to exclude reference-only items from your search results. We’re working on developing more effective ways of refining a search to include only items that are available and that can be borrowed. Improvements will be coming in a future version of the catalogue.
Thanks again for your feedback.
Sandra
Sandra, thanks for the info and link.
what happens if you lost a book? how much do i have to pay?
Hi Katie,
The cost is roughly based on the item value.
If you believe you have lost an item you can get help by contacting your branch in person or by telephone or by contacting Answerline for a telephone or email inquiry.
I have a suggestion for TPL webteam. I appreciate all the excellent work done by TPL web team so far and moving forward, I would like to see a search option within the different tabs for example: newest titles, find it fast etc., where booklists are generated based on titles. Would TPL consider adding a search function? say for example: date on which the book has been received? Another example could be finding the newest titles within the adult fiction based on historic, biographic, romance etc. Is there a way to find out the newest book under each library catalogue section obtained by TPL?
Hi Vget,
Great suggestion. We’ve heard from a number of users who are disappointed that the lists of new titles can’t be sorted by author or date. As you point out, it would also be nice to be able to search by genre (romance, mystery, etc.) and then be able to see the newest titles within each genre.
We are working toward this type of capability. Within the next few months, we will replace the current catalogue with a new search engine that should make it much easier to find the most recent additions to the library.
Thanks for your feedback.
Sandra
It would be great to have a visible date {month) when “Our Newest Titles” is updated.
Great format otherwise!
I put two items on hold last year. One on the 12th of april, and one on the 25th. Both items slowly moved up the hold list until a few months ago. One had made it to #5 and the other to #8 on their respective hold lists. Then they stopped moving up the list. Earlier this week, by chance I attempted to re-hold the two items (using the beta site) but without removing my previous holds. Strangely enough it allowed me to hold both, and even more strangely those new holds appeared on my hold list in addition to the original ones, AND in the same hold position. Later that day one of the items was in transit to me. As of yet, the other item is still at position #5 (due to a single copy I surmise). It is possible some of my other holds have “frozen” in the same way, but I don’t memorise all of the item positions. Still, I hope this information helps resolve the glitch.