[Building Sakai] Oxford Citations Helper work

[Adrian Fish]

I could do with a bit of advice on the citations helper work I'm doing, if
there are any citations people around.

I'm currently looking at the reordering ticket (
https://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SAK-22296) and was thinking of setting
up a new table that basically linked a collection with its citations and
had the position index in a column. I could just add some more property
types indicating position to the props table, but my instinct is that this
will not be a particularly performant approach. If I went this route it
would obviously mean data duplication as the sakai:hasCitation rows in
citation_collection do the same thing but without the explicit ordering.

Any thoughts or suggestions anybody?

Cheers,
Adrian.

On 22 June 2012 21:31, Cliff, David Graeme <dgcliff at iu.edu> wrote:

>  Woops, forgot to reply all (sorry for the double post Jim!)****
>
> ** **
>
> I think that seems very reasonable, and would probably greatly speed up
> the pace of getting the Oxford fixes into trunk.****
>
> ** **
>
> - David****
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
> *From:* Jim Eng [mailto:jimeng at umich.edu]
> *Sent:* Friday, June 22, 2012 4:30 PM
> *To:* Adrian Fish
> *Cc:* Adam Marshall; John Leasia; Noah Botimer; Eric Echeverri; Jon Dunn;
> Susan Hollar; Mark H Notess; Cliff, David Graeme; Matthew Buckett; Charles
> Severance
> *Subject:* Re: [Building Sakai] Oxford Citations Helper work****
>
> ** **
>
> I keep forgetting to respond about commit rights in citations code.  I
> favor giving Adrian commit rights.  But I guess that decision might involve
> some other people.  If anybody has any issues, please get back to me before
> Monday.  If I don't hear anything before then, I will ask to have Adrian
> added.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> Jim****
>
>  ****
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
> On Jun 22, 2012, at 4:40 AM, Adrian Fish wrote:****
>
>
>
> ****
>
> Hi Jim,
>
> Thanks for the well expressed, as always, email.
>
> Adam, have you got any documentation from Oxford's library types? I'm sure
> the group would like to take a look at it. The more librarians, the
> merrier, as we say here.
>
> Similarly, it sounds like it may be worth somebody at Oxford taking a look
> at the results of the requirements gathering exercises Jim mentions so you
> know what's on the radar.
>
> I know that what I just said is obvious, I just wanted to try and say
> something intelligent, okay?
>
> By the way, has anybody got any issues with me having commit on the
> citations code? I'll be submitting a lot of patches over the next couple of
> weeks. I'll treat it with love, promise.
>
> Cheers,
> Adrian.
>
> ****
>
> On 22 June 2012 03:33, Jim Eng <jimeng at umich.edu> wrote:****
>
> I agree with you, Adrian, that student involvement was a winning formula
> for dashboard.  But the challenges here are quite different.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> The functionality we are talking about now is support for embedding
> citations in various contexts, and we have not found that many students are
> using that capability or interested in using that capability.  If it gets a
> lot easier and a lot more natural, students may use it at times, but it's
> unlikely they will ever use it very heavily in part because, while students
> get information from the LMS and submit assignments through the LMS and at
> times use it to communicate, most students do not do a lot of writing or
> composition within the LMS (any LMS). It's just not the best environment
> for student composition (in my opinion).  ****
>
> ** **
>
> On the other hand, some instructors and some librarians do author
> materials in the LMS and some subset of those instructors and librarians
> are very interested in incorporating citations in various contexts in the
> LMS.  Requirements gathering for citations work has focused on instructors
> and librarians more than students, for that reason.  I'm not saying that
> students should not be consulted, but they are not the main focus in this
> case (as opposed to the dashboard, where they clearly are). ****
>
> ** **
>
> We have gone through two fairly significant requirements-gathering
> processes in the past six years.  The first led to development of the
> citations helper.  The second focused on possible development of new
> functionality for OAE, but that has not been pursued very much.  Some of us
> who expect to use CLE for several more years are now trying to follow up on
> that work to improve and/or replace current functionality in CLE related to
> citations.  We've already learned a lot about the requirements over the
> past six years, so there's little interest in doing more analysis.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> That is not to say that the process won't benefit from input and feedback
> from end users and from support people at sakai schools that make use of
> the current citations helper.  I think we should work with Oxford and ask
> people there for feedback as we work on this, just as we should get
> feedback from people at Michigan, Indiana and other schools where people
> use the citations helper.  But I think we are near the end of the design
> phase, rather than near the beginning.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> Here's what I expect to happen:  We will see a bunch of improvements in
> the citations helper for sakai 2.10.  They will come from you, Oxford,
> Indiana and Michigan.  We will all talk with each other as we do this work.
>  All of us will also post information in JIRA and on the sakai-user list as
> we work on things. At some point, we may have a proposal for a better
> integration of external citations management systems into sakai.  When that
> happens, I think we will all discuss it.  Maybe we'll have some paper
> mockups or a clickable prototype that people at various schools will be
> able to use to gather feedback from targeted groups of end-users.  We will
> also work with experts to make sure what we do is accessible and easy to
> use. And we will try to develop it as quickly as possible.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> Just my opinion.  It would be good to hear from a few other people at
> Indiana and Michigan.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> Thanks.****
>
> ** **
>
> Jim  ****
>
> ** **
>
>     ****
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
> On Jun 21, 2012, at 2:36 PM, Adrian Fish wrote:****
>
>
>
> ****
>
> Hi Jim,
>
> I know you weren't suggesting that :)
>
> Thanks for keeping me and Oxford in the loop; they unfortunately missed
> the conference as they were deep in the nether regions of a major Sakai
> upgrade. Ouch. Are you going to keep the ticket updated with comments as
> you go? Are you thinking of doing it as a student project like Dashboard?
> That's a winning formula!
>
> Cheers again,
> Adrian.****
>
> On 21 June 2012 19:24, James Eng <jimeng at umich.edu> wrote:****
>
> That sounds good, Adrian. I wasn't suggesting you hold off. We are
> going ahead with SAK-22083. I just wanted to make sure you were aware
> of the discussions from the conference and the ideas being discussed
> since then.
>
> Jim****
>
>
>
> On 6/21/12, Adrian Fish <adrian.r.fish at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi Jim at al,
> >
> > We're going to press on with the Oxford changes for the time being. They
> > need the fixes in the short term and this redesign sounds like a fairly
> big
> > job. They're obviously interested in a redesign and will still want to be
> > involved in the specification process. They have an engaged set of
> > academics and librarians by the sound of it so will be a useful sounding
> > board.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Adrian.
> >
> > On 21 June 2012 10:23, Adam Marshall <adam.marshall at oucs.ox.ac.uk>
> wrote:
> >
> >>  Since we have integrated CH with Ex-libris PRIMO we’ve had a lot more
> >> interest but a number of people have said they cant use the tool because
> >> ….
> >> We have tried to address the simpler requests with the work that Adrian
> >> is****
>
> >> to be doing.****
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> There are 3 other ‘biggies’ that people ask for****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 1/ The ability for specified librarians to see all reading lists and get
> >> a****
>
> >> collated view so they can see what books etc are on reading lists.****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 2/ Import from Word / PDF – people have word docs that they want to****
>
> >> translate into a reading list****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 3/ ‘resolve’ references that haven’t been created via a PRIMO search,
> >> This
> >> is for lists created by RefWorks / EndNote import that do not have an
> >> open
> >> URL assigned. What we would do is have a resolve button that when
> >> clicked,
> >> sends (say) the ISBN to PRIMO search and gets back the corresponding
> open
> >> URL. The reference is then modified and ends up with the same meta data
> >> that one would have got if one had created the reference by doing a
> PRIMO****
>
> >> search and importing to Sakai.****
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> Other requests are ****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 1/ better import from EndNote / RefWorks – we think there are (or were)
> ****
>
> >> bugs with this process.****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 2/ allow citations to be inserted into other HTML documents. We would
> >> need
> >> to insert the reference plus associated JavaScript (from Talis’s Juice*
> ***
>
> >> library) which would grab availability info from PRIMO.****
> >>
> >> ** ******
>
> >>
> >> 3/ add “course association” meta data to reading lists so one can search
> >> the system for all reading lists for Biochemistry 101 for the academic
> >> year****
>
> >> 2011-12****
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> Adam****
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >> *From:* Adrian Fish [mailto:adrian.r.fish at gmail.com]
> >> *Sent:* 20 June 2012 22:30
> >> *To:* Jim Eng
> >>
> >> *Cc:* John Leasia; Noah Botimer; Eric Echeverri; Jon Dunn; Susan Hollar;
> ****
>
> >> Mark H Notess; David Graeme Cliff; Adam Marshall; Matthew Buckett****
>
> >> *Subject:* Re: [Building Sakai] Oxford Citations Helper work****
> >>
> >>  ** **
> >>
> >> Hi Jim,
> >>  ********
>
> >>
> >>  There are several reasons.  One has to do with our assessment that the
> >> citations helper is not meeting people's needs very well.  That is****
>
> >> supported by the fact that it is not used very much anywhere.********
>
> >>
> >>
> >> Is that your experience also, Adam? How does the current tool go down at
> >> Oxford. Obviously, from the tickets, there are concerns about it. Would
> >> it
> >> make sense to you to take part in a new tool design? Can your users wait
> >> for a new tool or are they champing at the bit for the improvements?***
> *
>
> >>  ********
>
> >>
> >>  A much more natural workflow would be that an instructor (or student)
> >> comes across a citation that seems relevant and wants to save it,
> >> possibly
> >> for use in a course now or in the future.  That can be saved to Zotero,
> ****
>
> >> RefWorks, EndNote, Mendeley or any other citations manager.  ********
>
> >>
> >>
> >> That's makes sense. During their lit search they just gather citations
> in
> >> Zotero and then import them as and when they need to. I do have a
> >> question
> >> about this process though. If you were working on a paper, maybe in
> >> collaboration with others, wouldn't it make far more sense to use Google
> >> Docs and its research tool? You can suck citations straight in from
> >> scholar
> >> with that sidebar and it seems really simple. Maybe citations only ever
> >> gets used as a reading list tool and only ever will. Just a way of
> >> rendering a reading list for a course.
> >>
> >> Cheers again,****
>
> >> Adrian.****
> >>
> >> ** **
> >>
> >****
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>
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