[CODE4LIB] open space pre-conf Monday morning
Hi there everyone. A quick heads-up about the open space pre-conference Monday morning (9am-12pm): We will be in the Boardroom of the Crowne Plaza Hotel, aka The Conference Hotel Within Which Many of You Will be Staying, from 9am-12pm. Open Space is intended to be an Open Space, i.e. a place you can drop by a little if you want, so you are invited to drop by, even if you didn't sign up, and especially if you didn't sign up for any other pre-conferences during that slot, that's cool too. Please do! Note, though, that this is not a Big Room, so in the event that we are overrun with a mob of angry post-apocalyptic mad max librarian coder types demanding equal access to open spaces, I will fight to defend the right of the several people who registered in advance to attend to have a place to sit without fear of being trampled, eaten, reverse engineered, decompiled, or otherwise stripped of their rights to behave, even if only for a few hours, like a person who might attend a Board Meeting in a Boardroom. Other than that, though, hey, really, please do drop in and say hello! And big thanks to Francis and everyone else who made this open space possible. :) Safe travels to all and see you in a few days, -Dan
[CODE4LIB] OL support (was Re: [CODE4LIB] Anybody using the Open Library APIs?)
Karen - I've been wondering about this lately, digging around in code at github, noticing a lot of somewhat aging commit dates, etc. I am joining the ol-tech list and will ask there, too, but given your history with the project, do you have a sense of whether IA folks might welcome a modest influx of attention from willing volunteers to help maintain and improve the service? -Dan On Jan 22, 2013, at 12:44 PM, Karen Coyle wrote: There is an open library list: ol-t...@archive.org and some API users do answer there. However, Open Library is not currently staffed/supported by the Archive. It's kept running but I'm not clear on the future. kc On 1/21/13 5:04 PM, David Fiander wrote: I'm working on a project that involves collecting information about the books that people own, and the easiest way to do most of that data collection is to collect just the ISBNs for those books that have them, and photograph the title pages of the books that don't. This gets me out of people way quickly and lets me do my data processing later. I've asked OCLC about the requirements for getting an affiliate ID for using their APIs for the project, but while I'm waiting for that, I'm looking at the Open Library APIs. The documentation for the APIs is weak, and it looks like it hasn't been updated for a while. Has anybody used them much, or know what the state of ongoing development of them is? All I'm really looking for at this point is a way to convert an ISBN into basic bibliographic data, and to find any related ISBNs, a la OCLC's xISBN service. - David -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [CODE4LIB] Question abt the code4libwomen idea
On Dec 7, 2012, at 12:50 PM, Karen Coyle wrote: Code4lib appears to have no rules about who can and cannot form a group. Therefore, if there are some folks who want a group, they should create that group. If it's successful, it's successful. If not, it'll fade away like so many start-up groups. I'm astonished at the resistance to the formation of a group on the part of people who also insist that there are no rules about forming groups. I don't recall that any other proposal to set up a group has met this kind of resistance. In fact, we were recently reminded that if you want something done in c4l you should just do it. There is no need to ask permission. So, do it. A point of information: Ten years ago a few of us who were already on web4lib and perl4lib and xml4lib mailing lists were talking about python more so we discussed whether we should start a python4lib list. It seemed silly because a lot of us were already on all the other separate lists, and somebody suggested just naming a new thing code4lib because maybe more people would want to join it and might stop worrying about choosing between other lists and defining more oddly overlapping subsets and focus instead on talking about code more openly and expansively. This seems to have had the desired effect, modulo some areas we can improve upon. A point of history: Over the years several regional code4lib groups formed and some wanted to have their own lists. When such suggestions have been made on this list, those suggestions have often been resisted, because of the success we had originally collapsing (combining?) people who wanted to talk about code and libraries into one big list. Maybe some resistance to seeing a code4lib4women activity broken out is similar to that. I feel that resistance; maybe I'm not the only one. Didn't Ecclesiastes say something about a time to form mailing lists, a time to gather mailing list subscribers together? An opinion: I'm all for people creating new social structures to move themselves forward doing it however they see fit. The internet is a big place, and there's room for more. In this case, though, I hope it will be an and operation, not an exclusive or. I would be happy to hear that a new group formed and that it's going well. I would be disappointed if people in that group ended up moving away from this one big group. It happens, and I'd get over it, sure, but it'd still be disappointing. We gain something by gathering together like we have here. It's not exclusive, nor should it be. But code4lib has added so much to me and my work that I know how much I stand to lose if we do not also keep working to stick together, however difficult that can be sometimes. Respectfully yours, -Dan
Re: [CODE4LIB] Your Choice URL for Study Room Reservations
We use the same app, and recently switched from a longer URL with srrs for study room reservation system (still its name) as a script path element to just rooms.library.gwu.edu. I don't think we've had much feedback one way or the other on the URL, but maybe it's a little easier to remember. Looked like one big block of Xs of already-booked rooms this time last year at the old URL; pretty much looks exactly the same right now. Fwiw we've found it to be a useful app - somewhere well north of 250,000 reservations over the past 5-6 semesters. -Dan On Nov 30, 2012, at 12:07 PM, Alisak Sanavongsay wrote: I didn't have any part in its naming or development, but we use 'crs,' which is short for Campus Reservation System. You can take a peep at the front page at http://crs.ucmerced.edu. Our system is based on phpScheduleIt (http://phpscheduleit.sourceforge.net/). Regards, Alisak. Alisak Sanavongsay Digital Assets Programmer UC Merced Library http://library.ucmerced.edu asanavong...@ucmerced.edu On Nov 30, 2012, at 6:05 AM, Michael Schofield mschofi...@nova.edu wrote: What’s up everyone, We are homegrowing a study room reservation system and we’re within a week of making it live—but still in beta—to the public. Right now, on our staging box, our URI looks like something.library.nova.edu/room-res. /room-res doesn’t mean anything, to me. The public URI will be similarly long, like somethingelse.library.nova.edu/whatever. Any recommendations or experience with your own reservation links? IMHO, it should be simple, since the link is already going to be on the long end. Right now I’m vying for /reservations, but TBH this system is just for public study rooms and not for our larger conference rooms – I’m not sure our primary users [the students and faculty] will care, but we’ll definitely be reminded of that technicality by other librarians J. I don’t like /studyrooms, but it’s the best I’ve got since I’m avoiding hyphens. Just picking your brains. Thanks! Michael Schofield(@nova.edu) | @gollydamn | Front-End Librarian à www.ns4lib.com
Re: [CODE4LIB] Code4Lib North | Meetup!
Cool, I'll join you too if I can. Might head out a little early on Friday - so I'm with Graham, Jennifer, and Dileshni in preferring the full day Thursday. Thanks for putting this together again! I was sorry to miss it last year. -Dan On Feb 20, 2011, at 8:32 PM, David Fiander wrote: Right now both weekends work for me. I know that for me, and probably for many others, the sooner the date is made firm, the easier it will be to make sure that the chosen one *cough* will stay free for this. - David On Sat, Feb 19, 2011 at 13:02, Graham McCarthy gmccar...@ryerson.ca wrote: +1 for full day hackfest. both weekends work for me too! On 18 February 2011 08:55, Jennifer O'Donnell jennifer.s.odonn...@gmail.com wrote: +1 for a full day hackfest. Thanks for organising this Nick and John! Jennifer On Thu, Feb 17, 2011 at 5:17 PM, Dileshni Jayasinghe d.jayasin...@utoronto.ca wrote: Vote for a full day hackfest too. More time to come up with something interesting. Dileshni Tim Ribaric wrote: code4lib North ++ Thanks for putting this together. -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of William Denton Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2011 4:15 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Code4Lib North | Meetup! On 17 February 2011, Nick Ruest wrote: It is getting close to that time to start planning for another Code4Lib North meetup! In anticipation, John Fink and I have been working behind the scenes here at McMaster to convince our administration to allow us to throw in proposal to host it. Hurray! When - May 5/6, 2011 or May 12/13, 2011 Those both seem like good dates. And they both work for me. I'd love to come. I vote for a full-day hackfest, though. A half-day isn't enough to really get into things. I don't mind getting my own lunch. Thanks, Nick and John. I'm looking forward to it. Bill -- William Denton, Toronto : miskatonic.org www.frbr.org openfrbr.org -- Dileshni Jayasinghe Programmer Analyst Scholars Portal, OCUL -- Graham McCarthy Innovative Technologies Librarian Ryerson University 350 Victoria St. Toronto ON M5B 2K3 p: 416 979 5000 x2119 f: 416 979 5215
Re: [CODE4LIB] Code4Lib 2011 Proposals
On Mar 2, 2010, at 2:08 PM, Michael J. Giarlo wrote: Should be long enough after C4LN and between Access conferences so as not to interfere. I'd encourage the Vancouver contingent to put forward its proposal; if it gets the most votes, the community has spoken. I agree about putting forward the proposal, and the voting, and not conflicting with C4LN, but not about Access. I have a few concerns about the idea of code4libcon in Vancouver. When the vote comes, though, if it's the only option, well, there we'll be. Just to air said concerns... maybe this should be on the conf list but the thread's here, so, whatever. (a) I don't want to have to choose between code4lib and Access and if they're both in Canada I might have to choose; Access would win. This concern is one of the reasons we didn't try a code4libcon before 2006, though maybe the number of us who share this concern is small. (b) of the five code4libcons we've had, the ones that have been the most fun to me have been the ones in smaller towns (corvallis, athens, asheville) where we're more likely to stumble into other attendees as the evening... uh... progresses. Vancouver would be the biggest host city yet. It's a great town and I'd love to return there but it's not small by any measure. (c) in early years we emphasized keeping code4libcon cheap and have continued to succeed at that by using sponsorships to keep the registration fee low. It's good to be able to draw in students and people who are interested but not directly supported or who might choose to go on their own dime. These past two years the conf hotel rate has crept up some, with a good block rate but still well over $100/night. Vancouver's a more expensive town than any we've been in before, so I'd worry we'd be shutting some people out. I think there's been some kind of lower cost hotel or hostel option in every town, and surely there would be in Vancouver, but in a bigger town that means people are spread out more and then my concern (b) gets amplified, too. All that said, it's not like I'm putting in a hosting proposal, so, right, go VANOC^H^HC4LC! -Dan p.s. if we could try out a lightning talk cross session where four people talk all at the same time, i'm in for sure.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Code4Lib 2011 Proposals
On Mar 2, 2010, at 8:18 PM, Ziso, Ya'aqov wrote: Many institutions would consider Canada an international conference, and most likely would allow (if any!?) one. My 5 cents (and that's all left in the budget), Ya'aqov Yeah, exactly, I might run into the same thing. In the past few years I've taken vacation for c4lc and gone on my own dime... and it can be quite pricey for a US federal employee to fly outside the country (see Fly America Act) so I don't do it often. Seriously, you don't want to know how bad it can be. I could probably take time off again and cobble together a train ride (empire builder!) and a rental car in seattle and do it all on the cheap, which is how I got to Access '03 in Vancouver, but, yeah, none of you care about my problems. :) -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries on behalf of Jonathan Rochkind Sent: Tue 3/2/2010 8:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Code4Lib 2011 Proposals Why would the fact that they are both in Canada make you (or anyone else) have to choose between them? I'm not following. One is in Feb, one is in (what?) September. If you can go to two confs one in Feb and one in Sep when one is in somewhere in Canada and one is in somewhere in the US... why can't you go to two when they're both in Canada? I'm not following. Dan Chudnov wrote: On Mar 2, 2010, at 2:08 PM, Michael J. Giarlo wrote: Should be long enough after C4LN and between Access conferences so as not to interfere. I'd encourage the Vancouver contingent to put forward its proposal; if it gets the most votes, the community has spoken. I agree about putting forward the proposal, and the voting, and not conflicting with C4LN, but not about Access. I have a few concerns about the idea of code4libcon in Vancouver. When the vote comes, though, if it's the only option, well, there we'll be. Just to air said concerns... maybe this should be on the conf list but the thread's here, so, whatever. (a) I don't want to have to choose between code4lib and Access and if they're both in Canada I might have to choose; Access would win. This concern is one of the reasons we didn't try a code4libcon before 2006, though maybe the number of us who share this concern is small. (b) of the five code4libcons we've had, the ones that have been the most fun to me have been the ones in smaller towns (corvallis, athens, asheville) where we're more likely to stumble into other attendees as the evening... uh... progresses. Vancouver would be the biggest host city yet. It's a great town and I'd love to return there but it's not small by any measure. (c) in early years we emphasized keeping code4libcon cheap and have continued to succeed at that by using sponsorships to keep the registration fee low. It's good to be able to draw in students and people who are interested but not directly supported or who might choose to go on their own dime. These past two years the conf hotel rate has crept up some, with a good block rate but still well over $100/night. Vancouver's a more expensive town than any we've been in before, so I'd worry we'd be shutting some people out. I think there's been some kind of lower cost hotel or hostel option in every town, and surely there would be in Vancouver, but in a bigger town that means people are spread out more and then my concern (b) gets amplified, too. All that said, it's not like I'm putting in a hosting proposal, so, right, go VANOC^H^HC4LC! -Dan p.s. if we could try out a lightning talk cross session where four people talk all at the same time, i'm in for sure.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Choosing development platforms and/or tools, how'd you do it?
On Jan 5, 2010, at 10:13 PM, Ross Singer wrote: Dan Chudnov, for example, seems to think in Python. When I tried Python, it never really clicked -- I muddled through a few projects but never really got it. Actually, I think in Hoosier, but as the late Kurt Vonnegut might remind me, that's awfully silly. I mostly agree with Ross, though - find something that fits your brain and lets you get your stuff done and stick with it. It just might take a while. I have used python as a main language for about seven years now and it pays off in many ways. I didn't arrive at it quickly, though. At my first regular job 10-12 years ago I built stuff in perl, java, php, and vb, all of which turned into code I had to support for one user group or another for some period of time or another. It's one thing to experiment with toy code, it's another thing to do an experiment that brings you hard data and experiences that can help to inform future decisions. Here's how it went for me, but YMMV: I knew perl first, and everything I wrote in perl worked quickly and was easy to install in our hosting environment but was hard to fix later when it broke because I couldn't read it after I'd forgotten what I'd done. Java was just hard for me, period, and hard to install back then (tomcat wasn't particularly stable, yet, for one thing). VB was super easy to develop with but meant desktop support in the long run when everything was moving to the web. PHP was easy to write and install but I wrote a lot of bad code with holes all over the place, partly because of how easy it was. After all of these experiences, and having gained some insights about what I preferred, I tried python, and it clicked immediately. It wasn't so easy to install on a web server reliably back then, but it was doable, and it had all the other positives I was looking for: I could get stuff done quickly, get it installed, it made sense when I went back to look a! t it again, and I tended to write things slightly more securely than I had in the past. I was hooked. Seems like Ross is saying the same things about Ruby, for him. None of the stuff I was building back then was intended to be widely-used or even depended-upon, which helped a lot, but some of it turned out to be one or both, and that shines a bright light on the positives and negatives of platform choices. If I'd tried the languages in a different order maybe my experiences screwing up a lot of stuff early on would have led me to like a different fifth language; I definitely got better along the way. These days I am spending more time in Java and JavaScript than I would have expected but find that they're both less hard than they were the last time I tried them both, partly because they've become easier to work with based on frameworks and such but also because I have more experience, period. If you want help prioritizing which to choose first I could hardly argue with any of php, python, or ruby, for the same reasons others state, and as Ross said, building something with Solr is a great idea, because you can then try building follow-on apps with the same solr backend in different languages and see how they compare. Also, using solr often means writing less original code yourself, which is a big win in any language. I'd also suggest spending some time with javascript and a framework like jquery because it's applicable to anything you might do on the web. More than anything, though, build something you care about, and give it to real users, and then you'll start to see how you really feel about it. :) One last note... I do all my development behind screen-wrapped ssh sessions using vim. If I have to set up an IDE just to use a language, its happiness quotient drops immediately. This approach isn't for everybody, but it works best for me, so platform choices that mesh well with this preference increase their happiness quotient. Don't discount that factor, whichever way you feel about it, since that's how you'll spend much of your time. -Dan
Re: [CODE4LIB] Choosing development platforms and/or tools, how'd you do it?
At the risk of making this worse... Bill makes good points, and I wasn't saying don't use an IDE. I meant I don't like using an IDE, so I don't want to be forced to, and that affects my language/tool preferences. You might want to consider whether you like using a particular IDE or not, in addition to other considerations. Where I work we try hard to keep IDE-specific files and choices out of the vcs, aside from maybe adding some patterns to the .ignore file to reinforce this. We value letting all the different developers use whatever tools they prefer, and we do often use different ones (emacs, vim, eclipse, coda, etc.) to work on the same project and the same code at the same time without stomping on each other's toes, which is a Good Thing. I love you all. Really. -Dan On Jan 6, 2010, at 9:37 AM, Joel Marchesoni wrote: I should have worded my response differently. I didn't mean one shouldn't use any IDE at all, but as Dan said if there is a special IDE *for that language* and otherwise one can't develop it I would stay away from it. Joel -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:code4...@listserv.nd.edu] On Behalf Of Bill Dueber Sent: Wednesday, January 06, 2010 9:23 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Choosing development platforms and/or tools, how'd you do it? On Wed, Jan 6, 2010 at 8:53 AM, Joel Marchesoni jma...@email.wcu.eduwrote: I agree with Dan's last point about avoiding using a special IDE to develop with a language. I'll respectfully, but vehemently, disagree. I would say avoid *forcing* everyone working on the project depend on a special IDE -- avoid lockin. Don't avoid use. There's a spectrum of how much an editor/environment can know about a program. At one end is Smalltalk, where the development environment *is* the program. At the other end is something like LISP (and, to an extent, Ruby) where so little can be inferred from the syntax of the code that a smart IDE can't actually know much other than how to match parentheses. For languages where little can be known at compile time, an IDE may not buy you very much other than syntax highlighting and code folding. For Java, C++, etc. an IDE can know damn near everything about your project and radically up your productivity -- variable renaming, refactoring, context-sensitive help, jump-to-definition, method-name completion, etc. It really is a difference that makes a difference. I know folks say they can get the same thing from vim or emacs, but at that level those editors are no less complex (and a good deal more opaque) than something like Eclipse or Netbeans unless you already have a decade of experience with them. If you're starting in a new language, try a couple editors, too. Both Eclipse and Netbeans are free and cross-platform, and have support for a lot of languages. Editors like Notepad++, EditPlus, Textmate jEdit, and BBEdit can all do very nice things with a variety of languages. -- Bill Dueber Library Systems Programmer University of Michigan Library
Re: [CODE4LIB] c4l2010 T-Shirt Design Contest Extended to Jan. 6th
On Dec 21, 2009, at 3:39 PM, Rosalyn Metz wrote: Since we have yet to receive any submissions for T-Shirt designs, we are extending the contest until January 6th. This will give those of us with time off due to the holidays a chance to ignore family by creating an awesome design for the t-shirts. And those of you without time off can ignore work by creating an awesome design for the t-shirts. Either way something can be ignored. Remember that like in years past, the design should be one color. Please send any submissions to Rosalyn Metz at rosalynm...@gmail.com. Here's my entry, along with its source. -Dan http://www.flickr.com/photos/dchud/4205315880/
Re: [CODE4LIB] preconference proposals
Maybe you'd have to be e.e. cummings, but maybe not: the keyword refactotum leads to this: http://blog.thinkrelevance.com/2008/5/23/refactotum-overview ...which was what he described, and which sounds like a great session when led by the right hands. I think we could do it at c4lc. On Nov 10, 2009, at 10:44 AM, Jay Luker wrote: Those. Slides. Don't. Help. --jay On Tue, Nov 10, 2009 at 10:36 AM, Tom Keays tomke...@gmail.com wrote: Bad URL there. The real one is http://code4lib.org/files/chicks-lightning.pdf (that's where all the other lightning talks were stored). t On Tue, Nov 10, 2009 at 10:14 AM, Jay Luker jay.lu...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Nov 10, 2009 at 10:06 AM, Dan Chudnov daniel.chud...@gmail.com wrote: - Heckle Me, based on the example/ideas behind Chick's lightning talk last year The PDF of chick's slides is 404-ing [1]. Can someone remind me what this was about? --jay 1 http://code4lib.org/conference/2009/chicks-lightning.pdf
[CODE4LIB] big thanks to ND folks
A quick interjection to praise the wise folks at ND who host this list and whose listserv overlords (or they themselves?) saw fit to upgrade the listserv web front-end sometime past year or two. Following Eric's page into subscribers' corner led me into a screen where I could actually set my settings the way I wanted for the first time ever. Maintaining infrastructure for years is no mean feat, and modernizing ancient infrastructure is no meaner. Many thanks to our gracious hosts for all their years of list support! -Dan
[CODE4LIB] journal site down?
Seems like something's wrong at http://journal.code4lib.org/ . In the meantime, if you need journal access, a recent mirror is available here: http://journal-backup.onebiglibrary.net/issues/issue7.html ...note, though, that the home page over there is a copy of the redirect now up at the real site, hence the issue 7 path. -Dan
