The Logical Operator

I’ve been in the market the last few days for a web-based personal financial management tool. Managing bill dates, receipts, and so forth is an exercise in juggling and memory, and I thought a web-based solution might be optimal - my wife and I can both log in and update the accounts with our receipts, see where we are, how we’re doing compared to our budget, and all the other little things one likes to do. 

It has been an exercise in frustration, though. There are four tools I’ve looked at: ClearCheckbook, Mint, MySpendingPlan, and Wesabe. Of the four, only ClearCheckbook is a viable solution, and it is very primitive compared to the others.

This isn’t really germane to librarianship, as such, but here’s my superquick review of the systems:

1. ClearCheckbook: simple, clean, easy to use. Not particularly sophisticated. You create your accounts manually, input transactions manually. It does not connect to any banks or online services. You are required not to use any sensitive information - you call your checking account “Checking Account,” not “America Bank Account #123456789-0.” It supports expense categorization, simple budgeting, and reporting. Terms of use consist of 3 promises - they won’t sell your email (the only piece of personal info they have), and you in return won’t put any sensitive account data on their site, and you’ll use a good password. Otherwise, you’re on your own.
2. Mint: pretty, slick looking. Syncs with your bank accounts. In fact, you cannot create an account manually - you must let them sync to your bank accounts automatically. You also cannot add transactions manually - the only thing it does is pull down transactions that have cleared your bank and put them in. This means that, for instance, you can’t add a check you just wrote; you have to wait for it to clear before it shows up. Not terribly useful, in my mind. 
3. MySpendingPlan: would have been good, if not for the fact that it is absolutely littered with ads, offers, and advertising spam. Has a 7-step account setup thing (with interview questions like “when was the last time you evaluated your insurance needs?”) I wanted to use it but the sheer number of “free insurance quotes” and “looking to buy a home?” and vendor-linked shopping lists sent me on my way. It’s sponsored and paid for by the American Home Buying Association or something, so…
4. Wesabe: pretty, and has the interesting feature of building a tag-based aggregation of financial transactions (that is, you can tag a transaction with your own tags, and the amount of the transaction is aggregated with other similarly-tagged transactions from other users, which can let you know “is this amount normal” or “am I paying more than I should?”). Requires you to connect to your online banking services to upload accounts. Uploading doesn’t work - it’s clunky and broken. What’s more, there is once again no provision to enter transactions on your own - you have to wait until they’re downloaded from your bank. Not very useful. They do permit “cash” accounts to be manually created, though…I may go back and try that, because the aggregation features seemed nice.

So, enough about the tools - of the four, I choose ClearCheckbook, because banking info is sensitive, and I am in absolute control about what information I provide to the service. While I’m putting in transactions and such, I’m not required to put in passwords, expose account numbers, or anything like that. What’s more, it lets me put in transactions myself (like, say, transactions I just made). I don’t get the bizarre adherence to automation in that respect, to the extent that you are prevented from entering your own transactions.

And that made me consider an aspect of the “negative-click” repository idea that has been discussed previously. The goal was (to some extent) make repository contributions as effort-free as possible, by integrating all sorts of automated communication between various elements of the repository. However, there is likely a subset of users - or use cases - where the people making deposits to the repository want to have absolute control of what is added, how it is added, and how it is used. 

For example, if we look at it from a scholarly workbench point of view, we’re encouraging the use of the repository along the entire lifecycle of a piece of scholarly literature, including the sensitive early part where the scholar probably doesn’t want to show his or her hand about what research he or she is performing (for whatever reason: it’s sensitive, they don’t want to be scooped, whatever). For example, I’d love a tool that supported the process, but I have research papers in the works that I don’t really want to publicize quite yet. 

I see an (admittedly somewhat weak) analogy between this situation and the situation imposed by the financial management software mentioned above - if I want to add potentially sensitive or confidential data to a repository, I want to control absolutely what is added - I may not want it automatically tagged, uploaded, and connected to other similar research. I may want to simply have the data there, but avoid any really specific information associated with it - basically, make it something that only has meaning to me. 

This tends to fly in the face of some of the open-access goals of repositories, it seems to me. But if there is a goal to create a workflow-integrated repository with minimal effort, it strikes me as something that should be addressed. 

So, gentle readers - if I have any gentle readers of this post - what are your thoughts? Is this an interesting problem? Is it irrelevant to repositories? Is it simply so obvious as to not bear mentioning?

Uncategorized automation, confidential data, negative-click, privacy, repository, workflow

In the Journal of Academic Librarianship, v. 34, no. 2, Lyman Ross and Pongracz Sennyey write an article on the future of libraries in a changing technological milieu.

This is not a surprising topic - in fact, it’s a perennial topic in the library literature, to the extent that the first line of the article reflects that you can’t mention new or changing technology and libraries together without running afoul of somebody’s cliché. Still, this sort of article fascinates me as it falls in the realm of speaking the doom of libraries (doom here being “fate,” rather than “horrifying, fiery end” - that was handled in the last post I wrote about doomsaying).

Ross and Sennyey’s premise is to analyze libraries and their technological aspects through the lens of Richard Foster’s S-curve model (used to indicate the growth profile of new technologies, from early adoption to plateau and ultimately replacement by another “discontinuous” or disruptive technology). Foster’s theory suggests that in the face of a technology that is new and disruptive, most businesses will at first attempt to simply refine existing (and proven) methods. However, this sort of polishing only carries an organization so far, because while for a time, refined methods outperform new technologies, it’s like outrunning a toddler. Eventually, the new technology will get its feet under it and take off.

Ross and Sennyey argue that libraries are right now experiencing “diminishing returns as it continues totinker with its traditional protocols and services, while emerging technologies are improving at an exponential rate” (p. 145). I would argue that they don’t go far enough in their description of emerging technology: new technologies have surpassed traditional library methods in several areas of its mission, such as searching, resource discovery, and other areas.

Following are some of the notions in the article that I found interesting, and my thoughts. The relevant pages where these notions came from are listed as well.

1. People aren’t coming to the library to use it as a library anymore - they come for coffee, Facebook, and email. (p. 145)

I cannot argue with this; surveys here indicate that the primary reason someone crosses the gate is for the Java City coffee shop; second to that is (if I recall correctly) use of the computer labs. This may be an unavoidable consequence of offering such services, though. And, computer use for a relatively savvy user is often (from my limited, anecdotal observations) a rapid back-and-forth among multiple tools, web pages, and databases. You may Facebook or AIM, but in the moments between chat messages you’re hitting EBSCOHost or JSTOR to run a search. Read more…

Uncategorized competition, digital revolution, doom, future, library, marketing, technology, tradition

Because my institution is somewhat of a “latecomer” to the institutional repository initiative, we have the advantage of seeing what has come before - unfortunately, much of what has come before seems to indicate that the “digital repository,” at least in its current forms (DSpace, Fedora, ePrints, and other dedicated “repository” software), simply doesn’t work.

Oh, it works in the sense that it allows individuals to upload materials to a centralized server and tag the contributions with metadata (allowing it to be searched and interrelated). But the problem - something discussed pretty much everywhere I see repositories discussed (there are many, many blogs talking about this topic: Caveat Lector, for instance; Peter Murray Rust’s blog; the Digital Curation Center) - is that these tools, despite their power, are simply extra work for the people who are supposed to feed them.

Digital repositories, ideally, are the place where university faculty, staff, and/or students can place their scholarly work so that others can find it and so the university can accumulate a large digital collection of the scholarly output of its employees. The catch is that these systems require additional work on the part of the faculty member to participate, and the consensus among those who have investigated such things seems to say that faculty researchers are willing to invest precisely zero additional work in contributing to a repository. The value proposition for the repository is simply not adequately made. The visible benefits of this outcome are many. The visible benefits of the investment are AWOL.

Recently, a couple blogs - Digital Curation’s negative-click repositories entry and Peter Murray Rust’s put it on the web discussion - addressed the fact that nobody wants to mess around with clumsy, user-surly, or work-added repository systems. The “negative-click repository” idea focuses more on the pure lack of interest in investing “clicks” in the process of contributing to a repository. Chris Rusbridge’s argument is the “negative-click” repository, a system that makes the process of getting material into the repository transparent (or nearly so) to the contributor. Read more…

Uncategorized digital repositories, dspace, negative-click, repositories, slideshare, web 2.0, workflow

Sadly, it doesn’t scan properly, but it’s close.

I am, by dint of some technical know-how, a Master’s in Information Systems, and a perfidious streak of volunteerism, the Library’s lead person for the development of an institutional digital repository. We are relative latecomers to the game - many other higher-ed institutions already have some form of digital repository installed and running. In fact, we do too, although most of ours can be considered “beta” or “pilot” projects.

The project is closely integrated with university IT, who will provide the back-end support (one of the major steps forward over the pilot projects the library is currently running). We are currently considering software packages that could be used as repository installations (of which, according to Caveat Lector, none actually work), as well as considering user needs surveys, what faculty will actually want to do with the repository, how to market it, what my role will be when it’s established, and a host of other questions and concerns about repository setup.

The idea of a repository is fairly simple. The value of it is somewhat obvious to librarians (but deeply not so to nonlibrarians). The software packages are deceptively simple. But the biggest challenge may be mining the incredible amount of information and experience that’s already out there. Wish me luck.

Uncategorized

In the roundabout, 6-degrees-of-separation manner that weblogs have, I came across a blog post at the Chronicle that commented on a blog post I commented on over at ACRLog about librarians who spend time being a librarian, but being outside the library. Now, since this post isn’t exactly about the whole idea of having multiple offices, let’s suffice it to say I did it, it worked pretty well, it’s over now, and while it was a good way to begin establishing relationships with my “constituents,” I’m not sure it was so good that it needs to be resurrected.

The real gem of this Chronicle-by-way-of-ACRLog is a set of comments from Dr. Tim, who - completely apropos of nothing - lambastes the readership of the Chronicle, imploring them to avoid encouraging anyone to get an MLS while (it seems) rolling in deep piles of money from his medical practice, and regaling us with accounts of his take-home pay.

And, if he’s to be believed, that take-home pay is considerably more than my take-home pay.

Dr. Tim is a crazy diamond, and I hope he shines on.

But then again, I didn’t do this for the money. If I was interested in a job where money was made, I’d have gone into finance, accounting, or maybe organized crime. Seriously. This is not to say that I would avoid wealth were it to come my way (I’m not stupid, after all); likewise it is not to suggest that I haven’t drafted a detailed plan for what I’d do with my Powerball winnings. But I became a librarian because it interested me. I like libraries, even if they are always too stuffy and never cold enough. I fell into the field during a period of casting about for a real career path, and was taken in by it. And after a year or so in school, I began to see what librarianship could be - how it really is a teaching job, and how, despite having very little tolerance for the classroom setup, I actually do enjoy teaching.

Now, I make more now than what I made before. But that wouldn’t have mattered, really - it was a moderate step up when I got the job, but I’d have taken it regardless - it was something I wanted to do, a step into a whole new career, and it made me happy. I think I’m pretty good at it. I’d hazard a guess, too, that this is the reason why many librarians do what they do: it makes them happy, and it’s what they want.

And…I’ve lost the plot. I had a point here, and it escaped me. I’ll post this up, and if I remember where I was going with it, I’ll go there.

Uncategorized