Tag: sirsidynix

Lending paths

Whilst working on Pewbot, I wondered if you could really predict the future borrowing pattern of a user based on a specific book — in other words, if they borrow book X will they then go on to borrow book Y and then book Z?
Anyway, I’ve knocked together a basic script that will extrapolate the most likely lending path (both past and future) for a specific book.
For example, here’s the lending path for “Learning SQL: a step by step guide using Oracle”:
https://library.hud.ac.uk/perl/lendingpath/bib.pl?418925
The book in question is displayed in bold. The title directly before it (“Java: the first semester”) is the title that is most frequently borrowed prior to “Learning SQL”, and the one directly after (“Database systems: a practical approach to design…”) is the most likely to be borrowed subsequently.
In turn, I then continue to extrapolate the paths in either direction until I run out of data or a title gets duplicated.
What we end up with is a hypothetical path showing what someone is most likely to have borrowed previously, and will then go on to borrow in the future.
What’s interesting is the flow of subjects along the path — the books before are all IT books, but the future path flows into HCI, IT management, and then into corporate strategy and business titles.
If you click on a book title, then it’ll take you though to the OPAC. If you click on the “path” link, then you’ll see the lending path for that particular title.
Once you’re in the OPAC, there’s a link to the lending path at the foot of every full bib page (although the path can only be generated if there’s enough raw circulation data).
If nothing else, it proves that our students are sensible enough to borrow the Harry Potter books in the correct order! 😀

A serendipity of clouds

Insipired by the BBC Radio 1 tag cloud mentioned by Richard Wallis on the Panlibus blog, I quickly threw a couple together for the most recent search keywords used on our OPAC:

https://library.hud.ac.uk/perl/ajax5.pl

https://library.hud.ac.uk/perl/ajax5b.pl
The pages use Ajax and should automatically refresh with updated content every few seconds (assuming that someone has been searching the OPAC recently).
No points for guessing that the larger the font, the more times the word has been used in recent searches!

CODA 2006 Presentation

I can’t remember the last time I was up and out of bed before 6am, but this morning I’m giving a remote presentation about Web/Library 2.0 to the 2006 CODA Conference in Brisbane, Australia.
Given the choice, I’d much rather being doing it in person… instead of being sat here in Huddersfield where it’s pitch black outside and raining heavily!
SirsiDynix did offer to let us use their webinar software, but we’ve decided to do the presentation using Skype (for audio) and Festoon (to share my desktop).
A few years ago, I’m sure doing this would have involved someone running a copy of the presentation at the venue whilst I spoke over the telephone.  However today, we’ll be doing it with free software and it won’t cost either CODA or myself a single penny/cent/dollar.
Plus, I get to do the presentation wearing a pair of jogging bottoms and an old t-shirt, and unbrushed hair! 😀

CODI 2006 – Salt Lake City (day 3, final update)

Well folks, CODI 2006 is over!
It looks like it was another excellent conference, so congratulations to everyone involved in organising the event and many thanks to those of you who kept the rest of us up-to-date with your blog posts and photographs 🙂
If you were at CODI 2006 but you’re not a blogger, please consider posting your session notes and conference summaries to The Gordian Knot — there’s a lot of Horizon & Dynix sites out there who would love to read them!
The updates from the final day are…
Phyllis has posted:
» CODI 2006 — Customizable, Flexible
» CODI 2006 — day 3. Pocket Circulation
Over at the CODI 2006 / Salt Lake City, there’s:
» Mary’s week so far
» Carol’s update
Kevin has posted:
» Sumary of Codi2006 Days 2 and 3
The codi2006 tagged images at flickr are now up to 459 — that almost 3 times as many as last year!

“So you were teetotal until your library became an 8.0 beta site, huh?!”

CODI 2006 – Salt Lake City (day 3, update 3:00pm GMT)

It’s 9am in Salt Lake City on the 3rd and final day of CODI 2006.
Let’s catch up with the overnight action!
There’s now nearly 300 photographs tagged with “codi2006” at flickr 🙂
Over at The Gordian Knot, Super Susan and Luke have been playing catch up:
» The Missing Face (Steve Nielsen)
» Good news for serials catalogers
» OZDUG stars shine at CODI meeting
» The World of Indexes According to Shelley
» Migration – The Path to…
There’ll probably be a couple more updates, but let me say that I hope everyone has a great final day and a safe journey home!

CODI 2006 – Salt Lake City (day 2, update 5:30am GMT)

It’s 11:30pm in Utah, so the 2nd day of CODI 2006 is coming to an end.
Here’s a quick update of the latest action…
Over at the CODI 2006 / Salt Lake City blog:
» Biblio’s Angels
» ’70s party
» The day after the 70’s party

Phyllis has a post about RFID:
» CODI 2006 – Day 2
Kevin has posted some more photographs to his flickr account:

And finally, I reckon Ben‘s in danger of getting RSI in his shutter finger!

CODI 2006 – Salt Lake City (day 2, update 2:30pm GMT)

It’s now 8:30am on day 2 of CODI 2006 in Salt Lake City and I guess most delegates will be breakfasting at the moment.
Let’s catch up with the action…
Over at The Gordian Knot, Susan “suzyq” Johns-Smith has posted her analysis of the opening keynote speeches:
» A Cautious Beginning
Ben has confirmed that those librarians were doing the internationally recognisable “YMCA” dance:
» CODI 2006 photos (first set) are now on Flickr
And at www.thezbar.net, the anonymous blogger/bloggerette/bloggerino is indeed venting their spleen:
» VISIONS OF CODI: DAY ONE
…I remember being amazed at the number of people who sat knitting during presentations at CODI last year. I now have nightmares that one day I’ll do a presentation and the entire room will be filled with people knitting away (clackerty-clackerty-clackerty-clackerty-clackerty…) 😀

CODI 2006 – Salt Lake City (day 1, update 6:00am GMT)

It’s now midnight in Salt Lake City, so the first day of CODI has come to an end. However, I’m pretty sure that there’ll still be a hardcore of delegates hovering around the bar!
Let’s catch up with the activity in the last 12 hours…
Kevin “Fiddling Librarian 3.0” Smith has posted his summary of day one:
» Codi 2006 Day One
Ben Ostrowsky has posted another two articles:
» CODI 2006: SQL tips from John Craig at alpha-G
» A reflection on conferences
…and Ben’s also posted 82 photographs of the first day to his flickr account!


Garry Collum has also uploaded some more photos to his flickr account:

That brings the total number of photographs tagged with codi2006 at flickr to 121!
Phyllis (who is the Support Services Team Manager at Marathon County Public Library in Central Wisconsin) has also started blogging:
» Codi 2006 — Opening Comments by Patrick Sommers
And last, but no means by least, there’s a veritable plethora of pertinent posts over at the CODI 2006 / Salt Lake City Blogger blog!
» Robin’s Wednesday
» CODI 2006 / Salt Lake City
» Melissa’s Panel
» Amy’s Panel
» Melissa’s Disaster Recovery Program