Re: Holdings-as-Offer: wrap-up

Schema.org<http://Schema.org> has a branchOf property that probably has a role to play sorting this out.

I would argue that a "library system" like NYPL (in general) is more like an administrative agency than it is an agency where books are being circulated. The fact that the word "library" appears in the name shouldn't be a huge problem for search engines if the data publishers are careful.

Jeff

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 19, 2013, at 3:08 PM, "Dan Scott" <denials@gmail.com<mailto:denials@gmail.com>> wrote:


Also, I haven't added availableAtOrFrom to the examples on the Holdings proposal page because I was asking for consensus and providing sample examples in this thread.

I am worried about this distinction you're introducing between branch and library. To me, a branch is a library. The seller represents the current physical location of the item (if that item is physical) where an interested party can pick it up. I think search engines are trying to satisfy an immediate need, not saying "oh it's available in NYPL somewhere".

On Oct 19, 2013 2:24 PM, "Karen Coyle" <kcoyle@kcoyle.net<mailto:kcoyle@kcoyle.net>> wrote:
Dan, I'm obviously having trouble explaining my point. Here's what I would add to the example:



  <div itemprop="offers" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Offer">
     <meta itemprop="businessFunction"
content="http://purl.org/goodrelations/v1#LeaseOut">
     <meta itemprop="seller" content="Example Branch 1</meta>
     <div>Call number: <span itemprop="inventoryIdentifier">876.54</span></div>
     <div>Location: <span itemprop="availableAtOrFrom">Reference</span></div>
     <div>Item status: <span>
         <link itemprop="availability" href="http://schema.org/InStoreOnly">
         Library use only
     </span></div>
  </div>


 <div itemprop="offers" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Offer">
    <meta itemprop="businessFunction"
content="http://purl.org/goodrelations/v1#LeaseOut">
    <meta itemprop="seller" content="http://sfpl.org"></meta>
    <div>Call number: <span itemprop="inventoryIdentifier">876.54</span></div>
    <div>Location: <span itemprop="availableAtOrFrom">Reference</span></div>
    <div>Item status: <span>
        <link itemprop="availability" href="http://schema.org/InStoreOnly">
        Library use only
    </span></div>
 </div>

"Seller" becomes the library, not the location within the library, and not even the branch.

I see a useful interplay between "seller" and "availableAtOrFrom". If we add "availableAtOrFrom" (which I don't see on the examples on the web page for the proposal, but it makes good sense here), then we have "availableAtOrFrom" for the displayed physical location, whatever it is. Seller then becomes something that identifies the library qua organization, and should be an organization, not a location (like "Reference" or even "West branch"). Seller and availableAtOrFrom might be the same, but that's not a problem. For most displays, though, I think that they would be different, since the holdings display doesn't usually contain the library name:

(site is Berkeley Public Library Catalog)
Location        Call no.        Status
CENTRAL LIB     876.54          Check shelf

Imagine how many libraries have a location called "MAIN" or "CENTRAL" -- that's a location, not an organization. So you need to get the library organization name in there.

 <div itemprop="offers" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Offer">
    <meta itemprop="businessFunction"
content="http://purl.org/goodrelations/v1#LeaseOut">
    <meta itemprop="seller" content="Berkeley Public Library"></meta>
  <!-- or ... content="http://berkeleypubliclibrary.org"  -->
    <div>Call number: <span itemprop="inventoryIdentifier">876.54</span></div>
    <div>Location: <span itemprop="availableAtOrFrom">CENTRAL LIB</span></div>
    <div>Item status: <span>
        <link itemprop="availability" href="http://schema.org/inStock">
        Check shelf
    </span></div>
 </div>

Does that make sense?

kc



I can include an example to cover this use case.

Another case is for electronic
materials. Library systems handle this differently, but there isn't a
location in many cases:

Online    Click here

Good question! What we do in Evergreen currently is essentially:

<li property="offers" vocab="http://schema.org/" typeof="Offer">
   <a href="URL_FOR_ELECTRONIC_MATERIAL">Available online</a>
   <link property="availability" href="http://schema.org/OnlineOnly" />
   ...
</li>

Glancing at this, I think I need to add in a property="url" to the <a>
link there. And it certainly can have a <meta> tag for the "seller"
property as well. I can include some documentation and an example for
this use case, too.

I'm thinking that there are cases in which the library itself is not
included in the holdings statement (or anywhere else on the page) because it
is inherent in the context of the system being searched. So my question is
whether there is value in including information about the library itself as
a super-location to the holdings location, or is the assumption that this
connection will be made through, e.g., the URL of the web page that has the
markup?

I think there is significant value to creating 1) a page per library
for a given system that contains the physical addresses / hours / etc,
even for single-library systems and 2) linking to that page
(explicitly, or implicitly via <meta>) from each of the associated
offers. It will enable the search engines to follow their nose based
on our assertions, rather than having to make assumptions about how
many libraries may inherently be represented by library.example.com<http://library.example.com>.

I think my question leads to a broader one about the use case for library
data in schema.org<http://schema.org>. When I look at product examples it is clear to me that
the target is the URL of the product page. Is this also the assumption for
library data in schema.org<http://schema.org> -- that we are expecting a search engine
retrieval of a page for a library resource, and that page is the target of
the search? If so, then that URL is all that is needed to link to the
library and its resource. If, however, we anticipate other uses to be made
of the schema mark-up, such as organizing retrieved items by geographical
location, then we need to get that information into each web page. This may
be unrelated to the markup of holdings, but it was this proposal that
brought it to mind.

Good question again. I see the primary use case being the search
engines ingesting a sitemap, crawling all of the listed pages, and
sorting out the items and linked offers accordingly.

In the case of our library catalogue, I created a sitemap that lists
each of the record detail pages, which expose metadata & holdings.
Unfortunately, when I generated the sitemap last year, it was before I
had implemented holdings-as-offers; now that all of the attached
offers will be part of each record details page, I think a new crawl
of those pages could provoke much more interesting results.


--
Karen Coyle
kcoyle@kcoyle.net<mailto:kcoyle@kcoyle.net> http://kcoyle.net
m: 1-510-435-8234<tel:1-510-435-8234>
skype: kcoylenet