Open Source Reference Desk Software at the Victorian Parliamentary Library
- 1. Open Source Reference Desk Software at the Victorian Parliamentary Library Robin Gallagher & Peter Neish
- 2. Who are our clients? Members of Parliament Members’ staff (electorate officers, party staff, ministerial staff) Parliamentary staff (especially parliamentary committees)
- 3. Existing workflow Email or telephone queries Response emailed or printed and picked up Significant or common requests entered into Reference Knowledge Base Statistics recorded manually
- 4. Workflow problems Single reference task involved up to 6 separate actions Record query Compile answer Email client text & attachments Copy text record & files into RKB Record reference statistics on monthly form Transfer statistics once a month to spreadsheet Difficult to know: what other Reference staff were working on status of incomplete queries, if staff member absent
- 5. Requirements Simple to use Capture statistics Integrate into workflow Capture frequent / important queries into our Reference Knowledge Base
- 6. What we built Web-based tool Integrates with LDAP Built in JAVA uses the Play! framework MVC Hibernate and JPA Groovy templating system
- 16. Thanks Code will be available at github.com/pov
Editor's Notes
- #2: Talk about the Parliamentary Library: Established in 1851, building itself 1858–60
- #3: Clients can be located within the Parl building (Committee staff and Members on sitting days) or anywhere within Victoria, so we need to provide services and resources both face-to-face and remotely. Information here is a highly valued commodity, whether or not you have it and how you use it contributes substantially to the success or failure of Members.