April 2025 – DigitalKoans

Full Stack Web Developer at University of Utah

Under the direction of the Senior Web Designer, back-end logic of all Eccles Library websites and work to maintain the front-end design.

Develop code using HTML , CSS , JavaScript, React and/or Angular Frameworks, PHP , Perl, Bash, etc.

Interview internal and external stakeholders, anticipating their typical functions and projected solution experiences.

https://tinyurl.com/eadafvp6

“NYU Names Kristina Rose Dean of NYU Libraries”

Rose has been serving as NYU’s interim dean of libraries since January. She was appointed associate dean for collections and content strategy in 2019. She was made interim head of Access, Delivery, and Resource Sharing Services in 2011, and named permanent head in 2013. She first joined the NYU libraries in 2004 as an access services librarian. Prior to coming to NYU, she was the supervisor of the Butler Reserves and Milstein College Library at Columbia University.

https://tinyurl.com/yc5c2nmc

Associate Dean for Engagement, Learning and Public Services at University of Tennessee Libraries

The Associate Dean oversees approximately 57 full-time employees across several key departments, including Arts and Humanities, Data & Digital Scholarship, Health & Wellness, Immersive Spaces & Technologies, Professional Programs, Teaching & Learning Programs, Public Services and Branches, including the John C. Hodges Libraries (the main library), the George F. DeVine Music Library, and the Webster C. Pendergrass Agricultural and Veterinary Medicine Library.

https://tinyurl.com/mrxh3m28

“Effect of Perceived Preprint Effectiveness and Research Intensity on Posting Behaviour”

Open science is increasingly recognised worldwide, with preprint posting emerging as a key strategy. This study explores the factors influencing researchers’ adoption of preprint publication, particularly the perceived effectiveness of this practice and research intensity indicators such as publication and review frequency. Using open data from a comprehensive survey with 5,873 valid responses, we conducted regression analyses to control for demographic variables. Researchers’ productivity, particularly the number of journal articles and books published, greatly influences the frequency of preprint deposits. The perception of the effectiveness of preprints follows this. Preprints are viewed positively in terms of early access to new research, but negatively in terms of early feedback. Demographic variables, such as gender and the type of organisation conducting the research, do not have a significant impact on the production of preprints when other factors are controlled for. However, the researcher’s discipline, years of experience and geographical region generally have a moderate effect on the production of preprints. These findings highlight the motivations and barriers associated with preprint publication and provide insights into how researchers perceive the benefits and challenges of this practice within the broader context of open science.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.18896

Head of Research Services at Ohio University

Leads the Libraries’ support for research and creative activity, collaborating across campus, including but not limited to the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs, the Graduate College, the Office of Information Technology, faculty, and library staff to deliver services related to data use, research data management, digital scholarship, and evidence synthesis.

Advances knowledge sharing and research impact through open access initiatives, researcher identity tools, and guidance on publishing and citation analysis.

https://tinyurl.com/fny33fky

“Realising Open Data Principles In UK Research Institutions”

We report on the state of open research data (ORD) policy and practice across UK research institutions through the STAR (Sustainable & TrAnsparent Research data) project. Through qualitative interviews, focus groups, and workshops involving 52 university staff across 21 UK institutions, we investigated the progress and challenges in ORD practices since 2016 publication of the Concordat on Open Research Data.

We observed that while institutions have made progress establishing ORD specialist roles, developing policies, and creating repository infrastructures, systematic monitoring processes and widespread adoption remain stalled. Key challenges include capacity constraints in institutional repositories, limited workload recognition, insufficient funding for long-term archiving, and varying disciplinary interpretations of ORD relevance.

Based on workshops with participants, we recommend recognition of ORD in academic career frameworks, development of disciplinary-relevant data sharing practices, improved infrastructure for monitoring ORD practices, and enhanced support for external disciplinary repositories. The study emphasizes the need for a values-driven rather than compliance-driven approach to ORD implementation, calling for deeper engagement with diverse academic communities to ensure ORD requirements remain meaningful and relevant across disciplines. These findings provide insights for research institutions and funding bodies in developing more effective and inclusive ORD policies.

https://doi.org/10.2218/ijdc.v19i1.1052

Digital Archivist at Miami University (Term)

The Digital Archivist is responsible for working with a range of digital and physical materials generated and obtained by the Myaamia Center and National Breath of Life Archival Institute for Indigenous Languages (National BoL). These primarily consist of language, cultural, and historical materials that need to be digitally repatriated for community-directed curation, preservation, and dissemination.

https://tinyurl.com/mpfv3cpx

“Electronic Health Data Reuse Purposes”

This chapter elaborates on several fields of electronic health data (EHD) reuse in healthcare, mainly for public interest reasons. Real-life examples of EHD reuse in epidemiology, including insights into how EHD is applied in surveillance and occupational health, are provided in the first section. The second section elaborates how EHD can be reused in supporting institutional activities and policy making: project examples carried out by eminent health institutions around the globe, such as the global World Health Organization (WHO), the continental European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the American Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and some regional institutions, such as the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), are illustrated. The third section explores the application of EHD reuse for improving healthcare systems and for carrying out research activities. Specifically, some of the related areas covered include how EHD can be reused in learning healthcare systems, how to advance personalized medicine, how to improve healthcare quality and safety, and how to carry out various research activities. Finally, the fourth section is dedicated to the reuse of EHD for the artificial intelligence (AI) market, which has been experiencing an expansion in healthcare, addressing relevant topics such as administrative costs and associated burden reduction but also training and developing innovative AI-based tools for telemedicine to identify patients at risk for other reuses.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-88497-9_2

Library Systems Analyst at Appalachian State University

Administer and provide guidance for all systems used within the University Libraries;

Support existing library applications in consultation with colleagues and service users, including taking ownership of troubleshooting and enhancing functionality;

Collaborate and consult with students, faculty, and staff students to identify programming solutions to address library needs;

https://appstate.peopleadmin.com/postings/50637

“Reusing Chemical Data Across Disciplines: Initiatives and Common Challenges”

This work discusses reuse of chemical data across disciplines and the role of various data initiatives and projects including PARC, NORMAN-SLE, MassBank, WorldFAIR, PSDI and NFDI4Chem to facilitate increased data sharing. Improved machine-readable chemical data supports global research and interdisciplinary methodologies crucial for sustainable development and achievement of UNESCO’s Open Science priorities and the UN Sustainability Development Goals. Examples of success and ongoing approaches include integrating toxicology and chemical exposure data using ontologies, linking specialised chemical data collections with larger repositories such as PubChem, and developing IUPAC International Chemicals Identifier (InChI) extensions for nanomaterials and mixtures. National data infrastructure projects in the UK and Germany focus on digitising and standardising chemical research data management workflows, aiding scientists in data collection, storage, processing, analysis, disclosure, and reuse. These global initiatives aim to enhance chemical data interoperability to solve real-world problems, foster collaboration, and promote innovation while considering sustainable data resources beyond individual projects.

https://doi.org/10.1515/ci-2025-0203

Librarian for Systems and E-Resources at Yale University

The Librarian for Systems and E-Resources will oversee the access, metadata, administration, statistics, reporting, troubleshooting, and support for all electronic resources acquired and maintained by the law library. The successful candidate will ensure optimal access and usability of subscription resources, including databases, electronic journals, and electronic books. They will also serve as a system administrator for core library systems, including Ex Libris’ Alma/Primo and LibApps. In addition, the Librarian for Systems and E-Resources will lead the work of the Law Library’s institutional repository.

https://tinyurl.com/2zjctjns

“Enabling Factors and Opportunities to Maximize Health Data Reuse”

This chapter looks at future developments and maximization of health data reuse in public health. The digital maturity of healthcare systems is, for example, a crucial factor in enabling the availability of electronic health data and their sharing through interconnected databases. The frontiers opened by artificial intelligence to improve health surveillance, disease detection, and resource allocation are changing public health programmes and population well-being by enabling targeted health promotion efforts, identifying high-risk populations, enhancing communication strategies tailored to specific patient subgroups, optimizing logistics in healthcare delivery, and supporting professionals’ decision-making processes. The common data spaces, which are going to be built in the EU to promote data sharing and innovation, are sustained and strengthened by important reforms, such as the European for Health Data Space Regulation, which aims to standardize eHealth data exchange, empower individuals, and facilitate the secondary use of health data for research, innovation, and policy making by providing precise rules for health data governance, interoperability, and safe data sharing across EU Member States.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-88497-9_3

“Remembering Bill Mischo”

The University Library [of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign] honors the memory of William H. Mischo [https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4234-9836], who passed away on April 20, 2025. Bill was a legendary figure among his colleagues—an innovator, mentor, and leader whose influence shaped not only the Grainger Engineering Library Information Center, but also the very systems through which countless users have discovered knowledge. His decades of service leave a lasting impact on the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and throughout the wider world of library and information science. An excerpt from his obituary follows.

William H. Mischo began as Head of the Engineering Library in Engineering Hall in 1982 at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He developed science and technology library collections, worked with faculty to understand their research, and was a role model for other librarians on campus.

Bill was perhaps best known for the planning and construction of the world-class Grainger Engineering Library Information Center (GELIC), which opened on March 14, 1994, and is the northernmost landmark on the Bardeen Quad. Bill trained hundreds of new STEM librarians and information professionals who work around the world.

Soon after Grainger opened, Bill was a Principal Investigator on the Digital Library Initiative I (DLI-I), a National Science Foundation-funded grant in which research was developed to create digital journals and was a major change for information delivery. In 1999, some of the very first Digital Object Identifiers (DOI), which are used to create unique identifiers for articles, books, chapters, and conferences, and are used to discover and connect information on the Web, were first created in GELIC.

https://tinyurl.com/2mmysndk

Electronic Resources Licensing and Coordination Librarian at Michigan State University

Coordinates the licensing of electronic resources under supervision by the Head of Collection Strategies and with all involved parties, including reading all licenses, suggesting licensing language, and reviewing old licenses for needed updates.

Negotiates pricing, terms, and licensing language with vendors in a positive and productive manner in collaboration with the Head of Collection Strategies.

Develops relationships with vendors and communicates with them about electronic resources content, pricing, access, set up, and troubleshooting.

https://tinyurl.com/3f6nhk38

“Metadata Augmentation Using NLP, Machine Learning and AI Chatbots: A Comparison”

Recent advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence have provided more alternatives for the implementation of repetitive or monotonous tasks. However, the development of AI tools has not been straightforward, and use case exploration and workflow integration are still ongoing challenges. In this work, we present a detailed qualitative analysis of the performance and user experience of popular commercial AI chatbots when used for document classification with limited data. We report the results for a real-world example of metadata augmentation in academic libraries environment. We compare the results of AI chatbots with other machine learning and natural language processing methods such as XGBoost and BERT-based fine tuning, and share insights from our experience. We found that AI chatbots perform similarly among them while outperforming the machine learning methods we tested, showing their advantage when the method relies on local data for training. We also found that while working with AI chatbots is easier than with code, getting useful results from them still represents a challenge for the user. Furthermore, we encountered alarming conceptual errors in the output of some chatbots, such as not being able to count the number of lines of our inputs and explaining the mistake as “human error”. Although this is not complete evidence that AI chatbots can be effectively used for metadata classification, we believe that the information provided in this work can be useful to librarians and data curators in developing pathways for the integration and use of AI tools for data curation or metadata augmentation tasks.

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2504.17189

Librarian Digital Initiatives at Western New Mexico University

Investigates, recommends, implements, manages, and troubleshoots access to electronic library resources, including databases, e-books, and other applications. Ensures that electronic resources maintain compatibility with existing library systems.

Establishes and maintains relationships with vendors to learn about relevant new products and services.

Serves as the liaison between Miller Library and WNMU’s IT and Online / Distance Education departments. Coordinates new library software releases and evaluates the functionality of electronic product features.

Assists with library instruction, especially in the creation and delivery of online instruction materials.

Responsible for the development, implementation, maintenance, and advancement of digital products and collections.

Creates and maintains metadata for digital content.

https://tinyurl.com/mvh94edy

“Exploring Emerging Technologies in Archiving and Preservation: Leveraging 3D Models, Interactive Environments, and AI Tools”

This article. . . explores how cultural heritage practitioners can leverage emerging technologies to enhance their work. . . . This article highlights AI applications and emerging technologies that can generate scripts without needing coding experience, create 3D models that increase accessibility and engagement, and develop virtual exhibits that extend the lifespan and reach of physical exhibits while providing additional interactive elements.

https://doi.org/10.1177/18758789251336085

Digital Strategies Librarian at Western University

Works closely with colleagues across the library system to identify innovative and evolving digital tools and resources that advance scholarly exploration and investigation.

Leads and/or supports institution-wide digital projects, initiatives, services, and platforms. Examples of ongoing or planned projects include the implementation, development, and management of a new DSpace repository; a digital asset management (DAM) system for special and general collections; a university-wide researcher information management system (RIMS); and Western Libraries’ Open Journal System (OJS) instance.

Proactively seeks out and develops opportunities for partnerships with faculty and academic units on campus, effectively deploying technical, scholarly, and project management skills to plan and execute innovative, sustainable digital projects.

Develops and supports programming in Scholars Lab, a newly created collaborative space in The D.B. Weldon Library.

https://tinyurl.com/mt5wz24z

“Suspiciously Reliable: A Case Study of Students’ Perceptions of Open Access Searching”

This case study examines how undergraduate students perceive the search infrastructure involved in open access searching and the open access materials’ content. Thirty students across two semesters of a second-year library science course were given a research topic but asked to imagine themselves as lacking access to the university’s subscriptions—meaning they could only access open access content through search engines such as Google Scholar, repositories, and the Directory of Open Access Journals. They were then asked to complete a research log, an annotated bibliography, and a reflection paper. In reviewing their reflection papers, a dualistic theme of both valuing and distrusting open access research was identified. Most students felt it necessary to apply more rigorous evaluation to the content found through open access databases and even evaluated the databases themselves. Despite this and other reservations, many students commented on the value of open access, especially when it pertained to the free and open exchange of information. Based on this study, we have adapted the way we speak about open access in the classroom to preemptively address some of the concerns noted in the reflections. This case study can add to the body of literature that examines the value of introducing open access to students.

https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18273

Paywall: “Innovation-Oriented Makerspaces in Academic Libraries: A Systematic Literature Review”

The [literature] review highlights key themes and methodologies in existing research, with a special focus on the functions, services, and collaborative innovation aspects of these spaces.. . . It reveals that these spaces serve multiple roles, such as exploration and training hub for emerging technologies, cultivation and research incubation center for innovative literacy, innovation platform, component of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, and acting as space arrangements, guidance with new technologies, teaching and services design, consultation on entrepreneurship and intellectual property rights. Additionally, the research explores key collaborative innovation factors within these spaces, including governance, compactness, reliability, and institutionalization.

https://doi.org/10.1177/09610006251333447

Digital Asset Specialist at Chicago History Museum (Term)

The Digital Asset Specialist, reporting to the Head of Digital Collections Initiatives, will contribute to the development and implementation of a robust digital asset management program as part of CHM’s long-term Digital Futures initiative. Key responsibilities include assisting with DAMS vendor research, selection, and implementation; organizing and preparing CHM’s unmanaged digital assets for ingestion; migrating assets to local/cloud storage and DAMS; and creating and enhancing metadata. Collaborating closely with the Digital Futures project team, this position will help ensure the successful launch of a new DAMS in 2026.

https://tinyurl.com/57nax7vm

“Towards Sustainable and Coordinated Methods for Estimating Open Access Costs at Canadian Higher Education Institutions”

Higher education institutions in Canada aim to provide access to knowledge through subscriptions and investments in OA publishing. As subscription and OA publication costs continue to increase, some institutions have established funds to support authors’ payment of publication fees. Others have adopted models such as read-and-publish deals or “transformative agreements”, where institutions pay publishers a lump sum for subscriptions and publishing fees for authors. As institutions continue to subscribe to journals, support authors with OA publishing, and negotiate agreements, accurately estimating institutional OA spending is imperative to determining the cost effectiveness of deals and necessary funding support for authors. Methods to estimate OA costs have largely developed in silos across the country. This commentary presents observations derived from work performed across Canada on the challenges accompanying OA estimation and calls for a more coordinated approach to establish standardized, sustainable methods. Calibrating efforts across institutions can support the development of reliable methodologies and streamline resources helpful for the more efficient performance of the often onerous task of estimating costs.

https://doi.org/10.5206/cjils-rcsib.v48i1.22390

Digital Archivist at Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

The Digital Archivist works cross-departmentally with Academy curators, preservationists, and archivists to manage efforts to preserve, describe, and make accessible digitized and born-digital archival materials. This position primarily supports producers and users of audio and video content.

https://tinyurl.com/mvm3hvhp

“Improving the Transparency of Data Access Conditions in the SSH Domain: Recommendations Based on a Small-Scale Analysis of the Conditions Applied to Restricted Access Datasets”

The benefits of making data available for reuse are recognized by many. While some datasets can be openly available, others contain sensitive or personal data that needs to be protected. To allow the sharing of the latter datasets, many trustworthy digital repositories provide options to publish data restricted access. However, detailed standardized information about the access conditions for these restricted access datasets are often lacking from the metadata. Researchers interested in reusing these datasets can thus not judge whether they are eligible to reuse data and under what conditions.

To get a better understanding of how we can increase the transparency of access conditions, this paper aimed to investigate the access conditions and procedures that are commonly applied by depositors within the (Dutch) Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) research community. The results of a survey that was conducted (n=45) indicated that various conditions are applied and while some datasets can have few restrictions, for others reuse is highly restricted. Most respondents limit reuse to research purposes and prohibit commercial use. Some datasets are available for students or teaching, but often with additional requirements. A large majority of respondents required a motivation letter to evaluate before allowing reuse. Notably, respondents often chose ‘it depends’ when asked whether a specific condition was applied, showing a lot of nuances in the conditions and the evaluation of access requests. An important result from our survey was that clear procedures and decision-making guidelines seem to be lacking for many respondents. Requests are often evaluated ad-hoc and through email. Decisions are said to require an evaluation of the quality of the application, yet the evaluation criteria seem to be rarely specified and explicitly communicated at the time of data deposit.

Based on the results of the small-scale survey, we conclude with a set of six recommendations directed at researchers and infrastructure providers outlining how information about access conditions and procedures can be made more transparent in the future. This work should be seen as a starting point to improve the Accessibility and Reusability of restricted access datasets in the SSH domain.

https://doi.org/10.2218/ijdc.v19i1.1048

“ProQuest – New Ebook Central AI Tool Helps Users Engage Deeper with Scholarly Ebooks”

The Ebook Central Research Assistant simplifies book exploration by identifying key concepts and providing contextual explanations to enhance understanding. With chapter-level insights and key term definitions drawn directly from the text, it keeps users engaged in their research. Powered by Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), it ensures accuracy by sourcing insights directly from the book’s content. Additionally, it helps users discover related titles within their library’s Ebook Central collection, seamlessly expanding their research scope. Features at launch include:

Key Takeaways: Chapter-level insights help users assess content relevance efficiently

Concept Highlights: Identification and explanation of key terms, with one-click searches, deepen research

https://tinyurl.com/49kwvajd