New TDL Members
Two new members have joined the Texas Digital Library, bringing total membership to sixteen universities. Texas A&M Corpus Christi has joined at the affiliate level, with the guidance of library director Christine Shupala. The campus serves more than 8,000 students and almost 500 faculty. The University of Texas at San Antonio, encouraged by library assistant dean Stephanie Wittenbach, is the newest associate member. It supports over 28,000 students and more than 550 faculty members.
Welcome Dan Galewsky
In order to support the expansion of TDL services, we have added a new programmer to the TDL team, Dan Galewsky. Dan comes to us after many years as a software engineer in the private sector, where he worked for several large technology companies in the Austin area, as well as with four start-up companies. Dan brings many years of experience with Java, XML, content management and web applications, and he also holds both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in computer science from Texas A&M University.
Manakin Article Published in D-Lib
The TDL team has written an article for the current D-Lib Magazine. The article, “Manakin: A New Face for DSpace,” begins with a broad overview of Manakin and its role in the digital library landscape. A more technical discussion follows which considers Manakin’s three major architectural components: Aspects, Themes, and the DRI Schema. Finally, there is an examination of several use cases that have employed Manakin to solve difficult real-world problems. At the conclusion of the article, the reader will understand how Manakin can be used at his or her institution to adapt a repository’s interface to the individual requirements of the institution’s users and the unique properties of their content.
To read the full article, go to http://www.dlib.org/dlib/november07/phillips/11phillips.html.
Recent Presentations
Mark McFarland and John Leggett gave a TDL update to the Lonestar Education and Research Network (LEARN) Preservation Board at the beginning of December at Texas A&M. LEARN is a cooperative effort of thirty-three institutions of higher education in Texas providing high-speed connectivity between their institutions, as well as to research networks across the country in support of higher education’s research, teaching, health care, and public service missions.
The TDL co-directors also recently visited Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. John and Mark met with the Director of Library Services, Ann Holder, to discuss how the TDL could serve as a repository for research output, including electronic theses and dissertations, for the university.
TDL Shibboleth Federation News
The TDL Shibboleth federation now includes six member institutions — Angelo State University, Baylor University, Texas A&M University, University of North Texas, University of Texas at Austin, and University of Texas at Dallas — and is steadily growing. Recently Phil Mattingly visited Texas Tech University to discuss their Shibboleth implementation, and they should be joining soon as well.
In October, TDL co-directors John Leggett and Mark McFarland, along with Phil Mattingly, presented on the federation at a conference of the Corporacion Universitaria para el Desarrollo de Internet (CUDI), a Mexican analogue to the U.S.’s Internet2. If you would like to learn more about the TDL Shibboleth Federation, please visit the Shibboleth section of our Web site, where you will find a slide show, two Shibboleth videos produced by TDL staff (one in English, one in Spanish) and several documents about what is required to participate in the federation.
Scott Phillips and Phil Mattingly gave a project briefing entitled, “Shibboleth: Enabling Collaboration Across Institutions,” at the Coalition for Network Information (CNI) conference in Washington, D.C. this December. The talk focused on the TDL’s creation of a state-wide Shibboleth federation to allow for secure collaboration among the organization’s various member institutions.
IMLS Grant Update
The various TDL groups working on the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) grant project to create a state-wide electronic thesis and dissertation repository have laid out their plans for the first year, and efforts are well under way. For more information about the project, please visit the updated grant web site.
TDL CIO Advisory Committee Being Formed
The TDL co-directors have begun to put together a CIO Advisory Committee, which will provide input on IT collaboration issues in higher education as they pertain to the Texas Digital Library. Pierce Cantrell, CIO of Texas A&M University, and Brian Roberts, CIO of the University of Texas at Austin, have agreed to chair the new group.
DSpace Tutorial Created
Scott Phillips, TDL research and programming coordinator, and Tina Messinger, Texas A&M libraries web designer, have created an online tutorial about setting up DSpace. The tutorials will serve several purposes, including assisting developers new to DSpace and providing updated documentation for the next system release, DSpace 1.5. Links for the tutorials may be found at:
- Tutorial Text:
http://wiki.dspace.org/confluence/display/DSPACE/IDE+Integration+-+DSpace%2C+Eclipse+and+Tomcat+Video+Tutorial - Video: Part I
http://di.tamu.edu/publications/resources/tutorials/DSpaceEclipseVideoTutorialPart1.mp4 - Video: Part II
http://di.tamu.edu/publications/resources/tutorials/DSpaceEclipseVideoTutorialPart2.mp4 - Video: Part III
http://di.tamu.edu/publications/resources/tutorials/DSpaceEclipseVideoTutorialPart3.mp4
Upcoming Activities
The TDL co-directors will be making a visit to the Houston / Galveston area in January to meet with colleagues at TDL member institutions Texas A&M Galveston and the University of Houston, as well as to visit the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. At the same time, the chairs of the TDL working groups will meet at the University of Houston to discuss the status of their current projects and the interactions among their efforts.