This final main session for day 2 which I attended was another double presentation. The first of the two presentations was from Erin Thoms from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at the Smithsonian Institution and covered their use of bug-tracking software to let users identify problems in their database of digitized materials. It seemed to me an innovative use of bug-tracking software. The presentation was quite short and to the point.
The second presentation was on the subject of assessing library performance by Ger de Bruyn from Rotterdam. In this presentation Ger described the long process that led him to develop a system for libraries in the Netherlands to upload their statistical data to a central service on a monthly basis. This service fills a hole which Ger perceived in the world of libraries where there are no packaged solutions for tracking the performance of different library services. As a hosted service used by many libraries this system can also be used to compare different libraries' performance, something which has been mentioned as an issue of concern at the Winnetka-Northfield Public Library District Strategic Planning Committee meetings, but which is very hard to do without having data from other libraries to compare. It is an interesting concept and it will be interesting to see what happens with it in the library world. It seems to me that something like this could certainly be more useful and easier to prepare than the next best thing we have to it at the moment, the state-mandated annual IPLAR reports.
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