Simplifying the search experience – resisting the lure of shiny new technology
After two years of implementing a resource discovery system at the National University of Ireland, Galway (NUI Galway), and a new website to complement it, imagine our horror when in the first user survey postlaunch, our users told us that we were not meeting even their minimum expectations of a lib...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Ubiquity Press
2013-07-01
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| Series: | Insights: The UKSG Journal |
| Online Access: | http://insights.uksg.org/articles/192 |
| Summary: | After two years of implementing a resource discovery system at the National University of Ireland, Galway (NUI Galway), and a new website to complement it, imagine our horror when in the first user survey postlaunch, our users told us that we were not meeting even their minimum expectations of a library website that allowed them to find information on their own. Comment analysis, focus groups and a user observation study revealed that our technology-driven and information literacy-led implementation of our discovery system had resulted in user confusion. We had not delivered the simplicity and Google-type experience that this system had promised. In this article, we will share what we learnt from our users and discuss our new user-driven implementation of our latest discovery system and the user and library staff response to it. |
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| ISSN: | 2048-7754 |