Recent Feature Highlights for Hyku Commons

Amanda Hurford Uncategorized February 8, 2023

Home page for the Hyku Commons repository, showing representative logos for each school's repository

(Contribution by Nicholas Stanton-Roark.)

The past couple of months have been a whirlwind of development. In December the upgrade from 2.1 to 4.1.0 was finalized and the attendant bugs addressed; in the same month we finished a mini-sprint of enhancements mostly related to long-standing bugs; and in January we finalized a request order for metadata enhancements based on community feedback.

In this post, we want to highlight some of the features that have undergone significant improvement in the past couple few months.

Featured collections

For some time, the collections that appear on each repository homepage have been beyond anyone’s control. Frequently, editing a collection would cycle it off the homepage—but not always. There was no reliable way to control which collections would appear on the homepage except to limit the repository to only a few collections.

This has been addressed by replacing the random collection placement with a Featured Collection panel on the homepage. Collections can be toggled to be featured/unfeatured from the collection view page, just as works can for the Featured Works panel. Once featured, collections can be reordered on the homepage by any admin user.

A featured collections panel with no collections featured

Collection-level search

Previously, the search bar built into the collection page only searched the titles of works and required an exact string match even then. We have addressed this by building a full solr database search into this field. This means that searches from that central search bar work as a typical user would expect: it searches all fields and contents (including OCRed text) of works and subcollections within the collection.

Batch edit

For some time, the batch edit function on the Works dashboard has been bugged, returning an error message when attempted. We have repaired this functionality, and multiple works can be edited by selecting them from the dashboard and clicking the Edit Selected button. From this screen, information shared by the selected works will appear in the relevant fields, and new data can be supplied to fields and will update all selected works simultaneously.

Homepage appearance

The Hyku Commons homepage has had a renovation, greatly improving the look and feel as well as the clarity of the shared repository space. Whereas the previous, placeholder homepage was very static, this presentation dynamically displays a variety of directory images as they are toggled from unlisted to public.

Favicon

By navigating to Settings → Appearance → Favicon, users can set a custom favicon image for their tenant. If you often have 30-50 tabs open at any time, we expect you will find this helpful going forward.

Analytics

New analytics visualizations and information have been added to various dashboards. In particular, a new Analytics section contains a Works report and Collections report, with some configuration and export options.

Cross-tenant searching

With the upgrade came the capacity for us to support cross-tenant searching. This will include a Hyku Commons wide search (of public tenants, not unlisted ones), with a search bar to be added to the Hyku Commons homepage, but will also permit more custom shared searches.

This is only a cross-section of the work that has been done in recent months, but these are some broad changes we want to make sure stakeholders don’t miss. See our patch notes document for more granular information about enhancements and bug fixes. We’re looking forward to bringing metadata improvements shortly!

PALSave Textbook Creation Grant program releases first open textbook, “The Bible and Music”

molly Uncategorized February 3, 2023

What do works like Handel’s “Messiah” and Bach’s “Passions” have in common with contemporary songs like Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” or Kendrick Lamar’s “How Much a Dollar Cost?”

Like much of the world’s favorite music, these songs draw inspiration from biblical stories, and a new, free and open textbook published by the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) offers a unique learning approach to the subject.

In “The Bible and Music,” the first open textbook published with a grant from the PALSave: PALNI Affordable Learning program, author James McGrath, Ph.D., Clarence L. Goodwin Chair in New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University, explores the intersection of faith and music while inviting readers to experience the material firsthand through interactive video and audio clips.

“The chance first to teach a course on the Bible and music, then write a cutting-edge textbook on the topic, has been a dream come true,” says McGrath. “My career has been in the academic study of the Bible and religion. Alongside that has always been a love of listening to and playing music I never did anything with professionally, but that has been profoundly important to me nonetheless. Teaching the course provided the opportunity to figure out how best to explore this intersection for an audience that may not have a background with either the Bible or music. Writing the book has given me the opportunity to share what I have learned and what I teach, and to make it available not just for my future students, but anyone interested.”

“The Bible and Music” offers what no previous textbook on the subject has before. It provides readers with an overview of the highly influential—yet sometimes surprising—connection between song and faith, with material dating back from ancient Israelite music and the musical notation in ancient Hebrew manuscripts, to the reception of the Bible in classical, rock, hip hop, country, and other genres of today.

Offered digitally, it is the first textbook of its kind to engage readers in actively listening to the subject matter as they follow the readings. Best of all, it does this as an open educational resource (OER), meaning it costs readers—primarily college students and their instructors—nothing.

McGrath was one of the first open textbook authors to apply for and receive a PALSave Textbook Creation Grant from PALNI in 2021. Offered to faculty from PALNI-supported institutions, the grant allows educators to develop open textbooks that are freely available online, making them part of a nationwide effort to reduce the cost of course materials for college students. Financed with support from Lilly Endowment Inc., each grant provides a maximum of $6,500 per project or $5,000 per author.

As an inaugural grant recipient, McGrath agreed to have his book serve as the pilot project for the entire Textbook Creation Grant program. Since the release of McGrath’s book, there are now eight grant-funded titles in production with seven additional titles to be selected for creation in March 2023.

“It is extremely rewarding to see faculty authors like Dr. McGrath, who is so committed to creating high quality, low-cost course material, receive funding for a project and then see it come to fruition,” says Amanda Hurford, PALNI Scholarly Communications Director. “It is because of these educators that textbook affordability is becoming a reality. PALNI is grateful to them, and to our funding organization, Lilly Endowment, for enabling us to support them in the process.”

PALNI’s OER Publishing Task Force, including Project Manager and Butler University Librarian Jennifer Coronado and PALNI Publishing Project Coordinator Heather Myers, supported the creation of the book.

“The Bible and Music” by James McGrath is available for free through the PALNI Press.

Visit PALSave: PALNI Affordable Learning online to learn more about Textbook Creation Grants and other OER opportunities offered through PALNI.

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About the PALSave Textbook Creation Grant Program

With support from Lilly Endowment Inc., PALNI’s PALSave Textbook Creation Grant Program awards funding to faculty members from PALNI-supported institutions to create open textbooks.

Faculty are periodically invited to submit creation grant proposals for the courses they teach. Textbooks may cover any discipline at the undergraduate or postgraduate level. PALNI seeks proposals for textbooks geared toward specific fields of study that meet the inclusion criteria for the Open Textbook Library.

The PALNI Open Educational Resource (OER) Publishing Task Force selects projects for funding based on proposal quality, clearly defined goals, need within the current open access body of work, and adoption potential within PALNI schools and beyond.

PALNI coordinates peer review, copyediting, layout, and hosting services to assist grant recipients in their textbook creation. Each textbook is also supported by a local project manager to monitor progress and answer questions throughout development. The open textbooks are published on the PALNI Press-supported Pressbooks platform alongside other faculty-contributed works and are ultimately submitted to the Open Textbook Library and OER repositories.

About Lilly Endowment Inc.

Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based, private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by three members of the Lilly family — J.K. Lilly Sr. and sons J.K. Jr. and Eli — through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. While those gifts remain the financial bedrock of the Endowment, the Endowment is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion and maintains a special commitment to its hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana. More information can be found at www.lillyendowment.org.

About the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana

The Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) is a non-profit organization that supports collaboration for library and information services for 24 colleges, universities and seminaries throughout the state. From its inception in 1992, the PALNI collaboration has been a key avenue for its supported institutions to contain costs while providing more effective library services. More recently, PALNI has adopted a model of deep collaboration that pools resources and people as a tool to expand services while keeping costs down. PALNI’s board of directors, composed of all 24 library deans and directors from the supported organizations, convened a Future Framing Task Force in 2019 to address ongoing demographic challenges in higher education. The board has escalated this work in the wake of COVID-19, as the consortium seeks to manage the increased need for online support while reducing costs. Simultaneously, PALNI is expanding collaboration within its institutions and with external library partners to address challenges and build cost-effective services. Visit the PALNI website for more information.

PALNI Supported Institutions

PALNI and PALCI continue to remove barriers to Hyku adoption with IMLS grant

molly Uncategorized January 26, 2023

Midway through funding period, project organizers have completed UX research and major system upgrade, with the Consortial Institutional Repository Toolkit in production

The Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) and The Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration & Innovation (PALCI) are midway through a 2-year, $248,050 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to support Hyku for Consortia: Removing Barriers to Adoption. With this award, granted in 2021 as part of the National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program, the partners are increasing the flexibility, accessibility, and usability of Hyku, the multi-tenant repository platform system.

Why Institutional Repositories?

Repositories are a critical piece of library infrastructure, enabling access to many types of digital materials created by an institution’s students, faculty, staff, and researchers. Libraries, cultural heritage institutions, and other organizations also use repositories to provide access to digitized special collections.

In the face of continued budgetary pressures, libraries seek cost-saving approaches to their work. Due to costs or other constraints, those unable to deploy Institutional Repository (IR) services are increasingly looking to consortia to serve this role. This project specifically advances Hyku to support the repository needs of library groups by increasing affordability and flexibility in a scalable, multi-tenant environment.

“This grant has provided the foundation for PALNI and PALCI to apply open source software, new business models, and collaboration to remove barriers to widespread adoption of repository software,” says Kirsten Leonard, Executive Director for PALNI. “Thanks to this award and the critical feedback provided by our pilot participants—including those from partnering consortia VIVA and LOUIS—we have made progress in building and sustaining an open, community-led repository service that has the potential to impact thousands of libraries. We leverage the advances in the Samvera open source community and contribute our advances back to the community through our developer, Software Services by Scientist.com.”

“We place a high value on the opportunities for innovation, collaboration, cost savings, and agency that come from community-owned infrastructure and solutions like Hyku,” says Jill Morris, PALCI Executive Director. “It frees us to define scaled solutions in ways that proprietary software and fully outsourced solutions can’t. The Hyku community is active and vibrant, allowing us to partner and take advantage of momentum happening in other projects. It also puts libraries back in the driver’s seat as they make technology choices about how and where to store, discover, integrate, and access their digital assets and materials.”

The first year of the project culminated with PALNI and PALCI making significant progress on their initial goals to:

Produce a comprehensive gap assessment for Hyku, focusing on the barriers to adoption.
Complete user-focused development sprints tightly scoped around high-priority features of the system.
Create a toolkit to share with other library groups considering collaborating on a repository.

Engaging the User Community

The partners completed extensive user experience (UX) research with UX firm Samhaeng. Pilot participants identified barriers and had a central role in defining, reviewing, prioritizing, and approving the features of the Hyku service that are being developed.

“Engaging with the Hyku Commons community is key to achieving the major goals for Hyku for Consortia,” says Amanda Hurford, PALNI Scholarly Communications Director. “Together, the ‘PALs’ have built a user community to identify gaps in Hyku, deduplicate work, and encourage sharing of solutions across institutions.”

That community includes pilot participants from two other major consortia, VIVA and LOUIS, bringing the total number of Hyku Commons tenants across all four partnering consortia to 50. The UX research report, combined with user satisfaction surveys, is the basis of the project’s gap assessment report, which informs development decisions by directly addressing the needs articulated by these stakeholders.

“The support and responsiveness of the grant team to VIVA member pilot institutions has made the Hyku for Consortia project a joy to work on,” says Genya O’Gara, Acting VIVA Director. “VIVA has already gained a deeper understanding of the breadth of needs across the consortium and what future functionality would allow for a broader range of institutional engagement. With the recent release of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) advancing open repository principles, this work couldn’t be more timely—it is more critical than ever that we support the development of open repository solutions that are community-led, scalable, and sustainable for a wide range of academic library types.”

“The Hyku for Consortia project team’s community-building efforts around Hyku have been especially beneficial for LOUIS pilot members as they’ve tested the platform,” says Laurie Blandino, Associate Commissioner and Executive Director for LOUIS. “Monthly meetings to go over product developments and updates, as well as open discussions about repository practices and policy development, have enabled LOUIS’s member institutions to learn and share best practices with a wide range of academic libraries. The development of local collections of faculty and student works helps our members demonstrate their value to higher education in accordance with LOUIS’s strategic plan. It is essential to the development of such repositories that affordable, user-friendly platforms with robust support are available to meet the vastly different needs of our member institutions. The Hyku for Consortia project is a welcome addition to the institutional repository landscape.”

User-Driven Enhancements

In addition to completing initial UX research, project organizers recently concluded a major system upgrade from Hyku 2.1 to Hyku 4.1. Launched in November, the upgrade includes improvements to analytics, featured collections and cross-site search functionality, and an enhanced index and homepage. Other previous developments include improvements to bulk import and export workflows, an area defined as a high priority by users. Developments were completed in partnership with Software Services by Scientist.com (SoftServ), an open-source software development firm and long-time contributor to the Hyku project.

“This upgrade has brought in many desired enhancements, especially in areas where users noted room for improvement, such as reporting analytics, as well as many ‘quality of life’ improvements for repository administrators,” says Nic Stanton-Roark, PALNI’s Institutional Repository Project Coordinator and Archivist at Anderson University. “We look forward to our continued work addressing gaps identified by our user community. We expect metadata flexibility to be the next area for development post-upgrade, as suggested by the first satisfaction survey and UX report.”

The project’s next phases include continued UX research and data collection to identify and assign priority to other gaps in functionality, especially those that present a barrier to Hyku adoption. Emphasizing the goal to help other consortia and library groups stand up a Hyku instance, the partners are creating a Consortial Institutional Repository Toolkit that will provide guidelines, documentation, and other materials to support the development of similar collaborative repository services.

For more project information, news and updates, visit the Hyku for Consortia website.

About the Institute of Museum and Library Service

The Institute of Museum and Library Services is the primary source of federal support for the nation’s libraries and museums. We advance, support, and empower America’s museums, libraries, and related organizations through grantmaking, research, and policy development. Our vision is a nation where museums and libraries work together to transform the lives of individuals and communities. To learn more, visit www.imls.gov and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

About the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana, Inc. (PALNI)

PALNI is a non-profit organization supporting collaboration for library and information services to the libraries of its twenty-three supported institutions. Over time, the library deans and directors who sit on the PALNI board have adjusted the organization’s strategic direction as the internet and information services landscape has changed. PALNI has expanded beyond providing a resource management system to sharing expertise in many areas, including strategic planning, reference, information flue, outreach, data management, and configuration, and has identified greater collaboration in acquisitions as a key goal. www.palni.edu

About The Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration & Innovation (PALCI)

The PALCI organization was originally founded as the ‘Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, Inc.,” and was formed in 1996 as a grassroots federation of 35 academic libraries in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Today, PALCI is known as Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration & Innovation, with membership consisting of 74 academic and research libraries, in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia, and New York. PALCI’s mission is to enable cost-effective and sustainable access to information resources and services for academic libraries in Pennsylvania and surrounding states. PALCI Members serve over 800,000 students, faculty, and staff at member institutions, through a variety of programs, including the highly-regarded EZBorrow resource sharing service. PALCI also serves as the home for the Affordable Learning PA program, creating a community of practice for open textbooks and related educational resources. https://palci.org

About LOUIS: The Louisiana Library Network

LOUIS is a consortium of public and private college and university libraries in the state of Louisiana. This partnership was formed in 1992 by the library deans and directors at these institutions, in order to create a cost-effective collaboration among the institutions for the procurement of library technology and resources. We are currently forty-seven members strong.

About VIVA

VIVA is the academic library consortium serving 71 nonprofit higher education institutions in Virginia, including 39 state assisted colleges and universities, 31 independent private, nonprofit institutions, and The Library of Virginia. VIVA’s mission is to provide, in an equitable, cooperative, and cost‐effective manner, enhanced access to library and information resources for Virginia’s academic libraries serving the nonprofit higher education community.

About Scientist.com

Scientist.com’s mission is to empower and connect scientists worldwide. By transforming the way scientific research is performed, our Science as a Service® platform accelerates discoveries that cure disease, address climate change and help secure global food and energy supplies. We combine sophisticated AI technology with white-glove Research Concierge® support to enable researchers to run more innovative experiments faster and cheaper. Scientist.com acquired Notch8, a San Diego-based company offering application and software development services, in 2022. The acquisition of the company—now called Software Services (SoftServ)—enabled Scientist.com to begin offering web services—such as web and mobile application development, code audits, framework upgrades, deployment optimization and monitoring and support—to its existing global network of researchers and service providers.

Improving Bulk Import and Export in Hyku

Amanda Hurford Uncategorized September 16, 2022

(Feature photo by Pixabay.)

Introduction

Back in 2020, we wrote a duo of blog posts about bulk upload: part one examining the background of batch operations and why they are challenging, and part two talking about our specific work selecting and installing the Bulkrax importer tool into the shared Hyku for Consortia repository Hyku Commons. Today, we are writing about the wrap-up of a recent development sprint to improve Bulkrax importing and exporting.

In the user satisfaction survey performed at the kickoff of the Reducing Barriers to Hyku Adoption IMLS grant, we found that “Uploading and creating works in batches” was one of the areas that users were least satisfied with. The recent UX report on Hyku Commons administrative functionality similarly highlighted batch workflows as an area requiring attention.

In order to respond to user feedback about batch/bulk import, and to further add functionality for users to be able to export data, Hyku for Consortia worked with SoftServ (formerly known as Notch8) to complete a development sprint around import and export.

Process

Over the spring and summer of 2022, SoftServ upgraded Hyku Commons’ Bulkrax utility to introduce several functional improvements and bug fixes. They also improved the ingest data display, particularly resolving inaccuracies around the number of entries processed, entry failure, and the total number of entries. The import status message was also corrected to indicate when imports are successful and to provide a link to the imported work.

"Before" screenshot of successful importer showing inaccurate item link text. — **Before**: Inaccurate Item Link text

"After" screenshot of successful importer showing a link to the successfully imported Work. — **After**: Link to the successfully imported Work

SoftServ also introduced improvements to Bulkrax’s export functionality and user interface. According to Hyku for Consortia’s specifications, the ability was added to export all descriptive metadata, available provenance, administrative data, and structural and technical metadata needed to reconstruct works if available. Also added was functionality to export digital objects and their thumbnails, as well as a complete manifest of downloaded materials using a bagit integration.

Results

In summary, this sprint resulted in the following for Hyku Commons:

Upgraded Bulkrax functionality and bug fixes
Fixes to the display of inaccurate import data and status messages
Ability to export data necessary to reconstruct works
Metadata export for works, items, and collections
Export of digital objects and their thumbnails
Bagit integration for export

The Hyku Commons User Guide and Training Video Playlist are being updated to reflect the new Bulkrax importer and exporter functionality.

Next Steps

We will continue to support our users’ utilization of import/export, and note any problems and suggested improvements. Soon, we will re-survey Hyku Commons users regarding their satisfaction, and we hope to see improvements in the area of “Uploading and creating works in batches” based on the completed work. We also invite other Samvera users to take advantage of the Bulkrax improvements sponsored by Hyku for Consortia.

Further next steps for our project are to continue working on the development sprint currently underway — an upgrade of our instance from Hyku 2.1 to 5. This sprint will bring forth many desired improvements, including improved reporting analytics, which was another where users expressed dissatisfaction. We look forward to providing Hyku Commons users with improvements in this area.

Continuing data collection is taking place in order to identify and assign priority to other gaps in functionality, especially those that present a barrier to Hyku adoption. We expect metadata flexibility to be the next area for development post-upgrade, as suggested by the first satisfaction survey and UX report.

This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, LG-36-19-0108.

Hyku Commons User Experience Report

Amanda Hurford Uncategorized June 8, 2022

Introduction

Early in 2022, the Hyku for Consortia team started working with Samhaeng, a UX (user experience) firm out of Denmark. As part of the Reducing Barriers to Hyku Adoption 2021-2023 IMLS grant, we commenced the first official phase of user research with this partnership. This phase focused on Hyku administrative functions in PALNI and PALCI’s shared multi-tenant installation of Hyku, which we refer to as Hyku Commons. Samhaeng produced a UX report for the purposes of:

Identifying issues with existing Hyku Commons repository interfaces and workflows
Identifying needs for library/end-user metadata customization
Creating specific suggestions for improvement and enhancements

Process

After meeting team members to get a scope of the project and introduction to our setup, the consultant, Filip Jakobsen (CEO and founder of Samhaeng), held four in-depth interviews with Hyku Commons users to see how Hyku is used in their environment, listen to ideas for improvement, and even to co-design some solutions.

Results

The report starts with an acknowledgement that users are generally happy with using the software.

“…even though this report focuses on the many points of constructive criticism given by users, the overarching message from users was that the data input workflows in the software work quite well for them already.”

The report provides helpful contextual overviews of the software ecosystem and worker setups. Several points of feedback are presented in the areas of Public UI (user interface), Staff data input UI, Settings and configuration UIs, and Non-UI aspects of the system.

Candidates for further research suggested are:

“Work type” templates workflow
“Work” public page layout
Multi-Value input workflow
Workflow for adding of additional data for items
Batch workflows

It ends with a suggestion to continuously involve users in development decisions:

“I encourage you to continue running a process that gives users a central role in defining, reviewing and approving the features that are prioritized and developed.”

View the report in its entirety here (30MB download).

Next Steps

The next step for the Hyku for Consortia team is to synthesize the feedback provided in this report into a gap assessment. This gap assessment will also include satisfaction survey data, comments from the user community Basecamp forum and meetings, as well as legacy suggestions from earlier phases of the project. This is currently taking the form of a spreadsheet sorting enhancement requests into the following buckets: Metadata, Workflow, and Front-end User Interface.

Following the completion and sharing of the gap assessment, we will gather additional quantitative (via surveys) and qualitative data (via focus groups) about needs and priorities in each of these areas from the Hyku Commons User Group, as well as ascertaining which gaps are true barriers to adoption. Our team will then create user-informed decisions about upcoming development sprints based on this research, and we encourage others working in this space to advance the defined priorities as well.

What Do Hyku Users Think? Hyku Commons Satisfaction Survey Results

Amanda Hurford News February 1, 2022

Feature image by Lukas from Pexels

You can download this report here.

Introduction

In the fall of 2021, as part of our 2021-2023 IMLS grant, the Hyku for Consortia team surveyed users of the collaborative Hyku Commons Repository. The survey gathered baseline data about satisfaction with the Hyku Commons platform and service overall, administrative functions, front end user interface, and support/training provided.

We provided a PDF preview of the questions, and used Google Forms as our data collection instrument. The survey had 16 questions, which were a combination of Likert scale and open ended response. A total of 15 responses from PALNI, PALCI, LOUIS, and VIVA users were recorded, and the anonymous survey results are provided below. We very much appreciated this feedback to help us determine future directions for Hyku. We plan to check back periodically with users to gauge improvement. Hopefully, we’ll be able to report an increase in satisfaction as a result of the developments made throughout the IMLS-supported grant project.

Overall Satisfaction

The vast majority of users reported that they are either Satisfied or Very Satisfied (80% combined) with Hyku Commons overall.

Hyku Administrative Functions

Most users report that they are either Satisfied or Very Satisfied (48% combined) with Hyku’s administrative functions.

There are many Haven’t evaluated this or Not Sure responses (42% combined), likely due to the fact that several of our users are new to piloting Hyku and/or haven’t taken a deep dive into all the administrative functions.

Users were most satisfied with Uploading/creating single works, Uploading/creating works in batches, and Adding works to collections, as seen by the number of Very Satisfied responses below.

When looking at Very Unsatisfied, Unsatisfied, and open-ended responses together, we find that users are least satisfied with Existing metadata templates (worktypes), Uploading/creating works in batches, and Repository statistics.

The three Very Unsatisfied responses recorded were for Describing/editing works in batches, Availability of repository activity statistics, and Availability of other repository statistics. The number of Unsatisfied responses are presented below.

The bulk of the open-ended responses called for improvement to administrative functions, and specifically called out the need to customize both metadata and administrative tools.

Open-ended response category	Number of responses
Metadata customization	8
Repository statistics	6
Uploading/creating works in batches	3
Admin customization	3

User Interface

Most users report that they are either Satisfied or Very Satisfied (63% combined) with Hyku’s end-user interface.

There were also several Haven’t evaluated this or Not Sure (23% combined) responses in this category.

Users were most satisfied with Usability, Digital object presentation, and Customization options for site design, as seen by the number of Very Satisfied responses below.

When looking at the Very Unsatisfied, Unsatisfied, and open-ended responses together, users were least satisfied with Searching and search results, Metadata display, and Customization options for site design.

The two Very Unsatisfied responses recorded were for Metadata display and Customization options for site design. The number of Unsatisfied responses are presented below.

Some open-ended responses called for improvement to the user interface, especially Customization options for site design.

Open-ended response category	Number of responses
Customization options for site design	3
Digital object presentation	1
Searching and search results	1
Metadata display	1
Usability	1

Support and Training

Slightly more than half of users report that they are either Satisfied or Very Satisfied (51% combined) with Hyku Commons support and training. A little less than half reported Haven’t evaluated this or Not Sure (49% combined) responses in this category.

Users were most satisfied with Documentation and Help with troubleshooting, as seen by the number of Very Satisfied responses below.

There were no Unsatisfied responses in this category, although there was one open-ended response requesting screenshots/visuals to be added to the documentation.

Discussion

It’s interesting to note that users expressed both satisfaction and dissatisfaction with some features, for example: Uploading/creating works in batches and Customization options for site design. This will require more investigation to understand fully, but we suspect that users may be happy that a feature exists, but unsatisfied with quirks with its workflow; and/or users might be satisfied with the usability of a feature, but wish it were more customizable.

The data provided by this survey has directly influenced our plans for the next phase of development. We are currently in discussion with developers at Notch8 to implement the following:

Allinson Flex (a gem providing the building blocks for customizable metadata in Hyku)
Analytics work from the Oregon Digital project
Improvements to the Bulkrax bulk import tool. We are also planning to add export functionality.

The Hyku for Consortia team will continue to collect and evaluate both informal and formal feedback on Hyku, and we’ll prioritize future development cycles based on user priorities. We have also started working with Samhaeng, a UX firm out of Denmark, to start our first official phase of user research. This phase will focus on Hyku administrative functions and will produce a report of recommendations for improvements in this area. Stay tuned for more updates!

Hyku Accessibility audit published on the Hyku for Consortia Shared Repository

Amanda Hurford Uncategorized January 24, 2022

The completed accessibility audit for Hyku that Notch8 undertook in preparation for work with The University of Tennessee Knoxville has been released. The audit was conducted on Hyku 3.0 via the PALNI and PALCI Hyku for Consortia application.

For more information and a link to the full report, visit the full write-up at the Hyku blog.

Seeking UX Consultant

Amanda Hurford News October 18, 2021

User Experience (UX) Consultant

10-20 hours per week, Short-term contract-based role

Hyku for Consortia seeks a UX Consultant to work with project staff to develop and implement a series of user research activities determining the most useful updates for the Samvera-based Hyku digital repository software.

The UX Consultant will determine the best activities for the project goals, develop resources and plans for activities, carry them out with selected candidates, and assist in the analysis of results. Research activities may include surveys, interviews, focus groups, usability tests or other related feedback mechanisms. The Consultant will work closely with and have the support of the project team to accomplish their goals. Prior experience with user research, excellent communication skills, and attention to detail will be essential in this role.

This is a grant-funded part-time remote-working independent contractor role, with an estimated average of 10-15 hours per week needed to complete contracted deliverables between November 2021 and June 2022 subject to limitations described below. The position will report to the PALNI Executive Director. Flexible scheduling is available for many tasks, but the Consultant must have some availability to attend meetings during Monday-Friday, 11am-5pm EST.

Hyku for Consortia (see https://www.hykuforconsortia.org/) is a partnership of the PALNI and PALCI consortia to increase the flexibility, accessibility, and usability of the multi-tenant repository platform system, Hyku. This project will extend our previous work and improve the national digital repository infrastructure by enhancing Hyku, an open-source platform suitable for access to a broad range of types of materials, addressing needs articulated by diverse stakeholders and consortia and reducing barriers to adoption.

Responsibility and Requirements:

Demonstrated experience with gathering and analysing user research
Understanding of user experience and accessibility best practices
Familiarity with library/archives environments and digital repositories
Knowledge of the academic library and scholarly research landscape
Experience leading and facilitating group projects and meetings
Experience with Samvera repository software a plus
Detail-oriented, with demonstrated organizational and project management skills
Demonstrated strength in writing, editing, and other communication skills
Evidence of ability to work independently and as part of a team in remote work settings
Proficiency and comfort with using modern collaboration technologies and productivity tools necessary for distributed, remote-work teams, including but not limited to Google’s suite of business tools (Google Docs, Sheets, and Forms), project management software, such as Trello, online survey software, and web conferencing technologies, such as Zoom
Commitment to a high level of productivity, and excellent communication

Compensation

Compensation will be based upon delivery of contracted services. Hyku for Consortia anticipates an average of 10-20 hours per week required across the term of the contract, with payment delivered on a monthly schedule based upon successful completion of contracted deliverables. We anticipate a total of 200-245 hours for the set of deliverables we need, and we expect to pay an hourly rate of $45-$55, depending on demonstrated level of experience and expertise. Candidates will be selected based on availability and listed qualifications.

This is an independent contractor position. The contracted party will be responsible for all insurance or other business/employment related expenses, including taxes, benefits, licenses, and other expenses. Alternatively, this role may be filled by an individual employed at a PALNI or PALCI member institution, through an agreement with that institution that contracts to supply services on a time-release basis.

To Apply

Please send your resume and cover letter to consortial-ir@palci.org. Contact information for three professional references will be required from all applicants invited to interview.

The position is open until filled, with first consideration given to applications received by November 5th.

Equal Opportunity Employer/Diversity and Culture

The most productive and satisfying work environment is one in which work is accomplished in a spirit of mutual trust and respect. That trust and respect should be shown by the manner of interaction between our employees, contractors, participants (those participating in PALNI activities), and people with whom we collaborate. We value positive communication and conversations. We expect people to have different opinions – we all come from different backgrounds and have had different experiences. Those differences allow us to see things from different angles so that our organization can grow and thrive in a constantly changing culture. We do not and will not treat someone differently on the basis of race, color, religion (creed), gender, gender expression, gender identity, age, national origin (ancestry), disability, marital status, sexual orientation, or military status, in any of our activities or operations. See our Respect in the Workplace policy.

Removing Barriers Project – Development Kickstart

Amanda Hurford News October 18, 2021

(Feature photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels)

The next phase of the Hyku for Consortia project is off and running, with a small work sprint based on a backlog of known issues uncovered during our previous grant-funded project. This work allows us to maintain the momentum we have built in our previous pilot phase, while we start our user research and accessibility review to define the requirements and scope of work for future, more in depth, development phases. Wherever possible we will contribute development back to the Hyku base code, giving others the opportunity to use these features/configuration options in their Hyku repositories. This sprint is expected to be completed by the end of October, 2021.

Below is a list of items we have in development with Notch8, in what we’re calling “Sprint 0.” These proposed developments will address some metadata and worktype updates and user interface enhancements stemming from issues project staff and pilot participants have reported. In particular, we are focusing on improving functionality to our Open Educational Resource (OER) worktype (created under our previous grant, specs here) and overall enhancements to functionality that better equip Hyku for use as an OER Repository. Both PALCI and PALNI have work in progress on respective OER repositories.

The PALCI OER Repository pilot, funded in part by LSTA and the Office of Commonwealth Libraries, is envisioned as an opportunity for PALCI and the Affordable Learning PA community to evaluate the costs and value of running a repository for OER materials created by authors from PA institutions. Materials created as part of the new PA GOAL (Grants for Open and Affordable Learning) program will be deposited and made available publicly. In previous grant years, ALPA funds were allocated to support the initial development of Hyku’s OER worktype, so this is a practical continuation of that investment.

PALNI’s PALSave Course Material Repository is currently available in its beta release and will be improved by the developments in sprint 0. The repository is an online resource to help faculty identify open educational resources (OER) and other zero-cost course materials. It includes materials selected for use in the PALSave Course Redesign Grants Program, including some new OER created by faculty at PALNI institutions.

Hyku for Consortia: Reducing Barriers to Adoption Sprint 0

Metadata and Work Type Updates

Creative Commons (CC) Licence Updates

We will update the selectable CC licences to the most recent versions.

OER Relation Field

We will implement the relation field for the OER worktype. These will display as hyper-links to related content.

Updates to Work Types

OER vocabularies will be updated to implement “discipline” correctly, as in the ETD work type. We will also update all work types to make metadata field mappings conformant across them.

User Interface Enhancements

In-App PDF Viewer

PDFs will be viewable in-app utilizing the Universal Viewer. This feature will be behind a feature flipper so that it can be turned on or off.

Citation Functionality

We will improve functionality of the Citations feature by discarding the nonfunctional EndNote, Zotero, and Mendeley options and implementing the MLA, APA, and Chicago citation generator.

Improvement to Alphabetical Sort Ability

We will update Solr to push work, collection, and subcollection lists to alphabetical ordering and search options. Any page that lists or browses content should be alphabetical by default, except search results, which should default to Relevance, but include an alphabetical sort option.

Remove Social Media Buttons

We will remove social media link-out buttons

Hide Related Versions and Items

We will prevent the “Related Versions and Items” section from displaying if there is no related content to display. This includes related adjustment work to all theme templates.

Remove Depositor’s Name from Homepage Features

We will remove the Depositor name from display across the user facing site.

Remove Size Field from Collection Pages

Collection pages currently show size in KB, but it is broken and isn’t helpful. We will remove this from the application.

Improve Cultural Show Page UI

The Cultural show page is configured primarily for image works, which use the IIIF viewer. When works that do not use the image viewer display, some of the elements, especially the Collection metadata table, populate in constrained dimensions that need to be optimized.

Adjust Justification Display

When Featured Works and Recent Uploads are flipped off, but Featured Researcher is on, collections are justified to the far left of the screen, but featured researcher resets the justification to an odd spacing. Ideally, Browse Collections and Featured Researcher will toggle smoothly. This will require testing and implementation of many conditional situations.

PALNI and PALCI Partner to Remove Barriers to Hyku Adoption with IMLS Grant Award

Amanda Hurford Uncategorized September 1, 2021

The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) has awarded $248,050 to the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) in partnership with The Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration & Innovation (PALCI) for Hyku for Consortia: Removing Barriers to Adoption as part of the National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program. IMLS received 172 applications requesting more than $47 million in funding and selected 39 applicants to receive awards during this grant cycle. With this award, the partners will increase the flexibility, accessibility, and usability of Hyku, the multi-tenant repository platform system.

In the face of continued budgetary pressures, libraries are seeking cost-saving approaches to their work. Those unable to deploy Institutional Repository (IR) services on their own due to costs or other constraints are increasingly looking to consortia to serve this role. This project specifically seeks to develop Hyku to support the repository needs of library groups by increasing affordability and flexibility.

PALNI Executive Director Kirsten Leonard notes, “This grant will provide the foundational support for PALNI and PALCI to remove remaining barriers to more widespread deployment of the repository software. Together with input from our new consortia project participants from VIVA and LOUIS, we will create business modeling and a toolkit to support other consortia to provide this service for their members, potentially reaching thousands of libraries.”

This project will extend work completed under the previous PALNI/PALCI IMLS grant, which resulted in the establishment of Hyku Commons, a production-level, low-cost, multi-tenant repository service shared by the supported institutions of PALNI and PALCI. This new round of funding will further improve Hyku by directly addressing needs articulated by stakeholders in a scalable, multi-tenant environment.

The project will kick off with a user study and gap assessment to further define existing barriers and software requirements needed to support the adoption of the service. PALNI and PALCI will employ Notch8, an open-source software development firm and long-time contributor to the Hyku project, to deliver enhancements and changes prioritized in the early phases. Rob Kaufman, Notch8’s Founding Partner and current Product Owner for Hyku, sees this as an extraordinary opportunity to increase visibility and adoption of Hyku. “Hyku for Consortia has been one of the key projects in the community, expanding the functionality of Hyku in ways that really matter to the users. Notch8 is excited to continue this partnership into this game-changing new phase.”

The project will also expand its partnership to include consortial partners LOUIS and VIVA, who will pilot the service and offer feedback critical to ensuring widespread adoption. A Consortial Institutional Repository Toolkit will provide guidelines, documentation, and other materials to support the development of similar collaborative repository services in other consortia.

Jill Morris, Executive Director of PALCI, is excited at the opportunity to drive strategic innovation of community-owned infrastructure. “This project builds on the strengths of consortia and stretches our relationships to leverage our respective strengths. We are thrilled to continue our partnership with PALNI to explore new solutions, business models, and collaborative approaches to building and sustaining our library infrastructure.

Anne Osterman, Director of VIVA, said, “We are delighted to be piloting and supporting this important project as it develops scalable options for groups of libraries.The creation of a truly community-led, open, sustainable, and multi-tenant repository service meets needs long articulated by academic libraries and the consortia that serve them.”

Teri Oaks Gallaway, Executive Director of LOUIS, expressed her interest in the grant, “One of our strategic goals as a consortium is to explore opportunities with other libraries, consortia, and vendors for the development of an open-source library services platform. This project is a perfect example of how we can pool our collective knowledge and resources to improve upon and expand the reach of a needed tool like Hyku. We are excited to be a part of this opportunity with our partners and colleagues and look forward to supporting the development of this project.”

“As pillars of our communities, libraries and museums bring people together by providing important programs, services, and collections. These institutions are trusted spaces where people can learn, explore and grow,” said IMLS Director Crosby Kemper. “IMLS is proud to support their initiatives through our grants as they educate and enhance their communities.”

Updates for the project will be made available at https://www.hykuforconsortia.org/.

About the Institute of Museum and Library Services:

About the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana, Inc. (PALNI):

PALNI is a non-profit organization supporting collaboration for library and information services to the libraries of its twenty-three supported institutions. Over time, the library deans and directors who sit on the PALNI board have adjusted the organization’s strategic direction as the internet and information services landscape has changed. PALNI has expanded beyond providing a resource management system to sharing expertise in many areas, including strategic planning, reference, information fluency, outreach, data management, and configuration, and has identified greater collaboration in acquisitions as a key goal. www.palni.edu

About The Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration & Innovation (PALCI):

About LOUIS: The Louisiana Library Network

About VIVA

About Notch8:

Founded in San Diego, CA in 2007 by Rob Kaufman, Notch8 is a Ruby on Rails-based web consultancy with additional expertise in React and React Native mobile applications. Today we are a team of 18 developers and technical experts located across three time zones. Since 2016, we have been active with digital repository solutions, primarily through our involvement with the Samvera Community. We are Samvera Partners and both in and out of the Samvera framework, we have contributed to more than 20 projects in the digital repository space.