David Munsey-Kano's Dartmouth Projects
July 2000 - June 2001

Last updated on 4/5/2001

Here are some of the things I have helped to create and are either released to the general community, in development or planned to be started from July 2000 through June 2001. I have also gone to a conference worth mentioning. All of the projects are Web based. I will continue to add to this page throughout the rest of this fiscal year.

Released:

• The Inktomi Search enhancements. I created an add URL system that allows people in the Dartmouth Name Directory to manually add pages to the search index. This is required for pages that are not linked from any indexed pages.
  
  
• The DCIS Databases, by Name and by Category pages maintainance & enhancements. In the Winter of 2000 / 2001 I enhanced this script to output the new "Digital Resources" / "Campus Resources" category organization now used in that database and added a switch to output .shtml files with server side include tags as we are planning to use for the new Library website pages.
  
  
• The Dartmouth College Administrative Guide maintanance. I rewrote how the searching worked for the new Oracle "interMedia" searching feature which replaced the ConText feature in the older versions of Oracle.
  
  
• The Research Computing department started to use the code written for the Staff Training & Development Class Calendar for their Workshop sign up pages. This required me to make the code a bit more general and configurable. I have also made some enhancements to this system that should benefit STDC and RC, such as allowing announcement messages to be automatically posted to a bulletin and allowing a configurable list of "super users" to use any Contact Person function for any class.
  
  
• During the Summer of 2000, I created a simple signup web page for the free massages that were being offered at the Library to help people with the stress of moving to new offices. This was roughly a 4 hour effort. It allowed each person to sign up for just one massage.
  
  
• I am responsible for importing the Course information from the Organization, Regulations and Courses (ORC) web pages into the DCIS database used to search same. This is done once a year in the fall.

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Under Development:

• In the fall of 2000 I was put onto a task force to design and implement Subject Guide pages for the library website. These will be database driven pages whos content can be easily modified by bibliographers and/or reference librarians who are expert in the subject area for each page. Dartmouth Library Staff may access these pages while they are under development but only the members of the pilot project should attempt to create new Subject Guides.
  
  

• I am on a task force that is redesigning the Dartmouth Library Home page. I setup the cascading pop up menus for the prototype page using open source Javascript code I obtained on the Internet. I created a simple feedback form that uses Oracle to store and display the comments.
  

• I continue to develop a tool box of Object Oriented PHP code that makes it quick and easy to create web based database applications. The two STDC databases described above use this code, as does the Subject Guide prototype.
  

• In the fall of 2000 I got the MyLibrary system (from NCSU) to work with Oracle so we could experiment with it here at Dartmouth.

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Planned:

• I have been working with Aquisitions on the analysis and definition of some systems to help them manage their processes. In particular, they have a number of small databases implemented in Filemaker some of which they would like to see network accessible. In addition, they have a traditional paper filing system for tracking the process of aquiring digital resources (e-journals, etc.) that we are suggesting could be replaced or enhanced by a digital system.
  
  
• There are some enhancements desired for the Digital Resources License Information database.
  
  
• There are some enhancements desired for the Staff Training & Development Class Calendar code that would make it easier for Research Computing to continue to use this for their purposes.
  
  
• I assume I will play a role in defining and implementing the Digital Library. The experience I have gained doing web based database programs should prove valuable.
  

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Conference:

February 3 & 4, 2001 American Society for Information Science and Technology, "Practicing Information Architecture".

This was a very interesting conference. I made some quick notes to facilitate a meeting to present what I learned.