I _Really_ Don't Know

I've been looking at FRBR for some time. I've written about it and spoken about it. Overall I've found it difficult to work with and not really useful in solving the problems of resource discovery.

One of the recurring themes I see when looking at library data in 2009 is that it is centred far too often on the record - a MARC21 record usually. This record-centric view of the world pervades much of what is possible, but often it even restricts our very thinking about what might be possible. We are constrained.

Thanks to Documentally tipping us off on Twitter and his blog my wife and I received a gratuitous couple of FreshCases, one red, one white.

These claim to be the next generation of winebox and they are rather nicely designed. The floppy cardboard normally surrounding the tap on a wine box (and the digging around in the box for the tap with just two fingers) is replaced by a smart plastic moulding that, once pressed, releases the tap into position.

find . -type d | grep -v "/.svn/" | grep -v "/.svn$" | xargs svn info | grep "^URL"

Did you notice what just happened? I used used an URI as an identifier for a subject. If you popped that URI into your browser, it will take you to WikiPedia's article on the book and provide a lot of info there in human prose about this book, and this would make it rather easy for Bob to say that, yes indeed, that's the same book I've got. So now we've got me and Bob agreeing that we have the same book. from ShelterIt - My digital think-tank: On identity.

Great piece by Alexander Johannesen about the future of library data, semantic web and the difficulties of getting from here to there.

As you walk down the street you are approached by a dog. He is on his guard trying to discern your intentions. He will follow you and interpret your gestures as friendly or aggressive. He will try to engage you in a relationship and get you to pay attention to him. from Interactive storefront display | ARvertising news.

Computer generated dog, reacts to real-world passers-by.

It can be hard to make meaningful information from huge amounts of data, a graph and a table doesn't always communicate all it should do. We have been working hard on technology to visualise big datasets into compelling stories that humans can understand. We were really pleased with what we came up with in just one and a half days, see for yourself from Ito World: Visualising Transport Data for Data.gov.uk.

Nice work on visualizing traffic data.

On the surface, Twitter DJ seems like a gracious gesture from a DJ to solve the age-old problem of fans not knowing what the amazing track they’re hearing is called and who made it, as well as a boon for often small-time music producers to get some well-deserved props. from Interview with the Twitter DJ Traktor App’s Co-Creator at djtechtools.com.

Nice integration of Traktor DJ software and Twitter - part of a growing trend that makes apps more native to the web.

yaz4j is a toolkit for Java which includes a wrapper for the ZOOM API of YAZ. This allows developers to write Z39.50/SRU clients in Java. yaz4j supports both search and scan. See the javadoc for details. from yaz4j | Index Data.

I wrote Yaz4J a couple of years ago when I needed a robust Z39.50 client. The underlying work is done by Index Data's Yaz library, wrapped for use in Java using JNI (and yes, JNI does work fine and yes it does work cross-platform, we have it running on Linux, Windows and OS X). I hadn't ever found the time to properly structure and mavenise the code or release it properly so it's very pleasing that Adam Dickmeiss and Mike Taylor from Index Data along with Juan Cayetano have tidied it all up and published it under a home on Index Data's site.

A future Conservative government would drastically reduce the size of the "Big Brother" state.

Were they to win the election, the Tories would slash database projects and roll back the "snooping" powers given to officials.

In future, Whitehall departments would face tougher privacy rules to protect the individual against loss of their personal data, shadow justice secretary Dominic Grieve will say today. via Conservatives unveil plans to cut state surveillance » Local Government » 24dash.com.

There was an early time on the web when everything important needed to be ‘above the fold’; the area seen in a typical browser before any scrolling took place. This is now much less relevant. Read the Top 10 UX Design Myths over on Carsonified » Top 10 UX Myths.