Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Adding Library Catalogue Results to Google Searches

From LISNews to Musings on librarianship: adding your library catalogue results to Google searches.

The Google instinct is very strong indeed. The danger here is students might be just happy with what they get in Google (Wikipedia I'm looking at you) and be done with it. What if a plugin could be installed such that whenever the student did a search in Google/Yahoo etc and it would automatically overlay library catalogue results next to it? This leverages the user's strong "Google instinct" and without any additional effort he can see the library catalogue results together with Google's.

And a comment on LISNews' post:

Things to come

Sahil here, from the WebMynd Team. Thank you for your comprehensive post around our new Content Concierge Platform!

I would love to share a few clarifications and upcoming features that we are excited to get out of the door:

- We are excited to announce that as of next week we now allow users/publishers to add an unlimited number of advanced widgets (as opposed to last week's constraint of just 1 advanced and unlimited simple).

- We do work with sources that require logins such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Gmail etc. - In general, if a user can get to a source and search it manually, we can create an advanced widget for that source. In the next week we will allow anyone to create widgets that require users to log in to an authentication server.

- Also in the next week or two we will complete our revamp of the "User Control Panel" allowing registered users to actually go back and edit/remove any sidebars created using our Content Concierge Platform. We also pushed a build this morning that will generate your search sidebar in <1 minute! - These sidebars are already fully compatible with all other major search engines...Yahoo!, Bing, Google, YouTube - across your major browsers, IE, FireFox, Chrome and soon, Safari. - We are working on a solution that will add more comprehensive logic as to how your verticals appear (in which order) in the sidebar. Currently, we place the vertical/widget that loads first at the top. Soon you will see your widgets that you have added will be locked in the order you enter them in the creation process! - Finally, we are looking to introduce a Content Concierge Gallery that will allow users to browse other generated sidebars - look out for this in November! We are very excited to have you and all your readers taking a look at our product. Any additional feedback is monumental in creating a platform that will serve as an incredibly useful utility for a wide range of publishers/users. Keep an eye out for a few more exciting additions like a full redesign of the sidebar and redesigned customized user landing pages! We are always interested in gathering feedback and helping anyone create a perfect search sidebar for their content consumption needs. Feel free to reach out to to the WebMynd team at support@webmynd.com with any feedback or questions/help requests around the creation process and we will get back to you ASAP. For all of you who do not wish to create a sidebar of your own, please feel free to visit our website: www.webmynd.com, scroll down and download our latest WebMynd Search Sidebar - Turbocharge & personalize your searches with the sites you care about most! Regards, WebMynd Team


Very cool. But WebMynd? Didn't the 'adding Y for I' craze die down in the late nineties? No? Damn.

Lagomorph Watson
Through the Stacks and Down the Rabbyt Hole With a Wannabe Lybrary Technycyan

MY EYES ARE BLEEDING

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