Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
The transition to Web-based interface provides many other benefits and flexibility
in the way that library personnel and patrons make use of technology-based services.
Through concepts such as Responsive Web Design, applications can be easily used
across many different types of devices, including smart phones and tablets in addition
to full-sized laptop and desktop computers. Given that the adoption of mobile
computing continues to rise dramatically, it is essential for libraries to quickly
implement interfaces friendly to these devices. Libraries that lack fully mobile
enabled interfaces for patron-facing services risk losing an increasing portion of their
customers by year. This accelerated trend toward mobile adoption in the consumer
sector should prompt libraries to be very aggressive in deploying services that work
across all categories of devices. The sluggish way in which libraries have previously
moved to new technologies must be accelerated to maintain relevancy and to meet
patron expectations through this current phase of change.
The current change resembles previous phases in the history of computing. The
earliest phase of library automation took place during the time of mainframe
computers. The mainframe-based ILS products relied on very expensive central
computers, with character-based interfaces accessed through networks of display
terminals with new computational capabilities of their own. These mainframes had
very limited capabilities of processing and storage by today's standards, were very
expensive, and required highly technical software and hardware engineers to
maintain. A new generation computing infrastructure in libraries based on
client/server architectures displaced the mainframes beginning in the mid to late
1980s. These client/server systems took advantage of the desktop computers that were
beginning to proliferate in libraries in conjunction with more affordable mid-range
servers. This generation of library automation systems offered graphical user
interfaces for staff and patrons designed to be more intuitive to use than the character-
based interfaces of the previous era that operated through cryptic commands or
textual menus.
Once the era of client/server computing was in full force, software development
had to adjust accordingly. As organizations decommissioned their mainframes,
developers began porting or developing software designed for the operating systems,
distributed computing models, and graphical environments consistent with the client
server architecture.
We see the same kind of fundamental shift in computing architectures playing out
in recent years as the era of client/server gives way to cloud computing. In this
transition between preferred technology architectures we see two threads among those
who develop major library systems. One approach works to reshape existing
platforms incrementally toward Web-based interfaces and the service-oriented
architecture. This evolutionary method can deliver a more gradual transition toward
systems more technically viable by today's standards. They require considerable
effort in re-engineering products, but are generally able to reuse some of the code
base and preserve functionality that may have matured over time. Alternately, this
transition also provides the opportunity to build entirely new products specifically
designed to be deployed through modern multi-tenant platforms and with a fresh look
at functionality. The evolutionary approach can be seen in integrated library systems
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