This thesis describes the design, development, and evaluation of a social digital library to support users in finding information from a user-based point of view. This particular research project has been motivated by the fact that there has been very little research on the social features in digital library interfaces. This research aims to design a novel digital library interface by applying the concepts of social features to digital libraries. Also, the thesis investigates whether the functionalities in the social digital library help participants to accomplish different task types with minimum effort. Social features here refers to clustering users' interacting in a virtual community along with social information such as reviews, the number of recommendations and items/ viewed items by other people. In order to gain an insight into the social features that are useful for users to compt~te search tasks, I began with the development of The Victorian Times Digital Library by using PHP & MySQL. Initial design interfaces were tested by usability tests in order to overcome usability problems. Based on participants' feedback, the chosen features were presented in the social digital library and represented in different screens. These interfaces were then evaluated by several usability tests using an iterative design approach. Also during an iterative phase of design, the interfaces were revised based on Information Foraging Theory in order to increase strong information scent. The final version of the social digital library was then evaluated against a conventional interface in an effectiveness test. I performed an experimental study to examine the use of features in digital libraries to perform the tasks. A total of twenty four participants were recruited to perform various tasks on both interfaces and to rate their preferences. The outcomes of the effectiveness test were positive, with half of participants (12 out of 24) preferring the social interface and the rest of participants preferring the traditional one. Also, the results showed that the social digital library was able to help participants to accomplish different types of task with minimum time and effort. This was considered as a good result given the quality feedback from the participants. Also, some of findings emphasized the importance of social activities and look and feel over a set of social features.

Information seeking is the task of finding documents that satisfy the information needs of a person or organisation. Digital Libraries are one means of providing documents to meet the information needs of their users - i.e. as a resource to support information seeking. Therefore, research into the activity of information seeking is key to the development and understanding of digital libraries. Information structuring is the activity of organising documents found in the process of information seeking. Information structuring can be seen as either part of information seeking, or as a sepárate, complementary activity. It is a task performed by the seeker themselves and targeted by them to support their understanding and the management of later seeking activity. Though information structuring is an important task, it receives sparse support in current digital library Systems. Spatial hypertexts are computer software Systems that have been specifically been developed to support information structuring. However, they seldom are connected to Systems that support information seeking. Thus to day, the two inter-related activities of information seeking and information structuring have been supported by disjoint computer Systems. However, a variety of research strongly indicates that in physical environments, information seeking and information structuring are closely inter-related activities. Given this connection, this thesis explores whether a similar relationship can be found in electronic information seeking environments. However, given the absence of a software system that supports both activities well, there is an immédiate practical problem. In this thesis, I introduce an integrated information seeking and structuring System, called Garnet, that provides a spatial hypertext interface that also supports information seeking in a digital library. The opportunity of supporting information seeking by the artefacts of information structuring is explored in the Garnet system, drawing on the benefits previously found in supporting one information seeking activity with the artefacts of another. Garnet and its use are studied in a qualitative user study that results in the comparison of user behaviour in a combined electronic environment with previous studies in physical environments. The response of participants to using Garnet is reported, particularly regarding their perceptions of the combined system and the quality of the interaction. Finally, the potential value of the artefacts of information structuring to support information seeking is also evaluated.

Library and Information Science (LIS) and Computing/IT are closely related fields as both have at their very core the same object of concern: information and information services. Yet, weaknesses in the transfer of knowledge between the two domains have been apparent at both the conceptual and practice levels. The first question investigated in this thesis is what characterizes the relationship between LIS and IT and what have been its limitations and constraints. It is found that IT knowledge acquisition and transfer have been fragile and poorly consolidated, despite the history of common interests and interactions. As a result, the conceptual foundations of library information systems are still very much the same as they were in the analogue environment. However, deeper forms of IT knowledge are critical for the re-conceptualisation and redesign of library services in the face of the changes brought about by the network environment. These findings led to the investigation of a second question: how to enhance IT knowledge in LIS with durability and beyond the level of practical skills. This part of the research considered the hypothesis that the evolution of IT, and its conceptual underpinnings, can be a source of possible building blocks for common knowledge between LIS and IT. To explore this idea the field of computing/IT was analysed through the perspective of interoperability. A set of trends/concepts was identified as having potential applicability beyond the realm of technical IT systems, notably in the articulation of strategies for IT, information and organizational management. Overall, the study points out the need for a more effective participation of LIS in both the technical and social processes of IT production, reproduction and transformation. The conclusions suggest that a stronger appropriation of the ontology and languages of IT can help to overcome the limitations of the typical IT views in LIS and contribute to a more integrated model of communication between the fields.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the use of academic digital libraries from a user-oriented approach. For this purpose, end-users were invited to describe how they perceive and make use of academic digital libraries. The study was focused on Subject Based Information Gateways (SBIGs) and Electronic Journals Services. Specifically, two gateways were examined: the Social Science Information Gateway (SOSIG) and the Art, Design, Architecture and Media (ADAM) gateway, and an electronic journals service: the Electronic Journals Service of the Library and Information Service (LIS), the University of Patras, Greece. The target group was the academic community: academic staff, research staff and students (undergraduate and postgraduate). The research methods used were online questionnaires, face-to-face interviews and transaction logs analysis (TLA). Concerning the perception of academic digital libraries, users were invited: to provide the advantages and/ or disadvantages of electronic information over print, to compare the electronic and print version of a piece of information, to evaluate services or features as very important, important, or not important and to specify factors that would discourage them from accessing a digital library. Regarding the use of academic digital libraries, users were asked to specify: how frequently they use digital libraries, what reasons they use digital libraries for, what place they gain access from, what their preferred method of searching for information is, what their preferred method of storing and reading electronic information is, whether they use the support services provided, what types of information they want to be provided with and what the role of communication in a digital library is. The study concluded that end-users seem to appreciate the implementation of academic digital libraries. However, there are still some disadvantages that might prevent them from accessing them. A typical user would access them from their office or home for a variety of reasons, such as: for writing up a term paper/project or a thesis/dissertation, writing up a paper for publication, e. g. journal article or conference/workshop paper, keeping up with progress in the relevant subject area, supporting a lecture or for personal reasons. Concerning their search behaviour, they would adopt a relatively unsophisticated, simplistic approach to searching and limited use of Boolean operators or other commands. Notwithstanding their low search abilities, they would be reluctant to consult the online help function that could support their searches. Sometimes, they prefer to ask a person rather than attempt to use the online help. When they have identified information and want to read it, they print it out. But, when they want to store information for the future, they either print it out, or save it on disk. This information might differ in its formats, including electronic journals, reports and papers, digitised books, scholarly mailing lists and archives and educational software. Finally, some users would appreciate the opportunity to communicate with information scientists, authors, or other users who share the same interests with them. Some others emphasized the importance of the communication between users and digital library systems.

This study contributes to the academic literature concerning social tag systems for digital libraries, addressing the identified information gap from the user’s perspective. It defines social tagging tools and tests users’ perceptions about possible practices. Moreover, it evaluates the effect when using social tagging systems in digital libraries, to assess whether such a system enhances the search process, and to identify whether there is any significant relationship between using social tagging systems in digital libraries and user satisfaction. Although developments in the field of social tags have been significant in recent years, there remains an open question regarding their usability, particularly in the context of digital libraries. Therefore, there is a need for further investigation, exploration and evaluation, and so this work contributed to this by exploring the usability of social tagging in digital libraries in terms of accuracy for research, user satisfaction and adoptability. For this study, Saudi students were given the opportunity to use the system in the United Kingdom, and their experiences, and opinions regarding ease of use and adoptability were then analysed to determine if they would assist digital libraries in Saudi Arabia to achieve their educational goals and to ensure user numbers would not decrease. A quantitative approach and a qualitative approach were combined to collect and analyse the data used in this research. The two approaches were conducted in sequential phases. In the first quantitative phase, assessment measures were administrated to Saudi students using library websites while studying in the UK. Data was collected from 175 participants, and statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS. Cross tabulation was also used to describe the numerical data and a chi-square analysis was conducted to determine the relationship between the various study variables. In the follow-up qualitative phase, semi-structured interviews were undertaken with 15 Saudi students, to explore the proposed hypothesis in depth. This data was then thematically analysed. Results concerning the usability of social tagging in digital libraries obtained in western universities cannot be generalised to Saudi Arabian universities, because the context of Saudi Arabia differs culturally and academically (Alsurehi & Al Youbi, 1014). To address this, the study utilised a sample of Saudi Arabian students, who had had the opportunity to experience using social tags while studying abroad, specifically in the United Kingdom. Their experience might potentially be very important and this research could be considered a first attempt to examine the usability of social tags in digital libraries. Since to date few empirical studies have directly addressed the usability issues raised here in Saudi Arabia, this research also offers a contribution in this area. In addition, although this study relates to the Saudi perspective, the findings can also be considered valuable to Arab countries sharing similar cultural and academic traditions.

Libraries, particularly academic libraries implement technologies to enhance their services to promote teaching, learning and research. In this thesis the impact of information technologies (library technologies) on delivery of services at the Balme Library of the University of Ghana was evaluated. The researcher adopted the multi-methods approach to the research by using a semi-structured questionnaire to collect data from users (students) of the library and para-professional staff of the Balme Library of the University of Ghana who formed one group of the study. The interview was used to collect data form professional staff of the library who on the other hand formed the second group of the study. Responses of the data collected from the two groups formed the components of the study and data collected quantitatively were analysed using univariate analysis method and interpreted by the descriptive and inferential statistics method. The qualitative data, on the other hand, was analysed using the narrative analysis approach. The findings of the study reveal that a variety of IT facilities such as computers, internet, photocopiers, scanners, braille embossers, magnifiers for reading, reference management software, video conference facility, electronic theses, electronic databases, automated library system, electronic past questions and the library website are available at the library and are very accessible to all users (students) and staff of the library. Students and staff of the library have good IT skills to utilise those resources. The findings also reveal that the IT infrastructure had positive impacts on the delivery of library services ensuring that users received the appropriate services they needed at the right times and places The study found challenges of slow internet connectivity, unstable power supply, lack of IT skills, inadequate IT infrastructure among others and these hinder the maximum utilisation of IT in and out of the library and recommends periodic training of staff and users, proper maintenance of facilities, increase of internet bandwidth and better marketing of library services / Information Science / M. Inf. (Information Science)

Library automation is approaching its 90th birthday (deduced from Pace, 2009:1), and many librarians no longer remember the inefficiencies of the manual systems that were previously in place. For some, however, automation has not gone nearly far enough. In this second decade of the new millennium some libraries in Lesotho face multiple challenges in automating their services while libraries internationally are staying relevant by rapidly adapting their services to address the needs and demands of the clients. It was anticipated that full library automation is a prerequisite for delivering 21st-century library services and the researcher embarked on a process to establish whether libraries belonging to the Lesotho Library Consortium (LELICO) have automated to the extent where they will be able to provide the services that are currently in demand. The purpose of this study was to analysewhether full library automation is indeed a prerequisite for libraries to offer the services required in the current millennium. The study focused on LELICO member libraries. Benchmarking was done with selected South African academic libraries. Data were collected by means of interviews with all respondents, namely, LELICO member libraries, librarians from South African libraries and with international system vendors operating from South Africa. The study found that LELICO member libraries are indeed lagging behindin terms of service provision. LELICO member libraries do not appear to understand; which library services are possible when state-of-the-art technology is fully implemented. The study found furthermore that the laggard status is caused by factors such as a lack of funding, too few professional staff and ineffective support from management. These and other findings helped formulate recommendations that would underpin a renewal strategy for LELICO. The proposed recommendations include that LELICO should deliver a more meaningful service to its current members. LELICO member libraries should be using technology more effectively in their operations and good relationship between a system vendor and its clients should be seen as an asset that should be maintained.LELICO should be playing a key role in making change a reality. / Information Science / M.A. (Information Science)