I'd like to respond to the review by Amy McCrory of OSU, of DLXS for EAD. I
won't be the most objective voice on this topic obviously, and I don't think
her review contained any factual errors, but I did wish to disagree with
some of the opinions expressed.
1) The ability to change display of finding aids in DLXS is very flexible.
You can look at some of the sites that have implemented DLXS for finding
aids to see how it can be customized:
Indiana U: <http://www.letrs.indiana.edu/web/f/findaid/>
Florida Center for Library Automation:
<http://findaid11.fcla.edu/cgi/f/findaid/findaid-idx?page=browsecolls>
U Pitt: <http://digital.library.pitt.edu/ead/>
U Wisconsin-Madison: <http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/shswead/>
U Michigan: <http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/f/findaid/findaid-idx>
2) She's right that changing some presentational elements requires changing
the CGI at the moment, but even now many features can be changed without
needing to change the software program. Configuration files, html templates
and css style sheets can be easily customized for different collections. As
Amy states, our next release (due in Aug) will change to a complete XSLT
processing model, moving customization entirely to XSL style sheets, and
increasing flexibility even more.
Thanks,
Perry Willett
Head, Digital Library Production Service
300 Hatcher North
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor MI 48109-1205
Ph: 734-764-8074
Fax: 734-647-6897
Email: [log in to unmask]
|