Help features in digital libraries: types, formats, presentation styles, and problems

Abstract

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractPurpose -The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Help features in digital libraries and identify problems related to their design. Design/methodology/approach -This study selects six digital libraries to represent a variety of digital libraries developed or sponsored by different types of organisations. The Help features of these selected digital libraries are examined by their types (explicit versus implicit), formats (texts, images, screenshots, multimedia materials, and interactive formats), and presentation styles (descriptive, guided, procedural, and exemplary).Findings -This study presents the types of Help features available in the selected digital libraries, and further characterises the formats and presentation styles of these Help features. In the process of analysis, the author also identifies six types of problems: lack of standards; tradeoff between using explicit Help and implicit help; tradeoff between using general Help versus specific Help; lack of interactive Help features; lack of dynamic presentation styles; and lack of Help features for advanced users and users who do not understand English. Research limitations/implications -In order to design Help features that facilitate users to effectively use digital libraries, further research needs to extend studies to what types of help-seeking situations users generally encounter and the corresponding support they need. Originality/value -This study provides insightful information regarding the current status and problems of the Help features in existing digital libraries.

Linked open data portals: functionalities and user experience in semantic catalogues

“…The applied methodology considers research works on evaluation of catalogues and digital libraries that present analysis models, which will be used as a reference to systematise the applied indicators (Alvite-D ıez, 2009;Fuhr et al, 2007;Kelly, 2014;Mer cun and Zumer, 2008;Muller, 2014;Muñoz-Egido and Hern andez-P erez, 2016;Rodr ıguez-Yunta, 2014;Xie, 2007Xie, , 2008Xie et al, 2018). Three dimensions of analysis have been established to address the relationships among the three basic components of a collection: user-content (linked to utility), content-system (in connection with performance) and user-system (related to usability).…”

Analysing the relationship between information-seeking and help-seeking behaviours in a digital library

“…The literature review shows that, due to the complexity of environments affected by new technologies and the process of information-seeking from new information systems, users require help facilities. However, various reasons, such as ignoring users’ psychological features and skills; lack of standards; disregarding relevant theories, such as information-seeking, help-seeking and information literacy theories, to design the structure and content of help resources (Xie, 2007); inattention to design interactive help resources in digital libraries (Cool and Xie, 2004; Wu, 2011); ignoring help-seeking situations in information-seeking process by users (Xie, 2007; Xie and Cool, 2009); and other reasons have led to a discouragement to use such resources and a sense that, if used, satisfaction will not be achieved. Most studies investigated only one or a few select variables of users’ help-seeking behaviour without regarding their information-seeking behaviour.…”

Understanding library users’ preferences and expectations of online help

“…Users also require help information to be specific, visual, and interactive. Xie (2007) characterized the help features of six digital libraries, including types (explicit versus implicit), formats (texts, images, screenshots, multimedia materials, and interactive formats), and presentation styles (descriptive, guided, procedural, and exemplary). There could be correlations between these features.…”