2015 Preconference Proposals

Thank you for considering proposing a pre-conference! Here are a few details:

• We will be taking pre-conference proposals until November 7, 2014
• If you cannot or do not want to edit this wiki directly, you can email your proposals to cmh2166@columbia.edu or collie@msu.edu
• Examples from the 2014 pre-conference proposals can be found at http://wiki.code4lib.org/2014_preconference_proposals
• If you are interested in attending a particular pre-conference, please append your name below that proposal (indicating interest in more than one proposal is fine!)
• If you have an idea for a pre-conference, but cannot facilitate yourself please post the idea below and email cmh2116@columbia.edu or collie@msu.edu
• NOTE: Pre-conferences are NOT included in the Code4Lib Conference price and will be held on Monday, February 9, 2015 as either full day or half day sessions
• Please use the template for proposals provided in the pre-formatted block below

Delivering and Preserving GIS Data

Half Day [Morning]

• Darren Hardy, Stanford University, drh@stanford.edu
• Jack Reed, Stanford University, pjreed@stanford.edu

We will discuss how to set up a spatial data infrastructure (SDI) to deliver GIS data, to manage GIS content in a Fedora repository for preservation, and to establish metadata requirements for good spatial discovery. By the end of the workshop you will have a working SDI! This workshop is a compliment to the GeoBlacklight workshop in the afternoon.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Sarah Simpkin
2. Vicky Steeves
3. Andrew Battista
4. Peggy Griesinger

A hands-on introduction to GeoBlacklight

Half Day [Afternoon]

• Darren Hardy, Stanford University, drh@stanford.edu
• Jack Reed, Stanford University, pjreed@stanford.edu

GeoBlacklight is a discovery solution for geospatial data that builds on the successful Blacklight platform. Many libraries have collections of GIS data that aren’t easily discoverable. This will be a hands-on workshop, focused on installing and running GeoBlacklight which builds on the morning workshop "Delivering and Preserving GIS Data".

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Sarah Simpkin
2. Vicky Steeves
3. Andrew Battista
4. Peggy Griesinger

RailsBridge: Intro to programming in Ruby on Rails

"Half-Day" [morning]

• Contact Carolyn Cole, Penn State University, carolyn@psu.edu
• Additional instructors welcome

Interested in learning how to program? Want to build your own web application? Never written a line of code before and are a little intimidated? There's no need to be! RailsBridge is a friendly place to get together and learn how to write some code.

RailsBridge is a great workshop that opens the doors to projects like Blacklight and Hydra and Traject.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Maura Carbone
2. Vicky Steeves
3. Peggy Griesinger
4. Mike Price
5. Jean Rainwater
6. Coral Sheldon-Hess
7. Margaret Heller
8. Bohyun Kim

Replace yourself with a painfully complex bash script...or try Ansible

Half Day [Morning]

• Chad Nelson, chad dot nelson @ lyrasis dot org
• Blake Carver, Blake dot carver @lyrasis dot org

Abstract:

Ansible is an open source automation and configuration management tool that focuses on simplicity to help make your life as a developer, or a sysadmin, or even a full on devops-er, easier. This workshop will cover the basic building blocks used in Ansible as well as some best practices for maintaining your Ansible code. We will start by working through a simple example together, and then participants will be given time to work on their own projects with instructors providing guidance and troubleshooting along the way. By the end of the session, participants will have a working knowledge of Ansible and be able to write a working playbook to meet local needs.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Ray Schwartz
2. Coral Sheldon-Hess
3. Kevin S. Clarke
4. Joshua Gomez
5. Charlie Morris
6. Andy Mardesich
7. Anna Headley
8. Chelsea Lobdell

Intro to Docker

Half Day [Whenever]

• John Fink, McMaster University, john dot fink at gmail dot com
• Francis Kayiwa, University of Maryland Libraries , francis dot kayiwa at gmail dot com

Abstract:

Docker (jbfink code4lib journal article) is an open source Linux operating system-level virtualization framework that has seen great uptake over the past year. This workshop will take you through the basic features of Docker, including setup, importing of containers, development workflows and deploying. Knowing when Docker is useful and when it isn't will also be covered. Ideally, every attendee will have ample experience creating and running their own Docker instances by the end.

Interested in Attending

1. Jim Hahn
2. Joshua Gomez
3. Bobbi Fox
4. Ray Schwartz
5. Megan Kudzia
6. Coral Sheldon-Hess
7. Cary Gordon (uses Docker in production on AWS)
8. Eric Phetteplace
9. Esther Verreau
10. Charlie Morris
11. Anna Headley (voting for afternoon, compliments ansible)

Code Retreat

Full Day

• Jeremy Friesen, University of Notre Dame, jfriesen at nd dot edu
• Additional facilitators welcome; Especially if you have CodeRetreat experience.

Abstract:

"Coderetreat is a day-long, intensive practice event, focusing on the fundamentals of software development and design. By providing developers the opportunity to take part in focused practice, away from the pressures of 'getting things done', the coderetreat format has proven itself to be a highly effective means of skill improvement. Practicing the basic principles of modular and object-oriented design, developers can improve their ability to write code that minimizes the cost of change over time." About Code Retreat

Interested in Attending

1. Mike Giarlo
2. Charlie Morris
3. Devon Smith

Presentations workshop

"Half Day [Afternoon]" (but could be expanded based on interest)

• Chris Beer, Stanford University, cabeer@stanford.edu
• Additional facilitators welcome.

This is a preconference session intended for first time Code4Lib speakers, habitual procrastinators, experienced speakers, those thinking about offering lightning talks, etc. If you're preparing a talk for this year's Code4Lib, this workshop is an opportunity to rehearse your presentation, get feedback from peers, get familiar with the presentation technology, etc.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Vicky Steeves

Dive into Hydra

"Half Day [Afternoon]"

• Justin Coyne, Data Curation Experts, justin@curationexperts.com
• Bess Sadler, Stanford University, bess@stanford.edu

Hydra is a collaboration of over 30 educational institutions who work together to solve their repository needs by building open-source software. Dive into Hydra is a course that bootstraps you into the Hydra software framework. We'll start at the basics and walk you through the various layers of the Hydra stack. We'll conclude by installing the Worthwhile gem, enabling every participant to walk away with their own Institutional Repository. Participants who have prior exposure to web programming will get the most out of this course. It's recommended (but not required) that you attend "RailsBridge" prior to this workshop.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Maura Carbone
2. Peggy Griesinger
3. Mike Price
4. Jean Rainwater

code4lib/Write The Docs barcamp

"Full Day", with options for jumping in for half a day

• code4lib wrangler: Becky Yoose, yoosebec at grinnell dot edu
• Write the Docs contacts: TBA

Abstract

Documentation. We all know that we need it for things we develop, but most of us either keep putting it off or write documentation that is not maintained, clear, concise, and so on. We're all guilty! So what's stopping us from doing better docs? Luckily, Portland is also the home to the NA Write the Docs conference, and is home for many folks who live and breathe documentation. This barcamp is open to both code4lib and non-code4lib conference attendees and is intended to provide a space where code4libbers can find practices and tools in creating better documentation for all as well as documentation wonks can find out ways in which the library wonks can help with better documentation access and organization.

Remember, like metadata, documentation is a love note to the future.

More information about Write the Docs at http://conf.writethedocs.org/

There will be a nominal fee (t/b/d) for non-Code4LibCon attendees (subject to organizer approval).

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

Full day

Morning

1. Ranti Junus
2. Mita Williams

Afternoon

1. Francis Kayiwa (if my Pre-Conf is in the AM) Otherwise with Ranti if my Pre-Conf is in the afternoon.
2. Kevin S. Clarke

Linked Data Workshop

"Half Day [morning]"

• Karen Estlund, University of Oregon, kestlund@uoregon.edu
• Tom Johnson, DPLA, tom@dp.la

Abstract:

Developer and metadata experts-focused linked data workshop. Topics covered will include: linked open data principles, converting existing data, and modeling linked data in DAMS.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Logan Cox
2. Ray Schwartz
3. Chris Hallberg
4. Derek Merleaux
5. Steven Anderson
6. Eben English

Code4Arc

"Full Day" (with options for half day participation)

• Sarah Romkey, Artefactual Systems, sromkey@artefactual.com
• Justin Simpson, Artefactual Systems, jsimpson@artefactual.com
• Chris Fitzpatrick, ArchivesSpace, chris.fitzpatrick@lyrasis.org
• Alexandra Chassanoff, BitCurator Access, bitcurator@gmail.com

Abstract:

What does it mean to Code for Archives? Is it different than coding for libraries, and if so, how?

Code4Lib is a wonderful and successful model (you must agree or you wouldn't be reading this). This workshop is an attempt to create a space to replicate the model in an Archival context. A space to talk about development for archives, and the particular challenges of developing archival systems. Topics to discuss include Integration between different Archival software tools, and between Archival tools/workflows and larger institutional tools like institutional repositories, discovery and access systems.

The schedule may include the following:

• Panel type conversations about the State of Art in Archives
• Case Studies - discussion of workflows at specific institutions, including gaps in tools and how those are being addressed or could be addressed
• Tool Demos - access to demos of some of the open source tools used in an Archival Context (examples include ArchivesSpace, Archivematica, BitCurator, AtoM)

Artefactual will provide demos running Archivematica and AtoM, Lyrasis will do so for ArchivesSpace, BitCurator will for BitCurator. We encourage others to chime in here to expand the list of tools available to touch and play with.

When signing up, please indicate if you are an end-user or a developer.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Laney McGlohon - developer

Fail4Lib 2015

Half Day [TBD, probably afternoon]

• Andreas Orphanides, akorphan (at) ncsu.edu
• Jason Casden, jmcasden (at) ncsu.edu

Abstract:

Failure. Failure never changes. Since failure is an inescapable part of our professional work, it's important to be familiar with it, to acknowledge it, and to grow from it -- and, in contravention to longstanding tradition, to accept it as a fact of development life. At Fail4Lib, we'll talk about our own experiences with projects gone wrong, explore some famous design failures in the real world, and talk about how we can come to terms with the reality of failure, to make it part of our creative process -- rather than something to be shunned. Let's train ourselves to understand and embrace failure, encourage enlightened risk-taking, and seek out opportunities to fail and learn. This way, when we do what we do -- and fail at what we do -- we'll do so with grace and without fear.

This year's preconference will include new case studies and an improved discussion format. Repeat customers are welcome! (Fail early, fail often.)

The schedule may include the following:

• Case studies. Avoid our own mistakes by bearing witness to the failures of others.
• Confessionals, for those willing to share. Let's learn from our own (and each others') failures.
• Group therapy. Vent about your own experiences in a judgment-free setting. Explore how we can make our organizations less risk-averse and more failure-tolerant.

Interested in attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Ray Schwartz
2. Charlie Morris

Coding Custom Solutions for Every Department in the Library with File Analyzer

"Half Day [Morning]"

• Terry Brady, Georgetown University Library, twb27@georgetown.edu

Abstract

The Georgetown University Library has shared an application called the File Analyzer that has allowed us to build custom solutions for nearly every department in the library.

• Analyzing Marc Records for the Cataloging department
• Transferring ILS invoices for the University Account System for the Acquisitions department
• Delivering patron fines to the Bursar’s office for the Access Service department
• Summarizing student worker timesheet data for the Finance department
• Validating counter compliant reports for the Electronic Resources department
• Preparing ingest packages for the Digital Services department
• Validating checksums for the Preservation department

This hands on workshop will step through the components of the application framework. Workshop participants will install and develop custom File Analyzer tasks in this session.

The workshop agenda will loosely follow the pre-conference agenda from Code4Lib 2014.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Megan Kudzia

Confessions of the (Accidental) Code Hoarder: How to make your Code Sharable:

Half Day [Whenever]

• Karen A. Coombs, OCLC, coombsk@oclc.org

Abstract Have you built something cool and useful that you want to share with others? This preconference session will discuss techniques and tools for sharing code. Using our own OCLC Developer Network PHP authentication code libraries as an example, we will discuss a set of recommended best practices for how to share your code.

We’ll start with coding standards and test writing so you can be confident of the quality of your code. Next we'll discuss inline documentation as a tool for developers and how auto-generating documentation will save you time and effort. Lastly we'll provide an overview of the tricky areas of dependency and package management, and distribution tools. Along the way, we'll cover PHP coding standards, testing, and popular PHP tools including PHPDoc for documentation, Composer for smooth installations, and using GitHub and Packagist to manage distribution, updates and community feedback.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Peggy Griesinger
2. Ray Schwartz

UXtravaganza

"Half or Full Day [Based on Interest?, Morning/Afternoon Doesn’t Matter]"

• William Hicks, University of North Texas, William.hicks@unt.edu
• Volunteers?

Abstract

I’m envisioning a 1/2 of full day for front-end developers, content strategy people, and other misfits with an interest in user experience, where we can talk about our shared problems, use cases, the state of current research, and play with each other’s sites. A half day seems doable, but if there’s significant enough interest we could push for a full? Here are a few of the things I think might be interesting to see happen:

• Analytics Share-fest: A few volunteers demonstrate data about their websites, catalogs, archival/digital collections. Most of us know our own sites but it would be interesting/validating to share this data with others so we can start to see commonalities between institutions, in certain kinds of systems, etc. For anyone using event tracking, or using click- or heat-maps, this would be a great opportunity to show off what people are seeing.

• UX Best Practices Catch Up: This spring I had the opportunity to attend a few days worth of usability workshops from the Nielsen-Norman Group, most of which was focused on mobile. I could distill down a lot of the information into an short presentation. Since this is a constantly moving area of research it would be nice to see a few people do other similar short presentations on some current trends/findings relevant to libraries, search, etc.

• Mobile Dev Lab: The UNT Libraries has been collecting a small set of smartphones and tablets for testing and development. Basically an Open Device Lab. We have about a dozen devices now of varying sizes, OS, OS Versions, + Google Glass. I’ll bring the devices, you can bring yours, and assuming we can get the wifi up and running we can test our sites/services with our big sausage fingers rather than pretending to do so through emulators and the one or two devices we each usually have on hand. If anyone is game they can do a tutorial on Browser-based Inspector Tools, Browser-Cams, or other testing services.

• The Eye’s Have It. The UNT Libraries is also in the process of acquiring an eye tracker and software for usability and other gaze-based research studies. We’ll take possession of it shortly after this pre-conference proposal is due and will have a couple of months to play with them before the conference. Assuming we can get our act together learning the device and can get past the technical hurdles of setting it up at the pre-conference, we could try to do some live demos on each other’s sites; i.e. You nominate a site/service, someone in the audience volunteers to wear the device, and we all watch them struggle do the tasks you request on a projector. Rinse. Lather. Repeat. It would hardly be scientific, but it sure would be fun. As a backup, if we have some sites nominated beforehand, I can run a few students at my library through some tasks here and we can show off the results to the crowd.

For those of you wanting to attend and help out, I’d really like to see some discussion on typography, writing for the web, “dealing with business/administrative requirements from on-high", maybe do some prototyping exercises, etc. Similarly if anyone is interested in doing some tutorials on bootstrap or how-to’s on running a usability test, that would be rad. But we need you to step up and steer part of the time for most of this to work, so if you are interested in some aspect, and especially if you want to volunteer to lead a bit of the time, contact me.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Ray Schwartz
2. Andy Mardesich
3. Chelsea Lobdell
4. Eben English (1/2 day)

Intro to Git & possibly beyond

Half Day [Whenever]

• Erin Fahy, Stanford University, efahy@stanford.edu
• Shaun Trujillo, Mount Holyoke College, strujill@mtholyoke.edu

We can start with the basics of Git and discuss ways in which it can help you version control just about any file, not just code. Points we can go over:

• What is a Distributed Version Control System?
• What's the difference between Git and Github.com?
• How to initialize new Git projects locally and on a remote server/Github
• Cloning/Forking existing projects and keeping up to date
• The wonderful world of Git branches
• Interactive rebasing
• Contributing code to existing projects & what pull requests are
• How to handle merge conflicts
• Overview of workflows and branch best practices
• (time allowing) Advanced git: pre/post hooks, submodules, anything else?

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Jeannie Graham
2. Derek Merleaux

Visualizing Library Data

"Half Day [Morning||Afternoon]"

• Matt Miller, matthewmiller@nypl.org, New York Public Library, NYPL Labs

Visualizing your institution’s data can give new insight about your holding’s strengths, weaknesses and outliers. They can also provide potential new avenues for discovery and access. This half day session will focus on programmatically visualizing library metadata. Emphasis will be on creating web-based visualizations utilizing libraries such as d3.js but attention paid towards visualizing large datasets while keeping them web accessible. By then end of the session participants will have template, sample code and methodologies enabling them to start producing visualization with their own data.

Interested in Attending

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Ashley Blewer!
2. Bobbi Fox
3. Ray Schwartz
4. Ranti Junus
5. Eric Phetteplace
6. Joshua Gomez
7. Charlie Morris
8. Andy Mardesich
9. Tao Zhao
10. Chris Hallberg
11. Derek Merleaux
12. Bohyun Kim
13. Eben English

CollectionSpace: Getting it up and running at your museum

Half Day [Afternoon]

• Richard Millet, CollectionSpace.org, richard.millet@lyrasis.org
• TBD

This workshop is designed for anyone interested in or tasked with the technical setup and configuration of CollectionSpace for use in any collections environment (museum, library, special collection, gallery, etc. For more information about CollectionSpace, visit http://www.collectionspace.org

Participants will be walked through the process of installing the software and performing basic configuration work on a stand-alone instance of CollectionSpace. Participants will learn how to create user accounts, set up basic roles and permissions, and may then catalog or otherwise document sample objects from their collections. Materials distributed prior to the workshop will cover hardware and system requirements for participants.

Interested in Attending If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

DPLA API Workshop:

Half Day [Afternoon]

• Audrey Altman, DPLA
• Mark Breedlove, DPLA
• Mark Matienzo, DPLA
• Tom Johnson, DPLA

The Digital Public Library of America API workshop guides attendees through the process of creating an app based on DPLA's free, public API. The API provides access to over 8 million CC0 licensed metadata records from America’s libraries, archives, and museums in a common metadata format. This workshop is designed for people of all technical skill levels and will cover API basics, the capabilities of the DPLA API, available toolsets, and tips for using records from the API effectively. Members of DPLA's technology team will be on hand to help the group build their first application, and answer questions about tools and content.

If you would be interested in attending, please indicate by adding your name (but not email address, etc.) here

1. Ranti Junus
2. Jean Rainwater
3. Mita Williams
4. Margaret Heller
5. Bohyun Kim
6. Steven Anderson