As I'm sure you know, ICPSR re-designs its site every two years. Normally the re-design would launch in March, but we moved it back to August so that it could better coincide with the Summer Program, the academic school year, and the OR Meeting. Here's a summary of some of the big changes occurring on the new ICPSR site.
New Search EngineI know...we've been making this promise for many years. This year we'll finally be able to deliver. We tried Ultraseek, OracleText, and Google, and just weren't satisfied with the results. We instead built it ourselves using Lucene/SOLR, and the result is impressive. It's very fast, and it allows for robust faceted searching. We'll be able to apply the same search logic to all of our products (data holdings, bibliography, variable search, etc.), and we'll even be able to allow for a true Boolean search for those of us who bothered to learn Boolean in grad school. :)
Download PageWe sat down and ran the numbers on how people are actually using the download page, and we were rather surprised at the results. Our users do 'cherry pick' in terms of data formats and datasets, but they don't use the data cart to download multiple studies at once. That's a rather big deal for us, because it heavily impacted how we built the MyData accounts and how we manage terms of use. With that in mind, we're phasing out the data cart and moving to a system that allows for quick downloading of single studies.
We've created two different download pages and we'll be doing user testing (and polling during open beta) to determine which one best serves our users' needs. If you'd like a sneak peek, here are the two current prototypes:
Prototype Ahttp://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD/06849.html (multiple datasets, bundle mismatch)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD/03355.html (one dataset)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD/04639.html (restricted data)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD/07318.html (member only)
Prototype Bhttp://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD3/06849.html (multiple datasets, bundle mismatch)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD3/03355.html (one dataset)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD3/04639.html (restricted data)
http://staging.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/DOWNLOAD3/07318.html (member only)
Note that the links/buttons don't actually download anything yet. We're just dealing with interface issues right now. The notes section at the bottom is meant to convey important info, like "You can't download this; it's restricted." :)
Blogger IntegrationWe'll be phasing out the LiveJournal blog in favor of one using Blogger. (Yes, we'll port over every post/comment on the LJ Blog.) Blogger allows for tighter integration with the new site. We'll be allowing anonymous (moderated) commenting on the blog so that users can participate in the dialogue without having to create an account, and we'll retain the ability to give trusted users the ability to create new posts. Blogger has some rather impressive capabilities. For example, we could cause the headlines of OR Blog posts to automatically appear on the OR site alongside the other announcements, which would give the blog a lot more visibility and encourage more participation.
Web 2.0 NotionsWe're setting up the new site to allow users to comment on some pages, specifically study pages, announcements, and possibly faqs. The goal is to enable users to ask and answer questions, and to better enable dialogue. All comments will be moderated, of course, so that the dialogue remains professional.
Schedule & TestingWe'll launch in mid-August. July will be an open beta where anyone can check out a pretty stable/complete site and provide us with feedback. During May and June we'll be finishing development and doing internal testing and usability tests.
Questions/CommentsIf you have any questions or comments, please post here and I'll be glad to respond.