WorldCat Mashathon a huge success

Thanks to everyone who participated in the Mashathon and followed us on tweets. The library press noticed, too. It is hard to believe it has already been a week since we disbanded--I think I left half my heart (and 152 photos) in Amsterdam. Certainly, I came home brimming with interesting ideas and a renewed curiosity about how OCLC can use APIs and Web services to improve the information-gathering experience for researchers. A few people have asked what the Mashathon was for. Besides just being fun to get together, the goal of the event is twofold: one is to raise awareness of the WorldCat Search API and related Web Services freely available from OCLC and other library-related organizations. The equally important second goal is to help developers connect with fellow developers and other technology-minded thinkers to work on shared solutions to similar situations or challenges within their respective settings. We found the face-to-face interaction really helpful--even as online collaboration environments continue to improve. There are still reasons for Web-oriented people to come together: powerful connections happen that we all benefit from. In the end, there were 9 new tools/apps/ideas presented. I will share them below in the order they were presented, with links to the YouTube videos. I know there were a whole lot more apps still being worked on that weren't presented, too. So if you didn't present yet, let me know when you're ready to share. Add your project to the sample apps page, so everyone can build on your good ideas:

Also available at a WorldCat Library
A new sidebar in the Wageningen UR Library Catalogue that uses the WorldCat Search API and the WorldCat Registry OpenURL Gateway to display a location-sensitive listing for other WorldCat libraries who also hold the item. See it in action in the development space.
Peter van Boheeme, Wageningen University, Wageningen, Netherlands

AdLib Library Gateway to WorldCat A Web service built into the AdLib library system that uses the Worldcat Search API to add a WorldCat query component to the service, as well as an SRU-based name/author search that utilizes WorldCat Identities. Monika Lechner and Bert Degenhart Drenth, AdLib Information Systems Maarssen, Netherlands WorldCat Identities widgets 4 small blocks of functionality that use the WorldCat Search API and WorldCat Identities/VIAF to build on each other to turn a Dutch catalog ppn number into an OCLC number, return author names, citations and related works (subject headings) in XML and JSON. The "catalog group" contributors included: Derk-Jan Fiel, Royal Tropical Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands Niels Molenaar, Royal Tropical Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands Andreas Neumann, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich, Germany Eric de Ruijter, IISG, Amsterdam, Netherlands René Exterkate, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands Rick Gouw, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands Sjoerd Siebinga, Europeana.eu, The Hague, Netherlands Theo van Veen, National Library of the Netherlands (Koninklijke Bibliotheek) The Hague, Netherlands Martin Zwaal, OCLC, Leiden, Netherlands Bruce Washburn, OCLC, San Mateo, CA USA WorldCat on App Engine An app that gets the WorldCat Search API running on Google App Engine to solve cross-server/cross-domain security issues. Reuses a previous Hackathon attendee's WorldCat Python module and outputs JSON results. Etienne Posthumus, TU Delft Library, Amsterdam, Netherlands WorldCat Identities Photos A true mash-up of WorldCat Identities with Wikipedia photos, to help a user with quality name issues in the Credo Reference Service. Pete Ciuffetti, Credo Reference Service, Boston, MA USA SOLR + SRU implementation connections A realization that face-to-face connections are still very important in a predominantly online world, this project compared notes on how to open up indexes to the world. Lucien van Wouw, IISG, Amsterdam, Netherlands Hicham El Kasmi, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium André Hagenbruch, University Library Bochum, Bochum, Germany xISSN enhancement An addition to the xISSN Web service that will now include the RSS feed of the journal data, using the JISC national authority file information from the Journal Table of Contents Service. Xiaoming Liu, OCLC, Bloomfield, NJ, USA WorldCat World Tour An app that finds artists' albums through the WorldCat Search API and uses a UK-based streaming music service to play the musical tracks online. Julian Cheal, UKOLN, Bath, UK MetaLib Search for WorldCat A component that uses the WorldCat Search API and employs SRU updating. Bart Alewijnse, Groningen University Library, Groningen, Netherlands André Keyzer, Groningen University Library, Groningen, Netherlands (They didn't actually present, but Bart stayed late to finish it!)

More videos:

• Peter van Boheeme on what else he'd like to see with the OpenURL Gateway.
• Jerry de Vries explains what he's working on.
• Hicham El Kasmi used a Yahoo Pipes app to add data to his Institutional Repository.
• Thierry Vebr was up late, working on some code.
• Sjoerd Siebinga describes his Maven project.
• Dennis Nicholson explains why he came to the Mashathon.
• Ralph LeVan gives his definition of what a Web Service API is.

See all the Mashathon YouTube videos. We're already talking about the next mashathon and where it should be held. In the meantime, keep working on that creative reuse for WorldCat or OCLC data.