Ranking library materials

What is it about?

This paper discusses ranking factors suitable for library materials and shows that ranking in general is a complex process and that ranking for library materials requires a variety of techniques. The relevant literature is reviewed to provide a systematic overview of suitable ranking factors. The discussion is based on an overview of ranking factors used in Web search engines. While there are a wide variety of ranking factors applicable to library materials, today’s library systems use only some of them. When designing a ranking component for the library catalogue, an individual weighting of applicable factors is necessary. While this article discusses different factors, no particular ranking formula is given. However, this article presents the argument that such a formula must always be individual to a certain use case. The factors presented can be considered when designing a ranking component for a library’s search system or when discussing such a project with an ILS vendor.

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Why is it important?

This paper is original in that it is the first to systematically discuss ranking of library materials based on the main factors used by Web search engines.