WOLFcon 2024

In the Fall of 2023 the Lehigh University Libraries FOLIO/VuFind Team began the process of planning and testing a new single search discovery option. VuFind combined search brings together the results from FOLIO, EDS, ReShare, LibGuides A-Z Databases, Islandora, and EBSCO Publication Finder onto a single results page with various options for presentation.

To achieve clean, coherent results, understanding how the data in our cataloging records was contributing positively and negatively to the outcome of the single search was a challenge for Lehigh’s metadata team. With FOLIO’s Bulk Edit app, the LDP, the Data Import app, and tools external to FOLIO we identified and cleaned our data so it is represented cleanly and accurately in the single search.

VuFind's combined search affords a variety of ways to organize and present search results. We determined that user testing would be a vital part of the development process. Although we lacked formal expertise in user testing, we set about creating a framework for evaluating and grading user experience with various VuFind features and configurations.

In this session we will show the work that was done to get to this single search functionality that our library uses today. The session will cover data cleaning, newly developed integrations and related UX improvements, many of which are contributed back to VuFind for other institutions to utilize. The testing, feedback, and updating that contributed to those improvements will be detailed as well.