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Weekly News Digest
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November 29, 2016 — In addition to this week's NewsBreaks article and the monthly NewsLink Spotlight, Information Today, Inc. (ITI) offers Weekly News Digests that feature recent product news and company announcements. Watch for additional coverage to appear in the next print issue of Information Today.
CLICK HERE to view more Weekly News Digest items.
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Kobo Offers Titles Specific to Spanish Readers
Rakuten Kobo, Inc. partnered with Spain’s Fnac retailer to offer Kobo’s devices and platform to Spanish readers via Fnac’s website and in stores (which feature demonstrations of Kobo products). The Kobo by Fnac brand has a localized ebookstore with best-sellers, curated recommendations, best-of-the-month titles, and seasonal suggestions in Spanish, Catalan, Basque, and Galician. The Kobo store has more than 5 million ebooks in 100-plus languages.For more information, read the press release.
OpenAthens Introduces SaaS Product
OpenAthens rolled out the first phase of its OpenAthens Access SaaS product. Its dashboard brings together two previously separate systems that help service providers add resources, manage subscriber access, and configure the membership of Identity and Access Management federations. Phase two, which will feature API functionality, is planned for 2017.For more information, read the article.
Spiceworks Publishes IT Career Outlook Study
Spiceworks released “2017 Tech Career Outlook,” a survey of the career changes IT professionals expect, what challenges they expect to face, and what skills they will need in 2017. It shows that 37% of IT professionals will plan to look for a new job, and 64% want a more competitive salary. Generally, most IT professionals feel appreciated by their employers although they are underpaid. Cybersecurity expertise is predicted to be the most important skill needed in 2017, and the biggest challenge will be making IT a priority among business leaders.For more information, read the press release.
Springer Nature Aids Italian Universities Damaged by Earthquakes
Springer Nature is granting researchers, teaching staff, and students from two Italian universities that were affected by recent earthquakes access to all Springer and Nature journals through the end of June 2017. Springer Nature’s team in Italy is working with the universities to provide information about the titles and is considering expanding the offer to other institutions in the region that are rebuilding.For more information, read the press release.
Alexander Street Gains Prestigious Film Collection
Alexander Street signed an exclusive agreement with Sony Pictures Classics to bring more than 300 films to U.S. college and university libraries via Alexander Street’s streaming video platform. Libraries can access the collection using patron-driven acquisition (PDA) or single-title-streaming direct subscriptions. The agreement covers films released 1992–2015, such as The Lives of Others, Persepolis, A Separation, and Love Is Strange.For more information, read the press release.
Explorit Everywhere! Gets Improvements for All Users
Deep Web Technologies made Explorit Everywhere! more accessible by conforming to WCAG (Web Content Accessible Guidelines) 2.0 from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). This ensures that users with visual, hearing, or other physical challenges are getting a product that incorporates at least some of the checkpoints from three priority levels. WCAG has four principles, which Explorit Everywhere! now meets: that it is perceivable (nothing about the user interface is hidden, and it uses common iconography), operable (it has a focus on keyboard accessibility and timing between functions), understandable (it now allows users to save user interface changes, and navigation is consistent across all functions), and robust (it supports assistive technologies).For more information, read the blog post.
FIZ Karlsruhe Establishes New Research Unit
FIZ Karlsruhe—Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) are creating an Information Service Engineering unit to supplement FIZ Karlsruhe’s existing research program. Computer science professor Harald Sack will establish and run the new unit, which will focus on “models and methods for developing and providing information services,” according to the press release. It will use data and increasingly digitized workflows and processes as part of its commitment to “modern information services.”For more information, read the press release.
Newest Version of Koha Launches
The Koha open source ILS is now on version 16.11. According to the press release, it features numerous bug fixes and 240-plus enhancements, including:- Added ability to place article requests and document delivery in Koha
- Addition of a patron quick add form for on the fly patron additions
- A new Housebound Readers Module, adding the linking of deliverers, item choosers and homebound patrons
- Additional improvements to Koha’s EDI ordering and invoicing functionality
- Additional improvements to Syndetics and Novelist Select embedded content
- Improved ability to use Elastic as preferred search engine in Koha, adding speed and scalability to Koha’s searching capabilities
- Enhancements to REST API infrastructure, paving the way for Koha to be the most accessible and integrated ILS in the world
- Added ability to place multiple holds per patron per record, allowing for multiple item level holds
For more information, read the press release.
Chemistry Publishers Sign ORCID Open Letter
The Royal Society of Chemistry and the Publications Division of the American Chemical Society (ACS) signed the “Requiring ORCID in Publication Workflows” open letter, which means they have committed to integrate their workflow with ORCID’s technology infrastructure in order to standardize author names. Name changes, cultural differences in how names are presented, and the inconsistent use of initials can be eliminated by using ORCID identifiers for all authors. ACS and the Royal Society of Chemistry have also agreed to automatically deposit publications to Crossref.For more information, read the press release.
Amazon Web Services Unveils New Initiatives
Amazon Web Services (AWS) is creating several new initiatives. It launched three programs—the AWS Service Delivery Program, the APN (AWS Partner Network) Public Sector Partner Program, and VMware Cloud on AWS Partner Program—that provide tools, training, and benefits. It also developed two AWS Competencies to help partners that have succeeded in the areas of financial services and the Internet of Things, and it introduced the APN Partner Solutions Finder to help partners discover resources for their specific needs.For more information, read the press release.
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Brandi Scardilli
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