Category: Technology

Implemeting an Issue Tracker (Redmine)

For more than half a year now, I’ve been trying to get an issue tracker fully implemented for our IT team within the library. I admit that I’m still working on it. Getting the system up and running was easy enough, but trying to work it into people’s workflow isn’t so easy.

Choosing the Issue Tracker

There are a lot of issue trackers out there, but we are a small team and I wanted the issue tracker running easily and quickly. It’s not something I wanted to spend a lot of time getting up and running, because we had a lot of other projects happening.

Other requirements included:

  • support multiple projects
  • non-members being able to report issues
  • support email issue management (either built-in or plugin)
  • low to no cost

preferable

  • support CAS or LDAP login (either built-in or plugin)
  • documentation area and/or wiki
  • code repository integration
  • open source

I asked around a little bit, and these were the recommendations I got:

  • Asana: 2
  • FogBugz: 1 Against: 1
  • Footprints: – Against: 1
  • Github: 2
  • JIRA: – Against: 2
  • Pivotal Tracker: – Against: 1
  • Redmine: 5
  • Request Tracker: 1 Against: 1
  • SupportPress (for WordPress): 1
  • Trac: 3 Against: 1

Trac and Redmine seemed to be the two forerunners. My problem with Trac was that it didn’t have clear project organization, and no one could confirm that the email issue management plugin worked.

Installation & Setup

Our system administrator took a couple of (not full) days to get it installed and going, and following the instructions were apparently fairly easy. Then it took me maybe half a day to set up all the projects and users with the settings I wanted. The e-mail creation also worked well out of the box. We just had to make sure we had the right settings for what we wanted.

Staff Issue Creation & Management

In order to make it so that staff can file issues without ever having to see Redmine, I created a form in our Intranet (webform module in Drupal). The form had most of the standard fields:

  • Name: automatically filled in with username
  • E-mail: also automatically filled in
  • Related to: options which were essentially the project names
  • Need: options equivalent to tracker e.g. Support, Bug Fix, etc.
  • Priority: options equivalent to priority
  • Summary: email subject line, which then turns into issue name
  • Description: issue details

Once it’s submitted, a copy is sent to our team’s email. Through a cron job (every 5 minutes or so), the email is picked up, and filed.

If the user already exists in the system, Redmine will use the email from the user account to match it to the user, they will automatically become the ‘reporter’ of the issue, and get a copy.

If the user does not exist in the system, Redmine will say that ‘Anonymous’ reported it. This will always happen the first time someone reports an issue as I did not add everyone on staff to the system. So, the first time this happens, I then add the user to the system, and add them as a watcher to the issue.

The one issue I ran into was that I forgot you have to set both the email plugin and each project to accept issues from anonymous users. Simple carelessness really.

Getting Staff to Change their Workflow

I think the hardest part with implementing any issue tracker is getting staff to use it. Within the team, it hasn’t been too difficult. We have a small team and the developers in particular have no problems using it. The only problem I sometimes have is making sure they close issues when they’re done with them.

But even within the team, sometimes it can be difficult to get people to report issues using Redmine. While our manager wanted us to start using it just for the website, it has worked well enough, so we’re strategizing how to get the rest of the staff using it now.

We’ve concluded that it kind of needs to be an all or nothing. So we’ve decided that all non-urgent issues should be done through the intranet form regardless of the project, and that should people email us, we’re going to be emailing them back to submit it through the form.

For any urgent issues and for immediate support, they can still call us. After all, trying to walk someone through editing something on our website or intranet is much easier by phone anyway.

Before we start enforcing it, we’ll be introducing this workflow to staff through various committee meetings in part to gather feedback.

So… we’ll see how it goes.

code4libTO December Meetup Talks

BagIt Profiles – @ruebot

  • directory of data
  • bag has what you’re bagging, data, contact email/name, organization information, profile identifier (JSON via a URI)
  • pull in all the field values
  • validate
  • wrote a spec and send it to digital curation community
  • can look up profiles in the registry

Okay, I got a little lost, but you can see more on github.

Internet Archive Torrent Collections (iaTorrent) – @ruebot

Bookfinder – @TheRealArty & Steven

  • I will write this up later probably as a separate blog post, or maybe journal article

TPL’s Web Services Architecture: Understanding the Big Picture – @waharnum

  • many different systems that don’t easily communicate, which needs specialized knowledge even to do basic tasks
  • address the challenges by translation, simplication, standardization
  • Three tiers: Front End Systems (requests to back end) / TPL Web Services (REST) / Back End Systems (responds to front end)
  • Example: TPL Website -> Account Web Services -> Symphony Web Services (Symphony) – and back
  • can add new features and functions
  • helps to solve the challenges mentioned
  • also helps with reusability e.g. in addition to website, build mobile-friendly website, iPhone App
  • Might end up with:
    • Front End (Website, mobile, App)
    • Middle Tier (Account Web Services, ebook Web Services, online payment web services)
    • Back End (symphony, overdrive, payment gateway, accounting systems)
  • other benefits:
    • increase ease of knowledge transfer about how our systems work
    • follow modern best practice approach to building interoperating systems
    • reduce cost and integration time
  • reduce learning time for new staff or consultants
  • metrics: wish had resources
  • bolting together a lot of things, not using a lot of custom code

Ladder (aka MyTPL 2) – @mjsuhonos

  • wanted to solve problem: discovery layers suck
  • problems:
    • not scalable
    • inflexible
    • read-only
    • expensive
  • goals:
    • better than open source options (VuFind, Blacklight)
    • cheaper (than proprietary)
  • scalable as WorldCat
  • design:
    • schema-free/multi-schema (e.g. Dublin Core)
    • horizontally scalable (multi-node)
    • modern OSS components
  • simple data model (RDF)
  • Features:
    • hierarchical relations
    • clustering/de-duplication
    • versioning
    • real-time import & indexing
    • multi-thread/process
    • responsive UI
    • fully multilingual (18/10)
    • dynamic faceting
    • dynamic mapping modification
    • digital content storage (coming soon)
  • built on a linked data
  • not a discovery layer; it’s an integration platform

Heritage U of T – @ajmcalorum

  • News Announcement and Promotional Video
  • previously not centralized: hard drives, flickr, etc.
  • need central repository for tri-campus initiative with search & discovery, preservation, long-term access to content and metadata, support for multiple formats (e.g. images, books, documents, video, exhibits)
  • Drupal + Solr (search) + Fedora Commons (collection management, batch ingesting, metadata crosswalk, digital preservation) == islandora (digital asset management system)
  • pilot: 8 parent collections (by format, by campus)
  • exhibits in Drupal, not through islandora/fedora commons
  • modules: internet archive book reader (OCR on the fly), galleria, colorbox
  • official launch: 2 weeks ago

That’s it! Food and drinks time!

Setting up WordPress CMS for an Academic Library

A lot of people have setup WordPress, and obviously each organization needs to set it up a specific way to fit their needs. Nevertheless, learning how different libraries set up their CMS is something I have found useful in the past, so I thought it might be helpful for someone else if I shared the way I decided to set up WordPress at my work.

The Install

As we have more than one site, it was an obvious choice to use the MultiSite flavour of WordPress. We set it up to use the directory structure option since we would be under a subdomain already, we decided against having sub-subdomains.

We installed it on its own virtual server through our central IT. We discovered in the process, however, that by default, a lot of modules are disabled by IT, so we had to request a number of them to be installed. For the core, the only one was:

  • GD Support – required for creating the different image sizes (i.e. thumbnail, medium, large)

Various plugins uses PHP modules that are part of the standard PHP install, so may not point out the need for enabling them. For plugin requirements, I’ll note them in the plugins section.

Setting Up The Sites

Creating the sites were simply a click of a button of course, but a lot of settings had to be changed. While most of the defaults were fine, I did change a number of settings. In particular, one of the settings was only accessible (through the Dashboard) by manually entering into the address bar, options.php

image_default_link_type = ‘none’

For most of our sites, there is no advantage to linking to the attachment page or a full size version of the image. Additionally, the images that are uploaded are usually close to the size that is being used on the page. The one exception I made was for the Archives & Special Collections site.

We also do not allow users to set up their own sites, so staff have to contact a network administrator.

Making The Themes

The lengthiest part of the process was making the custom themes. I won’t actually go into details here, but will later post details on the creation of the library’s theme. I have already talked about the options I implemented in the post about Branding the Library Website.

I will note that we avoided making a ‘mobile’ theme by making the themes responsive. They’re not the prettiest, but at least they work.

I did have to make a standard template to use for our non-WordPress sites, including the ILS, Special Collections, and ColdFusion stuff.

Roles & Capabilities

All the sites use the default Roles & Capabilities, except for the main site. Using the Advanced Access Manager plugin, I changed the permissions so that:

  • Administrators: Due to the Carousel plugin, some staff were made administrators, but with restrictions at the user (rather than role) level to have similar permissions as editors.
  • Editors: have unfiltered html (using the Unfiltered MU plugin)
  • Authors: can also edit/publish pages and delete own pages, moderate comments to own posts
  • Contributors: can edit/publish pages (instead of posts) and delete own pages, and add/edit/delete own media

Pages that have JavaScript or custom CSS are also locked down so that only editors and administrators have access.

Migrating the Existing Sites

We migrated from static HTML sites and single install WordPress blogs (I don’t know why this wasn’t a MultiSite to begin with).

WordPress Sites

For WordPress sites, I used the standard export/import that you have to install, but is integrated into the core. The one problem is that in MS, if you import images, it will copy the images over with the metadata, but will not update the links in the posts themselves (see ticket #16404). To solve this problem, I used the Search and Replace plugin to change all the old links to the new ones in one go.

HTML Sites

We settled on using the HTML Import 2 plugin. It worked well, especially since it supports Dreamweaver templates, which were used with most of our pages. It didn’t catch all the links, so we had to update some of them manually, but using the Search & Replace plugin helped a great deal.

The other thing that took a bit of time was to replace thumbnail images with the WP version and delete the original thumbnails. My coworker also uploaded all the images with the thumbnail crop option on, so I used the AJAX Thumbnail Rebuild plugin to force WordPress to recreate all the thumbnails.

Updating the Site

As with any move, it’s a good opportunity to update the site. Unfortunately, we had too tight a timeline to update the content and organization of the site (except for some minor changes). As a result, the site looks more or less the same, but I updated and coordinated the updating of a lot of the code.

I consolidated the CSS files, updated the template to use HTML5 and meet WCAG2.0, and most time intensive of all, got rid of all layout tables (with some other staff helping).

Plugins

Here is the list of the plugins I ended up with including those to help with migration:

For reasons why I may have chosen some of these plugins, take a look at my other posts on WordPress plugins.

Oh The Time

So, the most time intensive part really is sifting through WordPress plugins and updating content.

Access 2012 Day 1: Afternoon Notes

Adventures in Linked Data: Building a Connected Research Environment

by Lisa Goddard

Linked data doesn’t just accommodate collaboration, it enforces collaboration. Need a framework that can handle a lot of data and scale.

Text data is really messy, because it doesn’t fit into a single category. Linked data should allow all of this.

Identify Top Level Entities

Main types of identities with mint URIs for entities include:

  • people
  • places
  • events
  • documents
  • annotations
  • books
  • organizations

Abstract away from implementation details to make it manageable in the long term.

Canonical URIs means that one ‘link’ is actually 3 depending on format through content navigation.

Define Relationships

Through RDF, make machine readable definitions.

Linked data is basically an accessibility initiative for machines.

Use ontologies to provide definitions for entities, relationships, and impose rules.

An ontology is for life.

Ontology searches are available, such as Linked Open Vocabularies (LOV), e.g. foaf:Person (Class) – friend of a friend

Tie the entity and class using rdf:type, such as creator. Which then results in a data model.

CWRC Writer

Provides a way to create a document, which provides an interface to tag in XML, where you can select existing authority file, the web (using APIs), or custom. You can then add relations.

Slides

Quick Comment

This looks like a really neat tool to easily add XML tags in a document. Would want to see it integrated into a standard document writer, much like RefWorks does through Write’n’Cite. I’m definitely looking forward to seeing this move forward.

Big Data, Answers, and Civil Rights

Alistair Croll

If you want volume, velocity, and variety, it’s actually very expensive.

Efficiency means lower costs, new uses, but more demand and consumption.

Big data is about abundance. The number of ways we can do things with this data has exploded.

We live in a world of abundant, instant, ubiquitous information. We evolved to seek peer approval. It all comes down to who is less dumb.

We look for confirmation rather than the truth.

The more we get confirmation, the greater the polarization.

Abundant data has change the way we live and think.

The Problem with Big Data

Polarization can lead to increase in prejudices. You don’t know when you’re not contacted. Increasingly moving from culture of convictions to a culture of evidence.

Genius says possibly. Finds pattern, inspires hypotheses, reason demands testing, but open to changes.

Correlation is so good at predicting that it looks like convincing facts, but they’re just guesses.

See also: Big data, big apple, big ethics by Alistair Croll

Break Time

BiblioBox: A Library in Box

by David Fiander

Inspired by PirateBox, which allows people to share media annonymously within a community using a standalone wiki router (not connected to the Internet). People in the same place like to share stuff.

LibraryBox then simplified by taking out chat and upload function.

Dedicated ebook device that allows browsing and searching of the collection.

Components:

  • Unix based file server using a wifi access point and small flash drive.
  • Ebooks using OPDS metadata format.
  • SQLite database
  • API module usually available in language of choice e.g. Python
  • Bottle – framework for web developing in Python
  • Mako Templating – templating in Python

Adding books much more complex than serving books. For example, author authority file. Want to automate taking out metadata from ePub files, but no good module for reading ePub files in Python.

User View

Add catalogue to ebook app. It then looks like a store, where you can browse by title or author.

Available on GitHub.

Question Answering, Serendipity, and the Research Process of Scholars in the Humanities

by Kim Martin

Serendipity occurs when there is a prepared mind that notices a piece that helps them solve a problem. It allows discovery and thinking outside of the box.

Chance is recognized as an important part of the historical research process.

Shelf browser of some sort in the catalogue can be useful, but what we really need in a system is something that allows personalization and in-depth searching. Researchers just do not typically leave their offices and use search engines.

Visualizations, such as tag clouds, could allow more serendipitous browsing.

More notes on the Access 2012 live blog.

Access 2012 Day 1: Notes on Locked in the Cloud

Locked in the Cloud: What lies beyond the peak of inflated expectations

by John Durno & Corey Davis

Right now, the ‘cloud is quite the hype:

Getting Locked into the ‘Cloud’

Using cloud-based system might still be closed and locked down that is vendor-managed and based on a subscription model. Supposedly a ‘one stop’ solution. While many of the features sound positive, can have many drawbacks.

Numerous ways to be locked in

  • data
  • software
  • API
  • institutional insertia/incumbent bias

Innovation can be stifled, because stuck with what the vendor provides. Switching is considered too costly and frequently entrenched in work culture.

One of the selling points is that you will save a lot of money with cloud computing. Many administrators seem convinced that it’s about managing information, not technology, but you cannot manage information without managing technology.

Why is our backroom workflow so tightly tied to a public service point?

The problem is that even if something better comes along, you might not go with it, because it would be too cumbersome to migrate.

Have an Exit Strategy

While we need a standard to switch, this is still being worked on. Need to know the cost of moving away from the current/new system.

APIs

  • limited functionality
  • limited access to data
  • can be changed or deprecated

Still not the solution. Need unmediated access to data

Caveat Emptor

  • high switching costs
  • escalating subscription costs
  • interoperability issues
  • dwindling innovation
  • limited choice

There are in fact alternatives and something to look forward to. The ‘fabled’ innovative system.

See also: Hacking 360 Link: A Hybrid Approach by John Durno on substituting vendor link resolver.

More notes on the Access 2012 live blog.