Indian Journal of Science International Weekly Journal for Science ISSN EISSN Discovery Publication. All Rights Reserved

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1 Indian Journal of Science International Weekly Journal for Science ISSN EISSN Discovery Publication. All Rights Reserved Analysis Drupal as a Content Management System in Libraries: A Study Publication History Received: 05 August 2015 Accepted: 27 August 2015 Published: 14 October 2015 Citation Arumugam J, Parthasarathy R, Lewish Yacub. Drupal as a Content Management System in Libraries: A Study. Indian Journal of Science, 2015, 21(72), Page184

2 Drupal as a Content Management System in Libraries: A Study J.Arumugam, R. Parthasarathy, and Lewish Yacub Information Resource Centre Tata Consultancy Services, Chennai ABSTRACT Content Management system is a tool which helps to create, collect, organize and retrieve the electronic resources as well as the web contents. In this present scenario, Users are become more technology savvy for the availability of internet which leads to a paradigm shift from traditional documents to web based e-resources, training videos, presentations, scholarly articles etc., Drupal, a powerful tool for managing web content and used in many organizations, libraries because of its extensibility and flexibility. This paper aims to highlight the salient features and benefits of Drupal in libraries. Keywords:- Content Management systems, Drupal, Library 2.0 INTRODUCTION The emergence of Information Communication Technology have changed the face of traditional libraries to web based hybrid libraries which forces the librarian to make use of open source tools to provide the web based services to the knowledge seeking environment. Content Management system is used to create, publish, translate, distribute, archive and retrieve the digital information. It also has features such as track the changes made to the digital contents. Web 2.0 technologies have transformed the way content is created, organized and shared though this tools, blogs, wikis, social networking sites, twitter, RSS, linked in etc. WHY DRUPAL The idea of drupal was conceived to create a message board for sharing information at local area network then after developed as a web board in the Internet platform. Users can publish, manage and organize a variety of contents based on the requirements. Drupal can be used for the purpose of creating institutional repositories, library portals, corporate websites and discussion forums. Drupal is maintained by thousands of community users and developers; the software is licensed under General Public License (GPL) as open source. It is user friendly, free to download and provides options like meta data functionalities, discussion forums, vocabulary control, administration dashboard, and able to publish the content in XML. INFRASTRUCTURE FOR DRUPAL IMPLEMENTATION As Drupal works in an open source platform, updated versions are available as a package in at free of cost. The basic requirements for using this content management software are WAMP, LAMP & XAMP. Queries related to installation and customization can be posted in the drupal forum for flexible and easy implementation in libraries. Page185

3 Drupal works with the technology called XAMPP or WAMP. X : Operating system (Mac, Linux, Windows) Apache : Web server MySQL ; Database PHP/ Perl: Programming language DRUPAL ARCHITECTURE Drupal has five main building blocks that are Nodes, core modules, Block & menus, user permission and Templates. It s in a modular architecture. The core modules, functioning of contents, user management, and blocks helps to create a layout and it has an option of easily accessible menus. The fundamental element which constitutes of a title, teaser and content is node. It enables options like place published, comments, and category. User permission is the layer which sets the rules and roles of the authenticated user s.the user can select any them they like from the available themes, they can change the layouts of the website written in PHP. FEATURES FOR LIBRARIES Open source scenario has a vast collect of open source software s for content management systems, course management system like joomla, moodle, wordpress, etc. The main purpose of choosing drupal as a content management software for the libraries is only because of the modules and options it provides for the library science professionals. It can be used to build an institutional repository for any institutions, as well as course ware module for academic environments. Drupal helps to develop the modules for acquisition, circulation, serial control, OPAC and report generation. In each module it has its own unique features such as Z39.50 module implements this protocol for information retrieval using PHP interface to the YAZ tool kit. Simple Remote search module allows user to search a remote database from Drupal sites. Scholarly publications can be displayed in Drupal. Drupal module has OAI-PMH protocol which facilitates to harvest the bibliography from the other bibliography module sites and exposes the same meta data. It has the provision of Machine readable Catalog called MARC which allows importing MARC records as nodes, book review sites, library catalogs in a rich social environment. Using just one node the library can manage their collection and multiple copies are supported. The library has full control over their content to be made available to all. Page186

4 Extension of due date and sending auto reminders are all incorporated as a built-in function in the module. Calendar management for events, Tasks, Journal renewals etc., Below are snapshots of libraries using Drupal for library portals. Benefits of using Drupal in Libraries There are certain benefits for which Drupal can be used to build the library portals with all freely available features in the open source platform. Some of the benefits are given below. Drupal is an interactive, user friendly and community driven content management software which allows for constant enhancement, modifications towards the library modules. It is easily customizable and rapid deployment of web 2.0 tools Extensive API support really helps the users to develop their modules in their own. Libraries can handle the routine operations such as acquisition, circulation, serial control, OPAC, Reports generation etc., Developers can concentrate only on the further development of library modules for the easy accessibility. Available at free of cost and effective support from the community of users. Quality of the code can be improved by suggestions from the wide community of users of Drupal in libraries. Reliability is another core compared with other content management software s. It can be used for all kind of libraries. Better performance compared to other proprietary software s. This is an independent platform, Open source software and compatible with Linux, Windows, and Mac etc. Source code can be modified based on the requirements of the libraries. CONCLUSION Owing to a view of Library 2.0, there is a gap between Repositories, courseware, websites, blogs and RSS feeds. Drupal acts as a bridging medium for library services to combine all services to establish a library portals to satisfy all aspects of information thirst in the tech savvy environment Since it has been implemented a decade before still the awareness about this technology and its usability is not reached up to the mark. Nowadays all those research and development institutions, academic and public sectors are moving to open source software like drupal to facilitate their resources and to reach the user community in a large extent. Lack of awareness, technological barriers makes the user not to touch these kinds of open source softwares. References Page187

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