The eXtensible Catalog Organization is working to design and develop a set of open-source applications that will provide libraries with an alternative way to reveal their collections to library users.
Please visit our project website at http://www.extensiblecatalog.org for a more complete overview of the eXtensible Catalog project and the software we are creating. Additionally, there is an overall XC mailing list, not just for the Drupal Toolkit, but other toolkits and topics, available at http://www.extensiblecatalog.org/mailinglist.
Drupal Toolkit
The eXtensible Catalog (XC) Drupal Toolkit manages the content and functionality library websites in one easy package with Drupal. This toolkit integrates searchable library metadata, ILS circulation services and library website content into a feature‐rich web user interface. The Drupal Toolkit:
- Provides a single user interface for searching across ILS, digital repository, and library web page content.
- Implements innovative faceted browse features
- Offers powerful tools to build web applications that tie into ILS content and functionality
- Integrates fully with an existing ILS to display live circulation status and place requests in the circulation system
- Works with existing authentication systems such as the ILS patron database and LDAP servers
The Drupal Toolkit is a modular system that handles the creation and manipulation of metadata in accordance to the XC schema format within the Drupal content management system by:
- Defining metadata
- Importing and exporting metadata
- Storing and retrieving metadata
- Searching metadata
- Extending and modifying metadata
- Controlling user access to metadata
- Generating fully customizable XHTML and CSS output
Some modules are part of the Toolkit however can be used independently from it. These are:
- OAI harvester
- NCIP integration
- Integration of Syndetics Solution services
- URL rewriting to EZProxy server
All of these core functionalities will be handled by XC defined hooks for Drupal that will allow XC modules, and perhaps any future contributed modules, to plug into and extend the features of the XC Drupal Toolkit.
The Drupal 7 version
In January 2012 Ron Jerome (rjerome) were so nice, that he created an initial D7 version of oaiharvester and xc_util modules. The main purpose of this is to create an opportunity to harvest OAI-PMH data providers under Drupal 7. The oaiharvester module provides lots of hooks, which helps you to save the records into Drupal. Later this year we will continue Ron's work, and we will come up with a paralell full feature D7 version of the software. Thank you Ron!
Installing the XC Drupal Toolkit
There are two ways to install the Drupal Toolkit:
- With an installation profile - XC installation profile (http://drupal.org/project/xc_installation) install Drupal with all necessary modules, and sets the basic configuration for starting Drupal right after installation.
- Manual installation of the XC modules - If you already have a Drupal installation, you can use the normal way of module installation. It will not configure all display and behaviour settings of course.
Each of these methods is described step-by-step in our installation documentation section http://drupal.org/node/651558. The XC Drupal Toolkit contains a settings check-list, which calls your attention to the necessary configurations you have to set after installation.
The documentation pages for the project is available at http://drupal.org/node/499770.
Drupal Toolkit API documentation is available at http://api.xcproject.org/drupal.
We created a theme as well devoting to our would-be demo site, which can be available at http://drupal.org/project/xc_theme.
A screencast is available here: http://www.screencast.com/users/eXtensibleCatalog (the second part is about the Drupal modules).
We haven't really released any stable versions. If you want to follow the development, use the dev version, and ask us any questions.
If you are a partner, or would like to follow the development of the module, read the News section of the documentation. That's where we announce important changes either in code, or in documentation.
Project Information
- Maintenance status: Actively maintained
- Development status: Under active development
- Module categories: Content, Import/Export, Search, Third-party Integration, User Access & Authentication
- Reported installs: 63 sites currently report using this module. View usage statistics.
- Last modified: January 25, 2012
