Dear All,
Apologies for cross-posting.
I wonder if I can ask some advice of the list, and if people would be willing to share their experience with me?
At Kent, we currently have a project to install the Raptor toolkit (http://iam.cf.ac.uk/trac/RAPTOR) in order to track eresource usage within our institution. If we decide to continue with full implementation, then a business case will be required to make the case for infrastructure and operational costs, as well as ongoing support. I am particularly interested in hearing from others who are already using Raptor in the real world to track resource usage, whether it is delivering useful metrics, and your reflections on some of the questions below.
If you do not use Raptor, I would be particularly interested in hearing if you utilise a different tool (other than JUSP - if so what?) to ascertain resource usage - and your reflections on this.
If you can spare the time to reply to me off-list at [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> (or tel. 01227 827608), I would be most grateful. If folks are interested, I can summarise ("anonymised") responses for the list(s).
* How long have you had Raptor in place for?
* Who uses the reports from Raptor, and what are they used for? (e.g. for management data, informing cost divisions, or identifying trial resources for subscription)
* Does Raptor do what you expect of it, and are the metrics fit for your purposes?
* What types of data do you retrieve from Raptor? (e.g. usage by institution, campus, faculty, school, programme, staff or student category)
* Do you measure usage for all resources, or selected/high value ones (if so, what?)
* Who retrieves reports from Raptor for your institution? (not names, but which team, or job role, owns this duty)
* How are new reports created (or who creates them)? (ditto)
* Are the separate usage reports for access via shibboleth, and proxy routes, an issue? If so, how do you account for them (e.g. have you tried to normalise and amalgamate the data to provide an overview report of usage)?
* Do you see an issue with the inability to track usage beyond the top-level entry screen of a database (e.g. which EBSCOHost dataset for instance)?
* Does Raptor represent vfm when the value of the metrics retrieved are balanced against the costs of IT infrastructure, operational maintenance (patching, upgrading, licencing, etc.), and technical support (additional report writing, etc.)?
With thanks and kind regards,
Jason
Jason Harper
Academic Liaison Librarian
University of Kent
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