Montreal’s 26 public librairies has now a main portal avalaible to the general public, and the key feature the network is most proud of is the Nelligan catalog, a web interface where users can search for books through the entire library system. The database is updated live, so you can see the book’s status: it gathers 5 millions books and will handle annually 22 millions transactions. And that’s pretty much about it. You can send the book’s description by email but you cannot make a reservation, or see your account in your local public library.
The system is said to have taken them 2 years to develop. If you want my personal opinion, this is sort of nice, the homepage looks clean and modern, with videos and digital media. It’s when you go into the heart of the system that you see legacy user interfaces that breaks the flow.
