For library users, Dr. Newman s team found that reading on paper outperforms reading on screen, that many sources cannot be borrowed from libraries, and that reading and note taking are time-intensive. The researchers further studied the needs of library users by working with 25 students, most of whom were doctoral students in the humanities. The students kept diaries for one day noting their library use and were then interviewed at the end of the day. Reading and note taking were found to be central to the research process and dominant in terms of time spent in the library. All of this was recorded by annotation, note taking and photocopying, which served a multitude of purposes.
Digital cameras are small, fast and convenient and are decreasing in cost.
However, there are problems with the image quality. The CamWorks prototype was created to explore the potential of this technology. In testing the performance of the CamWorks prototype, users were asked to copy specific passages of source documents using a word processor, a flatbed scanner and CamWorks. The camera outperformed the flatbed scanner by about 40 seconds per task and beat the word processor for any passage greater than 12 words in length. Although the research looks promising, Dr. Newman said that there is still much to investigate to determine if CamWorks could really be an effective tool for library users.