Digital Collections… on Paper!

Have you ever tried to print out anything from our Digital Collections site, like a cool historic advertisement, an old documentary photograph, or a list of search results? If so, you probably got a printout with some less-than-ideal formatting and some extraneous near-blank pages.

Today, we implemented a print-specific stylesheet, so give it another try and let us know what you think!

One of our core aims for our system is to be able to deliver items from our collections in the formats that are most ideal for the various ways people will use them. Lots of people print web pages, and what works on-screen isn’t always best on paper.

Here were our goals for the print styles:

maintain branding for Duke LIbraries, Digital Collections Program, and individual collection

remove interface elements like search boxes and facets that do not provide value on paper

write out the URL of copyright & reproduction information for items

eliminate unnecessary page breaking

support landscape & portrait orientation

support all major browsers/platforms

make table headers repeat on subsequent pages

There’s another feature we’re working on implementing (in the not-too-distant future) that should also make things easier to print: PDF generation. It should be especially useful for multi-paged items. We’ll keep you posted on this blog about all coming interface updates…

Happy printing!