Energizing Endeca: Emily Lynema

For Emily Lynema, “Librarianship was always one of those 'maybe' things in the back of my head.” Being practical, she first got an undergraduate degree in computer science, then, she says, “being practical again, it seemed like there was a need for folks with technical background in the library space.”

Postgraduation, she came to NCSU as a Fellow and immediately jumped into a key role with its Endeca project: a next-generation catalog search tool that allows relevance ranking, faceted search, spelling corrections, and faster response times. Lynema also helped create a user interface that permits integration with other tools and services. As systems librarian for digital projects, she continues to head the project team, which debates and prioritizes ongoing Endeca development, and she serves as primary programmer.

“Emily has only been a librarian for 18 months but kicked off her career with one of the most exciting library projects of the decade,” says colleague Andrew Pace, head of information technology at NCSU Libraries. California Digital Library user services architect Roy Tennant agrees. “Not every new librarian is offered the kind of opportunities that NCSU afforded [Lynema], but, to her credit, she took those opportunities and ran with them,” he says.

“I love working with both technology and libraries,” Lynema explains. “It defines a niche space for me and specific problems to tackle. I'm not just a programmer; I'm a library programmer. I get to try to help solve library problems.”