A case study of the State of Iowa Legislative Services Agency's use of Access Innovations, Inc.'s MAIstro software to index its Iowa Acts publication. Presented by Kevin W. Boyack of SciTech Strategies, Inc. at the 2012 Data Harmony User Group meeting on February 9, 2012 at the Access Innovations, Inc. offices.

1. MAIstro and the State of Iowa
Legislative Services Agency
The journey from paper and “back-of-
the-book” indexing to an electronic
indexing system and use of a controlled
vocabulary

2. Talking points:
• Life before MAIstro and use of a controlled
vocabulary
• Integration of MAIstro and new XML database
• Learning a new way to index
• Life after MAIstro
• Print publication
• Internet search and retrieval
• Moving forward and looking ahead…

3. Life before MAIstro
• Wordy index entries with lots
of detail and description
• Lengthy index: A 300-page
index was commonplace for
the Iowa Acts book. 2010
Iowa Acts consisted of 1200
pages, with over 300 pages
being the index.
• Indexing work for our Acts
publication consisted of
seven staffers and seven
months of work.
• Because of the amount of
work involved, indexing
production would delay
publication of the Acts book.

4. Life before MAIstro
• Paper printout, editing,
and rewrites. Rewrites
take time…
• Example to the right is a
fairly clean edit. Often edit
marks would fill page,
especially for new indexers
• 3 years was typical
learning curve for new
indexers

5. Life before MAIstro
• Example of recent Iowa Code
Index. Yellow highlight indicates
“see” and “see also” references.
• Common user complaints of
confusing “directions” and going
in circles.
• Such tactics were used to
condense index, already around
900 pages.

6. Life before MAIstro
… And we had these too. Up until around 2010, the index for the over 20,000-page Administrative Code was
still maintained using index cards. Updates were marked in pencil.

7. Integration of MAIstro and new XML database
• Access Innovations collaborated with the Iowa Legislative
Services Agency to build a customized thesaurus.
• The six-month project utilized Access Innovations’ Data
Harmony software suite. The project team created the
thesaurus using MAISTRO, a software tool which includes
both Thesaurus Master (thesaurus and taxonomy
management) and Machine Aided Indexer (M.A.I.).
• Thesaurus and controlled vocabulary were integrated as
part of indexing interface of new XML-based system.

8. A new way of indexing
Completely electronic system. Paperless. Indexing terms are “tagged” to XML database
content. Tags can be assigned to all types of content. Not restricted by type of
document or publication.

9. A new way of indexing
Machine-aided indexing interface. Users can choose top terms or select
other terms from thesaurus. MAIstro runs behind the background.

10. Life after MAIstro
• Previously Iowa Acts indexing was completed in about 7 months with 7 staffers.
For the 2011 Iowa Acts, indexing was completed in about 4 weeks with 2 staffers.
• Biggest surprise to me: How much time the use of a controlled vocabulary saved. I
did not realize how much time we had been spending writing, rewriting, and
editing index entries.
• Less learning curve for new indexers. In the new system, the concept applies or it
doesn’t.
• The entire Administrative Code (now in XML database) has indexing terms
assigned to its content electronically… No indexing cards to be found.
• The possibility now exists to index legislative documents that have not been
indexed before.
• Indexing for historical documents, current documents, and future documents can
evolve and change.

11. Print publications
• Example of 2011 Acts,
chapter 3 content. This
content is generated
without “see refs”
(nonpreferred terms)
• Interface allows us
ability to generate
with or without
nonpreferred terms

12. Print publications
• This is an example of chapter 3
content with “see refs”.
• For a simple output and design,
we have restricted our print
output to utilize only preferred
and nonpreferred terms.
• We have debated about
accounting for broader, narrower,
related terms in print output, but
for now we prefer the simpler,
streamlined approach.

13. Print publications
• For 2011 Acts, index size was
around 60 pages, compared to the
300 some pages of the 2010 Acts
index.
• Same concepts indexed, but with
less level of detail and description.
• This same print output and design
was also used for our 2011 Code
Supplement. Terms used are the
same, but output can be stylized
to fit publication.

14. Internet search
The next phase of development: Use of indexing tags to help users find and retrieve
documents. Combination of document types, indexing tags, keyword, and metadata for
search criteria. This is currently exposed only in test environment.

15. Internet search
This is an example of keyword “doves” coupled with “Iowa Acts” document type. Note
chapter 3 indexing tags “Birds, Hunting, Game animals, Doves” cited as Related
Topic(s).

16. Moving forward…
• One of the fears that my staff had at the start of
this journey was that the “machines” might
replace the “people”. In fact, quite the opposite
has occurred. Because of the ability to index
documents so quickly and efficiently with
machine-aided tools, we are being asked to do
more as an indexing staff.
• There is still a lot to learn, and I believe we have
only really scratched the surface regarding the
true potential of this technology.

17. Contact information:
Roger Karns
Legislative Services Agency
rkarns@legis.state.ia.us
515-242-6459