I created this word cloud from words used in my Reference Annual Report 2008 - enjoy!
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Reference Word Cloud
I created this word cloud from words used in my Reference Annual Report 2008 - enjoy!
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Managing Electronic Resource Collections
MARS Products & Services Committee Discussion Forum
2009 Midwinter
Discussion Questions
Print Reference Sources:
1) Are print sources obsolete? Should we continue to order them? Why? Why not?
2) Have you conducted any use studies of your print reference collection lately? Can you share the results?
3) What do you think is the right balance between electronic and print reference sources? What is the current balance in your library?
Electronic Reference Sources: Access & Integration
4) How do you provide access to your electronic reference collection? (catalog, portal product such as Reference Universe?) How successful do you find this approach?
5) Do you integrate access to electronic and print reference sources so that key print tools for a particular subject/discipline aren’t overlooked?
6) Do you integrate free and purchased reference sources? Why? Why not? How do you do it?
7) How do you facilitate patron discovery of electronic reference sources? (Browseable electronic reference collection? Subject or course-specific web pages? Subjection to google-like searches? Other ways?)
Electronic Reference Sources: Use by patrons
8) Do you find that your patrons are willing to use electronic reference sources? If not, how can we better promote these resources?
Are electronic reference sources valuable even if our users DON’T use them? For example, librarians may use Reference Universe all the time.
The Future of Electronic Reference Sources
9) What features would you like to see in electronic reference sources? For example:
a. Multimedia (graphics, sound files, videos)
b. Web 2.0 functionality (tagging, blogs, RSS feeds, discussion forums)
c. Customization options for librarians, faculty and students
d. Better inter-operability between different publishers and third-party products such as catalogs, portals, metasearch engines)
10) Do users currently use such features if available in reference sources? Do you think our users expect these features?
11) What message should librarians send to the major publishers of online reference sources? What are our priorities? (interface, platform standardization, variety of pricing models, ong term access, etc)
Answer the questions and we'll have our own online discussion forum. All comments welcome.
2009 Midwinter
Discussion Questions
Print Reference Sources:
1) Are print sources obsolete? Should we continue to order them? Why? Why not?
2) Have you conducted any use studies of your print reference collection lately? Can you share the results?
3) What do you think is the right balance between electronic and print reference sources? What is the current balance in your library?
Electronic Reference Sources: Access & Integration
4) How do you provide access to your electronic reference collection? (catalog, portal product such as Reference Universe?) How successful do you find this approach?
5) Do you integrate access to electronic and print reference sources so that key print tools for a particular subject/discipline aren’t overlooked?
6) Do you integrate free and purchased reference sources? Why? Why not? How do you do it?
7) How do you facilitate patron discovery of electronic reference sources? (Browseable electronic reference collection? Subject or course-specific web pages? Subjection to google-like searches? Other ways?)
Electronic Reference Sources: Use by patrons
8) Do you find that your patrons are willing to use electronic reference sources? If not, how can we better promote these resources?
Are electronic reference sources valuable even if our users DON’T use them? For example, librarians may use Reference Universe all the time.
The Future of Electronic Reference Sources
9) What features would you like to see in electronic reference sources? For example:
a. Multimedia (graphics, sound files, videos)
b. Web 2.0 functionality (tagging, blogs, RSS feeds, discussion forums)
c. Customization options for librarians, faculty and students
d. Better inter-operability between different publishers and third-party products such as catalogs, portals, metasearch engines)
10) Do users currently use such features if available in reference sources? Do you think our users expect these features?
11) What message should librarians send to the major publishers of online reference sources? What are our priorities? (interface, platform standardization, variety of pricing models, ong term access, etc)
Answer the questions and we'll have our own online discussion forum. All comments welcome.
Can You Open This for Me?
Using and Understanding Open Source Tools
Hot Topics Discussion Group
Midwinter 2009
Presenters:
Marsha Schnirring, Instructional Services Librarian at Occidental College
· Discussed Zotero
Ian Chan, Web Development Librarian at CSU San Marcos
· Compared research guides using Moodle, Drupal, and Library a la Carte
Open Source: a peer-based design/development process that makes the product’s source accessible to the public. The term usually applies to software.
Open Source Software: Software that is developed using an open source process and that adheres to the Open Source Definition – see http://www.opensource.org/
OpenOffice – http://www.openoffice.org/
An office software suite that includes word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, and database applications
Zotero – http://www.zotero.org/ a bibliographic citation manager that works with Firefox Web browser
Library a’ la Carte – http://alacarte.library.oregonstate.edu/ a content management system designed for creating and maintaining library research guides
Drupal - http://drupal.org/ a content management system
Moodle – http://moodle.org/ a course management system used by many colleges and universities
I attended this Discussion Group to find out more about OpenOffice and came away with much more. I'm looking at Library a'la Carte and the other management systems to see if we can use one of them to manage our online training classes.
Comments welcome!
Hot Topics Discussion Group
Midwinter 2009
Presenters:
Marsha Schnirring, Instructional Services Librarian at Occidental College
· Discussed Zotero
Ian Chan, Web Development Librarian at CSU San Marcos
· Compared research guides using Moodle, Drupal, and Library a la Carte
Open Source: a peer-based design/development process that makes the product’s source accessible to the public. The term usually applies to software.
Open Source Software: Software that is developed using an open source process and that adheres to the Open Source Definition – see http://www.opensource.org/
OpenOffice – http://www.openoffice.org/
An office software suite that includes word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, and database applications
Zotero – http://www.zotero.org/ a bibliographic citation manager that works with Firefox Web browser
Library a’ la Carte – http://alacarte.library.oregonstate.edu/ a content management system designed for creating and maintaining library research guides
Drupal - http://drupal.org/ a content management system
Moodle – http://moodle.org/ a course management system used by many colleges and universities
I attended this Discussion Group to find out more about OpenOffice and came away with much more. I'm looking at Library a'la Carte and the other management systems to see if we can use one of them to manage our online training classes.
Comments welcome!
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
How Librarians Are Using Web 2.0
RUSA MARS User Access to Services Committee hosted a discussion group on Web 2.0 tools. In 2008 the Committee sponsored a survey asking public and academic librarians a range of questions about how they are using Web 2.0 applications in their libraries.
There is interest and some implementation in public libraries with blogs, wikis, flickr and Facebook but overall public libraries have not jumped into the social networking aspect of 2.0 like academic libraries.
I think that the patron base accounts for much of this. Colleges & Universities are serving generations that have grown up with the Internet - this is how they communicate. So many colleges have developed interactive online classes for students and use YouTube and Podcasts.
The members shared a representative list of tutorials for some of the Web 2.0 products more commonly used in libraries. Here is a sampling:
Blogs: Blogger Video Tutorials
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryb4VPSmKuo
http://www.blogger.com/tour_start.g
Wikipedia Tutorial
http://enwikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_tutorial
What is RSS?
http://rss.softwaregarden.com/aboutrss.html
Mashup Tutorials
http://www.deitel.com/ResourceCenters/Web20/Mashups/TashupTutorials/tabid/985/Default.aspx
How to Use del.icio.us
http://websearch.about.com/od/dailywebsearchtips/qt/dnt0412.htm
If you'd like to see the bibliography of tutorials, let me know and I'll send you a copy.
There is interest and some implementation in public libraries with blogs, wikis, flickr and Facebook but overall public libraries have not jumped into the social networking aspect of 2.0 like academic libraries.
I think that the patron base accounts for much of this. Colleges & Universities are serving generations that have grown up with the Internet - this is how they communicate. So many colleges have developed interactive online classes for students and use YouTube and Podcasts.
The members shared a representative list of tutorials for some of the Web 2.0 products more commonly used in libraries. Here is a sampling:
Blogs: Blogger Video Tutorials
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryb4VPSmKuo
http://www.blogger.com/tour_start.g
Wikipedia Tutorial
http://enwikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_tutorial
What is RSS?
http://rss.softwaregarden.com/aboutrss.html
Mashup Tutorials
http://www.deitel.com/ResourceCenters/Web20/Mashups/TashupTutorials/tabid/985/Default.aspx
How to Use del.icio.us
http://websearch.about.com/od/dailywebsearchtips/qt/dnt0412.htm
If you'd like to see the bibliography of tutorials, let me know and I'll send you a copy.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Dewey Update - OCLC Research Update
WorldCat Survey Findings - What do users want?
1. More subject information
2. Summaries and abstracts in records
3. Book Covers
4. Datamining - clusters of like materials in a search
5. Fiction Finder - grouping of all titles into works with fast headings
6. Software that tags parts of speach (mix between library supplied data and end user supplied)
Announcements:
- New DDC23 should be out by late 2010 or early 2011
- New ILL Web Delivery Tutorial on the OCLC website: www.oclc.org
- WorldCat Mobile pilot - a program that brings WorldCat.org to hand-held communications devices such as PDAs and smartphones.
Members of the editorial team presented outlines of proposed changes to DDC: "Language variations" by Julianne Beall, "Rethinking meals" by Giles Martin and "780 Music" by Michael Panzer.
For more information check out this blog - 025.431: The Dewey Blog for a far better description of the updates from real catalogers and not just a reference librarian.
1. More subject information
2. Summaries and abstracts in records
3. Book Covers
4. Datamining - clusters of like materials in a search
5. Fiction Finder - grouping of all titles into works with fast headings
6. Software that tags parts of speach (mix between library supplied data and end user supplied)
Announcements:
- New DDC23 should be out by late 2010 or early 2011
- New ILL Web Delivery Tutorial on the OCLC website: www.oclc.org
- WorldCat Mobile pilot - a program that brings WorldCat.org to hand-held communications devices such as PDAs and smartphones.
Members of the editorial team presented outlines of proposed changes to DDC: "Language variations" by Julianne Beall, "Rethinking meals" by Giles Martin and "780 Music" by Michael Panzer.
For more information check out this blog - 025.431: The Dewey Blog for a far better description of the updates from real catalogers and not just a reference librarian.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
ALA Midwinter 2009
Denver in January - the mountains are beautiful but the weather is not.
It was a busy but informative meeting - I am on the MARS Chair's Program for Chicago and I want to take this opportunity to promote the program.
"Who Cares about Privacy? Boundaries, Millennials and the MySpace Mindset"
MARS Chair's Program - ALA Annual Convention
Sunday, July 12, 10:30 - noon
Libraries have long trumpeted their role as protectors of privacy, but what does privacy mean in an age when people share all aspects of their lives with a worldwide audience? Is the library's committment to privacy standing in the way of offering a truly collaborative research environment for our millennial users? The speakers will participate in a lively discussion on the changing definition of privacy and its impact on libraries and the research process.
So mark you calendars now.
My Committee commitments kept me busy with Executive and All Committee Meetings, My Favorite Martian Award selection and the Chair's Program but over the next few days, I'll post notes from the Discussion Groups that I attended.
It was a busy but informative meeting - I am on the MARS Chair's Program for Chicago and I want to take this opportunity to promote the program.
"Who Cares about Privacy? Boundaries, Millennials and the MySpace Mindset"
MARS Chair's Program - ALA Annual Convention
Sunday, July 12, 10:30 - noon
Libraries have long trumpeted their role as protectors of privacy, but what does privacy mean in an age when people share all aspects of their lives with a worldwide audience? Is the library's committment to privacy standing in the way of offering a truly collaborative research environment for our millennial users? The speakers will participate in a lively discussion on the changing definition of privacy and its impact on libraries and the research process.
So mark you calendars now.
My Committee commitments kept me busy with Executive and All Committee Meetings, My Favorite Martian Award selection and the Chair's Program but over the next few days, I'll post notes from the Discussion Groups that I attended.
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