Documentation and Online Help Committee Meeting Notes of 12/14/99

Attending: Angi Faiks, Lance Heidig, Nan Hyland, Leah Solla, Angela Horne, Marianne Hansen, Lori Micho, Elaine Krikorian, Martha Walker (Chair). Philip Herold and Katherine Reagon of IRPC Steering attended the first part of the meeting.
Recorder: Martha Walker

I. Welcome, Introductions, and Discussion of Charge: As this was the last meeting for  two committee members and the first meeting for new members, Katherine Reagan, IRPC Steering liaison, was present to respond to any questions  about the Committee's function and activities. Martha gave a brief history of committee activity, with a focus on the development of the current Gateway Help system. Future activities, particularly in regards to the creation of documentation for the new LMS, were also discussed. 

II. OPAC liaison: Philip Herold, IRPC Steering member and representative of the OPAC Working Group, was present to discuss the role of the Documentation Committee's liaison to the OPAC Working Group. The liaison will serve on both committees starting in January. It will be up to the Documentation Committee to decide which user guides are necessary to support effective patron searching of the new system. The Committee will also be responsible for creating all necessary documentation and making it available on a system wide basis, online and in paper. The committee was reminded that Endeavor comes with some built-in online Help which can be customized. The committee also has access to the documentation of current Endeavor libraries plus experience in the creation of a system of user documentation. Post meeting note: Lance Heidig was appointed to this position.

III. Changes to committee membership: Outgoing members are Angi Faiks (Chair of the Gateway Help Working Group) and Martha Walker (Documentation Committee Chair). Nan Hyland will Chair the combined group, Documentation and Online Help Committee. New committee members are Leah Solla, Angela Horne and Elaine Krikorian .

IV. Gateway Help: Angi announced various efforts to raise awareness of Library Gateway Help in the broader library community. We also reviewed current Gateway Help statistics. In rough numbers, Help use has jumped from 6-8 thousand hits per month during the Spring '99 semester to 35-36 thousand hits per month during the Fall '99 semester. As revised Help was introduced in September '99, we were all very pleased with these numbers. The group will spend more time studying the numbers in greater detail -- which pages are hit most often, etc. -- as they plan documentation for the new system. Thanks to John Ferreira for maintaining the Help statistics page, which can be found at <http://campusgw.library.cornell.edu/newhelp/stats/>.

V. Nan reported on the progress of PES Help. Nan has been providing feedback to a tech writer who was hired to create online Help for users of this new service. The pages will be part of Gateway Help and PES will link to Help there, rather than have its own separate Help system. Nan is working to fit these pages into the existing Gateway Help structure.

VI. MLA and APA Citation Style Guides: Lance reported that he and Lori were putting the finishing touches on the MLA Citation Style paper guide (which is now available through Photocopy Services). Lance also reported a few problems with HTML in the online version which he is trying to work out. Lance and Lori plan to finish work on the APA paper guide in the near future.

VI. E-mail Handout Order Form: Martha reported that Marianne Hansen has created an e-mail order form for system-wide handouts that will be linked to from the staff web page, both under the forms button and on the Committee's page. A "special mailbox" has been set up to receive the handout order forms. Staff in Photocopy Services will check the special mailbox once a day. It is still also possible to phone-in orders to Photocopy Svs.

VII. Sound Recordings Guide: Martha reported that there have been a few changes to the Sound Recordings guide available in Help. It has been split into two guides: musical recordings and spoken word recordings. The general guide in Help will link to a lengthier Music Library guide, for users wanting more in-depth searching assistance for these materials.

VIII. Transition process: The meeting ended with a discussion of ways to ensure a smooth transition process. Martha and Angi thanked the continuing committee members for their hard work and many accomplishments over the past year.