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PUBLIC SERVICES FORUM
15 March 1999
RWA Notes
- Updates. LMS
Endeavor will be visiting this week, and there seems to be an interest in taking a closer look at ExLibris as well. It is my understanding that the LMS Evaluation Committee is hoping to have a recommendation for the LMS Steering Committee by the end of April.
- Bear Access.
LMT is discussing a replacement for kiosk Bear Access, to take place this summer. In response to this, some reference staff are asking that we bear in mind the difficulties for the users, especially faculty, in frequently changing our systems. We made major changes in the past year, and we will be bringing up an entirely new LMS next year. We must therefore consider carefully whether replacing Bear Access with something else for only one year is worth the adjustment for our users.
- 988 Privilege Cards.
Privilege cards are provided to a wide range of users, from those who are unarguably members of the Cornell community (e.g., summer school students, affiliates) to those who are clearly outside the community (e.g., those who purchase cards, such as faculty from neighboring institutions). These cards have in the past allowed users to access licensed databases through the NOTIS navigator. Because we are obliged by our licenses not to permit users from outside the Cornell community to have remote access to our databases, we have begun to issue two kinds of privilege cards: 888 cards will, as has been the case in the past, allow users remote access through the navigator; 988 cards, on the other hand, will be issued to those users outside the Cornell community, and will not permit access to licensed databases (but will rather connect remote users directly to the online catalog). One problem is that this means holders of 988 cards will not have remote access to BooksOut--which will cause some inconveniences. 988 cardholders will, however, still be able to use BooksOut in the library.
- MVS Work-around.
Peter Hoyt explained that, in order to avoid the NOTIS connectivity failures we have been experiencing since the MVS upgrade in December, CIT has re-routed the NOTIS connection around the area that was know to cause the difficulties. In the meantime, IBM continues to try to identify the exact nature of the problem. There was a general sense at the meeting that this method is working, and that we have not noticed the kind of connectivity problems that had been happening before. The only problem with this work-around is the one Peter had previously warned us about, namely that when one is trying to move out of the OPAC by typing "stop," one gets a screen instructing the user to type "undial." This is causing some confusion, and it is an extra step in moving out of the OPAC. Peter said he would talk with CIT about how this step could be eliminated. Peter also noted that, if IBM does find a real fix to the connectivity difficulty, we will want to implement that--but Peter will communicate with IRPC to arrange a time for making such a fix that will be convenient.
- Personalized Electronic Services.
Holly Mistlebauer reported on the work of the Personalized Electronic Services Working Group, which she is chairing. This group also includes Zsuzsa Koltay, Daniel Smith, John Saylor, Bob Kibbee, Noni Korf Vidal, Jen Weintraub, Tom Turner, John Fereira, and Adam Smith. The group has been brainstorming potential personalized services that might be provided electronically. The group is now planning on having two initiatives in place by the fall semester: a personalized series of shortcuts for Gateway resources (an initial form of the Virtual Carrel) and a plan for a current awareness service that would eventually permit users to be notified of new sources in their subject areas. In addition to these two main projects, the group has been talking about a process for providing information electronically to new users, as well as some method to advise users of significant changes in library services. In planning for such innovations, the group would work closely with Martha Walker and the Documentation Committee. The group has also been talking about methods to help users know which sources to use for which kinds of research, and has generally been using the Focus Group report as a basis for thinking about new services. Holly encouraged staff to make suggestions to the group. This can be done by sending a note to the group's listserv, so that it will be read by everyone on the group. The address for that list is ESWG-L@albert.mannlib.cornell.edu. In response to a question by Martha, Holly said that the current awareness service and possibly other personalized services will require user profiles for all users--with a statement of their particular interests, and also some indication of whether they want to participate in such a program. Users need definitely to have the option of not participating. Lynn Brown suggested that we look into possibly connecting such personalized services to faculty Web pages, which are being used for courses; this would be a way to link up with interested faculty, and it would provide us with the ability to notify users of new resources in the course topics. Nancy said the idea of providing assistance in a specific subject context is an excellent idea, and urged Holly to work closely with IRPC on this. Creating such profiles and making such plans may well lead to more personal meetings between faculty and reference staff, which is something we have all agreed is essential, as we continue to make increasing amounts of information remotely accessible.
- Focus Group Report.
Karen Calhoun summarized some of the key findings from the Focus Group study. Despite all of our publicity and instruction, there is still a sense that some users are still finding the Gateway haphazardly and on their own. This is especially the case with undergraduates. The study also found that some faculty are unaware that they can (and should) ask reference staff to visit their classes, to introduce the Gateway and other key sources; in notifying faculty about such services, we need to be particularly careful also to inform lecturers and teaching assistants, as well. Users are very happy with the library and with staff. They are also very satisfied with the Gateway--more so, in fact, than we in the Library tend to think they are, presumably because we most often work with users who are having problems with the Gateway. Michael made the point that we still do not have an effective process for communicating with our user community. Jill suggested that we create something like an online newsletter--or some method that will ensure that we are not constantly bombarding faculty with new information about the Library. We should be providing them with key information perhaps only a few times per semester. Lynn said that there is a JGSM listserv which meets JGSM library needs very effectively; she has found that many faculty are glad to get ongoing input about library services through this means. Karen said study found that undergraduate use of the Gateway is intermittent. For undergraduates, the best time to receive information about the Gateway is just prior to their work on a specific assignment, such as a paper. Information at other times is far less useful. Michael said that one of our major difficulties is that instruction is cumulative. We do not get to all students every semester, but only to a subset. By the time they are seniors, we have managed to provide instruction to a good proportion of them. But the problem is that the resources and services are now changing so fast that students need much more frequent instruction than we are presently able to provide. By the time a student is a junior, for example, much of the instruction we provided that student as a freshman may not longer be very useful. Users, Karen said, do not like to make use of the help button--they want as much help built into the program itself as possible. In general, there is a tension, Karen said: users seem to want as much information, often highly specialized and complicated information, as possible--and yet they want access to that information to be easy and intuitive. There is also clearly a difficulty with keyword searching--the so-called "brown cow syndrome" (i.e., if you search "brown cow" on the Gateway, there will be no hits, even though the Gateway provides access to indexes which will contain considerable information about brown cows). Users do not know what they are searching in the Gateway search box; they need to know that they are not searching the databases. Michael said there should always be a box next to any search box that will answer the question "what am I searching?" Karen noted that some users were also clear that they definitely want to continue to have telnet access--not only Web access. They are also bewildered by the variation of interfaces, and they want the ability to search across several databases. Finally, there was a clear interest expressed, as we have always assumed, in having an effective hook to holdings for as many of the indexes as possible.
Minutes recorded by Ross Atkinson.
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rev. 4/6/99, mc