The interface we’ve been using for AskLive is being phased out by Meebo – it’s already lost its stats features and may disappear any day, so a group of us (Donna, Janette, Erin, Kathryn and me, reporting to Heather) have been working to find a replacement.

We’ve settled on LibraryH3lp, which was created by a librarian and a programmer, and comes extremely highly recommended. It allows greater privacy for patrons, doesn’t demand a name/age/gender before they can ask a question, has a louder alert sound, lets any number of librarians log in at once, and lets us transfer a chat (with the full transcript) between librarians.

It’s also just as easy to use as the Meebo interface – staff just need a short orientation to the new layout and introduction to the new transfer feature.

For the first two weeks of term, we’ll be guaranteeing AskLive coverage:

• 5-9 Mon-Thurs
• 5-6 Friday
• 1-5 Sat-Sun

(Staff can also test/practice monitoring it during the day if they want – whenever a staff member is logged in, the service will be live so if we receive questions then we’ll answer them; there just won’t be a guarantee that we’ll be there.) This will let us assess how things are going.

From the 3rd week onwards we’ll have AskLive open during all library hours (and will promote it more thoroughly). LibraryH3lp’s new features will let us try abandoning the roster system and instead:

• if you’re working at your desk, log in to LibraryH3lp
• to take a call coming through, answer with a quick greeting (both to assure the student you’re there and to ‘claim’ the question so no other staff answer it)
• when you leave your desk, check the contacts list to be sure that at least one other person is still available (with all public service staff, and any other interested staff, monitoring, probability alone should ensure this – otherwise arrange for someone else to log in), and then mark yourself away or logout.

Donna’s put up some simple instructions on Camelot, and there are people in each branch who can train you as time allows over the next couple of weeks.

Please comment/email/IM me with any questions!

Deborah