The staffing structure has changed to such a degree that the old departmental phone lists (eg interloans staff, Law Library staff) are now not working properly, and the full staff list has a few inconsistencies in it. So where I’ve found links to phone lists by department or branch on our web pages, I’ve temporarily removed them.

We are going to have to do some major changes to the database and program that creates the phone lists. Once this is done, and we are happy with what is displaying, the links to the phone lists will be reinstated.

The list of all library staff is still working, but may be broken briefly while the updates are being made.

Catherine

I’ve requested and received a new link check report for published Libguides from SpringShare. I’ve saved it at K:\information_services\LibGuides\2010-09-13 – LibGuides – Custom Link Checker.htm.

It does have some obvious false hits – seems to report links to our catalogue as broken for example, but there are definitely some broken links as well, so if you are the author of any LibGuides pages, please check the report and fix any broken links.

Any queries should be directed to Library IT

Catherine

As more and more of Library resources are now available electronically, Patricia has noted that some of the categories that are used to sort items in the New Titles list are rather outdated. Of particular concern are theses and e-books.

1) Theses currently display on the New Titles List under “Storage”, because that is where the print copy goes. However, most theses are also available electronically, so “Storage” is not a useful or intuitive place to display them.

2) E-books display under the heading “Web Resources”. E-books are not “Web resources” in the usual sense of the words and don’t really fit in this category so this has led to considering other ways of structuring the list. The distinction between print and electronic is becoming more and more artificial and outdated, and it might be better if these could be interfiled with print books.

Suggested modifications to the New Titles List

1) Create a new category “Theses” and have all theses display under this.

2) Remove the category “Web Resources” and interfile e-books with print books. However to achieve this, it would be necessary to list all new titles in call number order across all branches, and no longer sort them by branch. It could still be possible to offer a different sort option by branch, but any such list would NOT include e-books, which would have to be a separate list. Interfiling print and e-books is possible because e-books are assigned a classification in the 050 tag, though not a full call number (see definition below regarding the difference between classification and call number). However e-books are not assigned to any branch so can’t be interfiled if we continue to sort by branch. As items on the New Titles list are not exactly the same as items on branch new titles displays, and now that we offer an interbranch delivery service, we suggest that sorting by branch, as a default, is probably no longer relevant.

Definitions:
Classification: assigns a resource to an LC division, defining the subject area.
Call number: adds a cutter number to the classification, which assigns the resource to a position on a shelf (therefore not needed for e-books). At UC every resource on the shelf has a unique call number.

We are looking for feedback about these suggestions, and welcome any comments, suggestions etc. Please add a comment to this posting and get some debate going.

Patricia and Catherine.

I have recently requested and received a report from LibGuides about broken links on subject guide pages.

This report can be reviewed at K:\information_services\LibGuides\2010-06-08 – LibGuides – Custom Link Checker\2010-06-08 – LibGuides – Custom Link Checker.htm.

It does have some false hits – links that do work – and in some cases it may report links that have since been fixed (the report was run on 10 June 2010, but there are also some links that are definitely broken and need to be fixed.

Could all subject librarians please check the page for possible broken links on guides they are responsible for. If you can’t identify where the broken link is, or need any help to fix any of the links, please get back to Library IT.

Catherine

SpringShare have recently released new code for LibGuides, with a number of enhancements that should be very useful to us. See Spring 2010 Code Updates.

The ones that I have noticed, of particular interest:
1) You can now specify the order of subtabs – they are no longer ordered alphabetically – YAY!!
2) You can now specify the visibility of pages within a guide, meaning you can have pages hidden on a live guide. Very useful while you develop new sections of a guide.
3) You can now specify a collaborator who does not have to have their own full LibGuides login. You specify their email address, and LibGuides will send them login information, but this is limited to the single guide specified, and doesn’t allow access to any other guides.
4) Not specified in the documentation, but I’ve noticed that now the Search option specifies that it searches “This Guide” initially, but allows you to choose to search “All Guides”. This was a suggestion that we made!

Nice to have some good news to report!

Catherine Jane
Library IT

I’ve asked SpringShare to run another custom report to find broken links in Rich Text/Dynamic Content boxes (the standard report doesn’t find them in this type of box).

The report is available in html format at K:\information_services\LibGuides\custom_linkcheck_report_2010-02-09.html. Some of them may of course be fine, and just a temporary problem at the time the check was run.

If you maintain any Subject Guides, please check this file and make any changes to your pages. Contact Library IT if you have any problems with correcting any links.

Catherine

We need more input from Library staff regarding what we call the new Library search function – see the earlier posting and the comments to date.

Suggestions so far have been Eighty percent search, Library search, Multisearch or just plain Search, with Multisearch being the most popular to date. However, there have only been a handful of comments, so it’s hardly a landslide vote or a real mandate.

Lots of people have commented (with justification) that they don’t like Summon Search, so please make a suggestion, or vote on what has already been suggested, via a comment on the original posting.

Catherine

Library IT is in the process of implementing Summon search – see the earlier Counterculture posting.

It has already been decided that Summon will replace Databases Multisearch, and that it will be the first search box on our homepage. Catalogue Quick Search will remain on the homepage, but it will be under the new Summon search box. See the mockup of the retemplated version of our homepage, which includes a (not yet functioning) Summon search box.

We need a new descriptive name for this search – Summon Search won’t mean anything to our users. It needs to imply that it is searching more than the catalogue, but needs to be short and to the point. We will not be putting any explanatory text underneath the search box, as usability testing has shown that people just don’t read this type of text. There will still be a question mark after the search box, which will link to more information about the search for people who choose to click on it.

One suggestion so far has been “Library Search”. Please put any suggestions up as a comment to this posting, so everyone can see them and comment.

Catherine Jane

Has anyone got some fresh new news items for Library news? It’s getting to that time of year when we start running short of news postings.

If you have, please email Library IT asap.

Catherine