The Distant Librarian

Linking to chat services in the catalogue

Stephen Francoeur at Digital Reference has an intriguing post about how the New Jersey Instititute of Technology has a feature in their catalogue where a search result that ends in no hits provides a link to the school's virtual reference service.

That's a great idea!  I've already told our Catalogue Wrangler how lucky he is we don't have a centralized virtual reference service here or I'd be poking at him to develop a similar feature in our catalogue.  It being Friday, I also suggested to him that perhaps he could develop a script that would direct the patron to the appropriate librarian based either upon the search request or the searcher's major (would have to be determined by the patron's login, which we of course don't require to search the catalogue).

What about embedding a MeeboMe or Chatango flash IM window in the null search results page? Both of those give immediate information about whether someone's actually logged in on the librarian side, and would allow the patron to begin a dialogue w/o even having to leave the page.  Sure would suck if the catalogue timed out on them and reset in the middle of a conversation though!


Technorati Tags: virtual_reference

Embedded chat

Amit at Digital Inspiration has a brief review of three embedded chat options; MeeboMe, Stickam, and Gabbly.  I played with MeeboMe a couple of weeks ago and found it simple to use, but didn't like having to remember to be logged in to the Meebo page at all times.  I haven't tried the other two he mentions.  I still use Chatango on my university sites.  What I like best is that they offer a little taskbar widget so I can sign in and out from my desktop, and receive a little notification there if someone initiates a chat, or if I've missed one.  Wow, it seems I've been using Chatango for two years now - where does the time go?


Technorati Tags: IM, Virtual_Reference, chat

36,000,000 IMs per day

Yeah, it's a big number, but it's just the drop in the bucket that Meebo processes every day - imagine how many more Instant Messages are sent in the native interfaces!  The number comes from an interesting writeup of a meeting he had with Meebo by Tim O'Reilly.  Lots of little interesting "new ways of doing business" nuggets in there.

I was sure I had mentioned Meebo in this blog before, but apparently not.  It's a nifty web-based cross-platform IM service.  That means you can access almost any of your IM accounts (AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk, or Jabber) via the web (no software to install, so perfect for a public computer), and if you register with Meebo you can sign in to all of them with a single sign-on.


Technorati Tags: IM, Meebo

Instruction via Instant Messaging reference: what's happening?

An article from the most recent issue of The Electronic Library:

Title: Instruction via Instant Messaging reference: what's happening?
Author(s):  Christina M. Desai, Stephanie J. Graves
Journal: The Electronic Library
ISSN: 0264-0473
Year: 2006
Volume: 24
Issue: 2
Page: 174-189
DOI: 10.1108/02640470610660369
Publisher:Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Abstract:
Purpose – The purpose of this study is to analyze one Instant Messaging (IM) reference service to determine to what extent instruction is or can be offered in this medium and whether patrons want or expect it.
Design / methodology / approach – The authors surveyed IM patrons over a seven week period to determine whether they felt they could and did learn from chat transactions. Transcript content was analyzed to find out whether and how instruction is being offered.
Findings – Results show that patrons overwhelmingly welcome instruction and that it is provided in a large majority of cases, using a variety of bibliographic instruction techniques. The way the question is phrased, however, affects the likelihood of instruction to some extent.
Practical implications – The results of this study indicate that librarians should make a habit of practicing instruction in IM reference even when patrons do not appear to be asking for it.
Originality / value – The relationship between instruction and virtual reference has not been fully explored in the literature. Reference and instruction librarians
will benefit from this study's exploration of instruction in the IM medium.
Article Type: Research paper
Article URL: http://www.emeraldinsight.com/10.1108/02640470610660369

Technorati Tags: IM, Reference

Is Screencasting coming to SafariU?

I'm recommending another Jon Udell production to you; this time a 43-minute interview with CJ Rayhill of SafariU about their product, and technology in education in general.  SafariU is an O'Reilly customized textbook product that allows profs to pick and choose content to create a customized copyright-cleared textbook for sale to students, and that also can be completely searchable online.  The first half of the interview is mostly about the product and how it came to be, and gave me a better understanding for the textbook industry.  When I first heard of SafariU I didn't think much of it, as a librarian, but after hearing the interview I realize that of course it's not a product for libraries (gasp!).

The second half of the interview is where it gets more interesting, IMHO.  Jon describes how blended learning (listening to lectures on his bike and then showing up for class to discuss the material) seems like a complete no-brainer.  Then on to screencasting, where CJ posits that it's a natural fit/progression to allow instructors to incorporate multimedia into their custom textbooks.  They admit that there's still a learning curve for people to be able to easily whip out a good screencast, but it's becoming more common and you will start to see them appearing in places like software reviews and "textbooks".  That gave me the idea that screencasts could be effectively used to provide a very brief introduction to any new database your library rolls out.  You don't have to necessarily teach someone how to use the thing, but why not spend a few minutes getting to know the new product (you know you have to do that anyway), and then record a 2-minute overview to orient folks to the new database?

There are a couple more goodies in the interview, go give it a listen.

Technorati Tags: SafariU, Education, Technology, Screencasting, Udell

An Article on integrating library information into Course Management Systems

The most recent issue of Innovate, the Journal of Online Education, has an article by John Shank and Steven Bell called A_FLIP to Courseware: A Strategic Alliance for Improving Student Learning Outcomes (you'll need to register with the site to be able to read it - it's free).  Basically this brief article discusses ways librarians should be working with faculty and course adminstrators (the folks who manage and build the course shells) to better integrate library information and services at the course level in the CMS.  A few juicy quotes to pique your interest:

At the system level, simply creating a more obvious library presence through the addition of buttons that link to the library is an appreciated but ultimately inadequate gesture. Because the courseware systems constantly evolve, there will always be opportunities for new and innovative ways by which the library can be integrated across and throughout the system. For this reason librarians should have an ongoing role in the administration of the campus courseware system.

and

We anticipate that in the not-too-distant future, many library databases will allow search results to be generated as RSS feeds. When that is possible, a librarian could structure a database search that would feed the equivalent of a constantly updated subject bibliography into a specific course site. A faculty member could request that the librarian conduct a search related to a topic being discussed in class, and the RSS feed would deliver a regular stream of articles related to that topic for student awareness. Working with faculty members, librarians could also capture RSS feeds from news sources and provide students with highly customized packets of news related to their course topics from thousands upon thousands of Internet resources. These are just some of the ways that integrating new and developing technologies such as RSS or social networking software into courseware promotes a collaborative approach to connecting students to the highest quality information resources.

There are a few good examples and links in the article, so if this is a new concept for you it's a very good read.  I remember Rebecca Hedreen blogged about many of these same ideas about a year ago...

Intuitive Revelations: The Ubiquitous Reference Model

How's that for an ear-catching title? Brian Mathews at Georgia Tech is working on a really interesting project.  OK, so we know some libraries have created pages in places where patrons hang out, like MySpace.  I use a Pubsub feed to look for anyone who's blogged about the University of Calgary, and on rare occasions have been able to leave a library-related comment.  Well Brian's mashed those ideas up.  Check out his post on alt ref for the details, including a screencast, but here it is in a nutshell. 

He created an account at Xanga and LiveJournal - first as a library, but later as his human incarnation.  For the purposes of his study he subscribed to the RSS feeds of 20 GT student blogs at those sites (explained in the paper).  But what he's done that seems really innovative to me is that he's using the Bloglines keyword alert feature to monitor the postings in each of those student blogs for words such as assignment, library, help, paper, project, etc.  So if any of these words shows up in a post by a GT student he checks out the post, and if it is indeed a library or research-related post, he chimes in with some suggestions for help.  How cool is that?  Yeah, it's a little like evesdropping on the students sitting around the Information Commons, but the students don't seem to mind at all, according to Brian. 

And this gets to the core of Brian's thinking that "we need to get out from behind the desk and help students when and where they need it."  Surely in your physical library you don't just wait at the reference
desk for poor souls to come to you.  Every once in a while you wander around the computers, and even occasionally offer assistance to someone who looks obviously lost, right?  What do you think of this idea?



Technorati Tags: libraries, Xanga, LiveJournal, AltRef, GT

Window of Opportunity for DE Librarians?

The New York Times reports that "Colleges will no longer be required to deliver at least half their courses on a campus instead of online to qualify for federal student aid."  Wonder how many new DE Librarian positions will be created to help with the expected increase in distance education programs across the nation?  This could signal our Golden Age :-)

Unyte has some real potential!

Over the past couple of days I've had a chance to briefly try out a couple of co-browsing tools I mentioned last Friday.  Vyew doesn't look like it'll be of use to me - no opportunity for co-browsing that I can see - it just allows me to share a whiteboard and files, but Unyte has some real potential!

Unyte is a plugin for Skype, and is Windows only.  I first tried it with Greg on Tuesday and learned that it's best used with voice instead of chat, as the chat window does obscure the display.  At that time it appeared to me that I could show Greg anything I wanted, but that he couldn't drive, but since then I've learned that I just missed a setting.

So let me back up a minute.  Co-browsing is the ability to share a web browser with a remote user, and be able to have that user both see what you're doing and to drive your web browser so you can see what they're doing.  Obviously you only want to do this with someone you trust, but the implications for distance students are great.  Most of the virtual reference packages have this capability, but from what I understand they work to varying degrees of success.  Right about this time last year I started fiddling with a service called Jybe, and it worked fairly well, though required a toolbar to be installed by both users, and they haven't updated that toolbar for Firefox 1.5, so I haven't played with it in a while.

While Unyte requires Windows to initiate a share, a session can be shared with any platform (verified this AM as I shared a session with Sherri, who's on a Mac), and according to Unyte, the other end doesn't even need Skype! (unverified by me so far).  So what we've got here is a tool that should work for any distance student, as long as you, the librarian, are running a Windows 2000 or XP machine with Skype installed.

The way it works is that I can either initiate a shared session from within Skype, or can do so from the little application tray icon that Unyte installs.  If within Skype, the user on the other end is sent a link to click, and after a moment we're both in business.  If from the application tray, you can choose to share with a Skype user or a non-Skype user, and if the latter is chosen you'll get a box with a URL you can email to someone, and again you should then be in business.  You can choose to share any individual program you're currently running, or your entire desktop (useful for remote troubleshooting in general, but so far I've stuck to sharing just a single browser window).  You can choose to share so the other end can only watch, or you can choose to share and allow them to drive as well - this option is called Allow Remote Control.

Once you're both connected, if you've allowed remote control, both users can trade off running the browser.  The big big plus with this whole system is that in all three trials I've run, the remote users was able to access and drive U of C databases w/o any hassle, which means I've now got an easy way to co-browse my databases with any of my distance students!

Incidentally, this is what the screen looks like if you are running Skype but with only the chat (not voice) enabled:

 

So it works best if you can be talking about what's going on rather than texting about it.  If you're sharing with a user who doesn't have Skype, that probably means having a phone connection would work best.

I'll keep playing with this, and hopefully will get a chance soon to use it in a real world trial.  Definitely worth a looksee though!

Co-browsing tools to try

These have been taking up space in a couple Firefox tabs all week, and I have yet to get around to trying them.  First up, theory.isthereason points to Vyew.com, a free, browser-based web meeting application.  They tout "Unique real-time photo charing, One-click screen & file sharing, Whiteboarding for all participants, No downloads, and Unlimited use."  On their registration page they admit they're still searching for a business model, but "if you sign up now, we will provide the registered user's features to you for free for at least two (2) years."  Registered users can meet with up to 20 participants, have 10 Megs of remote storage for meetings, Email invitations, User rights management, and Auto file conversion to something called VyewSlide.  This sounds like it might be a possible way to offer remote instruction to up to 20 students - definitely have to give it a try.

Second on my list is a Skype plugin called Unyte that was mentioned by Digital Inspiration.  Quoting from from the Unyte website, "WebDialogs Unyte™ is an easy-to-use, secure sharing plug-in that allows Skype users to seamlessly escalate a call or chat to a real-time collaboration. With Unyte, you can share documents, applications or even your entire desktop with anyone, anywhere, anytime."  Sounds like another winner.  Will probably start bugging some of you next week to try these out with me :-)



Technorati Tags: co-browsing

LiB has concerns about the QuestionPoint Flash Interface

We're not a QuestionPoint user here at the U of C, but I'm sure some of you out there are.  Sarah, Librarian in Black, has some concerns about the upcoming release of the Flash interface to the product.  Worth a look if you use or are considering using QuestionPoint...


Technorati Tags: VirtualReference, QuestionPoint

More from Educause - Changing a Cultural Icon: The Academic Library as a Virtual Destination

As I was browsing around the Educause site looking for something for the previous post, I tripped across this Jan/Feb 2006 Educase Review article titled: Changing a Cultural Icon: The Academic Library as a Virtual Destination. Here's the abstract:

Deep into the digital age, academic libraries have relinquished much of their fundamental and sustaining role. For most people, including academicians, the library—in its most basic function as a source of information—has become overwhelmingly a virtual destination.

It's written by Jerry Campbell, CIO and Dean of University Libraries at UCLA, and I think this is an important article.  The question is what will become of the academic library in the next decade?  I loved the quote from Clifford Lynch from 1997, in which he says,

"Now that we are starting to see, in libraries, full-text showing up online, I think we are very shortly going to cross a sort of a critical mass boundary where those publications that are not instantly available in full-text will become kind a second-rate in a sense, not because their quality is low, but jmust because people will prefer the accessibility of things they can get right away..."

No kidding!  Mention of the launch of Google Book Search and the Open Content Alliance.  See where this is going?  Who's going to need a physical library soon?  The bulk of the article is taken up with a discussion of 7 (is this the magic Educause number?) "creative and useful services that have eveloved within academic libraries in the digital age".  Jerry feels that "some or one of them may indeed prove to hold the key to the future of the academic library."  They are; Providing quality learning spaces, Creating metadata, Offering virtual reference services, Teaching information literacy, Choosing resources and managing resource licenses, Collecting and digitizing archival materials, and Maintaning digital repositories.

Educause Review is read by administrators outside the library.  Are you prepared to talk about what your library is doing in these areas?  'Cause you're going to get questions about them in the near future, if you haven't already.

Handout from Internet Librarian 2005

 I'm doing some work updating files etc and ran across the handout Sherri and I made for Internet Librarian 2005.  There's nothing you haven't seen in here, but it is all in one spot and attractively presented :-).

Web Tools for 21st-Century Learners (PDF - 3 pages)

The state of co-browsing

Caleb at the Oregon Libraries Information Network blog has a lengthy post on the state of co-browsing and virtual reference.  In large part, it's a response to Sarah's post on the Librarian In Black about what she heard at the most recent Virtual Reference Desk conference.  Some difference in opinions here, and both posts are worth a read and consideration.

7 Things You Should Know About Instant Messaging

A nice, concise, 2-page PDF from EDUCAUSE that summarizes what educators need to know about Instant Messaging.  Nothing new here for those of you following the topic, but it's a nice presentation from an authoritative source.