September 30, 2007

Research guide links not working today

Neither the A-Z nor 'by discipline' research guide lists are accessible today. I've submitted a help desk call but don't expect action until tomorrow morning....

Posted by nkilgour at 04:29 PM | Comments (0)

September 26, 2007

Anthropology Plus migrates to a new platform

Please note:

Anthropology Plus is now available on OCLC's First Search platform. For a look at the new interface click on the link below:
Anthropology Plus

Posted by Lisa Petrachenko at 06:17 PM | Comments (0)

September 24, 2007

ARC/GIS Station

The ARC/GIS station is now offically fixed. I received a phone call from John D. stating that the station is now fixed and working.

Posted by June at 02:28 PM | Comments (0)

Facebook groups for librarians

Hottest Facebook groups for librarians, from iLibrarian...

http://oedb.org/blogs/ilibrarian/2007/hottest-facebook-groups-for-librarians/

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 11:43 AM | Comments (0)

"library website" =/ Library web presence

http://www.librarywebchic.net/wordpress/2007/09/16/the-future-of-web-services-isnt-the-library-website/

A recent post about the need for decentralized library web services -
"This has been a very difficult concept to get library non-techies to understand. It's one thing to have a great website that gives people what they need when they get there (and most libraries need improvement in this area, for starters), but it's a totally different thing to actually create a number of points of access all over the web, in the places your users are. And those presences need to be substantial enough to engage your users, to give them what they want then and there.

Creating a MySpace page that says "click here for the catalog" and "click here to find out about our databases" isn't enough. It's a good start, but putting a catalog quick-search box on the MySpace page and listing your popular databases on the MySpace profile is even better. Treat it like a mini-site for your library. Start with one place, then move along to another -- but don't forget to maintain and keep all the other presences current at the same time. "

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 11:42 AM | Comments (0)

BCMC 301 Library assignment

In case you get any BCMC 301 students at the desk asking about their library assignment, the main problem they have is that they try to find an article by their assigned faculty member on their assigned topic - the faculty member and topic are NOT related. They are supposed to use the faculty member for Exercise 1, and the topic for Exercise 2. Other than that, the assignment is super straightforward.

Posted by Ophelia Ma at 10:40 AM | Comments (0)

September 20, 2007

Wall Street Journal may follow NYTimes - Open Access

Andrew Clark in New York
Wednesday September 19, 2007
The Guardian

Rupert Murdoch again raised the prospect of ditching subscriptions for the Wall Street Journal online yesterday, hours after the New York Times dropped charges for premium sections of its website.

For full article see: http://media.guardian.co.uk/presspublishing/story/0,,2172288,00.html

Posted by Inba Kehoe at 01:52 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2007

Write N Cite with WORD 2007

I've created a separate handout with instructions on using Write-N-Cite with WORD 2007. It is been added to the RefWorks Workshops pages. Here is a direct link for your convenience:
http://gateway.uvic.ca/lib/instruction/refworks/writencite_word2007.pdf

Posted by Inba Kehoe at 12:32 PM | Comments (0)

September 14, 2007

Here is a neat Scavenger Hunt - Duke University

Library Hacks » Photo Scavenger Hunt

Here's a neat idea for student engagement.

Posted by Kathryn Paul at 03:45 PM | Comments (1)

September 13, 2007

RefWorks-Update

There is a Basic tutorial and an Advanced tutorial available in RefWorks. Click on the title of each module to listen to an audio version!

Also, check out the REFGRAB IT tool that will allow you to grab website information to import into Refworks. The plug in works with IE and Firefox.

You can download RSS feed information into RefWorks as well.

Write n Cite
The current plug can be download to be used with WORD 2007, but will not creat the bibliography in the same way that you did with WORD 2003. I will write up some instructions and have it on the website over the weekend.

On-Campus Labs
The labs now have Microsoft Office 2007.

Posted by Inba Kehoe at 10:24 PM | Comments (0)

National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoirs

Published since 1877, Biographical Memoirs are brief biographies of deceased National Academy of Sciences members, written by those who knew them or their work. These biographies provide a personal and scholarly view of the lives and work of America's most distinguished scientists and a biographical history of science in the United States.

"NAS Makes 150 Years of Scientific History Available Online @ http://www.nasonline.org/site/PageServer?pagename=MEMOIRS_A
Over the next several months, the Academy will publish its entire collection of Biographical Memoirs online. Although memoirs published since 1995 have been freely available online, over 900 memoirs published prior to 1995 were available previously only through archives and libraries. Among the additional 500 memoirs published recently online are those of famed naturalist Louis Agassiz; Joseph Henry, the first secretary of the Smithsonian Institution; Thomas Edison; Alexander Graham Bell; noted anthropologist Margaret Mead; and psychologist and philosopher John Dewey. More memoirs will be published regularly until the entire collection is available online."

Posted by Raworthr at 09:15 AM | Comments (0)

printing

A message from Chris Smith about printing changes:

Just wanted to give you the news about the next stage in the printing upgrade. I'm not able to post to the Ref blog and I wonder if you'd mind passing this on s.v.p? It actually looks like the change will be happening next Monday not this Thursday. There may also be an announcement from IT Services, and I don't want to steal anyone's thunder, but just thought I'd give you a heads up.
Cheers, Chris

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Main Loan Desk

Printing upgrade
By Chris Smith on ILS/IT Issues
Hi all, On Thursday morning, September 13, Michael from IT Services will be replacing the HP9000 printers in the IC print stations with the new Xerox printers. This phase of the printing upgrade will significantly improve printing from IC workstations....




Posted by Tracie Smith at 08:09 AM | Comments (0)

September 11, 2007

Elsevier's latest tactic

"The New York Times reports this morning that Elsevier has started a
new website (http://www.oncologystat.com) that allows registered
oncologists to get free access to the latest articles from 100 of
their journals, and that Elsevier plans to sell advertisements to go
with the content.

Article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/10/business/media/10journal.html?ref=business (free, but registration required)

Evidently Elsevier's revenue is flat, and online readership is
growing faster than print subscriptions, so Elsevier is going after
new revenue. A senior Elsevier VP said the total online advertising
market is growing in double digits, and said they expect it will be a
$1 billion opportunity within the next two years. (I think this is
meant total online advertising, not just Elsevier's share, although
you never know.)

The article points out that while teaching center oncologists
typically have access to these articles (libraries aren't mentioned
as the source...), non-teaching center oncologists see about 85
percent of all cancer patients, and rely on the internet as their
link to the knowledge base.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. If successful,
Elsevier may expand this to other specialties."

Posted by Raworthr at 08:57 AM | Comments (0)

September 10, 2007

Video on UWO Libraries

Check out this video made by Western libraries on YouTube - Kristin's in it!! ;p

Welcome to Western Libraries

Posted by Ophelia Ma at 12:48 PM | Comments (0)

September 07, 2007

RefWorks

Hi Everyone,

In case you haven't noticed, I've set up 2 workshops for RefWorks for the month of October.

Please let me know if you get suggestions at the reference desk for more time slots.

Thanks

Posted by Inba Kehoe at 03:12 PM | Comments (0)

September 06, 2007

Peeps! and other videos etc. I mentioned at the retreat

Here are links to some of the easy socialnetworkingsite projects that I mentioned yesterday - I love the use of Peeps, but I've seen similar projects using barbies, sock monkeys, people in gorilla suits, and more.

Classic Peeps library tour

Peeps does family history

Peeps learn to use microfilm


Otis library tour

Adventures of Super Librarian (ad for public library)

Calgary Public Library's award winning ad

Marshall Library reference video


UWO libraries ad answers the age old question, What do library staff do during the summer? (Stars an old friend...)

U of T robarts Library (caution, it's LOUD)

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 09:59 AM | Comments (0)

September 05, 2007

Top 10 Facebook apps for librarians

As promised....

Top 10 Facebook apps for librarians, from iLibrarian, part One

Part Two

Part Three

Includes:

Books iRead
Libguides
Librarian
myFlickr
slideshare
Several library catalogues (someday, ours?)
del.icio.us
Jstor
My Wikipedia

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 05:16 PM | Comments (0)

September 04, 2007

Events manager login - no such site

Hi-
I've just put in a help desk call because the Events Manager won't let me in to edit some events - it's saying 'application not found on this server' ...

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 02:06 PM | Comments (0)

ICA Hours

Not sure if this is going to change during the term, but currently, the ICA hours are from 11 am to 11 pm. Anyone needing help prior to 11 am can be directed to the loan desk.

Posted by Tracie Smith at 10:53 AM | Comments (0)

CIHR publications now open access!

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) has just issued this announcement:
Open access to health research publications: CIHR unveils new policy http://www.irsc.gc.ca/e/34851.html

Les Institutes de recherche et santé du Canada à publié pour diffusion immédiate:
Libre accès aux publications sur les recherches en santé : Les IRSC lancent une nouvelle politique http://www.irsc.gc.ca/f/34851.html

Policy details in brief:

"grant recipients must make every effort to ensure that their peer- reviewed research articles are freely available as soon as possible after publication...by depositing the article in an archive, such as PubMed Central or an institutional repository, and/or by publishing results in an open access journal. A growing number of journals already meet these requirements and CIHR-funded researchers are encouraged to consider publishing in these journals...grant recipients are now required to deposit bioinformatics, atomic, and molecular coordinate data, as already required by most journals, into the appropriate public database immediately upon publication of research results.. Researchers are encouraged to make use of the SHERPA RoMEO Publisher Copyright Policies and Self-Archiving service to determine whether publishers policies are compliant with the policy, and the policy clarifies that article processing fees for open access publishing are an eligible expense under the Use of Grant Funds".

Notable quotes from the Press Release:
Timely and unrestricted access to research findings is a defining feature of science, and is essential for advancing knowledge and accelerating our understanding of human health and disease," stated Dr. Alan Bernstein, President of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. "With the development of the internet it is now feasible to disseminate globally and easily the results of research that we fund.
As a publicly-funded organization, we have a responsibility to ensure that new advances in health research are available to those who need it and can use it - researchers world-wide, the public and policy makers.

This open access policy will serve as a model for other funding agencies, said Dr. James E. Till of the Princess Margaret Hospital in Toronto [Chair of the Task Force that developed this policy]. The policy will leverage taxpayers' investment by accelerating research and by fostering its broader application.

My comments on the CIHR policy as yet another example of Canadian Leadership in the Open Access Movement:
http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com/2007/09/canadian-institutes-of-
health-research.html

The library community in Canada can be proud of our participation, through strong pro-open access-submissions, in the consultation leading to this policy.

Posted by Raworthr at 09:11 AM | Comments (0)

September 01, 2007

ILL problems - weekend

Today I'm seeing a LOT of this error message, when people try to do unmediated ILLs....

"Submission of ILL request failed for http://kale.library.uvic.ca:8080/axis/servies/relais If the error persists, contact your library for assistance."

None of the Loan Desk staff or ICs I talked to have seen this before or have any idea what it means. I've sent an Email to Nancy, asking her to look into it and supply the ref desk with an answer asap. All I could do was ask the patrons to try again later and come back on Tuesday if the problem continues.

tina

Posted by Tina Bebbington at 03:38 PM | Comments (0)