TechBits

Recommend to Library

Guest post by Jean Anderson
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Wisconsin’s Digital Library has grown to include over 74,000 copies of over 27,000 titles (as of 1/30/2013). While that’s a lot of options, I’m sure there are titles that you and your patrons would love to see in the collection. Recommend To Library is a new feature recently added to Wisconsin’s Digital Library that will make it easy for you and your patrons to help grow the collection.

When patrons are logged in to their account and perform a search, they’ll see a tab for Additional Titles as part of the results list.

Clicking on that link will show all the titles available in the OverDrive collection (titles not on this list are likely absent due to publisher restrictions). Patrons will see the Recommend button for titles that are not currently part of the Wisconsin’s Digital Library.

Patrons can recommend up to three titles per month. The selection committee receives all the requests and places monthly orders for selected titles.

Thanks for your suggestions!

And thanks to Steve Heser at MCFLS for the great instructions and letting us use them!

Widescreens are in.

For the last two months Dell has been slowly been getting ready to discontinue the standard 19 inch monitor that we’ve been purchasing for several years. They're replacing them with widescreens and making it attractive by lowering the price on them. The standard monitor can no longer be purchased with a system. We are being given a choice of 19, 22, and 24 inch widescreen monitors when purchasing a system. I will update the SCLS website once the Dell website stabilizes and they settle on standard models. The options seem to change every time I log onto their site.

The 19-inch widescreen is about a half inch shorter than your standard 19-inch monitor and two inches wider. It also costs a few dollars less than the standard monitors did. I’ve ordered a few already and so far I haven’t had any complaints from a dissatisfied user.

Reimagining the library

What will the library of the future look like? Here are two items that crossed my path recently that show some possible directions public libraries might take.

The Bubbler

You may have already heard that Madison is planning for a maker-focused programming model in the new Central Library. It has a name now ("The Bubbler"), a description, and a short video telling more about the project. There was also a great article in the Isthmus about the evolving nature of libraries.

• "What Is The Bubbler?" 
• The Isthmus - "Renovated downtown Madison branch will showcase the future of libraries"

Bookless library

In 2013, San Antonio's Bexar County will be home to BiblioTech, described as "the country's first book-less public library."

It will look like a modern library, but there won't be any books --- just computers, gadgets, and ebooks. You can read more about it here:

• ABC News - "The First Bookless Public Library: Texas to Have BiblioTech"
• My San Antonio - "Bexar set to turn the page on idea of books in libraries

I'm not sure I'm ready to completely give up physical books, but the makerspace idea totally appeals to me! What do you think about these possible directions?

Show the desktop

If you're like me you open a lot of windows throughout the day.  Then when you want to get back to the desktop you have to minimize a lot of windows.  There is an easier and quicker way to get back to the desktop. 

In Windows XP there is a Show Desktop button in the Quick Launch toolbar just to the right of the Start button.

In Windows 7 the Show Desktop button is now on the opposite side of the tool bar from the Start button.

The Windows 7 Show Desktop button also has a neat feature that is called Aero Peek.  What this does is if you hover your mouse over the Show Desktop button it instantly minimizes all of your open windows.  Then when you move the mouse away all of your windows return.  If instead of hovering over it you click on it all open windows instantly minimize.

In both Windows 7 and Windows XP there are two other ways to get back to your desktop:

1. Right-click on the taskbar and there is a menu option to Show Desktop.
2. Hold down the Windows button and hit d.

 

Windows 7 tip: Move an offscreen window

Yesterday a Microsoft Word window got caught at the top of my monitor. The top edge of the window went offscreen, and I couldn't move it back because I couldn't get to the title bar at the top of the window to drag it back into position. If you experience this problem too (or lose a whole window after detaching a laptop from a projector), here's how to get your window back without having to completely close the program:

1. Hold down the Shift key and right click on the program icon in your task bar.
2. Click Move.
3. Move your mouse around the screen. You should see a cursor with four direction arrows on it.
4. Use the arrow keys to bring the window back into position.

See this tip and more in 7 Windows Frustrations You Can Quickly Fix.

Edelweiss

Photo credit: Ian Kennedy

Guest post by Jean Anderson
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No, the title of this post doesn’t refer to the flower, or the song Edelweiss or even the cheese shop in Verona. I’ll explain more shortly.

Many of you know that I’m a HUGE reader (or is that an understatement?) When you receive emails from me, you’ll see that in my signature line I always include what I’m reading (print), listening to, and reading on my NOOK.

You may have noticed that recently, many of the books I’m reading on my NOOK are books that aren’t published yet. For example, I’m currently reading Room No. 10 by Ake Edwardson which is due out in March. Up next are:

• Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger, due out 3/26/13 
• Tuesday’s Gone by Nicci French, due out 4/4/13 
• Cooked by Michael Pollan, due out 4/23/13 

How, you may ask, did I get access to all those ebooks? The answer is Edelweiss. From their website, “Edelweiss is a web-based interactive publisher catalog system that enhances or replaces the use of hard copy catalogs.” In addition, through participating publishers, they offer a way for librarians to request access to Digital Advance Review Copies (ARC). In the past, I’ve come home from conferences loaded with galleys or proofs of books also known as ARCs. Now, I do the same thing - but on my NOOK.

The process is easy. Check out the debut episode of Know More with Jean & Shawn for a demo of Edelweiss, or take a look at the tutorial on the Edelweiss site. Digital ARCs can be read on most all types of e-readers and there’s help on the Edelweiss site for each kind. It’s free, easy and can be very addicting - just ask Shawn!

OverDrive reports and statistics

Last year's post, "Authentication, stats, and Home Library" covered a lot of material. Some key points to remember:

• If you add or change patron info in your library's ILS, those changes won't be available to OverDrive right away (see post for details).
• SCLS provides OverDrive access for all patrons living in the SCLS service area.  Patrons living outside the SCLS service area should access OverDrive through their library system.
• OverDrive use is attributed to libraries based on the patron's "Home Library."

How can you get reports and statistics showing your library's OverDrive use?

• SCLS provides some statistics (OverDrive info is in the right column): http://www.scls.info/reference/libstats/index.html
• You can run your own reports for your library if you have a Content Reserve account. SCLS library staff can sign up for an account here.