« October 2008 | Main | January 2009 »
Calls: 6
A little busier today with six calls, all of them ready reference and pin related. Got to try out some translation tools, which was fun. It has been getting quiet at the physical reference desk as well, so maybe this is normal? Anyway - hope you have a great holiday CJ. I am meeting soon to discuss my schedule for January so hopefully we can sort out the missed shifts soon.
Have a great December - see you in January
Calls: 1
Issues: 0
I had a quick call about WebCT that seemed to be resolved. I think the problem was with their computer so just got them to reboot and start over. Other than that not very busy - I guess people are hunkering down and doing lots of exam studying. Hopefully it will be a little busier tommorrow.
ml
Thanks for the support provided for the Live Help service and working on your projects this past term. It sure went quickly!
I wish you both all the best for the holidays and chat with you in the New Year!
Best,
CJ
WebCT tech help is provided by the Help Desk at the University. There isn't much that we can do when someone has difficulty with their logins. Sending them info to contact the Help Desk (support info is on the WebCT page) is the right thing to do.
Calls: 4
I guess it’s getting down to the wire for a lot of students finishing their papers, so they seemed to be extra thankful for the Live Help tonight. A few citation questions, and one student with questions approaching the border between reference help and help actually structuring their paper (so I helped them a bit and gave them contact info for the Centre for Academic Writing Tutoring Centre). One reference question was a bit tougher tonight – someone needing primary sources for a paper on ancient olympics vs. modern olympics. I don’t have much experience with searching for primary sources, so I took her email address and worked on that for a while. CJ I sent you the resources I recommended to the student – would you mind quickly look them over to see if I missed anything big?
Other than that, I created screenshots of how to login to Putty with Windows (also sent to you CJ).
Hope you have a wonderful holiday in December! I’ll see you back here on Jan. 10th/11th.
Sarah
Calls: 6
Issues: 1?
Hi all,
Today was pretty quiet for the most part, except when I had 3 calls going at once, two of which were more in-depth. For one student, I guess a teacher had given them an assignment that involved searching libary resources. So, we did some looking through databases. In hindsight I could have involved some more teaching, but was trying not to leave the other two students waiting too long. I also had some ready ref questions, about library hours, MLA, and what WCBC stood for (figured that one out, which really I should have remembered from undergrad! CJ - I will send you a chat log today (exciting stuff!)
My only 'issue' was a student who came on experiencing trouble with WebCT. They said their password has just suddenly stopped working. I went through our list of codes to see if I could get onto WebCT to see if it was a system-wide problem, but didn't see any sign-on codes. So, basically I just referred them to the WebCT help contact info. They didn't sounnd too upset that they couldn't get help til Monday. CJ - do you know if there is something we can do? Could the librarians at UW have helped?
That's about it. Hope you guys have a great weekend. Sarah - have a good "last" shift til January.
ml
Calls: 2
The calls were the same student coming back – once for stats on Canadian immigration, and the other for help accessing a specific article.
The database project is done! All the problems should now be listed on the Google Doc.
CJ, I was thinking a bit about your request for ideas on promoting Live Help. I think you have done a fantastic job already! Having a link to it on the side of every webpage and within many databases, it really does seem like there is a very accessible way to contact someone if a patron runs into trouble at any time. I wonder if, in the databases, instead of being redirected to the page that talks about the service, maybe linking right to a pop-up Meebo window so they can start chatting right away, and can keep their database window open. Also, asking my partner (a non-library geek) for his ideas on promoting it, he said that as an outsider, the logo at the side of the page appears as though the help is possibly only for questions or problems with the website, and not necessarily research help in general. Maybe under the Live Help logo we could put in small letters “for help with research, accessing articles, or anything else!”. He also suggested somehow separating the logo from the “New Books” section – perhaps with a line or a coloured background change – so that it stood out more. The only other idea I have is maybe a sign at the reference desk. Something like, “Tired of waiting to ask your question? A little shy asking it face-to-face? Then try asking it in an online chat with ‘Live Help’!” But like I said, I think you’ve done a great job promoting it already. I wonder if maybe some people just prefer using other methods for their questions.
Sarah
Calls: 4
Calls were pretty standard – help with PIN, APA, accessing full text, and locating databases. It’s nice now that I have a bit of experience under my belt and I know my way around a little better, so that these questions aren’t a big deal.
Writing up the description of CLIO Notes was fun. And I got up to SCOLA in the databases. (Should be done the project soon!)
One thing that seems to be repeatedly coming up in questions is confusion over when a database provides the full text to an article, however that particular issue isn’t available in our subscription. (For instance, search for the article “Box of Bones...” in the Nature Online database. I guess that makes Nature Online, not in fact complete full text?). It’s confusing for patrons because they see the link to the PDF, and know that they logged in, but they get either get an error while loading the PDF or a prompt for another password. (I’ve had students in the past with similar problems in other databases too). Is there a way to either enable GODOT in these databases or disable the PDF links entirely?
Sarah
Calls: 1
I thought I might get skunked tonight, but one student texted near the end of the shift with one question that lead to another… which lead to an hour long research help session – it was great. :)
Got up to the O’s in the databases.
I also read the suggested readings about virtual reference. It was nice to see I was on the right track with things, and I got a few useful phrases from the articles – like “How will you be using this information? It will help me know what type of resources I should suggest.” They got me excited about providing even more welcoming and personal virtual reference.
Oh, and CJ, I’m not sure what was happening last week with the PubMed IDs, but they’re working fine now.
Sarah
Calls: 2
A quiet day. One call was involved pin-resetting, but actually took quite a long time to do. My second question just involved locating a journal article for a patron.
The rest of the time was spend going through databases (Sarah - start at 'L'). Some problems found, but nothing too major. My favorite database today was the directory of household products and all the possible chemicals in them (who knew?).
Pretty uneventful. Sarah - hope you have fun tomorrow. Oh, and CJ, just a reminder that Sarah will be doing both shifts next week, and I will cover hers the last weekend in November.
Calls: 2
I downloaded Jing and immediately fell in love. I also downloaded the Library Toolbar and was impressed with how much faster it makes searching. Although I’d also like to do things the old fashioned way, just so I’m efficient at them as well for when I’m talking a student through how to do something. For some reason my PubMed IDs weren’t clickable, so I didn’t get to play around with that. I did up to (and including) ERIC in the database project. Lots of problems found tonight.
I had one long conversation with a person looking for 5 reference books they’d want if they were on a desert island, for an assignment. We started with Choice reviews. They seemed to be having a really hard time finding the links I was talking about on the page, so Jing came in handy many times. Unfortunately, just as we got into the database they decided they’d rather use Google. I tried to gently suggest that they would probably get better results using a database, but there was no talking them out of it.
Someone also asked about photocopying in the library. Between the two of us we figured out that it was probably their student card that was required in the card reader, but I couldn’t find anywhere on the library or U of W website where to add money to it. Do you know about this CJ? The library was closed at that point – are students allowed in the library after it’s closed? It sounded like they were in the library at the time.
That’s all for tonight.
Calls: 2
Issues: 0
Both of my class today happened pretty early in the day, were PIN related and easily resolved.
So, spent the day going through the databases. Sarah - I got up to (and finished) City of Winnipeg Neighborhood Profiles. I actually enjoyed just poking through the various databases. My favorite is North American Birds Online - I spent a good five minutes just listening to different bird calls. I also found a lot of the census stuff quite helpful to know about, and really enjoyed the art databases (in particular ArtStor, which is really well designed). I noted the problems I encountered onto the google doc. CJ - please let me know if you need more detailed information.
That's about it - hope everyone enjoys the extra hour of sleep tomorrow!
Me-Linh