Connecting Librarian

Wow, my last visit and I spent a lovely day at Thomas Ford Memorial Library (TFML) in the outer Chicago suburbs. Thomas Ford is a single branch service with 7 librarians plus support staff. However, besides the number of branches and staff, our respective library services have a lot in common - more on that soon.

Thomas Ford’s ILS is part of the 81 (correction, it should be 96) library SWAN consortia which shares the same ILS and has reciprocal borrowing rights. They are looking to try a new module on their ILS which has more of an Amazon-like interface, which will incorporate reviews etc.

They offer downloadable audio for iPods, with content from iTunes. They also used to get MP3 content from a statewide consortia, but wasn’t getting the use. Their iPod content started well, tailed off but use is picking up again, with classics and scifi moving better than bestsellers. Process is manually intensive, so is usually done at the reference. Only limits are 3 week loan periods and 1 simultaneous user - most they have ever downloaded for a user is 4 titles (they offer 67 titles).

Their website was created 3 years ago (correction, it was 2002 - current iteration is from 2005) , by Aaron Schmidt (Walking Paper blogger - now Director at Northern Plains Public Library) using Moveable Type. Their site is hosted at LIS News. It runs the website, with some blog content and fixed template content, as well as a staff blog where they share notes, news and more. Comments are not enabled due to overwhelming spam. The blog entries can feed to different pages on the website. Very nice. Have a slight problem with uploading files, as Movable Type disallows the upload of large files, including images.

They are about to do a redesign of the website, keeping Movable Type for blogs and use another form for the rest of the website, using Dreamweaver as their editor. They want the website to do more to promote the services and collections of the library - at present this content is down too deep in the site and is rarely accessed.

They would like to have the public contributing book reviews via a public blog and will invite some early contributions so that they launch it with some content already available. They will use a Google Co-op facility to search their reviews (cool!). In the new website they want more staff collaboration, to make it easier for staff to contribute, have more community involvement, and be interactive. It will be interesting to watch it all develop over the coming months.

Their Staff exchange blog for staff news is supplemented by their new staff intranet, which uses Media Wiki and is well populated with great content. Its very comprehensive and more content is added nearly daily. They also have a Flickr page and MySpace and Facebook profiles.

They have some “listen to a story” podcasts and are looking to do some screencasting at some stage. They have created a blog, using Word Press for their Big Read 2007 program which involved 8 public libraries in the area. They would like to do more with their patron picks, staff picks and blurbs about new stock.

I felt really at home here, because like my work, we have no programmers on staff and our website is hosted offsite. Yet Thomas Ford have done some marvellous things with mainly the desire to learn and try new things. Very motivational for me, showing that its possible, even when you don’t have many technical resources available to you.

Their local history wiki came out of inspiration at the 2004 PLA Conference. It is blog based and came out of grant money which was used to pay Aaron to set up the website and Nancy, other TFML staffer, to do the digitisation and metadata. They already had a high quality scanner/copier for their central printing and for digitisation of the historic photos. At the time, a blog was the easiest option - the content has been duplicated at the Illinois Digital Archive, but took a year to get it uploaded.

The Western Springs History blog, using Word Press, has over 100 photos of local houses with accompanying info. It was supposed to be a starting point, but has not developed much beyond that at this stage. However, they are meeting with the Western Springs Historical Society in the next month to investigate further collaboration efforts.

Wow, such cool, achievable stuff. Thanks to Rick and Kristin for taking time out to share their achievements and future plans and to Thomas Ford Memorial Library for making me welcome, I really appreciate it.

Yesterday before sightseeing in Chicago, I had the honour and pleasure of breakfasting with Michael Stephens (of Tame the Web and much other fame). He was kind enough to spare some time from an overbusy schedule to pick me up from my hotel and pop to a local bakery for a hearty breakfast.

Our chat wandered around our respective workplaces, my study tour, his teaching and more and I was amazed to find out that we were actually born on the same day! Although I am a bit older than him, just due to time zone differences. Wow!

I really enjoyed our time together and hope that someone in Australia gets him to come over soon as he’s quite keen to do so. (Think 2008 people, he’s pretty booked until then). Follow that with a beautiful day checking out the Windy City and it was one to remember. Thanks Michael!

Had a great day at Hennepin County Public Library (HCPL) on the outskirts of Minneapolis, Minnesota. HCPL has a great team managing their web services. They have 4 librarians working on web development (all former adult, teens or childrens librarians), 2 programmers who are also librarians, an intranet staffer, a support staffer and an Office products trainer. All ILS and PC management are handled by their network services department, which is large to enable to manage all their PCs at their 26 branches.

Sharon McGlinn, manages their new Book Space, the adult reading area. It comprises booklists, forthcoming books (hugely popular), new materials, book club information, find a good book advisories. Sharon worked with 5 adult services librarians to develop the goals for Book Space, then worked with their graphic designer to produce the look and then with Glenn Peterson, one of their developers to get the required functionality.

Their webpages are mostly dynamic, database driven. They have one blog for the Book Space page, but their categorisation determines which genre page the feed will go to. Glenn has developed staff templates to simplify the adding the adding of blog content. Sharon keeps the site current by sending reminders out to staff, including suggestions for contributions - they need to keep the content dynamic. The challenge is to find people who will be passionate about the website and contribute to it.

Glenn Peterson developed a booklists admin function with their ILS, to simplify the generation of booklists. It uses the bibliographic numbers from the catalogue, cover images from Syndetics and a preview facility to see how it looks before going live. Book Space also includes topselling lists, book club info and user created booklists - only need a username and password to add one. Each staff generated booklist includes more the of the same type authors, related lists, awards lists, Syndetics content and live links to the catalogue. User generated lists pulls content from the catalogue, they can add comments and make it public or keep it private. Sharon then chooses appropriate user generated booklists to be rotated through the Book Space homepage as a highlighted list.

Where forms aren’t in use, they use Dreamweaver for webpage editing. Their website gets over 140,000 requests per week, with 12-15,000 individual visitors each month. They have submission guidelines for user created booklists, which now number more than 200 (in less than 2 months). They are now looking at their options as to how to manage these booklists, as it has turned out to be wildly popular.

Book Space also contains their audio book information, both linking to their audio CD collection and their downloadable audio - which they get through NetLibrary and Overdrive, so only for MP3 formats, not iPods. Their research books and authors sections links to relevant databases and websites. Book Clubs list needs to be further developed, Sharon is looking to get the book clubs themselves to contribute content. The book clubs can reserve the kits online, by title, by date of availability and more (another script from Glenn).

Christine Clifford took me through Reference services. They use Tutor.com’s “Ask a Librarian” software. It runs 24/7 – they contract Tutor.com to answer questions during the hours that HCPL staff are not available. Have offered this service since 2001 and has been 24/7 since 2002. They get between 350 and 600 questions a month, depending on time of year – email reference gets about 25 a day. They had 10 million visits to their website last year.

Librarians throughout the service are scheduled to monitor the service, with 55 currently on the list to provide the service, mostly one at a time, but two librarians at peak time, with backups as required. The schedule is posted on the Intranet.

They are trialing IM in house at present, using Microsoft Office Communicator between their Reference Work Group and Web Services Team, mainly chosen because it works with Outlook. They are testing Trillian for use with their future IM Reference service and are also looking at the Meebo widget – working through some issues with this at present.

Their Research and Reference page contains their subject guides. Each topic shows the most popular databases and websites for that topic first, then other content, which is automatically generated. To avoid the generalist databases coming on top with for all sub-topics, they skew the criteria so that only the most relevant content appears there. Topics are further broken down into sub-topics. A librarian is in charge of each topic and their image appears on the page with tips on information seeking on that topic or events etc, which are changed regularly. 42 librarians contribute to the 29 topics in this section.

The sidebar on each page contains pre-packaged catalogue searches, e-books links, news headlines, available classes, events, the facility to change topics or subjects via a drop down menu and more. They are looking to upgrade the 2 year old pages, with the recent purchase of a federated search tool. They are considering changing the librarians’ snippets to a blog, which will be easier to manage and enable archiving of the content.

HCPL has a number of web tools available to all staff, which have been developed in-house to make contributing content fast and easy, they don’t need to have any coding or HTML type skills.

Marilyn Turner, head of Web Services shared her experiences with getting their web services going and how they keep up the momentum. The Web Services department is located close to the ILS and Network staff. They have to work closely with them – systems need to be accessible, upgrades and backups need to be carefully scheduled (an issue when they first went 24/7 on Ask a Librarian). The Web Services Team also works as a bridge between IT and branch staff, whom they work closely with on content.

She recommends reporting on what can be done and to pick things that will make an impact with the staffing you have available. Take it on the road to decision makers to show the great things you are doing – eg. Online memberships, they now get 500 applications and amendments each month. Public libraries are there to serve all in their area, not just the people who come in the door. Need to have your web services staff at the table – have a representative on all teams, as web services covers all branch provided services. They have expanded ownership of the website by having librarians contribute content to booklists, subject guides etc and the simple web tools they use make it easy for them to do so. They have noticed a changed culture as a result of this, with librarians sharing ideas, content and inspiration. This is of huge benefit to library users, as shown in their increasing stats. Over 100 mostly librarians are contributing content to the website (150 librarians out of 500 staff at HCPL). Get started with new, enthusiastic people as contributors.

Internally, each department has its own blog – 5 divisions and the Directors office. Some sub divisions also have their own blogs, others just use the administration blog. They have found it to be a better communication tool than email, because it doesn’t have to be kept where it clogs up the email client, the posts are searchable and archived. They are also looking at using wikis for some of their manuals, rather than putting them up through their CMS.

Web Services is about providing the tools to make contributing easy. The focus is the content, not the technology. End of part one - that was all just until lunch. More in next post, so stay tuned.

Eli Neiburger, head of Information and Administration Services at Ann Arbor District Library (AADL) gave me most of his day to outline the great things that are happening at Ann Arbor. I so want a programmer on our staff. Eli leads the Information Access and Systems team of 9 fulltime staff who provide help desk support (2), programmers (2), ILS (1), systems administration (1), vendor/hardware specialist (1), AV media producer (1) and public training coordinator (1). The AV media producer also has 2 part-time assistants. Check out the flickr photos.

AADL has a reputation for doing great things with gaming, which arose when their Teen Librarian started in 2003 and suggested the idea. They didn’t just want to do a supporting collection and building limitations meant that installing gaming kiosks was difficult, so they chose a different means.

They want to build community with their teens, so their gaming is tournament based. Once a month, they will run a tournament weekend - Friday night is open to all ages, Saturday is teens only and Sunday is either for young kids or is open play again. It is usually held at the start or end of a school break. These tournaments are no different to storytimes, with the same sorts of relationships being developed and is the highlight of the kids relationship with the library, smashing their preconceived ideas of it.

Recreational reading teens are a minority audience. One of their teens has said that their gaming program is “a gateway drug for libraries.” It is not just bait to get teens in to the library and using other resources etc, it is an end in itself.

Out of gaming came the gaming blog, before the first tournaments began. School visits stirred up further interest. So their stats thus far are: 65 gaming events run with about 5000 attending across all events. Their database of gamers has 1000 players, with over 200 unique players last season. They get an average of 40-60 kids to each event, but their biggest tournaments have had 100-120.

As for their website, the previous incarnation had blogging, but was not blog based as it is now. They started planning in January 05 and went live with the website when they launches their new ILS in July 05. They used a graphics design company to design the look and the CSS templates. They also took paper copies of the proposed organisation of the site, to check terminology and structural transparency with their users. The study showed that had the right plan.

They looked at various content management system (CMS) options, limited to those that were php based as that is the development skill they had in-house. John Blyberg (who is now in Darien) brought in Drupal, mainly because of its open API. They now have 50,000 accounts on Drupal, not all are library members. Drupal works as a web interface for their ILS, logs their users in and returns search results. This enables them to use php scripts to do more. Their web server then becomes an application server, bypassing limits of their ILS. Next generation ILS for them may be an open source product, with all their written scripts as the front end.

Any one can blog on the website, with the approval of their manager and after they complete a 1/2 hour training session to ready them. They adapted the Drupal wiki to allow them to easily link to images, catalogue searches and individual items. Their blogs have had 10,000 comments, but over 9,000 of those have been on the gaming blog.

They started their gaming with $5000, buying 8 TVs, 8 Game Cubes, all the controllers, cabling etc, with 8 copies each of Mario Kart and Super Smash Bros. They also have PS2 and DDR dance pads. They have also run “Retro octathlon” sessions using compilations of old games. Have also started doing huge Pokemon XD tournaments and have Guitar Hero too.

Sessions are run by Eli and some of the IAS staff, with teen staff handling food, answering questions etc. They are also doing some family events and have had a parent/child tourney using Eli’s own Wii console and games. Hoping to get 4 consoles for more such events in the next year.

System staff and some OPACs are Macs, otherwise all machines, including their thin clients which work well, are PCs. Use in house developed software for PC management, which allows unlimited use, unless someone is waiting. The longest anyone has to wait is 10 minutes, minimum booking time is 1/2 hour. They use Pharos for their print management. Their PC training lab uses Macs, but they can open a Windows screen and run the software. They run an IRC channel for their intradesk communications, including inter-branch. No virtual reference service at present, they are examining options with IM.

Their server farm is awesome. They have an OSX server for managing the Mac OPACS and development, 2 ILS servers, a training server running a copy of the ILS, a number of infrastructure boxes, storage boxes, spam firewall in front of the mail server, media server installed but not yet used, a production server, windows file share server, terminal servers, firewall, domain controllers and more file storage. New servers awaiting installation will be used to supplement capacity and migration, for a Pharos update, as a new imaging server for PC images (ie. maintenance not pictures).

They also are starting a public development box - open up their applications and see what people come up with.

They are also starting up with Library Lego League, using Lego Mindstorms Robots. Run over 4 days, the kids build a robot from the kit which has to do a particular task set at the beginning. The champions then play off for the title of Grand Champion.

Eli, it was a great day and I appreciate all the time and effort you gave to my visit. I learned a lot from you and hopefully I will be able to blog about some of what I have been able to get done as a result.

Marianne Kruppa is Web Development Librarian at St Joseph County Public Library (SJCPL) and I have just spent a wonderful day with her, discovering their main library and all the great things that they are doing there. SJCPL is made up of the main library, 8 branches (plus one under construction) and a read mobile and services St Joseph County in and around South Bend, Indiana. Check out my photos on Flickr.

Their equipment comprises a web server, an external server for public access and an internal 4 staff, a mail server, their ILS server, PC management server, with an IT department to support them. The difference is that at SJCPL, 85% of their machines - staff and public, are Macs. They also have a development server where they can develop and play with applications etc before they go live on (wow, I want one of those!)

As at other libraries I have visited, they have some impressive public art in the Main Library too.

Their Sights and Sounds area on the third floor has all of their AV collection - from audio to DVD and video, from children’s to adults. Here is where they also lend out iPods with audiobooks they have purchased from iTunes. They have 30 iPods to lend, which come in satchel with earphones, adaptor, charger etc. They can have a maximum of 5 books downloaded onto it. Their list of titles is kept in a folder, patrons choose what they want and staff download the content, and when returned after the three week loan period, the iPod is wiped, ready for the next user. Patrons can also bring in their own iPod and have content downloaded to it. All iPods were out when I visited. They chose the iTunes option as the uptake of iPods is about 70% as opposed to other MP3 players.

They use Word Press loaded onto their server for the blogs and Marianne also uses a nice web tool, Feed2J to generate feed summaries from these for their homepage (very nice!) They have a public SJCPL blog, which is a free for all and has contributors from all branches and departments. Their teen page is blog based, managed by Marianne and their teen librarian, where teens are also able to submit book reviews, through a form in the blog page.

They also have 2 blogs relating to their building projects, one for the staff and one for the public, keeping everyone updated on progress. The Rewards and Recognition Committee also have an internal blog, which they use to recognize staff achievements and promote staff events.

For the staff, they use the content management system (CMS) Drupal, an open source products, which operates as their intranet – called Leaf-let and has a blog like front page, which several people post to. The Website itself is HTML based, no CMS is used, but it can be tweaked easily. Marianne uses Feed2J to put the feeds on the homepage.

The most popular blog is the Game Blog which is used to promote gaming events in the library and other gaming news. This is where they have built their gaming community, with approximately 60-70 kids now coming to their gaming events. They have done 138 posts and had 658 comments from the kids, it really is a case of creating a discussion on this blog. They also have a forum called GameBoard using PHPBB – open source software, for discussing gaming related items. Pedro and Marianne moderate it, but not too strictly. This is huge with the teens, who can start their own discussions.

They have the facilities to do podcasting, but wish to sort out copyright issues before going ahead. Would love to do movie reviews, with clips included, storytimes and more. They have a Flickr account with library photos and a MySpace page also.

They offer IM reference, as an extension to their in-house use of it as a communication channel between staff. It has not been widely publicized, but they still get 5-6 queries a day on average. They use Macs with the occasional PC, so IM on Macs uses Adium and on PCs uses Trillian. Non-staff queries are monitored at the Reference Desk, so a staff member is always there or close by.

Wikis came about at SJCPL after a Computers in Libraries. They used a server as a sandbox to play with the wiki, which then became a staff wiki, with the circulation team using it for their circulation procedures and more. It now includes manual type info and more from circulation, reference, branch information, handouts and more. It offers staff the option of feeding back training ideas and more.

Their links list was reviewed after they realized it was offering information that by-passed the great resources the library had. They used Media Wiki with a template created from input from all departments to cover content on a wide variety of topics, with the emphasis first on library held information and then external websites.

In the future, Marianne says SJCPL will be doing more videos – self-promotion, commercials etc, especially using the new Adobe suite, which incorporates video editing into Photoshop. They also want to start their podcasting and are moving to RFID.

Their gaming set up is something to behold and I did when they set some of it up for me to play with in the afternoon. (Pedro and Marianne kicked my butt in both game types). They have 8 Games Cubes with a TV and controllers each, 2 good quality Dance Dance Revolution platforms and accompanying signal boosters and projection equipment to show some of the action on the big screen. They mainly use 2 games – Super Smash Bros and Mario Kart. They set it up as a LAN, with fast match changes, automatic character selection (so no fighting over characters) and the equalization of tracks. It runs under professional tournament mode.

They have 1 open play session a month and 1 tournament play, both at the Main Library. They spotlight one game on the big screen. Kids also bring in their Nintendo DS’s and use the libraries WiFi to play against each other on their own devices. The tournaments always run on a Saturday from 9am-5pm in an open space in the basement of the library, away from the collections. Kids queue from 8.30am. They also have Dance Dance Revolution available and kids also come and play cards and more.

They discourage kids from bringing their own games or equipment (besides the DSs) – because it raises expectations and there are safety issues involved. Gaming gives the library relevancy to the teens, making it a Third Place for them. They don’t push library promotions on the teens, but make the information available if they want it. However they do get gaming kids at library events if they know one of the gaming library staff will be there.

Pedro runs every session and is assisted by Marianne on the tournament days and another staff member on open days. They have pizza for lunch on tournament days, with more staff on hand at this time to help out.

They recommend having a person in charge of gaming who is very enthusiastic about it. Gaming teaches social interaction, good sportsmanship and gamesmanship – they have seen the change in a quite a few of their kids. Not one piece of library equipment has been stolen at these events, although some personal belongings of gamers has gone. The kids will even stay to help clean up.
This is their only means of gaming as they don’t have consoles in their libraries, but hope to in the near future.

Thanks especially to Marianne who took me through all the great stuff happening at SJCPL throughout the day and particular thanks to Pedro who set up all the equipment so I could experience their gaming hands on. I had a lot of fun and learned a lot – THANKS!

Today I was warmly welcomed by Denise Stewart at the Dublin, Ohio offices of Web Junction. OCLC is located on a large green expanse outside of Columbus Ohio. It’s an awesome complex on a beautiful location with approximately 1,000 staff working out of two of the three OCLC owned buildings on site. Photos have been uploaded to my Flickr account.

Denise Stewart, my host, is one of two staff who works as support for the Web Junction website at the Dublin offices, amongst a team of approximately 10 support, development, and QA etc staff. The hardware/software side of the operation is also based here, with the content team in Seattle. “Web Junction is a cooperative of library staff sharing and using online resources that enable us to identify and embrace appropriate technologies and apply them to our daily work.” They use forums, a wealth of free resources, training and partnerships with cultural organisations in order to achieve this. Much of the courseware is provided through a consortia arrangement with Mind Leaders, so is available at a greatly reduced price, to any Web Junction member.

There are currently over 24,352 enrolments on Web Junction courses, which includes restricted content, such as the courses they host for the University of North Texas. However, there are individuals who enroll for 10-15 courses at once, so this does not translate to the same amount of students. Enrolments expire after a year, so these are current enrolments.

Denise and Mike monitor the email and phone help desk support, which is monitored using OCLC’s Relationship Management System, which enables them to keep good track of and statistics on any support requests coming in, from first receipt, through all touches, to completion.

Network administration of the Web Junction website and the other OCLC products including First Search, Question Point etc, are monitored 24/7 in the same building, with three shifts of staff. The Web Junction site runs on two servers: an Application Server which manages the incoming traffic and the Database server from which the content is transferred. These are supported by two redundant servers, which kick in if there is a problem with the primary servers. They also run development and QA servers for testing before going live, which along with their power sources, cooling etc, all have redundancies including two optic fibre networks which connect them to the internet.

They all also have a lab especially for usability studies, where both staff and non-staff are invited to come in and test software which they are unfamiliar with. This also includes an observation room for OCLC staff to monitor the usability interactions.

Of all the courses begun through Web Junction, about 30% are completed, with the vast majority “in progress”. Many users sign up for a particular course in order to learn a particular skill set and so may never complete the entire course.

The Library at OCLC is fascinating, particularly their collection of early DDC’s. They have a duplicate first edition (a lot thinner than the current editions) and a digitized copy of a first edition which Melvil Dewey wrote his notes for the 2^nd edition all over. Check it out at – it’s something to behold. Also amazing was the printed cards which are still done in the card room at the rate of 400,000 per month (check out the photos on Flickr). Old meets new in this space as it is also the print/copy office.

Thanks to Denise for a great day at an awesome location and to Chrystie Hill from the Seattle Office, who I caught up with at Computers in Libraries. You guys are doing some great things and I will be looking to stay more in touch with them.

Today I saw behind the scenes at OPLIN - Ohio Public Library Information Network, here in beautiful Columbus. The weather has been beautiful and warm the last few days, making up for the freezing weather I experienced when I first got to the US. Here’s just some brief notes on my day.

The team at OPLIN comprises director Stephen Hedges, PR Joel, Network Manager Karl and Help desk staff Vince and Bobbie. They manage the content and internet connections for all 251 library services across the state.

OPLIN provides the physical internet connectivity and database content for all public libraries in Ohio. They did this in collaboration with consortium representing the schools and colleges in the state to get the best prices. At the moment, they have 10-12 core databases and help libraries to get group rates on other databases which are not part of the core or subscribed to by all public libraries.

Their 2 key responsibilities are to provide T1 access to each public library service in the state and to provide content. They have also added a 3rd goal - to assist their libraries with www technology. More on that later.

They use 3 servers to deliver this service, a web server, a proxy server and a database server, all running Linux and with all the appropriate routers and firewalls etc. All this equipment is hosted at the State of Ohio Computing Center and is managed locally by their Network staff in conjunction with OPLIN staff, who monitor network operations from their offices.

They have minimal access issues, because of the way they do it. They have EZProxy for all 251 services and authenticate all access through this. If the IP is library based, the user goes straight through. If it is not a library IP, the IP is then checked against a list of Ohio based IP addresses and if on that list, it goes through - although they do ask for a zip code at this time, for library statistics, not for authentication. Anyone who is still not authenticated by this stage is asked for their library card number - this is about 3% of users, everyone else has quick and seamless authentication.

As with other consortia and databases elsewhere, they find that databases aren’t accessed as well as they could be, so are continually looking at new ways of promoting their content. They provide great supportive content on their website - including help guides on their databases, a FAQ and a weekly newsletter “4Cast” (blog based) on what to watch, which is delivered by email and RSS and aims to inform Ohio public libraries on Web 2.0 and also teach them about blogs and RSS. They send out about 200 copies via email and have 50 subscribers to the RSS feed through bloglines alone.

They are working on a new website - well 2 actually, a new one for the public which will incorporate a better federated search option, the other for library staff. The Ohio Web Library will have a Google type interface - they have 2 prototypes they are playing with, which they will user test before going live. OPLIN also includes extra information sources, including a link directory of OHIO related content (about 25,000 links) and 3 specialist sources - What snake is that, What tree is that and Whats the point - which is on flint artifacts. There are also links to useful resources for kids, teens and teachers. This is all managed by OPLIN’s PR person Joel Husenits and a part-time contributing editor. The OPLIN database list also contains links to free content resources.

Between all this, they do podcasts every 2-3 weeks, using just a Mac, a microphone and a script and upload it to their Word Press blog using the Pod Press plug in - 17 done so far. They have also done screencasts using open source Camstudio with Virtual Dub for the audio.

They use multiple sources for their support calls - traditionally they use email or phone, but are moving towards instant messaging - they already use it in-house, between them and the network centre and with one of the consortia they assist.

Stephen also introduced me to KnowItNow, the State Library of Ohio’s live 24/7 online reference service. Librarians across the state run it during the day, with paid staff taking the overnight. They are using proprietary software at present, but are looking to change to an open source software package, maybe in conjunction with another State Library.

OPLIN is also looking to the future in other ways. They have created a webpage for mobile devices, which is in test phase. It enables a user to search for and get the contact details for any library in the state. The server recognises that the requesting device is a mobile one and delivers the content in the appropriate format. They will expand this service to include being able to search the databases, but this is dependent on whether the vendors can deliver the content in the same format.

Thanks to Stephen, Karl, Joel and Bobbie at OPLIN for sharing their day and their operations with me, it was all very interesting and inspiring.

Tonight, the Main Library at PLCMC had an Open Night to celebrate Library Week. Invitees were able to sample food from local restaurants, cafes and a winery and the opportunity to find out more about library programs and more.

The more included the opportunity to play with the Library’s Wii games (I bowl better virtually than in reality), driving consoles (my physical driving is marginally better) and I could really grow to enjoy Guitar Hero and Dance, dance revolution - had a lot of fun with those (check out the flickr images). I even created a short animation which they will email it to me soon. When I get it I’ll post it to You Tube. Wow, me on You Tube!

So that’s me done in Charlotte, I’m flying to Ohio tomorrow for my third full week in the US. Its going to be busy with a place a day. I’m going to miss Charlotte, I really clicked with Helene Blowers - an amazing lady, but she’s coming to Oz in July and then next February so that will be awesome. Catch you from Ohio!

Second day at the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenberg County. Today Helen introduced me to Charles Brown, PLCMC’s Director. That was an honour and a privilege to enjoy our short chat together about our respective parts of the world.

Helen then took me to their CheckIt Outlet, a small shopfront library at the other end of the Charlotte city centre. (Check out the flickr photos) It is a small popular materials library with 3 staff, open only during business hours Monday to Friday and they do roaring business, particularly at lunchtime. Very cool!

It was then back to the Main Library where Helen gave me a quick rundown on what they want to do with the Virtual Village. This includes changing an unused part of the service desk to a collaborative space between library patrons and staff, plasma screens to inform and engage library patrons and to be used for on the spot teaching as required and a digital display area. They are planning to pipe music into the Virtual Village to help contain the issue of noise. They will also add more equipment to a studio to enhance music creation and make it a more collaborative space and reorganise a 2nd studio into another smaller PC lab. They will hope to reorganise some unused office space for gaming.

Back upstairs, we chatted about some other things that PLCMC is doing or has done. They have an IT department of 12 staff, who do everything in house. They host 75 servers and service over 1500 PCs throughout their admin areas and 24 branches, including help desk assistance.

Their website has recently included podcasts on their Readers Place website. Book reviews are easily uploaded through a simple form interface. They have filtering on all PCs, a condition of federal funding and have found it works well, with no real issues arising from its use. They have a MySpace page (Library Loft), which includes a library catalogue search box and has over 1100 friends.

Patrice Ebert, Head of Public Services took me on a tour of one of PLCMC’s regional libraries - Freedom and one of their branches - Sugar Creek. It was very interesting seeing what their libraries are like away from the Main Library. I’ll let the photos on flickr tell the story.

When I got back, I grabbed a few quick minutes from Matt Gullett, the Emerging Technologies Director. He spoke about libraries needing to be more interactive, collaborative and having a life-long learning facet. I have copies of some plans that they have and they look awesome. They want to use emerging technologies to help develop experience and learning opportunities.

Matt would like to develop programs that attract a lunchtime crowd, appealing to the corporate culture that is their neighbour, the banking town. Ideas include a digital art exhibition, guest speakers and more.

They still have those experiencing the digital divide. They want to give them training to enable them to get basic certification, which will open job opportunities for them. Want to offer enrichment, learning and Web 2.0 tools type training to the public.

They are having a big open night at the Main Library, partnering with local restaurants who will provide food for the evening. There will be wine tasting, gaming to enjoy and speakers. Should be a ball and I’ll be there. Will blog it later.

In the meantime, thanks to Helen and the team at PLCMC (particularly Kelly), I have had a ball here in Charlotte and have a lot to take back with me about virtual services. I really appreciate the time, effort and attention you have spared for this visitor from down under.

An amazing service is provided from the lower area of ImaginOn. Storytimes to go (STG) provides pre-literacy kits for preschool teachers and carers. The kits are themed and aimed at getting children interested in reading. The kits have 8 to 12 picture books, a booklet of original activities written by the staff (of 4), flannelboard activities, recordings of activity songs, a puppet or educational toy and a family activity sheet. They also have art kits, adversity kits which explain cultural diversity, meet the author kids (including one on Mem Fox) and bilingual (English/Spanish kits). They have over 560 kits on over 100 themes.

The way it works: a teacher from the local county contacts them. They must first attend an orientation workshop where they learn the rules, about the kits and how to use them and how to care for the materials. Once they have completed orientation, they get the list of themes. The teacher calls and asks for a kit, STG sends the kit to their nearest PLCMC kit to collect. They have it for 4 weeks and all loans are managed from the STG office. There no overdues on the kits and late kits are returned after a follow up phone call. STG also offers workshops on storytelling and other skills.

They have now expanded their services to their website. Between 1000 and 2000 free activities are available online over 50 themes, with more being added which will eventually number between 150 and 200 themes. This is all the supporting material that is available within the kits. Teacher resources are also available.

I spent the afternoon talking with Chuck Rigney - Web Services Manager about PLCMC’s internet presence. If you haven’t checked out the PLCMC websites, you really should and allow some time to do so, as they have so much content online. They have 16 websites with their own domain names plus their intranet. Initially they got the domain names because they didn’t want people to know it was the library providing the content. They are considering leveraging the content back to the PLCMC website, but may keep the domain names.

Web Services comprises Chuck, with 2 developers and a graphic designer based in their Main Library. They have 5 active web teams who provide the content for their website, each with a different focus and comprising 6 to 8 people. They focus on book reviews, childrens, adults etc and meet monthly with someone from Web Services attending every meeting. Unlike other teams at PLCMC, these are not arbitrarily rotated - librarians move on when they want a change. When this happens, their position is internally advertised and potential members can be interviewed.

They use Active server pages and built the interface themselves, making it flexible and adaptable. It may take longer than off the shelf packages, but they get exactly what they want. The IT department maintains all their servers in-house, for the website they have 2 production servers and a development server. A recent access issue resulted in content being split between the 2 servers and a clean-up of superseded files which resolved the issue. Apart from the PLCMC website, the others use templates to call on the content from the database as required.

Some content has been developed off-site as it came for a grant - including the Smart Collection and Hands on Craft. StoryPlace is by far their biggest website, so now has its own T1 line to manage the traffic. They have considered hosting it out due to the bandwith requirements.

Looking at new options, such as creating content in a blog and then pulling content from the RSS feed into a HTML webpage.

Their Intranet was developed in-house and is 6 years old. They will be updating the look and functionality soon, getting complaints about not being able to find things. At present Chuck is the only one updating the intranet, they want to share the content management and are considering replacing it with a wiki.

They use a system-wide calendar, with the branches entering all their own data. Proprietary software then pulls this content from this and into the website. On their intranet they have a link on each page, “Does this need an update” and the equivalent on their webpages “Comment on this page” which is on the same level as the breadcrumbs, which enables their users to easily let them know of any problems on a Intranet or webpage.

Their latest website design, which was launched last year, was user tested. They took the 2 prototypes of the website which they designed in-house and a consultant user tested it with focus groups. The feedback included: patrons interested in their local branch, not the wider service, wanted to see people, not buildings. As a result, users can set their local branch and its info as their homepage, but as a result they can miss out on regional happenings as it appears further down the page. They have over 1600 individual webpages, although some were created for one off events and have yet to be removed from their servers. The main PLCMC is the biggest in terms of pages and management as the others use dynamically driven content.

They used to host external websites, but it became too expensive for them to do so. They may consider doing it again if it was revenue generating.

Chuck ensures that he and his team have time to play, learn and find out what’s out there on a daily basis. Its the best way to ensure that they stay current and are using the best means and options for their websites. They are looking to use more of the Library 2.0 tools to add more functionality to their website, particularly patron content, including patron comments on their catalogue (Sirsi-Dynix’s Horizon ILS).