Frequently Questioned Answers

Password post

2011-08-31T10:48:00.000-04:00

So much has changed that I thought I should do a fresh password post.

There are now 3 ways to get into library resources from off campus:

1. You can log into the library catalog and databases using the same login as MySCSU, eLearning Vista, and the campus lab computers. Please see the Password Reset form, or a OIT Service Desk for help with your network login.

Use the login boxes on the LEFT at http://www.consuls.org/patroninfo, the Login or My Record link in the CONSULS Library Catalog, or the databases login screen.

Enter your Network Username and Password (MySCSU/Vista login).

Be sure to pick the correct campus!

Click the Submit button.

Problems with your Network Login need to be directed to the IT Helpdesk.

Note: If you have recently reset your password, the new password may take some time to "migrate" to the library login. Please try your old password, or use the Library PIN or Remote access in the meanwhile.

If you mistype and need to try again, the campus choice will reset to Central. Be sure to choose the correct campus on each attempt.

2. You can also use your University ID number and Library PIN to login.

Create your Library PIN at http://www.consuls.org/patroninfo, the Login or My Record link in the CONSULS Library Catalog, or the databases login screen.

Enter your ID number in the login boxes on the RIGHT.

Leave the PIN box blank and click the Submit button.

If you have a current library account and you do not have a PIN, you should get a form to create a PIN.

Your Library PIN should be at least 6 characters long, and use numbers, letters, or both. The library PIN is not case sensitive. DO NOT use "special" characters, such as *, #, or ! DO NOT use repeating patterns (such as 121212 -- dates are sometimes a problem, Jan 1, 1999 = 010199, for instance). You will need to enter the exact PN in both boxes.

Click Submit.

If you get an error message about your PIN being "not complex" enough, try a different PIN. Remember, do not use "special characters" or repeating patterns.

If you get an error message about "invalid" or "expired" entries, you may already have a PIN (possibly created by accident) or your library account may be blocked. For "invalid" entries, try the "Forgot your PIN" link below the PIN box. That will send a message to the email we have on file. If you do not get an email, or get a different error message, call the Circulation Desk at 203-392-5756 to check the status of your account and/or to delete an old or accidentally created PIN.

Video tutorial on creating a Library PIN (Flash plugin required).

3. An alternative route into the databases from offcampus is available through the campus Remote server. You will still need to log into CONSULS to view e-reserves, and request and renew books.

Log on to https://remote.southernct.edu/ using your Network username and password.

In the upper right, type library.southernct.edu into the Browse box and click the Go button.

Go to the databases and search without having to log in again!

Note: You will not be able to follow any links that go outside the databases or campus website. For outside links, open a new window or tab in your browser and copy the URL's into this new window/tab.

Accessing the Remote server on campus may provide different options than off campus access.

A Day in the Life

2011-07-28T09:17:00.009-04:00

What does a librarian do all day? Well, today I'm participating in the Library Day in the Life Project, and I'll be updating this blog post all day. I'm the Coordinator for Distance Learning for Hilton C. Buley Library, and the Sciences Reference Librarian.

9:00am My day always starts with email and whatever problems have come up over night that I can help with. Today, that's problems with the database logins--might be something lingering from the power outages yesterday, but the servers in question are actually not on campus. Sorry folks, can't help much on that!

9:15 Email. Mostly vendor stuff, newsletter-y stuff (like Inside Higher Ed), and spam.

9:26 Not too much email this morning. Making tea to take to the reference desk for a 1 hour shift. If it's not busy, I'll be working on a new "Accessing the library databases from home" brochure.

10:20 Power out, and back, again! Just got "unproxied" database login instructions up before the power went out. I guess the patch to the campus electrical system didn't hold. (The power went out 4 times yesterday.)

10:30 Answered reference questions about database access problems, printing, and finding articles from a reference list. Pretty slow, but not surprising given the lack of power right there in the middle!

11:20 Proofread and submitted my final grant reviews (Done!) and walked through the remote login work around with a student on the phone. It's a problem because I can't see the same screens on campus. I think I need to go home for lunch.

1:00pm Updated instructions with screenshots from home. I hope this makes more sense. Time to head back to work.

1:30 Email. More email. Now can I work on my brochure?

2:00-3:00 Tea and the eduMOOC Live Panel #5: Public, Private, and Open Learning. The audio stream seems to be a little choppy today. eduMOOC is a Massive Open Online Course about online learning with over 2500 participants worldwide. The weekly panels pull experts from all sorts of online learning fields and institutions together for an hour, while the participants listen and chat via Twitter. Everything is recorded and is/will be available on the site.

Notes:

Creative Commons is working on educational materials metadata scheme: LMRI

CC also involved in making available the materials produced in the TAACCCT grants, which is the grant project for which I just finished a reviewing stint.

Cable Green of CC: open will eventually be the default, you'll need a good reason to close resources

Jeff Newell of the Ill. Community College Board says that they are working on state-wide developmental courses that will be at least partially online

CG: open an make efficiency--if so much financial aid and student money is being spent on textbooks (est. $5m for Eng101 book in Washington state), wouldn't it make more sense to provide cheap, open textbooks instead of extra financial aid or student loans?

Larry Regan (Penn State): open makes for better books, improvements from future users

JN: 25% of college cost is textbook costs (Ill CC study)

Ray Schroeder (U Ill and eduMOOC): the split between course content (ie open) and course credit (me: and support services) is going to be a big point of discussion

CG: "Iron Triangle" formula: access, quality, cost are all reciprocal--this is devastating especially in current budget situations; OER ("golden circle") disrupts this completely

LR: may need a new paradigm if content is open (me: brings up the real question, what exactly does an educational institution deliver? It's not just content/information. Isn't our strength based on teaching and support of learning?)

OERu

4:00 Informal discussions about databases with other librarians. We are getting GeoBase on a new platform. Yay! Search widgets display differently in different browsers, and IE on Windows 7 messes up a lot of things, including our catalog. Ugh.

Good news: database access seems to be back (fingers crossed) and campus announcement says that we've got a new electrical system work around that should be more sturdy (fingers crossed again/still/more). Time to check email again and get back to work on that brochure.

4:50 Time to wrap up the day. I've got a draft of the brochure done, but it still needs some work.

What do I often do that I didn't today? Meetings (one tomorrow, but the summer is quieter in general); weeding (working on the medical sections right now--it gets outdated so fast!); collection development (buying books, etc.); helping students or professors with library research; teaching library instruction classes and demos; staff and faculty development (Web 2.0 and open access topics, mostly); helping faculty find resources for new classes or updating old ones; catching up on my own reading.

5:00pm Well, it's been nice spending the day with you. Have a good evening!

Thoughts on Google+ and the "Google LMS"

2011-07-14T13:57:00.001-04:00

I've been on Google+ for about a week now, and I want to document my thoughts on it. I also want to consider what Google+ might do to my consideration of using only Google products to run a course. Like the first post, this is mostly a thought experiment about what goes into a 'course' and what sorts of products and services might be cobbled together. It also gives me a concrete model to compare features and helps me think about what else I might do with something like Plus. (And if Google would like to take any of this as a suggestion, I'm happy to be of service.)

Overall, I like it. Having Circles be so prominent (as opposed to Facebook lists) really does help. I also like that following does not have to be mutual (though I've noticed a tendency for most people to follow everyone who follows them--I suspect this will wear off.) The privacy features do seem to be more self-explanatory--which, after all, is Google's biggest point against Facebook. I've seen some excellent cautionary postings about the intellectual property dangers, but those are inherent in any social network, not just Google+.

I see the main failings at the moment (and remember, Plus is still in very early development) as a lack of groups, a lack of easy posting, and a lack of something that no social network so far has really had: history.

Circles, while being marvelous in terms of communication management, are individual. A Circle is not like a Facebook Page or a Google Group, which exists beyond an individual. (This was initially confusing, as I was invited through someone's eduMOOC Circle, who was in someone else's eduMOOC Circle, etc.) Circles are like Facebook Lists or a personal email distribution list. So if I create a Circle for a class, I can broadcast to the Circle, but classmates can't broadcast to the class unless they also create Circles with all classmates in them, and we can't even check to see if everyone in my circle is in someone else's. You just know that someone is going to leave someone out, accidentally or on purpose. Perhaps Google will integrate Groups into Plus at some point--it would be a good pairing. I also like the suggestion I saw somewhere for Circles within Circles--so, for instance, I could have a Reference Department Circle within my Work Circle, so that everyone in Ref is automatically part of Work, without me having to remember to add them to both. It's not crucial (it's not that hard to add someone to two circles) but it would be an even better model of how social groups really work.

I'm now constantly frustrated at the difficulty of getting content into Plus. The only 'Add to Google+" feature that I've found so far is a 3rd party add-on to Google's Chrome browser, called Surplus. It shows me my notifications, and has a Share button that will post the URL of the page I'm on and whatever comments I'd like to make. It works great, except that I'm not in Chrome all the time. A simple bookmarklet would be fine! But until I can get content into Plus as easily as I can into Facebook or Twitter, Plus is going to have a distinct disadvantage. I expect this will be solved quickly, but it's frustrating at the moment.

I thought at first that I might be able to use Google's +1 (their 'like' button), but there doesn't seem to be a way of sharing the things I +1 to my Google+ stream.

The history issue is a problem I have with Facebook and Twitter, too. Sometimes I can't find my own old posted links! In some circumstances you could +1 pages (did I say I really want a Plus bookmarklet!), and see them in your profile, but you can't organize them there (at least not yet). Something like the Notes feature in the Google Reader would work--you can tag and share (or not), so you could save links to articles, blog posts, files, etc. Just a tagging feature on +1 would be great or the ability to save to Reader right in Plus. Right now, I'd do something like: see an interesting link in Plus, go there and save to a Reader Note (actually I save to Delicious or Evernote, mostly, but this is a Google post).

To sum up the previous post about Google as courseware: Sites for a course page, Calendar for due dates and scheduling, Docs and possibly Books and Scholar for readings, Blogger for student blogs and journals, YouTube for video lectures and class projects, Docs for papers and presentations, Docs spreadsheet for grading, GTalk/Chat for office hours and study groups, Groups for discussions, Gmail for individual communications and announcements, iGoogle for students' personal learning organizers/networks. This was based on a traditional course model, with grades and office hours and all, so obviously if you're doing something less formal, you could use less--and there definitely are better, non-Google tools for much of this. But still, it's a pretty impressive inventory.

So what does Google Plus add to the 'courseware' mix? Mostly networking and communication convenience. Students can easily self-organize into study groups. It's easy to share something with one or more Circles, or just one person. Plus currently has photos (Picassa) built in, and I bet videos from YouTube and files from Docs will get added at some point. Office hours can use the video chat in a Hangout or the Google Chat. You could even do small lectures in a Hangout (I think the limit is 10 people at a time).

The Sparks feature seems a bit like Google Alerts, so that could make a nice addition to a learning network. Students could also follow people outside of the class doing work related to their courses, and since you can create as many circles as you need, creating 'Follow' circles for different subjects would be easy, so you don't get your history mixed up with your English lit. If Plus takes off, and once Google allows institutions to create Plus accounts, there should be all sorts of interesting things to follow.

So, it's early yet, but Google+ has a lot of potential. Like any social network, the value to the user is in the network. So, please feel free to 'circle' me! http://gplus.to/delibrarian

First eduMOOC live panel

2011-06-30T16:51:00.000-04:00

I wanted to get my thoughts on the live panel down as soon as possible.

Every time I attend an online panel or conference I'm reminded of a lecture in grad school (education degree) where the speaker mentioned "mature technologies". A toaster, he said, is a mature technology. Computers and the Internet are not. About a week later, my toaster died an untimely death. Personally, I think a chair is a mature technology (though maybe not my desk chair). You don't need that much familiarity with one to use it, they generally work, and breakage usually has to do with the quality of the materials, not the quality of the design. Online conferencing is definitely not a mature technology. I'm not sure it's in kindergarten yet. This was an interesting setup --a live screencast of a virtual conference system (Elluminate?) such that we were watching a video of someone's screen and hearing the panel discussion, with a Twitter widget for back channel and questions. Unfortunately the Twitter display wasn't picking up the hashtag, and there weren't many slides (which was actually a good thing, in the end) so I think most of us ended up following the Twitter feed on some other system and just listening to the audio. All and all, that was fine, but not quite what was planned, I think. Ah, technology.

For content, the panel consisted of a number of administrators of various online programs across the country. (You can see the list on the eduMOOC week one page.) (One comment via Twitter was that we needed more international coverage.) They spent some time at the beginning introducing themselves and relating how they got to their current positions in online learning. I did miss a few minutes at the beginning, so I'll have to go back and listen to the recording, but I would have been more interested in hearing why they were chosen for the panel. What difference in perspective does someone from a community college system bring as compared to someone who directs a regional system of online programs or who someone who works with continuing education programs. They didn't seem to have many philosophical differences (they agreed with each other a lot.)

The Twitter backchannel (once I got somewhere I could see it) was most interesting in what we picked up on. "The access war has been won" brought some disagreement (I'm not sure I agree with that myself, though I think I would agree that the tide of battle has finally turned), but also brought up accessibility--not only for physical disabilities but also learning disabilities and learning styles. We also touched on evaluation and assessment, and how the models for f2f classes don't usually fit online or hybrid. (Related note--I attended an online conference recently where the evaluation survey asked, after asking whether I had attended online or in person, how I had liked the lunch. And it was a required question to finish the survey.)

I'm wondering how much of the online vs. "traditional" (whatever that means) education debate is really about a shift in education, especially higher education, from a select population to general. It used to be that education was essentially self selecting--if you learned well in schools, you progressed; if you didn't, you found something else, like a trade, an apprenticeship, factory work. There were other things to do. Now it seems that it's impossible to get a good job without a reasonable amount of education, and that's happened at the same time that online education has become feasible. So we (educators) are having to learn to use a new medium at the same time that our learner population is changing. We (and I'm speaking mostly about higher ed now) no longer have the luxury of only teaching those who had already figured out how to learn.

I've read that the reason that SAT scores have "declined" is not that the student body has gotten dumber, but that those students who might not have done well (because of flaws in the tests or in their educational backgrounds) didn't take the tests. Or why it's so hard to tell if autism is really more prevalent--most of it wasn't reported before. It's hard to know what the real issue is if your baseline measurements have changed--you no longer have anything to compare current conditions to.

Basically, I'm not convinced that, as some people in the panel asserted, that online or at least blended learning is better than f2f. I think any learning where both the instructor and the student are forced to think about what is actually happening will be better. It's so easy to think you know what you're doing in f2f, both as an instructor and as a student. We've all done it before. The challenges of dealing with unfamiliar technologies, especially with non-mature ones, bring all the issues up front. Why are we doing it this way? This isn't working for me. Why did we spend 15 minutes of valuable synchronous learning time on introductions that I could have read?

But there are still the same issues--having the misfunctioning Twitter widget distracted me in a way that reminds me of a professor who always played with a neon green plastic keychain while lecturing. It was completely useless, but really hard to ignore. So today, I stared at Twitterfall; back then, I stared at the my notebook. And is it better to spend class time, synchronous time, in explanation, in demonstration, in elaboration, in discussion, than in merely presenting information? If so, isn't that true f2f and online? If learning styles (or preferences) do affect ease of learning, wouldn't that be true in any medium? Could it just be that it's easier to translate a digital text to an audible one, for instance, and so it's easier to accommodate both aural and verbal/visual learners online? (I'm a kinesthetic, according to most AVK tests, so I have a different perspective on that anyway.)

I'm really looking forward to the Research next week!

Consolidation of info streams and a MOOC

2011-06-30T11:12:00.000-04:00

This is a brainstorming, trying-to-figure-out-what-I-actually-think, probably irritating-to-read type post. You may see several of these in the next few weeks. I've signed up for a MOOC, a Massive Open Online Course, on Online Learning. Dubbed eduMOOC, it's now got over 2000 participants, all over the world, mostly online instructors and instructional technologists, but also includes students, librarians, and other interested parties.

It does really bring home an issue I've been working with lately--how many streams of information can I actually follow, from a practical standpoint. For eduMOOC, there is the Google Sites homepage, the Google Group, a Twitter hashtag, a Twitter list, an etherpad, several wikis, Diigo and Delicious tagging, and participants' own blogs (like this one) using tags like #edumooc. (And more, some of which I haven't found yet, I'm sure.)

The problem is I can only seem to work with a limited number streams of information at a time. Right now those are Facebook (mix of personal and professional), Twitter (mostly professional and local info), and Email (separate accounts for work, personal, and non-work professional). I used to use an RSS reader for most of my professional reading, but that's mostly been moved to Twitter and Facebook when the blogs/sites/people I've been following have Twitter or Facebook accounts. I'm still missing a few RSS feeds that I'd like to follow. (Suggestions welcome.) I used to use the news reader in Outlook (effectively combining RSS feeds with my work email), but the Outlook 2011 for Mac doesn't have that feature. I may have to figure out how to integrate an RSS Reader back into my schedule.

What I'm trying to do is consolidate my streams. This does run the danger of turning the steam into a flood, which is what happened to my RSS reading originally--too much info and I can't follow any of it, then get the dread 'unread anxiety'. But I've found if I don't consolidate, I simply stop checking things. (This is essentially why I don't watch TV: as soon as I start missing shows, I stop watching at all.) I also have different roles (personal, professional, etc.) in which I have different networks and information needs. So the trick is to find a balance.

(How ironic. The writing of this post was interrupted by a phone call about a new social networking site for academics and researchers.)

That balance is limited by the technological and policy decisions of the services. For instance, while I can get my own tweets to post on my wall in Facebook (so that my Facebook friends can see my Twitter posts), I can't get my Twitter timeline (the tweets of those I follow) into my Facebook news stream. Or vice versa. If I want to read those together, I need to investigate one of the third party social network aggregators, which are limited by what the various services will allow you to do outside their own site. Some allow you to read but not post, or only post certain types of things, etc. After all, Facebook really wants me to be on their site, seeing their ads, not on some other site seeing someone else's ads. Also, with some services I could have multiple accounts, like I do for email, for personal and professional, but Facebook forbids this (and will cancel a second 'fake' account if they find out.)

The MOOC has really brought all this home to me. I've been thinking about it vaguely for a while, knowing I'm loosing control over my info stream, again, and not sure what the most effective thing to do about it. But the MOOC! How in the world do you work with a network of over 2000 people? The answer, of course, is that you don't; you work with only a portion of the network. How do you choose? I think the answer ends up being a combination of research and serendipity (like many things in life). Find out what you can, and then trust your networks (the setting up of which is part of research) to find out the rest.

And that's why I want to manage my info streams better. My networks are a valuable, perhaps the most valuable, part of my personal and professional development environment. Cultivating them is worth spending time on, but not so much time that I can't get anything else done.

To any who read this far, how are you dealing with your info streams, personal learning networks, or whatever you want to call it?

Frequently Questioned Answers

2011-05-26T14:44:00.000-04:00

As you've undoubtedly noticed (anyone who is still following my blog) I've not been posting much. I always said that this was an experiment in distance learning communication, and I think so much has changed that I need to change the parameters of my experiment. Or maybe that's scrapping the whole thing and starting new.

My intentions for this blog was to provide a newsletter sort of thing, with resources, explanatory articles, news, etc. I think there are better ways of doing that now. I post to Twitter and Facebook (and none of that content requires an account to view), collect links in Delicious, and post content for the library in LibGuides. There is a Library Facebook page for library news (again, viewable without an account). The Library will probably experiment with other methods of "getting the word out" too. I also have a separate blog that I've irregularly collected reviews and information about online tools.

So what do I do with this blog?

Well, the first clue is the title. I'm changing it from Frequently Answered Questions to Frequently Questioned Answers. I want this space to be a place where I can speculate about issues regarding distance learning, and, hopefully, question some of the assumptions that we make regarding distance education, distance library services, and probably education in general.

So, yes, I'm going to get all philosophical on you. At least sometimes.

If that's not what you want to hear, please feel free to follow some of the other links I've listed above. If you're interested in occasionally hearing about something intriguing, that might make you think about education in a different way, please stay around. I'll also try and post more often, and to post the updates to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, so there's no real reason you have to actually visit this blog (as those who will read this on my Facebook Notes will already have realized, assuming you even noticed that I was importing the posts at all!)

What topics might I write about? Given the previous Facebook example, the interconnectedness of networks and resources will be a topic. Personal Learning Networks. Open Education and Open Educational Resources. Things that aren't capitalized.

So, another experiment. Let's see what happens.

to iPad or not to iPad

2010-10-12T10:07:00.004-04:00

My home computer is getting a little weird, odd shutdowns and other irregular performance--processor problems. I suspect I'll need to get a new computer in a while. Most of what I do at home is web surfing, a little bit of word processing and the occasional spreadsheet (mostly in Google Docs, recently). So, I'm considering an iPad.

Most of the web applications and sites that I use have iPad apps available, and some that I'd love to try out. It's light weight, cheaper than a full computer, and looks like fun, too. I can even justify it as a good professional development purchase--since I could experiment with access issues and the educational apps available.

But....the iPad business model really does go against my principles as a professional and as a person. Everything is funneled through Apple's app store, with whatever tracking Apple wants to invoke. If Apple doesn't approve an app, it just plain not available. I'm an open access advocate, considering a really closed piece of hardware. (My other computer is a Linux box.)

So, friends and readers, do you have an iPad? What do you think? What do you think of the apps, and the business model? What are the keyboards like? Do you have something else to recommend?

Open Access Textbooks

2010-09-15T17:41:00.003-04:00

I am taking a free, non-credit course through P2PU.org on Open Access Textbooks. Many colleges, especially community colleges, are trying to deal with a crisis in textbook costs. I was down by our bookstore at the beginning of the semester and overheard some students comparing receipts. Someone had spent over $1000. Textbooks can be a real burden to some students, and financial aid doesn't always cover books and supplies.

One possible method of assistance is open access textbooks. I am hoping to learn more sources of textbooks, how instructors are using them, and how to "sell" the idea of an open textbook to faculty.

I will be giving two workshops through Faculty Development this semester, one on publishing via open access, and one on open educational resources. I've assembled an open access resource guide: http://libguides.southernct.edu/openaccess and I'm focusing my attention this semester on teaching materials and textbooks (mostly under the Books category). Some of the sites I have listed may not meet stringent qualifications for open access, but if it's freely accessible, legal, and of educational use, I'm willing to include it.

For any faculty reading this, I would be very interested in working with you if you'd like to consider open access for your courses. Just contact me.

Passwords

2010-08-30T13:51:00.001-04:00

Welcome back everyone, and welcome to the annual password post!

Passwords have gotten simpler, but with a few twists. Last year, MySCSU (with Banner), Vista, and the general computer logon were synchronized to a "Network ID". You can also download software (like MS Office with Windows and Mac), from the SCSU Software Share site, and log onto the wireless campus network. For those off campus, this will also get you into https://remote.southernct.edu/ (network file access and services--some access and services are only available off campus), and your southernct.edu webspace (you can also access your web files via the remote site from off campus).

Twist #1: The new student email, Owls Mail, is on the Microsoft Live system. That password is currently separate, but will be synchronized in a few weeks. In the meanwhile, be sure to 1) use a separate, non-identical password, and 2) add a separate (non-SCSU) email to your account so that you can get your password changes if needed. Until the synchronization happens, SCSU IT won't be able to help you with your Owls password.

If you need to change your Network password, you can visit an IT Service Desk, or use the online form. More help is available by phone (203-392-5123) or email (helpdesk@southernct.edu). Don't forget to identify yourself as an online student if you can't come to campus.

Library access (online databases and resources, library record viewing, online renewal, intra-campus requests, & online reserves) is still via your ID number (70xxxxxx), and a separate library PIN/password. If you don't know your ID number, log into MySCSU and look for Account Information and View SCSU ID Number under Settings on the main MySCSU page. You can set or check your library access via the CONSULS login page. The 'Forgot your PIN?' link on this page will send a link to the email address we have on file, which is whatever is in Banner. If you have not changed your Banner info, it's possible we still have whatever email address you first registered with (i.e. a non-SCSU address). You can change this in the library system by logging in to the CONSULS Library Catalog and selecting the Modify Personal Info button on the right. Email is the only thing you can update online (though, of course, you have to be able to log in in the first place.) You can also call the Circulation Desk at 203-392-5756 to wipe out an old PIN, so that you can set a new one. They can also help you update your contact information. This will not update your email address in Banner, so you might want to check that in MySCSU (Settings, View email address(es)). More on setting/resetting your Library PIN.

Twist #2: The new ILL system uses your network ID and password to login. There also seems to be a lag in the synchronization here, so if you have recently updated your Network password and can't get into ILL, try your old password.

Twist #3: You can use the Browse function in https://remote.southernct.edu (offcampus only) to access the library databases. This makes it look like you are on campus, so the databases will let you right in. Some materials may not be available, since there restrictions on web access; but it's a good backup if you are having PIN problems.

That's all I have for passwords this semester.

Printing@SCSU

2010-08-23T13:26:00.000-04:00

Students and faculty who have been away for the summer may have missed the fact that SCSU is now charging for printing in the public computer labs, including the main floor of the library. The cost is $.05/page (black and white, single sided) on your HootLoot ID card only.

Students who rarely visit campus should make an extra effort to bring your ID card if you have one. If you don't have one and want one, you can visit the Card Office in Wintergreen during their business hours. Online students can get a non-picture card by emailing the Card Office (see the Note: Online Students). If you don't have an ID and can't get one in time, or lose yours, you can buy a copy card and use that for printing. Copy cards are $5, and you get $4 worth of copies/printing. (The photocopiers are $.11/page.) There is a card machine in the library by the Reference Desk; you can buy a card and put money on an old card or an ID card. You can also put money on an ID card (not a purchased copy card) via the Card Office website.

It's probably an even better idea to bring a USB "thumb" drive to the library. You can save all your articles, documents, etc., to the drive and print them elsewhere if the printers are down, card machine is down or out of cards, etc. You can scan printed items instead of photocopying. No online student should be without a USB drive these days. And they have gotten a lot cheaper. Staples had them at the check out counters for $10 for 2G, and I've seen $10 for 4G and $20 for 8G ones on sale. They are usable across platforms (Mac, Windows, Linux) and you can even load programs onto them. If you visit another library, they may be your best bet for getting articles, since you may not be able to get printing privileges.

Or you could go the all-online route. You can email PDFs and other files to a Gmail or other large capacity email account. You could use Google Docs, Zoho Docs, or your Owls Microsoft Online Office and Sky Drive to hold documents you are working on. Mendeley will store PDFs of articles and help you organize and cite your sources. I've used Drop.io to "send" myself files that are too big to email. Links to sites you want to look at later could be stored in Delicious, Evernote, or a similiar system, and Evernote lets you store pictures and add text notes, too.

So, don't let me hear that you've come a long way to visit the campus library, and left without what you needed because you "couldn't print"!

Article linking updates in EBSCO databases

2010-08-18T15:41:00.003-04:00

Database interface changes always seem to catch me by surprise, even when I supposedly know they are coming. EBSCO updated it's EBSCOhost interface and one of the changes was pointed out to me in an email from a faculty member. No, she wasn't seeing things, the Permalink really wasn't where it "should" have been.

There is now a Tools menu on the right of the record screen (the screen with the info about the individual article). All the old functions (Add to Folder, Email, Cite, etc.) are over there, including Permalink.

There is also a new one, Bookmark. That gives you an astonishing array of linking services, such as Delicious, Facebook, CiteULike, and Connotea, courtesy of a service called AddThis. They are posting the "proxied" URL, too, so off campus users will be prompted to log in properly. (Of course, non-SCSU users will not be able to use the links, but that's a different issue. If you need to send something to a non-SCSU colleague, you should probably copy the info from the Cite tool, so that they can look it up themselves in their own library's databases.)

Now I really have to get that linking guide updated!

Comment Guidelines

2010-07-23T11:51:00.003-04:00

I did, long ago, post Comment Guidelines for this blog, but somewhere along the line the link got removed from my sidebar, so I'll do a repeat/update and make sure the link gets in there.

Basically, if you have a comment that is related to the post and substantial, I'll leave it up. What I mean by that is that I don't want my blog cluttered up with irrelevant comments or thinly veiled spam telling me what a great job I'm doing and please look at this site. So, that means that I will delete comments when I can't figure out why you would have posted that comment to that post, if you are just saying, "Nice job," and, of course, obvious spam.

I do appreciate people telling me I've done a nice job, but everyone in the world (or the tiny number who read this, anyway) doesn't need to see a string of "Nice job", "I agree", etc. We all hate it when people do it in email and in discussion forums, so don't do it here either. If you want to tell me how much you appreciated the post, either tell me why it means so much to you in a comment, or feel free to "Like" it when it gets shuttled into Facebook. Or drop me a line via any of the communication methods on my Contact page. (This is beginning to sound like instructions in an online course discussion forum, "Please make your posts on topic and substantial. 'I agree' is not considered a substantial post.")

And, as I said before:

By the way, to all comment spammers, according to Blogger, none of your comment spam links increase your Page Rank, because all links in comments are tagged with the "nofollow" tag. So links in my blog won't help you increase traffic to your site via Google. Especially since I'm going to delete those comments as soon as I find them.

Oh, yes. I will try to make more posts this coming academic year, so that my loyal readers will actually have something to comment on. Thank you all for staying with me during this dry spell.

Google Courseware?

2010-05-11T22:00:00.000-04:00

A completely unrelated comment today led me to an interesting speculation: Could you actually run a course using only Google products?

Let's see:

Google Sites for the course site itself. You can limit the "sharing" so that the site is only viewable to those enrolled, and you could make the students either collaborators (authors and editors of the site) or viewers only. You can also enable comments on each page of the site, so it would be possible to have basic interaction with 'view only' students.
Google Calendar for a course calendar.
Blogger for student writing/journals. With comments, this also allows for basic peer review. Blogger blogs can be made viewable by members only.
Google Docs for collaborative efforts: writing, spreadsheets, and presentations. An additional benefit is that you can see who did what using the history functions.
A Google Group for discussions.
A Google Docs spreadsheet for a gradebook. (This would have to be private or everyone would know everyone else's grades. You'd probably have to email grade updates, unless you wanted to clone the spreadsheet and make one for each student--that might be reasonable for a very small class.)
A Google Book textbook? That would really depend on your subject. If you could find something, however, Google now has "My Library" with the option to make a "bookshelf" public. It would also be interesting to use Google Books to search your print textbook, even if you couldn't view the whole thing online. With the new Google Book legal settlement maybe some out of print books will become feasible as textbooks.
Google Docs will display any PDF file, and limit viewership, so you could do readings easily enough.
YouTube for video lectures, tutorials, screencasts, etc. Students could do video projects, too. Like pretty much everything else, you can limit viewing on YouTube. And there's Picasa for still images.
Google Scholar for research. Well, sort of. Scholar can be very frustrating if you don't have access to library subscriptions. Personally, I think I'd probably just use the regular web search and teach some good information evaluation skills, assuming I didn't have library access. Though Scholar does index a lot of repositories with great content.
Since everyone would need a Google Account for this, everyone would have Gmail. Either a contact list or a Google Group would work for announcements.
Office hours and appointments can be held in GTalk.
I think everything is embeddable in a Google Site using either widgets or links. It might be possible to use iGoogle for a "personal learning platform" for each student, too. That's were students collect links, RSS feeds, videos, images, etc.
As an additional benefit, Google does host some amazing archives, too. Google's Life Magazine Image Archive is astonishing. And Google Video hosts a National Archives video collection. Very suitable to educational use. Google Books has articles, now, too. (I think the date listed on that page is the most recent issue, not the only issue, available.)

OK, so that's course site, calendar, writing/journaling, peer review, discussions, collaborative projects, gradebook, video lectures and projects, images & diagrams, textbooks & readings, announcements, email, chat, and educational & research materials (via archives & search).

What else do we need? (Let's avoid the issues of the advantages of having everything in one place, and whether or not we want Google to have our course content and student records.) In a hypothetical sense, what else do you need to teach a course?

And is anyone game?

Not exactly the annual password post

2010-02-08T15:03:00.002-05:00

Whoohooo! It's finally happening. We are going to a much reduced password system, making my annual password post almost unnecessary.

On Feb 17 (next Wed.) the Windows network and MySCSU passwords will finally merge. Everything to do with SCSU, except the library, will be accessible via a single sign-on. (And even the library is partly accessible this way.)

Unfortunately, it looks like it is the Windows password that will be the "real" one as of 6am next Wednesday. According to the IT announcement: "If you don’t remember your Windows password, you should reset it before February 17." So if you have not logged onto a campus computer, or your remote files (including your campus webpages) recently, you might want to contact the Helpdesk at 203-392-5123 or helpdesk@southernct.edu before 2/17.

However, once you have this straight, you will be able to log into campus computers, MySCSU, Vista, your webspace and network files, Banner (via MySCSU) using the same username and password. You will still need your ID number and LibraryPIN to log into the CONSULS library catalog and the databases (aside from the remote login detailed at the link above.)

Carnegie Mellon's Open Learning Initiative

2009-12-28T10:58:00.000-05:00

Carnegie Mellon now has a set of Open & Free Courses that use a highly sophisticated tutorial system. They did a study comparing a class of students using the tutorial system for statistics to a traditional statistics class: the students did equally well in both courses. (Of course, knowing traditional statistics courses, that doesn't necessarily mean they did well.)

Now CMU is going to attempt to devise hybrid courses that use the tutorial system to teach the basics, while the professor works on problem areas and can also get into more detail on more interesting things (real life applications, big picture aspects, or ethics all come to mind) .

Besides the statistics course, CMU has courses up for Engineering, Logic, Chemistry, Biology, Phyiscs, Economics, French, Empirical Research Methods (under development but available), Computational Mathematics, and Visual Communication Design. They are all open and available to anyone (as non credit tutorials).

CMU is even providing instructors with a platform to make their own versions of the courses. Some courses will have a fee for students; others are grant supported. Since the fees listed are between $15 and $60, this is the equivalent of a cheap textbook.

This is a fantastic step forward in the open course arena, started by MIT's OpenCourseWare initiative. It also gives some hints about what could be the future of higher education--not the content of courses, but the expertise of professors. Will we eventually see a more open marketplace of university level course, where you take basic courses from wherever might be convenient (or perhaps where a special feature is offered, like one-on-one tutoring, or a famous expert) and then concentrate on the major at a single school (or two)? How does that affect the cash flow of a university, and accreditation? Will we see "design your own major" programs? More credit by examination?

It's both intriguing and terrifying.

Searching and Finding

2009-10-27T16:34:00.001-04:00

There's a saying in the library world that librarians like to search, while users like to find. And it's true, to some extent. There is a pleasure in designing and executing a really good search. Kind of like the pleasure of a well executed play in a sport -- you think, "Yes! Perfect!" And librarians do love to teach subject headings, boolean logic, and similar search techniques. But, as in sports, the perfect hit isn't all the game is about. You have to score, too, and for searching that means finding.

Do I execute perfect searches when I find things for myself? (Me, the professional librarian.) No. I do good searches, and use techniques learned in searching to find what I need.

Here are some things that I've learning as a professional searcher, and I hope, a professional finder.

Start general. It's easier to narrow a search if you get too much, than to broaden it if you got too specific. Looking at the results for a broad search can also give you ideas of extra search words to use, ones to avoid, and if you might be better off searching elsewhere.
Learn to skim. I've found more answers by skimming through a general search than by any other method. I don't blink at the idea of skimming 10 pages of results. When you are searching, you use keywords, but in skimming you are looking for key concepts, even if they use different words. There are also patterns; an article title looks different than a book title, and a scholarly title looks different than a popular one. It's a learned skill, and one you have to practice.
Searching is iterative. Use what you observe in your search results to make the next search better. Also, if there are Related Results (by whatever name), have look. On the web, I find related results in the comments on blogs and other social sites. (Finding isn't iterative, by the way; when you've found it, you're done.)
There is more than one place to search. Google isn't the answer to everything, but neither is AGRICOLA. Try to choose a resource that is more likely to give you want you want (searching the library catalog for articles isn't going to help that much, though you might find some government documents on the web that look like articles.)
That said, if you have a choice between two likely resources, you are likely to have better luck with the one you are familiar with. I am more likely to choose a database, for instance, from one of our major vendors, because I know how the search interface works. I don't want to waste time figuring out how to do a phrase search.
The corollary to the last one is: get familiar with the resources that you might need.
And do it when you don't have a deadline looming. This is a great reason to start your research early. You can try out your searches in resources you don't know much about, and if you don't find something, it's not a crisis. And don't think of this as "wasted time". You are learning, and next time (when you might be in a hurry), you will be better equipped.

The inspiration for this post was a question about a web service I don't use much. I don't know much about the service, but I do know help files. I was able to find exactly what was needed in two searches, because I know that help files are constructed using the words that programmers and technicians think users use. I've written help sheets, and experts don't think the same way as novices, they don't use the same language, and, even when they know that, they don't always get it right. So there's a funny disconnect sometimes in help files, and, once you've searched enough of them, you start to learn something about how things might be worded. That, combined with a combination of a general initial search and skimming the results, gave me the answer on my second try.

This is part of metacognition, thinking about your thinking (or in this case searching), and it is a vital part of lifelong learning. If something doesn't work, learn why, because it will save you tons of time in the long run.

More outages

2009-10-21T09:22:00.004-04:00

The Library Catalog system will be down for an upgrade, this Friday, Oct 23, 2009, from 5pm to 8pm. (The library itself is closed for that time, as we usually are Friday evening.) For off campus users this will affect using the library catalog, CONSULS, including e-reserves, and logging into the databases from off campus.

If you have research that you can't put off, I would suggest working in Google Scholar to find likely prospects and using the library preferences and the Journal Locator to see if we ought to have the article you want. You won't be able to get into anything until 8pm, but you can save your citations until then. (This is a good strategy for anytime that you can't get into our databases, whether it's because of a network issue, system down time, or account problems.)

The Journal Locator will be down on Saturday, Oct. 24, 2009, from 2am-8am (updated). You will be able to search the databases, but not use the Find Article @ SCSU. I would suggest saving the citations you are interested in (either by email, in database folders for the databases you can set personal accounts for, like EBSCO and ScienceDirect, or in an outside citation manager like EndNote Web) and then checking them once the system is back up.

Speaking of Journal Locator, we have having issues with one component listed, EJS (EBSCO Journal Service). It is currently showing up for more journals and years than we actually own. If you see it come up and you click through and get a No Access message, it's probably that we really don't have that journal/year. The results should be getting better as the next 2 weeks go on, as Periodicals is manually updating the EJS records, all 22,000 of them. Sorry for the confusion and the frustration.

State budget woes arise again

2009-09-28T14:52:00.002-04:00

We thought we had pulled through without a hitch (or cut) in the databases that the state pays for, but we sighed with relief a little too soon. iConn (the CT digital library organization) just announced that they are cutting CINAHL, Westlaw (Campus Research), AP Photo Archive, and the Boston Globe, as of Oct. 1 (yes, that's this Thursday).

We are picking up CINAHL ourselves, so there should be no interruption of access.

Our law librarian recommends the following for law related searching:

For Westlaw cases and statutes, try these sites: Findlaw http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/ (link goes directly to cases and codes portion of the site); Justia http://www.justia.com/index.html ; or Public Law Online Library http://www.plol.org . Academic Search Premier indexes several law reviews.

For the AP Photo Archive, try Google Images, Googles new Image search for news, ArtStor, or the image search feature in some of the Ebsco databases like Academic Search Premier.

For Westlaw business news, try Business Source Premier.

For local news (Westlaw), try the Hartford Courant (Proquest Newspapers) and General Reference Center Gold.

For the Boston Globe, try General Reference Center Gold.

MySCSU, Vista, webserver down

2009-09-16T17:06:00.003-04:00

Something happened to the MySCSU server which took most Internet services down this afternoon. As I write this, Web access is back, but the campus web server (southernct.edu) is down. MySCSU and Vista are still down, and Banner may be down as well. Faculty Exchange Webmail seems to be up.

If you need the library catalog, go directly to http://www.consuls.org/ (including e-reserves). If you need the databases, go to http://libguides.southernct.edu/ , choose General, and click into the Databases guide. The alphabetical links should work.

If I here anything else, I'll post it.

Update (9/17): Everything seems to be back to normal. If you have any lingering difficulties, be sure to contact the Helpdesk.

MySCSU Upgrade will block access Fri & Sat

2009-09-11T11:22:00.003-04:00

After several postponements, they are finally going to do a planned upgrade to MySCSU. Starting tonight (Fri, 9/11) at 5pm, MySCSU (and all related services) will be down until 5pm Saturday, 9/12 (24 hours!) This includes:

MySCSU email
MySCSU portal
U-Drive
home.southernct.edu websites
VISTA (e-Learning Vista courseware)
Banner Web

This should not affect campus network logins (computer labs, faculty webmail, remote access) or library logins (e-reserves, databases).

New Library URL's

2009-08-31T13:39:00.002-04:00

Hi folks, long time no write. (Sorry.)

Don't worry, the library home page is still http://library.southernct.edu/

The Proxy Server (what allows you to log into the databases from off campus) got a new URL at the end of the summer. (No, it wasn't our idea.) You now have the security of logging in to the databases securely.

If you have old links that go directly to the databases, or to articles (etc.) in the databases, those links will not work now. If you like to make your own edits, you'll need to change the .csulib.ctstateu.edu/ to .www.consuls.org/ so that a link to JSTOR was http://0-www.jstor.org.csulib.ctstateu.edu/ and is now http://0-www.jstor.org.www.consuls.org/

If that made no sense to you, just go back into the databases using the links on the library website and find your database/article again. If you can't find it, let me know and I'll see if I can find it.

The second URL change is for the research guides. We are now using a service called LibGuides for our subject research guides and help pages. So if you had linked to one of our guides, you will need to use a new link. The old pages are getting redirect notes, and the Research Guide link on the library homepage now goes to the new site: http://libguides.southernct.edu/

We think we've found most of the old links on our site and changed them, but if you find something that doesn't work, please let me know!

New way of logging into the databases

2009-06-24T16:15:00.003-04:00

Hi folks, long time no write. Sorry about that. Things have been extraordinarily busy and a lot of things are changing at the library. Retirements, budget cuts, redistribution of resources and responsibilities...it's been a challenge and will continue to be so for a while yet.

But anyway, the real reason for this post is that we just discovered a new way of logging into our databases from off campus. Very quietly implemented and improved over the last year or so are Remote services (VPN) from IT. When you log into the Remote server, it acts as if you are logged into a campus computer, no matter were in the world you are. You can view your network files (including web pages), use some campus resources, and browse the campus website. (From on campus you see different options.)

You log in using your username (as with MySCSU & Vista) and your Windows/network password. The network password is only used on campus, so most distance students will not have one. If you don't have one, or haven't logged into a campus computer (including Remote) for over 3 months, go to the Helpdesk website (http://helpdesk.southernct.edu/) and choose Accounts and Email. Then choose Windows, and then Password Reset. Complete the form, then got to the Remote site, https://remote.southernct.edu/ (watch the 's' in https -- this is a secure site). Log in using your username and the password you just set. Once logged in, you can change your password to match your MySCSU/Vista password. (IT tells me they are working on a single signon, so this multiple password thing will shortly get better.)

Once you are logged in all the way, you should see a list of services and sites, and, up in the upper right, a box labeled Browse. In this box, enter the library's web address, library.southernct.edu and enter. You should see the library web site underneath a banner with Southern, a URL address bar, and a small toolbar. At this point, you can use the databases as if you were on campus, without having to use your ID and Library PIN. The one catch is that you can't leave the databases or the campus website. Any outside web links within the databases will be blocked. (You can, of course, copy them and open another browser window to use them.)

This is brand new to us, and we aren't quite sure of the full limits of the service. Please let me know if you have trouble. I tested this last night on a Mac with Firefox, and didn't have any trouble. This won't completely replace the Library PIN, which will still be needed for e-reserves, and if you are using a database with lots of outgoing links, logging in the PIN way will be much easier. But at least you now have an alternative.

Have fun, and I promise to try and post more often!

Email this blog or Overcoming technological inertia

2009-02-02T10:52:00.004-05:00

The time comes when, despite technological inertia, it is time to change services. I have been using RSSfwd for email delivery of new blog posts. (Why would you want this when RSS exists? See below!*) RSSfwd redid their service a few months ago, and everyone had to resubscribe. I never did post that entry, because the service was kind of screwy for a while. I'm still not happy with it--my last "update" was a list of the 25 most recent posts, which I received 3 times in one day. Mashable.com also reports that RSSfwd may be stopping service altogether, though I still see nothing on the RSSfwd site about this.

I've now set up Feedburner (owned by Google) email delivery, with the link available in the right hand column. Please feel free to resubscribe via that link.

Changes and failures of services are something that we need to take into account when we use other people's services in any context. It seems to happen a little more often online, but that might just be that we hear about them all, immediately! (I end up hearing about nearly every Twitter outage, and I don't use Twitter.) For services that I use personally, Jott and Library Elf have both recently changed service models. I didn't use Jott enough to make it worth paying for, and I probably won't end up paying for Library Elf, either (but I haven't decided yet.)

Change is inevitable, and I feel it is better to try things out and have them change or fail, than to ignore the possibility of a useful service by refusing to try something that might change later. Such as ThinkFree Office for the Mac, which may change my mind about paying for personal office software.

*Now, why would you want to subscribe to a blog by email? Why not use a RSS reader? Well, if you don't already use an RSS reader, why would you want to start? Some people don't want to use yet another service, but they view their email regularly. I personally use either email deliver or RSS in my email client for things that I want to see regularly, or that I want to be sure I see the updates for. My RSS reader gets ignored when I'm busy. I even have a few feeds set up as "live Bookmarks" in my various Firefox browsers, for things that are really local computer dependent. (The ACRL blog is something that I only look at at work, at my desk, and if I miss a few posts, I can just scroll back on the site when I have the time. I only look at lolcats at home, so a local computer dependent feed works very well and stops me from wasting time at work!)

Basically, for me, different updating options work for different sites and feeds. I'm making the technology work for me, rather than changing my needs and habits to fit the technology.

Notices and Updates

2008-12-19T11:26:00.002-05:00

Sorry, I haven't been posting much, folks. Here are a few notices and updates:

Campus is closing at 12:30 today, including the library. The library is closed this weekend, but will be open Monday - Wednesday next week. (Library Hours)

There's a MySCSU database update scheduled for Dec 23, 10 am - 5 pm. It will affect the MySCSU portal (email, calendar, etc.), but not Vista. IT suggests using the alternative interface for web email access: https://mail.southernct.edu/.

I'll be on vacation from Jan 5-19. I'll be keeping an occasional eye on my email (mostly to keep the spam from building up), but if you need help, you'll be better off contacting the Reference Desk directly: (203) 392-5732 or eref@southernct.edu.

Warm holiday wishes to everyone!

Problems with JSTOR and ScienceDirect PDF's

2008-11-19T11:03:00.006-05:00

We are having some issues with JSTOR and ScienceDirect PDF's on campus. We're seeing proxy and subscription error messages. If you get something like that (or other errors, for that matter) from off campus, please contact me.

In the meanwhile, keep track of the articles you are trying to access; I'm pretty confident we will have this fixed soon (as soon as we figure out what the actual problem is!) You may want to try going through the Journal Locator to find the journal and get in that way (this works for ScienceDirect--you can see the HTML version of the article, but not the PDF).

Update: (3pm) Add Emerald and American Chemical Society to the list. HTML versions of articles are fine, it's just the PDF's. If you are using the "Find Article @ SCSU" links and the "Article" link won't work, try the "Journal" link, then find the correct issue for your article. We know what the problem is now (proxy server issue) so we are a giant step towards solving it. Please bear with us!

Update: (11/20) The problem is definitely with our proxy server, so on campus access works by using the direct URL (jstor.org, sciencedirect.com, etc.) If you can get on campus, that will work. If you can't, and you need the article right away, let me know.

Update: (11/21) All fixed now!