Celia’s Eleventh Blog for Library Systems Class - THANK YOU, Dr. Ball

This week proved to me that I am gaining not only knowledge from my MLS classes but also confidence in my ability. A patron came in who is a powerful mover and shaker in the town and who for a long time did not approve of me as Library Director. He said that he had a research question for me. "Why are barns red?" I thought that I would have time to find the answer but he wanted me to come up with an answer on the spot. I was able to stay calm and look it up on my computer. He was impressed when I gave him his answer in a short time. (In case you are wondering, it started in the 1800's when they added blood from slaughtered animal or rust (to prevent mold and ivy from growing on the barn walls) to the stain (linseed oil) that was put on the barns to protect it. This thus turned the barn a red /orange color not the bright red of today.) After I read this to the patron, he asked me to print it off so he could take it with him since he wanted to share it with the people he got into the discussion with while driving a man to his doctor's appointment and those working in the doctor's office. The page I printed off for him happened to have a picture of a barn on it that was very decorated so he wanted me to find out why barns are decorated they way they are so I went back to the website I found the original barn information from and with some further digging found that there are two areas of thought on this. One is that they are decorated purely for aesthetic purposes and the other is to ward off evil with the hexagonal shapes. With these answers, I think I was able to actually impress the patron. For a man who gave me a very, very hard time when I was first started this is a real boost to me and to the library. So a big Thank You to Dr. Ball and her Online Searching Class for giving me the confidence to pull this test off.

I spent most of the week working on designing and implementing a website for kids at the Roanoke Public Library. I am adding pages to promote the programs, events and other items that we have available. I am collecting permission and information from area organizations to add to the site also. I have asked all the area schools, the boy and girl scouts, 4-H, visitors' bureau, local chambers, and sport organizations. So far they have all been very cooperative. I don't want to add links without permission. Everyone that I have shown the site I'm making are excited about it. One of my board members is especially pleased as he has been asked many questions about the library and its events as he has been volunteering at the American Legion. This process has been fun, frustrating, and very informative. I can't believe how much I am learning and how much is actually possible. I find that I am really getting into wiki. I love how they allow interactivity and make the pages come alive.

The circulation computer at the library has Microsoft Office 2007 on it which the library was able to purchase at $20 a computer from TechSoup. I have used Publisher to make the library's brochures but not much more. My assistant was using Word to make a paper to insert into a kit we were sent for Preschoolers and Kindergarteners to prepare them for entering school. These are the first kits that the library has that it is planning to circulate. The point of this is that the Word only has a very few fonts on it. It doesn't seem to be downloaded correctly. I have tried to repair it and tried to add more areas to it. Neither of these has worked. I think that I am going to have to completely remove it and then download it again and hope that the bugs in it go away. Computer and computer programs are great when they work and such a major pain when they don't!!!

 

 

Celia’s Tenth Blog for Library System Class—Punished for Vacation

I don't know if it happens to everyone, but I have noticed that every time I go on vacation I come back to some form of disaster that I have to fix or find a fix for. That happened this last week as upon returning I was told that both of our printer were down and that the only thing we and the patrons could print to being the copier. I tried everything I knew to get the big color LaserJet printer to work and nothing worked. I talked to a board member who is our handyman and he said that he would see what he could do. So Monday night after the annual membership Friends meeting, he and the board president went to work on the printer. They followed the step-by-step instructions given by the machine which I and my assistant had done repeatedly to no avail. They then proceeded to try to take the machine apart this again was to no avail. I had called the company that serviced the printer for the company that had donated the printer to the library and they wanted $184 for the first hour service call and $46 for each 15 minutes after that with no other information told to us. I then tried Allen Business Machines which is where the library bought the copies and has a service contract with. After being transferred repeatedly I was told that I needed to speak to their IT serviceman who was out. He did call me in a timely manner and I was told that they charge $125 for the first hour service call and $34 for each 15 minutes after that. I told him what the problem was that we have a 54.6 error and that we have gone through the help steps, cleaned it, and replaced fuser kit but the error was still there. He said that since I could give him the error number and the exact problem he would not have to trouble shoot so he knew what the problem was—we need a new drawer. He quoted me at $654 to buy the part and replace it in our printer. He suggested though that instead of doing that it would be more cost effective to just buy a new printer. He said that often once a problem like this happens it leads to more and more problems and turns into a money pit.

I have been comparing fixing that printer both through ABM or the library buying the new drawer and installing it ourselves or buying new printer. I used the areas of initial cost, capacity of the printer, speed of the printer, cartridges needed, cost and life of cartridges (color and black) and whether it has duplex capabilities. I also have to factor in if we get a new printer that we would have to have the tech guy come to network it in. I have an email in to him to find out that quote.

I was lucky as the other printer that was down was just because it was not plugged into any computer. On the Monday before I left we had a board meeting. The board member I mentioned before came early to look at one of the new donated computer was telling me that there was a problem with the CPU fan. When he opened it up, he found that the inside of the computer was very full of dust and that the fan was clogged with dust. Once he cleaned the inside the fan and the computer worked fine. He thus went and cleaned all the donated computers figuring that they would all be dusty inside. He was right. Evidently when he was reattaching he did not reattach the printer. We didn't notice it since the big printer was the default and the one everyone used until it went down so we didn't notice the problem right away. I glad that was so easy to fix.

One other problem happened too. The OPAC computer that we use for the scanner too wouldn't go on the Internet. It would try but would immediately shut it down. I explained to the tech guy as a flick or like it was taking a picture. I again had tried everything I could think of to get it to work including having one of my patron who is technically good with computers try what he knew. Again we had no luck. The tech guy even had trouble finding the problem but finally did. I had updated Internet Explorer to 7 from 6. In that process or sometime after the program became corrupted. The tech guy took Internet Explorer back to 6 and now it works fine.

I sometime wonder if vacations are worth it, then I wake up and know THEY ARE!!!!

Celia’s ninth blog for Library Systems class--Colorado (Wyoming) Experience

This week I was proved again how wonderful the librarian profession is. For my other class, I was to interview a webmaster. One of the webmasters, I chose to try to interview was the Denver Public Library's. Their webmaster not only answered my questions, she also offered me an inside tour of the library while I am there over spring break. I can't wait!

I also found out that other professions have great people too. March is disability month. To celebrate that, my library has a guest storyteller and the local developmentally disabled group (Pathfinders) come and give a talk. During this story time, I take pictures as my assistant runs most of our story times although I do get the guests and help her plan. We had this special story time on March 3, 2008. I took my digital camera and took about 5-6 pictures. I then went home and downloaded them to my computer. I thought that all went well but when I went to find the pictures on my computer they weren't there. Since I am planning to take the camera on vacation with me I had cleared it thinking all was well. The pictures were simply not there. All I can figure out is that something went wrong with the download. I have learned that I should erase the pictures from the camera until I am positive that they are on my computer and that I know where to find them. Luckily for me the Pathfinders organization sent a lady to take pictures for their own publicity so I asked them to send me those pictures so I could add them to my article to the newspapers to publicize the event. They were happy to help me in this way as both of our organization will get some good publicity out of it.

We also had problems with one of our computers and the printers. We have a 4500 color LaserJet printer that is our default printer. Computer 4 would only print to the 2300 b&w LaserJet printer though. Even when the 4500 was chosen, it would print to the 2300. I had to reset the 4500 printer into computer 4 and finally got 4500 printer working correctly from computer 4. What really bothers me now is how the computer lost those settings in the first place. My board has had me set restore points on all the patron computers. One of the board members has a portable DVD drive he is going to use make back-up disks. We are also planning on putting SteadyState from Microsoft on all the computers also. This program is supposed to take the computer back to its starting point every time that it is restarted. I will be putting that on the computers when I get back from vacation. We are hoping with all this protection the patrons will not be able to add or change things like they are now.

Denver was great! I was surprised as I thought Denver would be more mountainous but we did drive out to see them a little closer than you can from Denver itself. I did get my tour of the Denver Public Library. I took my new flip video camera and took a video during it. We were specially allowed to go into the room where a G7 summit was held during President Clinton's term of office. It was neat to see where the heads of state sat and the special nameplates placed inside the table. They also have a wonderful display of Colorado artworks from the neighboring art museum. We were also shown the genealogy and children's sections of the library. It is a 64 million dollar library that is a showplace as well as a functioning library. It was definitely being used and was a vibrant place so it was proof that libraries are necessary.

I repeatedly took a group of pictures in Denver on my digital camera and then went back to the hotel and downloaded them to my laptop. I have quite a video slide show now of Colorado and even some of Wyoming which we spent a little time in. I was lucky as the hotel gave us complimentary "wired" Internet service. I would have had to pay for "wireless" Internet. I was thus able to connect from Denver and work on the wiki project a little. I copied off maps from the internet before we left which show Denver in squares grids and then part in diamond grids. We thought it was a mistake but once there found out it was actually set up that way. It was confusing! We were often relying on my nephew's phone as he was able to get Google Maps on it. It is incredible to me how phones have changed. Who would have believed 20 years ago that we would be getting Internet, able to take pictures and texts or talk to people on our phones from almost anywhere. My nephew could often be seen in during the "vacation" making sales calls from his phone in the middle of our touring walks of Denver while we females shopped. I left my niece use my cell phone to call her husband and such since I have nationwide coverage and only use it for emergencies. I thought that I had 500 whenever and 75 weekend minutes. It turns out that it was actually the opposite and she talked for 96 whenever minutes so I will have to pay extra since I have an overage. Luckily it isn't that much!