Libraries: Research, Instruction, and Outreach Committee : Minutes October 15, 2007

11/14/2007
Minutes October 15, 2007

Minutes October 15, 2007

Five College Libraries
Research, Instruction and Outreach Committee (RIO)

Minutes of the October 15, 2007 Meeting

Present: Bryan Goodwin (chair), Margaret Groesbeck, Beth Lang (recorder), Barbara Polowy, Bonnie Vigeland
Absent: Sherre Harrington (FCLD liaison)

Meetings:
Minutes of the September 17, 2007 meeting were approved without changes.

Next meeting: November 12 at 9:00am.

Membership change:
Margaret announced that she will be rotating off of RIO after the December meeting. Susan Kimball will be the new RIO representative from Amherst College. Both Susan and Margaret plan to attend the December meeting.

Orientation for new librarians:
The last time this session was held was in October of 2004. RIO tentatively plans to hold an orientation in January, 2008, and will discuss this in more detail at November meeting.

Usability Testing of ALEPH OPAC:
RIO will conduct another round of testing at all Five Colleges, in mid-November. When designing tasks for users during testing, we will keep in mind outstanding issues with the OPAC that still need to be addressed including relevancy ranking, design features, record retrieval flaws, and use of advanced and modify search functionalities.
For the November RIO Meeting, each member is assigned to come up with a task in the OPAC concentrating on a specific feature. They are:

Barbara: modify search (start a search on Advanced page and add limits)
Beth: E-journals (do users understand the records and find the links?)
Bonnie: retrieve and request items features
Brian: relevancy ranking (incomprehensible results list)
Margaret: graphic design features (do users see the buttons?)

RIO OPAC Assignment updates:
E-journal links task force (Bonnie): Their goal is to complete the project by the end of January, 2008. If librarians wish to see the full URL for the e-item, it can be found in the MARC record, field 85640.
OPAC Help screens (Margaret): Help sections should be simplified and cut down in length. We will divide up the sections, edit and rewrite, after usability testing plans are underway.
SDI (Barbara): Barbara provided screenshots of SDI at other Aleph institutions for discussion at a future meeting.
Service Pack testing (Bryan): AMC will load SP1280 onto the test catalog, tentatively scheduled for the week of Oct. 22. Brian will receive the spreadsheet with the enhancements, and forward to RIO members for testing of any part that will have an impact on users of the OPAC.


	11/14/2007 Minutes October 15, 2007 Minutes October 15, 2007 Five College Libraries Research, Instruction and Outreach Committee (RIO) Minutes of the October 15, 2007 Meeting Present: Bryan Goodwin (chair), Margaret Groesbeck, Beth Lang (recorder), Barbara Polowy, Bonnie Vigeland Absent: Sherre Harrington (FCLD liaison) Meetings: Minutes of the September 17, 2007 meeting were approved without changes. Next meeting: November 12 at 9:00am. Membership change: Margaret announced that she will be rotating off of RIO after the December meeting. Susan Kimball will be the new RIO representative from Amherst College. Both Susan and Margaret plan to attend the December meeting. Orientation for new librarians: The last time this session was held was in October of 2004. RIO tentatively plans to hold an orientation in January, 2008, and will discuss this in more detail at November meeting. Usability Testing of ALEPH OPAC: RIO will conduct another round of testing at all Five Colleges, in mid-November. When designing tasks for users during testing, we will keep in mind outstanding issues with the OPAC that still need to be addressed including relevancy ranking, design features, record retrieval flaws, and use of advanced and modify search functionalities. For the November RIO Meeting, each member is assigned to come up with a task in the OPAC concentrating on a specific feature. They are: Barbara: modify search (start a search on Advanced page and add limits) Beth: E-journals (do users understand the records and find the links?) Bonnie: retrieve and request items features Brian: relevancy ranking (incomprehensible results list) Margaret: graphic design features (do users see the buttons?) RIO OPAC Assignment updates: E-journal links task force (Bonnie): Their goal is to complete the project by the end of January, 2008. If librarians wish to see the full URL for the e-item, it can be found in the MARC record, field 85640. OPAC Help screens (Margaret): Help sections should be simplified and cut down in length. We will divide up the sections, edit and rewrite, after usability testing plans are underway. SDI (Barbara): Barbara provided screenshots of SDI at other Aleph institutions for discussion at a future meeting. Service Pack testing (Bryan): AMC will load SP1280 onto the test catalog, tentatively scheduled for the week of Oct. 22. Brian will receive the spreadsheet with the enhancements, and forward to RIO members for testing of any part that will have an impact on users of the OPAC.