Our next Technology on Your Own Terms workshop is coming up on Thursday, October 29, from 11:30am – 12:30pm in WML room 306. If you are a University faculty or staff member doing research–this workshop is for you.
In “Stay Alert! Keeping Your Research Up-to-Date,” Bonnie Oldham will explain how to set up e-mail alerts and use Rss Feeds to gather scholarly information.
Seats are limited, so be sure to register (under Special Events).
We’ve just added some old photographs of the amusement park at Nay Aug Park in Scranton to our Flickr collection. Please take a look and either help us date/describe them, or just post some of your memories of Nay Aug!
The photos were contributed by Weinberg Memorial Library Associate Director Bonnie Strohl, whose father and uncle owned the park (called Nay Aug Amuseument Company).
The Technology Support Center just announced that the software upgrades intended for this weekend have been postponed. This means that email, Angel, and my.scranton will be available over Fall Break. Library online resources (databases, catalog, interlibrary loan, course reserves) will all be accessible as usual, though the building will still be closed over the weekend.
Here’s the official notice from the Support Center:
The hardware and software upgrades scheduled for October 9 – 12 have been postponed. These upgrades will be rescheduled at a later date. University enterprise computer systems will be available as normally scheduled. As always, information technology questions or problems can be directed to the Technology Support Center can be reached at x4357 or techsupport@scranton.edu
Also, the Library building will be closed from 4:30 pm on Friday 10/9, and will reopen at 8:30 am on Tuesday 10/13 for Fall break. The 24 hour Pro Deo room will be open this weekend. Have a great break!
Our next Technology on Your Own Terms workshop is coming up next Tuesday, October 13, from 12pm-1pm in WML room 306. If you’re a University faculty or staff member who has trouble keeping track of all of your favorite websites – this workshop is for you.
In “Really Simple Steps for Managing the Web: An Introduction to RSS,” we will explain how RSS feeds and RSS readers can help you manage the abundance of information available on the web. You’ll create a Google Reader account and will learn to import, organize, search, and share up-to-date content from your favorite websites.
Seats are limited, so be sure to register (under Special Events).
The University’s Information Resources department has announced an important outage of critical University services over Fall Break.
Due to a needed upgrade, both email (RoyalMail) and my.scranton.edu will not be available from 4:30pm on Friday, October 9 through 8:30 am on Tuesday, October 13.
Angel and Library services (including our catalog and research databases) will be available during the service outage but must be accessed using the URL www.scranton.edu/myScranton. You can log in using your usual my.scranton username and login.
Other Library services such as Electronic Reserves (ERes), PALCI E-Z Borrow, Ask-a-Librarian, and Interlibrary Loan will be available during the service outage as well and can be accessed from the Library’s homepage. Please note, however, that Interlibrary Loan requests are received by the Library via email – so to be sure that your ILL request is processed, it would be best to send it before 4:30pm on Friday or after 8:30am next Tuesday. PALCI E-Z Borrow requests will not be affected by the unavailability of email.
Last but not least, don’t forget that the Library will be closed over Fall Break. Our hours for the weekend will be:
Friday, October 9: 8:00am – 4:30pm
Saturday, October 10: CLOSED
Sunday, October 11: CLOSED
Monday, October 12: CLOSED
Tuesday, October 13: 8:00am – 11:30pm
Students, be sure to plan ahead if you are thinking of doing research or homework over fall break. If you have any questions about the availability of Library services this weekend, contact the Library’s Associate Director, Bonnie Strohl, at strohlb1 (at) scranton (dot) edu or 570-941-4006. For information about the service outage in general, contact the Technology Support Center.
Update: Tech Support center just announced on Wednesday (10/7/09) that the planned software upgrades will be postponed.
This Fall, the Weinberg Memorial Library is proud to host “Scarce Books and Elegant Editions,” a collection of rare books by and about Samuel Johnson and James Boswell from the Edward R. Leahy Collection, in celebration of the 300th birthday of Samuel Johnson.
Samuel Johnson, best known for his Dictionary of the English Language, is often considered the most important English prose writer of the middle and late 18th century. He was also the subject of what has been called the first truly modern biography, written by James Boswell. On display in the 5th floor Heritage Room are rare editions of Johnson and Boswell works, as well as items and autographed letters by or about both authors.
The exhibit will run until December 11. An opening reception, featuring a talk by Edward R. Leahy ’68 about the collection, will be held on October 7 at 7:30pm in the Heritage Room.
If you’re a University of Scranton faculty or staff member and you love to read, be sure to come to our next Technology on Your Own Terms workshop! “Curl up with a Kindle” will be held on October 1, 2009 from 12pm-1pm in Weinberg Memorial Library Room 306. CTLE Instructional Technology and Enrichment Specialist Aileen McHale will introduce you to Amazon’s Kindle e-book reader and will demonstrate some of the Kindle’s features, from digital highlighting to note taking.
Seats are limited, so be sure to register (under Special Events).
We’re big fans of our colleagues over in the Center for Teaching & Learning Excellence (CTLE), and we’re excited about their new News & Events blog, where you can find all “the latest—announcements, updates, articles & more—from the CTLE.”
Check out the CTLE’s blog at ctleblog.blogspot.com or by clicking on the CTLE blog link in our “All Things Royal” menu on your left. And make sure you also visit the CTLE’s new website!
At last! Students can print from their laptops to the Weinberg Memorial Library’s UniPrint system – wirelessly.
Here’s how it works: First, install this new printing system to your laptop. Note – we don’t yet have software ready for Mac or for 64-bit Vista computers, but we’re working on it!
Then, to send a print job from a wireless connection to the UniPrint station on the first floor of the Library, just log in into RoyalAir or connect to Resnet. All wireless jobs, whether you’re using your laptop inside the Library or elsewhere on campus, go to the first floor print station in the Pro Deo Room (which you can access 24 hours a day, even after the Library has closed, by swiping in with your Royal Card).
When you print a job using this system, you’ll be prompted to enter a name for the job, a password and your username. Within two hours, go to the Library and swipe your Royal Card at the UniPrint Station in the Pro Deo Room where your documents will be printed and a per page fee will be charged. If you wait longer than two hours, your print jobs will be purged – you’ll have to resend the job to the UniPrint Station.
Remember, the Library subsidizes 200 prints for each student in the fall semester, 50 subsidized prints for students taking an Intersession class and 200 in the spring – see our post on “Printing in the Library – The Inside Scoop” for details.
This is a new service at the Library, so if you run into any problems, please let us know – either tell a Library staff member, comment here on our blog, or post to our Facebook or Twitter pages.
UPDATE: As of February 2010, wireless printing is now available for Macs. Instructions are here.
Here at the Library, we love pirates. (Who doesn’t?) But we don’t love hearing about our students being pirates – that is, pirating music, movies, or other copyrighted material.
Here’s what you need to know about pirating: Downloading or distributing whole copies of copyrighted material for personal use or entertainment without *explicit* permission from the copyright owner is against the law – and the movie and music industries are increasingly searching for and prosecuting people who violate their copyright (yes, including students – for a first hand account, see “How it feels to be sued for $4.5 million,” by Joel Tenebaum).
For this reason, the University of Scranton is particularly concerned about peer-to-peer file sharing. Not all file sharing is illegal – you can legally share content that you’ve created, or content for which the creator has given permission to share (for example, some artists and musicians choose to share using a Creative Commons license – like the photographer who took the pirate photo that we’ve used at the top of this post). But sharing anything that’s under copyright – and that’s mostly everything! – is a violation of both federal law and the University’s Student Computing Policy.
As a result, the University prohibits some peer-to-peer applications and limits bandwidth on others, and student violations are taken very seriously – see the University’s Peer-to-Peer File Sharing Policy.
So what’s a movie-and-music-loving student to do? There are *legal* ways to listen to music and watch movies either for free or for a low price. For music, try out free internet radio stations like Pandora or playlist.com. If you prefer to own your own mp3s, check out Amazon’s mp3 store – songs are often $0.99 or less, and each week samplers of new music are available for free. For movies, become a fan of the University of Scranton Programming Board on Facebook to get the latest updates on free movie showings on campus. If you’re willing to pay a few bucks, explore streaming music services from Netflix or iTunes.
Want to know more? If you have questions about the University’s policies on file sharing, contact the Technology Support Center at extension 4357. If you have general questions about copyright, feel free to ask a librarian – we have lots of resources on copyright and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
