I'm Not Here I'm There -- Using a Local Instant Messaging Service in Your Library
If you can't read please download the document
-
Upload
john-fink -
Category
Technology
-
view
1.110 -
download
0
Transcript of I'm Not Here I'm There -- Using a Local Instant Messaging Service in Your Library
I'm Not Here I'm There: Using a Local Instant Messenger Server in your Library
John FinkDigital Technologies Development LibrarianMcMaster University
http://twitter.com/adrhttp://claimid.com/[email protected]
An apology...
Ths is not prezi, not sexy, not anything.
Who am I?
Who are you?
Why did I do this?
A brief primer on our blended service.
I went to library school to do reference.
Then suddenly, I didn't have reference anymore
So I could...
...hang around the reference desk stalking people
...hide in the machine room, coming out occasionally to get coffee
...despair of ever dealing with the public again.
Because if we're taken out of the public sphere, and especially out of reference, we will atrophy. We don't know what patrons are looking for, and we may not be up on the search methods, databases, etc that they're using.
When I was on the desk 10-20 hours a week, I felt energized.
But it's not just me...
Any library any organization will have problems with communication commensurate with its size.
Email, telephones, newsletters, forums these are all ok, but nothing really replaces walking by someone's office and going Hey, look at this neat thing, you got five minutes?
This is made way worse if you have multiple branches.
In other words...
...we need synchronous as well as asynchronous communications methods.
When I was a young sysadmin, I felt that maybe even more than http email was the one service that had to be up.
Now I think that about IM services.
Tackling a social problem with a technical solution.
Used to think email was the kiler app.
But back to reference
Libraries are changing blah blah blah
...blah blah blah...
...dedicated reference services by librarians will, by all measure, get less prevalent instead of more prevalent.
...I'm a librarian, and I think this mostly sucks.
But why didn't we...
...go with telephone referrals?
...or set office hours?
...or a hosted IM solution (libraryh3lp, etc)
...or a consumer grade IM solution (gtalk, AIM, etc.)
DO NOT WANT
NOOOOO
Now that we've got those two out of the way...
...using standard IM is not ideal because
...we want to foster a sense of community
...we want to make it easy enough for all staff to take part
...we want an in-house solution, for security and convenience.
...we've heard horror stories about libraryh3lp.
Also...
We need some things that standard IM doesn't do...
...or at least doesn't do easily.
...like have all users join a single group
...so they can see and be seen by everybody else
...and maybe more importantly
so they can all talk together.
Any solution had to be...
...standards compliant.
...usable with cross platform clients.
...open source.
...simple to implement.
...simple to use.
...local.
Explai all of these things totally ad nasueum
Openfire
Why Openfire?
Java!
...Java?
XMPP/Jabber so...
...works with Pidgin/Adium/
...can run on commodity hardware.
..no seriously Java!
But also!
Openfire can have everyone added to a buddy group automatically...
And hey presto!
When I say commodity hardware, I mean it.
...original box a five year old Dell
...one gb of RAM
...teeny tiny hard drive.
on its last legs.
A plea for the cloud...
So how do we use this?
...well, originally, we did it so paraprofessionals at desk could, if they got an unanswerable question, send it around to people
...but we've used it for
...quick polling
...general socializing
...system outages
...probably lots of other stuff I don't see. And that's fine!
Some problems...
Adding accounts is annoying due to no centralized identity service (e.g. LDAP)
XMPP is a standard, but not everyone implements it well (problems exist in Adium that don't in Pidgin, even though both are libpurple based)
For it to really work well, you need outside net access.
This is not always trivial.
And ideally...
We'd like buy in at all levels.
Right now, due to our (now departed) access services head we've got most blended services paraprofessionals but...
...usage is not compulsory.
...so we us ually see the same 10-15 users.
...and librarian involvement is not exactly where I'd like it.
Got time for a demo?
Any questions?
Muokkaa otsikon tekstimuotoa napsauttamalla
Muokkaa jsennyksen tekstimuotoa napsauttamallaToinen jsennystasoKolmas jsennystasoNeljs jsennystasoViides jsennystasoKuudes jsennystasoSeitsems jsennystasoKahdeksas jsennystasoYhdekss jsennystaso
