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My first session of the day was a panel presentation titled “Not your Dad’s Interface: Next Generation OPACs and Search Engines.” Our old friends from NCSU were there to talk about their Endeca project. King County Public Library System presented on their implementation of AquaBrowser. AquaBrowser is a stand-alone product that supposedly is ILS independent (this library has III). Try a search of their catalog and see the visual map that appears. The next speaker, Jody Fagen from James Madison University, presented on a usability study she conducted on students’ use of EBSCOhost’s Visual search interface that is powered by Grokker. The final speaker talked about her library’s (Binghampton University) current implementation of Grokker to search their Aleph system. It certainly appears that these applications are the wave of the public OPAC interface future. Remember, I mentioned ExLibris’s new product, Primo, that is another entry into this market. Patrons’ response to these libraries’ new faceted searchability has been very positive.

After lunch, it was time for my first committee meeting. We were scheduled to meet today and again tomorrow afternoon. Our group was so productive, we finished both meetings’ agendas today. The purpose of my committee is to produce Info Tech Tips and Tricks . Until this year, the committee was larger and also dealt with producing Primo, a database of online library instruction efforts. It was divided into two separate groups, and my group is charged with annually picking 4 new technologies that have importance or potential in library instruction and writing about them. We are working on standardizing the effort, publicizing it so they might actually be used, and producing it in an effective format. In addition, our group was given a few other existing documents to update, so I’ve been charged with updating Tips for Developing Effective Web-Based Library Instruction.

We even finished early, leaving me time to dart across town several blocks to catch the discussion group on digital gaming in library instruction. It turned out to be a session where people verbalized concerns and then broke into groups to discuss them. I stuck it out for awhile, but I went looking for some answers and I think what I learned is that the library community is just starting to explore gaming as a potential instruction tool. Other disciplines are much further along and we should turn to them rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.

Now, I’m off to a EndUser meeting where old Endeavor sites (that’s us) will have a chance to hear the top ExLibris management. I was all gung ho until I looked at the meeting location information and the location has the hotel but the room number is “TBA”. Ah, I hope it’s not a rerun of Endeavor efficiency…..