Library power outages and losing documents

Just a reminder that students (and all patrons) should be encouraged to save their documents often and in the ways recommended below. Even a brief power outage can results in lost documents. Recommendations and warnings from IT are listed below.

Safest ways to save:

• Flash drive/memory stick
• Google Docs (does auto-save frequently)
• CD
• Email it to yourself

Unsafe:

• Saving to desktop only (can be lost in an outage)
• Documents folder only

Gov Docs accessibility

Due to the G-Line construction on the 2nd Floor, the Gov Docs collection will be mostly inaccessible. We’re not quite sure of the timeline for this (at least today and maybe tomorrow?). If you encounter a patron who wants one of these inaccessible government documents, please let me know. We might be able to find a work-around; the desired document might be available online (even if there is no apparent electronic copy) or even on microfiche. So please feel free to call me at 9-5654 or find me in my office (my door will probably be closed due to construction sound) and I will help in any way that I can.

Cheers,

Jess

Opening PDFs on public computers

If a document opens with the open source PDF viewer (not Adobe), right-click to choose "Open with...Adobe" or save it to the desktop and then drag it to Adobe in the dock. Same for the Ref Desk computers.

History 10 - primary source questions

We are getting more questions from History 10 students needing primary sources. Their assignment is to find a letter that is ideally from the time period of a historical event (ex. the Missouri Compromise), or at least not after 1877, and then write 5-7 pages about it's historical significance. I had luck with a Thomas Jefferson letter (on Library of Congress site) about the Missouri Compromise. Consult Kerry's class guide for more sources:

http://library.ucsc.edu/course-guides/history-10a-united-states-history-to-1877

Word documents on public computers

A patron came to the desk before the IT desk was staffed and said her Word 2007 document wouldn't open on PC #7. I called ITS and
Frank said that the PC's do have a concerter pac installed and should automatically open Word 2007 docs. If they don't, have the patron try another PC and report that one by submitting a ticket to ITS. And that's what I did and it worked fine on another PC. So in case this happens to you on a morning watch, that's what to do.

Saving docs on public computers: save often and wisely

There is not much more frustrating when a student comes up after a power outage and has lost their paper because they were only saving it to the desktop. So to help them avoid this, we've added some signage in the Info Commons to help them know how to save safely. And it's a good reminder for us to tell them. I conferred with Fish about this so here's the scoop:

Safest ways to save:
-Flash drive / memory stick
-CD
-Google docs
-Email to yourself

Unsafe:
-Desktop only
-Documents folder only

If they've only saved to the desktop or docs folder and the power suddenly goes out or flickers strongly enough, they will lose their paper and there is no way to recover it.