Friday, June 26, 2009
It worked!
Cool. The posting worked and went off without a hitch. Not entirely sold yet, but definitely pleased.
Windows 7
I loaded the Windows 7 Release Candidate onto the Windows partition of my iMac yesterday. The process was fairly simple thanks to the directions that were provided by SimpleHelp.net. I was somewhat lucky and everything appears to have gone off without a hitch.
What I am doing now is experimenting with some of the software that is a available for Windows 7. This posting (if it works properly) will have been scripted and posted through Windows Live Writer. This work is being done, in part, for the preparation of my machine to be demoed at the college’s next Geekapalooza event. I do not mess with the plumbing an OS, so I cannot speak to being extensively knowledgeable about such issues, but I do find that Windows 7 has delivered thus far – accessing my personal network was a cinch (I had troubles in the past using Vista to connect to my home network). I am also a fan of the redesigned taskbar. The new taskbar delivers some Mac OS X dock-like functionality, but delivers some nifty Vista features such as the window preview pane. Overall, it seems much snappier than my Vista-based machine in my office.
Despite being a Mac person for the last 10+ years, I am pleased with this new Microsoft OS thus far (a whopping 2 days – for which some people are smirking and thinking, “Give it time, give it time.”). I do love to get my hands on a new OS and give it a spin. I definitely foresee myself using the Windows 7 OS, which is not to say that I have given up on OS X, especially with 10.6 due in September, but I do see it a great complement to my existing home setup. Cheers, from my not yet abandoned blog.
What I am doing now is experimenting with some of the software that is a available for Windows 7. This posting (if it works properly) will have been scripted and posted through Windows Live Writer. This work is being done, in part, for the preparation of my machine to be demoed at the college’s next Geekapalooza event. I do not mess with the plumbing an OS, so I cannot speak to being extensively knowledgeable about such issues, but I do find that Windows 7 has delivered thus far – accessing my personal network was a cinch (I had troubles in the past using Vista to connect to my home network). I am also a fan of the redesigned taskbar. The new taskbar delivers some Mac OS X dock-like functionality, but delivers some nifty Vista features such as the window preview pane. Overall, it seems much snappier than my Vista-based machine in my office.
Despite being a Mac person for the last 10+ years, I am pleased with this new Microsoft OS thus far (a whopping 2 days – for which some people are smirking and thinking, “Give it time, give it time.”). I do love to get my hands on a new OS and give it a spin. I definitely foresee myself using the Windows 7 OS, which is not to say that I have given up on OS X, especially with 10.6 due in September, but I do see it a great complement to my existing home setup. Cheers, from my not yet abandoned blog.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Relais Post-to-Web Nearing Fruition
After a great deal of effort we might have wrestled the beast known as Relais Post-to-Web down. After some minor set backs, our testing was finally successful yesterday. We can now proudly send our ILL team to Calgary for the Relais workshop on Monday, June 15th with some bragging rights as the first college in Canada to implement this system. I believe this progress document delivery system is a feather in our cap - especially for being such a smaller college.
What am I talking about? What is Relais Post-to-Web? Essentially it is a paper free document deliver system for patrons that use the ILL service to acquire journal, magazine, and newspaper articles. When a patron requests an article, (a) we order it, (b) the lending institution transmits a copy of it, (c) we receive and send a notice to the patron that contains a link to download the article, and (d) the patron receives the notice, at which time they can choose to download or print the desired article. Easy peezy lemon squeezy.
The most difficult part (well maybe not "the most" difficult part) was coordinating schedules between Relais support, ILL staff, and myself - due to staggered shifts here, and time zone differences between Medicine Hat and Ottawa. After several WebEx sessions and phone calls with Relais Support, we were able to hammer our the major kinks. The next step, before opening it up completely to our patrons, is to recruit some guinea pigs to help us test the process in a real-world context.
Next issue: Millennium printing to the new Xerox print centre. Works for somethings, but not others. Argh!
What am I talking about? What is Relais Post-to-Web? Essentially it is a paper free document deliver system for patrons that use the ILL service to acquire journal, magazine, and newspaper articles. When a patron requests an article, (a) we order it, (b) the lending institution transmits a copy of it, (c) we receive and send a notice to the patron that contains a link to download the article, and (d) the patron receives the notice, at which time they can choose to download or print the desired article. Easy peezy lemon squeezy.
The most difficult part (well maybe not "the most" difficult part) was coordinating schedules between Relais support, ILL staff, and myself - due to staggered shifts here, and time zone differences between Medicine Hat and Ottawa. After several WebEx sessions and phone calls with Relais Support, we were able to hammer our the major kinks. The next step, before opening it up completely to our patrons, is to recruit some guinea pigs to help us test the process in a real-world context.
Next issue: Millennium printing to the new Xerox print centre. Works for somethings, but not others. Argh!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)