Trinity College

My second library visit (and a very inspirational one) was to Trinity College
(Web Site address: http://www.tcd.ie/Library/)

Despite a nightmare car ride and taxi ride (I promise never to attempt to drive in Dublin again), I somehow managed to arrive at Trinity College. A student from Clare helped find the library





Here I am photographed with Jessie Kurtz, the Deputy Librarian. The picture between us is of the common room where we took coffee. (I have to say it is better than the SWTAFE staff room, but don't think I don't appreciate our home grown facilities). The library buildings and collections were amazing. Kerry Vickers would love it -- note Kerry that the reader services librarian is called Keeper (Reader Services). Many thanks to Jessie, Trevor, Pat, Romona and Anne-Marie and Robin for their informative chats and tours.


Note student asleep on couch in Trinity reading room.










Trinity College Library is the largest library in Ireland. Its collections of manuscripts and printed books have been built up since the end of the sixteenth century. In addition to the purchases and donations of almost four centuries, since 1801 the Library has had the right to claim all British and Irish publications under the terms of successive Copyright Acts. The bookstock is now over four million volumes and there are extensive collections of manuscripts, maps and music. The Library has a triple rôle. As a university library it serves the needs of the College's undergraduate and postgraduate students and of the academic staff; it is also a research library of international repute, making available much rare material to scholars from all parts of the world. In addition, it provides an information service to government departments, to research organisations and to technical, industrial and commercial bodies within Ireland.
One interesting aspect is the mode of providing off-Campus access to electronic resources - On your home computer, you have to specify the Trinity proxy server in the options or preferences of your web browser. When this is done, and the browser is launched, the Trinity server will send a dialog box asking for a User Name and Password - this checks if the user is really a College member. The password that is required is known as your ‘local webaccess’ password (not the usual network login password!). If the User Name and Password is successful, the browser is launched and the machine will appear to the rest of the world as if it is on campus. (http://www.tcd.ie/Library/resources/offcampus.php)
The wireless network at Trinity (http://isservices.tcd.ie/network/genreq.php#wireless) can be accessed by students and staff with their own laptops. A wireless network card is required.
The library regulations are at http://www.tcd.ie/Library/libraries/regulate.php
All readers are required to observe the terms of the Library declaration
'I,...., do solemnly promise that, whenever I enter the Library, I will treat the books and other furniture of the Library in such fashion that they may last as long as possible. I further promise that neither will I myself take away any book nor designedly damage or write in or badly treat in any way whatever any book, nor so far as in me lies will I suffer such things to be done by others. All and each of which things and all the Statutes of the Library, in as far as they concern me, I promise and vow faithfully to observe.
The Book of Kells is by far the Library's most famous book and is located in the Old Library, along with the Book of Durrow, the Book of Howth and other ancient texts.
The Book of Kells is the centrepiece of an exhibition which attracts over 500,000 visitors to Trinity College Dublin each year. Written around the year 800 AD, the Book of Kells contains a richly decorated copy of the four gospels in a latin text based on the Vulgate edition (completed by St Jerome in 384 AD). The gospels are preceded by prefaces, summaries of the gospel narratives and concordances of gospel passages compiled in the fourth century by Eusebius of Caesarea. In all, there are 340 folios (680 pages). The script is embellished by the elaboration of key words and phrases and by an endlessly inventive range of decorated initials and interlinear drawings. The book contains complex scenes normally interpreted as the Arrest of Christ, His Temptation, and images of Christ, the Virgin and Child, St Matthew and St John. Originally a single volume, it was rebound in four volumes in 1953 for conservation reasons. Two volumes are normally on display, one opened at a major decorated page, the other at a text opening.
Also incorporating the Long Room, the Old Library is one of Ireland's biggest tourist attractions, and holds thousands of rare, and in many cases very early, volumes.
Though the Book of Kells has been exhibited in other locations, damage caused on a loan in 2000 to an Australian institution has led to a policy of never allowing the book to leave Trinity again.
Needless to say the visit was extremely interesting and provided me with many valuable ideas.

Visit to Southern Regional College (N. Ireland)

This post on SRC has been published before -- it is slightly updated to mention that college Librarian Liam O'Hare has been asked to write a small piece in the college's e-magazine.

My first library visit was to Southern Regional College in Northern Ireland. (Web site of library -- http://www.src.ac.uk/lrc/lrchome.asp )

Thanks to Liam and his staff for hosting me.


A couple of points we could note -- no hot drinks in library, no fizzy drinks -- On the down side -- no time and and a half after 6.00 pm!!!!

On the Saturday before visiting the library Hannah and I entertained some folks at the Halfway House in Broughshane. Some Irish patrons appeared not to have adhered to the code of behaviour for responsible drinking, but most were very friendly and said what a good singer Hannah was (didn't seem to mention me!) (see photo below)




This is Danielle in the library at Southern Reg College -- she wants to work in Australian next year -- have we a vacancy? Anyone taking maternity leave?



This is me outside the College





This is the Kilkeel library (not connected in anyway to Southern Regional College) -- Marty Clarke the Collingwood footballer comes from a nearby wee village.


Southern Regional College
Southern Regional College was formed on 1st August 2007 when three of the provinces top further education colleges merged to become Southern Regional College. The new SRC comprises of the former FE colleges at Armagh, Newry and Upper Bann. There are a total of 6 campuses across the geographical region and the College incorporates four council districts.
Southern Regional College caters for approximately 50,000 students each year and has in excess of 1,100 members of staff. The College offers a wide range of courses: in excess of 100 courses for full-time further education; in excess of 80 courses on a full-time & part-time higher education capacity and; in excess of 1320 courses (not counting those courses offered in the community) on a part-time vocational & recreational basis. The College caters for the needs of all learners from the essential skills of numeracy and literacy through to degree studies and much more in between including First Diploma/Certificate; National Diploma/Certificate; NVQ and
City & Guilds/OCR qualifications. The College, offers an increasing range of Higher Education provision including Foundation Degrees, Higher Education Diplomas and Full Degrees
Foundation degrees are degree level qualifications designed with employers and combine academic study with workplace learning to equip people with the relevant knowledge, understanding and skills to improve performance and productivity.

Course subject areas -A/AS Levels and National Awards Adult Access Art and Design Beauty TherapyBusiness Childcare Construction Engineering Furniture Design Hairdressing Health and Social Care Hospitality and Catering Information Technology Learner Development Program Media Multimedia MusicPerforming ArtsPublic Services Science Secretarial and Administrative Sports Studies Travel and Tourism




The LRC (Learning Resource Centre) is a new facilty is the latest in design and innovation. It is equipped with over 130 PCs giving access to a wide range of software applications and the internet. The centre continues to have its extensive and ever expanding book stock along with a wide range of journals and reference materials. All library resources are catalogued and students can use the computerised LRC catalogue system to search for books by author, title or subject.




Hours: roughly 9:00 to 20:00 (17:00 Fridays) no weekends




Online databases:Childlink - Contains over 6000 papers and articles, providing information on legislation policies and practices on
health, education, benefits, welfare, youth affairs, justice and employment.
Kenote - Keynote Market Information offers 140 individual reports, and access to over 750 executive summaries,
covering a varied range of market sectors including Business Services, Computing, & IT, Education & Training,
Environment, Financial Services, Food & Catering, Lifestyle, Retailing and Travel & Tourism
Infotrac - This facility provides instant one-stop access to all Gale periodicals in an integrated database. It
currently offers 3000 full text titles.
Construction information service - A complete reference source for those needing rapid, reliable and up to date online access to British Standards, legislation and other guidance information related to construction, health and safety, and pharmaceuticals, in addition to product catalogues covering the construction, engineering, process and electronics industries.
Capacity builder -- Northern Ireland based Community web site providing an easy access support service to those
working in the community and voluntary sector.




Encyc. Britannica -- This is the online version of the renowned encyclopedia, an authorative source of information and an invaluable reference tool.
Emerald full text -- Emerald publishes the world's widest range of management and library & information services journals, as well as a strong specialist range of engineering, applied science and technology journals. Its electronic databases allow instant access to the latest research and global thinking. It provides the information, ideas and the opportunity to gain insight into your key management topics.
Film and sound online -- Film & Sound Online is a JISC-funded set of collections of film, video and sound material.
Several hundred hours of high-quality material are available for download, either in full or as segments, and can be used freely in learning, teaching and research. Journal of Sports Science Online -- The Journal of Sports Sciences publishes articles of a high standard on various aspects of the sports sciences covering a number of disciplinary bases, including anatomy, biochemistry, biomechanics, psychology, sociology, as well as ergonomics, kinanthropometry and other interdisciplinary perspectives.
Sports injury clinic -- Virtual sports injury clinic has a directory of over 100 sports injuries and conditions, 58 step-by-step sports massage guides and a virtual therapist for virtual diagnosis.
Tourism insights -- Tourism Insights , written by industry professionals, aims to help you monitor developments in the UK tourism market, analysing and interpreting trends to keep you completely up to date.




At http://www.src.ac.uk/lrc/support.asp the LRC makes available some Powerpoint presentations (Evaluate a website, Research skills ,Evaluate a book,Harvard Referencing), and some Word documents (Bibliography, Websearching, Essay checklist, Planning your essay)




At http://www.src.ac.uk/lrc/webresources.asp the LRC points to some services such as RSCNI (which supports Further and Higher Education Colleges in their development of Elearning Technologies and Resources), intute (a free online service providing you with access to the very best Web resources for education and research), and ni-library (Northern Ireland Libraries Network)





Needless to say the visit was extremely interesting and provided me with many valuable ideas.
































Note -- No hot drinks in library, no fizzy drinks -- no time and and a half after 6.00 pm!!!!

Conference day 2

Here is a photo of me attending the conference sessions. It was taken by a Swedish librarian with a Scottish name. Any suggestions that I look like I'm asleep will not be received favourably -- I am concentrating -- we were asked to close our eyes and think of what our next generation library would look like, feel like, sound like, smell like. How about that?

The second day's keynote address was The Shanachie report -- presented by 3 people from the Delft Public Library who and toured several countries, visiting libraries, interviewing librarians and filming the process.

Here is a photo of them -- they are coming to Melbourne on Dec. 6th. We should go. Recommendation for library -- 3 staff members to produce a road trip documentary on library best practice (perhaps Austin Texas as the starting point).

I also attended sessions on Web 2.0 applications in Denmark, Finland, Cairo and Singapore. I probably need to follow these up with visits as the accents of the presenters made it a bit difficult to grasp all points.

A couple things I did pick were that the person who created the Facebook page for the American University in Cairo was jailed for 2 weeks, and that that library developed a concept of a deskless library. How good would that be for the person doing the desk roster?

Here is a photo of last night's dinner with some young people we hooked up with (some are my friends on Facebook)

Video report

This video should work -- if not I am not up with this technology and may need another trip

Conference registration achieved

I have registered at the Conference and collected my bag.

Earlier I visited the Marylebone Library (see photo)

It was near the Registry Office where Paul (McCartney) married Linda and Ringo married Maureen. (see photo)

Workshop on blogging

The world has gone crazy. The first librarian I met was from Nashville and he told me country music was not his preferred type of music.

Prior to the actual "Internet librarian international" Conference I attended a workshop "Blogging effectively" led by UKOLN's Marieke Guy and University of Bath's Ann Chapman. For those who don't know (including myself until recently) UKOLN is a research organization that aims to inform practice and influence policy in the areas of digital libraries, information systems, bibliographic management, and web technologies. It provides network information services, including the Ariadne magazine, and runs workshops and conferences (see http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/).A BLOG is an online journal. The term BLOG comes from web log.www.emerge-solutions.com/learning_glossary.htmlThe aim of the workshop was to learn about up-to-date blog features and tools, to identify potential issues with the implementation of blogs within an institution, to outline policy considerations which best fit their individual or organisational purpose, to learn about tools for measuring blog success and to hear about and discuss examples of best practices to make use of in developing a sustainable blogging service locally.

The night after the workshop I performed with Gary Day at the Hammersmith Ram pub -- his mother is a librarian in County Down Ireland

See photo

Kuala Lumpur

The first stop on the journey has been Kuala Lumpur.

The National Library in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, is a uniquely-designed building. Borrowing its design concept from the traditional Malay headgear known as the tengkolok, the building was built to symbolise pride in and respect for Malaysian culture. The tengkolok-shaped roofs join at a courtyard that serves as an open-air amphitheatre. Another interesting aspect is the roof's songket design, which symbolises the rich cultural heritage of the country. Within the building are various levels that house different divisions and faculties. Each floor is linked by a striking staircase. Well planned and laid out, the library is a vast network of rooms and facilities that is user-friendly, taking the needs of the disabled into consideration as well.