The Distant Librarian

Author: Paul R. Pival

  • EBSCO to deliver blog content

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    Paul R. Pival
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    Sorry I couldn’t come up with anything more original than David Rothman’s original title, but that pretty much spells it out.  What an interesting idea.  David posts about a press release in which EBSCO and Newstex announce that EBSCO databases will begin delivering selected blog content alongside standard search results.  Sure hope one can easily…

  • New York TimesSelect available to students and faculty in Canada too

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    Paul R. Pival
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    I was mildly cheesed when I read the announcements last week that the NY TimesSelect service was going be offered for free to students and faculty with a .edu email address, ’cause here in Canada we don’t have that domain.  But then I thought I’d check and see so at least I’d have proof when…

  • She hearts ILL

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    Paul R. Pival
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    LIS News points to a great piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education in which Professor Susanna Ashton tells the academic world how great ILL is in the US.  In my limited experience, pretty much everything she says is true of ILL in Canada as well.  A good read, and positive quotes from Michael Gorman…

  • Mac Screencasting Tips

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    Paul R. Pival
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    Still no perfect all-in-one package, but Miraz Jordan has a nice post with tips and tools for screencapture and screencasting on the Mac. Technorati Tags: Screencasting, OSX

  • UNC Greensboro Information Literacy Game

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    Paul R. Pival
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    This may be well-known in the InfoLit circles, but it was new to me.  UNC Greensboro has a nifty little Information Literacy (board)Game you can play, and download for use at your institution!  Go ahead and give it a try – it’ll only take a few minutes – think your students will go for it?…

  • Find X

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    Paul R. Pival
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    Couldn’t wait until Friday to post this one – nothing to do with libraries, but it’s a rare thing that makes me laugh out loud so I thought I’d share it.  A colleague forwarded a half-dozen funny responses to physics and math questions written by frustrated students.  This gem was right in the middle:  Maybe…

  • Interview with BookSwim

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    Paul R. Pival
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    I mentioned BookSwim a couple of months ago.  Being sold as Netflix for books, it’s still not available to the public, but Joe Wikert has a brief interview with co-founder George Burke that you might find interesting. Technorati Tags: Books, NetFlix

  • LJ on Federated Searching

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    Paul R. Pival
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    Jonathan Rochkind has a really good article in Library Journal on the current state of Federated (Meta) searching, with Google Scholar as the catalyst.  In it, he explains why Google Scholar seems more attractive than library solutions – they index information locally instead of searching it live each time.  Good examples of a couple of…

  • CFP: Internet Librarian 2007

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    Paul R. Pival
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    I don’t think funding will allow me to go this year, but the Call for Presenters for Internet Librarian 2007 (Oct. 29-31) is out.  The theme this year is 2.0: Info Pros, Library Communities, & Web Tools, and proposals are due by March 26th!  I’ve spoken at IL the past two years and really enjoyed…

  • Ovid MEDLINE Screencast

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    Paul R. Pival
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    David Rothman points to a really well-done Camtasia Studio screencast of the Ovid MEDLINE interface.  The screencast was done by a librarian at Yale, and while it’s 30 minutes long, the use of the web menu at the left of the screen makes it simple to jump back and forth to the sections you need…