Reminder: Barcode Deal Deadline is Monday

The deadline to place an order for patron barcodes at the special price is Monday, January 31, 2011 at 3pm. Ordering details are in the original posting about the deal. Incomplete or late orders cannot be honored at this special price.

SW B van route shortened 1/25

The Southeastern Route B van delivery route is being cut short today, due to the travelling conditions. If you are not sure which route that is, please check the website http://www.nh.gov/nhsl/services/librarians/van_delivery/southeastern.html Jarod is attempting an abbreviated route today, hoping to hit his heaviest stops, before he returns to the State Library.

Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

Diana DeCota,
Library Technician
NH State Library
(603)271-2206

SW B & CD vans cancelled 1/21

Friday, Jan. 21: Two van routes have cancelled today, due to weather. The van routes not running are Southwest B and Capital District. To see affected libraries visit our van website at http://www.nh.gov/nhsl/services/librarians/van_delivery/friday.html.


Donna Gilbreth
Supervisor, Reference and Information Services
New Hampshire State Library
20 Park Street
Concord, NH 03301
603-271-2060
donna.gilbreth@dcr.nh.gov

NHU-PAC back in service 1/19

Wednesday, Jan. 19, 11:36 a.m.: Well, that took a little longer than planned but the NHU-PAC is back in service after some needed repair work. No further interruptions are expected today. Please contact the NHAIS Help Desk at 271-2141 if you find something in the NHU-PAC not working as expected.

NHU-PAC outage 1/19

Wednesday, Jan. 19, 11:15 a.m.: NHU-PAC searches at this time will yield an "unable to retrieve results" message while maintenance continues on the database. The work should be completed shortly and a message will be posted at that time.

Brief NHU-PAC outage 11 a.m. Wed. 1/19

Wednesday, Jan. 19: There will be a brief interruption of NHU-PAC service starting at 11 o'clock this morning. You'll be able to connect to the website but functions like searching the database will not work. Service should be restored within 5 minutes.

Brief NHU-PAC outage 1/19 late morn

Wednesday, Jan. 19: There will be a brief interruption of NHU-PAC service late this morning for maintenance purposes. The outage should last about 5 minutes and is expected to begin sometime between 10 a.m. and noon. I hope to be able to post a more precise start time later.

Van Service Cancellations, 1/18

The Southeastern Supplemental (Route B) [Jarod's] and the Capital District [Frank's] Van Delivery Routes are cancelled for today, January 18.

NHU-PAC Reaches 2 Million Records

At 12:03pm, on Monday December 13, 2010 an OCLC bibliographic record was added to the NHU-PAC for Extreme New England Weather by Josh Judge. This was the 2 millionth bibliographic record in the NHU-PAC. It was added at the request of the Weeks Memorial Library in Lancaster.

As of today there are several holdings on this record, including one for J. A. Tarbell in Lyndeborough. On November 17, 2010 they put in the first request for a record for this title, but since no record existed on OCLC on that date the request was set aside to be re-searched. (As part of the normal processing routine in NHAIS requests that have all the needed info but that don't match an existing OCLC record are set aside and re-searched within 2 weeks.)

On 12/07/2010 a record for this title was added to the OCLC WorldCat. Consequently, when the title appeared in the batch of requests submitted to NHU-PAC on December 7, 2010 it was found (on the 8th) and added to the database. Holdings from previous requests were then added onto this bibliographic record.

Those of you who pay close attention to details may notice that this record is not NHU PAC Record #2000000. That is because records are added and removed from the database by the hundreds each week. Every record that goes into the NHU-PAC--a brief record to let us know a library needs ar ecord for something, or a test load of a record that is later deleted, or a full MARC record ready for holdings to be attached--gets the next sequential record number assigned to it. When we remove a record--a duplicate, or a brief record, or whatever--the number that was assigned to the deleted record isn't reused. So, it took us 2,512,457 loaded records to get 2,000,000 good MARC records in the database.

Congratulations to everyone who adds records to NHU-PAC, a great resource for NH libraries is getting better all the time thanks to your contributions!

A Video Introduction to ALA

The current president of ALA, Roberta Stevens, has done a 5 minute video introducing ALA. What it is, why you should join, and how members can get involved. It gives a nice quick summary of a lot of ALA stuff and -- I am guessing here -- a look at what one of the really nice offices at the Library of Congress looks like.

Van service cancelled except NC 1/12

All van routes except the North Country route are cancelled today (Wednesday, January 12th) due to the snow storm.

Donna Gilbreth
Supervisor, Reference and Information Services
New Hampshire State Library
20 Park Street
Concord, NH 03301
603-271-2060
donna.gilbreth@dcr.nh.gov

Special Offer on Patron Barcodes

If you have been thinking about moving to standard barcodes for your patrons – or if you are running low on patron barcodes and want to stock up – we have negotiated a special one-time deal with Reliance Label, our barcode vendor.

If you place an order (by emailing the info outlined below) by 3pm on Monday, Janury 31, 2011:

You can get 1000 patron barcodes, with your library name (or whatever 25 characters you want) printed on them for $20.

If you want duplicate labels (2 of each number, one for the patron's card, one for your records) you can get that with a 1000 label order.

You also have the option of ordering 500 patron barcode labels (duplicate labels not allowed) for $15.

Shipping, handling, and set up fees have been bundled into this package price. However, unlike typical barcode orders placed with NHAIS Services, these orders will be shipped as a single order to the NHSL and redistributed via van delivery. You will receive an invoice for your order from NHAIS in the package with the barcodes.

****************************************************
To order, send an email with all the information requested below to mary.russell@dcr.nh.gov by 3pm on 1/31/2011. Incomplete or late orders cannot be honored at this special price.

Library placing order: ____________________________________
HSA code: _______________
Person placing order: __________________________
Phone #: ____________________________________

Van delivery address: ___________________________________
____________________________________
____________________________________

Qty of patron barcodes (500 or 1000): ____________

Do you want duplicate numbers? ______ (if yes, you will get half as many unique numbers as indicated above)

Patron barcodes begin with 2, followed by your 4 digit institution identifier.
Your identifier (if you don't know it list your HSA code and we will look it up): _____________

What 8 digit number (including leading zeros) do you want your order to begin at? (This will be positions 6-13 of the 1st label): ______________________________________

What do you want printed above the number on each label (up to 25 alphanumeric characters, including spaces, capitalized as indicated here):
_________________________________________________________________

For Duplicate labels only: What do you want printed on the 2nd set of labels (up to 25 alphanumeric characters, including spaces, capitalized as indicated here):
___________________________________________________________________

Brief searching outage 1/10 am

Monday, Jan. 10: There will be a brief interruption of NHU-PAC searching starting at 8:10 this morning. The interruption should last no more than 5 minutes.

Barcode Prices Drop for 2011

NHAIS Services, working with our long-time barcode vendor, Reliance Label Solutions, was able to lower the cost of barcodes for NHAIS libraries for 2011.

The new price (for the same high-quality labels we have been getting) is $16.75 per thousand labels ordered, with a minumum order (as always) of 10,000 labels. This will save libraries $13.50 per minimum order -- hopefully you can use the savings to add an extra item to your collection!

Details about ordering are on the Technical Services Supplies page of the NHAIS Services webpage. We have also added some Barcode Basics information to the site.

January 2011 Van Delivery News

The New Hampshire State Library is closed on Monday, January 17, 2011, in observance of Martin Luther King, Jr./Civil Rights Day.

There will be NO Van Delivery on that date.

For a complete list of all of the holidays the State Library is closed, please visit http://www.nh.gov/nhsl/services/librarians/van_delivery/instructions.html (the van delivery instructions) and scroll down to "NO Van Service".

If for any other reason (e.g. bad weather) van service on a particular route(s) does not operate, libraries will be notified via an e-mail message and a post to this blog. If your library does not receive van service on a particular day, please check your e-mail and/or this blog before calling the State Library.

Please remember to properly label each item which you are sending via the Van Delivery Service. This will help ensure these items make it to the correct destination in a timely manner.

If you need a refresher on how items should be marked for the van, please refer to the Van Delivery Service - Instructions, http://www.nh.gov/nhsl/services/librarians/van_delivery/instructions.html, and scroll down to number 3 of the guidelines, "Addressing material to be sent on the van".

To print a current van directory list arranged in alphabetical order by library, please use the PDF version which is available at http://www.nh.gov/nhsl/services/librarians/van_delivery/documents/vandirectory.pdf

You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view and print this pdf file.

If you do not have it installed on your machine, you may down load it for free from http://www.adobe.co.uk/products/acrobat/readstep2.html

Due to the ever increasing load of materials transported by the New Hampshire State Library van delivery system, our vans can reach maximum capacity before the end of a van route, especially following long weekends and holidays. Our drivers can decline to accept materials if they feel they cannot fit them safely on their van. We are also asking libraries to please be aware of volume during times when there is likely to be a problem. You should prioritize your materials to be picked up, in case some items must be left until the next van pick up. That will allow us to immediately transport the most important items as quickly as possible.

If you have any questions you may contact Donna Gilbreth at 271-2060 or Diana DeCota at 271-2206.

NHU-PAC keyword indexes up to date!

Wednesday, January 5, 10:20 a.m.: For the first time in nearly a month, NHU-PAC's keyword indexes are up to date and new materials are searchable within a minute or two of being added to the database.

From December 22 through this morning, we were using a static keyword index that only included materials added through mid-October. More than 10,000 MARC bibliographic records have been added to the NHU-PAC since then and now they're findable through all the searching methods available on the NHU-PAC.

Brief searching outage 1/5 am

Wednesday, January 5, 7:45 a.m.: Expect a brief (5-10 min.) interruption of NHU-PAC searching later than morning as we try out a new keyword index that should bring search results up to date. The outage probably won't happen until after 9:30 a.m.

Does Your Rural Public Library Need New Childrens Books?

Ann Hoey sent this out to NH libraries today with the suggestion that you should take a look at this grant opportunity if you are in a community of fewer than 5,000 residents.

The Children's Literacy Foundation (CLiF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to nurturing a love of reading and writing among children throughout New Hampshire and Vermont. CLiF's programs have already touched the lives of many thousands of children across the Twin states. One of the ways CLiF supports children's literacy is by awarding Rural Library Sponsorships for libraries in towns with less than 5,000 inhabitants. Each sponsorship includes $2,000 worth of new, high-quality, children's books as well as a 45-minute storytelling presentation to all the towns elementary school children at which we deliver all the new books.

Please note that libraries are able to choose the books they would like from a list of more than 800 titles. In addition we will also sponsor a local childcare center or home daycare by providing them with a storytelling session, a collection of brand-new children's books and give-away books for their children. Most CLiF book delivery celebrations take place at the local elementary school, and we typically have every child in town from Kindergarten to Grade 6 attend these special events. Its a very memorable occasion that rekindles the children's interest in books and reading, and reminds them of the treasures that await them at their local library. Most libraries find that their children's book circulation increases significantly, immediately following a CLiF sponsorship.

If your library is interested in applying, please visit www.clifonline.org to download an application or contact CLiF at (802) 244-0944 and they will be happy to send you one. This is also the point of contact if you need more information about CLiF's Rural Library Sponsorships.

The deadline for the next application is February 1!

This sponsorship is completely free for your library!

NHU-PAC update

Hello and welcome to 2011. If you've been reading all the NHAIS Notes postings of the past two weeks, you can skip the rest of this message. Because many libraries were closed over the holidays, this posting is an attempt to summarize what's happened with the NHU-PAC recently.

For much of last month, our keyword indexes were only updated through December 8. Following a server software upgrade that had the NHU-PAC out of service for much of the day on December 22, we've actually moved backwards and materials added to the database since late October are not searchable through keyword indexes as of this writing. We continue to work with SirsiDynix on this significant problem.

In the meantime, you can use browse indexes to find records for newer materials (except in the ILL program, where this option is not available). Browse searches that consolidate results (Authors, Standard Subject Headings, Series Titles, Uniform Titles) may not show recent additions but all other browse searches (including Titles, ISBNs, and Numbers Appearing on Materials) will give up-to-date results.

There are some minor changes in the NHU-PAC as a result of the software upgrade but we're still reconfiguring a few things. Once things are in their more-or-less final form, a message about the changes will be posted.