7 - keeping up

Are You Experienced? Exploring User Experience

in Public Libraries

Resources (keeping up with current and upcoming library

technologies)

How can I keep up?

Here are the resources I find the most useful. I am sure I am going to leave off some of your favorite resources. Or even forget some of my favorite resources. I am sure I will hear about it….

Library Technology Reports

www.alatechsource.org/ltr/index

published 8 times a year: each issue focuses on "products, tools, and projects."

In-depth overviews of technology topics.

Computers in Libraries

www.infotoday.com/cilmag/ "a monthly magazine that provides complete coverage of the news and issues in the rapidly evolving field of library information technology."

Written in a you-can-do-this style so that even non-techies can appreciate the topics.

Select articles and columns from such magazines as:• American Libraries: americanlibrariesmagazine.org/ • Library Journal: lj.libraryjournal.com/ • School Library Journal: www.slj.com/

Just skip all that blather about welcoming teens into the library, promoting access for the elderly, inspiring patrons with this or that, etc! Go straight to the tech stuff!

Library Technology Guides website:

www.librarytechnology.org/ Thanks to Marshall Breeding, anything you want to know about ILSs and Discovery tools, vendors, current market news, who-uses-what, etc. An invaluable resource.

And mark on your calendar the times when Library Technology Guides makes available two studies:

1. Results from Perceptions (early every year, January or February), the International Survey of Library Automation)

2. The Library Systems Report (every April), which used to appear in Library Journal (as Automation Marketplace) but appeared in American Libraries in 2015.

NOTE: Library Journal published “Managing Multiplicity” by Matt Enis on April1 (Volume 140, Issue 6, pp30-34), which may be the new direction for this annual overview. It is online at: lj.libraryjournal.com/2015/04/technology/managing-multiplicity-library-systems-landscape-2015/

TechSoup website: www.techsoup.org/ You don't have to buy software here (although I recommend it), but the articles are worth your time.

Is that all?

No, but that is enough to keep you aware of past, present, and future technology in the library world.

Just find your favorite resources and -- above all -- stick with them or else fall behind (i.e., you can't keep up with technology by reading about it every 6 months…).

In sum…

Get acquainted with the non-fad technology that you encounter every day in the library, the technology that will serve the user-experience of librarians and library users for years to come.

Then you can get acquainted with Facebook, 3-D printers, and whatever other technology comes our way…because it will.