VALA2008 Session 13 McKay

VALA Peer Reviewed PaperShibbolising Online Librarian: how two university libraries enhanced their collaborative chat reference service by using a MAMS Mini grant to add authentication and develop an interoperable chat client

VALA 2008 CONCURRENT SESSION 13: Virtual Reference
Thursday 7 February 2008 11:55 – 12:30
Persistent URL: http://www.vala.org.au/vala2008-proceedings/vala2008-session-13-mckay

Jean McKay

Manager Liaison Services, Murdoch University
http://wwwlib.murdoch.edu.au

Annmaree Brown

Liaison Librarian, Macquarie University
http://www.library.mq.edu.au

Helen Bronleigh

Library Systems Coordinator, Murdoch University
http://wwwlib.murdoch.edu.au

Margaret Wright

Frontline Services Manager, Macquarie University
http://www.library.mq.edu.au

Please tag your comments, tweets, and blob posts about this session: #VALA2008

Abstract

Chat reference, so what’s new or innovative about that? It’s a common enough service now offered by many libraries. In fact, Macquarie and Murdoch University Libraries have collaborated to provide a virtual reference service since March 2003 as described in a paper presented at the VALA2004 Conference. Since then Online Librarian has been transformed using open source standards and freeware products. The result is a robust and scalable product that allows multiple operators, smart assignment of calls, transfer of calls and automatic statistics collection.