News from July, 2009

July 1, 2009 -- As Library Maintenance of Effort (MOE) is a complicated formula under normal circumstances and a very challenging prospect in light of legislative changes and financial unallottments, the SELCO Librarian offers specific details on the significant changes and calculations.

• Library MOE - Significant Changes to Maintenance of Effort in 2009
• Library MOE: Just How Will It Be Calculated?

July 6, 2009 -- The order form for the Summer 2009 Cooperative PC Purchase has been released and emailed to Online Library Directors and Automation Contacts.  The deadline for orders is Friday, July 31, with SELCO placing orders in the first week of August.  Equipment installations will be carried out as orders arrive.  If you have any questions or concerns please contact the SELCO Help Desk, thank you.

July 6, 2009 -- The First Annual Handheld Librarian Online Conference, sponsored by Alliance Library System, LearningTimes, and Infoquest, will be held on Thursday, July 30, 2009.  The conference, which will be held completely online, will allow participants to learn more about using handheld and wireless devices in libraries.  Alliance Library System, LearningTimes, and SELCO has reserved a spot at this conference by purchasing a group registration and would like to invite all SELCO and SELS member library staff to join us on July 30, 2009 in the Avila Room at the SELCO Office from 10:00 AM to 4:30 PM.  A pizza lunch will be provided.  For more information about the conference, go to Handheld Librarian Online Conference website.  We hope to see you here!

July 6, 2009 -- Two upcoming workshops have been scheduled to discuss the application process for broadband stimulus funding available to various organizations, including libraries, have been announced.  On Wednesday, July 8, 2009, ALA will be holding a "Know Your Stimulus" webinar about the application process for broadband stimulus funds.  On July 21, 2009, the National Telecommunications & Information Adminstration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service will be holding a free day-long workshop at the St. Paul Crowne Plaza Hotel on how to apply for broadband stimulus funds.  SELCO staff will be in attendance at these workshops.

July 07, 2009, 02:10 PM -- We've received calls from several Online Libraries reporting Horizon freezing or locking up.  In most cases, waiting a few minutes and trying to login again brings back normal functionality.  So far, it's only been a few libraries and there is no discernable pattern.  We are working with SirsiDynix to troubleshoot the issue and will send out more information as it becomes available.

July 07, 2009, 2:34 PM -- Our current spate of Horizon issues appears to worked itself out.  All Online Libraries who contacted us have confirmed that they are now functioning normally.  It appears that the Horizon server got a little busier than usual and suffered some loss of performance.  Factors contributing to this included:

--heavy lunchtime circulation activity at Online Libraries

--summer reading circulation activity at Online Libraries

--bibliographic database work at SELCO

 Horizon use has dropped a little now and things appear to be normal.  It's possible that, in some cases, heavy Internet use spurred on by live video feeds of the Michael Jackson memorial service aggravated the problem.

 We will continue monitoring the situation.  We have stopped work on the bib database for the day.

 Thanks for your patience.

July 10, 2009 -- Today is the deadline for Online Libraries to submit banner graphics for the new AquaBrowser online catalog.  Each library will have a personalized version of the catalog featuring the banner of their choice at the top of each page.

Questions about this process should be sent to the SELCO Help Desk.

Banner submissions should be sent to BANNER@selco.info.

July 12, 2009, 3:48 PM -- The Horizon ILS is down.  After a planned maintenance shutdown of the system on the evening of Saturday, July 11, the server hosting the ILS failed to come back up properly.  Technically, Horizon is functioning but the networking software on the server has malfunctioned and it cannot communicate to the rest of the network.  SELCO staff are working with SirsiDynix and Sun to diagnose the issue.  It appears unlikely that the system will be up immediately on Monday morning but we will continue working to bring things up as quickly as possible.  Due to this problem, preoverdue notices will not go out for today.

We will post updates to the website and in email to Online Library Directors and Automation Contacts as the situation warrants.  Please accept our apologies for this loss of service.

July 13, 2009, 7:39 AM -- Due to the problems with Horizon, this has also caused Pharos to also be down.  Once the Horizon issues are resolved, Pharos should be up shortly after that.  We apologize for any inconveniences this may have caused and appreciate your patience on this matter, thank you

July 13, 2009, 10:55 AM -- The initial problem with the network interface has been resolved.  The issue now is the possibility of disk corruption on the ILS server.  Technicians from Sun are working with SELCO staff to check the drives.  These integrity checks must be performed before we can bring anything else back up.  The process is proceeding slowly but is nearing completion.  After that, we'll need to have SirsiDynix check the Horizon database.

Above, I said "possibility" of disk corruption because it is not yet established that the drive is corrupted.  What I can tell you is that, during a reboot under less than ideal circumstances, it is not uncommon get a warning of possible corruption.  Running a disk-checking utility can clear the warning.  Alternatively, minor corruption to the files can be fixed by this same software.  If the problem turns out to be worse (and I stress that we are not to that point), other measures can be employed.

Updates will be posted here and sent as email to Online Library Directors and Automation Contacts.

ADDENDUM, 11:50 PM--I was not as clear in this posting as I should have been.  The possible drive corruption we're looking at is on the server drive that houses the operating system (Solaris 10), NOT the hard drive array that houses the Horizon databases.  At this point, we have no reason to be concerned about Horizon data.

July 15, 2009, 10:52 AM  --  Day End is complete for July 14th, and circulation reports, reset pull lists, and notices for review lists are now available.

July 21, 2009  --  New collection codes were added to the SELCO ILS, as detailed in an ILS Bulletin sent out this afternoon. Read this and other bulletins here.

July 27, 2009 - - We have encountered some slowness with the iPac today, so I will be doing a full re-index of the iPac tonight. Starting at 9:00 PM, the web catalog will be down. It will take a few hours to complete before searches contain full results. Thanks for your patience.

July 30, 2009  - - The Handheld Librarian Conference is experiencing technical difficulties. Conference organizers sent a new URL for the conference that is working for us. Anyone else registered and still having difficulties should check their email for the updated link.
Please direct any further calls about the webinar to the phone number shown below.

888-222-9749