Christmas Opening Hours

All CSU Campus Libraries will be closing at 12.30pm Friday 24th December 2010 and re-opening on Tuesday 4th January 2011.

You can check the Library's opening hours on our Opening Hours page.

CSU Library Staff would like to wish you all a very happy festive season, and wish you all the very best for 2011.

Robots and the future of libraries

A key reason for the implementation of robots in Chicago State University after a careful evaluation of student needs by the school officials was the desire to save students time. Mr Crank stated that " "We discovered that the average student took 30 minutes to find a book. Books would be misplaced or not filed correctly,"... "That's a lot of time that cuts into how long students can spend analyzing the material, focusing on work, or continuing to find even more research on a particular subject." Read the article here

How does it work? Library staff at University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC) loaded books and other items into hundreds of bins, each of which has a cubbyhole in one of several four-story steel structures. Each item is tagged with a radio frequency ID chip. When students want a book a 58-foot robotic crane zooms down a narrow passageway between the structures, finds and pulls the bin and delivers it to a docking station and librarian. The process takes less than four minutes. Read more about how this works here

The robotic system saves space, which means libraries can house more spaces for students, including study rooms, meeting spaces, computer labs etc . This system enables better climate control for the collection and reduces the threat of theft. Plus the books don't need to be stored in subject order because the computer keeps track of all the items.

What are the disadvantages? There are no more shelves of books to browse, which means you can't take your time selecting a book whilst browsing along the shelves. In a time poor world though its likely that less and less patrons have the time or inclination to do this anymore. Read more on the advantages and disadvantages of the robotic library.

So far 17 libraries in North America are using this system. With libraries needing more space and yet housing more items than ever before this system is likely to become even more popular.

Highlights of New Titles

• On not being able to paint by Marion Milner Milner’s great study, first published in 1950, discusses the nature of creativity and those forces which prevent its expression. Check Availability
• The miracle of mindfulness : a manual on meditation by Thich Nhat Hanh In this beautifully written book, Buddhist monk and Nobel Peace Prize nominess Thich Nhat Hanh explains how to acquire the skills of mindfulness. Check Availability
• Sin city : crime and corruption in 20th-century Sydney by Tim Girling-Butcher Few cities have experienced such overt corruption as Sydney during the 20th century. From crooked police, politicians and members of the judiciary, through to the ingenious criminals who had them in their pockets, Sin City examines some of the big names and illicit activities associated with this controversial topic. Check Availability
• Action plan for high blood pressure by Jon G. Divine Based on proven research, this exercise-based plan will teach readers the best exercises for controlling blood pressure; correct exercise technique; and how diet, medication, and exercise interact to affect blood pressure. Check Availability
• Cutting edge advertising : how to create the world's best print for brands in the 21st century by Jim Aitchison This is the first step-by-step guide to creating cutting-edge print ads, covering everything from how advertising works, how brand-building methodologies are changing, how to get an idea, and how copy and art should be crafted. Check Availability
• Extra lives : why video games matter by Tom Bissell Extra Lives is an impassioned defense of this assailed and misunderstood art form. Bissell argues that we are in a golden age of gaming—but he also believes games could be even better. He offers a fascinating and often hilarious critique of the ways video games dazzle and, just as often, frustrate. Check Availability
• Inside out : straight talk from a gay jock by Mark Tewksbury In public, Mark Tewksbury has always credited the 1976 Olympics as a major inspiration for his becoming an Olympic champion swimmer, but in fact, it was wearing a towel-turban in imitation of his grandmother and swimming in her condo pool that first sparked his love of swimming. Intimate and endearing details such as these are what provide Tewksbury's story with relevance beyond the famous-athlete-fights-and-overcomes-his-personal-demons story. Check Availability
• Phantom limb by David Musgrave David Musgrave’s poems are at once meditative and restless, elegant and sensual – with an energy of empathy that draws him to a wealth of subjects. Check Availability
  

PhD Resources

• Time for research : time management for PhD students by Hugh Kearns & Maria Gardiner Three years might seem like ages when you’re starting out, but without some strategies, it’s gone in no time. Find out about rolling plans, dealing with distractions and interruptions, managing paper and staying motivated. Check Availability
• The PhD experience : what they didn't tell you at induction by Hugh Kearns Find out what they don't tell you at Induction that would be really useful if only you knew! We interview 10 PhD students from different disciplines, discuss the emotional roller coaster of PhD study and let you know how best to handle it. Check Availability
• Defeating self-sabotage : getting your PhD finished by Hugh Kearns & Maria Gardiner Procrastination, perfectionism, over-committing. Sound familiar? Learn how to identify your own patterns, find out what might be behind them, and work out what you can do to tackle them so that you can get your thesis finished. Check Availability
• The unwritten rules of PhD research by Marian Petre and Gordon Rugg The Unwritten Rules of PhD Research is essential reading for anyone considering a PhD or embarking on one. It will tell you the things many students wish someone had told them before they started. Check Availability

The complete list of new titles can be accessed here.

That was the year that was...

With Christmas quickly approaching, it's interesting to reflect on the year and the big & bizarre stories that made 2010 the year that it was. ABC Science has posted a list called "Science year in review: 2010" looking at some of the science highlights of the year, from "synthetic life, naughty Neanderthals, eruptions and well-endowed crickets." You can read the list, and the stories that inspired it, on the ABC Science website.

Interested to see the stories that made it to ABC Science's list in previous years?

• 2009
• 2008

Censorship and Social Networking: How successful can it really be?

Is it possible to censor social networks countrywide? While China have been moderately successful, there have always been ways of getting around the firewalls or finding a proxy server. Additionally this has come at a great cost to China financially.

This question of censorship is currently being grappled with by Chavez, president of Venezuela. The country currently has access to social network sites and actively uses them. In fact, the country has one of the highest number of Twitter subscribers in the world. Even if Chavez is successful in getting censorship imposed, the people have already experienced a shift in cultural and psychological values; as a result of the exposure to social media technology. This means that it will be more difficult to prevent people from using something that has become ingrained in everyday life.

To read more about this click here

The bill proposed could potentially grant Chavez with the chance to silence oppositional messages and tweets. During his 12 years in power, Chavez has been granted temporary decree powers three times by lawmakers. More information on Chavez's presidency can be found here

The digital story of the nativity

This video is a light-hearted look at the traditional nativity story, re-told 2010-style!

Citations Helper is now available in Interact

Staff from CSU Library’s Information and Liaison team, the Division of Learning and Teaching Services (DLTS), and the Division of Information Technology (DIT), are pleased to announce that the Citations Helper tool is now available within CSU Interact. The Citations Helper tool allows for creating and managing citations and persistent links to journal articles and other online items.

By choosing to add a 'Citation list' as an optional Resources tool within the Sakai system, users can choose to import citations from Google Scholar, and create and manage both citations and persistent links to articles and other online items.

Figure 1. Options for adding citations to a list (click image to enlarge)

The tool integrates with Google Scholar to allow users to add citations directly from the search engine into a citation list. Citations can also be added manually by clicking on the ‘Create New Citation’ button.

For CSU, the use of the SFX link-resolving service in the Citations Helper tool will enable subject coordinators to more easily direct students to content in subscribed databases without having to manually create a persistent URL for the required article. That is, for an article in a journal to which CSU Library subscribes, subject coordinators will be able to simply add the citation to a 'Citation list', and SFX will enable students to access the full text of that article.

If you would like to experiment with Citations Helper, simply go into a resources folder in Interact and from the ‘Add’ menu select ‘Add Citation List’ (see below).

Figure 2. Creating a Citation List (click image to enlarge)

If you would like further information on Citations Helper please refer to the corresponding Interact help guide, or contact one of the faculty liaison librarians.

History of the eBook

With Google launching their own eBook store in the US called Google eBooks, the eBook scene has the potential to change completely. Plans are already underway the store to be available in the UK, with international release likely.

Read here for what this release could mean for Australians.

eBooks already have a transformational history; from humble origins in 1971, to the announcement this year by Amazon that eBook purchases outnumbered print sales for the first time in history. To see a timeline history of the eBook click here