Title

LiBerry Guides Go Mobile: Creating Usable Handheld Solutions for 21st Century Student

Document Type

Presentation

Publication Date

10-1-2009

Description

According to the PEW Internet Project’s December 2007 survey, on a typical day 73% of young adults (age18-29) use their cell phone or PDA. An informal survey of 150 East Tennessee State University students indicated they would be highly likely to use a handheld device to access course materials or library related information. Dovetailing with our student population’s desire to use their Blackberries, IPODs, and other handheld devices, the ETSU Library decided to adapt its library guides to work in the mobile handheld environment. The library uses LibGuides, an application for producing webpages, which are linked to ETSU’s online course management system Desire2Learn (D2L). A link to the library homepage already exists on every D2L course site. The decision to go mobile not only determines the content but how a librarian customizes a subject guide to be embedded in a course’s D2L site, builds subject guides for the library’s webpages, or produces individual guides for researchers. These mobile subject guides include text and links to online materials such as the online catalog, e-books, databases, Internet sites, bibliographic style guides, and advice on database selection. Librarians have to be prepared to tailor subject guides based on the capacity of the devises currently being used by their clients; one size doesn’t fit all.

Location

Salt Lake City, UT

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