Home Page > FDLP Desktop > Administrative Notes > May. 15 - June 15, 2008

Administrative Notes: Newsletter of the FDLP

Public Printer Names New Members to Depository Library Council

Public Printer Robert C. Tapella is pleased to announce the appointment of five new members to the Depository Library Council.

The Council, composed of 15 members each of whom serve three year terms, advises the Public Printer on policy matters relating to the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). The FDLP, which traces its roots to 1813, provides access across America to the published information of all three Branches of the United States Government through partnerships with more than 1,250 libraries ranging from public libraries to research universities.

“I am pleased to welcome this talented incoming class of Council members,” said Public Printer Robert C. Tapella. “I look forward to their advice as GPO continues to work with the library community to provide free, open and permanent public access to the documents of our democracy.”

The five new DLC members for the October 1, 2008 - September 30, 2011 term are:

• David Cismowski, Regional Depository Librarian at California State Library, Sacramento. In his role, Cismowski has worked to improve communication and networking among California’s depository community. He has helped to re-institute California depository conferences, kept the California depository community connected via the state’s depository online news list and started an orientation program for new depository coordinators.
  
  
• Carlene Engstrom, Library Director for D’Arcy McNickle Library, Salish Kootenai College, Pablo, Montana. Engstrom has been Library Director at the college since 1999. She has also served as the President of the American Indian Library Association and is active in many other library and educational organizations. As an advocate for improved access to resources, she has planned and coordinated the digitization of 20 years of a tribal newspaper. She worked with the University of Montana to transfer the college’s library catalog to the University of Montana Libraries Online Shared Catalog. This catalog involves more than 80 libraries in the state that pooled resources to purchase a library automation system for library customers.
  
  
• Sarah (Sally) G. Holterhoff, Associate Professor of Law Librarianship and Government Information/Reference Librarian at Valparaiso University Law Library, Valparaiso, Indiana. She is also a member of the legal research faculty and has been a government documents librarian since 1981. Holterhoff served on the Depository Library Council from 1987-90 and is a member of INDIGO (Indiana Networking for Documents and Information of Government Organizations), a group she helped to organize in 1992. She is the immediate past president of the American Association of Law Libraries.
  
  
• Justin Otto, Social Sciences and Government Documents Reference Librarian at Eastern Washington University, John F. Kennedy Library, Cheney, Washington. He is the coordinator of the American Library Association’s GODORT Federal Documents Task Force, which provides a communication forum between documents librarians and others involved in government information. Otto previously served as the Economics Liaison Librarian at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.
  
  
• Suzanne Sears, head of the Government Documents Department, University of North Texas Willis Library, Denton, Texas. Sears joined the university in August 2007. She spent ten years as Government Documents Librarian at the Tulsa City-County Library, which was the recipient of the first annual Federal Depository Library of the Year Award in 2003. She also served as Chair of the Oklahoma Library Association’s Government Documents Round Table in 2000-2001.

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Interagency Depository Seminar Preliminary Schedule Now Online

The 21st Annual Interagency Depository Seminar will be held in Washington, DC from July 28, 2008 through August 1, 2008. During the week-long seminar, representatives from various Federal agencies will present an overview of their information products and activities as they relate to Federal depository libraries.

A preliminary schedule of events and additional event information is available on the FDLP Desktop.

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Registration Now Open for Fall Council Meeting and Conference

Registration is now open for the fall meeting of the Federal Depository Library Council and Federal Depository Library conference, to be held October 20-22, 2008 in Arlington, VA. For details, including hotel location and registration, visit the events page on the FDLP Desktop.

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Call for Presentations at 2008 Federal Depository Library Conference

GPO invites the Federal documents community to submit proposals for presentations at the annual Federal Depository Library conference.

The conference committee invites presentations from introductory to advanced levels on topics related to Federal information librarianship, including but not limited to:

• Collection Development
• Cataloging and Other Methods for Access
• Depository Library Operations, Training,  Management
• Regional and Local Depository Events
• Depository Library Promotion
• Preservation of Depository Materials

Presentations may run for 45 minutes or 90 minutes, with a sole presenter or a panel. Audiovisual equipment will be provided.

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Annual Item Selection Update Cycle Begins June 2, 2008

An opportunity to add item numbers to depository library selection profiles will take place in June and July 2008. From June 2 through July 31, depositories may make additions, which will take effect on October 1, 2008. The Annual Item Selection Update Cycle will follow existing procedures used for previous update cycles.

GPO recommends that libraries review their current selections in terms of their communities’ government information needs and change their selections accordingly.

Libraries are strongly encouraged to select electronic information products only when they adhere to their Federal collection plan.

The Annual Item Selection Update Cycle period is the only time that items may be added. Items may be dropped at any time. Adds will not take effect until October 1.

Please use the amendment of item selections form, which can be found on the old FDLP Desktop.

In making selections, bear in mind that titles in the FDLP Basic Collection and Essential Titles Lists are primary U.S. Government resources which may be of interest to many depository library communities.

Please use the amendment of item selections form, which can be found on the old FDLP Desktop.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Making Amendments to Selections
Libraries enter their amendments to selections using the Amendment to Item Selections form.

You will need your depository library number and internal password to submit your additions or deletions.

Contact Information
To report inputting errors, request your password, get help with access, or to ask any other question about the update cycle, please contact the GPO online help service.

To ensure that your question is routed to the correct area, please choose the category Federal Depository Libraries and then, under the subcategory DEPOSITORY MANAGEMENT, choose Annual Item Selection Update Cycle.

NOTE: If you mistakenly delete an item number or select an item number that you really wanted to delete, you must contact GPO. Do not try to re-input the correct selection by entering another transaction on the Amendment to Item Selections form.

Suggestions for Changing Formats
If you want to change from paper to microfiche for dual distribution items, GPO suggests the following procedure to reduce gaps in holdings:

1. Add the microfiche item during the update cycle.
2. Once the new selection is distributed in April, delete the paper item.

For example, to change the Federal Register selection from paper to microfiche, add item 0573-D in December or January, for implementation in April. Then use the Web Amendment to Item Selections form to delete item 0573-C after you begin receiving microfiche copies.

Items Distributed to All Libraries
Titles distributed under item numbers 0154-B, 0556-C, and 1004-E are distributed to all depository libraries whether your library selects these items or not. GPO will distribute other titles under these item numbers throughout the year if the informational content is deemed relevant to all depository libraries. Please do not drop these item numbers from your selection profile.

Regionals Only:
Reminder: Item 0993-A-01, Congressional Record (bound) 1985 and forward, SuDocs Class X 1.1:, and Item 1008-F, Serial Set (bound) 105th Congress and forward, SuDocs Class Y 1.1/2:, can be selected only by regionals or by one designated library in each state that does not contain a regional library.

Automatic Confirmation of Selections
Automatic confirmation of the changes you input is a function of the Web application. If you enter your e-mail address along with your depository library number and internal password when filling out the online selection update form, an e-mail confirmation of your transactions should be sent to you. However, for your records you may want to print out and/or save the Web page confirmation that appears as soon as you hit the Submit button. When you save the file, change the file name extension from .cgi to .html to view the page in a Web browser.

Tools to Help Evaluate Your Selection Options
Tools to help evaluate your selection options are listed on the FDLP Desktop.

Tools include:

• List of Classes
  
• Administrative Notes Technical Supplement, Update to the List of Classes, New Item Numbers
  
• Documents Data Miner 2 (DDM2)

EFFECTIVE DATES

Deletions
If you have deleted item numbers for paper and electronic titles, GPO will stop shipping the publications within 1-2 weeks of your Web transaction. You should not claim publications listed under these items on shipping lists dated after the date you submitted the deletion.

Deletion of microfiche item numbers will take effect beginning the week after the amendment was submitted.

Deletions can be submitted to GPO throughout the year.

Additions
Libraries will be able to make additions to their selection profile only during the Annual Item Selection Update Cycle (June 1 through July 31, 2008).

All additions must be posted to the Web site by July 31, 2008.

All additions remain pending until they are activated on October 1, 2008. Libraries will begin to receive new publications with shipping lists dated October 1, 2008 and after.

Claims
Do not base your claims for missing depository publications on additions made during this update cycle period until the first shipping list is distributed after October 1, 2008. If you do, the claims will not be honored.

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Book Conservation Program Available in OPAL Archive

"The Conservation Kitchen: Basic Tools for Any Preservation Recipe" is now available for viewing in the GPO OPAL archive.

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Share Your Expertise with Other Depositories

If you have developed training programs on any aspect of depository library operations, consider sharing them with the wider community through GPO's online learning program via OPAL. You can submit a proposal anytime.

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Help Us Help You!

When you make an inquiry or provide information to us, we can respond to you more quickly if you give us complete contact information, including your depository library number, full name, phone number and email address. For password inquiries, we can respond only to the depository coordinator or director listed in the Federal Depository Library Directory, so be sure to keep your library’s entry up to date!

For all inquiries, it helps us to have as much information about the subject as possible. If you are inquiring about a specific publication, please supply all known information, including the complete SuDocs class and item number, as well as the title. If you are submitting a claim, we need the shipping list number and date, as well as the SuDocs class and item number.

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Homeland Security Digital Library Now Available to Depositories

GPO and the Naval Postgraduate School have announced their recent partnership to provide access to the Homeland Security Digital Library (HSDL). HSDL is a database of over 50,000 non-classified Presidential directives and policy and national strategy documents, as well as specialized resources related to Homeland Security. Additional information about HSDL is contained in a presentation by Greta Marlatt at the Fall 2007 Federal Depository Library Conference.

Prior to this partnership, HSDL was only available to Federal, state and local government officials, research institutions and the U.S. military.

All Federal depository libraries are now eligible to add HSDL to their item selection profiles. Academic and Federal agency libraries will have the option of gaining access through IP authentication. All other depositories will be eligible for access via a password. Individual user names and password will be provided to all reference librarians.

A validation form must be signed by your library director and faxed to GPO at 202-512-2300 before you receive access to HSDL. Once verified, your library will receive instructions on how to set-up an account from GPO.

The validation form is available from the FDLP Desktop. By faxing the signed form, your library has agreed to the terms on the form, which include:

• Login information is for library staff only and should not be given to patrons;
• You may not allow organizations outside your library to connect to HSDL using your account and password via your library's computer network.

GPO has classified, cataloged, and created a PURL for HSDL. An entry will appear in an upcoming Administrative Notes Technical Supplement and WebTech Notes:

SuDoc number: HS 1.18:
Item number: 0520-B-24
PURL: http://purl.access.gpo.gov/GPO/LPS93521
Aleph system ID: 613113
OCLC #: 62246163

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Computer Security Issues in Depository Libraries

In light of recent communications regarding authentication of patron identification on library computers, the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) would like to take this opportunity to address some of the common security issues we are seeing more frequently in depository libraries.

The overall goal of the depository program is to provide the public no-fee access to U.S. Government information regardless of format. That said, GPO recognizes the necessity of securing computer networks. Balancing the need for network security and no-fee access to depository electronic information can be accomplished.

For libraries that use log-ins or authentication, the Federal Depository Library Handbook states, "Libraries may provide guests the ability to log-in at a workstation or staff may log them in at authenticated stations. At a minimum, if all workstations providing Internet access require authentication, users should be directed to public service desks for assistance through mediated searching."

On a similar thread, libraries that employ filters, "must allow users the option to use workstations without filtering software or provide the capability of turning off the filter while users are searching FDLP information resources... At a minimum, if your library is unable to deactivate filtering in a rapid manner, you must provide mediated searching for depository users."

Keep in mind that language on public workstations, Web pages, and signage should promote access to government information rather than dissuading or limiting access.

As technologies evolve, the depository community and GPO will continue to work together to find that balance point between library user needs and network security requirements.

For additional information, please see:

• Federal Depository Library Handbook, Chapter 4. Public Services
• FDLP Internet Use Policy
• Depository Library Public Service Guidelines for Government Information in Electronic Formats

If you would like to discuss your library's situation with GPO, please feel free to contact us at (202) 512-1119.

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Nominate a Depository Library of the Year

While all depositories work hard to support the FDLP and provide Government information to the public, there are those libraries that have gone above and beyond the norm. Please take the time to acknowledge those efforts and successes by nominating them for the Federal Depository Library of the Year.

Nomination guidelines, information about the award, past winners and the nomination form are available on the FDLP Desktop under the drop-down menu of Outreach and Education > Library of the Year.

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Update Your Library Directory Entry

Please check your library's entry and input any changes online.

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Questions?

If you have questions or comments on any of the content in Administrative Notes, please send them to askGPO, the online help service at:
http://gpo.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/gpo.cfg/php/enduser/ask.php

To ensure that your question is routed to the correct area, please choose the category "Federal Depository Libraries" and the appropriate subcategory, if any.

You may also contact the GPO Customer Contact Center at 866-512-1800 (Toll-free), or at 202-512-1800 (DC Metropolitan Area), Monday through Friday, 7:00 a.m. - 6:30 p.m., EST.

A service of the U.S. Government Printing Office.

Last update Date: June 23, 2008
Page Name: http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pubs/adnotes/ad5-6-1508.html