from the Campuses of Monash University
In a naming ceremony that took place on Wednesday 21st September, the Main Library building at Monash University became the Sir Louis Matheson Library building. The ceremony flowed from the University Council decision to name the Main Library after the founding Vice-Chancellor of Monash University, Sir Louis Matheson. The ceremony was officiated by the Chancellor and the Vice-Chancellor, in the presence of Sir Louis and Lady Matheson.
The Sir Louis Matheson Library (formerly the Main Library) currently houses :
Humanities and Social Sciences Library (Collection and Services)
University Library Administration
MONINFO (The Library's commercial information service)
When the new Information Services Building (ISB) is completed in late 1994, some of the existing services and facilities currently located in the Sir Louis Matheson Library building will be moved into the ISB library wing. These include the Rare Books, University Library Administration and the Technical Services Division. The ISB will also house new facilities and services, including the Postgraduate Reading Room, Computer Instructional Facilities, the Music and Audiovisual Services and the Asian Studies Research Library (refer to story on page 3).
The Asian Studies Research Library, The Postgraduate Reading Room and the Music and Audiovisual Services will be managed as part of the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, while other facilities and services will be managed centrally.
At a later stage a centralised book storage facility will be established in the Sir Louis Matheson Library in the space vacated by the Technical Services Division.
The Library has been offering free hands-on training sessions in the use of AARNet (the Australian Academic and Research Network) and the Internet (the world's largest international network) sense mid 1993. This year courses have been conducted for University staff at Caulfield, Clayton, Gippsland and peninsula campuses. A couple of lunchtime demonstration sessions have also been held this year. One of these lunchtime sessions was to promote the Campus Wide Information System (CWIS) to people on campus who were interested in using it to advertise their services and activities and as a tool for disseminating information. The other lunchtime session was delivered as a HEPCIT presentation, to talk about AARNet and the Internet, and to promote the courses being offered by the Library.
During First Semester 1994, 107 staff were trained with the course covering the following:
| Day 1 | Day 2 |
| Internet/AARNet | Remote Login (telnet) |
| Overview | Menu driven telnet (LIBS / Hytelnet) |
| Electronic Conferencing | Networked Information Resources |
| Introduction to CWIS | Archie, File transfer (ftp) |
| Internet Gopher | World Wide Web |
| Access to remote databases | |
| Using WAIS indexes and Veronica |
In Second Semester, it was decided to hold a series of single half-day introductory sessions open to all University staff. A number of Faculties specific training sessions will also be run for the Medical Faculty, and the Faculty of Business and Economics. Course content will incorporate aspects of the general courses, and will be tailored to meet the perceived needs of the faculty concerned via input from the Subject Librarians affiliated with those Faculties.
The general half day introductory sessions in Second Semester cover the following:
Introduction to AARNet/Internet
Introduction to World Wide Web (WWW)
Understanding URL's (Uniform Resource Locators)
Saving Internet Documents
Electronic Conferencing
Access to Remote Databases (Telnet via the WWW)
File Transfer Protocol via the WWW
Accessing Gopher via the WWW
plus a brief overview of finding subject specific resources on the Internet.
The general courses have been booked out for the remainder of 1994. A number of courses will be offered in First Semester 1995. These will be advertised early next year. University staff interested in pursuing Faculty based training in 1995 should approach their Subject Librarian in the first instance.
Deidre Schutz
Network Librarian
Ph: 905 5292
Email :Deidre.Schutz@lib.monash.edu.au
Towards the end of 1993 Monash University Library was presented with an opportunity to establish an Asian Studies Research Library (ASRL). The Vice-Chancellor and Deputy Vice-Chancellors' support was sought and obtained for the proposal to go ahead. The ASRL will provide a focus for the University's Asian Studies programs and it will facilitate and attract Asian Studies Researchers. The ASRL will be located on the lower ground floor of the Information Services Building (ISB), and it is anticipated that the ASRL will be operating by the beginning of first semester 1995.
The ASRL will be a specialist research collection with the primary emphasis in the fields of language, literature, the humanities and social sciences. Asian resource librarians with the appropriate language skills will be at hand to service the collections. Provision will also be made for online access to databases which will be of interest to researchers. For example, it is expected that by the middle of 1995, the National Chinese, Japanese and Korean (CJK) Project funded by DEET and a consortium of Australian University Libraries and the National Library of Australia, will make it possible for researchers to access data in these languages in the original scripts.
Materials to be located the ASRL will include books and periodicals in the Asian vernacular languages such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Malay, Vietnamese, Thai, etc.
The Korean Studies Research Library (ASRL) established by the National Korean Studies Centre consortium and funded from DEET funds will also be located and serviced as part of the ASRL.
The Library has now taken delivery of the first edition of SESAME2 on CD-ROM. This CD-ROM
contains abbreviated entries for all publications that were in the Monash University Library catalogue at the beginning of July 1994, together with a simple but powerful searching engine, the use of which is largely intuitive. We have contracted with the supplier for a quarterly update of the database, initially for 12 months.
The purpose of the CD-ROM edition is primarily to serve as a back-up on occasions when PALS is down.
Visitors, honorary and sessional staff will need to obtain a Monash University identity card before they can be provided with library borrowing privileges.
The card is available on request from Personnel Client services Branch Departmental Chairmen should provide a written request for the issue of a card, specifying the nature of the visit and its duration. After receiving their identification card, visiting staff members can then use the card to obtain library borrowing privileges from any Branch Library.
For further information contact Joan Mitchell, Personnel Client Services Branch on ph. 905 6089.
William Golding 1911-1993
The British Council's travelling exhibition on William Golding will be on display at Monash University Library from 18 October - 20 November. The exhibition is on display on the first floor of the ISB (Information Services Building), Sir Louis Matheson Library building and can be viewed during library opening hours. The exhibition consists of several panels illustrating Golding's life and works including his most famous novel Lord of the flies.
Entrance to the exhibition to free. Limited copies of a free catalogue
are available. For more information please contact the Rare Books
Librarian, Richard Overell,
ph: 905 2689
Email:Richardo@lib.monash.edu.au
New books on display in the Biomedical Library and the Alfred Sub-Branch Library now appear of the Monash Libraries New Book List accessed online through the Monash Campus Wide Information Service (CWIS).
They may not be borrowed for the two weeks they are on display, but may be reserved at the loans desk t be borrowed when they come off display on a Friday morning. The list is in call number order and shows author, title, series and date of publication.
To access the Biomedical New Book List, type Gopher at the system prompt. From the menu choose : - Monash University Information
- Library Information
- Monash Libraries New Book List
- Biomedical Library
Each weekly list will remain on the CWIS for six weeks, showing the dates the books are on display. New titles from the Alfred Sub-branch Library will be listed at the end.
For the last 3 years the Gippsland Campus Library has provided remote dial-in access to CD-ROM databases for off-campus students through the Library's ROMOTE system. However, this only allows one user at a time to access either of the two ROMOTE workstations.
The Gippsland Library has been allocated $100 000 from the University's Quality Funds to improve access to databases by remote students. Funds already allocated for a CD-ROM network for on-campus students will be added to this sum to provide a new network, ROMOTE-PLUS, which will service both on-campus and off-campus students.
A system which is currently in operation at the universities of Sydney, New South Wales and Western Australia has been selected, and implementation of the project has begun. The network, which is expected to be completed before the end of the year, will provide simultaneous access to 7 databases in high demand for up to 16 users (through 8 on-campus workstations and dial in access through 8 modems on dedicated lines).
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Comments to Angela Prior
(Last updated 26/3/96)