Vacation

This week I’m in the company of family in lovely Rehoboth Beach. I figured it’d be a good idea to explain why my posting pattern was about to become sparse.

*snerk* Comedy. Gold.

Self-deprecating humor aside — and there’s something that deserves its own tag — the past two weeks have been kind of crazy at the library, with some staff alterations and a trip down to Northern New Jersey to obtain nearly 600 volumes of labor and employment law books from a generous donor. (For the record: me and Ryan, the student assistant who accompanied me, managed to fit them into 55 boxes, all of which fit into the van we were driving. If that’s not success, I’m not sure what is.)

I’m trying to forget the craziness for the week, and stop thinking that I’d be better off there. Because, seriously? It’s all gonna be there when I get back, and right now I’ve got warm weather, a beach, and a sack full of books.

I’ll deal.

A moment of geekery

The Tompkins County Public Library has an amazing collection of graphic novels, including the entire run of the manga masterpiece Lone Wolf and Cub. Being able to get those books out, often five or six volumes at a time, was a phenomenal thing for me a few years back; the work truly lived up to its reputation.

Two weeks ago, I checked out Lone Wolf and Cub 2100 from the same library. This more recent, American work, adapted the tale into a shorter form, and temporally shifted the setting into a post-apocalyptic future. It was entertaining, but lacked the power and impact of the original. I also couldn’t help thinking that I’d read a better post-apocalyptic LW&C pastiche. Then I remembered: I had, years before, and was called Grendel: War Child. Unfortunately, I’d read borrowed copies of the original single issues, and the library didn’t own the compilation.

Thank goodness for interlibrary loan.

A week later, I was reading through said compilation and finding my memories of its quality were not unearned (though it may be the goriest of the three works cited here, which is something of an achievement). It was also interesting that it inverted a common element of American works that draw on Japanese inspirations: it was in many ways a samurai story with a cowboy ending, rather than the reverse.

This sort of thing is why I love libraries.

More information solicitation: Content management

The project I’m working on for my library school internship involves setting up a single research portal for use by the faculty of an academic department (the very department which granted me my BS, in fact). I’m in the process of vetting both content and the system to manage that content, and it’s the latter that I’d like to pick folks’ brains about.

It doesn’t look like LibGuides is going to fit the bill for what we’re trying to do, and I’m not sure that Drupal will be within my capabilities given the time frame for this project. So right now I’m looking at other CMSs, as well as systems like wikis; this article by Edward M. Corrado and Kathryn A. Frederick was an excellent start, but now I’m hoping to hear from folks who have undertaken projects like this.

The department in question has around 25 faculty members, and is looking for a single website where they can find resources relevant to their research drawn from the Cornell University Library, the U.S. government, and other online and print sources. I’m looking for a system that is easy to set up, easy for the faculty to use, and easy to maintain (since I can only be dedicated to this project for six months, tops).

Any advice, warnings, recommendations or tall tales would be greatly appreciated!