New Look for Library Web Site

The Library launches a refreshed home page on 6 February 2012.

The site has been redeveloped after consultation and testing with JCU students.

The home page uses less library terms  and has been designed to reflect four goals:

  1. Find knowledge and  academic resources (e.g. article, book or other library resource)
  2. Learn how to acquire an information skill (e.g. referencing)
  3. Connect to ICT resources and services (e.g.  mobiles )
  4. About the Library - who we are, what we do and how we can help you

The home page is your portal to library resources and services for learning, teaching and research.


A big thank you  to the students who participated in the usability testing and our ongoing thanks to all staff, students and community who provide comments, and suggestions!

Your comments and suggestions are welcome.  Please use the News and Suggestions button  to provide your feedback.

Comments

Dr Agnes Hannan said…
The new web page is very nice and good for students. As an academic, however, I'd really like to see some way of getting straight to Tropicat. Perhaps it is there but, if it is, it is not easy to find.
Helen H said…
Thank you for your feedback. You can still get to Tropicat quickly by clicking the Books, Videos & more link under the Find column. This will take you straight to a Tropicat search option.
Sarah said…
The thing I used most on the old Library website was the enable Remote Access button. After a lot of searching I have finally found it. Wondering if you could make it easier to find?
Hi Sarah

We trained you very well didn't we? Up until a couple of years ago it was necessary to enable remote access before trying to use subscription content. It used to cause our users an inordinate amount of headaches when they forgot, or didn't understand. It was clear in the 2009 library client survey it was something that we needed to improve.

So we changed our approach. Now whenever you try to follow a link that requires remote access from off campus it will automatically ask you to login. If you are on campus, or have already enabled remote access you are immediately redirected through our proxyserver and don't have to login again.

Our helpdesk statistics, and a number of surveys carried out on graduating students indicate that we have succeeded in making remote access much more seamless and there are far fewer problems with the new model.

We've waited two years to remove the 'remote access' button from the home page because our Google Analytics statistics showed a continuing but decreasing use of the manual remote access page. We believe that we'd reached the point where it was more confusing to have it on the front page than not.

We maintain the remote access page because there are still some special cases where you might want to enable it manually (using RSS feeds for Table of Contents for example) but mostly because it has hints on how to set up remote access in Endnote and also how to email or publish a link to an article that will work regardless of whether the recipient is on or off campus.

If you have any problems accessing subscription resources from off campus please contact Infohelp.

Many thanks,

Alan
Library Technologies Coordinator