Vol. 14     No. 4   1998
F      I       U           L       I       B      R      A       R      I      E      S

Inside and Out: Construction of the new library is nearing completion.

University Park Library Approaches Completion Move to Additional Space Starts April 25
On April 25, the University Park Library will begin a major shift to newly constructed space on the second and third floors. At the same time, IMS will occupy new space on the ground floor. As a result, the library will be closed April 25-29. This represents the period between the Spring Semester and Summer Session, so the library would normally be closed April 25-26
North Face: Lake front entrance towers three stories high The fifth floor will continue to house multimedia collections but in addition will contain music and visual arts collections. This places them close to related visual materials and listening facilities. Once again, the patience of the University Community is requested during this move. Fortunately, disruption should be substantially less than a year ago since, for the most part, the dislocation occurs when classes are not in session. -- Laurence Miller	During the shift, reference, circulation, documents, and interlibrary loan services and collections will be moved to the second floor. Journals will occupy the third floor. At the same time, access to the library will gradually be shifted to an escalator connecting the first and second floors. The current library entrance, which occupies a temporary structure built into the breezeway, will be demolished. This will be part of a phased transition that will have been communicated to the University Community by the time this article appears. Major reading areas will be available throughout the second and third floors. Changes on the upper floors will be notable. Three major reading rooms will be created on the sixth and seventh floors. These levels house the general collection. New furniture will be received for these and most other public spaces in late April and early May. Here's Looking at You: Second floor view across the lake to the Engineering and Computer Science Building

FIU's ATM Network

In 1996, FIU started to upgrade its network infrastructure by providing network services to the new University Park Library building using Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM). IBM was selected as the ATM hardware vendor and to work with FIU on the network implementation. The project specification called for (1) networking the Library to the FIUnet backbone using two high-speed ATM 155-Mbps trunks; (2) that devices, such as computers, printers, etc, in the Library connect to the ATM network using ATM-25, ATM-155 or switched ethernet; and (3) that the services and programs which worked over the Library's ethernet network work over the new ATM network. The ATM hardware started arriving in December 1996. By April 1997, the ATM network was installed in time for occupancy of the upper floors of the Library. The ATM network in the Library has been in operation ever since.

ATM was selected as the technology to enhance FIUnet because it's scaleable and capable of supporting multimedia education-on-demand to offices, classrooms, residence halls, and more than 400 desktops in the University Park and North Campus Libraries. FIU is in the process of digital technology to build a new and additional information repository that will serve as a conduit for research, teaching, and administration. Termed the Digital Library, after the name of the IBM software employed, the information in it will be simultaneously accessible to the university community on and off campus. An IBM RISC System/6000 SP2 with four nodes and eight 155-Mbps ATM ports was purchased as the platform on which to implement the Digital Library. The IBM Digital Library software was selected to contain materials such as digitized lectures, voice and music recordings, musical score sheets, as well as data, video and text-based library materials. A user of the Library will be able to use the network to download images, play, pause, rewind or fast forward a full-motion video clip, perform catalog searches, or read text with hyperlinks to related information objects. One of the advantages of the Digital Library together with a high-speed network with guaranteed quality of service is that a single digital copy can be shared simultaneously by multiple users in different locations.

Thus far, FIU has grown its ATM network to the UP Library, the College of Education, the Charles Perry building and its Digital Library server, the School of Computer Science and the DM building. Phase I of the Library project provided 365 ATM-25, 60 switched ethernet and 3 ATM-155 ports. Phase II of the project, which is scheduled for completion in April 1998, will add 365 ATM-25, 70 ethernet and 38 ATM-155 ports to the ATM network. The next building connected to the ATM network was the College of Education. The equipment in the building provided the College with 216 ATM-25 and 64 switched ethernet ports. The OE Expansion project allowed FIU to install an ATM network in a building that was networked with ethernet. For this project, a new ATM-155 backbone was installed and 120 switched ethernet ports were provided. The next project was to connect the IBM RISC System/6000 SP2 Digital Library computer to the ATM network. The SP2 was connected to the ATM network using 8 ATM-155 ports. Smaller servers have since then been connected to the ATM network, also using ATM-155 ports. In March 1998, the backbone in the DM building was upgraded from a shared ethernet backbone to ATM. An ATM switch was installed in the building and the network hardware in the building was upgraded to support switched ethernet and to directly connect to the ATM backbone. The upgrade provided 280 switched ethernet ports. FIU's ATM network is growing at a very rapid rate. In 1998, more buildings will be networked with ATM and their occupants will be able to access FIUnet with greater speed and more reliability. The goal is for FIU to have a high-speed network infrastructure that is accessible from all campus buildings.

In December 1997, the network connection between University Park and North Campus was upgraded from a 10Mbps ethernet to a dedicated ATM-155 connection. This upgrade significantly increased the network capacity between the two campuses, but more importantly, established the necessary network infrastructure for the Digital Library to be accessible from North Campus. The dedicated ATM inter-campus connection is a service that FIU purchased from TCI in 1997. In addition to the connection between North Campus and University Park, FIU purchased optical fiber cable from TCI to connect the College of Engineering complex (CEAS) to the ATM network at University Park. CEAS is presently connected to FIUnet using a dedicated FDDI service from Bellsouth. This FDDI service will be replaced with a dedicated ATM connection in Spring 1998.

In an effort to simplify the process used to report data troubles, the Department of Information Resource Management (IRM) has implemented one centralized telephone number. All calls related to data connection problems, new data installation, and hardware/software upgrades should be directed to this group. The number to call is 348-2284 if dialing from outside the University. For on-campus calls, you can dial extension 2284. For ease of access, this extension has been set up at both, North and South Campus.

The following is a list of question/troubles and inquiries that should be directed to the 2284 number:

• If you are moving to an office and you are not sure if there is an active data connection.
• Your printer is not printing at all or not working properly.
• Your PC cannot connect to Pathworks.
• You are not able to log in to Solix, Servax, Servms, send or retrieve E-mail messages.
• Need information on training provided by University Computer Services (UCS).
• Need software or hardware installed in your PC.
• Need information on how to use specific software packages.
• Need assistance with your UNIX terminal, supported by UCS.
• Questions regarding student labs supported by UCS.
• You are trying to access FIUNet from home, using a modem, and not able to connect.

There are many other questions, inquiries or troubles that you might have or will experience, and the list above is just a sample. We will be very happy to assist you at this number on any problem related to information resources within the FIU community.

Our commitment is to facilitate communications and provide timely and quality resolution of troubles. Your comments and suggestions will certainly be appreciated.

SEFLIN Leadership Institute

SEFLIN (the Southeast Florida Library Information Network) has inaugurated a year long leadership institute for librarians. The mission is to develop and enhance leadership skills through participation in a program that will provide the opportunity for individuals to be better prepared to create, articulate and contribute to the vitality, growth and success of the library profession. It is designed for professionals who have exhibited leadership potential as well as the ability to share with others their enthusiasm, optimism and vision for the library services of tomorrow. Registration is limited and candidates are nominated by the library director. In this first year the FIU libraries have two Sunseekers: Nancy Hershoff and Mayra Nemeth. The program started with a day on a TRAC course (Team Ropes Adventure Challenge) with Sunseekers learning team cooperation and personal challenges through the ropes exercises. There are five additional day long seminars dealing with communication, marketing and advocacy, strategic planning, personal leadership skills, organizations and change agents, and empowerment and partnerships. Another part of the institute is a mentoring program with librarians throughout SEFLIN volunteering their services as coaches, advisors and confidants. The goal of the institute is to continue this program on an annual basis and, if possible, expand opportunities for other librarians in developing leadership skills.

It's Music to Our Ears

The Library has received a donation of 50,000 LP recordings together with a locator system from radio station WTMI in Coconut Grove. The gift includes the recordings from WQRS in Detroit and WFLN in Philadelphia, both of which were owned by Marlin Broadcasting, Inc., the parent company of WTMI. WTMI is celebrating its 27th year as a classical music station and the other two had been classical for many years (50 years in WFLN's case), so the accumulation of discs was considerable.

The collection consists of classical music of all periods, styles, and genres, with recordings of historical significance and by legendary performers, including many rare discs that were only issued commercially in a limited fashion.

According to Lyn Farmer, Director of Broadcast Operations: "Radio stations tend to take very good care of their LPs and actually, because they have so many, don't play them as often as listeners with fewer copies of a given work might at home. Thus, FIU is gaining multiple copies of many recordings, and they are in good shape and should provide good access to both well known and rare repertoire for music students."

The library is greatful for such an outstanding collection, a resource that greatly enhances the suppport we offer our music school and students.

New Electronic Database Services Librarian

Valerie Edwards

Valerie Edwards is the new Electronic Database Services Librarian for the University Park Library. She is a recent graduate of the School of Library and Information Sciences (SLIS) at Louisiana State University. As a graduate assistant at the SLIS computer lab, Ms. Edwards was given the duties of Computer Lab Supervisor. She assisted in web page creation and maintenance, created point-of-use guides for some software packages, and helped students one-on-one with a variety of computer needs. Valerie was also active in a variety of SLIS student organizations and activities. The Electronic Database Services Librarian is a newly created position in the FIU Libraries aimed at coordinating and managing the infrastructure for electronic reference services. Among her duties, Ms. Edwards will oversee a research lab that will be established on the second floor of the UP Library following the move scheduled for late April. She will also provide general reference desk service and teach bibliographic instruction courses. --Ron Martin

INFO People

Sherry Crowther (Reference Librarian, NC), as a member of the SEFLIN Local Content Committee, planned a SEFLIN event, the Information Provider EXPO, held March 14. The event was designed to recruit community groups in Dade County who want to get a free website through SEFLIN. She presented a new web creation software. FIU North Campus will be sponsoring two training clinics within the next two months to help community groups use the new software to make their webpages.

Antonie B. Downs (Associate Director of Libraries) was invited as a member of SACS to review the membership application of the University of the Andes, in Bogota, Colombia, February 21-25.

David Goldsmith (Resource Development Librarian, NC) was recently appointed to the ALA Association for Library Collections & Technical Services Subcommittee on Vendor Research and Development.

Patricia Iannuzzi (Head of Reference Dept., UP) just completed a book on Teaching Information Literacy Skills that will be published by Allyn & Bacon in 1998. She also will be presenting a paper on "Faculty Development and Information Literacy: Establishing Campus Partnerships," at the LOEX of the West Conference, in Utah.

Mercy Sanchez (International Documents Librarian, UP) gave a talk on the "Resources Available for the Model UN Researcher," at the opening ceremonies of this year's Model United Nations, held on January 22nd, at FIU. Mrs. Sanchez was also recognized for her dedication and for the work she has been doing with the United Nations collection by Professor Jean Kate's, Political Science Dept. She also participated in the College Major Fair, held March 4, at IF. She organized and set up a table to advertise librarianship as a career. This was the first time that the project, sponsored by the Florida Library Association Ad-Hoc Committee for Minority Librarian Recruitment, was undertaken at FIU.