Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Find movies by ratings!

You talked, we listened! You can now search for movies by ratings! On the website, under the Movies tab in the Browse box there is a link called Movies By Ratings. Click on this to open the choices, Rated G, Rated PG, Rated PG-13 and Rated R. They will be shown in order by newest first.

We hope this feature is useful to you!

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Help when you need it

You can now find a Help link under the Search box on the website. It has actually been there awhile but just not noted on this blog til now. Clicking on Help takes you to a list of ways you can contact us - whatever is most convenient!

Additionally, a link was just added which provides some tips for better search results.

Hope this is helpful information to you!

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Self Help becomes DIY

What????? In the Research & Databases area of the website, one of the Browse facets used to be named Self Help. A staff person thought that we would be providing psychology-related databases (and possibly an eCouch!). Lo and behold, we place databases there such as:
So, we have changed the name and it is now referred to as DIY. Do you think this is more descriptive of the offerings? Are you a regular user of any of these databases?

Friday, September 16, 2011

Research & Databases Page

The Research & Databases page provides a feature story highlighting some aspect of the business or nonfiction collection. In the carousel boxes, we have books and databases featured. When you click in the left Browse box, you are taken to a list view of databases. We have fixed or at least made a positive change on this page. When you now click on a title, you are taken to another page. Unfortunately it does not provide you any more information than what was on your previous page. The good news is that there is a Connect Now button so that you can enter the database.

This is one of the functions of our content management system whereby a title is clickable. A small change, but a positive one nonetheless!

Monday, June 27, 2011

Contact Us link changes

were made today in response to our new Answer Squad service. In order to consolidate the various ways the public can contact us, a new Contact Us page was created. Links in some pages (such as Interlibrary Loan and Using Computers) now go to the new page instead of to the How are we doing page.

With the new Answer Squad service, patrons can type in their questions to see if an answer is already in the system or they can text us with questions at 303-720-7832.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Russian Page Changes


Today, with the magic of code and talented staff changes were made to the Russian page:
  • you now see a graphic for the feature story instead of image and text. This falls more in line with other interior page looks. The feature story link goes to a list of Russian titles recently received.
  • the top carousel has 2 links. unless you can read Russian you won't know that the first one says Coming Soon and the 2nd link says Katya Recommends.
  • on the Coming Soon page, there is a list of facets on the left which are relevant subject headings. As new titles are added, this list will grow.
Changes were made to improve the backend work of providing new titles for Russian-speaking patrons. We now have the ability to pull in material covers, too, which were previously unaccessible to us.

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Computer class handouts online

This was completed a couple of months ago but forgotten about. You now have the ability to download our computer class handouts! On the Programs & Classes page, click on Adults in the Browse box to find the link. As of this writing there is only one handout, for Picasa, available. But, look in the future for more of these treasures!

Monday, April 18, 2011

Did You See?


On the Books, Movies, Music, OnDemand and Research & Business pages we have made a large change. You now see the feature story presented graphically. From the screenshot you see here, the Celebrate Children's Poetry is an example.

In keeping with the theme of the site, this design change was made to better fit with the look of the page.

Hope you enjoy!

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Research & Databases Update

Today changes were made to the Research & Databases page. The top carousel/box now has a header which is a nice description of what you will find contained in this box. Thanx to our Communications Department for helping us with the name! Next to the title you will see a link called "business" and a link called "databases"

The "business" link takes you to a list of recent titles and further navigation to business resources available from ALD. Find the link to Suzanne Kaller's business blog or Kathleen Rainwater's twitter. Access business databases and find titles in our catalog.

We hope these changes are useful for the businessperson to find and access our rich array of business resources.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

March Changes Made

In the footer, the Contact Us and How are we doing links now go to an intermediary page which describes the customer surveys and provides links in different languages. You can also click to ask questions specifically about your account, ask a reference question, or suggest, comment or question.

Friday, February 25, 2011

End of February Changes to the Website



Exciting changes have been happening with the website!

When you click on Staff Picks in any of the Browse boxes you will now see the page has changed from an alphabetical list by staff pick name to a list of popular genres, age ranges and formats. Thanks go to the Communications Department for the wonderful graphics and to the Alyson and Jill for putting the page together. When you click on an icon you see a presentation of handpicked titles. The Staff Picks page still does have staff names presented, if the staff person has provided a review within the last 60 days.

Look for a new search in Movies – Family Friendly. This list presents G and PG rated movies and was added based on demand.

We hope you enjoy these changes!

Friday, February 18, 2011

February Changes

On the homepage you will see the large story box is or will be by February 22 changed over to a graphics box. The graphics will move in slideshow fashion. Clicking on the graphic will take the user to more content. The smaller box on the home page is now graphics based and clicking on this will take the user to more content, also.

Many of the links have been changed on the Browse pages in Books, Movies, Music, Russian and Spanish. Most of these links are now canned searches instead of feeds from III. We had multiple reasons for making these changes. In the Books, Movies and Music pages we evaluated the use of each link and removed links which were not being well-used. Our other consideration was removing feeds from III where possible in order to improve the performance of the III server.

In the footer under Community, a new link has been added, Patron Survey Results. Here users can find results of the DVD Vending Survey. Other survey results will be populated in this area.

January Changes

Updates made during January to the website include:

1. The navigation formerly entitled Research & Business is now renamed Research & Databases to reflect the database content and navigation found on this page.

2. The OnDemand page has experienced back-end changes. The result is the top carousel contains imags with links to services such as the downloadables. Anytime you see a database in the carousel, it is going to direct you to the list of databases page rather than to the "Connect Now" link. This is due to the library card authentication which is a requirement with most of our electronic products.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Enhancements for January 2011


It has been awhile since the last blog post - happy new year, readers!

To let you know a few minor tweaks which have taken place on the website:

1. The navigation formerly entitled Research & Business is now renamed Research & Databases. This title more accurately reflects the content contained within the page.

2. The OnDemand page has experienced back-end changes. The result is the top carousel contains images with links to services such as the downloadables. Anytime you see a database in the carousel, it is going to direct you to the list of databases. Find the database you are interested in and "connect now" from here. Because most of our vendors require a library card for entry into the product, the "connect now" has to happen at this point of entry.

As always, feel free to leave comments or ask questions here. And in celebration of 2011, the Year of the Rabbit, today's image gives you a bunny image!