QuickSearch is leftist now

Have you noticed that QuickSearch and "Most Used" traded places on the Libraries' website? Wonder why? When QuickSearch was first launched we (the ITAC QuickSearch Product Team) didn't have tremendous confidence in it. It was new. It didn't search all our silos of information. Back then it searched the website + FAQs + Best Bets (example of a Best Bet: lexis). We looked around at search-heavy websites and concluded that sites with great confidence in their search box made the box big and put it center or left. So we made ours small and put it on the right. A humble beginning.

Since then, QuickSearch has added results from the catalog (credit Tito Sierra and Emily Lynema for catalog web services, which results in this + MobiLib + other stuff), results from the Journals tool, and has a "Find Articles" function that we think works well. So QuickSearch now has better real estate on the left.

Also note the addition of an advertisement for a QuickSearch gadget for iGoogle users; see the bottom right of the QuickSearch results screen (example). Joe Ryan made this gadget.

Tinyurl link now available from the Library Article Linker

The Library Article Linker now provides a TinyURL in addition to the proxied link.

You've probably seen TinyURLs around--they are short URLs that redirect to longer addresses. They have a few advantages for reference because they work better in e-mail (no line wrapping issues) and are short enough to read and type (if patrons are working off a printout or over the phone).


Let me know if you have questions about these.