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Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh District Library Center

Technology Services

Director's Office, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Mary Frances Cooper, Deputy Director

Two technology forums, sponsored by Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh in conjunction with the Allegheny County Library Association and the eiNetwork, were held on November 20 and November 21. These presentations/discussions included:

  • An overview of what it means for CLP to assume the role of fiscal agent for the eiNetwork. Briefly, the eiNetwork as we know it still exists, but this represents a different way for funding to flow to the corporation. The current articles of incorporation, bylaws, and governance structure for the eiNetwork are still in place.
  • A review of four opportunities that CLP sees for the eiNetwork include: outsourcing those IT services that it makes sense to outsource; exploring a catalog upgrade and piloting the ENCORE interface; streamlining the IT focus of eiNetwork; and supporting network flexibility.
  • An explanation of the Technology Council, which met recently and published the minutes of its first meeting.
  • An overview of the RFP process for potential outsourcing of current eiNetwork functions, such as Network Administration, Server Administration, PC Security Administration, and non-ILS Help Desk functions. Bids have been received and are being reviewed by eiNetwork Staff. Recommendations are to go to the eiNetwork board in December.
  • A discussion of potential governance options, including a way for small and medium-sized libraries to have input into technology decisions while they are still in the discussion phase.
  • A demonstration of ENCORE, an Innovative Interfaces product that CLP will be adding to its catalog beginning next year. ENCORE enables greater flexibility for searching on the part of customers, and allows them to interact with the catalog in a different way. A link will be provided to the District Services Web page soon so that everyone will have the opportunity to become familiar with this interface before it goes live on the CLP catalog. District Libraries are invited to submit feedback on this interface as it is hoped that it will be possible to add it, or something similar, throughout the county in 2009.

A link to the brief PowerPoint from the technology forums can be found here. We hope that this represents the beginning of an ongoing conversation on these topics.