Feeling a bit lost without my old friend Prospector (the Colorado libraries’ joint catalog that supplied much of my pleasure reading, music and movies) I turned to some experts in the library for guidance. Diane Trotter of Interlibrary Loan speaks below, with reassurances about ordering materials and confidentiality. Prospector expert Brenna Philbrick offers still more reassurance that Prospector will one day return.

Dusty Shelves: Can I use Request It to order the same stuff I ordered from Prospector?
Diane Trotter: Yes

DS: Even movies? Music?
DT: Yes

DS: How long does Request It usually take?
DT: Depending on where the item is located around the US – the safe bet is 2 weeks

DS: How much does it cost?
DT:Nothing

DS: What’s the craziest thing anyone’s ever ordered through Request It?
DT: Not sure what you mean but we get orders for videos, DVD, CD, Records, Cassettes, Microforms, books and articles. I won’t go into titles because of privacy.

Dusty Shelves: When will Prospector return???
Brenna Philbrick: Although Prospector was originally slated to return on August 4th, it may not go live then. However, it will be up and running during the Fall Semester and will be even more fabulous with several pick up locations available at the branch libraries.

DS: Do you miss it?
BP: I do miss Prospector. My students and many library regulars miss the service and I miss seeing all the fascinating items other people order – I discovered many a great movie and book from our Prospector users!

Prospector fans, please place your Prospector orders prior to June 15th. The popular borrowing service from Colorado libraries will be out of service from June 15 – August 15, 2009 while the UW Libraries migrate to a brand-new catalog system.

This makes me blue, for sure, but know two things:
1) you can still order materials through Request It, which might take a smidge longer than Prospector deliveries but should meet your scholarly needs.
and
2) your new library catalog system will be sleeker and better!

Fans of Prospector, take note! The service will be down Tuesday, December 16th for scheduled maintenance.

Also please remember that you can order items from Prospector during the library holiday closure (December 24 – January 1) but you will not be able to pick them up until after January 5th.

Happy reading!

Prospector addicts, take heart! Our courier arrived today with a fresh load of Prospector items. You can expect items to continue arriving all week; check your email for updates.

Please continue ordering more books, movies and music from Prospector as usual. We believe that the delivery issues are resolved.

If you spent the past few days wondering “when on earth will my Prospector items arrive?” you are not alone.

The courier service which delivers items from Colorado to UW experienced problems this week. We hope to receive a shipment again on Monday.

Update!  Normal delivery will be slower to resume than we thought.  You might want to use our Request It service to ensure timely delivery of your items instead of Prospector until our Courier situation is resolved.  Thanks for your patience!

Please continue ordering items and we anticipate that normal delivery will resume next week. (p.s. This is kind of good news for some patrons like me who keep forgetting to return their overdues and therefore can not check out new items regardless!)

Place your Prospector orders before Friday at 5:00 p.m., as the Prospector catalog will be out of service until January 7th for upgrades. I hardly know how to go two weeks without Prospector, I fear the withdrawal symptoms might be severe!

Speaking of withdrawal symptoms, the Writer’s Strike is killing me. Thank goodness for all the good TV options available from the Coe Library AV department and from Prospector. Currently I’m watching season two of The Office and it is cracking me up!

Go ahead and start requesting library materials through Prospector, it is back up and running!

Students and researchers know that improving the built-in search capability of your browser saves time and screen space.

Some ideas for maximizing your search potential:

1) Install simple plug-ins to add more searches to the built-in search on the upper right corner of Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 2.

2) Add some library specific Firefox plug-ins from the Travelin Librarian, including my favorite, a Prospector search.

3) For those of you interested in taking your research power even further, I invite you to beta test the UW Libraries toolbar.

Our toolbar offers access to tons of library searches, a host of UW logins, and fun internet stuff as well. Let us know what you think, as we are still tweaking the design. Leave comments here or visit our toolbar survey and we’ll take note!