The first international Open Access Week is intended to raise awareness of the benefits of free, open, online and immediate access to scholarly research. Celebrate by learning more about Open Access at the following sites:
Open Access Week Organization
SPARC: The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition
VCU Libraries - Open Access Resources
VCU Libraries is participating in trials of three online products from Springer. These trials are an opportunity to test and evaluate resources under consideration for addition to our online collections. Members of the VCU community are invited to explore these resources and help inform future decisions about purchases. Trial products are only available from computers on the campus network. Trials end on October 30, 2009. Please send comments and feedback to Lynne Turman.
Most of our current journal subscriptions are delivered electronically, making quick work of downloading a PDF for later reference. But there's still a massive amount of information stored away in the heavy bound issues filling the Journal Stacks, with no electronic copy available. Previously, to make a quick PDF of an article, you'd have to pay 10 cents a page to photocopy it, and then scan in all the pages with some hostile piece of software.
No more.
The HP Digital Sender, a new arrival at Tompkins-McCaw Library, allows anyone with a VCU eID to quickly make digital copies of any print material to send via e-mail. The machine, located by the copiers and printers on the first floor, can produce color and grayscale images up to 300dpi in resolution in JPEG, TIFF, and PDF formats. When you've scanned all you wanted -- a job that's pretty quick on this zippy box -- just hit "Send" and you'll find your files waiting in your e-mail. Easy!
This new tool will save you time, energy, money, and make all your articles from print far easier to find and share than a manila folder full of scattered photocopies. It's available now, and free to use.
Have you tried the new Digital Sender? What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
September 18th is Take a Loved One for a Checkup Day. It's your chance to encourage those you love to visit a health professional -- or at least make an appointment to visit one. And look for a community-sponsored health event near you on this day. It's a great way to show you care. When your loved ones are connected with the right medical care, they can find out about their health concerns. Certain health problems can be prevented and others can be treated. Please help those you love do something good for their health on September 18. Go with them to visit a health professional or make an appointment to see how they can take care of their health.