Thursday 12 August 2010

The iPad is perfect for Liaison Librarians

After playing with an iPad for a few days I'm smitten, and I think they make an ideal device for a liaison librarian to have on hand to increase productivity at work.

Here's why:

-Increased connectivity means you can comunicate more easily with colleagues and academics from anywhere on campus (within WiFi range, which is just about everywhere).

-Unlike a laptop you don't have to worry about lugging it around, it's light and very portable.

-It's great to demonstrate our databases, eJournals and particularly eBooks on. EBL books particularly look great and work very smothly in Safari (The web browser) for the iPad.

-In meetings you can take notes and email them straight out to colleagues, or make a useless meeting (You know the ones I'm talking about) more productive by doing something useful.

-Unlike a laptop, it is on (or off) as soon as you press the button, saving time.

-For reference desk duties you can go to the student, sit anywhere and show them our online resources, or search the catalogue while among the shelves, or outside the library, much more convenient than being stuck at a desk.

It's not perfect yet, there are a few niggling issues that I've found so far, but it does just about everything I need 90% of the time very well, and I'm sure Apple are hard at work trying to make the next version even better.