Shibbolising Online Librarian: how two university libraries enhanced their collaborative chat reference service by using a MAMS mini grant to add authentication and develop an interoperable chat client

McKay, J., Brown, A., Bronleigh, H. and Wright, M. (2008) Shibbolising Online Librarian: how two university libraries enhanced their collaborative chat reference service by using a MAMS mini grant to add authentication and develop an interoperable chat client. In: VALA 2008 Libraries/Changing Spaces, Virtual Places : 14th Biennial Conference and Exhibition, 5-7 February 2008, Melbourne, Vic..

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Abstract

Chat reference, so what's new or innovative about that? It's a common enough service now offered by many libraries. In fact, Macquarie and Murdoch University Libraries have collaborated to provide a virtual reference service since March 2003 as described in a paper presented at VALA in 2004. Since then, Online Librarian has been transformed using open source standards and freeware products. The result is a robust and scalable product that allows multiple operators, smart assignment of calls, transfer of calls and automatic statistics collection.