L&LR staff blog

New discs for version 17 of SPSS are now available.  These have the new code on them and instructions for downloading the software.  They are available for loan from the main library desk on the ground floor in the Brayford library.  There is one available at Riseholme and more are being processed for both Riseholme and Holbeach.  Find them on the Library Catalogue.

The SPSS codes are now available at https://portal.lincoln.ac.uk/C11/C14/SPSScode/default.aspx

There is one for updating version 14 on home computers and one for version 17.

Some people may wish to update their version 14 but I suspect most will want to install the latest version which is now also available on desktop.  On-campus you may have to go to the Control panel and click on ‘Run advertised programs’ and click on ‘SPSS Inc. PASW Statistics’ to update your machine.

We are soon to get version 17 or 18 of SPSS.

We are just waiting for confirmation while ICT negotiate with academic staff as to whether they get version 17 or wait a short while for version 18.  There is a big difference between version 14 and 17 but not so much between 17 and 18.  I will receive a pdf document which I can forward onto you so you know what has changed.  I also found this press release which explains it a bit with a link to the SPSS site – http://spss.com/press/template_print.cfm?PR_ID=1048

I will inform everyone of the new code for the CD updates and installation on home computers as soon as I know.

I’ve finally got a year’s worth of e-book usage data from both the ebrary and MyiLibrary platforms.

I’ve been commenting on the growth in usage throughout the year (since Michelle formally launched ebrary Academic Complete back in January), so here (without comment) are all the stats from August 2008 and July 2009.

Graph: e-book usage as a % of total usage (print+e).

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…alright, so I can’t resist commenting.

It looks as if we are definitely levelling out at the 25% mark – i.e., one e-book session for every three paper loans. It’ll be interesting to see what happens in September – will this 3:1 level of preference carry on into the new academic year?

My assertion that this translates to “one electronic loan for every three print” has been rightly challenged – after all, a new e-book session will be recorded every time a user ‘opens’ an e-book, whereas the same can’t be said for print loans, where the ‘loan’ is only registered once, irrespective of whether the reader opens the book thirty times, once, or not at all. Really, we need a formula along the lines of:

S = rL

Where S = a single user session, L = a print loan, and r = the number of times on average a student reads a library book they’ve borrowed. Anyone care to give me a figure for r?

What’s particularly interesting to me is that this growth has happened with – in the grand scheme of things – little in the way of overt publicity. I know that we’ve all pointed readers to e-books where they’ve been available, and I’m sure the Academic Subject Librarians have made sure their respective subjects were aware, but I’ve a hunch that the real driver has been the existence of e-book MARC records on Horizon, allowing readers to discover the e-books serendipitously. What would happen if we did the same for our 44,000 e-journals?

The usage data for Athens authentication sessions for the 2nd quarter of 2009 are now available on the L&LR staff Portal.

The initial impression is a promising one: overall usage via Athens is up 11% on the same period last year.

(Chart: Athens usage, 4th quarter of 2006 to date. Click for bigger.)

However, this figure masks some unusual features – while authentication via Athens to the Electronic Journals A-to-Z is up significantly, usage of some important individual e-resource packages (including the EBSCOhost databases, IngentaConnect, Art Full Text, Mintel, others) has actually fallen since last year.

Is this a reflection of changing patterns of use (or of preferred authentication method) amongst our students and academic staff?

Or could it be a mistake in the figures? I’ll certainly be checking them with Eduserv.

Curious.

As I reported in March, a comparison of Horizon issue stats and e-book ’sessions’ shows that use of our e-books is going up.

I now have the e-book usage data (ebrary + MyiLibrary) and print circulation stats (all 4 sites, desk and self-issue) for April 2009, and the usage of e-books shows no sign of levelling out yet.

Counting one session with an e-book as equivalent to one issue of a paper book, there’s now approximately 1 e-book session for every 3 paper loans. That is, nearly one-quarter of total usage is “e”.

Actual figure for April is 23.17%.

Graph: e-book usage as a percentage of total loans, 2008-8 to 2009-4.

The proportion of e-book sessions as a percentage of total loans appears to have been growing in a roughly linear way since we formally launched ebrary in Jan ‘09. My question still stands – where will this linear increase naturally level out? And (different question) where would we like it to level out?

Addendum: if it keeps going at the same rate, we’ll reach 1:1 print:electronic by January-February 2010. Will that happen, really, or will it bottom out before then? Is that what we want to happen? Could we stop it if we wanted to? Could we speed it up? Is it Friday yet?

The Athens stats for the first quarter of 2009 are in, and they’re on the Portal now for L&LR colleagues to view.

No great surprises in store – though the graph [below] does suggest a sharper-than-usual fall from 2008/4 to 2009/1. Perhaps we should expect this as a feature of higher usage at peak periods: that the drop-off in use of e-resources during quieter periods will be more pronounced.

We’re still up 18% on the same quarter last year.

Click the graph for bigger.

Interesting visualisation of how the increase in our e-book usage is almost exactly offsetting the drop in issues.

For every seven paper books issued between Aug ‘08 – Feb ‘09, roughly one session with an e-book took place.

This includes data from both MyiLibrary and ebrary (which we only really launched in January ‘09, so it’ll be interesting to see whether – and to what extent – the trend continues).

“Y” axis numbers have been removed to protect the innocent… but you can get them from the Portal (L&LR staff only).

My prediction was that our quarterly Athens usage would hit 90,000 for Oct-Nov-Dec 2008.

I wasn’t far off. Actual figure = 89,183.

• Overall usage is up by 32% on the same quarter last year.
• Three databases/services in particular have shown massive jumps: IHS Technical Indexes (presumably because we now have access to the Construction Information Service); LexisNexis Butterworths; and LinkSource (i.e. Find it @ Lincoln).
• Conversely, usage via Athens of a number of resources has fallen to zero; this because we’re now authenticating directly via the UK Access Management Federation.

The full table is on the L&LR staff Portal, at: https://portal.lincoln.ac.uk/C12/C14/eLibraryUsageStatistics/

• My next prediction: the usage for Jan-Feb-Mar ‘09 will be in the order of 78,000-79,000.

There are around 15 subscribers to this, the L&LR staff blog (average over the last 7 days), according to FeedBurner, with an average ‘reach‘ (people actively engaging with the content – clicking on links, listening to audio, etc.) of 2.

Our public, student-facing news blog, on the other hand, has “only” 12 subscribers (7-day average), but a reach of 15.

Yes, that number is higher than the number of subscribers – probably resulting from people discovering the blog through our Web site or the Portal – they won’t be counted as subscriptions, but show up in the ‘reach’.

These are small numbers: I hope because it’s very early days for the Blogs·Library·Lincoln project. I’ll keep checking these stats and I’ll post them here, intermittently, so we can see if the message is getting through.

Paul

Further to my posting on Friday, here are our quarterly Athens totals from the start of 2003.

Those numbers give the following graph, which seems to show the same annual periodic curve with an upwards trend (except for the 2nd quarter of 2004, which showed zero usage – surely an error?):

Maybe 100,000 was a bit optimistic – let’s say 90,000 for the 4th quarter of 2008?

Paul