Public Access PCs in Academic Libraries - HELP!

[Katherine Furlong]

My Library Director asked me to post the following question to you, in
hopes that we can get some information to use in our next round of meetings.  

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"At the University of Maine at Farmington, we are putting 20 new Windows 95
PCs in our public areas.  These machines would be used to access our new
Web-based catalog and magazine indexes, as well as general Internet
searching.  Campus e-mail, word processing and other services will not be
offered. 

Providing Internet access is causing concern for our computing center,
which provides hardware and network support for us.  I have gotten into a
disagreement with the computer center folks over network security.  They
are wanting Novell network authentication to the level of the user
(password, network ID), and possibly using a filter (such as Bess) in case
any children use our system (Our recent capital campaign opened our library
to the community, in exchange for a million bucks.).  We in the library are
opposed to a filter such as Bess, nor do we want to have users reboot the
machines and authenticate to search the Web or look at our Web-based
gateway.  The administration is now involved, but most of the technical
expertise lies with the computer center, so I need input from other
librarians on how network security, authentication, and access to children
is handled.  I am willing to compromise and allow just searching from our
terminals and using a product such as IKIOSK to limit e-mail and chat
rooms, but even this is a problem for our computer center.

Does anyone out there have any suggestions for our situation, or examples of
how you cope with these issues?  Thanks.  Frank Roberts, Library Director."

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Katherine Furlong                   <> Mantor Library, 41 High St.
User Education and                  <> Farmington, ME  04938
     Electronic Resources Librarian <> kfurlong at maine.maine.edu
University of Maine at Farmington   <> 207-778-7224
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