Summary: Troubleshooting Interview Form

[Kathy Gaynor]

A few weeks ago, I asked whether anyone had developed a form that would
help us gather information from users who are having problems accessing our
subscription databases.  Thank you to everyone who responded.  Here is my
original message and the information that was provided:
**********************************
ORIGINAL MESSAGE
We have a number of subscription databases from various vendors (e.g.
InfoTrac, FirstSearch, Ovid, etc) and use IP recognition to allow our users
to input their university id numbers and gain access.  When someone has
trouble getting in, they call and we have to try to diagnose the problem.
I realized the other night after I had asked a number of questions of a
student in this situation that it would be helpful to have some sort of
interview form that would prompt me for the information I need.  If I as a
reference librarian couldn't figure anything out, I would have the
information to give our systems staff.

I was wondering if anyone had such a form in use and would be willing to
share it?  A preliminary list of questions on the form might include:

Name
Phone
Student i.d. number
Browser version
ISP
Description of problem
Names of databases student IS able to access
Which databases student CANNOT access and whether student has never been
able to gain access
Whether student is using computer at home or office

What additional information would be helpful?


********
We set this form up a while ago and it gets reasonable results.

<http://www.library.unsw.edu.au/report.html>

We have noticed an increase in use since we providing database access using
frames (with a top frame containing our status reports, report problems, info)

Ken Klippel <k.klippel at unsw.edu.au>

******
We have a form like this on our Library Gateway.  If you go to :

<http://campusgw.library.cornell.edu/>

Click on 'Networked Resources', there will be a footer there with a 
link to 'Problem Connecting'.  You can see our form there.

Tom Gale
Mann Library, ITS
tdg6 at cornell.edu
****************
Kathy, our systems guy Marshall Reeves has developed a webform that's
pretty much what you said here. If you click HELP from our main Virtual
Library screen, you'll see a button that says "CAN'T CONNECT?"
That takes students through some basic trouble-shooting and ends with info
on how to contact us and includes the kinds of questions you mentioned
here. How many people do we head off this way? No telling! We still get
questions.  

our Virtual Librry is at <http://www.lib.usf.edu/virtual/>


Ilene Frank, Reference Dept.
Tampa Campus Library, LIB 122 
University of South Florida, Tampa FL 33620
ifrank at lib.usf.edu        Work 813.974.2483
http://www.lib.usf.edu/~ifrank/
***********************************
Cookies are turned on/off
Last time cache was dumped
Have they ever been able to access that material from that machine
Are they accessing via cable modem, dialin or webtv connection

Patricia Erwin
erwin.patricia at mayo.edu
Mayo Medical Library
*****************************
Good idea about the form. The only thing I didn't see on there, and that I
as the contact person for these problems find very helpful would be (this 
is used for students who e-mail about their problems):

a description of the problem (copy down any error message(s) you receive 
if possible). 

Susie Breier
Assistant Systems Librarian
Concordia University Libraries
1400 de Maisonneuve W, LB 303-3
Montreal, Quebec
<susie at alcor.concordia.ca>
*****************************





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Kathy M. Gaynor, Reference Librarian		Eden-Webster Library		
(314) 968-6950					475 E. Lockwood Ave.
(314) 968-7113  fax					St. Louis, MO  63119
kgaynor at library2.webster.edu