Report on a digital reference service project

[Sloan, Bernie]

My final report on the Ready for Reference pilot project is now available
at:

http://www.lis.uiuc.edu/~b-sloan/r4r.final.htm

This paper reports on various aspects of the use of a collaborative digital
reference service, including:

SESSIONS BY HOUR OF DAY
SESSIONS BY DAY OF WEEK
SESSIONS BY WEEK
STAFF SESSIONS BY INSTITUTION/ORGANIZATION
SESSIONS BY INSTITUTION OF USER
LENGTH OF TIME SPENT IN HOLD QUEUE
LENGTH OF ONLINE REFERENCE SESSION
READY FOR REFERENCE QUESTION LOG (4/2/01 Through 4/15/01)

The Ready for Reference service is a collaborative 24x7 live reference
service being piloted by eight academic libraries in the Alliance Library
System in Illinois. Funding for
this grant was provided by the Illinois State Library, a division of the
Office of Secretary of State, using federal LSTA funding. The Ready for
Reference project uses the
eGain web call center software, as modified and marketed by Library Systems
and Services, Inc. (LSSI).

Bernie Sloan
Senior Library Information Systems Consultant
University of Illinois Office for Planning and Budgeting
338 Henry Administration Building
506 S. Wright Street
Urbana, IL  61801
Phone: (217) 333-4895
Fax:     (217) 265-0454
E-mail: bernies at uillinois.edu