Posts from — December 2008

On one of the WinMacs in the 1st floor computer area, when I go to save a file from my Gmail account, I don’t have the option to “Save As,” just to “Save.” I hit “Save,” but then when I go to My Documents, the file does not show up. There was no error message telling me to do anything, but I could not find the file. Where do files like this go? Can something be done to these machines to make files save better, or at least provide a message of some kind when a save does not work, what we should do? The person at the Reference Desk basically had no solution except to save to Bengalspace or a flash drive – but as I said, there is no “Save As” option provided.

Thanks for sending in this comment. We checked the gmail problem with a student login. When an attachment link is clicked within gmail, there are 2 options, the “save” option, which functions as you outlined, or “open with,” a suggested program that opens the file then allows “save as” to My Docs. The attachment link can also be right clicked, which also brings up the “save link as” option. We are sorry the librarian or staff person you spoke to wasn’t able to solve this problem for you, but now the staff are aware of how to save from Gmail.

As a senior student, I have seen Mizzou grow considerably over the years. Unfortunately, between the hours of 10am-3pm or so, I see this growth putting a strain on the certain library resources, such as the computer work stations on the first floor. Perhaps this growth warrants a restriction to using the computers for “academic purposes only” during these times, and students who “need” to check Facebook or Myspace should be restricted to personal laptops or computers in Memorial Union/Brady Commons.

I appreciate the set up of the research work stations, where I can spread out my books and papers and have the privacy partition to keep me from getting distracted, but these are only useful if they aren’t occupied by recreational users.

Thank you for your consideration.

You are absolutely correct in that the computer usage in Ellis Library is at maximum capacity between the hours of 10:00am to 3:00pm every day. In fact, just a month or so ago, we added about 15 additional computers to the Information Commons area, and we found that these, too, immediately filled up during this peak time.

If you are a senior, you may remember that about three years ago, we did just what you are suggesting below. We posted on every computer that research users had priority over recreational users, and when we noticed students waiting around for computers, we made a public request to everyone that any recreational users needed to yield their computer to those waiting. The problem was we never knew if those waiting to use the computers intended to do research or wanted recreational usage, and we could not determine what, exactly, is recreational usage. For example, some professors are asking to students to use Facebook for instructional purposes. These are very subjective decisions, and we found these judgment calls too difficult to determine.

One thing we did achieve, however, is to limit the computer usage to our guest users to only two hours per day — and we often encourage them to come at our less congested times.

Another option to consider, is to check out one of our twenty or so laptops located at the Circulation/Reserve Desk. Students may check these out for two hours, and they often do so when the floor computers are full.

We wish we had enough computers for all our users. Unfortunately, we don’t have the resources or space in the library for this, so we try to spread out the computer usage to non-peak times and encourage students to use our laptops.

Thanks for your comments. Let us know if you have additional concerns.