Boiler plate responses for responding to specific issues

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Here is a template for us to write up boiler plate responses for responding re: specific issues. There is already an FAQ page which has boiler plate answers to questions that came from emails, see BHL Portal FAQ

Boiler Plate Responses for Common Gemini Issues


- lipscombb Sep 13, 2010 suggested text that was here is no longer applicable, so deleted. Please see the page history if you'd like to see it.

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Standard Response for PDF feedbacks that claim the PDF is blank when it is not:

Dear ######,

We received your feedback regarding your PDF request. We have accessed the PDF and were able to view the pages using Adobe Acrobat v. 9, Windows operating system. Below you will see a link to the PDF.

Please note that if you are using Mac OS X to view the PDF, Preview (the default application for displaying images and PDFs) may not correctly display the images and the PDF may appear blank. Also, please note that the first page following the cover page is intentionally left blank, and the content of your PDF follows thereafter. If you still have problems viewing your PDF, you may respond to this email -- please include information about the viewer and operating system you are using. We thank you for your feedback and use of our services.

LINK here

Sincerely,

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Standard Response for Requests

Dear------,

Thank you for submitting your request for scanning to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. Your request for: has been added to the queue. Please keep in mind that our ability to fulfill requests is limited to the collections of the BHL partner institutions.

We are unable to provide a timetable for when the material might become available. Many factors, such as the condition, location, or rarity of the item(s) requested, contribute to the speed with which we can fulfill requests. Particularly with rare or oversized materials, the digitization and handling costs are often prohibitively expensive. If and when funding becomes available we will consider requests for rare materials within our queue.

For tips on how to expedite the request process and ensure that the correct material is added to the scanning queue, please take a look at our guidelines on the BHL wiki http://biodivlib.wikispaces.com/Tutorials. To receive notification as to when new material becomes available online, please subscribe to our rss feed of recent additions to our collection http://biodiversitylibrary.org/Recent.aspx. Again, thank you for submitting your request(s) to BHL. We are excited about the opportunity your feedback gives us to strengthen our ever-increasing digital collection.

Sincerely,
Bianca Crowley
BHL Collections Coordinator
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Standard Email for Asking for Blog Participation

We've started featuring some of our users in a new series on our blog, discussing how they use BHL and how it has impacted their research. I was wondering if you'd be interested in participating by filling out a short questionnaire about your use of BHL. Alternatively, if you would prefer to write up a short post of your own, without limiting yourself to the questionnaire, that is perfectly okay as well. There is no pressure, of course, but if you're interested, I'm attaching a short list of questions. Feel free to fill out at your leisure, and, if you do decide to participate, it would be great if you could send a picture to accompany the blog post. Thank you very much for your continued use of BHL, and for being a faithful user.

Best Wishes,

Grace Costantino, Biodiversity Heritage Library Librarian
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Some Good Phrases to use when...

It's too big

Unfortunately, the size is too large for us to be able to scan it as our maximum is 36cm. When we have the funding to scan larger works such as these we will submit your request for consideration regarding oversize queue.

User submits request via email/other

In the future, please submit your requests through our scanning form http://www. biodiversitylibrary.org/ Feedback.aspx so that we can process your request within our established workflow.

Content already available elsewhere

Thank you for submitting your request for scanning to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. Your request has been added to the queue. I have noticed, however, that the content you are seeking may already available online through the link provided below. I encourage you to access this content in the short term, but please note that until we can incorporate this content into BHL, you are not able to use our unique data export, content download, and taxonomic intelligence services. If the link I have provided is not what you were seeking, please let me know.

We are unable to provide a timetable for when the material might become available in the BHL collection. Many factors, such as the condition, location, or rarity of the item(s) requested, contribute to the speed with which we can fulfill requests. Particularly with rare or oversized materials, the digitization and handling costs are often prohibitively expensive. If and when funding becomes available we will consider requests for rare materials within our queue.

For tips on how to expedite the request process and ensure that the correct material is added to the scanning queue, please take a look at our guidelines on the BHL wiki http://biodivlib.wikispaces.com/Tutorials. To receive notification as to when new material becomes available online, please subscribe to our rss feed of recent additions to our collection http://biodiversitylibrary.org/Recent.aspx. Again, thank you for submitting your request(s) to BHL. We are excited about the opportunity your feedback gives us to strengthen our ever-increasing digital collection.

[link]

Sincerely,
Bianca Crowley
BHL Collections Coordinator

Taxonomic name search & OCR issues

Please note that a search for taxonomic names is dependent upon the ability of the optical character recognition (OCR) software to automatically detect the text of the scanned images of pages. Especially for historic works or items with non-standard typeface (such as medieval German or Chinese for example), the OCR capabilities are significantly limited and the text must be manually hand typed to enable the taxonomic name finding services to function properly. At present, we do not have the resources to transcribe such texts but it is a long term goal of ours to allow users to voluntarily contribute transcriptions of our scanned content via a web interface or some other mechanism in the future.

Can't fulfill request

Thank you for submitting your request for scanning to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. We received your request for

Unfortunately we will be unable to fulfill this request as no BHL member library holds this title. For more information about the libraries in our consortium, please see the following: http://biodivlib.wikispaces.com/BHL+Consortium+Membership. Please note that the BHL project is growing globally and it may be possible to some day fulfill your request as more libraries become part of the consortium.

Thank you for taking the time to submit your requests to our feedback form, http://biodiversitylibrary.org/Feedback.aspx. I encourage you to submit any additional requests you may have. Please keep in mind that our ability to fulfill requests is limited to the collections of the BHL partner institutions. Additional factors, such as the condition, location, or rarity of the item(s) requested, contribute to the speed with which we can fulfill requests if at all. Particularly with rare or oversized materials, the digitization and handling costs are often prohibitively expensive. If and when funding becomes available we will consider requests for rare materials within our queue.

For tips on how to expedite the request process and ensure that the correct material is added to the scanning queue, please take a look at our guidelines on the BHL wiki http://biodivlib.wikispaces.com/Tutorials. To receive notification as to when new material becomes available online, please subscribe to our rss feed of recent additions to our collection http://biodiversitylibrary.org/Recent.aspx. Again, thank you for submitting your request(s) to BHL. We are excited about the opportunity your feedback gives us to strengthen our ever-increasing digital collection.

Can't fulfill request - (c) issue

Thank you very much for submitting your request for scanning to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. We received your request for...
Unfortunately, the publication date for this work is beyond our copyright cut-off date of 1923. We are only allowed to scan works after this date if we obtain permission from the copyrightholder. If you have any information that might help us obtain permission to scan this work, please send it to my email at crowleyb@si.edu. Thank you for your feedback, and please do not hesitate to submit any additional questions/comments/concerns/etc. that you might have via our feedback form http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/Feedback.aspx.

Sincerely,
Bianca Crowley
BHL Collections Coordinator

Server slowness perhaps?

We received your feedback regarding your difficulty viewing scan images from on the Biodiversity Heritage Library. I believe you may have been attempting to access these images during a time of server slowness on our end. Occasionally, we experience some server slowness, and this can result in scans not opening or appearing "blank" when accessed. I was just now able to access the scans for this volume, so I believe if you try to access it again, you should not have any difficulty. If you still encounter difficulty, please let me know by replying to this email and indicating which Internet Browser you are using. Thank you for your feedback, and please do not hesitate to contact us in the future with any additional questions/comments/concerns/etc.

Thank you,
Bianca Crowley
BHL Collections Coordinator

(- lipscombb Jan 26, 2011Thanks Grace)

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Standard Response for Book Value Inquiries

Thank you very much for your feedback regarding your [title]. Unfortunately, we are not able to provide estimations of value. However, below you will see a list of resources that you may consult in order to further your investigations regarding the value of the pieces you own. Please note that any prices you may see listed in any of these resources for any book are quite specific to the individual copy being listed, and therefore those items listed must be examined carefully to determine how closely they match your own copy - edition, completeness, and condition can vary a great deal and are crucial to market value. Nevertheless, with these caveats, such listings can provide a ballpark notion of a book's value.

1. www.abebooks.com (similar to vialibri – both search the listings of booksellers in the US, Europe, and around the world),
2. ViaLibri – an online searchable database of the inventories of thousands book dealers in the US and Europe. There, one can search to see if there are any copies currently in the market of the book they want to sell. We remind people that they input information directly from the title page, since it’s the title page that uniquely differentiates book from other editions.
3. Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America (ABAA) – A more exclusive gathering of reputable book dealers (most of whom I believe put their inventories on viaLibri). Member booksellers can be searched by subject matter (as well as name and geographic location) including map sellers and those that offer appraisals .
4. For general information about identifying and assessing rare books, the Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS) of the ALA has published Your Old Books, a guide in FAQ format about rare books and their values.
5. The Smithsonian's Special Collections Department has posted a (now outdated, but good) reference bibliography titled “Information on Old Books”.

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Suggested Auto Response for Submitting Feedback:

Thank you for submitting your feedback to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. Your form has been submitted successfully and will be addressed in the order it was received. If requested or required, a staff member will contact you shortly regarding your comment or inquiry.


"Submitted"
how about super short and sweet? - ErinThomas Nov 9, 2009

- ConnieR Nov 9, 2009 Too short. but a combo, so someone not interested can stop at "Submitted" would work. I would prefer "Thank you for submitting your feedback to the Biodiversity Heritage Library. If requested or required, a staff member will contact you shortly."

- matt707 Nov 9, 2009 I think Connie's incorporative suggestion is fine.

I also like Connie's suggestion. - dukeg1

I think Connie has nailed it. Works for me - rmorin

Another vote for Connie's text. - jmignault Nov 9, 2009

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Suggested Language for "Expand All" text on portal pages:

We could ditch the "download options" in that box all together. those functions are more clearly available elsewhere and it muddies the rest of the content in the box. We have:

= show details = read book

How about? = Notes from the librarian = read book

So, when we want to offer the "expand all" option, we can just add one word. "Expand all notes". My feeling is there's enough context for the user to know what we mean, although, perhaps...ha! - ErinThomas Nov 9, 2009

I really like this option, and I agree that there will be enough context for the users to know what we mean. I think this is also a simple, easy fix solution :-) - dukeg1

- ConnieR Nov 9, 2009I am missing the context here. I don't see a problem with several places to get a download.

- ErinThomas Nov 9, 2009 I dont think it's a problem per se, but it makes naming that box a little hairier than, imho, it needs to be. if we say it's a "data" box, then we can describe it pretty simply. but if its a data + hey-here's-some-function-too box, then....it makes it more confusing to name. several places to get a download is fine. several places to do lots of stuff is fine, as long as the navigation makes sense.

- jmignault Nov 9, 2009 What about "Book info" and "Read book?" I don't have a problem with the download options, though I could see simplifying the download section a bit by using a dropdown for format and a ok button next to it. I sometimes find the interface on the portal to be very text heavy - everything is done in underlined links, which is very difficult to read at times.

What makes things additionally difficult is the constraint that we need to get the sponsor and contributor information in there, which can vary from volume to volume, which is unfortunate. I think the boxes are not so bad, they could just use some better design, they're very busy and the layout makes them confusing.

- ErinThomas Nov 9, 2009 Ah, "book info". Can it really be that easy? When going over the "report an error" issue, this was the problem we kept running into. what part of the book? metadata? missing page? "book" isn't specific enough (at least, not for the feedback mechanism aspect). Maybe it works for this? The information in the box is now: sponsor&contributor/download/date scanned/IA notes re: copyright.

and we, as BHL librarians, are tryna get in there too. So.

Our task is to correct "expand all" to something that makes sense for all that info currently (and our info later) in the box. Since 'expand all' is referring back to "Show details" we need to be clearer about what the details are. Yes, they are book details. Book details and IA scanning details. And a place for us to articulate why we choose to have a dupe, for example... So, if folks like "Book Information" here, I'd say it kinda works. But I also think we'll end up changing it again later...viva la beta. :)
Maybe the problem, though, is with "info" rather than "book" in this case?
I thought "Notes from the Librarian" or somesuch works because it gives us loads of room to say whatever we want about the item. while still making sense for the scanning origin story, as it were, to also be included in the box.

Only by clicking will users know the content of the little box--whatever we call it.

- jmignault Nov 10, 2009 Maybe "Expand all" should become "Show info for all vols?" I dunno. I see what you're after with "Notes from the librarian," but I expect commentary from that wording ("This book was a PITA to scan",) and there's way more than one librarian (maybe THAT's the problem :) ) I think we should be trying to use real-world domain language here, though technically that'd mean we should be saying "Digital Surrogate Info" and "Expand info for all digital surrogates," which doesn't exactly trip off the tongue. I'm not sure. I'm still thinking that some of this problem could be ameliorated by the judicious use of other interface elements besides text links. Making "Report an Error" an actual button, for instance, pretty much solves the whole "is that a link or a page load error" problem immediately.


- matt707 Nov 10, 2009
My 2 cents:
Remember, we are dealing with monographs and serials, and the display looks a little different when you have 30 serials volumes listed.
We need to be more simple and specific as well, as the linking language used is a little fuzzy, so we should state what’s going on more clearly:
present language: “+ = show details” and “ = read book” (I think read book is clear)

The above 2 lines should not be next to each other, they should be 2 separate lines.

“+ = show details” could be clearer if it said something like:

“+ = download – scan - copyright details”
(I think we need to be Librarians, explaining to our users what's behind the buttons)

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and for the below:
View: Expand All Collapse All

Could be edited to something like:

View: Details per volume(s)

And the collapse feature could be standard web language such as

Hide details

Also, part of me thinks that the entire line View: Expand All Collapse All

could be deleted.

- dukeg1 Personally, I like the suggestion to just change the language to "Show info for all volumes." I think this is simple, to the point, and, if users want to know more details about each volume, I think it should be pretty clear that they can do so by clicking this button. I don't think we'll be able to come up with language that articulates the whole realm of information that can be gleaned by clicking on the button in one word. I think we'll need to simply tell users, if they want to get more information about said volume, they need to click the icon. Similarly, I think the legend at the top that currently looks like this:

= show details = read book

Could be changed to:

= show info for volume = read book

I think we need to not make it more complicated than it needs to be. I think John's wording suggestion makes it clear, but still keeps it simple.

- ErinThomas Nov 10, 2009 Agreed, grace. agreed, John.

- matt707 Nov 10, 2009

I'm OK with "show info for all volumes"...where I was coming from was distinguishing between "information" vs. MARC information on the left.
- ConnieR Nov 10, 2009I liked Matt's comments about serials vs. books and agree that John's suggestions are good. I am not sure what is wrong with "show details".

- ErinThomas Nov 10, 2009 I find "show details" a pretty meaningless phrase, but, again, once users click there, they'll know what it means. seems a more descriptive word or phrase would be more useful.
I would like it if the legend was referring to something that actually describes the content of the box. i.e. the scanning details and the download function and whatever info we decide we want to impart about a given item...But if we cant do that, I agree, why change anything? Because, there's not a whole lot of difference between "show details" and "show info for volume" now that i think on it...and yes. MARC info versus scanning info. so begins a descriptive quagmire.
"Notes from the librarian" is also pretty meaningless as descriptors go, but it communicates that there are professionals at work on the other side of the box and adds some humanity. which, I dunno. Is that useful? maybe not in this specific context, actually. It's vague, but it's also flexible.
So, I dont want to add complexity to what could be a simple fix.
Here's my point: :)
If we cant describe the box concisely, let's be usefully vague. And is it already usefully vague?

If we keep "show details", then let's "expand all details".

And I agree with Matt, the two lines should not be next to each other. But, we often run into a real estate problem, especially when we're dealing with long serial runs, so they might need to stay adjacent for a while.

- dukeg1 So, is our consensus going to be that we don't change the language? My concern with this is that, at the face to face meeting, everyone in the room said they DID NOT like that wording and wanted it changed to something that was more descriptive of the information contained in the boxes. Why are we now deciding that the decision we reached at the meeting is no longer valid? I believe something more descriptive than "show details" needs to be agreed upon. Show details of what? At least "show details for each volume" would communicate context if we agree that "details" is the word we want to use. Details is broad enough to encompass a wide range of information that could be contained in the boxes, and at least this gives the users some idea of why they might want to click on those expand icons.
- ConnieR Nov 12, 2009"Show details for each volume" works. It provides a little more information without limiting what is in the box.

- matt707 Nov 12, 2009 or "Show details for volume(s)" to make it slightly more brief. or Display Volume(s) Scanning Information, or Show Vol(s). Scan Details or
or "Display Vol(s). Scan Info"

What's going on is we are displaying download options, scanning information, and copyright details. Is there a single word which would better represent those functions?

- ErinThomas Nov 12, 2009Yes, of those three content buckets, i think scanning info best describes the content.....and hey again a small plug for 86ing the download options just in this spot. the copyright info seems to collapse into the scanning details. So, how about + = show scan details. (or + = show digital scan details) leaving us with "expand all details" thinking folks can fill in that gap, given the legend.

- dukeg1 So how about:
= show scan details for volume(s) = read book

and


View: Expand All Scan DetailsCollapse All


Are people comfortable with this? Can we send this on to Mike?

- ConnieR Nov 12, 2009I am still reluctant to remove the download option in this box.

- ErinThomas Nov 12, 2009 it's true, perhaps folks have been using that feature, in that spot. and removal could upset some. that can be a topic for another time--I just want to also remind us that we have a deadline of tomorrow, thats the 13th! to decide on wording.

= show scan details for volume(s) = read book

I vote yes.

and View: expand all details/collapse all details. (the alternate option being visible)

- dukeg1 Yes, I think for this discussion, we are not talking about whether to remove or not remove downloading options from the box. This will still stay in the box for the time being, and permanently should we decide to keep it. Our recommendations to Mike will not be about whether or not to remove this option from the box. We are simply giving him the text for the "thank you for submitting feedback" option and our language change for details. This is what we need to vote on.


- matt707 Nov 12, 2009
I know you guys want to wrap this up, I agree,
but I think we should try and follow through on language when we can
so if we say
+ "Show scan details per volume(s)

when we say "View: Expand all", we should use the same language as above, like : " View: "All details, and the complimentary language could be
"View: Hide details" -

does this make sense to you guys- OK for you to say I am going too far mincing words

- ConnieR Nov 12, 2009I am happy with Matt's suggestions.

- dukeg1 So we are going with the original suggestion:

= show scan details for volume(s) = read book

and

View: Expand All Scan Details/Collapse All Scan Details

Correct?

- ErinThomas Nov 12, 2009 yes. i second, er a third? that.

- matt707 Nov 12, 2009First, this type of communication involving designing something via a wiki is not easy so a pat on our backs is in order.

Second, John, are you there?
Third, I am fine with the above changes.

- dukeg1 I agree - I think making these kind of decisions would be MUCH easier in person! Maybe for future decisions the happy button committee has to make, we can have a conference call or something...

- rmorin Sorry for not weighing in on this issue (damn time difference!). I agree with the final result. Good work, everyone who is not me.

- jmignault Nov 13, 2009 I'm good with all this. Consistency through the interface is a good thing.