As we’re getting close to a number of positions on our KLAS Users’ Group committees and Board of Officers, I wanted to take some time to say, “thank you.”

(Yes, we’ve done this before—but it’s important.)

I’ve been there! I was on the Officers Board and the Conference Programming Committee for several years while I was working for the Illinois Talking Book Outreach Center, and I remember what an inconvenience it could be to have committee work or board meetings on top of my regular Reader Advisor duties. Now that I’ve been on both sides, though, I can really see how important it was that I made time for it.

To all of our current (and exiting, and incoming) officers and committee members: I see you showing up for meetings even when it feels like your patrons are crawling out of the woodwork with requests. I hear you asking thoughtful questions and sharing your ideas even when you’re tired and not sure you’re on the right track. And I thank you for it, because I know how much you are bringing to the Users’ Conference, and through it, to your fellow users’ understanding of KLAS, their ability to serve their patrons, and their relationship with Keystone.

Even beyond the conference, our active community of users guides Keystone—including future development, where we allocate our time and resources, and how we communicate. That happens in planning and at the conference, but also when users take their questions and concerns to the Officers Board to share with us, in our discussions with KDAC, in survey responses, and more. We rely on you to make all of that happen, and you make us better and better, every year.

So one last, heartfelt, Thank You.

And to anyone out there who is considering getting involved: Your voice matters! We’d love to hear from you.

This week's post shares some insider info about our Software Development Project Lead. Read on to learn something new about Brian...

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Brian White

Year Hired: 2004

Current Job Title: Software Development – Project Lead

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Piecing together the parts of a software process to make something that will make someone's job easier.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: Worked for a programming staff supplement service. I worked at 2 customer sites over the 20+ years there.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Singing in a church choir, playing handbells.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Australia

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: We are currently without pets. We have had dogs, cats, guinea pigs, and a rabbit in the past.

Welcome back to the "The Stars of Keystone Systems' Staff" series. Each will include some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Drea Callicutt

Year Hired: 2002

Current Job Title: Marketing, Sales & Communications Coordinator

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Collaborating with other Keystone staff as well as staff from our various libraries and organizations to create and provide opportunities for our users to learn and share how to better serve your patrons.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: After graduating with a B.A. in Journalism, I was a teacher’s assistant in a Montessori classroom and then worked for Tech Resource Group providing onsite and then phone-based tech support for contracted clients.

I joined Keystone in December 2002 and combined my Communications degree and experience in software and hardware to fill the position of “Sales & Marketing Support”. In 2011, I decided to go back to school part-time. I graduated in 2014 with a Masters in Library Science with a concentration in Special Libraries and an emphasis on community / public relations, outreach, and serving special populations.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: My husband and I have participated in non-profit medieval reenactment organization for over 20 years. In fact, we met at a business meeting of our local group. A few years ago, we also became costumed volunteers at Jamestown Settlement in VA where we interpret and teach the public about life in the colony including historic clothing, foodways, etc. Also, I love to travel, sew, cook, read, and play board and card games.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: I am very interested in traveling to the far east, in particular, India and Thailand. I especially love the history, arts, and food of each of these cultures.

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: My husband and I have three dogs. Enoch Squirrlesbane’s a 9 or 10-year-old pug / beagle mix that was found as a stray. Lafayette Nubbintail is a 3-year-old French bulldog chihuahua mix from a local animal shelter. Hercules Maximillian Mulligan aka Max is a 9-year-old pug from NC Pug Rescue.

Our "Stars of Keystone's Staff" series includes some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

This week's post shares some insider info about a member of our Executive Managment Team. Read on to learn something new about James...

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: James Burts

Year Hired: 1992 (27 years ago) -- Yikes! That’s a long time!!!

Current Job Title: Executive Vice President, Lead dishwasher, Junior Assistant Gopher 2nd Class

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Being a small company, no day is ever the same as any other day we’ve ever had. There is no routine, boring day of doing the same thing for the 1,000th day in a row. I really like how many different things I get to do here, how many hats I wind up wearing. Also, I really appreciate how what we do really makes a difference to the Patrons that KLAS helps serve. I think that it’s true of all of Keystone’s staff, but knowing that at the end of the day we’re really helping make people’s lives better is a huge draw for me.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I started working for Keystone as a summer job, while I was studying Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech. My first tasks were helping write documentation for KLAS v2 and then v3. Over time, my work grew to writing some reports on the side, which turned to joining and eventually leading the software development team, and ultimately led to my current position.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Making stuff, strangely most of my hobbies involve fire or excessive heat. I do glassblowing. I do metalwork. Lately, my son’s been really excited with creating electric vehicles, so we’ve been working on the welding, metal fabrication, and electronics for that. Currently, we’re building our own version of a OneWheel, and have an EV club that he’s involved in where they’re starting to build their second electric go cart.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Probably Bermuda. I’ve done a few trips there, and really love it. The snorkelling is fantastic, and I hope to learn to do some scuba there.

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: We have a dog, a Shiba Inu named Kuma.

The snow has melted, the Holidays are rapidly approaching, and it's time for another post in our "Stars of Keystone's Staff" series. Each will include some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: John Owen

Year Hired: August 2002

Current Job Title: Senior Support Analyst

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Developing relationships. Of course, helping but always building trust.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: Technical and sales support for a major semiconductor manufacturer and point of sale company.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: My grandchildren, my church and my music, and Alabama Football...Roll Tide!

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Fiji and Vietnam

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: One cat, Belle Belle hired us six years ago.

The grandkids:

John working with kids in Haiti:

 Belle Belle, managing her staff:

 And a throwback to high school basketball--can you tell which of these players is John?

Today we're starting the first in a series of Key Notes blog posts called "The Stars of Keystone Systems' Staff". Each will include some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Katy Patrick

Year Hired: 2017

Current Job Title: Technical Writer

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: I love the variety: I get to work on a wide variety of things from how-to documents and blog posts to pitching in to help test new releases. I always have a lot of different projects in the works, so I never get bored.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I worked as a Reader Adviser for Kansas' and then Illinois' Talking Books programs. That work meant a lot to me, so I'm glad that I have been able to stay connected to that community despite moving on to a new type of work.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Fiction writing, mostly fantasy novels. I haven't gotten anything polished and ready for publishing yet, but maybe someday! I also enjoy sewing, digital art, photography, and gardening.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: I'd love to go to Machu Picchu. It looks like such an amazing window into another time and culture and set in an incredibly beautiful landscape.

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: I have a pair of finches: Terragon (a Spice Finch) and Wrenegade (a Society Finch). They love birdbaths and listening to the radio, and their favorite treat is carrots.

Our "Stars of Keystone's Staff" series includes some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

With KLAS 7.7 on the verge of general release and just a month until the 2019 KLAS Users' Conference, we thought it was a perfect time to let you learn more about Kyle Honeycutt, Keystone's Manager of Software Development in this instalment of our "Stars of Keystone" blog series.

Basic Stats:

Name: Kyle Honeycutt

Year Hired: 1994

Current Job Title: Manager of Software Development

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Hearing of a need from customers, designing and programming a solution to that problem, and seeing the customers put that solution to use.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I was a student. This is my first job out of school. In school I did work as a lab assistant, helping other students debug their Assembly, C and Pascal programs.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: I'm very active in my church, both working in teaching ministries, and working with the technology needs of the church. I am also the Secretary/Treasurer of a non-profit cemetery association, so I am actively involved in the management and operation of the cemetery. Otherwise, I do yard work, odd jobs, and garden work at our home in Raleigh and my home-place in Benson. We always had a large vegetable garden, and my Dad and I raised collards, a tradition I carried on after my Dad passed. I stopped most of that recent years, but hope to get back on my tractors in the near future.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Home. I don't get to spend as much time at either of the places that I call home as I would like. Otherwise, I'd just like to spend a while traveling across the country, seeing the sights I've never seen and seeing how agriculture is done across our land.

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: We have four cats – Maggie, Wendy, Teddy, and Stanley. We had not intended on adopting a fourth cat, but Stanley just showed up as a skinny stray a few days after Teddy got out. He's now a plump, happy part of the family.

Wendy is a sweet calico.

 Teddy is a black and white tuxedo kitty. He like lounging on laps.

Maggie is a grey tabby.

Stanley is a light orange tabby.

Welcome back to the "The Stars of Keystone Systems' Staff" series. Each will include some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Marion A. W. Campbell

Year Hired: 2008

Current Job Title: Customer Service Representative

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Working with librarians and IRC staff.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I taught High School Chemistry. During my time teaching, I had two students who were blind and one who was deaf.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Glassblowing, Historical Reenactment, and Blacksmithing

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Italy

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: Yes. 2 cats and a bunny. Tinkerbell is our older calico cat, and Bobbles is our black kitten. Bun Bun, the bunny, is a Jersey Wooly which is a dwarf / angora mix.

Our "Stars of Keystone's Staff" series includes some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

With the upcoming release of KLAS 7.7, we thought it is good time to bring you our latest "Stars of Keystone Staff" so we can highlight our staff member who has helped to coordinate, support, and install many versions of KLAS in his time at Keystone. He is also the person our staff calls when we can't get on the VPN, we need our email account unlocked, or need to be reminded of how to log onto a customer's database after a change in IP address.

Basic Stats:

Name: Mark Gardner

Year Hired: 1985

Current Job Title: Manager of Systems and Networking

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Solving problems, working on different projects, working with others

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: Programmer, Piedmont Microsystems

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Country Music Concerts, Photography, Fantasy Basketball, Fishing, Anything blue (Doctor Who, M&M’s, etc)

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Austin Texas, Australia

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: No pets, just occasional visits from our rabbits

Welcome back to the "The Stars of Keystone Systems' Staff" series. Each will include some basic info and insight into one of our staff members. We hope these posts will provide you a look into who makes up our diverse, supportive, and knowledgeable staff.

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Nancy Underwood Honeycutt

Year Hired: 1998

Current Job Title: Manager, Customer Support

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: I enjoy helping people. It helps that the folks we work for are some of the nicest people around, and they’re doing a good service. So, I feel good when I can help them do that.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I was a middle and high school English teacher.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: I do a lot of crafts, most recently quilting and crochet. I get a lot of satisfaction in seeing a project come together from its pieces.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: I’d like to see Australia and New Zealand.

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: We’ve got three and a half cats. The three indoor cats – Maggie, Teddy and Wendy – are pretty happy kitties. Meanwhile, Stanley has been hanging out on the back deck for over a year. We’ve decided that we’d like him to come inside, particularly for the upcoming winter, so we’re working on that.

This is Maggie. She's looking on dubiously.

 Here's Teddy with his tuxedo.

 Wendy is the pretty tortie..

 Maggie and Teddy are curled up on the cat tree inside while Stanley lays on the patio table on the deck outside the window.

This week we wanted to give you the opportunity to learn more about the woman who's usually the first voice you hear when you call our office, knows how to use the copier better than anyone else on staff, and can program the heck out of a barcode scanner. Hopefully, you know who I'm about by now...yup it's Tracey Fye!

Basic Stats:

Name of Staff Member: Tracey Fye

Year Hired: 2002

Current Job Title: Administrative Assistant

Getting to Know You Q&A:

Q: What is your favorite part of your job?

A: Talking to customers when they call and hearing about their families, etc.

Q: What did you do before working for Keystone?

A: I did title work at an Infiniti car dealership.

Q: What are your hobbies outside of work?

A: Scrapbooking, taking my dog for walks, and playing with my granddaughter.

Q: If you could go anywhere on vacation, where would you go?

A: Hawaii

Q: Do you have any pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?

A: I have a black lab mix named Deuce. He is 100 pounds and thinks he’s a lap dog. He’s about 11 years old. We just got a kitten named Cleopatra (Cleo). She is only 3 pounds and almost three months old. Her and Deuce have become best friends – they will curl up together and sleep. I also have a goldfish named Peaches. She has managed to kill her tank mates and prefers to be an only fish.

Deuce is wearing a purple harness and laying on the floor.

Cleo is asleep on the couch beside a throw pillow.

Hello, KLAS Users! This week, I am very pleased to introduce: the 2019 KLAS Users' Conference app!

A lot of work was put into the app this year to make it easier, better, and more useful. We hope it'll be a valuable tool for you as you attend UC2019. And even if you can't join us, the app will allow you to browse through the sessions, download presentations, or find out how to contact the user who presented that session you really wished you could go to!

You can download the app now (or any time) from either the Google Play store or the Apple App store - just search for "KLAS Users Conference". It should be among the first results, with a green "K" icon.

The app was designed to be magnification-friendly and screen-reader accessible. If you encounter any accessibility problems, please let us know as soon as possible so we can work on a fix! It should be compatible with all Apple and Android devices, including both phones and tablets.

Hopefully, everything will be intuitive and easy-to-find while exploring the app on your own. Just in case, and for those who don't have their phones handy to check it out right away, let's take a tour...

The Home screen of the app allows you to navigate quickly to whatever you need. Open the Menu for useful links, or select one of the options from the bottom navigation tray to open one of the app's "tabs." You can also swipe your screen left and right to move between tabs that way!

Updates, available from either the menu or the navigation tray, contains the latest information from us and will continue to be updated through the conference with any last-minute changes or useful information. The Updates page itself will include brief headlines, which you can tap to view more information (this format is repeated through the app).

The latest updates are pulled in every time you open the app, so make sure to close the app when you are done with it.

Other menu items include Resources, where you'll shortcut links to some of the most useful KLASusers.com articles and a downloadable PDF version of the agenda, Keystone Contact info, and a link to the feedback Survey (so you can let us know about your experience after the conference).

The Sessions tab lists the full conference agenda by day. Tap any session to view details, including a download link to the slides or handout!

NOTE: For now, all download links point to a placeholder, to show where the download links are located and allow you to test downloading and opening slides on your device. Once we start receiving presentations from our speaker, the placeholder links will be removed until they can be replaced with the presentation.

The Speakers tab has information on all of our presenters, including both Keystone staff and user presenters. Again, tap any entry to view more information. We hope this will be a great way for (especially newer) attendees to get to know our speakers and enable you to reach out to a presenter if you have questions about their session after the fact.

Finally, the Map has an embedded Google map with pins on various points of interest, to help you navigate the area.

ConfI hope you enjoyed this look at everything the 2019 KLAS Users' Conference app has to offer!

Be sure to download it to your device(s) so it's on hand and ready to go when you arrive in Palm Beach. We look forward to seeing you there!

With the KLAS.com revamp successfully launched, we’ve started planning and looking ahead to reorganizing and redesigning KLASusers.com as well.

It’s important to us that this site can serve as a valuable resource for you, as well as a place where the user’s group can come together and collaborate on common issues. The appearance of the site isn’t as important... but we do want it to be pleasant to look at. A much higher priority is that the revamped KLASusers be easy-to-navigate and convenient to use (for all of our users—accessibility will be absolutely required in the revamp). Finally, if we’re able to add in some new features to facilitate user interaction, that’s a big plus!

We have our ideas about how to achieve all of this, but we want your feedback. Drop by Drea’s recent forum post to let us know what you’d like to see in a revamp, if there’s anything you don’t want us to change, or if you have any thoughts or feedback on our ideas below. We hope to hear from you!

A couple of examples of what we’re hoping for in the revamp:

Our current plan is to fold the current Documents and Recordings sections together into a Knowledge Repository (maybe just called "Resources"), so you can find all of the how-to information, downloads, and other "good stuff" without needing to know what format the resource is in. Of course, this section especially will need good indexing and searching.

Another change we’re aiming for is for users to be able to log in from any page and stay on that page rather than being redirected to their profile. This should make it a lot more convenient to access restricted content.

We’d also like to be able to include comments sections on articles, so it’s easy for you to ask questions or provide feedback on blog posts and resource articles without needing to switch to a forum post or email.

A lesser (but still high) priority is for the new version to be easier for Drea and I to administer. That won’t be as apparent to you, but it will help us get new content up on the site quickly. Right now, handling recordings can be especially tricky, so we hope the new site will allow us to more easily post new recordings in a way that will allow you to view them on the site itself and maintain a proper level of security for library-specific recordings that may include patron data.

So how does all that sound? Anything else you want us to be thinking about or try to address in the revamp? Please drop by the forums (since we don’t have that comments section yet) and let us know!

As states ease restrictions and some staff are returning to large pile-ups of returned books (or a suspicious absence of returned books), and things are still far from “business as usual”, how is everyone handling it?

I’ll discuss some approaches that have come into our support inbox so far, but everyone has a little bit different situation, so remember these are just a few ideas to get you started. Please continue to contact us as needed to help strategize and determine the best workflows to get you back on track.

Albany called in reinforcements from other departments and raised their card limit while they get caught up. Their strategy was to start by checking out the waiting Mail Cards and then focus on check-ins knowing that they had the extra staff to handle the surge of assignments this would cause the next day.

Libraries that don’t have reinforcements to call on likely want to take a somewhat different approach.

Braille Institute, for example, is working to get caught up on check-ins but is not ready to start sending outgoing mail again. They set their Daily Circulation Cutoff to zero, but that control stops Nightly from assigning books... not Reserves, which are filled on check-in. So, once they’ve finished checking in books each day, they are then Unassigning the whole batch that has been generated this way from the Mail card Review screen. Because the titles have only been Assigned, not checked out, the reserves will stay on the patron records. However, this approach helps to keep assignments fresh—if the patron downloaded the title from BARD in the meantime, the reserve will be cleared when Braille Institute loads their BARD Stats. They are also taking this time to shelve everything that was currently on turnaround, clean the shelves, and start the check-ins with a new shelf order and set-up.

Oregon Talking Books is returning to sending outgoing books, but only by Duplication. Because switching a patron to Duplication service shifts KLAS to only counting duplication orders towards the NS Cutoff, it won’t matter that they are catching up on check-ins more gradually. As an added complication, they are required to send all outgoing containers inside a manilla envelope due to the life of the virus on plastic. We’re working with them to generate these additional mailing labels, which will allow them to greatly ramp up the number of cartridges they can send per day.

Nevada is also making the switch to Duplication. They've started with a nightly Duplication Order limit of 100, though they may need to increase it as they get more of their patrons converted and more experience with duplicating. We helped them unassign the large batch of outstanding Physical service mail cards, and like Braille Institute, they will be unassigning the new ones generated each day as Reserves are made available. However, because those patrons are likely to be great candidates for duplication, we’ve recommended they export the list from the “Mailing Cards – Review” screen before unassigning the batch. They can then save the list of Patron IDs to import as a query set and convert them to duplication using the “Batch Update Patron Profile” tool.

We hope this gave you some things to think about—both in terms of approaches to take and complications to consider. Please reach out any time you’d like some help, or if you just want to confirm something will work the way you expect it to.

From Merriam-Webster.com:

Definition of FOMO
plural FOMOs
informal : fear of missing out : fear of not being included in something (such as an interesting or enjoyable activity) that others are experiencing

Do you have klasusers.com FOMO?

Well, here are some tips to make sure you see all the latest articles and posts...

All the latest Key Notes

To see all the latest Key Notes blog articles click on "Key Notes" under the Main Menu. The page sorts the newest post to the top.

A link to "More / Older Articles" is available at the bottom of the page. You can also navigate through older posts using the page navigation links (Page 1, Next, End, etc.) also located at the bottom of the page.

Keeping up with Discussion Forum posts

Subscribing to Specific Discussion Forum Threads

At the top and the bottom of every discussion forum thread, you will find the 'Subscribe' button. Pressing this button subscribes you to that topic so that any responses to that topic will generate an email notification to your email address stating that a new post has been made along with a link directly to said post for your convenience. You will notice the button now reads 'Unsubscribe' indicating that you are subscribed and pressing the button again will remove your subscription to that thread. Remember that you can also manage your subscriptions in your profile.

Favouring a Discussion Forum Thread

Another way of gaining visibility of threads you want to keep an eye on is set them as your 'Favorite'. This will place an obvious indicator, such as a star, beside the topic name of the thread so that it will stand out in the forum list of topics. After you "Favorite" a post, you will notice the button now reads 'Unfavorite' indicating that the post is already one of your favorites and pressing the button again will remove it from your favorites. This is a great way to get visibility on multiple topics that you wish to watch without getting spammed by email subscriptions. Remember that you can also manage your favorites in your profile.

Finding all the most Recent Discussion Forum Topics

If you quickly want to find ALL the latest discussion forum posts, you can navigate to the "Recent Topics Tab". This is the second available tab on the forums whether you are logged in or not. Here, you will see all of the most recently posted topics with the newest available first.

Subscribe to a Discussion Forum Category via RSS Feed

From Lifewire:

Instead of checking back every day to any particular site to see if it's been updated, RSS feeds give users the ability to simply subscribe to the RSS feed, much like you would subscribe to a newspaper, and then read the updates from the site, delivered via RSS feeds, in what's called a "feed reader."

Check out their "What Everyone Should Know about RSS Feeds" article to learn more about what an RSS feed it, how to subscribe to one, and suggestions for different RSS readers.

Now, use the RSS Feed button to subscribe to the Discussion Forum Index Page to have ALL the newest posts sent to you in your RSS Reader.

OR, use the RSS Feed button at the bottom of a community, category, or thread to subscribe to those that interest you most.

 So, there's no reason suffer from klasusers.com FOMO by employing just a few of the above tools.

Did you know we've been posting new Key Notes blog posts for 10 weeks straight? In celebration of this and in anticipation of the upcoming 2018 KLAS Users' Conference, Katy and I decided to share our Top Ten list of what we're looking forward to at the conference.

10. The once a year opportunity to see many of our customers / friends in person.

9. Hearing Gary Eller's program and music at the Tuesday evening Welcome Reception.

8. Getting together with our Instructional Resource Customers in IRC focused sessions to discuss their specialized workflows and features designed specifically for them.

7. Hearing the creative ways you use KLAS to help you provide the books, magazines, and equipment your patrons want / need.

6. Touring the Idaho Commission for Libraries, Talking Books Service on Wednesday evening.

5. Getting ideas and suggestions from users for better KLASusers content.

4. Listening to our Keynote Speaker, Ramona Walhof.

3. The chance to do in-person training, helping you use KLAS better!

2. Honoring Nancy Reese, this year's Julie Klauber Award Recipient, during our Opening General Session on Tuesday morning.

1. Unveiling all of the exciting things we've been working on for the future of KLAS -- from PCC to the Browser-based UI, and a few surprises too!

Are you excited for the 2023 KLAS Users' Conference? We sure are!

While we're grateful that we get to hang out with some of you in-person, we also want our online attendees to have a great conference experience. To help get you oriented, here's a short video tour of the Zoom Events platform:

While we hope this platform will be easy-to-use for everyone, please do let us know if you have any questions or issues. Ready to try it out? Log in any time to start building your personal agenda, filling in your profile, and making connections!

How are you training your new staff to use KLAS—and how can we help?

We will continue to post Key Note blog posts and weekly tips, tricks, and questions on the discussion forum, and we hope these posts will be both a resource for you and a jumping-off point for you to share and collaborate on resources and methods with each other. But there’s more coming!

I have a lot of ideas about different materials and resources that I could create, but I want to make sure that I’m putting my time into the projects that will benefit you. A few of the possibilities are listed below, but I’m very interested to hear your ides as well! Have a look through the list, then please chime in on the forums.

How do you train your staff? What materials do you already use or what materials would you like to have? What are your needs or wants in terms of evaluation, continuing education, certification?

Idea 1: Video Series relaunch

KLAS staff have created instructional videos before, but there are a lot of challenges for this kind of project. It takes a lot of time and work to create even a short instructional video, and they aren’t easily customizable for different libraries the way a text How-to document is. Every library and other institution that uses KLAS is unique, and has unique settings, workflows, and standards—this is a strength of the software, but it makes it hard to provide generalized instruction.

Because of these challenges, a renewed effort to provide an instructional video series would probably keep a high-level view (i.e. “What is in this module” and “How to use the screen” but not step-by-step instructions for specific tasks or processes such as “How to check out a book”) meant to introduce staff to the different parts of KLAS and how to use basic controls standard throughout the system.

Idea 2: Assemble-your-own KLAS Scavenger Hunts

The KLAS Scavenger Hunt is a skill evaluation method we have used in the past. As context, the 2014 Scavenger Hunt and answers are available for download at the end of this post.

Because these are text documents, I could create various sections addressing different common set-ups and procedures. Then, from the “Master Test,” individual libraries could pick and choose the questions that apply to their situation. This would help to share the work of customization and would hopefully be flexible enough to meet many needs and remain sustainable through upgrades.

Idea 3: Online Evaluations

These would face many of the same challenges as the Video Series. Depending on what platform I find to help me create them, some customization would hopefully be possible, but a significant re-do for each interested library and IRC would be unlikely except as part of the subscription below.

These would essentially be an augmented, self-contained version of the Scavenger Hunt, though they would need to remain at least a little more general. They would facilitate evaluation of staff skills, and potentially even a certification if such a thing is of use, without needing a supervisor to grade the test themselves.

Idea 4: Training Subscription

Finally, this is an idea that Drea has been mulling over. A training subscription would be a paid, annual service which would allow us to provide customized training targeted directly to your needs. The subscription could potentially include a series of webinars (either quarterly or scheduled as needed), which would be recorded and available to your staff from then on, as well as one or more custom Online Evaluations.

Our current price list for our current training services is attached below; several of you have been taking advantage of these options, and they are still available. However, we recognize that training is often an ongoing need, rather than a one-time event. Our thinking is that an annual subscription could help you build training into your annual budget, while also helping us to plan out what we will need to provide through the year.

Wrap-up

Remembering that these are ideas for brainstorming and not formal offerings: which would you most like to see? Do you have your own ideas? Would you be interested in a paid training subscription, and if so, what would you like to be included?

We also want to hear what you are doing for training now—and we know your peers will be interested as well! So whatever your situation, drop on by the forum and join the conversation.

Please Note: The scavenger hunt questions and answers are included for context purposes, and are not considered "ready to use" at this time.

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Whew! Are you all caught up from the Users’ Conference yet?

For those of you who were at the conference, make sure to fill out our feedback form! Every year, the conference planning committees comb through your responses to find out what worked, what didn’t, and what people want from the Users’ Conference. Every voice matters—so please share yours!

For our part, we’re very happy with how the conference went. We came back with a ton of great feedback about what we’ve been working on, and what you want to see from us in the future. I hope y'all were able to learn as much as we did!

We want to keep that energy up and the conversation going, so if you are new to the KLASusers’ website, or if there are others at your library that aren’t on board yet—go right ahead and Create an Account. This is also a great time to let us know if there's anyone at your library that needs to be added to the email list. You don't need to be an admin to participate! Reader Advisors, circulation staff, machine wranglers, records managers, and everyone else who uses KLAS is invited to join in.

If you didn’t get to join us in Boise, want to look over sessions you didn’t make it to, or have a look back at something you maybe, sorta, kinda, remember, Drea has put together an article linking to all of the presentations and handouts: Check it out!

It was wonderful to see so many of you; and we hope you will all be able to attend next year's conference! Read on for a few of my favorite highlights:

We're dedicated to supporting each type of organization that uses KLAS. Here are a few examples of our ongoing efforts to connect with and serve our IRC / IMC users:

• Keystone staff attends the American Printing House for the Blind Annual Meeting where we host the IRC KLAS Users' Meeting.
• The KLAS Users' Conference Program committee makes it a priority to seek out / provide KLAS content that appeals our talking book library, resource center, and association users as well as content specific to each.
• In late October, Keystone is hosting an IRC Symposium at our office in Raleigh.

I wanted to take a few minutes today to highlight two upcoming IRC / IMC KLAS user events.

KLAS IRC / IMC Users' at 2019 APH Annual Meeting

On October 10th, Nancy and I will host the KLAS IRC / IMC Users' Meeting at the 2019 APH Annual Meeting. We invite you to join us at 8 AM in the Hialeah Room of the Hyatt to hear the latest updates about Keystone and KLAS, see new features being demonstrated, and provide us feedback about possible future development. Please let us know if you plan to attend before September 30, so we can have enough breakfast and (most importantly) coffee available.

Current meeting agenda includes:

• Welcome & Introductions
• Update on Keystone over the past year - news, new projects & customers, etc.
• Demonstration of new features in KLAS
• Question & Answer session - open discussion of what you need / want from KLAS

If there is anything in particular you want to ask about or to have us cover, please let us know! Your shared experience helps guide future development of KLAS (especially for IRCs / IMCs), and we value your input.

We will also offer four one-hour one-on-one consultation meetings on Thursday, starting at 1:00 PM. To sign up for one of these time slots, please contact me and let me know your preferred time (Ex: 1:00-2:00 PM). Meetings will be scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis.

IRC Symposium

Want an opportunity for even more in-depth training, round-table discussions, user feedback opportunities, and networking with Keystone staff and other IRC / IMC staff? Then make plans to attend the two-day KLAS IRC Symposium on October 29-30 at our office in Raleigh, NC.

We ask that all attendees have a KLAS Administrator role in their local system and authority to change records and policies for their KLAS system.

Interested? 

Here's the planned agenda:

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We're offering this specially focused training workshop for $300 / attendee. Check out the "KLAS IRC Symposium" article for further details including travel and accommodations and the link to register.

I sincerely hope to see you at one or both of these events.