AskAway Blog

New Tool for Working with Patrons: Screenr

Submitted by admin-boss on

Screenr is a great new tool that many Ask-Awayers might find useful. It's a webcasting product which  allows you to create videos of website navigation. This type of thing can be helpful in a reference situation where there is a complicated set of steps a chatter must follow in order to navigate to a particular article or database, or in cases where the chatter is having trouble understanding your directions.

Embedding an AskAway Chat Qwidget in ProQuest Databases

Submitted by admin-boss on

ProQuest has now added the option to embed custom widgets into their databases!

Already have an AskAway Qwidget in your EBSCO databases or library web pages? Why not check-out the new option in ProQuest to add a custom widget to all your standard-platform ProQuest databases like CBCA (the options to select individual databases or non-standard platforms like Chadwyck are not currently available).

You can re-use your already existing AskAway qwidget code OR create/update your AskAway qwidget code to embed in ProQuest.

November and December 2011 Update

Submitted by admin-boss on

We have just completed another busy and successful semester! Our busiest day this semester was November 15, when we had a whopping 216 sessions! That's up 10% from last year's busiest day. The busiest hour was from 7:00pm - 8:00 pm on October 31, with 31 sessions. Spooky!

November and December's usage and form fields statistics are available on the AskAway webpages below:

Usage Statistics

Form Fields Statistics

Chat Transcripts and User Privacy

Submitted by admin-boss on

We wanted to clarify the policy around AskAway transcripts and user privacy, and put together a short FAQ on the subject.

Can AskAway transcripts be re-sent, at the user's request?
If a user asks for a transcript to be re-sent, we unfortunately have no way of verifying the identity of the person asking, so re-sending the transcript violates the patron's privacy.

Swamped Tool Update

Submitted by admin-boss on

We have updated the swamped button - our new tool that allows you to quickly send an email to the listserv when AskAway is swamped. We're pleased to say that it now works with both web-based email and email clients (so that should be everyone)!

The swamped button remains in the same place on the AskAway Portal - Staff Tools page, but will now lead you to a form. Just enter your institutional email (the one that is subscribed to the listserv), click "send" and an email asking other AskAwayers to help out will be sent.

AskAway Transcripts: Advanced Keyword Search

Submitted by admin-boss on

Keyword Searching AskAway transcripts may be useful for monitoring trends in question subjects, or just taking a glance at how frequently a session contains a key topic. As an example, we searched the entire system (all AskAway questions for the past 90 days) and found 39 questions mentioning “copyright”

To keyword search transcripts from your patrons:

1)    Log in to your Question Point Admin account (9-digit login).

2)    Select “Ask” from the drop-down box at the top right of the screen.

3)    Verify the active tab is “Questions”

New BC Business Resource

Submitted by admin-boss on

When answering business questions on AskAway, institution-specific guides and resources are the first place to check; if you are looking for additional information, though, a great new resource called Small Business Accelerator (SBA) may be the next place to look.

It helps with queries such as:

Resolution Codes

Submitted by admin-boss on

The renewed focus on the descriptive codes has generated some questions about use of the resolution codes, so here's a refresher...

There are five resolution codes available as you end your AskAway sessions, but please use only these three: Answered, Lost Call, and Practise.

New Descriptive Codes!

Submitted by admin-boss on

Many of you make vigilant use of the resolution and descriptive codes as you end your AskAway sessions.  Up until now use of the descriptive codes has been fairly random, as we didn't have control over the list of available codes.  QuestionPoint has recently provided the ability to customise codes, so we've identified and defined a new, MUCH SHORTER list of AskAway descriptive codes to make your job easier.  Read on to learn more....

What are the new descriptive codes?

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