Are libraries extinct? In these times of economic downturn and digital availability, what could provide libraries with a reason for being? In order to provide a vital presence on Facebook and Google+, you must provide a true sense of connection with the library's friends.

Creating a New Library: Recipes for Transformation offers ways to make your library group space into one conducive to transformational learning. The book is structured as a cookbook with an introduction to the idea, then directions on its execution. Next, the book gives tips on how to adapt each ‘recipe’ to fit other specific needs, including other kinds of libraries. The layout follows three strands: space, community, and outreach. Each section includes five elements critical to transforming spaces:, fun, stimulation, safety, freedom, and personal. From providing coffee in the morning, to a full Personal Librarian program, this book presents useful and engaging ideas for transformational learning. Enables and encourage transformational learning in academic and research libraries Presents practical ideas in the style of a cookbook, recipes that can be readily applied to a variety of sites and situations Gives useful insight and ideas relevant to different kinds of libraries, including academic and research libraries Suggests fun, quirky, and practical ideas for your library

George H. Locke, chief librarian of the Toronto Public Library between 1908 and 1937, was Canada’s foremost library administrator in the first part of the twentieth century. During this period, free public libraries and librarianship in Ontario expanded rapidly due to the philanthropy of Andrew Carnegie, improvements in library education, and the influence of American library services. Locke was closely associated with all these trends; however, his outlook was primarily guided by his Methodist upbringing, the Anglo-Canadian academic tradition of British Idealism, and his association with John Dewey’s contribution to American progressive education. These religious and intellectual strands encouraged personal action to improve social conditions. As director of Toronto’s libraries, he brought his ambitious ideas to bear in many ways: the building of neighbourhood branches, library service for children, formal education for librarians, suitable reading for immigrants and young adults, and the idea of the public library as a municipal partner in the self-education of adult Canadians. By 1930, Toronto’s public library system was recognized as one of the best in North America and George Locke’s reputation as a visionary leader had vaulted him to the Presidency of the American Library Association. Although he had created a large organization that might have succumbed to bureaucratic practices and formalized centralization, Locke resisted this development. He remained faithful to his moral, intellectual, and humanistic values acquired during his early schooling and university career. For Locke, libraries and librarians were less about organization and formal duties. Both needed to be faithful to the main principle of serving the public interest by delivering knowledge and by guiding individual self-development through experiential learning and transcendent ideals.

Library Technology Reports August/September 2011 vol. 47 / no.6 This issue of Library Technology Reports, conceived and coordinated by the American Library Association's (ALA) Office for Research and Statistics, focuses on the evolution and current state of public-access technologies in public libraries from the infrastructure, services, and resources perspectives. This issue brings together longitudinal data, key issues, trends, and best practices that will provide library staff with tools for planning, advocacy, and service enhancements. A number of prominent library professionals contributed their expertise to this issue. Authors and topics include John carlo Bertot, Paul T. Jaeger, Emily E. Wahl, and Kathryn I. Sigler on Public Libraries and the Internet: An Evolutionary Perspective; Nicole D. Alemanne, Lauren H. Mandel, and Charles R. McClure on The Rural Public Library as Leader in Community Broadband Services; Robert A. Caluori, Jr. on Successfully Planning a Scalable and Effective Patron Wireless Network; Nancy Fredericks on E-Government and Employment Support Services; Larra Clark and Marijke Visser on Digital Literacy; and Stephanie Gerding on Transforming Public Library Patron Technology Training.

As society struggles with issues related to the scope and effectiveness of government, librarians must ask, “How and why will communities support public libraries in the future?” This book covers public library administration in a comprehensive and detailed manner.

The proposed book emphasizes importance for a library to be flexible to changing needs and to adopt new technologies rapidly. If a library of today wants to achieve success, it must offer high quality service, the best possible satisfaction of requirements, and exhibit great flexibility in its activity. In order to achieve all these goals, it is necessary to attract specialists of a library to solving common problems. Today, people get their information online — often filtered through for-profit platforms. If a book isn’t online, it’s as if it doesn’t exist. Yet much of modern knowledge still exists only on the printed page, stored in libraries. Libraries haven’t met this digital demand, stymied by costs, e-book restrictions, policy risks, and missing infrastructure. We now have the technology and legal frameworks to transform our library system. The Internet Archive, working with library partners, proposes bringing millions of books online, through purchase or digitization, starting with the books most widely held and used in libraries and classrooms. With the emergence of new technologies, the traditional library, acting as a medium for sharing information, needs an integral refinement in its processes. This transformation will bring in efficiency and minimize human error in the processes with the help of smart gates, material location finder and smart check-out booth to automate the processes of controlling access, locating items as well as the issuing/returning of materials. However, the changeover to a smart library system might face several challenges like for instance the cost of implementing numerous high-frequency RFID readers at prime locations in the library. Another crucial challenge of this system will be the limitation of the equipment to achieve a more performing system. Highly sophisticated equipment will be required which will largely affect the cost. Smart library focuses on use of technology in a library and is designed to be very collaborative learning environment, where participants are encouraged to contribute ideas and information. Smart library improves traditional and non-traditional library services, improves users' library experience and enhances opportunities for students learning. Libraries are facing increased expectations from users, and challenge of developing technologies including: Web 2.0, e-books, digitations and a problem of archiving digital content. Web-based technology provides users and information professionals with powerful and flexible tools for information dissemination.

This book examines how academic librarians think about or approach instruction as a part of their work. Through explicating this metacognitive process, this book helps both academic librarians and librarians-to-be to more intentionally consider their teaching practices and professional identities.