our setup is similar to Deborah's.

we have several machines for the general public for those unaffiliated with our university.   these are controlled via librerica's libcassie.

to use libcassie,  the guest must show an ID to our front desk, and they're issued an immediate guest pass, which unlocks one of thr controlled pcs.  like Deborah's setup, as soon as their session is over, the pcs hard drive resets to a known, saved state.  USB and email, etc available for retaining files.  the guest gets 1 hour, and can extend for an additional hour.

for databases, many are controlled by ip range in ezproxy.  for many databases, guest computers offer access.  some vendors insist on actual affiliation, thus guest computers ips are blocked in ezproxy for those stanzas.   also a few databases require a login, usually tied into our shinnoleth.  these are inaccessible to our guest users.

we are a state institution,  thus must make some effort to allow guest access, thus the provided pcs.

Bruce Orcutt
UTSA Libraries: Systems
(210) 458- 6192

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We have some public "kiosk" computers which default to a landing page of useful links for students, but can be used by any members of the public. I don't think any URLs are blocked; I can't remember if USBs are permitted but people can always email files to themselves if needed.(*) After each use, the computer 'resets' its state, deleting any files that have been created or cached in the meantime.

(*) Most of our databases allow such walk-in use. For those that don't we've configured EZProxy accordingly.

Deborah

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All,

I'm curious how you handle access for guests at your libraries.

Here at UND, we've used a process for many years that involves issuing a guest account in the campus Active Directory server through NetIQ Access Manager (NAM), which is supplied by campus IT. But it has a lousy UI and doesn't work reliably. When it does work, it takes about 15 minutes for the account to become active. When it doesn't work - which is more often than not - the account never works at all.  At that point we usually just have a staff member log in and let the patron use their account, which is not great.

We're a depository library for the state and the federal government, so we're required to ensure that the public can access government documents.  Which are, of course, increasingly digital these days.

So we're looking for other ways to manage guest access.  How do you all do it in your libraries?

Will Martin

Head of Digital Initiatives, Systems and Services Chester Fritz Library University of North Dakota he/his/him

701.777.4638

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