Up the Downward Compatibility Staircase

I got a new laptop computer over the weekend. Exciting, yes?

Not exactly. Yes, it's nice to have all that extra memory and storage. I was looking forward to it and it's great. But there's a down side.

It's called Windows Vista.

Yeah, you've heard the stories. Turns out that they're true. In the interest of progress Microsoft appears to have upgraded itself out of compatibility with things like my not-very-old Netgear wireless router. So my fancy new laptop can't connect with the Internet except through a cumbersome Ethernet cord. So much for progress.

In the computer world it's called "lacking downward compatibility," and it's a common problem with Vista, judging by all the complaints I've seen. What it means is that the new stuff can't talk to the old stuff very well, if at all. What it implies is that I may have to upgrade my other technology (i.e., purchase a new wireless router) just to use Vista.

Downward compatibility isn't a problem just for computer geeks, though. It's something libraries are grappling with as well. In our case, the newer technology—online databases, the Internet, e-books, talking books, and learning software on CD-ROMs—sometimes don't connect all that well with the "old" technology: books.

Part of the problem is that there are so many new forms of information storage and retrieval that it's difficult to juggle them all. Or juggling them comprises an additional burden. A good case in point is this LATI class, with its blogs, e-mail, discussion boards, and assignment modules. Jumping from Web page to Web page has made me yearn for an old-fashioned, linear syllabus to guide me. It's also led me to form some new questions. Just because it's electronic, does that make it better? Just because we can blog, does that mean we should?

But there are other ways lack of downward compatibility plays out in libraries. Many teachers in my community—doubtless frustrated with students cribbing their assignments from questionable Web sites—now routinely require their pupils to use at least one or two books as resources for research projects. Their definition of "book" is pretty straightforward: information that is printed on actual paper with actual ink, and bound into a volume.

Problem is, many of today's "books" don't fit those specifications, and other information resources are starting to move away from the ink-on-paper model as well. What that means is that volumes on the shelves aren't being replaced as often, so many are less current than their electronic versions. It also means that a broad selection of printed materials on a given topic may no longer be available, because they've already been supplanted by online versions.

So how can we offer current information that also satisfies educators' demand for published information with integrity? Clearly we need to start thinking "outside the covers" if we are to meet this demand in the future.

But first we have to recognize that, as seductive as the new technology may be, it's still expected to be downward compatible, to serve the "old" requirements of a good education.

Rhymes with Time Management

No offense meant to the LATI coordinators, but in my experience "time management" has usually been a business buzz phrase for "too much to do and too little time to do it properly." So you learn to cut corners. After all, something's gotta give.

All the time management in the world isn't going to make up for the fact that I have to be on the info desk for 15 of the 20 hours I work each week. And mine is a busy library. So I am reading the Pink chapters and other books at home, on my own time. Likewise, I know I'm going to be spending some time outside of working hours doing some of those 35 resource reviews, because I would like them to mean something, not just toss them off like so much busy work.

Also, I have to wonder, isn't "time management" one of those "left-brain" activities that assumes a given task can or should be completed in a finite amount of time? That human beings are interchangable cogs when it comes to performing certain tasks? Think about it.

I'd like to think that the right-brained "work-smarter-not-harder" theory is really the key to time management, but my experience is that something always gets left undone. That's the nature of priorities—you perform triage to do the most essential things, which usually end up being finite tasks rather than big-picture conceptual brainstorming.

A case in point: I had to spend one of my hours off-desk today weeding a section of the library that has become way too tight. It's a task that waits for someone to have time to do it.