The HardiBlog

Essential training for all students new to NUI Galway - in just 30 minutes you will learn how to find your way around the Library, what services are available and how to find the books you need in the Library.  You will be shown how to search the library's catalogue to find out if the library has the books or journals you need.  You'll also be given a short tour of the library, so that you can learn how to find the books on the shelves.   This training will be held in the   Library Training Room   on the ground floor of the Library at the following times: January 11th to 22nd   Monday to Friday   11.00 - 11.30 (except January 13th) and 14.00 - 14.30   You can book a place or Just Drop In!  

A reminder of Library Opening Hours for those of you still working hard in the run up to Christmas: The Library is OPEN :   8.30 - 17.30           on December 22nd and 23rd     Please note that the Library will be closed at 17.30 sharp on these dates, so please collect your belongings in plenty of time.     The Library will be  CLOSED from: Thursday December 24th to Sunday January 3rd (inclusive)   From January 4th to January 10th the Library will be OPEN : Monday to Friday   8.30 to 17.30   Normal opening hours will resume on January 11th.   Wishing all our students and staff a very happy Christmas!     

This week the Abbey Theatre/NUI Galway Digital Archive Partnership made freely available online the digitised minute books of the Abbey Theatre 1904 – 1939. As part of the Yeats2015 celebrations, the online digital archive of Abbey Theatre Minute Books will be made available to the public for the first time. Collectively, the minute books amount to nearly 1,000 pages, covering some of the Abbey’s most significant events from the period 1904-1939, being the period that spans Yeats' lifetime. 'A Digital Journey Through Irish Theatre History' , the Abbey Theatre - NUI Galway Digital Archive Partnership is the largest digital theatre project ever undertaken, and heralds a new era in Irish theatre scholarship, both nationally and internationally. Previously unseen, the Abbey Theatre Minute Books include the period in history when both Lady Gregory and W.B. Yeats were involved in the management of the Abbey Theatre. The Abbey Theatre minute books contain notes fr...

A recent upgrade of the ARAN (Access to Research at NUI Galway) platform has added some new features. Usage data for each item is now displayed alongside Scopus citations and Altmetrics information (when it is available from the publisher). Altmetrics measures the attention research is attracting on social media. View an example of these new features at http://aran.library.nuigalway.ie/handle/10379/4735 In the new version of ARAN the official published version of each article is explicitly promoted. Usage data for each item A key benefit of uploading articles to ARAN (Access to Research at NUI Galway) is the extra discoverability it offers via Google and RIAN ( http://rian.ie/ ) the single portal to the repositories of the seven Irish universities. Open Access publishing also provides a citation advantage. Seventy-five studies have investigated this. The results of forty-six of the studies report a positive impact of open access publishing on citations. Study results...

When we started our 3D printing service back in September we had just one Ultimaker 2 printer which we thought would be enough to satisfy demand. Soon we realised how slow 3d printing is and found that there was no way we could provide a service with just one printer. Many of the models we print can take more than 4 hours to print and some as long as 8 hours or more. Luckily we were able to purchase a second Ultimaker 2 and also managed to get the RepRapPro Mendel 3 that we built calibrated to where we now have 3 printers working. We had also planned to have the Makerspace area open by now but delays with furnishing the space have meant we could concentrate on the 3D printing service. The Makerspace itself will open January 2016 for definite. To date we have printed over 150 different models for staff and students. Some of the models were for students studying Biochemistry, Engineering and Biomedical Engineering and were part of their 3rd year projects. Other ite...

As part of the Arts in Action programme, drama students from Galway and Belfast, Martin Kenny, Luke Bannon and Sarah Blair performed a new play, 'Fighting the Waves', based upon the archive material held within the Lyric Theatre Archive, of the Hardiman Library. Caroline Lynch, playwright, as Mary O'Malley The play written and starring Caroline Lynch, depicted the life of Mary O'Malley as she dedicated her life to establishing a new theatre in Belfast, during a volatile time in the backdrop to growing social unrest and the eventual conflict of 'The Troubles. The play explores this birth of a new theatre that was hugely influenced by the writing of W.B. Yeats. The play was researched by Barry Houlihan, Archivist at the Hardiman Library and organised by Mary McPartlann, with support from the Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance. The Lyric Theatre archive contains a detailed account of the growth and development of the theatre and its founding dire...

Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Heather Humphreys T.D., launched NUI Galway’s 1916 Programme of Events, ‘A Nation Rising: Commemorating 1916 and Beyond’, as part of the Ireland 2016 Centenary Programme. The event took place in the Archives and Special Collections Reading Room of the Hardiman Library where Minister Humphreys, along with Dr. Jim Browne, President of NUI Galway, and members of the organising committee, officially launched the programme, which will be a year-long programme of celebration, understanding and questioning of Ireland's revolutionary period, at the heart of which was the 1916 Rising. The programme will focus on the women and men involved in the lead-up, during and aftermath of the Rising, focusing on how this major event was experienced and felt in the West as well as influenced by those who were based there or had connections there. Events will features a major exhibition, drawing on the archival holdings of the Hardiman Librar...

For a Friday it was very busy at the library entrance at 8:30 this morning.  Still plenty of spaces free upstairs and we are open until 10pm tonight.

Have you ever found the perfect article on JSTOR only to click "Download PDF" and watch helplessly as nothing happens? We imagine it left you feeling a little irritable. We’re sorry you had to deal with that. (And hope you didn’t break your computer.) We're aware of how distressing it is to finally find that perfect article only to have it snatched away. But don’t worry! You’re not alone with this sneaky problem. Web browsers generally have a default setting that blocks all pop-ups. While this is mostly good for the health of your computer (and your personal sanity) pop-up blockers can’t differentiate between ads for the latest internet scam and pop up PDFs of scholarly articles. This is something that users have to manually change within their browser settings. Sound scary? We promise that it’s not. Each browser has a slightly different way of changing these settings, so we’re going to walk you through the most common. Furthermore, some browsers act differently...

[The following is taken from the ScienceDirect Blog ] Last year we  announced  that ScienceDirect would no longer be supporting Internet Explorer 8 as of 1 January 2016. We wanted to make sure you are aware of this and explain why. In order to continue to make the most of your ScienceDirect experience, we encourage you to move to the latest version of the following browsers: Chrome Firefox IE  (version 9 or higher) In 2014, Microsoft announced that it would only support the most recent IE browser version with technical support and security updates. At ScienceDirect, we’ve chosen to follow Microsoft’s lead as we believe this will allow for the best overall user experience as well as allow you to take full advantage of our new features and functionality. We therefore encourage you to update to the most recent version of IE now – or consider another supported browser option. By upgrading to the most recent version of IE, we’ll be able to provide you with...