All of the public-access "desk-top" PC's and terminals are offline this week at the main library. We are making several major changes at once.
Since the 1990's, there have been public-access Internet computers on the the first floor, ("Tech-Media"), and the second floor, ("Adult Services"). Most of them, 42 seats, will now be assembled, with new furniture, in Adult Services on the second floor, leaving 20 or so in the old "Gates Lab" classroom in Tech-Media.
PC's, boxes with their own motherboards and hard drives, are going away completely. Public-access computing will move entirely to Pano Logic Zero Client terminals. Microsoft Office will also disappear, replaced by Open Office.
The library is also implementing "pay-for-print". Library card holders will get 10 pages free, and pay ten cents per page thereafter. Users with "guest-passes" will get no free pages.
It will be a shock to our users. Some of them, anyway. Many of our regular "homeless" patrons, (who live at the Shelter), have acquired wireless laptops.
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