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What will you read this summer break?

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Summer is well and truly here!

Many of us are taking some time off, some travelling, some having staycations. Wherever you go (or don’t go) you can always take a book with you. These days, the formats are so diverse but all can transport you to another place and time, inspire you to make great changes or maybe no changes at all.

Glass head with headphones

“Downloadable audiobooks are here” by Lucius Beebe

Good stories can be like friends. They can pick you up when you’re feeling down, make you laugh out loud or bring you to tears. I have one or two novels that I’ve read (well, listened to actually… BIG fan of audio books – you should check out QUT Library’s collections of audiobooks) so many times I almost know them off by heart. They are my comfort reading books. The beauty of an audiobook is that you can be listening/reading while doing something else such as lying on a beach, preparing a Christmas feast or going for a walk after consuming said feast.

 

3 books and sunglasses at a beach

 

 

Are you the sort of person who likes the look, feel and smell of a physical book? New books especially can build that sense of excitement; that you are the first person to look at these particular pages, the first one to feel them, to read the words that the author has spent labouring over, and sometimes it will feel like they are speaking directly to you.

 

iPad on a desk with pen, keyboard and mouse

“iPad ereader” by Constance Wiebrands

What about ebooks? Ereaders (think Kindle, Kobo, etc) these days are great for offering you the flexibility of enlarging the text, changing the background colour, the font, personalising your reading experience. Our etextbooks don’t have quite the same flexibility or customisation as an ereader, but are still really handy if you want to get ahead of the game for 2020 and use your summer reading time to learn something new in anticipation of what you will learn or teach next year.

 

 

 

However and whatever you like to read, I hope that you enjoy the summer break and the festive season and may 2020 be your best year yet.

 

P.S. QUT Libraries will be closed from the 25th of December and reopen on 2nd January. Check the website for more details.

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Summer is almost here – Let’s go!

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Alexandra Headlands BeachYou’ve worked hard all year and the time is right to take a break from work, study and perhaps even the summer heat.

Personally, I love the summer – the long hot days and the balmy summer nights but I also love getting out of the City and heading to the beach. My favourite place to escape to is the Sunshine Coast with its gorgeous white sandy beaches and enticing blue waters. Just remember to swim between the flags and ‘slip, slop, slap, seek and slide’! Glasshouse Mountains

For those of you not so enamoured with the beach, the Sunshine Coast Hinterland can be absolutely breathtaking and a cooler area than the coast. Mary Cairncross Park has spectacular views across to the Glasshouse Mountains and beyond. They have a museum and environmental education section as well to learn about all the fabulous flora and fauna in this remarkable area.

The Gold Coast has its own natural beauty with its beautiful beaches and luscious hinterland as well as the added attraction of the theme parks for those adventure seekers.

If you’re looking to go a little further afield, why not check out our collection of travel guides at Kelvin Grove Library. There are online versions of some of the guides too so you can access them wherever you are (with an internet connection of course 😊).

What ever you do or wherever you go we wish you a safe and restful holiday break.

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GIF IT UP

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GIF IT UP is an annual gif-making competition for the most creative reuse of digitised cultural heritage material. This year’s 6th edition is run by Europeana in close cooperation with Digital Public Library of America, Digital NZ and Trove.

QUT Library Digital Collections has three submissions created from digitised cultural heritage material.

If you like our gifs please vote for us!

  1. Click here to view OUR gif

    Source material: 1. Territet-Glion funicular railway; 2. Children’s party in the grounds of the Herston residence, Coralyn, ca. 1907| Robert Augustus Henry L’Estrange; 3. Glasshouse mtns Beerwah, 1894
    | Queensland University of Technology via Trove
    The images used by this GIF are sourced from Queensland University of Technology Digital Collections. The Territet–Glion funicular railway image is a postcard from Montreaux, Switzerland and the photo with the young ladies are from the L’Estrange collection. The mountain in the background is one of the Glasshouse mountain images from the QUT Stories collection.

  2. Click here to view our gif

    Source material: Unknown people in horse drawn cart and coachman; possibly Chester, England (Bache Hall) Inside grocery shop possibly Kelvin Grove Queensland Harrison’s jams and jellies display | Robert Augustus Henry L’Estrange | Queensland University of Technology

  3. click here to view our gif

    Source material: Shot putter; Inside grocery shop possibly Kelvin Grove Queensland; Harrison’s jams and jellies display | Robert Augustus Henry L’Estrange | Queensland University of Technology via Trove

You can view all entries here at GIF IT UP

 

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Mo Can Do

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Thinking of growing a moustache? November, or Movember, is the ideal time, as your mo can play an important role in promoting men’s health (it can look good, too).

Conceived in Melbourne in 2003 to raise funds for prostate cancer research, Movember is now an international movement and the leading global organisation tackling prostate cancer, testicular cancer, and male suicide and other mental health issues.

Not thinking of growing a moustache? There are other ways you can take part in Movember to help men live happier, healthier, longer lives.

If you’re interested in learning more about the history of Movember, watch this entertaining TED Talk by the movement’s co-founder Adam Garone – just one of numerous moustache-related resources available through QUT Library.

 

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November 11 is Remembrance Day

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November 11 is Remembrance Day, which commemorates those who lost their lives in war, conflict and military service for Australia.

Traditionally, a silence is observed at 11am on the 11th of November, which comes from the “the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month”: the time and date that the armistice between the Allies and Germany ended the First World War in 1918.

Remembrance Day is also observed in other nations, sometimes by another name like Memorial Day or Veterans Day.  The day is observed in the USA, Commonwealth countries including Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and many Caribbean nations, France, Belgium and Serbia.

Originally known as Armistice Day, Remembrance Day was first meant to commemorate those who died in WWI. But since WWII, the day came to include people who had died in later wars too.

Remembrance Day traditions generally focus on members of the armed forces and military who died in conflict, but other people may be commemorated too. Casualties of conflict or peacekeeping missions include civilian nurses and medical staff, members of auxiliary services (including women’s auxiliaries), humanitarian volunteers, war correspondents and police officers assisting in peacekeeping activities.

Red poppy flowers are used in Remembrance Day traditions, and are a common symbol of commemoration of those killed in conflict. Red poppies grew in the churned-up soil of the Western Front in WWI, and their bright red colour eerily evoked the spilled blood of fallen soldiers.

Remembrance Day ceremonies commonly include the Last Post bugle call, which was used on the battlefield to announce the end of the day’s activities and the time for sleep. It is now also used at remembrance ceremonies and military funerals to signify that the soldier’s duty has ended and they can rest in peace.

Take a moment to view the display at the Kelvin Grove Library on level 3 (pictured above) and feel free to borrow any displayed items.

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Get your game on!

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International Games Week 2019 - November 3-9 It’s time for International Games Week (IGW). IGW is an initiative “…around the world to reconnect communities through their libraries around the educational, recreational, and social value of all types of games.” https://games.ala.org/international-games-week/

Personally, I love playing games. Not with people’s feelings and emotions, but with a board and some tokens or some cards, or a bat and ball. I like games I play on my mobile device too, but not as much as the ones I play face to face. I love the strategizing where I’m trying to be the best zombie killer, the cooperative games where I’m helping to stop a pandemic from wiping out the world and the storyteller, who’s taking my character through a series of challenges imagined by the castle-master. I enjoy the team games like Pictionary or Charades that test my creativity and quick thinking and the more active ones like table tennis (I know that this is an Olympic sport, but the way my friends and I play, it’s a game) or Marco Polo (for those of you who don’t know what this is, see here for a definition/rules for game play). I’m not always the best player but I’m always willing to have a go.

QUT Library gets involved in the action too. At all the Libraries there are games to help you get your mind off your exam prep, relax a little and enjoy a bit of socialisation, ready for the next study session. The Law Library has chess, KG Library has giant Jenga and table tennis (Ping Pong) and GP Library has table tennis too! If the digital games really are more your thing, you can borrow Xbox or Playstation games to take home or use the Games Lab if you’re at KG Library. See which games are available in Library Search.  So get your game on and get those endorphins flowing!

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Exam time in the Library

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Exam time already and the library is here to help 

The library is the ideal place to study and is open extended hours again during Swot Vac and Exams.

Gardens Point and Kelvin Grove Library opening hours

  • Monday – Saturday: 7am-2am
  • Sunday: 9am-2am.
  • Both Libraries will close at 10pm on Friday 15 November.

The Law Library has normal opening hours

  • Monday -Thursday: 8am-10pm
  • Friday: 8am-8pm
  • Saturday – Sunday: 10am-5pm

More detailed information about the Library extended opening hours and services can be found here

Research and referencing support is still available, particularly useful if you have any assessment extensions

Gardens Point and Kelvin Grove both have Drop in sessions, check here for times and places.

Students can also book individual sessions for help with researching and referencing, appointments can be booked here.

More information about support services can be found on your Digital Workplace/HiQ

A couple of last minute exam tips:

 

 

Good luck from everyone here at the QUT Library!

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Five Open Access Tips for 21st century researchers: Tip #5 Access Open Research

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This #OAWeek we are introducing five tips on how to make your research open and find open research. Yesterday we looked at growing your impact with QUT ePrints. Today we’re looking at accessing open research.

What would you do if your library subscription access was suddenly cut off?  How would you continue your research?

Hopefully you’ll always have somewhere to work that has access to subscription databases, but the prospect is frightening, and a stark reminder that much of the world’s publicly funded research is locked behind oppressive publisher paywalls.

Don’t panic, help is at hand, and this Open Access week, if you haven’t already,  have a look at some of the world’s biggest Open Access content curators unpaywall.org, openaccessbutton.org and CORE.

Unpaywall is an open database of almost 25 million scholarly articles harvested from more than 50,000 publishers and repositories.  You can install it onto your browser and it will find open versions of articles, wherever they are.

CORE is the world’s biggest collection of open access research with more than 135 million papers from around the world.  Its mission is to facilitate free unrestricted access to research by aggregating all open access research from repositories and journals.

Open Access Button is a research finder providing instant delivery of open access articles from open sources or direct from authors. It also has a browser extension.

So take note of these tools and access open research – if you no longer have access to our extensive databases!

 

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Five Open Access Tips for 21st century researchers: Tip #4 Grow your impact with QUT ePrints

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This #OAWeek we are introducing five tips on how to make your research open and find open research. Yesterday we looked at publishing wisely, and today’s tip is Grow you impact with QUT ePrints.

QUT ePrints is our institutional repository of research outputs, showcasing the research of QUT staff and postgraduate students. It was established in 2003, when QUT endorsed the world’s first institutional open access policy. Last year QUT ePrints celebrated a truly momentous occasion, surpassing 25 million downloads. The 25th millionth download, a law article by Professor Rosalind Mason, exemplifies this year’s OA Week theme, Open for whom: Equity in Open Knowledge, with the download coming from Namibia.

QUT ePrints now hosts close to 100,000 works which have been downloaded nearly 28 million times! Depositing records and full text is the most important way that QUT researchers can comply with QUT’s open access policy and that of the two big Australian funders — all for free.  But more than that, QUT’s repository allows anyone anywhere to access your research. And if your research is more likely to be discovered and read, your research is more likely to be cited

QUT ePrints allows anyone anywhere to access your research.

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Five Open Access Tips for 21st century researchers: Tip #3 Publish wisely

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During #OAWeek we have been introducing five Open Access tips for 21st Century Researchers. Today we are taking a look at Tip #3: Publish wisely.

Tools and repositories such as Think Check Submit, the Directory of Open Access Journals and OpenDOAR can help you identify trusted journals for your research.

Think Check Submit takes the guess work out of where to publish. Through a range of tools and practical resources, Think Check Submit helps researchers identify trusted journals for their research. It aims to educate researchers, promote integrity, and build trust in credible research and publications.

The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is a community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals. It contains just under 14,000 journals, containing over 4,372,000 articles. DOAJ allows you to search by subject, publisher, or licence type. The Directory aims to increase the visibility and ease of use of open access academic journals—regardless of size and country of origin—thereby promoting their visibility, usage and impact.

OpenDOAR, the Directory of Open Access Repositories, is a global directory of Open Access repositories and their policies. Launched in 2005, it enables the identification, browsing and search for repositories, based on a range of features, such as location, software or type of material held. OpenDOAR provides access to more than 4,300 different repositories from all over the world.

If you have any questions about strategic publishing, feel free to contact your Liaison Librarian or the Library Research Support Team at library.research@qut.edu.au