Westbank Community Library

Westbank Community Library is the first district library in Texas. The library receives 0.5% of the 8.5% sales tax collected in the Westbank district. As a result of their status as a district library, Westbank is separate from the rest of the Austin Public Library.


In many ways, the OPAC is a little awkward and ugly. It's brightly colored and boxy, much like the rest of their Web site. It does, however, have some nice features. The basic search page has one search box with three links beneath it. The "search tips" link opens a new window with some VERY simple tips for searching the catalog. Essentially, the tips page recommends that users search by keyword and then gives several examples of what search terms one might use if looking for a known item. One of the examples instructs that if you're looking for "That book you heard about once, written by somebody named Fred that has "Sea" somewhere in the title" you should enter "fred sea" as your query. I suppose this can be useful information but it doesn't exactly maximize accuracy or the features of the OPAC. It might be useful for them to add more information for more advanced users. The advanced search link opens a new window as well which allows you to search using keyword, title starts with phrase, title contains phrase, author, subject, call # starts with, or material type. These features are not explained anywhere in the search tips section. The third link under the search box (See What's Hot), allows users to see the most recent additions to the catalog over the last week, 2 weeks, month or 2 months. That's an interesting feature but I'm not sure when it would be useful to a patron. I suppose if someone just wants to see a sample of the library holdings this would be a good place to start.

One feature I really like is that the basic search page also includes the list of electronic resources available through the library. Because they only have subscriptions to nine databases, they use large icons to represent each one. This display takes up about 70% of the page which may be unnecessary but it allows easy access for patrons. What's more, is that when you scroll over each of the icons, a small window appears showing a brief description of the database and its content. The site also offers some interesting services. In addition to a page of links to follow for book recommendations, the reference staff also offers to suggest five titles to patrons based on a list of five provided by the patron. It's an easy way for members to ask reference librarians for suggestions at their own pace.

One feature I find problematic but well-meaning is the "Max Reads" section which is meant to encourage middle school kids (but really just boys) to read. Again, it's well-intentioned but smacks of essentialist notions of what it means to be a boy. All the books that Max reads are either about historical battles or sports and his blog links to ESPN.com. This may be a rant for another day.

Overall, I'm impressed with what the library is trying to do. They really emphasize the community aspect of the library and offer features tailored specifically to their users. In some ways the Web site is lacking but I think it was actually put together by the son of one of the librarians for a very small fee. Given the library's resources, the OPAC and site offer a lot.