[Publib] COOP in the Library... was How bizarre is this?

[K.G. Schneider]

> ... But many of us don't think catastrophes
> can
> happen in our areas. We're never prepared enough. So what I'm saying is:
> 
>          BE PREPARED!
> 
> "Just rain" can really have a major impact on your life and your library.
> 
> Write and understand your disaster plan. Don't wait until disaster strikes
> to buy a wet-vac. Know what to do.

I've been thinking about this post since it showed up on the list. Really,
I've been thinking about it much longer, in a way. Then a post showed up on
Web4Lib yesterday that got me to thinking some more:

http://lists.webjunction.org/wjlists/web4lib/2006-July/040862.html 

COOP stands for Continuation of Operations Programs. It's gummint jargon but
useful jargon all the same. 

David Karre says "know what to do." I think many administrators do prepare
to a great extent--but there's always room to apply lessons-learned. 

For some of you these questions should be a walk in the park. But still...

If your mailserver was under nine feet of water, and everyone in the
community had evacuated hundreds of miles away, could you communicate with
your staff? 

How localized are your electronic communication tools? In other words, if
you are using a regional mail service, would email be knocked out until it
was restored? 

If your website was down, would you have a place to post notices? Would
everyone know what that place was? 

How many of you have a plan for resuming communication that clearly
delegates responsibility to the first available person (as opposed to
waiting for "admin" to resurface)?  

Is your secondary DNS geographically separate from your primary DNS? (Do you
know what that means and why I ask?)

Complete this sentence: text messaging is valuable for emergencies because
____ . (And do you have cell phone numbers on your emergency contact list?)

Do you have a designated alternate location? 

Would you be able to help your community establish a mesh wifi network in
the aftermath of a major emergency (hurricane, etc.)? 

I work with several Internet service vendors that have alternate websites
for emergencies. These websites are set up so that if the primary website is
kaput, the companies can communicate with their clients. These websites
usually begin with status, as in status.dreamhost.com. Do you have something
like that? 

Karen G. Schneider
kgs at bluehighways.com