[Publib] RE: PC Reservation

[Cris Adams]

Thanks for the responses so far.  After sharing them with my circulation
staff, I was told about a piece of the puzzle I hadn't considered.

First of all, the product we have is PC Reservation by EnvisionWare.  We do
have it set up to log out or to move on to the next person on the list if
nothing has been done on the computer for 10 minutes.  We currently have 7
Internet computers.  

However.....and this is the piece of the puzzle I was missing....say that
two people are already scheduled for computer #4, and both say they want it
for an hour.  Mrs. Jones wants a reservation, and the software assumes that
both people ahead of her will use their full hour.  It's a very busy day,
all of the computers are being used, and Mrs. Jones' reservation is on
computer #4 for 90 minutes from now.  She leaves the library and runs up the
street to the drug store, knowing she has 90 minutes before the time of her
reservation.  If the people ahead of her only use half their time, and the
staff had the ability to cancel the remainder, that would move Mrs. Jones'
reservation up, unbeknownst to her.  Once it's her turn, if she doesn't show
up within 10 minutes, her reservation is automatically cancelled. 

So that's the other side of the coin.  This software takes the term
"reservation" very seriously---a person's Internet time is for a particular
computer at a particular time, and that's that. Personally I think someone
making an Internet reservation should STAY IN THE LIBRARY in case they can
get on early, but hey---what do I know?

Cris