We're still not Friends with the new Millennium software system yet.
I think most of the problem stems from our ignorance at how we can adjust the system to Not Quite So Annoying mode from the Pretty Damn Consistently Annoying mode it's currently in.
We can't seem to make it stop printing whenever we
perform ANY normal function with it. Check out a book, it prints a
slip. Renew a book, it prints a slip. Put a book on hold, it prints a
slip. (And while I'm using the term "slip" what I really mean is "a
full 8.5" by 11" piece of paper with a slip-sized print at the top of
it.)
Oh, we can uncheck the little box that says PRINT
SLIP and make it stop temporarily, but that box never stays unchecked
for long. In fact, it rechecks itself to PRINT SLIP if you do pretty
much ANYTHING and suddenly the printer starts shitting out slips again.
Actually, if it only shit out the slips that wouldn't be so bad. (It
might even be useful at shutting the whine-holes of some of our patrons
who moved here from big cities where their libraries gave them an
itemized printout of all their books with every checkout, and where they were
served pastries and tea and had a frickin' Starbucks in the
reference hall.) Instead, the printer shits out BOTH a slip AND a
damned cover page for each slip that tells us it just printed a slip. No
kidding? REALLY? A slip you say? Damn, I'm glad you used a whole
piece of paper to tell me, cause I wouldn't have noticed it among the
500 other pages the printer's shat in the last hour!
Occasionally we are able to convince the infernal
thing to stop printing on a more lengthy basis, but we never know
exactly how we've done it when we do. See the thing comes with more
than one PRINT SLIP box to check and we think they ALL have to be
checked, cause if you do only one of them it just rechecks itself when
your back is turned. Another method is to shut Millennium down and
bring it back up again. A box comes up that mentions something about
printing capabilities and you can tell it "HELL NO." This is all very
inconvenient because our circ computer is so slow that it literally
takes 8 minutes to reboot, during which time the computer cannot be used
for anything else. It's also merely a temporary measure, cause as soon
as we really DO need to print something, say a book hold request slip,
the computer assumes you want it to print EVERYTHING once again and
starts doing so with gusto.
We know there has to be a way to get it to print only
when we specifically request it. Our librarians are hesitant to call
our state tech guys to ask, though, because: A) the tech's are busy as
hell with all the other libraries calling to ask why the system keeps
freezing up or eating patron records or losing its ability to search
books by barcode or smoking cigarettes in the restroom and horking
sandwiches from the staff fridge, etc.; and B) because we have no faith
that the tech guys truly know any more about it than we do. Many of the
other libraries seem to take this same attitude, which is why they call
us when they have questions. Naturally, these questions tend to land
painfully in my crotch.
THEM ON PHONE: Hey, Juice, this computer isn't
letting us check a book out to this patron and it keeps telling us we
can't access its Booginfroondle Record using that number, cause it's
invalid, but we're not using that number and we don't want to access its
Booginfroondle Record in the first place, we just want to check out a Patty Cornhole book to them. How do I fix that?
ME: (*THROWS UP HANDS*) Pshht! Ya got me. Have you tried turning it off and rebooting?
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