Found a broken link or a bug? Is a technical glitch keeping you from the full text? Now there’s another way to let us know!

We know that when you are in the throes of serious research, miles away from where you started, down the rabbit hole of a particular database or resource, sometimes you might happen to come across a gnarly broken link or problem that we librarians might never see or be able to fully recreate, even when we are searching on our own, or helping others search.

We would really like to hear about any instance where you locate an example of technology gone wrong. In managing our electronic resources, we want to make sure that all of the tools that we put at your disposal (aka that the library chooses and that taxpayers pay for) are working as seamlessly as they should. So in those moments where you hit a wall, find or a 404 message, or some other kind of mysterious problem, there is now a new way to document these bugs and other access issues: the E-Issues Reporter (which you can find linked on our home page under “Quick Links” at the top left, and under the Databases tab).

This form won’t magically manipulate all these problems away, but it is one additional way you can contact us and make sure that we hear about glitches. It also might be more convenient at times than looking up an email address or trying to explain via online chat or phone, although all of these options are still available and can be used interchangeably, depending on what suits you best.

Of course we hope that all of our researchers will never come across any of these ugly technological problems, but we want to make sure that if you do, we’re easily accessible so that we can troubleshoot and eradicate the problem as soon as possible.

As always, if you have suggestions or comments about how we could better help your research and the technological issues therein, please let us know–here in the comments, via twitter, by contacting your librarian, or in person at the reference desk are just a few of the other ways you can tell us about issues and suggestions. Happy researching!

About the Author

Alycia Sellie is the Associate Librarian for Collections at the Graduate Center Library.