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Tarrant County library patrons can plug into the digital world
[January 04, 2010]

Tarrant County library patrons can plug into the digital world


Jan 04, 2010 (Fort Worth Star-Telegram - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Moments after the Watauga Public Library got Wi-Fi, the laptops started rolling in.

"We didn't even have to publicize it," said Connie Barnes, adult-services librarian. "There's people here all the time using their laptop computers." Tarrant County libraries have gone digital. Real-time information and talking e-books are the hype while Wi-Fi has become as prolific as the Dewey Decimal System.



Best of all, you don't have to leave your home to use the library. While electronic services have been available at libraries for a decade or more, cities in the past year have been adding online learning services to their library Web sites.

"This is a more direct service to the user rather than just some static document or piece of information. They're accessing, really, a service," said Cary Siegfried, director of libraries for Arlington.


In many communities, a library card now brings access to a world of online tutors ready to help schoolchildren with their homework or a database of study materials for foreign-language learners and people preparing for college entrance and licensing exams or the GED test.

Children can read along with talking, animated storybooks on the library's Web site. Moms and dads can download bestsellers to their iPods and video to their smart phones and other devices.

"Instead of having all these CDs and tapes, you can listen in your car," said Janis Roberson, director of the Grapevine Public Library. "A lot of women say they vacuum and clean house listening to a book. People who run can listen to a bestseller if they don't have time to sit down and read a book." The new programs have catchy names -- including animated, talking picture books known as Tumblebooks. There are OverDrive and LearningExpress. Mango is the online foreign-language service. Information Live! is a real-time reference service that enables users to contact a reference librarian 24/7.

But best of all: "It's all free" with a library card.

Grapevine Public Library has a database that allows you to price antiques on a cost guide. In Grapevine and at other libraries, people can access automotive repair books online or a health and wellness database.

The Benbrook Public Library, besides offering Tumblebooks to youngsters who want to listen to books online, also offers many clubs and activities, said Lori Batchelor, adult-services librarian.

An expansion two years ago allowed the library to begin offering game nights for families and children 5 and older; a teen zone; a poetry series; a monthly book club for adults; and home-school book clubs.

It has also partnered with a landscaping company and feed store to provide a gardening program.

"We're having a great time doing all this stuff with everybody," Batchelor said.

In Saginaw, John Ed Keeter Public Library is offering Evergreen, an open-source library automation software. The Evergreen catalog, which helps patrons find materials, represents nearly 100,000 registered users.

Saginaw patrons can also access OverDrive, a downloadable audiobook service. Anyone with a library card can download a choice of books to an MP3 player.

Watauga offers free computer and English as a second language courses at its library, Barnes said. The classes meet weekday evenings.

Watauga has a job-view kiosk to help job seekers.

"We hope to be able to provide more," Barnes said. "But that's what we're doing now." The Fort Worth Library has Wi-Fi at 13 locations. Arlington provides it at most of its locations.

After hearing about Wi-Fi at other libraries, Watauga residents swarmed to their library seeking it, Barnes said.

"We had people almost daily asking if we had Wi-Fi," she said. After it was hooked up, "within days, people walking in already knew we had it and were asking where the connection was." Word around the library: If you can find a plug, then go for it.

"Somehow the word spread," Barnes said.

YAMIL BERARD, 817-390-7705 To see more of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.dfw.com. Copyright (c) 2010, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email [email protected], call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

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