University of Southern Queensland creates “one stop shop” for information delivery with FDI’s ZPORTA

The University of Southern Queensland (USQ) is a dynamic University offering award programs at undergraduate and postgraduate level through on-campus, off-campus and online study. The University of Southern Queensland believes that flexible delivery is about giving people what they want, where they want it, when they want it, in their style, in their place, in their time. Almost 80% of USQ students are classified as "off-campus" or external. As such USQ’s student profile presents a challenge for the University Library in terms of student access to resources, service and resource delivery, and student support. The University Library is currently using a VTLS integrated library system.

In March 2004, the University Library implemented FDI’s VDX software, locally called DocEx, to provide web-based document discovery, request and delivery as an option for off-campus students. The ZPORTAL/ OL2 solution will expand the range of services available through DocEx, and the architecture is capable of evolving to meet new functional requirements that the University Library may have for federated searching and document delivery in the future.

"The FDI solutions provide seamless integration between searching the Library catalogue and electronic resources and inter-library loan and document delivery options for our end users. With the ability to provide links to web pages outside of the system, DocEx seems to be rapidly emerging as USQ Library’s new "one stop shop", particularly targeting our off-campus users." explains Deidre Lowe, Systems Librarian at the University of Southern Queensland. Ms Lowe continues, "USQ was pleased to continue the productive working relationship established with FDI during the implementation the DocEx service. Vendor support has been prompt, consistent and of a high calibre. It is good having a local Help Desk service operating out of Melbourne."

"The University of Southern Queensland Library is a leader in the delivery of information services to off-campus students, and the University Library has successfully positioned itself as central to the teaching and research programmes. The selection of FDI’s VDX, ZPORTAL and OL2 solutions by the University of Southern Queensland Library demonstrates that libraries can look to FDI to provide standards based next-generation information delivery solutions to overlay their current ILMS and offer a dynamic new range of services," said Robin Murray, Fretwell-Downing Informatics CEO and Managing Director.

About the University of Southern Queensland
University of Southern Queensland is a dynamic University that offers award programs at undergraduate and postgraduate level by on-campus, off-campus or online study. USQ believes that flexible delivery is about giving people what they want, where they want it, when they want it, in their style, in their place, in their time. USQ was established 32 years ago as an Institute of Technology and, later, as a College of Advanced Education. It was redesignated as a University from 1990 without amalgamating with any other university. As at May 2004, the University had approximately 26,000 enrolments, including over 7,400 international students. More than 120 nationalities are represented and about 5,000 international students study USQ programs in their home countries.
The University has strong research programs in such areas as biotechnology, agricultural and environmental engineering, sustainable land use, the design and development of fibre composites, numerical modelling and simulation, e-business and e-commerce, school leadership, children's literacy, theatre studies, literature and regional history. It is renowned for its performing and visual arts programs and is a world leader in online learning technologies and pedagogy. The Library has made a significant investment in electronic journals and databases.
http://www.usq.edu.au


Deidre Lowe, Systems Librarian
University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba
lowe@usq.edu.au

About FDI’s ZPORTAL / OL2
ZPORTAL provides libraries and information centres with a single (federated) search environment that simultaneously searches across their choice of information resources, and retrieves the hits into a single results set. OL2 dynamically builds links between citation information and digital content in the form of e-journals, full-text databases and PDFs, using OpenURL technology.

About Fretwell-Downing Informatics
Fretwell-Downing Informatics (FDI) has a long history of supplying leading-edge information management solutions to over 250 organisations worldwide. FDI operates from its headquarters in the UK with a US subsidiary, Fretwell-Downing Inc., in North America plus additional offices in Australia and Europe. FDI’s experience has resulted in a suite of well-designed solutions including information portals, resource sharing, document delivery, library management and data publishing. The company’s freedom by design philosophy is underpinned by a strong software development team and a commitment to interoperability and open standards – such as NISO Z39.50, ISO ILL. This enables FDI components to be built into a total solution or integrated alongside existing technologies.
http://www.fdisolutions.com

For further information, contact:
Emily Haynes
Marketing Executive
Fretwell-Downing Informatics
Brincliffe House
861 Ecclesall Road
Sheffield S11 7AE England
Tel: +44 114 281 6040
Email: emily.haynes@fdisolutions.com

Erica Maxwell
Regional Manager, Australasia
Fretwell-Downing Informatics Ltd
Suite 5, 131 Paisley Street
Footscray, Victoria 3011
Australia
Tel: +61 3 9362 8502
Email: erica.maxwell@fdisolutions.com