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This was a fantastic conference! The speakers were excellent and the whole conference was very well organized. All the organizers should be very proud of the event! We needed more time to stretch between speakers. My back was VERY sore for the week following the conference because we had to sit so long at a one time. Great job; I'm really impressed... Food was great, but not enough places to sit. Hard to balance soup, sandwiches, coffee, dessert. Excellent conference All and all a great conference, the best I get to. Well done. I like the way there's only one stream of presentations: please keep this format. Congratulations on putting together an excellent conference! It was wonderful. This is the 1st time I've been so energized at a conference, The lunch got boring. This was the best conference I've ever been to. It blows ALA and CODI out of the water. The level of technical discussion was usually high enough to be valuable to systems people, and was library-oriented. I've never seen that combination before. I also managed to hitch up with an interesting group of strangers for a great dinner on Friday night, which was a bonus. Thank you for an excellent conference. Excellent conference overall. The conference was very good and maintained the tradition of the previous Access conferences in providing timely information about the broad spectrum of technology applications in libraries. Thanks very much to all the organizers and speakers for their hard work. Do not have another GODOT session. Last year and this were poorly done. No intro is ever given to outsiders as to what it is even. Regarding Sunday lunch: when it came it was good. There needed to be more seats and tables in the area to eat lunch. Also, salad on Friday and Saturday would have been nice. The soup was excellent. There should have been 5 minute breaks between speakers, sitting for almost 2 hours at a time was too much. Keep it small. "Free" time halfway through to meet with others with similar problems or issues. Regarding the "Integrated Systems Vendor Panel Convenor"- "Too long, too much stuff in here". Have vendor panel at the end of the day. Avoid the 4 people in 60 minutes unless you tell them they have 10 minutes. Too much time is lost switching equipment etc. and it is hard to keep them on time. For panels, have a moderator/convenor to stop the panelists when they go overtime. I hope all papers will be on the Conference website. As a first time attender, I was VERY impressed by the organization and extent of this Conference - I'll be a regular attendee from now on. Databases Vendor Panel - not enough time Vegetarian food! "Planning for Sustainable Desktop Computing" - too basic, too fast! Lunch - need more variety in sandwiches (bread & fillings) and need VEGETABLES! Good soup, bad desserts. Saskatoon Soaps were wonderful - Thankyou! Addition of some related "non-technical" issues like licensing and privacy is a good move. Technology does not work in isolation. Very good Conference at value price. Excellent choice of speakers, topics and hosts. Good time-keeping. "Integrated Systems Vendor Panel" - not enough content, too much sales promotion. "Authentication and Security" - nothing new - too basic. Time keeping pretty good except @ end of day - DON'T GO OVER! Approach to some topics was too basic, even for reference librarians - should assume some familiarity with current issues (eg. search engine functions) or likely people wouldn't attend Access. Give different structure to vendor panels to avoid a content-empty sales pitch - be more specific with questions asked. Give more (as much) time to library showcase presenters as vendors - schedule it rather than go over time! Can we have proper seating for breakfast and lunches? It's an excellent idea to have the evaluation form in the registration package and broken down by events. Do we really need to run over a weekend? Great Conference! Keep up the good work. Need more chances to stretch/short breaks. I know its hard to get people back with only 15 minute coffee breaks but 30 minutes is a little long - at least for all 3 days. Don't have vendor panels - have tables for them in foyer. Noise coming from somewhere - kitchen? "Library Intranets" - needed more time. "Databases Vendor Panel" - much too short. "Coffee" - No espresso! Overall, an excellent conference. Conference summaries are redundant and merely a non-informative venue for who?? Updates need to be preceded with explanation of what/why it is... I'm attending for first time and found it impossible to jump in and understand projects (eg. GODOT). Also, I found "Very Techie" of little interest. Enjoyed the Conference very much - content was good. Thanks to the organizing committee for all their hard work to make this a valuable conference. Could we have a glossary of '98 Conference acronyms put on the Access site, and full text of Clifford Lynch's and Valerie Steeves presentations. Thanks to the Conference Committee! Well done! The QUALITY of the presentations was excellent. Loved Peter Scott's sense of humor. The systems people talked a little over my head so I didn't learn as much technical stuff as I wanted to. When speakers didn't have a computer presentation, I found the Access 98 screen with changing sponsors very distracting. I kept thinking the speaker was starting a screen presentation. "Lunch - Saturday, October 3" - Exact same thing 2 days in a row, shame on you! PLEASE NOTE: if presenters are limited in time - please see to it that that law is enforced UBC & SFU at Library Showcase were allowed to go on and on and on - when the moderator for the day should have stopped them - it was banquet night and there was not time to spare between end of day & banquet! "Lunch - Sunday, October" - same stuff again! 3 days in a row!! Yuck. Soaps were great! Not enough fresh air circulation in the room. No censorship talks. Banquet entertain was wonderful. "Conference Summary" - She did a good job BUT: why is this needed? Force of habit? Excellent conference, well organized, well paced. Overall, a very well thought out and good conference. Some session's speakers presented were a little general and not practical in nature. Historical precedent in the field should be less of a focus with more concentration put on present issues and potential solutions. Roy Tennant's keynote address was superb & right on the mark! An excellent, content-intensive & highly informative conference. This series should not be missed by Library Systems and other staff! Excellent blend of topics. Speakers addressed the topics at a level that was useful. Length of sessions was just right. RE: Convention room - having it next to a kitchen facility was a bit distracting - lots of crashing and banging and loud talking. Otherwise, the Bessborough was an excellent facility. Too much kitchen noise. Great Conference - please keep the hotel as cheap as you can so we can afford to keep coming!! Not sure if vendor panel is still appropriate! I was very disappointed to see that topics on the Internet, Web Links, etc., seemed to deal solely with large-scale libraries and institutions, not at all with small-scale libraries!!! In addition, I had difficulty in tracking down anyone to get my receipt returned immediately. After registering, there should have been more info. available re: meals provided, etc. The meals (lunch, breakfast were very poor and small.) If Access '98 is geared more towards large-scale libraries & institutions especially systems programmers, this should be made clear to those who are not! Also, there should've been more time spent on topics (more rooms). "Integrated Systems Vendor Panel" - uneven - too much "sales" too little perspective. "Databases Vendor Panel" - too little time per vendor. Nice if food suppliers would provide milk as well as cream, more whole wheat, low-fat (bagel) alternatives to muffins & croissants. Saskatoon Soaps were great! Need variety of sandwiches at lunch! or other like. Very well organized - I appreciated keeping to strict time-lines. Topics were well chosen and speakers good. Congratulations on a job well done! "Lunch - Sunday, October 4" - Excellent, even though it was late. Excellent conference, Saturday was too long, even without running over time. GODOT presentation was too long! Like the "single-stream" approach as opposed to little workshops. A hard-working conference, very full. The care taken with timing was very much appreciated. Really wonderful job. Congratulations! Include salads with lunch (more variety) and perhaps bagels and biscuits or scones for breakfast. Great conference, very well organized. Great job. |