Dear Answer Person,
You do many amazing things, and your colleagues at the library are some of the people I admire the most. Dukeref is definitely my favorite IM Buddy. I’m sure someone is working on it, but wouldn’t it be convenient if the interlibrary loan login was tied to one’s netid so that it would be easier to keep track of login information and maintain continuity through the Duke computer systems?
Thanks!
ANSWER PERSON RESPONDS: Oh, yes, this would be a lot easier, and we at the library know it. The system uses completely different software that apparently can’t communicate with OIT’s NetID services (or no one has figured it out yet). The “My Library Card” feature of the Catalog does work with your NetID without even having to register, but apparently the Document Delivery (a.k.a., Interlibrary Loan or ILL) system can’t.
If you register into ILL with the help of library staff, sometimes they hint that instead of accepting the default Username (which is your DukeCard number plus issue number), you replace that with your NetID and password if you want to synchronize the systems. Then, you won’t have to think about it next time. Of course, you still have to register the first time, and it would be nice to get rid of that step. Also, you can’t go back and change your Username once you’ve gotten a crummy one, unless you ask ILL to reset your account so you can start over.
Thanks for the input.