ALIA West

March 2005

Western Australian electronic lists

There is a multitude of electronic lists for the information professional but only a few Western Australian lists. The best known is WAIN (Western Australian Information Network) which has been running since 1994 and has around 1000 members. AliaWEST was established in July 2003 and has approximately 300 members. These are the main general lists but there are more specialised WA lists, such as allgwa for members of the Australian Law Librarians Group, and Watlnet for teacher librarians, library technicians, library officers and anyone with an interest in school libraries.

Which ones should you join? If you are job hunting, you will find that WAIN, aliaWEST, and Watlnet run job postings fairly regularly. On Mondays Lorraine Bradshaw from IEA posts a list of jobs advertised in Saturday's West Australian to aliaWEST and WAIN (if you inadvertently delete her posting, you can access it and any other aliaWEST message via the aliaWEST archives as long as you are a list member).

While outside the parochial focus of this column, aliaLIBTEC rates a mention for 'EmployLT', a service posting library or library skills related positions to the list. The subject lines are exemplary for always including the state.

All advertise CPD events, although WAIN gets more event postings than aliaWEST (The listowner would like to rectify this. Hint, hint. Postings may be sent to aliawest@lists.alia.org.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) no attachments and e-mails in plain text please.) The majority of WA events are posted to WAIN but some events targeted at specific interest groups are only advertised on more specialised lists, for example, most school library related CPD events are posted to Watlnet and not to WAIN. Some events will be cross posted to national lists such as aliaCPD, aliaHEALTH, aliaLOCAL or aliaLIBTEC, depending on the target audience. If you want to know what events are occurring in WA you must join WAIN, you should join aliaWEST, and you should join any local lists in your library sector to pick up details of events not posted to WAIN (after three years of compiling 'Diary dates' I do have a good sense of where events are advertised. And don't forget about reading Biblia!)

How do you subscribe? How to subscribe and other important information has been cribbed shamelessly from the instructions sent when you join the list (the e-mail that you save in a safe place, right?) and appears below.

aliaWEST

Purpose:
AliaWEST has the following purposes:

1. To provide a means for ALIA West and other Western Australian based ALIA groups to communicate with members
2. To promote events and other activities of ALIA West and other ALIA groups
3. To provide a forum for the discussion of professional issues

Web page:
http://lists.alia.org.au/mailman/listinfo/aliaWEST/

Address for posting to the list:
aliawest@lists.alia.org.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

Address for posting administration commands (subscribe/unsubscribe/receive digest, etc.):
aliawest-request@lists.alia.org.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

NB: It's easier to use the web page for changing subscription options.

Subscribe:
Go to the web page and follow the instructions.

NB: All the options below require your password. If you can't remember your password there's a button on the web page for e-mailing your password to yourself.

Unsubscribe:
Go to web page and click on 'Unsubscribe or edit options'.
Click on 'unsubscribe' and tick the checkbox.

Digest:
Go to the web page and click on 'Unsubscribe or edit options'.
Choose 'on' for 'Set digest mode'.
Click on 'Submit my changes' at the bottom of the page.
Click on 'Log out' at the bottom of the page.

Stop mail temporarily:
Go to the web page and click on 'Unsubscribe or edit options'.
Set 'Mail delivery' to 'disabled'.
Click on 'Submit my changes' at the bottom of the page.
Click on 'Log out' at the bottom of the page.

TIP: It is a really good idea to stop your mail while you are away if you use the 'out of office' auto reply as listowners don't like fielding out of office messages posted to the list and other subscribers to the list don't like getting them.

Other options:
You can change your password (choose 'change globally' if you want all your alia lists to have the same password) and can change your e-mail address and name from 'Unsubscribe or edit options'.

Getting help:
If you don't want to use the web page, send a message to: aliaWEST-request@lists.alia.org.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the word 'help' in the subject or body (don't include the quotes), and you will get back a message with instructions.

Archive: The archive can be accessed by current list members from http://lists.alia.org.au/mailman/listinfo/aliaWEST/

WAIN

Purpose:
'The list has three primary purposes.

1. To allow dissemination of information about events of interest to members of the profession.
2. To discuss issues that are of interest to a broad cross section of the profession.
3. To advertise positions that have become available.'

Webpage:
WAIN does not have a web page as far as I know. Information on how to subscribe is available from the directory of electronic lists at http://www.nla.gov.au/libraries/resource/lists.html. Information on subscribing and unsubscribing is also available in some issues of Biblia from 2003.

Address for posting to the list:
wain@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

Address for posting administration commands (subscribe/unsubscribe/receive digest, etc.):
listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

Subscribe:
Send a mail message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following message in the body of the mail
SUBSCRIBE WAIN yourfirstname yourlastname

Unsubscribe:
Send a mail message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following message in the body of the mail
UNSUBSCRIBE WAIN

Digest:
If you want to receive a digest of the day's messages then send a message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following in the body of the message
set wain mail digest

To return to receiving mail as normal send a message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following
set wain mail ack

Stop mail temporarily:
If you do not want to receive any messages while you are away then send a message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following in the body of the message
set wain mail postpone

To continue receiving mail on your return send a message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address) with the following
set wain mail ack

Getting help:
Send the following request in the body of a mail message to listproc@info.curtin.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)
HELP

WATLNET

Purpose:
'This list has been set up to encourage discussion and sharing among Western Australian teacher librarians, resource teachers, library technicians, assistants and officers, and any other people interested in school libraries. It is not intended to replace OZTL_NET but to work alongside the national listserv and provide information and networking opportunities at the local level. It will provide for the 'torn pages' and video requests, PD notices and discussion on local issues which do not normally require national listings. Discussion on topics of general interest should be posted to the national list.' (http://www.eddept.wa.edu.au/cmis/cat/watlnet.htm)

Webpage: http://www.eddept.wa.edu.au/cmis/cat/watlnet.htm

Address for posting to the list:
watlnet@edna.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

Address for posting administration commands (subscribe/unsubscribe/receive digest, etc.):
lyris@edna.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)

Subscribe:
Send an e-mail to lyris@edna.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)
In the body of the message type subscribe watlnet
Leave the subject area blank and turn off your internet signature
Respond to the confirmation e-mail within the time period stated

Unsubscribe:
Send an e-mail to lyris@edna.edu.au.nospam (please remove '.nospam' from address)
In the body of the message type unsubscribe watlnet [your e-mail address]
Leave the subject area blank and turn off your internet signature

Camille Peters