RE: catalog front page on outside server

[Barb Anderson <bja9@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At a previous institution, the home page was "effectively" on another 
server--the opacmenu and mainmenu were both basically just a redirect 
page.  The advantage to that was if/when the campus webserver was down you 
could still access the catalog by typing out the whole ugly URL yourself 
(blah.blah.edu/screens/pick-a-page.html)  I had them added as 
favorites/bookmarks at the reference desk.

perhaps this would work for you as well?

Barb

At 11:05 AM 10/3/01 -0700, you wrote:

>We do that.  Our main page is:
>
><http://www.calstatela.edu/library/opac/catalog.html>http://www.calstatela.edu/library/opac/catalog.html 
>
>
>Unfortunately, if the campus web server is down, so is the front page to 
>our catalog now.  For example, some computers on campus got infected by 
>the Nimda virus and later another virus (actually a Trojan horse).  Our 
>Innopac server was clear, but the campus web server was shut off from 
>outside contact for security reasons until the campus was 
>protected/disinfected.  So we had several days when no one could get into 
>the Web OPAC  (at least we still had some Wyse terminals for the 
>public!  Reference is now reconsidering their decision to get rid of the 
>Wyses).
>
>Our first page used to be on the Innopac server along with all the other 
>pages, but was changed for a variety of reasons, the primary one being the 
>initial page has locally maintained javascript in it, and the author of 
>the javascript couldn't maintain it on the Innopac server.
>
>Sandra Card
>Systems Librarian and Technical Services Specialist
>John F. Kennedy Memorial Library
>5151 State University Dr.
>California State University, Los Angeles  90032-8300
>scard@xxxxxxxxxx
>(323)343-4894     fax:  (323)343-3992
>
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Rob Bruno [<mailto:rbruno@xxxxxxxxxx>mailto:rbruno@xxxxxxxxxx]
>Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2001 9:57 AM
>To: INNOPAC@xxxxxxxxxx
>Subject: catalog front page on outside server
>
>Hi-
>
>Have any of you "bypassed" using opacmenu and mainmenu files, and instead
>used a webpac front page that was located on a different server?
>
>Basically, what we are considering doing is using an html file located on
>our library's web site as the main catalog menu, and wanted to know the
>advantages and disadvantages of doing so.
>
>For example, instead of having our front page be:
>
><http://libcat.amnh.org/screens/mainmenu.html>http://libcat.amnh.org/screens/mainmenu.html 
>(libcat.amnh.org is our
>Innovative server)
>
>It would be:
>
><http://library.amnh.org/catalog/index.html>http://library.amnh.org/catalog/index.html 
>(library.amnh.org is our
>library's web site server)
>
>One problem I see with doing so is that if the library's web site goes
>down, access to our catalog will be cut off. However, an advantage would be
>that the page would be easier to update.  Any arguments for and against
>would be welcome.
>
>Thank you
>-Rob
>
>
>
>Rob Bruno
>Cataloging/Metadata Librarian
>American Museum of Natural History Library
>Central Park West @ 79th Street
>New York, NY 10024
>212.769.5644
>212.769.5009 Fax
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>--
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>

Barbara J. Anderson
Library Systems Specialist
Kelvin Smith Library
Case Western Reserve University
11055 Euclid Ave.
Cleveland, OH 44106-7151

bja9@xxxxxxxxxx
(voice) 216-368-2666
(fax) 216-368-6506