Yes! Beginning November 16.

The library is pleased to announce that an online reservation system is now in place for the Group Study Rooms in both the Williams and Wolff libraries.  You can reserve rooms online starting the week of November 16th.  To use this new service please visit the “Study Room Reservation System”

The new system incorporates library operating hours, so you can book available rooms during all library operating hours. The system integrates email notification, allowing one person to pick a study group location and notify all included group members.

You can also see details about each room, such as number of seats (from 6 to 10), availability of overhead projectors or writing boards. This information is found in Option 4  “View the List of Rooms“ on the Reserve a Room home page.

Students should use their NetID and Georgetown Law password to access the system.

You can now book a room in five easy steps:

1. Enter the netID
   of at least three persons (the minimum to qualify to reserve a room, including yourself).   Note on the right side of the page there is a “Georgetown University Directory Search” where you can search for the netID’s of your group.
2. Pick a date.
   A drop down calendar menu is presented when you click on the box.  Please note you can make only one room reservation per day, and you can reserve up to 1 week in advance.
3. Select a start and end time
   in 15 minute intervals. The maximum time allowed time is 3 hours.
4. Select the room
   from those available at your chosen date and time.
5. Review the data and submit the request.

We’ve built the system to incorporate existing policies for group study access, and we hope everybody likes having online access to the system.  Of course, for now, you’ll still have to be physically in the library to actually use a group study room.  You just don't have to come here to get one at another time.  :-)

With the advent of near-ubiquitous wireless internet access, distractions are hard to avoid.  The complete question we received was "Has the library ever considered having an internet-free room? That is, a study area where there is no internet/wireless access but computers are allowed. Just a (crazy archaic) thought for increasing paper-writing productivity.

We haven't yet considered this option, but we think it might not work very well in practice.  This is partly for technical reasons, and moreso because we think most students won't want it.

The technical issue is that it's difficult to reliably limit wireless internet access to a specific location. Wireless access points tend to overlap coverage areas, so we don't think it's easy to, say, turn it off for one area while not impacting another part of the library.

From a student perspective, we think people are concerned with more (and more reliable) Internet access, instead of technical restrictions.  A few years ago, we had a laptop-free zone in the library, but we found that many people didn't use it.  To better assess student preferences for quiet study, our 2007 Law Library Student Survey included the question: "What would your perfect quiet study space consist of?"  Almost everybody answering the survey responded to this question.  Somewhat to our surprise, the majority of students wanted laptops as well as headphone music, which you can see in this chart.



For students wanting to limit personal distractions, turning off your laptop wireless access might be the best way to avoid online distractions.  More advanced users might want to read "The Productivity Guide for a Computer Geek". The tips range from the obvious (e.g. turn off your computer, use a pen and paper) to the more advanced (e.g. altering your Windows host file).

One suggestion in this guide is to use a Firefox add-on called LeechBlock. This is a productivity tool that lets you block selected time-wasting sites you find most distracting. All you need to do is specify which sites to block and when to block them.

We have no plans to selectively disable wireless access, but we welcome ideas for other things we can do to help you be more productive.

Yes! We think this is a good idea. This past weekend, we opened the Williams reference desk on Saturday and Sunday based upon the suggestion of a student and will continue to do so through exams. So, stop by the reference desk in the Reading Room with research questions or use the LiveHelp service to chat with a Georgetown librarian. We're open from Noon to 6pm each weekend day during exams.

We've had reports of students not being able to access Westlaw through the Law School Portal.  

One work-around is to use the general sign-on page at www.westlaw.com. 

• If you're used to using your customized username and password instead of the official Westlaw password, just look for phrase "switch to sign on using your own username and password" for a link. 
• You need to enter something into the Client Code box, but it doesn't matter what you enter.