Why not put RSS feeds into a browser toolbar so your patrons have the latest news in their browser? That's what the Lansing, Illinois, Public Library asked and answered in the form of a very cool toolbar.

If you're using Windows ME/NT/2000/XP and Internet Explorer 5.0 or higher, you can use their toolbar. It's similar to the Google toolbar -- it provides a search box you can use on the Lansing library catalog, their regional library catalog, the web, or a variety of other sources. There's a link to Instant Message the reference desk.

And -- here's the kicker -- there are four RSS feeds built in. The library publishes four newsletters -- three by age of audience (adult, teen, and youth) and one for IT issues. These four feeds are listed in the toolbar. Clicking on a headline on the drop-down menu for any of these four RSS feeds pulls up the weblog entry in the browser. Very cool!