Barry J Marshall Library

This library is well made, well lit, and generally quite wonderful. Highly recommend the BJ Library.

Very decent library - better than Reid if you're a science student. The wifi in here actually works better than Reid, so you can actually get some work done. The place is usually quite full though during peak hours, so it's very difficult to find a nice seat on any given day. Furthermore, the seats are kinda nasty, with so much dirt and grime on those cushions - they really need to do a thorough clean of them. Regardless of that small point though, it's a much nicer library than Reid, and isn't as crowded as it as well.

There was once a time when the UWA library was one of the most inspiring academic venues in the state, with its walls filled with countless tomes covering all manner of subjects. Many current students may not know this, but UWA once consisted of three distinct science libraries: the UPSL, the MPSL and the biology library. How I spent many wonderful hours browsing through books, periodicals and journals on subjects I never even knew existed, let alone would proactively seek. Fast forward to 2021 and the library is a shadow of its former self. The map library, business library (which was once in Reid) MPSL, UPSLand biology libraries have all been consolidated. What was once four separate libraries now occupies less than one-third of two of the four levels. The entire third floor collection is gone, replaced with a sparse array of cheap and I inviting furniture. With no acoustic baffles, you can easily hear noise and conversation from the other side of the floor. Mechanical plant noise is also a problem, with signs advising you to move elsewhere if you need to concentrate. It also doesn’t have nearly enough computers on the third floor. To add insult to injury, the library has also moved to predominantly expanding its collection through the acquisition of ebooks. Whilst, in principal, ebooks have many potential advantages ages, their encumbrance by DRM means you can only view them in an awful web browser. If you’re feeling particularly masochistic, you can potentially also view them using Adobe Digital Editions, which has a spectacular one star average rating on the Apple App Store and hasn’t been updated in about 5 years. Forget trying to print, photocopy or annotate non-contiguous ranges of pages; the publishers will have none of that. Why do a bunch of old books matter, especially in science when the literature and current thinking changes so quickly? Because the path we took to get here matters. In my field of study (computer science) we are beginning to see the first generation of students who don’t know how a compiler operates. They don’t know operating systems beyond Windows, macOS or Linux existed. They don’t understand the fundamental principles of how a computer operates. Finding this information on the internet is surprisingly difficult and often incomplete. Even worse, we are starting to see more and more papers presented as new work where in actuality, they are covering the same material covered 30 or 40 years ago, but being rediscovered. So what is the library good for? Well, it’s great for socialising, and they sometimes have board games on the ground floor. Everything else can be done online from a more comfortable location.

The second floor has tons of space and comfy chairs, sometimes I don't want to leave.

Marshall has requested an upgrade of the foyer/entrance so that it "looks shiny and new" or something similar. I think someone from UWA should contact him about this - his request was made in 2019 but nothing has changed...