I saw a clever use of RSS recently at work. Council produces all sorts of pamplets, brochures, media releases, fact sheets etc. Many of these are one off items that will either stay in their current format for years, but there are some that need updating on a regular basis. An example of this would the the libraries "What's On" pamplet that comes out once a month.
These sort of serialised pamplets have starting coming out with RSS links so staff or interested customers can add them to a reader and keep up to date with the information they contain. I love this idea and wondered if it could be extended to out productions like the council's agendas and minutes?
Just a thought.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Managing Management
More and more my work is being dominate by events. Unlike a regular activity on a weekly or fortnightly basis, management and customers are demanding bigger spectacles where large number of can participate. I can see a place for application like the ones below to help co-ordinate these events in the future.
Doodle was really just a scheduling application much like in Outlook. Outlook is used extensively at work so though Doodle is a cute program I can't see us moving to it in the future. Here is my scheduled meeting, Christmas Day.
Google Calendar suffers the same problem as Doodle where many of the things it can do are already done within the Outlook program. I actually see more potential for myself co-ordinating meetings outside of work. I will keep both Doodle and Google Calendar in mind next time I have to try and get a group of people together.
Eventbrite was a more unique program that allowed you to create tickets and even take payments for events. Though I didn't play with the payment option, I did create an event, for which the website is here. It was easy to use and as you can see, modify for a more corporate look. Again, I don't know if we could use it at work with security issues always the main priority, but it is good to know it's there.
Doodle was really just a scheduling application much like in Outlook. Outlook is used extensively at work so though Doodle is a cute program I can't see us moving to it in the future. Here is my scheduled meeting, Christmas Day.
Google Calendar suffers the same problem as Doodle where many of the things it can do are already done within the Outlook program. I actually see more potential for myself co-ordinating meetings outside of work. I will keep both Doodle and Google Calendar in mind next time I have to try and get a group of people together.
Eventbrite was a more unique program that allowed you to create tickets and even take payments for events. Though I didn't play with the payment option, I did create an event, for which the website is here. It was easy to use and as you can see, modify for a more corporate look. Again, I don't know if we could use it at work with security issues always the main priority, but it is good to know it's there.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Oh boy! RSS again!
From last year I had this post, and this post and finally this post on RSS. I just didn't get them for a long time, they didn't seem to speak my language and early on we didn't seem to want to be at the same places. But I've lived companionably with GoogleReader for 21 months now and we're still going strong. I don't see a separation looming anytime soon.So not love at first sight unlike many of the applications, but I now read it everyday and add and take out links as I need. If I haven't seen anything I'm interested in reading on a blog for a while I unsubscribe and clear the clutter. If I wish to search for a specific topic through all my feeds, GoogleReader has a search option at the top of the screen. Though not as convenient as a rinse like Feed Rinse I don't usually look for any one thing and like the scan the news and library blogs for things of interest.
I can't say I organise my feeds, I don't have that many: a news feed, a few funny blogs, friends blogs, blogs relating library learning and a few other work related ones. There would be less than 20 feeds and they don't all post everyday. For the blogs that do post more than once a day, I scan the headings for something that interests me and mark the rest as read hiding them from my screen.
I set up a Feed Rinse for ABC new: Just In blog asking for any posts on cats and dogs. And did get a post on Pandas being genetically similar to dogs, I also receive a post on a helicopter crash that I couldn't see my search terms in. Not a great success, I could have done that with a scan of the headlines.
FiltermyRSS had no more success in finding articles with dogs in them, and didn't have the convenience of being delivered to my reader.
Tabloid was cute. Creating a pdf of the current posts from whatever blog you stick in. Not sure how I can share it besides just sending it as an attachment to an email. Mind you it does make a very presentable version of the post which could be handing for making a printout for someone. Cute, but really useful?
Google alerts, did that and talked about it here. I've had to remove them already as the one on my suburb was just too depressing.
I can see a need for such filters to find quality information on subjects and don't want to be wading through posts. In saying that many posts are already on a particular subject and these filters are not very refined searches. I'd be pretty disapppointed with any searchengine I was using that came back with the results I've seen here. In the end, I'm glad people are thinking about these sorts of things and making them available, but me and my RSS are doing just fine thank, just the way we are.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Let me Present to you...
I remember the SlideShare week of last years course with happiness as it was one of the few audio-visual components of the course that would run on the work computers. I have since used different slideshows from SlideShare for all sort of uses including Sunday School.
I notice SlideShare have the option of uploading documents as well, a very handy tool when you find yourself travelling from computer to computer. As part of my life and work I already use Googledoc for this as I have it as a widget on iGoogle that pops up as my homepage. Googledocs will also hold Powerpoint presentations as well as Excel spreadsheets but SlideShare is great when you just don't know where to start. Often it's better not to reinvent the wheel.
I was looking forward to the Cultureshock set of stories, however the computers have let me down and won't play them.
I didn't have any Presentations I could share with the world so I quickly whipped up one that will hopefully get you singing to yourself for the rest of the day. You will find it eventually, here.
I notice SlideShare have the option of uploading documents as well, a very handy tool when you find yourself travelling from computer to computer. As part of my life and work I already use Googledoc for this as I have it as a widget on iGoogle that pops up as my homepage. Googledocs will also hold Powerpoint presentations as well as Excel spreadsheets but SlideShare is great when you just don't know where to start. Often it's better not to reinvent the wheel.
I was looking forward to the Cultureshock set of stories, however the computers have let me down and won't play them.
I didn't have any Presentations I could share with the world so I quickly whipped up one that will hopefully get you singing to yourself for the rest of the day. You will find it eventually, here.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Ning a ding-ding
Recently I was asked to participate in a workshop for the redesign on the Council Intranet, specifically the access to information about different departments and individuals. If I had seen a Ning previously I would have just suggested forming one for the Council.
I like that each person has their own page for a photo and contact information... maybe a link for photos or other important sites. I like that they can be affiliated with groups or departments within the network so others can search for you either by your name or department. In council I know we wanted an interactive business structure that can show the relationship between departments Clicking on them would bring up the department page and links to staff in that department. I could see Nings being very suitable for thall these applications.
Outside of work I suggested to a co-worker that setting up a Ning network for her large family. Everyone, even the youngest can have a page and add blogs, comments, events, send birthday greetings...etc. An awesome application.
Still waiting for the Administrator for Library 2.0 to approve my application, but I'll add a link here as soon as it is.
I like that each person has their own page for a photo and contact information... maybe a link for photos or other important sites. I like that they can be affiliated with groups or departments within the network so others can search for you either by your name or department. In council I know we wanted an interactive business structure that can show the relationship between departments Clicking on them would bring up the department page and links to staff in that department. I could see Nings being very suitable for thall these applications.
Outside of work I suggested to a co-worker that setting up a Ning network for her large family. Everyone, even the youngest can have a page and add blogs, comments, events, send birthday greetings...etc. An awesome application.
Still waiting for the Administrator for Library 2.0 to approve my application, but I'll add a link here as soon as it is.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Evaluating evaluations.
It thrills me to see my personal blog's statistics. I average around 40 hits a day mostly for one or two posts that people have found through searches on search engines such as google. How do I know all this? Wordpress tells me so. Every month is laid out in a line graph showing number of hit with highest hitting posts for the month being listed in summary below. You can even look at the statistics for each day, seeing how people found your site, what they used and searched under to discover you.
Now if I, an individual, can get excited about statistics, I can only imagine how wonderful an institution would think such a service.
Google Alerts is a very handy tool that I can see being very handy for study in the coming year. The main feature is that you gather the information you want in one place where you already go to review articles, be it either your email, or RSS feed. Unfortunately you can't do an advanced search and make the search ignore anything that is coming from inside the organisation. I got alot of miss-hits from my searches that I would have with a more refined search terms option.
I must say, the excercise of creating a Google Alert for the place where I live was demoralising. Honestly I don't live in such a violent suburb. I wish I had created a Google Alert for work now.
Feed Burner was confusing but I can see the advantage for the organisation. Having one location that provides all the statistical information about several blogs in one location. I was interested to see the Publicize tab that give tips and help to make your blog more accessible. I personally like the ability from this one site to change all my blogs access all subscription services. I can not speak ofr Feed Burner's statistics as they weren't available.
Zoomerang was good fun, though I do find writing a good survey is harder than it sounds, the software with it's template surveys did help considerably. Here is my survey for a Christmas Party. This could have been very handy recently while organising our own Christmas Party plans.
So on the whole. I can't say I learnt anything new about my topic through Google Alerts but I can see that it is a great tool for getting a broad look at a topic from day to day. Feed Burner has it's uses in managing multiple blogs and helping promote them online. Zoomerang was great fun but doesn't replace a well trained staff member in survey writing. In the hands of such a staff member, programs like Survey Monkey and Zoomerang are wonderful. If staff aren't trained in survey writing, they can annoy and alienate customer with ill-conceived surveys that provide little in the way of useful information.
As usual no matter how good the application, it comes down to the skill and knowledge of staff to make the most of them.
Now if I, an individual, can get excited about statistics, I can only imagine how wonderful an institution would think such a service.
Google Alerts is a very handy tool that I can see being very handy for study in the coming year. The main feature is that you gather the information you want in one place where you already go to review articles, be it either your email, or RSS feed. Unfortunately you can't do an advanced search and make the search ignore anything that is coming from inside the organisation. I got alot of miss-hits from my searches that I would have with a more refined search terms option.
I must say, the excercise of creating a Google Alert for the place where I live was demoralising. Honestly I don't live in such a violent suburb. I wish I had created a Google Alert for work now.
Feed Burner was confusing but I can see the advantage for the organisation. Having one location that provides all the statistical information about several blogs in one location. I was interested to see the Publicize tab that give tips and help to make your blog more accessible. I personally like the ability from this one site to change all my blogs access all subscription services. I can not speak ofr Feed Burner's statistics as they weren't available.
Zoomerang was good fun, though I do find writing a good survey is harder than it sounds, the software with it's template surveys did help considerably. Here is my survey for a Christmas Party. This could have been very handy recently while organising our own Christmas Party plans.
So on the whole. I can't say I learnt anything new about my topic through Google Alerts but I can see that it is a great tool for getting a broad look at a topic from day to day. Feed Burner has it's uses in managing multiple blogs and helping promote them online. Zoomerang was great fun but doesn't replace a well trained staff member in survey writing. In the hands of such a staff member, programs like Survey Monkey and Zoomerang are wonderful. If staff aren't trained in survey writing, they can annoy and alienate customer with ill-conceived surveys that provide little in the way of useful information.
As usual no matter how good the application, it comes down to the skill and knowledge of staff to make the most of them.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Hmmm...that's del.icio.us!
Last year I was impressed with Delicious. I thought it was a great place to pool all our collected websites and more importantly sort them by topics via tags so they become searchable. Very nice.
But what about now?
The Twitter connection is a great idea, particularly within a workplace. It would be easy in inform staff of a new site if they were all connected to the libraries Twitter site. I notice that though the link says its delicious it actually takes you to the bookmarks site. Very clean and very simple.
For customers, I'm not so sure I how this would be much different from just adding the link to your Twitter site.
I can't say I use any feature beyond bookmarking in Delicious. As everything is tagged when added I find it simple to search and have no problem finding my old links. As mentioned above the new Twitter option is cute and for me give more value to Twitter in the workplace.
As for recommendations, I always like clicking on the numbers to the right of each link showing how many times that site as been bookmarked. It's interested to see what other people tag sites, it can help give inspiration to reference equiries when the site you have is sort of what you want, but not quite there.
But what about now?
The Twitter connection is a great idea, particularly within a workplace. It would be easy in inform staff of a new site if they were all connected to the libraries Twitter site. I notice that though the link says its delicious it actually takes you to the bookmarks site. Very clean and very simple.
For customers, I'm not so sure I how this would be much different from just adding the link to your Twitter site.
I can't say I use any feature beyond bookmarking in Delicious. As everything is tagged when added I find it simple to search and have no problem finding my old links. As mentioned above the new Twitter option is cute and for me give more value to Twitter in the workplace.
As for recommendations, I always like clicking on the numbers to the right of each link showing how many times that site as been bookmarked. It's interested to see what other people tag sites, it can help give inspiration to reference equiries when the site you have is sort of what you want, but not quite there.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Twittering about Twitter
I must remember #nswlearning2.1...I must remember #nswlearning2.1...I must remember #nswlearning2.1...
![](http://media.photobucket.com/image/"no%20sir,%20I%20don't%20like%20it"%20quote/Ein-7919/mr__horse-1.jpg)
I've tried...I really have. I've had the account for a few months and besides the creative mind puzzle of trying to fit what I want to say elloquently into 140 characters I haven't had use for it personally.
And I suspect that lots of people feel the same.
Having looked at a few tweets I'm seeing a general pattern of simple tweeted and added value tweets. Let me explain
Simple tweets are just a statement just thrown out into space to be accepted by the cosmos as it sees fit, for example:
Simple tweets are just a statement just thrown out into space to be accepted by the cosmos as it sees fit, for example:
Ground breaking stuff. In the library world this would be equilivant example:
BCLIS: Summer Reading Club starts Monday 16 November.
Useful and dull. It doesn't tell you what Summer Reading Club is or contain a link to where to find the branches participating.
On the whole, most organisational tweets I read are more your value added than those above. The tweet you have when the 140 character just aren't enough:
This tweet includes a link to another site which provides more information. Which means that this group have found the can not communicate as they would have liked in Twitter so they need to put what they want to say somewhere else and link to Twitter. Twitter ceases to be communication itself, but a link from your readers to your communication.
It's just not enough
And that's the problem for me with Twitter, it's just not enough. I can only express myself in a tiny space (all of which I can do on my macro-blog site if I so wish) and requires me to be fluent in game-speak to make any real sense of others' communications. I can't just write a simple tag into a Labels box to help find my post, I have to add # marks after my statement and make it look...messy.
I'd love to think that people will follow their library Twitter and find the tweets interesting and useful. I'd love to think I can catch people in the nick of time to let them know about an event that's starting, or closing or that I think could be really popular. Prove me wrong.
And just as I'm about to publish this post I read this tweet:
wilw: One of my neighbors is having a pine tree cut down. The whole street smells like Christmas.
Maybe it's not so bad.
wilw: One of my neighbors is having a pine tree cut down. The whole street smells like Christmas.
Maybe it's not so bad.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Refreshing you and your blog
It's amazing how much blogger has changed in a year. There are some rather nifty new widgets...er...gadgets which have made it onto my blog and I find I like the minimalist style as long as I can find a good image to spice it up. So here are the answers to the prompts given in the course:
1. How much have you blogged since you finished the original course?
I blog every week (almost) sometime more often...just not here. Actually, here. It's all nonsense stuff, but I'm hoping to get into blogging for the library in a few months. I think once we get into the swing management will be impressed with what we can do.
2. What do you like about blogging?
I use it as a open letter to friends. Thoughts and issues that I've found compelling enough to put word to screen about. Sometimes it's just life's funny stories and they're the posts I like the best. If others read it and...dare I say comment...all the better. I've had a few spammers but the site software usually culls those out for me to review and on the whole my blogging career has been very positive. I average 40 hits a day and am always surprise at what people find interesting.
3. Have you found other blogs to read?
YES! And thanks to RSS feeds into my iGoogle page I keep up to date on all the gem of blogs I've discovered in my wanderings. I'm a regular reader of more than a dozen different blog and the Google Reader allows me to keep them all under control. I think it could be very hard to keep up with everthing you're interest in without being about to centralise it somehow.
4. Do you comment on others' blogs?
I do. Not to everything I read. I won't flame, but try to find a contructive comment that I believe in and want to stand behind. I know how cool it is to get a thoughtful comment and so when I comment I like to make it worthwhile.
I now have two blog (besides this one) and as I said above am looking forward to contributing to a work blog for children and youth service. I can show with detailed statistics that it is a great way to get in touch with people. My blog site will show how people have found my blog, what they search to find my post and who links to my posts. Isn't that important information for any organisation?
Blogging does not require your organisation to have powerful computers, you don't need to host your blog on your own servers. It's free, simple and with with some sites you gain access to amazing stats that can only justify the staff time, which is minimial. To keep a blog running it needs a post a week, I think we can all achieve that no matter how small the library.
1. How much have you blogged since you finished the original course?
I blog every week (almost) sometime more often...just not here. Actually, here. It's all nonsense stuff, but I'm hoping to get into blogging for the library in a few months. I think once we get into the swing management will be impressed with what we can do.
2. What do you like about blogging?
I use it as a open letter to friends. Thoughts and issues that I've found compelling enough to put word to screen about. Sometimes it's just life's funny stories and they're the posts I like the best. If others read it and...dare I say comment...all the better. I've had a few spammers but the site software usually culls those out for me to review and on the whole my blogging career has been very positive. I average 40 hits a day and am always surprise at what people find interesting.
3. Have you found other blogs to read?
YES! And thanks to RSS feeds into my iGoogle page I keep up to date on all the gem of blogs I've discovered in my wanderings. I'm a regular reader of more than a dozen different blog and the Google Reader allows me to keep them all under control. I think it could be very hard to keep up with everthing you're interest in without being about to centralise it somehow.4. Do you comment on others' blogs?
I do. Not to everything I read. I won't flame, but try to find a contructive comment that I believe in and want to stand behind. I know how cool it is to get a thoughtful comment and so when I comment I like to make it worthwhile.
I now have two blog (besides this one) and as I said above am looking forward to contributing to a work blog for children and youth service. I can show with detailed statistics that it is a great way to get in touch with people. My blog site will show how people have found my blog, what they search to find my post and who links to my posts. Isn't that important information for any organisation?
Blogging does not require your organisation to have powerful computers, you don't need to host your blog on your own servers. It's free, simple and with with some sites you gain access to amazing stats that can only justify the staff time, which is minimial. To keep a blog running it needs a post a week, I think we can all achieve that no matter how small the library.
Library learning 2.1: here we go again!
This was such a great course last year that when I saw it was on again I jumped on this old blog and revamped the look.
Minimalist I know, but it does mean I have twice as much room for commenting on all the new apps that have found there way onto the Internet.
I do like how much you can now edit to suit your own tastes including the look of your Nav bar...like, only you'll be looking at it, but there's an option to change it to suit your current layout.
I didn't try one of the after market templates as I didn't think I could do that on the work machines, but I can see that having the ability to use templates made elsewhere, out choice of looks explodes into almost infinite possiblities. Surely there would be one to suit any organisation's corporate image.
So Library learning 2.1...here we go!
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