Saturday, April 12, 2008

Social networks

So far MySpace, Facebook haven't appealed to me. I wanted to see hpw they worked without joining myself and have considered asking my sister for her login details so I could have alook around before putting up my profile. I guess I am a private kind of person.

However the applications for libraries are great, especially to appeal to the younger (future) library users. First it would need to be "cool" to have a library as your "friend"....

Seb Chan's article too hard to read late at night...

I had heard of second life but never thought libraries would be part of it too, that's great.

I will do the survey and congratulate myself on finishing. Perhaps I can go back and do some of the "adventure" activities to further my learning. Thanks to the State Library for putting together this course, I now feel more knowledgeable about some of the new technologies and will use some of the websites I have discovered in this course.

Nearly there....Online productivity tools

Online productivity tools

Wow didn't know about all these useful applications. Saving data to Google docs/ zoho would eliminate the need to store files and transport them with you. You could access the files from anywhere. No need to worry about that disk you left in the library because you wouldn't need to bring it with you! Also handy for "collaboration" (is it only me or does that term sound like war criminals?!). Would this be the end of buying software like MS Office? I know I only use a few basic features of Word and occasionally Excel.

I had trouble viewing the slide show on Slideshare, no sound came up. However I really liked the idea of Jott and tadalist. I like making lists (and occasionally doing the things on the list!) I could browse through a bookshop, see the books I like, send a message via Jott then add to my "reading list" on Tadalist.

Going to try Google Docs and check my gmail while there. OK here's the document I created.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=dsmpw4c_0hnxq73gq&hl=en

and I think I shared it with nswpln@gmail.com

Uses at work:-
  • Minimising meetings as people can access and work on documents at the same time from different locations eg when a team is set up to work on library policy.
  • Could allow some work to be done from home too.
  • Online storage would mean the end to IT departments asking people to remove unnecessary data from various drives to free up space.
  • For the public- can access their files from anywhere eg at home, uni, work and in the library without carrying around USB drives

Thursday, April 10, 2008

More mashups


One more fun thing I did with the help of bighugelabs


Sunday, April 6, 2008

Mashups

I was working on the Ref desk yesterday and it was fairly quiet so when i had the chance I had a good look at the links provided.


Bighugelabs looks great, could be easy to produce more professional looking signs eg Fiction A-C, Gardening etc or for brochures. Lots of great uses for outside of work too, I will return to this site


This is a picture of my daughter at 2 days old. It only took a few minutes to create this poster




Google maps was also great.


I liked Keir Clarke's blog and links to famous destinations (Ipswich city square?!) and journeys. About as close as I will get to travelling for a while! Great for lerning, see the place and watch a video. I will show my daughter the Uluru video http://homepage.ntlworld.com/keir.clarke/uluru.htm


Star viewer is also a great idea.


I work in an area with a fair bit of interesting local history so could see this being useful- have a map of a tourist walk with information on sites along the way.

Wow only 2 more modules to go! I think I can finish up for tonight.

Podcasts and audio

I liked the idea of podcasts of story time sessions, video would be good here too. Also useful for author talks, oral history, staff training sessions

Tried listening to a Libvibe podcast but couldn't bear the accent! Also slow to download but think that might be my PC.

British Library-podcasts all looked very interesting but lengthy. Might be useful to have on in the background when doing other work either on the computer or around the house.

ABC-initially got an error message
If you're seeing this, you've clicked on the linkfor the Health Minutes Podcast.This file is not meant to be read by a webbrowser directly. Instead you're meant to copythe URL for the file, which is: http://www.abc.net.au/health/minutes/podcast/healthminutes.xmland paste it into your RSS reader or podcast program.

I don't want to subscribe to another application so will leave this for now.

I had a look at what some other libraries are doing. Still having trouble getting some of the podcasts although can read a description of the content. Getting teenagers involved (Manchester Public Library) was a good idea. Ohio University Libraries used podcasts to explain how to use various services in the library (eg booking a room, overnight lending).Author talks and storytime features at Sunnyvale public library.

However at my library we are pushing it to cover all the desks and open the doors so can't see this technology being used in the near future.

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Answer boards and social searching

The Amazon use of "customers who bought this also bought..." reminds me of a quick way to shelve fiction- put it on a trolley with a sign "Just returned items"- many people think if someone else has borrowed it, it must be good!

I looked at the answers posted by librarians on the Answer Board Librarians wiki, wow some of them are pretty good. Makes me feel inadequate.. "Slamming the boards" might be a good way to keep up reference skills, these days my Ref desk shifts seem to be booking computers or handing over newspapers and if someone asks a "reference question" I am amazed! I liked the way the librarians referred to traditional print sources and online databases to encourage people to use their local library.

I liked the tag lines :-

Librarians--Ask Us, We Answer!
Librarians ... the ultimate search engines
Have a question you don't want the whole world to see?


Maybe there could be a link through the library website for questions and answers- patrons could post their questions and have an answer online; hopefully promoting the library and its resources. It would need to be done frequently to maintain its usefulness.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Del.icio.us & Technorati

Joined delicious, added some of websites and tags- very easy

http://del.icio.us/mangotoko

See previous entry for thoughts on library applications...

On to Technorati

None of the popular searches appeal to me!

398 results for "bookmobile"

In advanced search- did a tag search on "bookmobile" as suggested in the comments for this week and got 32 results, mostly from bapl.org. Clicked on one of them and got more details in technorati along with ads for meeting beautiful sexy babes, the secret of getting rich and debt reduction. Still finding it a bit too confusing on Technorati.

Cannot find any posts tagged nswpln2008 either in search or tag search or keyword search??

I had a good look around LibraryThing earlier on. Getting tired, enough for now. Might come back to this topic later or might move on to the next one, this one covered quite a lot.