Given all the companies and institutions that have an online presence, the length of time we've all had to trial-and-error our way through attempt after attempt, and the extensive research and study into how people scan text, process information and solve problems, it actually is kinda surprising how many bad interfaces there are out there. Perhaps it's all intentional, just as the Pointy-Haired Boss prophesied!

Labels: funny, internet

 

One of my biggest beefs with how people search for information is that they don't know (and don't care to know) how the tool that they are using works. Whenever I bring this up, the common response is something like, "You don't have to be an auto mechanic to drive." But I think this is a misunderstanding of what it is to know how something works.

To drive, you certainly don't need to know about everything that's under the hood, how spark plugs ignite fuel causing pistons to move up and all the rest. It may help in some way, in order to push your car to its extreme, or to ensure that you are not causing unnecessary harm to the engine, or even how to interpret subtle reactions the car may have to what you're doing. But you DO need to know what happens when you turn the steering wheel, when you step on the accelerator, when you turn the key... You need to know what the result is in pretty good detail (how much do you turn the steering to cause so much turn in the front wheels or how much gas to give it to accelerate a certain amount). You don't need to know how the car does what it does but you do need to know what it does. That's what "knowing how a car works" in a operational manner means.

Similarly when searching for information, you need to know how your search tool works. You don't need to know Google's proprietary code underneath the "hood" or what programming language PubMed uses on it's servers. You do need to know that when you type in a word in the Google search box, it's looking for entries in its database (i.e. web pages) that has that word in the web page (or rather Google's record of the web page) somewhere. You need to know that PubMed not only finds the article citations that has the word that you typed in somewhere but also maps that word to possible subject labels and includes the articles tagged with those too.

But too often, novice users merely type words and phrases into the box without considering what the box will do with those words and phrases. Some think they are clever and include Boolean terms like AND or OR or short forms of those like the plus (+) sign, but don't think to check whether the tool recognizes those terms or whether it uses them in the way they think. And I've come across a few tools that don't know themselves how they work. (For example, TRIP at http://www.tripdatabase.com claims in the search tips that users can include the connector AND but it "ands" terms by default anyway, making using the word useless.)

So, please, when you're searching, test out the tool a little first. See what changing your search a little will do to see if it does what you think it does. If you think adding more words will get you closer to what you want, see if adding any other word actually reduces your results. If it increases them, it's not doing what you think. So test drive your search engine or article index a little first. Or better yet, ask a librarian.

Labels: internet, librarianship, thoughts

 

Notes from Web 2.you workshop (February 15, 2008, at McGill University, Montreal) session called “Web 2.0, Library 2.0, Librarian 2.0” 1.5 hour presentation by Jessamyn West, Library Consultant from rural Vermont & blogger from “librarian.net” [librarian.net] (professional) & “Abada Abada” [jessamyn.com/journal] (personal)

[Her presentation notes can be found at librarian.net/talks/mcgill]

As a contrast with many of her colleagues, she prefers the title “library technologist” for the work that she does now, helping a number of small public libraries in Orange County, Vermont, primarily with their technology needs and issues.

She began her discussion of the whole 2.0 concept with some of the real basics and what really needs to be considered before any mention of 2.0 anything happens:

• Her (and our) frustration with mere dial-up internet access and that, like it or not, many of our users still have and always will have merely dial-up access.
• The usefulness (or not) of school libraries being wonderfully filled with PCs with high speed internet access in small towns with little or no ‘net otherwise.
• Government agencies and companies trying to put everything on the web (and very often ONLY on the web) and the difficulty some people still have with getting access to that.
  

Through all of these barriers and issues, it’s still important for libraries to recognise their role in making technology fun, easy and accessible.

You know those O’Reilly programming books with the black and white animal on the cover? Well, the term “Web 2.0” comes from one in which the author was merely using the phrase like a brand name and not literally meaning any newly formed technology in particular. The web before 2.0 was just a billboard – sites, pages, information, and images posted to the internet, were just that: posted up for users to look at and admire but not interact with in any way. The desire to be able to interact with what was there, to be able to comment on articles, manipulate images, and reconfigure data, was the birth of the Web 2.0 idea. Beyond this rather vague sense of the user being able to take part in the internet somehow, the 2.0 concept is still not completely clear, including the “spin-offs” like our own Library or Librarian 2.0, similar to the US Justice Potter Stewart’s famous definition of obscenity, “I know it when I see it.”

Because it is still a concept in its infancy, there are many things to do before (or while) we jump on the Library 2.0 bandwagon. Consider the elderly or novice computer user. In many ways these patrons are even more difficult to assist than the truly disabled like the blind or deaf. And although parts of Library 2.0 can seem to help, such as the idea that we are to be making our tools and services more user-centered, other assumptions make it more difficult, such as the assumption of a certain level of technology being available or interest on the part of the user. The network is not always up and running and some users create lousy content. But the important thing to remember is that you don’t want to refrain from doing something just because the supports MAY not be there someday. “We can’t get nice furniture… What if the library fills with squirrels?” Librarianship is getting much more open now so we have less and less nay-saying-for-the-sake-of-nay-saying like this, but we still have a hard time letting go.

Library 2.0 is not a “what”, it’s a “how”. It’s a way of thinking about what we’re doing without a specific list of tools and resources to do it. And it’s not always just about the web. For example, in those brochures or PowerPoint slides we create, we have a tendency t o simply use the free clip that comes with Microsoft Office. Not all of that is bad and it’s certainly better to have a graphic than not but we could also be searching through flickr.com for images licensed under Creative Commons to get images that are not only free and legal but also much more interesting and attractive. The idea is that we should be experimenting, and just like so many companies and products coming out today in “perpetual beta”, it’s ok to just try something without being absolutely certain it will be perfect first.

[At this point Jessamyn pointed out that she used the term L2 as a short form for Library 2.0, but was not claiming to be starting any new trend or catchphrase for the topic. I say we should start using this right away! lol]

The book “Cluetrain Manifesto”, by Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger [cluetrain.com], talks about how the web, and particularly Web 2.0, is changing business. “Markets are conversations,” and some companies are slowly realizing that they need to get back to a more human level of interaction and offering of service: we need to avoid data silos, for example, and resources need to allow “deeplinking”, the ability to link directly to the page or part of the web site that interests us specifically. Some illustrations of how libraries are following this trend are:

• Pace University Library’s reminder to users that they could get a library card for the local public library system and therefore access to different and more resources if the university’s resources are not sufficient;
• Cook Memorial Library’s use of Scriblio to provide usefully named links with friendly text in their catalogue (as compared with the University of Vermont Library’s catalogue, using the standard interface most academic libraries use now with unintelligible labels, long call numbers, jargon, etc.), the moral of the story being “keep it simple”,
• (A comment at this point from the audience repeated the question in an earlier session about the Amazon “recommender” function and whether this was in any catalogues to Jessamyn’s knowledge. Apparently, there are some big systems that have something like this, but there are privacy issues to be considered when a library provides this service.);
• the McGill Hospital Library’s website includes a photo of the staff which makes the library, and the work seem more personal;
• Plymouth State University Library is using the resource type facet for multimedia types, making it easier for users to find exactly what they are looking for;
• Koha (I believe this is the correct spelling) provides an example of the existence of fun or silly interfaces, the fact that tools can be designed in almost any way so that the users are more comfortable in the “environment” (in this case it was a tool for young children).
  

Another issue that is being worked through using Web 2.0 tools, is the issue of increasing numbers of workers complaining about unmanageable amounts of email being received. Using RSS feeds, blogs, social networking sites like Facebook, etc., communication can be funneled to appropriate channels to get the tools to do some of the work of sorting information flow for us.

But Web 2.0 is also about saving the time of the user, as one of the founders of modern librarianship, Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan, defended. And with the right tool or service, this doesn’t always have to translate into more work for the librarian or library staff. For example, there’s a plugin for FireFox called LibX that will allow the user to search a library’s catalogue without having to first navigate to the catalogue’s page. Also, the University of Connecticut Library is using a wiki to create a collaborative FAQ. Wikis have also been used as a platform to more easily create, update, and access the reference manual. The key is to try new things and do your own usability testing – find out what works and who it works for. We keep buying OPACs and other tools that do not work. We need to develop standards and demand compliance.

Finally, Library 2.0 is not a religion and it is not always about technology. It’s about taking the initiative. Go on... Scoot!

Labels: internet, librarianship

 

Notes from Web 2.you workshop (February 15, 2008, at McGill University, Montreal) session called “Blogging for Professional Development” 1.5 hour presentation by John Dupuis, Head, Steacie Science & Engineering Library, York University & blogger from “Confessions of a Science Librarian” [jdupuis.blogspot.com] , February 15, 2008.


[Presentation given here can be found at tinyurl.com/2u24do or here]

The new “digital world” is all about attention and reputation (from Richard Akerman, CISTI). This, among other reasons, is why blogging is so important, valuable and popular. We blog for social (or selfish) reasons: to become popular, to be known, to improve our standing in a certain field or group, but we also use blogs to explore ideas, to act as an external memory, to make a profit, to communication, and to create opportunities.

(Note: The presentation slides include several comics from the series XKCD [xkcd.com]. And a blog of note is "Walt at Random" [walt.lishost.org].)

The term "biblioblogosphere" among others is used to describe the world of librarian and library related weblogs. And there are many different types of "biblioblogs": from the personal to the institutional, from containing commentary on events big or small to sharing news items and new resources, and from the very broad to the very narrowly defined in terms of subject area. To find blogs of interest you can try:

• blogrolls (lists of related blogs) available on a blog you already know;
• search using
• Technorati [technorati.com]; or
• Google Blog Search [blogsearch.google.com];
• check out the list of blogs on:
• LISWiki [liswiki.org/wiki/Blogs#Individual_Weblogs]; or
• OEDb [oedb.org/library/features/top-25-librarian-bloggers-by-the-numbers]; or
• check out a compilation of individual blog posts via
• “The Library Shelf” [thelibraryshelf.com]; or
• the “Carnival of the Infosciences” [infosciences.pbwiki.com].
  

Although there are plenty of library related blogs, it’s also a good idea to read blogs (or any material for that matter) outside of librarianship. For example, as a health science librarian, I could regularly read blogs from health care professionals like “The Physician Executive” [executivephysician.blogspot.com] or “Stories from the hospice nurse” [atrugoddes.livejournal.com] to connect with my users and stay on top of their personal issues to help me serve them better.

Issues to consider when blogging:

• Library 2.0 – as a subject, as a mindset, and in the functionality of your site.
• Privacy – yours and others
• Intellectual property – yours and others
• Politeness – to what degree should you be or can you be
• Anonymity – whether to be so or not
  

Why should someone blog as opposed to publish in the more academic literature?

• Blogs are more immediately available and easily accessible.
• Blogs tend to be much more interactive, allowing readers to contribute with comments and the author to respond to such comments.
• It is much cheaper both for the author and the system as a whole.
• There is no “gatekeeper” when writing a blog post: anyone can create a blog and start posting right away, whereas to get published, you must get past the publishers, editors, and often your own peers.
  

(Note: Check out the book “Balanced Libraries” by Walt Crawford all about Library 2.0 – read more in a brief review from the blog “Slow Reading”.)

Blogs are also an excellent source of information on a variety of very new, controversial, or little known topics. In a comparison of search results on certain current issues, LISZEN (an LIS search engine that includes blogs) [liszen.com] outperformed tools like Web of Science, Inspec, or even LISA, simply because the latter do not include blog literature which is where some of these ideas are being discussed in much more volume. In some subjects, blogs are the only real outlet to get your ideas out. We’re always talking about information overload nowadays but there will always be something new and unique to say and it’s important to make sure your make your voice heard using whatever method you can find.

Audience comment to the presenter remarking how great it would be to have senior university administrators blogging about their work: Check out the French blog from University of Montreal library school director Jean-Michel Salaün “Bloc-notes de Jean-Michel Salaün” [blogues.ebsi.umontreal.ca/jms]

York University has developed a site called Planet York [planetyork.yorku.ca] that compiles blogs posts from blogs written by York U staff and faculty. This not only provides a rich overview of what some of the university’s minds are thinking for the benefit of those outside of the institution, but is a source of pride, inspiration and networking for those within York U as well.

Tips on blogging yourself:

• Find a niche to fill but don’t be afraid to evolve as well.
• Blog your passion. Blog about what you love, otherwise you won’t be able to keep it up.
• Post when you want. We don’t all have to post several times a day or even once every day. The presenter blogs about 3 or 4 times a week. Some blogs are weekly.
• Pause before writing, but don’t obsess about it.
  

Oh and check out the blog “Academic Librarian” [blogs.princeton.edu/librarian]

After-session comments from the audience:

• Consider your impact and reach: If you are job searching you may not want blog posts about how much you hate your boss or about how you steal pens from work regularly.
• Is it possible to delete your entire blog? Many blogging tools allow you to delete your content and account and therefore remove it from the “live” web but search engines by design roam around the internet saving text wherever they can. If you have a relatively new blog, then deleting will probably really delete it. If you’ve been blogging for years, chances are that all your text has been scooped up and archived somewhere.
  

Labels: internet, librarianship

 

Notes from the Web 2.you workshop (February 15, 2008, at McGill University, Montreal) session called "Is Boolean Dead? Research and the New Web" 1 hour presentation by Rajiv Johal and Beth Dunning, Librarians, Howard Ross Library of Management, McGill University.

Having driven from Kingston and not accounting enough for the traffic in Montreal, I was late for this presentation by a few minutes so I missed the opening statements but was flung fully into the meat of the presentation without any preamble.

The question was asked, "What is Search 2.0?" There is no clear definition for this concept but it does include the increasingly popular use of facets and tags, and is emphatically not Boolean. Some examples of public search engines illustrated this 2.0 idea are:

• the child focussed, visually appealing search engine RedZee [redzee.com],
• the guided search engine ChaCha [chacha.com], and
• Rollyo [rollyo.com] which allows you to choose or create a tool that searches only a certain set of sites.
  

The open source ILS movement is also including some very 2.0 concepts:

• Fish4info [fish4info.org] is an example of a user-friendly interface for your OPAC/ILS created with the CMS Drupal; and
• Evergreen [open-ils.org], which is quite popular in the US, is a full OPAC/ILS product with facets, reviews, and no Boolean.
  

In many of these tools, although Boolean operators are not used or not recognized in the default or basic searches, very often there is still the option to be able to use it. It just remains hidden to the user who may be confused or ignorant about Boolean techniques.

Increasingly, vendor solutions are also integrating some of the Search 2.0 preferences, whether as full products or “middleware”, pieces you can simply add to your current system. And example is Aquabrowser’s tag cloud (note: the tag cloud is frequently on the left of the screen because research has shown that that is where average users tend to look first), used at the University of Chicago’s library catalog option “Lens” [lens.lib.uchicago.edu]. When trying to determine whether this technology was a useful addition to their catalog, the U of C found that upwards of 9 out of 10 students (even Masters and PhD students) improve their search results with access to the tag cloud. (I’m not sure that the survey really shows that it is a good tool: it could just be that generally people are really bad searchers and that any tool would improve things. Searching problems are very often a matter of lack of a clear process not always lack of synonyms or proper terms.) U of C is still maintaining their original catalog interface (sans tag cloud) so that all the usual functionality can still be used included Boolean searching.

At this point, an audience member asked about about the existence of tools that enabled virtual browsing of the shelf but the presenters were not aware of any such tools.

Citation and other research databases were also entering into the Search 2.0 ring. For example Factiva Search 2.0 ( a business news database) does not translate “and” or “or” into the Boolean functions but rather includes them as any other keyword in the search because AND or OR could be a company’s ticker code or part of one. When searching using a term that the tool recognizes as a company’s ticker, it breaks this option out to link to the company’s homepage or related news, and it includes a multimedia search in the platform as well.

Another question from the audience concerned the existence of recommender-type tools in use in any of these tools. Apparently McMaster University Library is testing this functionality.

Another vendor jumping on the Search 2.0 bandwagon is EBSCO with their Visual Search. This uses indexing to create a visual interface to explore articles but, just like the other tools, it really only helps with browsing as opposed to performing comprehensive searches.

The important points to take away from this session were summarized as:

• Boolean searching is not dead but rather hidden from the average user; and
  
• Search 2.0 is here to stay, being about what users want. Try implementing some of the ideas in some small way.
  

After-session comments from the audience:

• Consider a search tool used by Walmart called Endeca [endeca.com].
• What would you do first? Remove the necessity to search with Boolean operators and include a spell check feature. The term “fuzzy searching” was used to describe these kinds of functions.
• Consider the tension between teaching users how to search and making it easier for the users to search.
  

Labels: internet, librarianship

 

Here's a link to the 43 page pdf document, "Information searches that solve problems" report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project (Can't we Canadians ever do anything ourselves? Sheesh.), but here's 4 of the 6 major findings from the executive summary (2 about gov docs and e-government... yawn) for those of you who are too lazy to read the whole thing... like me. LOL

• People use something called the Internet to get information! Duh.


• "Searchers usually end up satisfied." Yeah, and people flock to McDonald's... that doesn't mean they're getting what they need!


• "Libraries meet special needs." They say 'special needs' and then they talk about libraries being filled with people in their 20s. (Maybe this deserves some reading of the actual report.) I'm glad they're coming in and all but the people who really need information (doctors, politicians, teachers, parents, etc.) don't all fit in that category.


• Some people have access - others don't. Again, duh.

Not much new. Not much interesting. What really needs to be studied is why people don't want to read or learn or think any more (if they ever did). I think most of the world's problems would disappear if everyone just "chillaxed", became a little more aware of how things actually work and became a little more responsible for their own thoughts and beliefs. What we think and feel affects what we do, and therefore we need to be armed with the best raw material on which to base those thoughts and feelings so that the actions that burst forth make a little more sense and work a little better with everyone else's actions.

Can't we all just get along?!? LOL

Labels: internet, librarianship, thoughts

 

Now THAT'S what I like to see. This article from Library Journal explains briefly how the US Library of Congress has submitted upwards of 3000 photos for which no copyright restrictions are known (Woah... risky.) to flickr in the hopes that users will swarm in and tag them all, using the power of Web 2.0 democratic scholarship (new word possibility: "democrolarship"?) to add value to the photos and give them some meaning and organization.

At the very least, all these Web 2.0 tools make it easy, fun and tempting for everyone and anyone to start dumping mass amounts of their collections into the public arena where at least it's more accessible. Even the tools that have been online and technically free and open for years already (like library catalogs or government databases) are being made more "crawl-able" and/or pushed into view with RSS feeds and the like.

He who has nothing and wants something is less frustrated than he who has something and wants more.
Eric Hoffer (1902-1983), True Believer or Theory of Leisure Class

Check out the photos at flickr's "The Commons".

Labels: internet

 

I haven't received any of these warnings recently but I have been sent and told about all sorts of warnings not to use certain products or not to do certain things with the barest of anecdotal evidence to support the claims. Here are two firm denials concerning a message being sent around about how the evil Swiffer is apparently killing our poor defenseless household companions: Swiffer WetJet Toxic to Pets? - Netlore Archive and ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center Responds to Swiffer Wet Jet Rumor.

This is a perfect example of why the general public needs more education in the areas of general science (particularly as it relates to health) and in critical thinking and information skills. The average person would read a message like the Swiffer one and would probably think, "I'm not sure that this is so but I love my pet more than I love using this commercial product so I'll stop using the product just in case." This is not entirely a poor line of thinking and would probably have a good outcome if it stopped there or made them more doubtful of other commercial products. But no. Most people take this message and internalize it, spreading it to all their friends and acquaintances, adding their own personal acceptance of the message to the already emotional weight of the warning. They will also go out and buy some competing product, because if WetJet's no good, they'll have to go out and buy the Clorox ReadyMop Mopping System! Cuz you can't live without some sort of mopping system! What did they do before mopping systems?!? lol

Labels: internet, reading, thoughts

 

Why Yahoo, not Google, should drive your search -- chicagotribune.com

All old news but rereading all of this made me switch. At least at home. I have my built-in search box point to Yahoo instead of Google now. I really haven't noticed much difference other than having to get used to a slightly different interface. The results are very similar and I certainly haven't noticed any glaring gaps or errors that Google wouldn't have done. Actually, it's surprisingly (or not so surprisingly) similar in terms of results and layout.

Also, being the de facto graphic designer in my library, I'm constantly looking through Google images (and now Yahoo images) for raw material, ideas, inspirations, and comparisons, and the most important thing I've learned from switching is that these tools even more than the regular web page searching really don't overlap very much. If you're looking for something rather specific and you want as much as you can find, try both, try several.

The only reason everyone is so enamoured with Google is the simple first page and the fact that everyone is talking about it. Word of mouth and visual laziness. Don't get me wrong... it's a great search engine. But there are plenty of great search engines out there, and turning Google into the verb like we have is cutting us off from thinking as quickly about the other options. Although their motto is "Do no evil", no monopoly is ever really good for the consumer. Do yourself (and the rest of society) a favour and shop around, explore, and try other search engines.

Labels: internet

 

So, I was sitting in my office at work thinking, "I wish I had a way to make blog entries quickly from other pages" -- online newspaper articles, other bloggers entries, cool sites, etc. -- and, as a lark, I typed in "blog this" into Google (in the vein of bookmark this and digg this, etc.). Lo and behold, the first link is to Blogger Help : What is BlogThis! ?. Problem solved. Way to go me! (With a little help from Google and Blogger, of course.) So, I just made this entry with the "BlogThis!" link. QED.

Labels: internet, thoughts, work

 

Let start by saying (again) that I do like Wikipedia. But (and here we go) I don't think people really know how to "use" it. And I don't mean, they don't know how to look up specific articles in it, or modify things in it, etc. I mean, people don't know how to treat it as an information source. The common complaint about it is that it's not "authoritative" like the Encyclopedia Britannica (the usual comparison). And then the retort to that is, "Well the Encyclopedia Britannica makes mistakes too!" I hate that. First of all, let's try to get along people, ok?

Second of all, that dismisses the whole value of both sources, particularly Wikipedia. And it shows a fundamental misunderstanding about what Wikipedia is, or rather, what it does for us. Take as an example, how people usually refer to information they find in Wikipedia. I'm reading along in the 2006-07 Annual Report for the Canadian Cochrane Network and Centre (the Canadian part of the Cochrane Collaboration, an organization successfully high quality, timely, and most importantly as near-certain as possible, health care evidence materials... read the first few pages of the report) and they refer to a description of Cochrane found in Wikipedia by saying "Wikipedia, the popular online community encyclopaedia states..." it. This is the common mistake. Wikipedia did not state it. A user of Wikipedia stated it. You may think, "Well, duh!", but this is an important distinction. Encyclopedia Britannica (the organization) is an entity that has taken on the responsibility for the information put forth in the Encyclopedia Britannica (the information source). Wikipedia has not. They can't. All they've done is provide a forum in which anyone can manipulate text, that happens to be in the form of an encyclopedia. I'm not saying that this makes it less truthly or trustworthy or authoritative, just that when you citing something in Wikipedia, the author isn't Wikipedia. It's "Chrismoore123" or "Thinboy00" or "Noodlenozzle", the user that typed it in. They're responsible. They're the source that you're judging authoritative or not. Individuals created the entries in Encyclopedia Britannica too, but Encyclopedia Britannica (the organization) has taken efforts to make sure those individuals are qualified and us readers trust them on that, or at least hold them responsible for their efforts.

One interesting difference is how time plays into judging the authority of these two sources. In Encyclopedia Britannica, we assume that the newer the information is, the better, the more accurate it is. Although in Wikipedia we do this to some extent too, it should also be seen that in a community where anyone and everyone can change anything and everything, the older the content is, that is the longer it's stayed around without anyone changing it, the better (or at least, most agreed upon) it probably is as well.

Labels: internet, librarianship, reading, thoughts

 

Excellent list of ways that we humans regularly and often unintentionally misunderstand or misrepresent the world around us. They're a little academic so it's good that there are links to some sort of definition (although I probably wouldn't have chosen Wikipedia for so many of them). Read through them if you can... I particularly like some of the comments, or rather am somewhat dismayed at the comments -- too many of them are needlessly critical or bring up unrelated issues.

My favourite is the first one that says that these are "26 things which differenciate humans from logic machines" and that it's "a partially upsetting, partially comforting list… i.e. it's ok to have human faults!" The very first sentence in the post describe these biases as things "that our minds commonly do to distort our own view of reality". It's ok to have a distorted view of reality? You're proud of it? Yes, there's very little we can do to avoid all errors and biases at all times, but isn't it a good idea to be aware of some of the ways we make those mistakes? Shouldn't we try to make fewer? Human limitations are not something to revel in, nor should they make us feel ashamed. They are to be seen as challenges, things to be accepted as natural and sometimes unavoidable but ultimately areas for improvement.

Am I right? Or did I commit one of those biases listed? Please tell me... I'll try to do better next time, I promise. LOL

Labels: internet, reading, thoughts

 

Here's some sites that I found out about through Marylaine Block's "Neat New Stuff I Found This Week":

• LibSite: A Recommendation Service for Library-related Websites
  http://libsite.org/
  Reviews of interesting and important web resources for librarians; feel free to add your own recommendations.
• NPR Podcasts Directory
  http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_directory.php
  This 2007 Webby and People's Voice award-winner includes over 450 podcasts from member radio stations on a wide range of topics - Car Talk, Speaking of Pets, The 90-Second Naturalist, Sports with Frank DeFord, GeekSpeak, and more. Browse by topic, title, or provider.
• Reading Stack at Flickr
  http://www.flickr.com/groups/readingstack/
  Here's a fun meme to spread: take a photo of the pile of books you're hoping to get around to reading. Then, once you've finished one from the stack, post a comment on it.
  

Now, of course, I have to get someone to recommend my sites on libsite.org, check out all these podcasts, and build and photograph a pile of books to read. This is "Internet" thing is NOT helping me finish my To Do list. It just adds to it! I can't wait until the fad dies down. LOL

Labels: internet, librarianship, reading

 

Check out this entry from InfoTangle. Warning: It's incredibly long (for a blog entry) but it's totally worth it. It's a great summary of some of the trends, changes, new tools and new concepts in web design now such as drag-and-drop functionality, use of bold colours and bold shapes, and navigation by "heat map". Some old hat stuff for those who are paying attention, but it's always great to see it summarized so succinctly. (Found via this entry on Tame The Web.)

What I have to say about all this is that there are two reasons a user visits a site (and I'm really focusing on library web sites here but I think it can be generalized), or rather two situations they are in when they come to a site: they either have time or they don't. They are either there to find something they need or they are browsing and wandering around. In the first case, your site must be simple and straightforward. They are looking for what they want and if they don't find it within microseconds, they'll get fed up and leave. In the second case, intricacy is often preferred, or at least enough "stuff" to entertain, to tempt, even to confuse temporarily. These two design guidelines are somewhat contradictory but they can be used simulataneously. Obviously the first case takes priority: navigation must be simple. But then you can fancy the rest of the pages up with some interesting images, tools, interactivity, etc. as long as they don't crowd out the simple navigation. It's a fine line, but I have faith in you... LOL

Labels: internet, thoughts

 

Funny: The top ten books of 2027 (PDF). (via LISNews)

And "duh": Wireless users are online more. (via LibrarianInBlack)

Labels: internet, reading

 

And speaking of heads, isn't mine big??? LOL I read somewhere that in a personal blog/site you should have a picture of yourself to let your audience know who they are dealing with. So what better way to include a pic of me, than to have my big head sticking into the works from stage left?

So, this is my latest design. I'm not completely happy with it but it will pretty much have to do for now. I've got other things to do now. I will implement some minor changes here and there (I've received some valuable advice from JennTSG, and am open to advice from anyone else) but the general layout will remain the same... Unless I get struck with inspiration (which is sometimes as painful as being struck by lightning).

The other things I have to do are: create two other blogs I have ideas for (one on reference service and one on perceptions of librarianship, libraries, librarians, etc.), work on some presentations and posters and reports I have signed on to do, keep beating away at the dead horse I call looking for a permanent position nearby, and probably some other things that escape me for the moment.

I've been watching TVO's "The Agenda" which is totally awesome. Political and geeky and certainly NOT for the drowsy, it is primarily a interview/discussion show that focuses on Canadian (and sometimes world) politics and social issues. Put your thinking cap on, have a cup of coffee (ewwwww!) and give it a try.

Took my 2yo son to the photographers tonight to get a picture taken to include in his "Application for a Citizenship Certificate from Inside Canada (Proof of Citizenship) Under Section 3" (he was born in the States) which I really should have done a year ago but I'm doing it! Get off my back already!

And I was working on creating a "cheat sheet" for using the staff wiki at work today. I'm training the staff at Bracken on how to use a/the wiki and they've requested a handout. Of course, I can't just give them some notes and stuff on a piece of paper.... I have to create a work of art! Place the screenshots just so, choose colours, select fonts, perfect the layout... It has to be something I can be proud of, something people LIKE to look at, something they can hang on their wall... well maybe not that good, but still.

Labels: family, internet, work

 

This image from flickr is an excellent graphic to go along with today's post. I've spent several days over the past week or so rethinking and redesigning my blog. I'm still not perfectly happy with it (can you ever be) but I think I've got it to a point where I can let it be for a while. I've still got to create a forwarding page from the old url to here but that shouldn't take much time.

In other news... I've been going for family walks a little bit more recently. I was helping my 6yo daughter ride her bike and after a few trips up and down the sidewalk I felt like I was going to die... I think that's a hint from my body telling me that I should get a little more exercise. LOL

Work's good. It's getting closer and closer to the end of my temporary contract at Bracken so I'm getting a little anxious, looking and preparing for any job openings at Queen's U or in Kingston (or near enough anyway). Now that my colleague across the hall has officially announced that she's going on maternity leave in October, I feel a little less panicked, but I certainly don't want to just assume that that will be enough: I will still be looking and preparing in any case.

I've been using the "Remember the Milk" site to record my to do list and I've put several presentations I'd like to give at some upcoming conferences and events. Hopefully I'll be able to submit them, get accepted and complete them all... Speaking of which, I'd better get doing some of them and stop procrastinating. I've got to make dinner for the family first.

(Oh yeah, I've also taken some nice screenshots of some things in World of Warcraft. I'll put them in flickr and then maybe post one of two of them here. Along with a screenshot of my "completed" new design. For historical purposes.)

Labels: family, internet, work

 

Ok, I did it. This is what my blog used to look like. But only in IE. If you saw it in FireFox you would break down and cry.

I liked this template. The image was randomly displayed out of a bunch of "blue" images: a blue bus, a blue sky, a blue tablecloth, the drawing shown in this screenshot, etc. And I liked the layout of everything but I've gotten bored of it, I'm switching the whole concept of my blog, it wasn't FireFox-friendly, and didn't leave room for all the cool things I'm going to put in now. You just wait and see...

Labels: internet

 

Notice a change? I've just applied one of those Blogger style templates (titled Mr. Moto, I think) to my site to clean it up and make it FireFox readable while I work on a new template of my own. I've include a screenshot of it here so that when I do finally update it, I will have a record of this temporary state of affairs.

Damn. I should have got a screenshot of the way it looked before! Hmmm... Maybe I still can. Wait and see.

Labels: internet