It’s week one for my third ION course, Tech Tools. One of the assigned tasks is to set up a blog or a wiki that will become the final tech scrapbook project. I already have a blog that has been languishing in the Word Press archives. Two years ago we had a summer Web 2.0 project at the Oakton Library where we explored a variety of new technologies. This blog was one of the activities from that project. I think it’s time to repurpose this blog rather than creating a new one. Maybe this time I’ll really take the time to learn about the features and see what enhanced capabilities have been added since 2008. So, welcome to Ruth’s Know What?
January 22, 2011
July 17, 2008
I know a little more about wikis now
I played with editing a page on Oakton’s wiki today. I used the link from Richard’s week 2 list of activities to get to the wiki. I looked through the favorite restaurant section and decided to add a review of my own. I hadn’t signed in and just clicked the edit button. After writing a short review, I clicked save only to discover that all of the previous reviews had been deleted and the only text left was what I’d just written.
I browsed the history of the page and saw that the other material was still available. Then I went to the help area and learned about “revert.” I copied my review and then tried to revert the page to the way it was before I’d entered my information. Before I could revert, I had to log in (Back to the list of sign ins and passwords to figure that specific log in!). Once logged in, I reverted the page, pasted my information and saved without a problem. It’s good to have the history on a wiki so it is possible to revert to previous entries as needed. Neophyte users, like me, can unknowingly delete or change content without meaning to when the intention was to add to the content.
As we consider using wikis more widely with library services, I think we need to think about how much users can edit material, who has access to the information and how often we need to manage the content. It’s very frustrating to find dead links or outdated material when doing information searches and I think it would affect our credibility if we allow our electronic resources to include unreliable information or links. I think the wiki format may be useful in the assignment central area. Faculty can provide the syllabus and assignments. We can provide links to our resources. Students, faculty and librarians can post questions and updates. To me this seems the place to start with this particular web 2.0 resource. It’s going to require a marketing/education campaign with the faculty and a librarian to monitor it very regularly.
Some things I know because of my kids
My son talked about the singer “Feist” a couple of weeks ago. She had a sold out show at Ravinia over the weekend (even the lawn seats were sold out). So today when I signed on to WordPress, I saw a featured YouTube item with Feist singing on Sesame Street. It’s pretty cute – counting to 4 with the usual assortment of monsters, penguins and chickens that often get to sing along. I’m going to see if I can add the link and move on to another topic.
I tried pasting the link and it didn’t work for the first few tries. A browse through the FAQ wasn’t much help. I finally figured out that the link I was pasting included the WordPress site name. I went directly to YouTube and found the video. When I pasted in the link directly from YouTube, it worked easily. I guess it’s important to look at the link you’re using if there’s a problem getting the post to work. Now the next step is playing with the location of the video within the post.
July 16, 2008
Who do I know on Facebook?
I warned my college aged children that I was setting up a facebook account at work. They both told me not to try to “friend” them. It made me laugh.
Setting up the account was easy. I explored the profile information options and the privacy settings. It would be nice to be able to see the profile as you choose information to be posted and which level of security to apply to different sections. That way you could see what the public profile looked like as you made your choices. As it is, I found myself trying something and then switching to the profile to see if I liked my choices.
After setting up the account, I tried a few family names (guess who I looked up first?), school alumni groups and a few subjects. It was amazing to find that within 5 minutes of setting up the account, facebook had a list of 25 or so people who had one or more tags similar to mine. Even more remarkable was the fact that three were high school classmates of mine and one was a former next door neighbor. The school classmate finds were interesting too as I had listed only the school, not the year of graduation – of course facebook does have a record of my birthdate……..
I haven’t had time to explore the search capabilities of facebook. During my next visit I’d like to see if I can limit the number of “Ruth Whitney” hits by location or some other characteristic. It made me wonder about an institutional facebook account and what we would like to name it and how we would like to be “found” by facebook users.
Are We There Yet?
I was finally able to figure out how to add a photo from my flickr library to the blog. I had tried using a url which didn’t transfer between the two for reasons that are unclear. With Gretchen as my “tech buddy” we noodled around and tried just selecting one photo. Then the light dawned and I saw the button marked “blog this” How hard is that? With this small success, I plan to move on and see about adding groups of photos and other media.
Originally uploaded by A Ruth W
July 10, 2008
July 3, 2008
Flickr knows where I’ve been
June 26, 2008
Didn’t know I already had some RSS feeds
Lat year when I set up the “My Oakton” page that I use as a portal for my calendar and email, I set up some connections to NPR stories, a word of the day and one or two other information sources. The choices were limited but there was a nice variety of sources. I always do a quick check of the news stories and word of the day when I check my email. I knew I had the links but never really thought about the name of the product. I think I already had RSS feeds.
Setting up subscriptions in my Google Reader account was easy. I’m glad to have consolidated access to all of the library blogs. It will be much easier to see what comments have been posted recently by having all of the blogs feed into one folder. Actually adding each staff member’s url wasn’t difficult, but it was time consuming to do each blog, one at a time. I know that it’s possible to export/import feeds from other aggregators, did I miss a transfer technique that would let me transfer all of the library blogs to my Google Reader account in one step?
June 25, 2008
Getting to know what’s happening.
Today I had time to do actually work on the blog and try some of the activities. After the initial set up, of the blog, time evaporated as students arrived with reference questions and library instruction classes were scheduled. I always found the time to read about each week’s topic and explore some of the related articles. However, each time that I tried to modify the weblog site or learn HOW to do the next activity, there was a student with a question.
Perhaps it was the rain today or mid term blues, but things at RHC were fairly quiet and I had a chance to work with Richard for a couple of minutes. Two thoughts resulted from today’s experience. One, for those of us on the desk, it may be difficult to learn how to do each activity if we don’t have an uninterrupted block of time. Second, it helps to have a “tech buddy.” Last week Jane mentioned that it helps to work with someone else as you are trying a new technique. As I worked today, both Richard and Gretchen had helpful suggestions. Maybe we should consider scheduling “tech buddy” time in the library classroom at DP and find a way to do something similar at RHC. The Drop – In time is wonderful. Tech buddy time may be an additional learning tool.
Finally, I really like the short videos by Common Craft. They get right to the heart of the topic. They are simple and appealing in format. And I usually remember the information. I do wonder if I’m doing an effective job as a reference librarian if I’m wearing headphones and watching a video while on the desk.
Ruth's Know What? 