tech

conferences - tech

Code4Lib North convert

May 10, 2011 by 0 Comments

I attended my first Code4Lib North conference last week. The first day was Hackfest – I love the notion of getting a bunch of people together, people who have not worked together before, to solve agreed upon problems. I would love to see more of this happen within the library world and wonder if it could work within an institution. One day a week or month, get everyone together, decide on a problem or two, and spend the day actually trying to solve it. I want to try this (I’m pretty sure this occurs in other industries – has anyone done it in their library?).

The second day was full of short presentations on all of the neat projects programmers and web folk were working on – be sure to check out the wiki and here for content from the day (video link coming soon). The group was small – great for meeting and talking with a bunch of interesting folk. This was one of the first conferences in a while where I went away with really exciting new tech ideas – I felt I learned a ton but also left excited to learn a heck of a lot more!

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New Media Fun

November 5, 2010 by 0 Comments

This year we opened the Lyons New Media Centre, which I was lucky to be part of the creation team. This term, I’ve been working with a multi-section class and have been working with the LNMC staff to incorporate new media components/projects into the course. So far, it seems to be quite successful, one section even returning to do an extra project using the LNMC resources that the library helped design.

One of the exciting things about incorporating new media components into library instruction is that it opens the door to teaching more than just a one shot. I’ve been able to have conversations about copyright and have introduced students to creative commons images, something I never have time to do in a one shot.

Does your library have a new media centre? How has the library been incorporated into the centre? How has the centre been incorporated into instruction? Please share your experiences!

 

ebooks - tech

The World of e-Readers

December 27, 2009 by 0 Comments

I hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday. I got some new toys to play with, one of them being a Sony e-Reader. I have been playing with e-readers for a little while now, though not in any professional or scholarly way. I thought I would use this post to do a very brief comparison of the e-readers I’ve played with so far.

I suppose my first run in with e-readers is through my own library. We offer an increasing number of ebooks, some which require specific software to be installed in order to read. I must admit, I have yet to be impressed by this software. I find many of the programs used on computers very clunky. If this was my only introduction to e-books, I think I would be hard pressed to see a  rosey future for e-reading.

My next introduction came through my iphone. I installed both the Kindle e-reader and the Barnes and Noble reader. I will admit that I did not use these for quite some time. I’m not sure what the impetus was for finally starting to play with them – perhaps it was finding sites that allowed me to download books in iphone format. Perhaps it was the fact that I always have my phone on me. I found myself going out in the summer with my lunch and forgetting my book – but then I remembered I could still read! I used the iphone for reading quite a bit in the summer and was surprised by how much I enjoyed reading from it.

Both readers have advantages and disadvantages. Lately I find myself leaning towards the Barnes and Noble but this could change on a whim. Both readers function quite similarly and are quite intuitive. Pages turn very smoothly and easily with a tap or a swipe, there is a built in dictionary, the page can be reorientated according to how it is held, bookmarking is easily done by turning down the corner of a page and there is a night screen (most handy for reading in bed without disturbing  anyone). The Barnes and Nobel reader also provides internal links for sites which offer more books for their reader, which is incredibly handy.

For Christmas, I was spoiled with a PRS-600 from Sony (for a great comparison of e-reader privacy, check out this site from the EFF). I quite like the size of this e-reader, it is relatively light and sleek. I am impressed with the screen – it really doesn’t feel like reading from a screen (except for the glare). It does have a more natural feel to the screen/page. I love the fact that I was able to immediately (once I downloaded the reader software) load 30 books on it.

I had certain expectations from this e-reader thanks to the iPhone, especially since this is a touch e-reader. I expected smoother  page turning. I set it up to swipe pages like my iphone, assuming I would use it this way. Since I’ve started reading, I find it is more natural for me to use the buttons to move the pages than the swipe, as this is where my hands are anyway.  Bookmarking takes an extra step on the Sony reader but is still available, as is a dictionary feature, highlighting and notes (all available features on the iphone readers). So far I’m generally happy with my Sony reader. I can take notes with it using a keyboard (again, similar to the iphone so an easy transition) or by hand using the stylus. It also stores audio and photos, which I have not used yet. I have not had any books yet with graphics or complicated illustrations, so I’m not sure how this reader will handle them yet.

So, what does this mean for my reading habits? I still love my physical books. I love the tactile aspect of reading and my favourite books will still have a space on my bookshelf. I do love to have my books surrounding me. What I suspect will happen is that I won’t be buying a physical copy unless I really enjoy the book. I may start with an e-book version and then decide to make the extra investment, both monetary and physical space, in a “real” copy of the book. The whole notion of “real” vs. “virtual” books is an interesting one I may come back to at another time. There are limitations to ebooks (can’t take them in a bath, what happens if there is no power), so they won’t be my sole means of reading. I doubt I will be able to walk out from a bookstore without purchasing a book, but I may come out with one and a list of others for downloading.

The e-readers offer other advantages though. I have 30 books on one device ! This will make travelling much easier. I suspect that I will still be using both the iphone readers and the Sony. The latter will likely be my primary e-reader, used for longer books or books I am particularly interested. The iphone will likely be for more casual reading – books I am in no hurry to read or which don’t take much concentration. As I almost always have my phone on me, it will be the device I turn to when i have forgotten my other reader.

I am waiting for e-books to catch up to my desires. I’d like to see the Sony with an option for night reading, and wireless access. I think I’d also like to see some kind of screen saver for it. I have walked away and it has been there waiting for me, which in a way makes it feel more like a physical book, but I fear burning the screen. Wireless access and e-readers also makes a lot of sense to me. Not only can books have built in dictionaries, you could include links to related information. A knitting pattern book could link out to a YouTube video showing how to do the stitch. I think there is still a lot of potential for e-reading and will be interested to see how this develops.

Maybe not such a brief comparison, but it is still in my early days of playing with and discovering potential in e-readers. The Kindle only recently started selling in Canada, but if you use one and love/hate it, lemme know!

odd stuff - tech

Fun with Words

November 25, 2009 by 0 Comments

I’ve been encountering some terms lately that I’ve found intriguing – not necessarily groundbreaking, but interesting. The first term is informavore. I came across this in a post on BoingBoing, which lead me to an article on the Edge. I would like to consider myself an informavore, and I suspect most librarians would. What intrigued me in the article was the parallel of information to Darwin selection – in a world filled with information, how do we choose which information is important, what can be left out and what might this mean for culture, history and the future? I’m sure I can not do the article justice, so I will simply recommend that you go read the article.

I came across the other term in a Spark podcast. In this episode (episode 90), we learn of the term continuous partial attention (it also talks about email apnea – an interesting concept in itself). I think this explains a lot of what I do, certainly better than the term multitasking. I also think that many of the students I work with also fall prey to continuous partial attention. If this is the case, what does this mean for educating these students? Does it change they way we think they work – or should it? I think I will be spending some more time considering what the implications for this might mean for the students I teach. I’m becoming more and more interested in how technology affects our students and their learning and I think continuous partial attention is certainly one side effect of technology.

gov info - tech - web 2.0

A New Age

January 20, 2009 by 0 Comments

Today I watched my first inauguration ever. I may not be an American but I understand the importance of this event and was excited to be part of this momentous event, to be part of history. It was amazing to see him recognize the challenges and problems that lay ahead of him and to recognize the diversity in peoples and religion. Obama has a huge battle before him and I wish him all the luck and intelligence to see his country through it.

Obama represents change on a number of fronts. While I intend to follow what he does, I must admit I’m intrigued by this president’s ability to embrace science and technology and am excited to see what he does with it and what impact this has elsewhere. Obama already does weekly YouTube addresses, whitehouse.gov now has a blog, he tweets, he’s addicted to his blackberry and he promotes participation, transparency and accountability (I keep wishing Canada would follow his lead). Hopefully he will continue to embrace these technologies when he becomes overwhelmed with actual work. Libraries have been actively moving towards such technologies and Obama’s use may have a direct impact on these services we provide as others begin to use the technologies to follow and participate in their government. I watched the inauguration on CNN’s live facebook feed. This is an amazing collaboration – people changed their status as they watched history unfold – over 1 million status changes were made during the inauguration – over 4000 a minute. It became a truly social, global event and I bet that Obama’s use of technology had some part to play. I think CNN and Facebook were a great collaboration and would love to see that continue – especially during breaking news, etc. I know Twitter was also going strong but decided to save my connection for the feed itself.

Exciting times are ahead and it’s great to be part of it!

tech - web 2.0

Tweeting Away

December 11, 2008 by 0 Comments

It’s been a while since I posted anything on government, so I thought I’d share some interesting twitter news (which is also posted on the AGIIG blog, so apologies for those who follow both). As some of you may know, I’ve become quiet addicted to Twitter and FriendFeed. Librarians aren’t the only ones twittering – the US government has started tweeting too. Here’s a link to a directory that has been started that notes tweeting agencies.

Pegasus Librarian had a great post a while back on the changing nature of the biblioblogoshpere. I think she’s right in her observations that for many, blog posting have droppped off and part of this has been the increase in the use of microblogging. Blog posts have moved from the informal medium to act as a more formal medium and the informal conversations have moved to Twitter – it’s faster and resembles more of a dialogue. I know that I have been moving that way myself.

Twitter has had quite an impact on communication, for good or bad depending on your viewpoint. It’s really too bad that Canada’s technological infrastructure is preventing Twitter usage from cell phones. CBC’s Search Engine has an interesting podcast and blog on Canada as a digital ghetto – be sure to check it out and share whether you agree or disagree.

odd stuff - tech

Technoblindness

November 27, 2008 by 0 Comments

I just came back from catching a presentation done by a multimedia class. I’m sorry I missed the beginning and the rest of the presentations as this was quite enlightening. In a project called Lifecasting, students filmed a number of reactions to situations. I was most enthralled by two scenarios which filmed people staging things left behind/being stolen and invasions of personal space in a public atmosphere. In the cases where people left items behind or staged a theft, the people around them were generally oblivious to the action happening. Why? Because they were on their cell phones or staring at their computers. The same occurred when people invaded personal space – computer screens seemed to act as a barrier to the actions and conversations around them. I find it fascinating that we’ve used social technology such as cell phones and computers and use them in such anti-social ways, blocking out the world outside our small personal world.

This has implications for work on a reference desk. I know I am tied to my computer and while I try to look up and keep an eye out for people needing assistance, I wonder how many I’ve missed because I’m using technology as a barrier. I will certainly try to be more aware of my surroundings while I’m using technology.

odd stuff - tech

Warning Sounds for Librarians

October 10, 2008 by 1 Comment

First of all, apologies for the extended silence. Between IFLA, First Year Experience activities and a slew of beginning of term instruction, I have had little time to think let alone blog. Now that things are quieting down, I hope to be more on the ball.

I decided to title this post after an article I read on BBC News a while back, Warning Sounded on Web’s Future (speaking of which, I’m trying to read the Future of the Web and How to Stop It – may have more on it later). The line that caught my attention is in bold at the very beginning of the article “The internet needs a way to help people separate rumour from real science, says the creator of the World Wide Web.” Sir Tim Berners-Lee is worried about disinformation on the web. This is where I hear trumpets – duh duh da na! Enter Librarians! This is us! We should be and are doing this! One of the main tenants of information literacy is the evaluation of information in any form. Many of us have been teaching this for years – the skills to evaluate and examine information. So why doesn’t Sit Tim Berners-Lee know this? Why doesn’t anyone seem to know this? How do we get out and teach everyone how to evaluate information? This is a fundamental problem for us. We’re great at what we do but no one knows. It’s partly a marketing issue. It’s partly an outreach issue. It’s also the fact that many people think they are doing alright on the info front and don’t attend a library session to improve their skills. I teach basic library searching skills and web evaluation classes. While I hope the students take something away from both sessions, I hear time and again from faculty that the students felt the web session was more valuable – they learned they didn’t know everything about the web and how to tell good from bad info and it speaks more to the way they tend to search. So how do we let people know that we can help them wade through information swamp that is the Internet? I’m certainly open to suggestions. Does your library offer web or info evaluation sessions?

On a complete aside, it’s conference time. I just helped plan and attended my first Access conference – a very good time and I highly recommend it. A very techy conference, which at times could be intimidating for a tech wannabe like me, but a lot of great content for those with less than stellar tech skills. Up next is Internet Librarian – maybe I’ll see you there!

tech

Horizon 2008

February 5, 2008 by 1 Comment

The Horizon 2008 report is out. I haven’t taken a good read through yet, just wanted to get the heads-up out there. I will certainly have more to say once I’m finished with it. A quick glance seems to note that some of the predications from last year have fallen off, in particular virtual worlds. I’ll post on this soon, so stay posted!

tech - web 2.0

McMaster Youth Media Study

May 10, 2007 by 0 Comments

Interesting post from Geoffrey Rockwell, who shares a summary from the McMaster Youth Media Study of what a typical McMaster undergraduate might be like when it comes to new media. I must confess, it wasn’t too terribly surprising. Of course, I do see undergraduates wandering around the library and campus every day with cell phones and mp3 players and facebook on nearly every other computer. I was a little more surprised to see that the typical undergraduate did recognize that technology was starting to interfere with actual personal connections.