Fin!

Well, we've come to the end of the semester, my friends. The reason for this blog no longer exists. Rather sadly, I've become fondly attached to it. I'm signing off now, but don't be too terribly surprised if I resurrect this blog somewhere down the road.

Week 13 Muddiest Point

"Helloooo Ladies..." it's the muddy llama! Watch out now, don't let the Thanksgiving triptophan goggles fool you: he's a dirty boy underneath that handsome exterior.

Reading the No Place to Hide site, I got to thinking: how much more difficult is it to hide when you engage in electronic forms of communication? Should those wishing to send secret messages revert to rotary phones, carrier pigeons, and paper airplanes if they want to keep their information private?

Week 13 Readings

No Place to Hide
It all sounds so 1984 Big Brother-y to me that my natural inclination is to dismiss it as conspiracy theory nonsense, but I think I’ve heard this same sort of theory enough times over a long enough period to give it some credit.

EPIC
I’m glad to know that there’s a group out there lobbying for the privacy of my information, but obviously they’re not especially well funded if their website looks as skillfully written as some of our Assignment 6es.

YouTube Video
no longer available due to copyright claim by Viacom

Week 12 Comments

This week's comments are brought to you by the cutest purse evah! Please please please Santa, I've been good!!!

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Not Class Related: Google + Time-Life = Clutch

So get this y'all--I was innocently surfin' the web, lookin' for some slammin' pix of Jennifer Beals with which to pimp my next blog post, when I came across this:

Google has collaborated with Time-Life to digitize and release to the public domain some of Life Magazine's celebrated photography, like this gem of Walt Disney. Unlike many other collections, this wee little snickerdoodle of an operation is supercali-awesome 'cause it includes all the published photographs--not just scans of famous covers. Enjoy, my friends, enjoy.

Week 12 Muddiest Point

This week's Muddiest Point is brought to you by Muddy Squirrel. Apparently he lives on a Hill or something. I'm not sure, I don't speak squeakum (3:18 mark), and he was a Pixburger squeaker at that.

Why are we learning about the value of blogs months after we began blogging for class. I mean, c'mon, we're all MLISes aren't we? My black, technology-unsavvy heart cries out "Poor form!", even tough my teacher-sense tells me that we can't learn everything in the first week, and my Yoda-soul tells me to chill.

Week 12 Readings

Sorry for being away for so long, y'all! All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy and all that.

Using a wiki to manage a library instruction program
Does anybody else suspect that the ALA was reading this sort of wiki-propoganda before they aparently drank the Kool Aid and went all wiki on us? Ugh. I don't think much of this author, to tell you the truth. I read the summary first (c'mon like y'all don't! it's like reading the abstract), and got all uber-sarcastic up in this joint like "Oh, we need everybody's expertise? Really? Stunning. Give us another gem, genius!"


Creating the academic library folksonomy
At some point, I just have to shrug my shoulders and say "this has as little to do with my work as a children's librarian as sock puppets do to a chemistry librarian." This article brings about that reaction. Working with kids, I can't conceiveof why I would have them make a folksonomy of the library's holdings. Perhaps I could get them involved in the choosing of bookmarks for the library's homepage, but kids and their language and their fads change so quickly that there would be an incredibly high turnover rate in tagging. Sorry, but this gets a pass from me.

Jimmy Wales: How a ragtag band created Wikipedia
He's a pretty darn good talker. I was really surprised at how volunter-based Wikipedia was--I expected them to be closer to the PBS model--as well as how few users are editors (he says that there's a close-knit community of only 600-1000 editors, and only about 18% of edits are anonymous). Anybody else think his opinion on truth and neutrailty was uber post modern?

Weblogs: their use and application in science and technology libraries
I really like the idea of incorporating blog-teaching into the role of librarians. Hurrah information literacy! Since I've taken to bridle with SCALA's blog (and, coming on its heels, this blog where I can freestyle shizzle), I feel totally comfortable with the idea of incorporating blogs into my professional life (whether with students or with other library workers).

Assignment 6: My Website

We did it/ We did it/ We did it/ Horray!

For those of you who don't know what on earth ^that's^ all about, it's about time you either tuned into Nick Jr., went shopping at WalMart, or talked to a Children's/School Library Track MLIS student. Srsly, lol.

Anywho, here's the link (htttp://www.pitt.edu/~jht3/) to my Assignment 6, which wasn't nearly as painful, or as aesthetically pleasing, as I intended. Ah well, c'est la vie n'at.

Week 9 Comments

I'm just a postin' machine today, y'all! Here are my comments for Week 9, brought to you by the Halloween-appropriate- and also, and this is quite rare, English-9-appropriate- lolcat!

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Week 9 Muddiest Point

Complimenting last week's muddy dog, pointing you towards SCALA's Technology Petting Zoo, and continuing the animalistic ferocity of this blog in general, may I present the muddy horse (with hooman accessoree)!

Now that I’ve been thinking on it a little bit (as I carefully *stifled laughter* edit this post), maybe HTML is that much more comfortable than XML because it seems a more natural extension of what I already do to edit my documents. I press CRL+i to italicize, then press it again to stop italicizing. If I were to write out what I was doing, say to instruct someone through IM a Librarian (a Help/Reference Desk service popular at many academic libraries and called Digsby at Pitt) about how to italicize something in their paper, I might just write it out like HTML. XML, not so much. Is anyone else getting the sense, like I am, that HTML is more semantic than XML, despite techie claims? Or am I just being an ostrich with my head stuck in the sand, incapable of moving forward at the necessary pace?

Week 9 Readings

Bergholz Tutorial
Maybe because it seems to take longer to write out, or because I came into this class as an HTML and an XML virgin , but XML just doesn’t seem any easier or more semantic to me. In fact, and maybe, again, because it was introduced first and I don’t even have my training wheels off yet, but HTML seems simpler.

XML Schema Tutorial
Yeah, no, totally didn’t convince me that XML is easier than HTML. Perhaps they need to get the guy who wrote the HTML instructions to come on over and write these ones. It makes me realize that it’s going to be a long time before I’m comfortably literate in either of these computer languages.

Survey of XML Standards
XML has vendors? Are there like XML conventions? Are they at ComicCon? ‘Cause if they are, I’ll totally go see them (since SCALA will be having a booth there at ComicCon anyways, not that I'm plugging SCALA or anything, nope no conflict of interest here)! Having a person actually give you an elevator speech on the importance of XML and its use would be so much more motivating and intriguing than (at this Debbie Downer part of the semester) trudging through useful, but difficult, articles.

Introduction to XML
You’d think after nearly 18 years of formal education I’d not be such a doofus. I totally should have read the Intro first! This was an excellent, concise, and clear explanation about why I should give a flying fudge about XML. Don’t think I’m converted to the good church of XML just yet, but I think I will go back and reread the other articles now that I’ve read this.

Week 8 Comments

This week's comments are brought to you by Doc Brown, of Back to the Future fame, whose hair I can so totally identify with. Sadly, on a daily basis.

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Week 8 Readings

Beyond HTML
The most important thing in this entire (read: loooong) article is right there in the abstract: "The new system met and exceeded the baseline expectations for content collection and
management, offering a greater control over appearance and navigation while still offering
customization features for liaisons." No matter what brave new world we're exploring in trying to better library services, I think it's important in every type, shape, and size of library that we remember that the end must always be to best serve the patrons. Georgia State University Library succeeded in that way, I think; andThat makes me feel warm and fuzzy.


HTML Cheatsheet, HTML Tutorial, and CSS Tutorial
All of these seem easy enough to follow, but they annoy me for no rational reason. It's almost like they'd be useful or something if I ever stooped to doing my own webpage authoring. Yes, I am a huge snob. Yes, I'm out of the closet now: I'm a playa hater. I don't want to know more about programming. I *heart* event programming to the nth degree, but I could do without ever trying to HTML my way out of a paper bag. Highly unfortunately for me, there's Assignment 6 to be done. Who knows, maybe I'll be converted to the good ways of HTML writing by the time the assignment is finished...yeah.

Assignment 5: Koha Bookshelf

Brought to you by Kobra Khan: Koha Komplete!

To read up on the art and science of NHL goaltending, see http://pitt4.kohawc.liblime.com/cgi-bin/koha/bookshelves/shelves.pl?viewshelf=16.

Week 8 Muddiest Point

Mud? I haven't seen any mud. Don't touch the stuff myself.

Know it's a little early...for me at least, but this week's muddiest point for me relates to Koha. Does it have a foreign language complex? I really wanted to add a book about Dominek Hasek (one of my favorite goalies) to my virtual shelf, but the book just wouldn't load past to the second screen (where you have imported the MARC record already, but need to assign it a barcode).

Could this be because the book (and parts of the record) is in Czech? I do have a couple of French books, too, but they're all translations. None of them had any trouble.

Is foreign language a common stumbling block for tools like what we're using this semester?

BTW, the book and all its AWESOMENESS can be found here: http://lccn.loc.gov/2004549421

Week 7 Comments

This week's comments are brought to you by the ever-addictive lolcats. Just like real cats, you may like them, but they really don't care about you.

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Week 7 Muddiest Point

"Muddy...tonsils?" You ask yourself. "Yes, indeed," I whimper, "and adenoids too."

I am sick. I hate being sick. I'm bad at it. Like 3 year old wrapped around mama's leg bad at it.

This week's muddiest point is two fold because I haven't got the energy to think of anything at a deep level. First of all, will we ever run out of IP addresses like they thought we did with ISBNs? Second, can you actually exchange books through Library Thing? I didn't think it was a place for physical exchange like Craigslist or anything.

Week 7 Readings

How Internet Infrastructure Works
Satisfactorally well written, but I still had to go back and re-read several parts in order to get the right idea. Is it just me misremembering again, or was there a big deal made out of T3 internet connections a while back--like was it used as a marketing campaign on the scale of the 10-10-220 commercials but with the idea of "bigger is better" like those insane razors?

Dismantling Integrated Library Systems
Every library I have worked in has used an ILS--but no library has been satisfied with theirs. I have found them clunky, plodding, and ugly--sort of like Shetland Ponies.
I'm glad to see that there is some recognition of the dissatisfaction with ILS's and that they may go the way of the OPAC in terms of improvments over time.

Inside the Google Machine
The video was a nice presentation and all, but like most companies' chest-thumping power points, it was overwhelmingly shallow. It didn't really explore how Google works (with the algorithyms and spiders and all), which would have been more to the point really, considering what we're studying and all.

Assignment 4

Hey y'all.

I did Assignment 4 all about pirated YouTube videos. Pirating is a personal pet peeve of mine so if you do it don't tell me about it!

Here's the video I created: http://www.screencast.com/t/E2bCIGmip8l.

Here are the images I created, handily available in a slideshow: http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/sets/72157607607965257/show/with/2901421707/

I originally thought I could make a video from the images, but I was either wrong or it was just so much easier to create a video too that I didn't bother. If you only want to see the core of the pictures (5 instead of the 10), you can click here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/2901420005/, http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/2901420005/, http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/2901420325/,

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/2901420325/,

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30372805@N05/2901420521/).

Week 6 Comments

This week's comments are brought to you by The Breakfast Club. What's your archetype?

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Week 6 Muddiest Point

I didn’t find the time to look into it myself after finishing the Wikipedia article on Networks, but are we going to go over Bluetooth networks in class? I should very much like to know more about them.

PS- I searched and searched and searched for a particular picture for this week’s muddiest point. As a young’un I loved the movie Drop Dead Fred about a girl and her imaginary friend (really her id) who keeps getting her in trouble. There’s a lovely mud pie scene in that film, but I couldn’t find a screen capture high or low. Anybody know where I can find a screen capture of it?

PPS- Are we really in week 6 already? Sheesh!

Week 6 Readings

YouTube
In my apartment building we all share one wireless internet connection. Does this count as a LAN or a PAN? I would have just jumped on LAN before this video, but now I’m thinking it might be a PAN since I don’t share any of my files with them—and I’m not sure that if I wanted to I could. It’s the same sort of thing at McDonald’s or Starbucks I guess—you’re all sharing the internet connection, but can you be said to be on a LAN?

Wikipedia: Networks
What advantages and disadvantages does a university the size of Pitt see in LAN WAN? Are the considerations different for universities the size of say CalU (California University of Pennsylvania) or IUP (Indiana University of Pennsylvania) than for Pitt?

Wikipedia: LANs
I can’t believe the first LAN was set up in 1974! Do you think Harvard and Yale were very angry indeed that Cambridge did it first? I shouldn’t be surprised if Oxford is still ticked off—can you imagine not being able to invite them over for tea and crumpets (a most scrumptious delight) for decades over this business?
“Netware dominated[8] the personal computer LAN business from early after its introduction in 1983 until the mid 1990s when Microsoft introduced Windows NT Advanced Server and Windows for Workgroups.” Wait—what’s netware? What’s it got to do with LANs? Confused=me.

RFIDs
Is it just me, or is anybody else reminded of those chips they implant in dogs to identify them if they run away when the author describes the radio frequency, electromagnetic field, having so much information, and not having to be seen to be read of RFIDs? I really like the author’s points that RFIDs are multitasking (doing both security and circulation) and money-saving in comparison to their use by the retail sector.

Assignment 3

Here's the link to my Assignement 3: http://www.citeulike.org/user/quiimp

Whew was this a toughie! Honestly, playing to-the-death chess may be easier than researching articles on chess!

If anybody else gets to the point where they're going to pull out their (in my case Hermione-textured) hair out, may I recommend installing Firefox version 2.0? For me, Firefox 3.0 (the lastest), demanded Chrome compatability, which Zotero doesn't seem to have, so I was getting a whole lot of nowhere for hours.

Week 5 Comments

This week's comments are brought to you by the Macho Man Randy Savage, who wants to take a moment to inquire: "Would you care for a refreshing Slim Jim? They are snap-into-able!" Such a polite young man. And look at that QVC-ready face!

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Week 5 Muddiest Point

She’s so plastered.

Maybe I just missed it in the reading, but does the collaborative Pittsburgh digital image collection only include “old” photographs—i.e. stuff from before 1960? In twenty years will it be our task as librarians to digitize photographs from 1960-2000? How many of these images will already be digitized? How many photographs may be lost to us by a Flickr account going inactive or an inadvertent Delete? In short, how will already digitized images be put in digital libraries in similar, future collaborative efforts?

Week 5 Readings

Wikipedia: Data Compression
Is data compression what is being used or what is being reversed in the creation of high-definition DVDs like BluRay?
Possibly the best-written WikiTech article I’ve read yet for this class. Let’s keep it up!
Does anybody use Zip drives anymore? Is a zip drive the same thing as an external hard drive? I so totally remember wanting a zip drive badly in my tween years cause they had these sweet ads, but I can’t say I actually know anybody who got one, other than Carrie Bradshaw. Thanks Aidan!!!

ACRL
With YouTube and Blogger both owned by Google, it should now be easier than ever to get tech-savvy at your library. I can especially imagine teen services hopping on this.
Do you think in another 5 years that watching a series of YouTube videos will be a part of the summer reading program at your local library? I’m thinking back to the 2007 summer reading program especially, which involved kids playing detective (y'all remember—007 right?).

Data Compression
The DVD link I guessed at is here! Makes me wonder about laser disks. Do you remember them? They were vinyl-sized but made out of DVD material and played on what resembled a superhuge DVD player. We had them in art class when I was in 6th grade to replace slides. The art teacher (hugz for Mr. Riskofski!) loved them, but was back to slides the next year for our lessons in art appreciation for some reason. *Ponder*

Digital Library
This is a fantastic example of (and a well- and clearly-written explanation of) a fabulous cross-city collaboration. The reality of the difficulty of such a collaboration, though, came to life in the “Communication Challenges” section when the author said “A simple example is a cataloging discussion we once had regarding subject terms. Our museum friends tend to view their image collections as works of art with intrinsic value as a photograph. The academic archives tend to view their image collections for utilitarian purposes with minimal description, while the historical society’s practice has been to provide contextual information that not only describes the image, but informs the reader about the history and impact of an area or person depicted by the image.” I went and spent a few minutes on the site (a link to which was buried all the way down in the article’s references) and found it spiffy. Please to enjoy yourselves: http://digital.library.pitt.edu/pittsburgh/.