http://stephaniec-lisblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/unit-14-readings.html?showComment=1228846620000#c5350351708118936743
http://mhsyoung.blogspot.com/2008/12/week-14-readings.html?showComment=1228847040000#c557301501685131116
http://arklibraryscientist.blogspot.com/2008/12/unit-14-reading-notes.html?showComment=1228847340000#c3191968051686861401
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Friday, December 5, 2008
Week 14 Reading Notes
Computers of the Clouds
I suppose I have dipped my toe into the computer cloud as I have used Google Docs for quite some time now. However, before reading/watching this week's items, I had never heard of the terms "computer cloud" and "SAAS". I was also not aware that Amazon and Google were offering use of their infrastructure. I think the advantages of this type of computing are really, really great. The fact that it can remove some of the financial burden of start-up for some businesses is really wonderful. I also think it is a boon for collaborative work. As I said, my only use so far is Google Docs, but the time and effort it has saved me at my job as well as for personal task is paramount! It made writing subject guides so much easier for my colleagues and I. And it really helped me orgaznize my graduate school application materials.
Frey's Trends Article
I could not tell from the website just when this article was written. If it was written a couple of years ago, then he was right on many accounts. Our academic library is becoming much more of a cultural center and we are encouraging a balance between that and the library as center for learning. I can personally attest to his prediction that we will be increasing pressed for time, forced to to super multi-task, and be somewhat overwhelmed by the information sent to us. I know that I sometimes want to shut my inbox and not open it again for a very, very long time. Information fatigue is starting to set in.
Muddiest Point: How do companies feel about security when using cloud computing. Do they feel better because Amazon and Google must have the money and technology to afford great security? Or do they worry because a lot more people could possibly have access to their information and security is somewhat out of their hands?
I suppose I have dipped my toe into the computer cloud as I have used Google Docs for quite some time now. However, before reading/watching this week's items, I had never heard of the terms "computer cloud" and "SAAS". I was also not aware that Amazon and Google were offering use of their infrastructure. I think the advantages of this type of computing are really, really great. The fact that it can remove some of the financial burden of start-up for some businesses is really wonderful. I also think it is a boon for collaborative work. As I said, my only use so far is Google Docs, but the time and effort it has saved me at my job as well as for personal task is paramount! It made writing subject guides so much easier for my colleagues and I. And it really helped me orgaznize my graduate school application materials.
Frey's Trends Article
I could not tell from the website just when this article was written. If it was written a couple of years ago, then he was right on many accounts. Our academic library is becoming much more of a cultural center and we are encouraging a balance between that and the library as center for learning. I can personally attest to his prediction that we will be increasing pressed for time, forced to to super multi-task, and be somewhat overwhelmed by the information sent to us. I know that I sometimes want to shut my inbox and not open it again for a very, very long time. Information fatigue is starting to set in.
Muddiest Point: How do companies feel about security when using cloud computing. Do they feel better because Amazon and Google must have the money and technology to afford great security? Or do they worry because a lot more people could possibly have access to their information and security is somewhat out of their hands?
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Week 12 Comments Left on the Blogs of Others
Friday, November 21, 2008
Reading Notes for Week 12
Creating the Academic Library Folksonomy...
Several of my colleagues and I participated in a library-sponsored Web 2.0 project this past summer. The project lasted nearly the entire summer and consisted of several assignments that introduced us to different tools and websites. Del.ico.us was one the tools we used. I thought it was a cool concept especially for someone like me whose Favorites and Bookmarks page had grown to the point of being unmanageable! I had not heard of "institutional" social tagging like the PennTags programs. I think that something like that would really encourage collaboration and knowledge sharing between students, faculty, and library staff. I can imagine using it during library instruction sessions where the concept is introduced and we add to it as part of the class.
Wikis in library instruction programs...
At this point our library only uses wikis in order to prepare for social-type gatherings. Staff can see what items are needed, volunteer to bring them, and then mark those items off the collective list. Gone are the days where we have 47 bags of chips and no ice! The reference staff is in the process of revamping all of our subject guides. We have tossed around the ideas of using wikis, but have to yet to make a decision. I really like the collaboration aspect, especially being the newest member of the reference team. However, I am a bit concerned about the consistency and appearance of a wiki-based subject guide. For the sake of our patrons, we want them to have a familiar and easy-to-use look and format. Other wikis I have seen tend to look a bit unkempt.
Behind-the-scenes of Wikipedia video-
I have mixed feelings about what I learned in the video. On the positive side, I feel better about the validity of the information provided in Wikipedia entries. I think it's great that they maintain such a strict neutrality policy and they do have more of a information-vetting process than I realized. I do think, however, some of the claim of the self-proclaimed creator rang a bit false. He claims that they only need 5000 dollars a month to operate. Yet they are practically begging for money on their home page. Plus their own entry on their site lists that they have a foundation that is worth over 3 billion dollars. Granted this video was made over four years ago and perhaps things have changed since then.
Weblogs in Scientific Libraries
We have yet to use any kind of blogs in our academic library. There is an interest in writing one geared towards informing our patrons but also a fear that those patrons (especially our students) simply won't read it. Perhaps if we educated highlighted RSS feeds as well as the blog, it would be more effective. I certainly rely on Google Reader to follow personal blogs as well as those of my fellow 2600 classmates.
In the past, I have followed project-based blogs like those mentioned in the Reichardt/Harder article, but I am not aware that our university has ever used one. They make a great point about a blog being a much easier way compared to e-mail to keep a group of people informed and up-to-date. I just cleaned out over 5000 messages from my work inbox, so I am certainly aware of e-mail overload! As far as blogs for reference staff, I think our staff is bit too small for this to work. I certainly see the benefit for libraries with large reference staffs.
Several of my colleagues and I participated in a library-sponsored Web 2.0 project this past summer. The project lasted nearly the entire summer and consisted of several assignments that introduced us to different tools and websites. Del.ico.us was one the tools we used. I thought it was a cool concept especially for someone like me whose Favorites and Bookmarks page had grown to the point of being unmanageable! I had not heard of "institutional" social tagging like the PennTags programs. I think that something like that would really encourage collaboration and knowledge sharing between students, faculty, and library staff. I can imagine using it during library instruction sessions where the concept is introduced and we add to it as part of the class.
Wikis in library instruction programs...
At this point our library only uses wikis in order to prepare for social-type gatherings. Staff can see what items are needed, volunteer to bring them, and then mark those items off the collective list. Gone are the days where we have 47 bags of chips and no ice! The reference staff is in the process of revamping all of our subject guides. We have tossed around the ideas of using wikis, but have to yet to make a decision. I really like the collaboration aspect, especially being the newest member of the reference team. However, I am a bit concerned about the consistency and appearance of a wiki-based subject guide. For the sake of our patrons, we want them to have a familiar and easy-to-use look and format. Other wikis I have seen tend to look a bit unkempt.
Behind-the-scenes of Wikipedia video-
I have mixed feelings about what I learned in the video. On the positive side, I feel better about the validity of the information provided in Wikipedia entries. I think it's great that they maintain such a strict neutrality policy and they do have more of a information-vetting process than I realized. I do think, however, some of the claim of the self-proclaimed creator rang a bit false. He claims that they only need 5000 dollars a month to operate. Yet they are practically begging for money on their home page. Plus their own entry on their site lists that they have a foundation that is worth over 3 billion dollars. Granted this video was made over four years ago and perhaps things have changed since then.
Weblogs in Scientific Libraries
We have yet to use any kind of blogs in our academic library. There is an interest in writing one geared towards informing our patrons but also a fear that those patrons (especially our students) simply won't read it. Perhaps if we educated highlighted RSS feeds as well as the blog, it would be more effective. I certainly rely on Google Reader to follow personal blogs as well as those of my fellow 2600 classmates.
In the past, I have followed project-based blogs like those mentioned in the Reichardt/Harder article, but I am not aware that our university has ever used one. They make a great point about a blog being a much easier way compared to e-mail to keep a group of people informed and up-to-date. I just cleaned out over 5000 messages from my work inbox, so I am certainly aware of e-mail overload! As far as blogs for reference staff, I think our staff is bit too small for this to work. I certainly see the benefit for libraries with large reference staffs.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Comments Made on Others Week 11 Notes
Friday, November 14, 2008
Reading Notes for Week 11
Lynch- ARL Article (Institutional Repositories)
I really liked Lynch's clear explanation of his idea of an institutional repository- I just wish he had provided it before the middle of the article. I also liked his suggestion that educational institutions make an effort to digitize some work of their students and faculty (like dissertations) and make them available. As ILL coordinator, I receive several requests for theses or dissertations daily. Many institutions do not lend the hard copies, so these requests have to be denied or purchased at a high cost. He mentioned MIT's dSpace. I had tried to use that several years ago when it must have been in its earliest form. I could never find anything that I needed, so I had seen look at the site in years. I followed the link provided in the article and the interface looks much better. I look forward to giving it another whirl.
Digital Libraries- Challenges and Influential Work
Our library has applied for a grant so that we may digitze and make accessible our large of collection of Southern Episcopal and Civil War History. I truly hope that it will go beyond just a collection of scanned images and documents. Granted our project is is much smaller than the projects profiled, but it is interesting to see those who went before. I truly hope that it will go beyond just a collection of scanned images and documents. I think we could incorporate a simpler version Mischo's mentions of internal linking between citations and footnotes, forward and backward links to cited articles using DOIs and Open URLs and make the scholar/patron's efforts much more fruitful.
Dewey Meets Turing
I didn't know that the idea of modern digital libraries stretched back to the early 1990's, I thought that it was a more recent idea. His point about the metaphorical struggle between metadata and algorithms was interesting and still true to some extent.
I really liked Lynch's clear explanation of his idea of an institutional repository- I just wish he had provided it before the middle of the article. I also liked his suggestion that educational institutions make an effort to digitize some work of their students and faculty (like dissertations) and make them available. As ILL coordinator, I receive several requests for theses or dissertations daily. Many institutions do not lend the hard copies, so these requests have to be denied or purchased at a high cost. He mentioned MIT's dSpace. I had tried to use that several years ago when it must have been in its earliest form. I could never find anything that I needed, so I had seen look at the site in years. I followed the link provided in the article and the interface looks much better. I look forward to giving it another whirl.
Digital Libraries- Challenges and Influential Work
Our library has applied for a grant so that we may digitze and make accessible our large of collection of Southern Episcopal and Civil War History. I truly hope that it will go beyond just a collection of scanned images and documents. Granted our project is is much smaller than the projects profiled, but it is interesting to see those who went before. I truly hope that it will go beyond just a collection of scanned images and documents. I think we could incorporate a simpler version Mischo's mentions of internal linking between citations and footnotes, forward and backward links to cited articles using DOIs and Open URLs and make the scholar/patron's efforts much more fruitful.
Dewey Meets Turing
I didn't know that the idea of modern digital libraries stretched back to the early 1990's, I thought that it was a more recent idea. His point about the metaphorical struggle between metadata and algorithms was interesting and still true to some extent.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Link to my 2600 website
http://www.pitt.edu/~css33/
Thanks for your patience, guys and gals. We had a campus-wide Internet failure today that prevented me from posting my link for over from 9an this morning until now. It will not win any website beauty contests, but at least it works!
Cari
Thanks for your patience, guys and gals. We had a campus-wide Internet failure today that prevented me from posting my link for over from 9an this morning until now. It will not win any website beauty contests, but at least it works!
Cari
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