All Good Things Must Come to an End....or NOT

So much to learn....so little time. It is amazing how fast the weeks have gone! This has been an exhiliarating and fun program with some new 'thing' to look forward to and learn each week. Especially helpful and a big THANKS to the coworkers who delved ahead, plunging into the new-age Tech arena leaving behind helpful hints & detailed blogs, willingly answering questions & assisting those of us laggggging behind! So glad to hear the site will remain active for us delvers. Now we can go back and spend as much time necessary to cover the correlating links.
I am most anxious to exlore the Flickr, RSS Feeds, YouTubes, & PodCasts sites for my sole entertainment and revisit sites like Zoho, Google document & audiobooks to become familiar with & able to further assist patrons working in the Tech Center.

Week #9:YouTube,PodCasts,AudioBooks

I thoroughly enjoyed the YouTube & PodCast assignment, especially viewing some of the older T.V. shows and sitcom clips that I watched when I was a little younger, brought back memories. One of my favorite late nite entertainers, view on my YouTube!

YahooPodcasts was the most easily accessible site of those listed. I spent some time previewing the podcasts (the good, the bad, and the very ugly!) and decided to download the 60 Minutes Podcast covering the most recent headline stories I found interesting and always seem the miss the t.v. episodes.

I think I prefer to curl up with my book but it was interesting to explore audiobooks/ebooks. I selected to download the computer read audio of "The Secret Garden" from Project Gutenberg and I was not able to focus on the narration. The audio sounded like a combination of R.2.D.2. & C.P.O.3 from Star Wars, thus I'd recommend listening to the person-read version.

http://sailor.gutenberg.lib.md.us/etext05/gardn3-index.htm

Overdrive had a thorough and user friendly tutorial for audiobooks. Will have to revisit this site.

Week 8:Online Productivity Tools

Once a Word user, always a Word user, (& Excel) but maybe I've learned a new trick. I was not familiar with any of the other web based applications for word processing & spreadsheets. In reading the information and exploring Zoho writer, a fabulous feature (for me) is you can revert back easily to the original document, if you mess up and save over an older version.

Ironically, I had a patron come in the Tech Center just today wanting to access his files in Google Documents. One downfall I discovered, however, with our library internet security or browser settings? the system did not allow him to access his files or it may have been a site problem.....another matter to check w/systems;-)

Web 2.o Awards List - I selected to examine the "events" category:
#1 Upcoming.yahoo - I was disappointed; it did not have The Great Frederick Fair listed!
Now I will have to find out the dates and go back and add the event information.
#2 Eventful.com - I was not impressed w/either, it also did not have Great Frederick Fair.
Some of the links are not connecting properly w/search words. i.e., I wanted to see craft show events in MD and instead received information on Wine Festivals in Virginia. FUN
but not what I wanted.

Week 7: Wiki's

My experience w/wiki's has pretty much been limited to Wikipedia which I thought was just another encyclopedia site. silly me! Now I discover it's the latest, greatest trend in an updated, collective, possibly subjective, pooling knowledge base of information from wiki users which also includes entries on diverse subjects (such as love life of ......) maintained by specific interest groups & other enthusiasts. One disadvantage noted in the resource was many teachers do not allow students to use wikipedia as an information source. Wiki's are a useful tool in many ways within the library setting where collaborative writing, sharing knowledge and exchanging ideas can be utilized like a monthly book club discussion or review.

Week 6 Tag, Folk, & Technorati

The discovery resources & perspectives on Web 2.0, Library 2.0, describe various advances in technology, revealing the future and changing direction of libraries now pioneering & implementing these tools. It also explains the critical role we play in developing new services and expanding programs and resources to further meet the needs of the community and assist patrons of all ages - it's just simply... mindblogging! ;-)


Technorati provides the site to unlimited blog sources and answers to tagging and so I discovered why I receive certain blog posts in response to my various web searchs ie., when & how to trim a damaged holly tree? I see the advantages of (unstructured) cataloging especially with something like digital photos and social bookmarking functions. However, who has time & paitence to sit and weed thru the 54,000 sites and pics tagged under holly trimming and is it necessarily expert or authentic advice I care to read or follow.
So I'm thinking really, isn't less information, more resourceful?

I did not register for the Delicio.us site as I simply use the drop down browser on the computer to access the sites. I can see the benefits of it tho as a resource tool for libraries to utilize tags and organize bookmarks and especially enabling access from any computer. At the reference desk and the back workstations specifically this would be helpful to personnel that float from different computers and would save time looking up the same or similar reference information or books/websites of interest for patrons.

Rollyo

After weeding thru the web, I am excited to create a search roll of my favorite sources for gardening and tips. Here's one - Combine ingredients in blender:eggs, tabasco, garlic powder & water, then mist liberally on plants. Reapply weekly or after it rains, to repel the deer-now onto the rabbits.
http://rollyo.com/catlashx/plants_gardening/

Avatars

On avatars.yahoo - you can create and save up to 12 avatar favorites (love the wardrobe options) but I could only export one of my creations to Blog. I was attempting 2 different looks, so I used Google image search for the other.