Week 10: #23 Is this really the end? Or just the beginning...

I have enjoyed 23 things. I especially enjoyed learning more about Flickr, YouTube and Library Elf. The benefit to learning about these different technologies in a self paced program is that we can spend whatever amount of time we want to on each "thing." I found some of the technologies very interesting and will definitely spend more time discovering more about them. On the other hand, some of the 23 things didn't interest me so I'll feel comfortable passing on them.

I appreciated the opportunity to earn some training hours without having to travel. I do think that everyone should be given 10 hours of training, regardless of how many hours they had prior to this program. That's the fair thing to do - after all, we all worked the same out of time! Thanks again for the opportunity and thanks to the hard working staff that had to read ALL of these blogs. What a job that must have been!!!! You should have your training earned for the next five years!

Week 9: #22 Downloadable Media

I enjoyed this exercise. I had not checked out overdrive so that was interesting. I was surprised how many titles HCPL had available and impressed with the collection. I checked out Wowio also. I actually was not as impressed with it as HCPL's overdrive. Wowio's collection seemed to be more dated. I definitely will be checking out some titles from overdrive in the future.

Week 9: #21 Podcasts, Smodcasts!

Actually this was probably my least favorite assignment for some reason. I looked around at several different podcasts but really couldn't find anything real interesting. Since I love to travel, I suppose the most interesting ones I found were travel related. I'm not sure I would ever really be a full fledged podcaster!!

Week 9: #20 Discover YouTube and other video sharing sites

I've heard about YouTube, but haven't really looked at it much. I did a search for Seattle Pioneer Square and found a great short clip showing different buildings in Seattle and particularly in Pioneer Square. I love that area and would like to live there one day. I going to attempt to place it in my blog post, we will see if it works!

Apparently I was not successful in attaching the YouTube video to my blog. Later....

Week 8: #19 Web-based Apps: They're not just for desktops

I signed up for a free account with Zoho and played around with Zoho writer and the spreadsheet. I think this sight is a great tool for those who do not have or cannot afford the expensive Microsoft packages. Also it makes sharing projects with coworkers so easy. All they have to have is a computer and be online. I attempted to send my work to my blog but I was not successful. I will continue to work on that. But for now, it's really time to do some real library work like check in and check out books!

Week 8: #18 Social Networking: Making friends in the comfort of your own home

I have to be honest. I hardly have time to keep up with my personal email so I don't think I will be setting up an account in any of the Social networks. http://ratemyspace.hgtv.com/ and http://www.dogster.com/ were kind of interesting. I suppose if I had time, I might possibly check those out every now and then. I can definitely see how the younger generations are really getting into the networks.

Week 7: #17 Blog About Technology

Technology is great when it works!!!!! I'm still pretty slow when it comes to using the new technology out there such as MP3 players, Ipods, etc. I've only had my cell phone for 3 years. As with other new gadgets, I can't do without it now. But, I only use it to talk to people. I do not take pictures with it and I don't text message. Give me a few years and I'll probably be texting all the time!

Week 7: #16 So what's in a wiki?

I am a little familiar with Wikis since we have one at Tomball. I enjoyed the Wiki site listed in this assignment for Book Lovers. I actually found a Jodi Picoult book that I haven't read. Imagine that! Several of the other wikis look much like Wikipedia. I added a couple things to HCPL's wiki.

Week 6: #15 On Library 2.0 & Web 2.0

I found the articles on Library 2.0 very interesting. It's clear that not only have our libraries changed significantly since I started working in 1990, but they will continue to change even at a faster pace. Having worked at a small library for many years, I think the customer service part of Library 2.0 has been existence for quite awhile. I enjoyed reading Dr. Wendy Schultz's article, "To a temporary place in time...." She seems to place a great deal of importance of the idea that we continue to listen to our customers relating to changes in the library world. I'm just getting used to the idea of Library 2.0 - hope it's around for awhile before 3.0 and 4.0 replace it!

Week 6: #14 Getting not-so-technical with Technorati

I explored through Technorati some. It's really amazing. I performed the searches for "Learning 2.0" as instructed. There were significant differences in the hits depending on the method of searching. There were 6,837 results through the Blog search, 662 results through the tag search, and 691 through the blog directory search.

I found it interesting that Learning 2.0 is one of the most popular searches - do you suppose HCPL is partly responsible for this?????

I'm not quite ready to tag my blog with Technorati. Maybe in the next few days.

Week 6: #13 Tagging makes the web 2.0 world go round

I viewed the 8 minute tutorial. It was rather fuzzy and kept cutting in and out, so I wasn't able to get much from it. I did some exploring around Delicious and HCPL's membership. I'm not sure I would use this service very much, but I can see how it would be useful for research in both the academic and public sectors. The benefit that interested me the most was the ability to access all of your bookmarks no matter where you are. Very interesting.....

Week 5 #12 Library Elf

Library Elf was available today. It looks like a very useful service. I decided not to register since I have only one library card that I use and HCPL does such a terrific job of alerting me regarding the status of my account. I can see that this service would be very useful in small library systems.


Service Unavailable
Sorry for the inconvenience -- the server is temporarily unavailable. Please try again later.

Thank you for stopping by.

Week 5 # 11 Library Thing

This was pretty easy to do. I like this author- she's from the Pacific Northwest. Her novels are set in this area

Week 5 #10 Play around with image generators

I'm trying to add this mosaic to my blog using FD toys or Big Huge Labs. I'm hoping it turns out. We will see. I'm going to expore some of the other generators where I might be able to learn how to place a my blog name behind the picture of the pie. DIDN'T WORK - WILL TRY SOMETHING ELSE. TIME TO GO HOME. Okay, I played around with http://headerbar.com to add the picture and text to my blog title. I think it turned out okay. I still was not able to remove the very small print. Moving on to next assignment.

Week 4 #9 Finding feeds

I found using Bloglines the easiest for finding more feeds to add to my blogline. The Syndic8 and Technorati links were not as user friendly. I also thought their layout was way too busy, so I didn't use them. I did look around Feedster under the Travel channel. I found a blogline about some Seattle suburbs that was interesting. Topix looks useful since it allows you to get up to the minute news about the area you live in.

Is there a way to add your blogline to your blog space we have created? That would be very useful.

Week 4 #8 - Setting up account on bloglines.com

Setting up my new account on bloglines was very easy. I've added several newsfeeds at this point and will add more later today. I like the idea that I can save this website to my favorites, so I'm being very choicy about what I add to the blogline. This has been a pretty simple exercise.

Week 3 #5 Adding Flickr to my Blog

OK - Someone on our staff helped me do this the right way. The directions given through the iHCPL email said you needed to go to Flickr and get to the page to edit. We could not find that edit, but were able to do another way. This assignment was a little harder for us commoners!

Seattle early morning

Seattle early morning
Originally uploaded by kaye.barr

This is an early morning picture taken of Seattle from a loft terrace in Pioneer Square.

Week 3 #6 More Flickr Fun

I really like the idea of Tripmaker where you can add photos from your vacation and actually do a trip planner entry. I'm thinking about adding some photos from my vacation this summer and seeing how it goes. Just not going to do this tonight.

I'm amazed at the creativity out there on the web using flicker.

Week 3 #5 Discover Flickr

I tried to follow tip we received in email on how to blog our flicker photo. I could not figure it out. I cheated by going to my blog and adding the same picture I had on flicker (it was on my computer). Anyways, I'm still going to play with this and see if I can do it the correct way.

Week 2 #4 Online Safety

I'm not sure how much personal info to attach to my blog. So for now, I'm not putting any personal info. But I'm sure as I feel more comfortable with the process, I will be tempted to add some details. One small detail - I've been told I make a really good lemon icebox pie!

Learning style

My personal learning style is a combination of different techniques. One thing I find as I get older is I need more time to accomplish tasks. I also find that a quiet and relaxing environment is necessary for completing tasks successfully. Even though I generally do not like to read directions, I did follow the instructions for setting up my blog. Could that be why it was so easy????

Making Blogs

I found it extremely easy to create my own blog through blogger.com. It has been interesting to look at everyone's blogs created so far. My blog is pretty plain now, but I plan on making in fancier when I have more time.