Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Help Section

Week 1: Introduction

To Do This Week:

#1 Register your participation in the Learning 2.0 Program.

#2 Discover a few pointers from lifelong learners and learn how to nurture your own learning process. Listen to the Seven and 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners Podcast. Read the Wikipedia Definition of Library 2.0 and see how Learning 2.0 impacts upon Library services.

Readings:

Discovery has never been so much fun ...

Learning 2.0 is an online learning program to learn more about emerging technologies on the web that are changing the way people, society and libraries access information and communicate with each other.

Over the course of the next nine weeks, this website will highlight “23 Things” with Discovery Exercises to help you become familiar with blogging, RSS news feeds, tagging, wikis, podcasting, online applications, and video and image hosting sites.

To familiarize yourself with this project, be sure to read about the Learning 2.0 Progam and also our Learning 2.0 FAQs page. These FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) should answer most of your questions about this program. If you don't see your question answered just add it as a comment at the bottom of the page so we can address it.

Lifelong Learning:

The Seven and 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners provides you with a refresher on what it means to be a lifelong learner.

Habit 1 – Begin with the end in mind.
Habit 2 – Accept responsibility for your own learning.
Habit 3 – View problems as challenges.
Habit 4 – Have confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner.
Habit 5 – Create your own learning toolbox.
Habit 6 – Use technology to your advantage.
Habit 7 – Teach and mentor others.
Habit 7 ½ – PLAY! Have fun! It's never too late to become a lifelong learner.

Resources / Links:

Recap For The Week:

By the end of the week you should have familiarised yourself with the Learning 2.0 Progam and know what the definition of Library 2.0.

Learning 2.0 – Quick Recap

“The Learning 2.0 Program is based on the PLCMC Learning 2.0 program developed by Helene Blowers of the Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County. Many thanks to Helene Blowers for allowing us to use her program. Learning 2.0 is licensed under Creative Commons.”

For more information visit:

Wikipedia Definition Library 2.0 – Quick Recap

“Library 2.0is a loosely defined model for a modernized form of library service that reflects a transition within the library world in the way that services are delivered to users. The concept of Library 2.0 borrows from that of Business 2.0 and Web 2.0 and follows some of the same underlying philosophies. This includes online services such as the use of OPAC (Online Public Access Catalog) systems and an increased flow of information from the user back to the library.”.

For further information visit:

Week 2: Discovering Web 2.0 Tools

To Do This Week:

Select any site/tool from the list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees. Explore the site you selected. Create a post about your discovery. What did you like or dislike about the tool? What were the site’s useful features? Could you see any applications for its use in a library setting?

#3 Set up your own blog, try at Blogger.com and then publish your first post.

#4 Register your blog with Victorian Public Libraries Learning 2.0 Program.

Readings:

Throughout the course of this Learning 2.0 program we’ve explored just a small sampling of these Web 2.0 technologies that are empowering users with the ability to create and share content. But given time there are so many more we could explore.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to select any site from this list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees and explore it.

With so many to choose from, it might be handy to first select a category that interests you (like “Books” or “Personal Organisation”) and then simply select a tool/site to explore. Be careful to select a tool that is Free and that doesn't require a plug-in or download. The majority of these free, so this shouldn’t be a problem.

Resources:

Recap For The Week:

By now you should have set up a Blog and published your first post, and then registered your Blog with the Victorian Public Libraries Learning 2.0 Program. You also should have had a look at the Web 2.0 Awards just to see the calibre of the different sites and services that are available on the net.

Help Setting Up Your Blog:

There are a numerous sites that you can host you Blog for you free of charge. A few examples are:

For this help section I’m assuming that you are going to use Blogger to host your Blog. Just click on the link that corresponds to you question and you will be taken to the official help section of the particular site is question ie. Blogger. Hopefully the page you will be sent to will answer your questions, most have clear and precise directions and screen captures (photos of the computer screen) to help you along the way.

What is Blogger?

Setting Up To Blog:

You will need to have an account with Google or one of it’s associates like Google Groups, Gmail or Orkut. But I’ve found that my Hotmail account will also work (go figure!).

How To Create a Blog With Blogger:

To Sign In / Out:

Must Read Blogger Help:

Publishing A Post:

Editing You Blog's Look:

Your Blogger Account:

How To Register Your Blog:

To register your Blog with the Victorian Public Libraries Learning 2.0 Program you will need the following information about your Blog:

Once you have this information got to Register Your Blog. Fill in the form with the information you collected above and then click on the “Register Now” button.

Week 3: Photos & Images

To Do This Week:

#5 Take a good look around Flickr and discover an interesting image that you want to Blog about. Be sure to include either a link to the image or, if you create a Flickr account, you can use Flickr's Blogging Tools to add the image in your post. Don't forget to label this post on your blog “#5 Flickr” and talk about what you have learned doing this activity.

#6 Explore some of the fun Flickr mashups and 3rd party tools that are out there. And create a blog post about one that intrigues you.

# 7 Create a Blog post about anything technology related that interests you this week.

Additional Exercise:

You might also like to take a look at the National Library Picture Australia website

The National Library's vision of building a comprehensive pictorial record of Australian history. You may also like to view the media release from the National Library about this collaborative project.

Additional Exercise Resources:

  1. Picture Australia
  2. National Library Media Release
  3. Flickr : Picture Australia: People, Places and Events
  4. Flickr: Picture Australia: Ourtown
  5. Snap.com
  6. Fotolia.com
  7. Slide.com
  8. Dumpr.net

PS: A quick word about photo posting etiquette - When posting identifiable photos of other people (especially minors) is it advisable to get the person's permission before posting their photo in a publicly accessible place like Flickr.

Never upload pictures that weren't taken by you (unless you have the photographer's consent) and always give credit when you include photos taken by someone else in your Blog.

Readings:

Photo sharing websites have been around since the 90s, but it took a small start up site called Flickr to catapult the idea of “sharing” into a full blown online community.

Within the past couple of years, Flickr has become the fastest growing photo sharing site on the web and is known as one of the first websites to use keyword tags to create associations and connections between photos and users of the site.

For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a good look at Flickr and discover what this site has to offer. Find out how tags work, what groups are, and all the neat things that people and other libraries are using Flickr for. Also explore out the Library Stuff website for more ideas.

3rd Party and Mashups:

Suggested tools to use are FD Toys Trading Card Maker. And there’s a ton of librarians out there that have created their own Flickr: Librarian Trading Card. So have some fun discovering and exploring some neat little apps. And if you're up to the challenge while you’re at it, why not create a Librarian Trading Card of your own.

Wikipedia (online open source encyclopaedia) offers some great articles that explain mashups. Basically they are hybrid web applications that take features from one application (like Flickr) and mash it up with another (like a map).

Like many web 2.0 sites, Flickr has encouraged other people to build their own online applications using images found on the site. Through the use of APIs (application programming interfaces), many people have created third party tools and mashups that use Flickr images.

Readings Resources:

  1. Mediamazine: Flickr Tutorials
  2. Flickr
  3. Flickr : Learn More Tour
  4. Flickr: Popular tags
  5. Flickr: Interesting - Last 7 days
  6. Flickr Services : 3rd Applications and Mashups
  7. Flickr : Search “Libraries”
  8. Flickr: Other Libraries
  9. Flickr : What Are Tags?
  10. Wikipedia
  11. Wikipedia : What Are Flickr Groups?
  12. Wikipedia : What Are Mashups?

3rd Party And Mashup Resources:

  1. FD Toys
  2. Library Trading Card Maker
  3. Mappr
  4. Flickr Color Pickr
  5. Montagr
  6. Flicker: Mashups
  7. Web Apps
  8. Flickr Tools
  9. Mash Up Awards

Help:

How Do You To Create A Link To Photo on Flickr?

Once you have found a photo that you would like to link to on Flickr:

  1. Click on the image to get the full image and image description.
  2. To get the photos URL (Uniform Resource Locator or web address) copy the URL address (the http://).
  3. Go to and login to you Blog.
  4. Create or edit a post.
  5. Write you post and the type a small description of the photo you want to link to. For example “Library Visit Photos”.
  6. Highlight / select the description of the photo.
  7. Click on the “Link” button in the compose menu bar.
  8. Paste the URL of the photo into the popup window that prompts for a URL.
  9. Click on the “OK” button.
  10. Finish your post then publish your post.

How Do I Post A Flickr Image To My Blog?

Read the Flickr help section article:

How Do I Post A Flickr Image To My Blog?

If you have a Flickr account:

  1. Go to Flickr.com and login into your account.
  2. Go to Flickr Blogging Tool.
  3. Click on “Set Up You Blog”.
  4. Under the heading “What kind of weblog do you have?” and select “Blogger Blog” from the drop down list.
  5. Click the “Next” button.
  6. Click on the link “Head over to Google now”.
  7. Login into your Google Account – the same one you use to login into Blogger.
  8. Enter you email address and password.
  9. Click on the “Sign In” button.
  10. Click on the “Grant Access” button.
  11. Check the details entered in URL and Label. If anything is incorrect edit them. What is my Blog URL?
  12. Click “All Done”.

Now you can Blog any public photos on Flickr!

In the search box up the top of the menu on the Flickr page do a search to find a photo you want to display. Once you have found a photo you want to display:

  1. Click on the photo to bring up the full size image and image details.
  2. Click on the “Blog This” button above the image.
  3. Click on your Blog that should appear in the drop down menu if you have correctly configured your Flickr account.
  4. Compose your Blog entry, adding a title and a post entry.
  5. Click on the “Post Entry” button.
  6. Either visit your Blog to see you recent addition or return back to the photo search to add more photos to your Blog.
What Is Flickr? Flickr is a website that allows you to upload and store your photo's online so you can access them anywhere and anytime. The site also allows you to organise your photo's into what the site called Sets and Collections. Sets are a grouping of photos that you can organize around a certain theme, a Collection is a grouping of Sets. You can organise your photo's with the site's own tools so there is no extra software that you need to install. All you need is your Internet browser and to sign up for a FREE account with Flickr.com.

Official What Is Flickr:
You will need a Yahoo account, if you don't have a Yahoo account, sign up for one:

To Create A Yahoo Account:
To Create An Account With Flickr:
1. Go to Flickr.com.
2. Click on the "Create Your Account".
3. Enter you YahooID and password.
4. Click on "Sign In".
5. If you don't have an existing Flickr account choose the "Make a New Flick Account Option".
6. Enter a screen name - it's like a nickname that everyone will see when you post.
7. Click on "Create A New Account" button. Congratulations, you now have your Flickr account!

Yahoo! ID's, Signing In & Screen Names:
Flickr Must Read Help:
Flickr & Photo's:
Organising Your Photo's on Flickr:
Photo's Tags:
Photo's Privacy:
Flickr & Blogging:
Useful Links:
Flickr Profile & Account:

Week 4: RSS & News Feeds

Learn about RSS feeds.

Set up your own Bloglines newsreader account.

Locate a few useful library related blogs and/or news feeds.

To Do This Week:

#8 Learn more about RSS and newsreaders.

#9 Create a free online Bloglines account for yourself and subscribe to at least 10 news feeds to your reader. Subscribe to several of your co-workers' feeds. This is as easy as typing the blog URL into the subscribe field in Bloglines. Or go to your friends' blogs, click on the 'subscribe' or 'atom' button at the bottom of the page. Then try adding a few other types of news feeds from news sources (you may like to select a couple from the list below)

Create a post in your blog about this exercise.

Optional: If you're up to the challenge, you can provide the URL address to your public Bloglines account.

Readings:

You’ve heard of RSS? You’ve seen those small funny tags on websites?

You’ve heard co-workers and acquaintances swear by it, but still have no idea what RSS is? Well don’t worry, according to a recent survey you’re still in the majority, but this is changing rapidly.

In the information world, RSS is not only revolutionalising the way news, media and content creators share information, but it also is swiftly changing the way everyday users are consuming information.

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the web.

Just think about the websites and news information sources you visit every day. It takes time to visit those sites and scour the ad-filled and image-heavy pages for just the text you want to read, doesn’t it?

Now imagine if you could visit all those information sources and web pages in just one place and all at the same time … without being bombarded with advertising… without having to search for new information on the page you’d already seen or read before… and without having to consume a lot of time visiting each site individually. Would that be valuable to you? Well, it’s available now through a newsreader and RSS.

This week’s discovery exercises focus on learning about RSS news feeds and setting up a Bloglines account (a free online newsreader) for yourself to bring your feeds together.

Readings Resources:

  • CNET Video: RSS – Feel the Need for Feeds (3:32) – a good over view of what RSS is and the benefits to users.
  • Feed Me: A gentle introduction to Internet feeds a good tutorial from Palinet, a library cooperative
  • Using Bloglines Tutorial - This online tutorial walks you through how to set up a Bloglines account and add news feeds.
  • Adding RSS Feeds to Bloglines - A short YouTube video that I created showing how to add feeds.
  • RSS in Plain English: A simple and user friendly overview of RSS created by Commoncraft Video on YouTube.

Recap:

By the end of the week you should have read the reading and learnt a bot about RSS feeds, created a Bloglines account and subscribe to at least 10 feeds. Also create a blog entry about RSS feeds and Bloglines adventure.

Help:

What Is Bloglines?

How Do You Create A Bloglines Account?

How Do I Search?

How Do You Find Your Public Bloglines URL?

  1. Log in to your bloglines account.
  2. Under the heading "Publish, Share & Save".
  3. Click on "Share your blogroll".
  4. Forget about the last two text fields and just fill in your username.
  5. Copy the text (JavaScript) in the grey box.
  6. Go to your blog and paste the text in either a blog entry or a added page elemet (HTML / JavaScript type) where you want the link to appear, make sure you paste it in the "Edit HTML" view for creating or editing your post not in the "Compose" view, otherwise you will see gibberish on the screen and the link to your bloglines will not work.

Week 5: Play Week

To Do This Week:

#10 Play around with an online image generator. Post the result of your discovery process in your blog. Be sure to include a link to the image generator itself, so other participants can discover it too.

#11 Take a look at LibraryThing and catalogue some of your favourite books. Add a least 5 books to your library. Blog about your findings and be sure to link to your LibraryThing catalogue.

#12 Explore Rollyo and create an account for yourself. Create a search roll for any subject you like. Create a post in your blog about your experience and link to your search roll. Can you see a potential use for tools like this? OPTIONAL: Add your search roll to your blog.

Readings:

Image Generators:

Generators?

No, I’m not talking about those gas powered back-up things. The generators I’m talking about allow you to easily manipulate images and graphics to create fun images like these:

For this discovery exercise, I just want you to have fun. Find a few fun image or text generators to play around with and write a post in your blog about one of your favourites and display the result. Often adding the image you mocked up to your blog is as simple as copying and pasting the code that the page provides. If not, you may just need to right click on the image and then save it to your hard drive before using Bloggers image button to add it to your post.

If you’re having difficulty getting your image added to a post in your blog, ask a co-worker for help. In looking at several staff blogs, it’s easy to see that we have lots of people in the system who have figured out how easy it is to add images to their blogs.

LibraryThing:

Are you a book lover or cataloguer at heart? Or do you enjoy finding lost and forgotten gems on the shelf to read? Then LibraryThing may be just the tool for you.

Developed for booklovers, this online tool not only allows you to easily create an online catalogue of your own, it also connects you to other people who have similar libraries and reading tastes.

Add a book to your catalogue by just entering the title - it’s so easy that you don’t even need MARC record training to do it – to connect with other users through your similar reading tastes.

There are lots of ways to use LibraryThing:

  • You can even view your books on a virtual shelf.
  • Add a widget to display titles that are in your catalogue.
  • Install a LibraryThing Search box on your blog.

So why not join the ranks and create your own library online. With over 65,000 registered (BTW: LibraryThing also has group forum for librarian users and over 4.7 million catalogued books, so you're bound to discover something new).

Rollyo:

Do you have a group of websites that are your favourites? Or a set of similar online resources that you frequently use to answer homework or reference questions?

Well Rollyo may be the tool for you. Rollyo allows you to create your own search tool for just the websites you know and trust. Take a look at some of these search rolls that have already been created:

Readings Resources:

Image Generators:

LibraryThing:

Rollyo:

Help:

LibraryThing:

Rollyo:

Week 6: Tagging, Folksonomies & Technorati

To Do This Week:

#13 Learn about tagging and discover a Del.icio.us.

  • Take a look around Del.icio.us using the PLCMCL2 account that was created for this exercise. Note: In this account you will find lots of resources that have been highlighted or used throughout the course of the Learning 2.0 program.
  • Explore the site options and try clicking on a bookmark that has also been bookmarked by a lot of other users. Can you see the comments they added about this bookmark or the tags that they used to categorize this reference?
  • Create a blog post about your experience and thoughts about this tool. Can you see the potential of this tool for research assistance, or is it just as an easy way to create bookmarks that can be accessed from anywhere?
  • OPTIONAL: If you’re up to the challenge, create a Del.icio.us account for yourself and discover how this useful bookmarking tool can replace your traditional browser bookmark list. You might even want to explore Del.icio.us’ latest addition, a network badge.

#14 Explore Technorati and learn how tags work with blog posts.

  • Take a look at Technorati and try doing a keyword search for “Learning 2.0” in Blog posts, in tags and in the Blog Directory. Are the results different?
  • Explore Technorati’s popular blog, searches and tags. Is anything interesting or surprising in your results?
  • Create a blog post about your discoveries on this site.
  • OPTIONAL: If you're up for a challenge, learn how to tag your posts by with Technorati tags so they can join tag searches. You may also want to consider claiming your blog and creating a watch list.

#15 Read a few perspectives on Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and the future of libraries.

  • Read two or three of the perspectives on Library 2.0 and the future of libraries from the resource list.
  • Create a blog post about your thoughts on any one of these? Library 2.0 It's many things to many people. What does it mean to you? You may like to talk about the State Library of Victoria's vision for the future, and how you see Web 2.0 being incorporated into this.

Readings:

Del.icio.us:

Tagging is an open and informal method of categorizing that allows users to associate keywords with online content (webpages, pictures & posts).

Unlike library subject cataloguing, which follows a strict set of guidelines (i.e. Library of Congress subject headings), tagging is completely unstructured and freeform, allowing users to create connections between data anyway they want.

In the past few weeks, we’ve already explored a few sites – Flickr and LibraryThing to name two --that allow users to take advantage of tagging. This week, in addition to exploring Technorati tagging, we want to also take a look at a popular social bookmarking site called Del.icio.us.

Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking manager which allows you to bookmark a web page and add tags to categorize your bookmarks. Many users find that the real power of Del.icio.us is in the social network aspect, which allows you to see how other users have tagged similar links and also discover other websites that may be of interest to you.

You can think of it as peering into another users’ filing cabinet, but with this powerful bookmarking tool each user's filing cabinet helps to build an expansive knowledge network.

For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at Del.icio.us and learn about this popular bookmarking tool.

Technorati:

So now that you’ve been blogging for a while, you might be wondering just how big the blogosphere is. Well, according to Technorati, the leading search tool and authority for blogs, the number of blogs doubles just about every 6 months

On July 31, 2006, Technorati tracked its 50 millionth blog.

Yes, these numbers are astounding, but as you’ve already seen for yourselves, blogging is so easy that these publishing tools are being taken advantage of by almost every industry, including libraries.

So how does a person get their blog listed as part of the blogosphere and how can you tag your posts with keywords to make them more findable through a Technorati search?

The answer to the first question is that your blog is probably already being captured by Technorati due to the fact that you're already using Blogger, the most popular blogging tool.

But if you want to join the party and have your blog officially listed on Technorati and also take advantage of the watch list and other features, you’ll need to claim your blog yourself.

As for tagging posts with Technorati tags? This is easy, too. All you need to do is add a little bit of HTML code to the bottom of your post (see my example below) and Technorati will pick up these tags when it spiders (or web crawls) your site.

There are a lot of new features that have been added to Technorati including new ways to search for blogs. You can search for keywords in blog posts, search for entire blog posts that have been tagged with a certain keyword, or search for blogs that have been registered and tagged as whole blogs about a certain subject (like photography or libraries).

2.0:

Library 2.0 is a term used to describe a new set of concepts for developing and delivering library services. The name, as you may guess, is an extension of Web 2.0 and shares many of its same philosophies and concepts including harnessing the user in both design and implementation of services, embracing constant change as a development cycle over the traditional notion of upgrades, and reworking library services to meet the users in their space, as opposed to ours (libraries).

Many have argued that the notion of Library 2.0 is more than just a term used to describe concepts that merely revolve around the use of technology; it also a term that can be used to describe both physical and mindset changes that are occurring within libraries to make our spaces and services more user-centric and inviting. Others within the profession have asserted that libraries have always been 2.0: collaborative, customer friendly and welcoming. But no matter which side of the debate proponents fall, both sides agree that libraries of tomorrow, even five or ten years from now, will look substantially different from libraries today.

Reading Resources:

Del.icio.us:

Technorati:

2.0:

Help:

Del.icio.us:

How Do I Register With Delicious?

  1. Go to Del.icio.us.com.
  2. Click on the “Register Button”.
  3. Fill in the registration form.
  4. Click on the “Register” button.
  5. If you don’t want to install a “Del.icio.us” button to your browser (especially if your on a work PC), scroll down the page and find the sentence “After installing, please restart Firefox. You'll be automatically taken to step 3.”. Click on the words “step 3”.
  6. Click on “View your saved pages now »”.
  7. Verify your account. Check the email account that you entered into the registration form. A verification email would have been sent. It contains a link you must click in order to verify your email address. If it does not arrive shortly, you can request another one from your settings page.

How Do I Add A Link Roll To My Blog?

  1. Go to Del.icio.us.com.
  2. Copy the “hypertext” in the text area.
  3. Go to and login to your account at Blogger.com
  4. Click on “Layout” in your dashboard menu.
  5. If not already in the “Template” page, click on the “Template” tab.
  6. Click on “Add A Page Element”.
  7. In the pop up window click on the “Add To Blog” under the HTML / JavaScript.
  8. Enter a title then paste the copied hypertext into the content text area.
  9. Click on the “Save Changes” button.
  10. View your blog to see if it works!

How Do I Bookmark A Website?

  1. Go to Del.icio.us.com and login.
  2. Execute a search for a particular term.
  3. Once you find a website you want to bookmark, click on “save this” button next to the title.
  4. Enter a description and URL if they are not already displayed then add tour tags and notes for the bookmark.
  5. Click on the “save” button.

How Do I View My Bookmarks?

  1. Go to Del.icio.us.com and login.

Technorati:

What is Technorati?

Week 7 Wikis:

  1. Learn about wikis and discover some innovative ways that libraries are using them.
    • Take a look at some library wikis.
    • Create a blog post about your findings. What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries might work well with a wiki?

  2. Add an entry to the Learning 2.0 SandBox wiki.
    • Add your blog to the Favorite Blogs page.
    • Create a post in your blog about the experience.

Readings:

Wikis:A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content.Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide, the use and popularity of these tools is exploding. Some of the benefits that make wikis so attractive are:

  • Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
  • Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what been changed and by whom.
  • Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed.
  • And users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases simple syntax structure is used.

As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, conference wikis and even library best practices wikis. PBWiki:"Sandbox" is the term that wikis often use to describe the area of the website that should be used for pure play.

For this discovery and exploration exercise, Helene Blowers at PLCMS has set up a whole Learning 2.0 Favorites wiki* that’s for nothing but play! For this “explore and play with wikis” exercise, you are asked to add your blog to this PBwiki Learning 2.0 wiki. The theme of this wiki is simply “Favorites” : Favorite books, favorite vacation spots, favorite restaurants, favorite anything …all you need to do is play and add your thoughts. To mark your adventure on this site, you should add your blog to the Favorite Blogs page.There are already a list of Blogs under "Australian Blogs".

Reading Resources:

Wikis:

PBWiki:

Help:

How DoI Add My Blog To The Favourites List on PBWIKI?

  1. Copy your URL of your blog.
  2. Go to the PBWiki Favourites page.
  3. Click on the "Edit Page" button.
  4. Scroll down the page until your find the header "Eastern Regional Libraries".
  5. Place the cursor at the end of the last entry.
  6. Press the "Enter" / "Return" button.
  7. Click on the link button.
  8. Select "URL" in the drop down menu.
  9. Enter a name to display into the "link text" box.
  10. Enter your blog's URL into the "URL text" box.
  11. Click on the "OK" button.
  12. To save the changes to the page click on the "save" button.

Week 8: Online Applications & Tools

To Do This Week

  • Take a look at some online productivity tools.
    1. Create a free account for yourself in Zoho Writer.
    2. Explore the site and create a few test documents of two.
    3. Try out Zoho Writer’s features and create a blog post about your discoveries.
  • Explore any site from the Web 2.0 awards list, play with it and write a blog post about your findings.
    1. Select any site/tool from the list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees.
    2. Explore the site you selected.
    3. Create a post about your discovery. What did you like or dislike about the tool? What were the site’s useful features? Could you see any applications for its use in a library setting?

Readings:

Online Productivity Tools:The availability and use of online productivity web-based applications
(eg: word processing and spreadsheets) has exploded over the past two years.

These powerful applications provide users with the ability to create and share documents over the internet without the need of installed desktop applications.

Some experts speculate that this emerging trend may mean the death to Microsoft Office and other software-based productivity tools, while others think web-based applications have their place, but not in the office.

But no matter which side of the office suite platform you side with, on this both sides seem to agree; web-based applications have their place.

One large benefit to web-based applications it that they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC.

Another bonus is that they easily accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file (with versioning) and provide users the ability to easily save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf).

And, you can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs and spreadsheets to author and publish posts to your blog.

It’s this type of integration with other web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to take a look at a web-based word processing tool called Zoho Writer, create a simple document and then document your discoveries in your blog. If you're up to the challenge, you might even export your document as an HTML file or publish it through Zoho to your blog.

With Zoho and web-based applications, the possibilities are endless.

Web 2.0:
Throughout the course of this Learning 2.0 program we’ve explored just a small sampling of these Web 2.0 technologies that are empowering users with the ability to create and share content.

But given time there are so many more we could explore.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to select any site from this list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees and explore it.

With so many to choose from, it might be handy to first select a category that interests you (like Books or Personal Organization) and then simply select a tool/site to explore.

Be careful to select a tool that is Free and that doesn't require a plug-in or download.

The majority of these free, so this shouldn’t be a problem.

Reading Resources:

Online Productivity Tools:
Web 2.0:

Help:

What is Zoho Writer?

What Does Zoho Writer Do?


Zoho Programs:

What Kind Of Documents Can I Make With Zoho Writer?

How Can I Post To My Blog From Zoho Writer?

How Do I Create An Account with Zoho Writer?

  1. Go to Zoho.com.
  2. Click on the "sign up" link underneath the sign in box on the right of the screen.
  3. Fill in the form with your details.
  4. Tick the "I agree to the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy" check box.
  5. Click on the "Sign Up" button.
  6. A verifcication email will have been sent to your email address you provided. Go to your email and click on the link inside the email sent from zoho writer (the email will be from accounts@zoho.com and have the title: Welcome to Zoho).
  7. You are now signed up! Edit your user profile if you want or get to work!




Posted by Space Cadet at 9:00 AM

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