Week 21 – Google Docs

One of the best ideas I saw came from 12 things you didn't know Google Docs could do - tip no. 5 Backups. My desktop computer at home crashed because the hard drive has died. I guess I could have uploaded my key files as an off site backup. This would have been very handy so long as my internet speed was quick enough so the task could be done quickly.

It was good to be able to create a form with google docs. I was able to create a helpdesk form for any computer problems. This could a form that any of our branches could submit a problem from. It is very nifty to see that once I submitted a completed from the results were logged into a spreadsheet. This could be a great way to track our local support calls. Not sure if you would give only Systems staff access to the spreadsheet or all clients. I think only systems staff but I am sure we could share the helpdesk spreadsheet out if we wanted.

I believe there would be many other ways that our library could use google docs. One example might be to setup a feedback form for our clients. This would allow us to fine tune the service to our clients needs.

Yes as many people say, "Google docs rocks".

Week 20 – Events Management

Doodle was a delight to use. Both a simple and efficient way to Poll people for all types of meetings, events or even just for making choices. As there was no need to login I was wondering for a while how to administer my poll but that quickly became clear. Brilliant and useful tool.
Google Calendar looks like a very clever tool. It could be used to host a calendar of events held by any of our libraries so that the public could link to it and see what’s on at a glance. It could even be updated by the branch librarians when they wanted to promote one of their events.
EventBrite looks like a useful tool as it will let an account be created and is free to manage an event where the tickets are free. It looks useful if you want to pay to have the extra abilities like accepting credit card payments & tracking statistics and being able to create list to contact those who have signed up for your event.

Week 19 RSS Feeds & Filtering

FilterMyRSS did not work with the link provided but did work with this address http://www.filtermyrss.com which then forwarded to another address. I was not sure what format to enter my filtering words and so hit the FAQ link which also gave me an error. When I entered some filtering terms with a , in between them and a – to exclude a term it only partly link worked ie it returned a page which was not showing correctly.

Feedsifter let me create a filter for one of my RSS feeds but did not let me subscribe to it. When I went to click on the subscribe link it gave me an error.

The feedmyinbox tool was a delight to use as it was simple and it worked wonderfully.

I feel the there would be use for filtering RSS feeds on occasions but not always.

Week 18 Slideshows, Screencasting & digital storytelling

Slideshare looks as if it could be a useful site to host a presentation which could be a great way to tell our clients about what they can access at our libraries. I like google docs because I think there could be stacks of applications for it's use. I am in a Systems team and we could use a Spreadsheet to log helpdesk requests and to update staff on the progress of their requests. I also think that we could create a template of a calendar so that regional staff could input any activities that they want to promote and have a like or have staff update the calendar as needed on our site.

The Slideshare show of the British Library's resouces available to researchers is a good example of a way to promote our library's services in a more interesting way. I really liked the way it highlighted the smorgasbord of tools that can be used.

The screencasting tools look very neat. I think that they are something we could use at our library. I will try to upload a powerpoint presentation promoting our library soon.

Cnrl website tips1

View more presentations from Eric20459.

Week 17 Nings

Nings


I thought the Mossman Library Ning was very good. It looks like a neat way to integrate web 2.1 technology. I think that libraries will need to interact more with their patrons especially when the patrons are not in the library. By engaging patrons outside the library it will keep the library connected to their users. This will allow for better promotions and greater utilisation of the library’s facilities. It is wonderful to see that Mossman has 125 members which will increase over time. Our patrons can interact on our OPAC by creating ratings and reviews for books. I feel that we should encourage this much more to help bring more life to our OPAC.

It was very interesting to see Musuem 3.0 using their Ning to elicit feedback from 39 of their clients about possible changes to the Ning. Nings are good because they allow the combinations of blogs, photo and video sites and forums all in the one unit. It is a valuable tool for any interest group.

Week 16 - Evaluation of Web 2.0 Tools

Wow. I am amazed at all the functions and capabilities of the Web 2.0 Tools. It was very time consuming but interesting exercise to try some of these tools functions. I searched for the Tweet reach of the word Library. I was astounded that it reached over 25,000 people from the 50 most recent tweets. WOW that would be a great way to see our libraries message get extra exposure. It would take a while to build up followers but it would be well worth it. TweetReach for web 2.1 Reached 63,115 people via 50 tweets. This shows me that there is considerable interest in Web 2.1 tools. This search took a fair amount of time even on a 20Mb link with no other users. I would hate to see how long this would take me from home on a 256/64 link. It is interesting to note that I can setup to be able to email a special twitter email address and Twitter will then post my message. Most of these web 2.0 tools are much more powerful than I expected. It would take a while to create a plan to take best use of them for our library. I setup a Google Alert account but did not find anything out about our library service directly. When I setup Library Staff which is much more general I got a lot of interesting information back. Setting up alerts about Library gave an insight into what other libraries are doing. This exercise gave me a much clearer idea of what these tools can do. By the way you should be able to subscribe to my blog post through Feed Burner at this address http://feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/rGWel

Week 15 - Learning 2.1 - Delicious

This weeks assignment has taken me a lot of time. It is not good when you forget all your old passwords and have to open new accounts when one already exists. I have enjoyed using Delicious and finding bookmarks to very interesting sites for my hobby of lapidary. It was great being able to refine searches with 2 keywords. I have linked to my Twitter account so that I can tweet any bookmark that I want too. I am hoping to place a Tag Cloud on my blog below.