Clam Chowder

New blog

2008-06-20T07:27:00.001-05:00

Long time since I posted here...have a new blog that I'll be using going forward located at http://blog.christopherdeweese.com/

Check it out and leave some comments!

Change comes in threes

2006-08-16T19:40:00.000-05:00

And as of August 14th, I have officially made three life changes in the span of a year. In March my beautiful daughter was born, happy and healthy and more than we could ask for. In June I started my new job, leaving LCLS after 7 excellent years. And as of August 14th, my wife and I now own a home!

We've started moving and will be finished on saturday. After this, I think we'll take it easy for a while and just get settled in.

In other news: look for me at IL 2006, I will be presenting on Mashup Applications with John Blyberg from AADL.

Fixing the radio...a life change

2006-05-09T22:10:00.000-05:00

Some months ago I posted about the radio in my Honda Civic.

Looks like I'll be getting it fixed, but not because it's bothering me. Yes library fans, I'll be fixing my radio because my drive time to work is going to increase.

At the end of May I will no longer be working at LCLS. I have accepted a new position with a company called REJIS in St. Louis. On June 1st I will join their team as a programmer analyst, essentially doing what I do now for a different set of clients and I'll be on a team of people who do what I do: code.

This is a major change for me. I've been with LCLS for seven years now. I've literally grown up there and it has a very special place in my heart. I will miss everyone at LCLS, but I won't be out of touch. I'll also miss working with all the people I have met at our "sister" systems in IL, through conferences, and through the biblioblogosphere.

I will still see some of you this fall. I was invited to speak at Internet Librarian in Monterey and will be keeping that date clear. My new employer is aware of this and they seem to think its pretty neat, so I'm looking forward to being there.

I'll be leaving LCLS with nothing but good feelings for the people there and a little sadness too. I've been lucky to serve under two excellent directors and had many colleagues there help me along the way. I was fortunate to be in a position where I was encouraged to create, to dream, and to grow. Without that type of support I do not think I could have accomplished many of the things I did.

I will be going to the local car radio shop with mixed emotions. I'll be happy to finally have a working radio again, but sad to be leaving such great colleagues.

Sad News

2006-03-20T13:04:00.000-06:00

From Tina Hubert, the Executive Director at LCLS

It is with deep sorrow that I must notify you of an LCLS staff member's death. Dan Sawler experienced a heart attack while driving the courier route this morning. He was rushed to the hospital by ambulance, but all efforts to stabilize him did not work. Dan died at Oliver Anderson Hospital in Maryville, Illinois, this morning.

We will share information regarding visitation and funeral services as it is received.

Dan was a part-time driver who was very well-regarded by all of his colleagues at the Lewis & Clark Library System and he will be sorely missed.

No-one else was injured in this incident. The courier route was delayed and shortened and all materials will arrive at their destinations throughout the week.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tina Hubert
Executive Director
Lewis & Clark Library System
425 Goshen Road
Edwardsville, IL 62025

I meet all the drivers when they are first hired because I take their photo for the website. Dan was always very friendly and he will be missed by all. My condolences to his family.

LCLS on LISNews.org

2006-03-17T13:56:00.000-06:00

Charm just sent this out to our staff: Mapping Routes

Cool! Neat to see your work get out there.

For those of you looking for baby updates, I'll post soon! Until then you can check out the new photo set @ Flickr.

Hello World - Meet Tess

2006-03-13T11:15:00.000-06:00

I just watched the entire focus of my life change. World, meet Tess Isabel, the newest member of my family. Mom and baby are doing fantastic!!!!

From TTW: Ten Ways to Lose Your Technies

2006-03-10T15:54:00.000-06:00

Michael made a great adaptation post on T en ways to lose your techies. (Note to employer: No worries, you guys do great!) He hit some great points that I want to restate in bold print.

4. Allow barriers to exist that make it difficult for IT staff and librarians to plan and collaborate

5. Bog down their projects in red tape and approvals that take weeks or months to get

Bonus: Never Dream. Never innovate. Never think outside the Box.

Many who have come to know me or work with me know that #4 and 5 are huge problems with me. Because of the nature of my work and how my position has evolved, I believe firmly in breaking down all barriers. I am trusted to do a job and there should be minimal things that prevent me from doing so. This goes for all staff!

There is an inherent disconnect that occurs when developers are not allowed to interface directly with end-users or that interfacing is done through a middle-man that causes things to be "lost in translation". Believe me, every system I've seen that was designed without direct end-user to developer communication and collaboration was more work for and accomlished less for the end users. IT and management should never forget that every system is designed to accomplish something for the end users.

When it comes to IT planning you need a true dialog between management, end-users, and IT staff. All staff should dream and say things like "It would be nice if" and the biggest thing is that...IT should not rule out anything just because. I regularly sit down in tech meetings and open the floor for people to say their wildest tech dreams. Then we look at what is available today that could possibly accomplish that. Somethings are just not feasible or affordable, but you'll be surprised at what you can accomplish just by entertaining ideas. You'll also be surprised at what other ideas are generated from that synergy.

There is a lot to be said for collaboration and putting up barriers definately does not invite that dialog or collaboration. And in that end, your internal constituents lose and so do your external.

Illinois Library Day on Flickr!

2006-03-03T12:04:00.000-06:00

March 1st was Illinois Library Day. Over 500 librarians met in Springfield, IL (the state's capital) to meet with Legislators and their staff. The librarians were also addressed by Secretary of State and State Librarian Jesse White.

For those of us that couldn't make it, we have rallied and created some hot (should I say Overdue instead?) Flickr action!

You can check out the LibraryDay2006 tag or view some of the Illinois Regional Systems that have posted photos:

Lewis & Clark Library System
Lincoln Trails Library System
Metropolitan Library System
Shawnee Library System

Also check out the Illinois Library Day Group!

If you know of more Flickr photos from Library Day, let me know!

Singing the harddrive blues...

2006-03-01T14:03:00.000-06:00

The inevitable has come. The harddisk on my almost 2 year-old Dell is starting to fail. Thanks to our next-day keep-you-harddrive warranty Dell is hooking me up with a new drive that will be here tomorrow. In the meantime I'm backing up what I can and plotting out my fresh install of Windows XP.

I know a lot of people probably see reinstalling an operating system as the biggest headache ever. I'm actually looking forward to it. I have not formatted my drive and started from scratch in nearly two years; so this is a great chance for me to declutter my electronic work life.

Fortunately this all comes at a time where I'm between major projects and can afford to take a day to restructure and reload.

Anytime you can, I recommend taking a day to do housekeeping around your office, with your electronic files, and taking care of the little things you haven't done that are bothering you.

While you're at it, check out Getting Things Done by David Allen from your library. It just might open your mind to decluttering and taking control of all the things that seem to be in control of you.

HigherEd BlogCon 2006

2006-02-27T09:06:00.000-06:00

The HigherEd BlogCon is coming to a browser near you! Starting April 3rd, the HigherEd BlogCon website will feature presentations, audio, and video on topics dealing with Teaching, Library & Info Resources, admissions, alumni relations, and communications & marketing, and websites & web development.

Thanks to Meredith at Information Wants to be Free, I will have a presentation in the Library & Info Resources track which runs from April 10th-14th.

Bookmark the page or add the feed to your favorite aggregator! (mine is Bloglines)

ILSDO Diversity Drive-in photos

2006-02-23T11:47:00.000-06:00

ILSDO held it's Diversity Drive-in workshop at the Parkland College in Champaign. There were over 65 system consultants and library staff in attendance.

Speakers included Vandella Brown from the Illinois State Library, Tracie hall from the ALA's Office of Diversity and Satia Orange from ALA's Office of Outreach.

Vandella overviewed the diversity programs available at the state library and also had us take the diversity eye exam which really makes you think about how open you are to things like having a female president or who would you rather your direct supervisor be: a white female or an asian male? A very interesting test.

Tracie had the longest of the presentations. She is a very inspiring speaker and really made you think about how populations are changing, especially in the United States and what libraries should be doing to reach out to these new population segments.

Some interesting facts:
-Illinois is always one of the top six "Gateway States" that people are most likely to migrate into from other countries.
-Less than 32% of high school graduates are ready for college upon graduation (That is Scary)
-Today the average college student graduates in six years, some are forecasting it could be as long as eight years in the future (for undergrad studies!)

Tracie also hit on some very, very library 2.0 topics. Topics that need to be discussed and topics I think that fit in with much of the library 2.0 talk that is not technology related.

My favorite: Libraries need to get rid of the "no-first" attitude. Libraries need to stop saying no as their first answer! Want to test your library? Keep a log of how many times your staff tell a patron "no". I would love to see data from libraries on how much they say no.

She discussed libraries breaking down barriers and not putting up walls for their community. Consider multilingual services and also make sure to market them to those parts of your community that could use them.

Tracie also talked about libraries as the third place and what we have to learn from places like Border's and Barnes & Noble.

Some of Tracie's best advice:
"If you don't like people, don't work in the library!"

Satia came in and wrapped things up. She added some more thought to some of Tracie's comments as well as sharing some stories about diversity.

Unfortunately I need to leave early, so I will miss out on the afternoon. But overall this was a great program to attend. To all the Illinois libraries, expect to see a lot of diversity information coming from the systems in 2006!

I took a few photos which you can find in the LCLS flickr account.

Smile Kathryn & Judy!

Tags:

Diversity

Libraries

ILSDO

Illinois

Stedman Graham speaks at the Edwardsville Country Club

2006-02-16T15:04:00.000-06:00

I was fortunate enough to be asked to provide technical support for the Leadership Series, a program being sponsored by the Glen Carbon Centennial Library (the library was awarded a grant to fund all this), the Lewis & Clark Community College, and the Edwardsville & Glen Carbon Chamber of Commerice.

The first program in the series was presented by Stedman Graham on building your life brand. What an amazing program! He is a very dynamic and engaging speaker and very, very personable. After the program he toured the Glen Carbon Library and spent some time talking to the staff and browsing the collection. I hear he asked one of the catalogers to show him what she does.

So thank you to Anne for asking Tina to lend me out for tech support there, the work was more than worth it!

Tag! I'm it!

2006-02-08T14:56:00.000-06:00

Thanks to Eli, it's now my turn:

Four jobs I’ve had:

1. Paper boy (for the E-ville Intelligencer!)
2. McSlave
3. Tech Support at several Internet Providers (none of which exist anymore...)
4. WebMASTER

Four movies I can watch over and over:

1. Ocean's 11 & 12
2. The Bourne Movies
3. Supertroopers
4. Saving Private Ryan

(the only) Two places I’ve lived:

1. Troy, IL
2. Glen Carbon, IL

Four TV shows I love:

1. 24
2. Fairly Oddparents
3. Jimmy Neutron
4. MXC

Four places I’ve vacationed:

1. Monterey, CA (Do conferences count??)
2. Chicago
3. Las Vegas
4. Ft Benning, GA (road trip for my buddies graduation from Basic)

Four of my favorite dishes:

1. Chicago Deep Dish Pizza (Gino's East!)
2. Tortellini
3. Anything my Father-in-law cooks
4. Cheesecake!

Four sites I visit daily:

1. google.com
2. bloglines.com
3. lifehacker.com
4. www.lcls.org

Four places I would rather be right now:

1. Home with my wife :)
2. In the middle of no-where with a GPS, a compass (the military style, not a crappy commercial one), and a map
3. Anywhere with a bottle of Stewart's Orange'n'Cream in my hand
4. Sleeping

(added for Eli):
Four books (or series) I love:

1. Harry Potter
2. Bourne Series (Identity, Supremacy, Ultimatum)
3. How to Survive a Robot Uprising
4. Starship Troopers

Four video games I can (and do) play over and over:
1. Star Wars Battlefront II (Xbox)
2. Mario Kart: Double Dash (Gamecube)
3. Ghost Recon 2 (Xbox)
4. C&C: Tiberian Sun (PC)

Four bloggers I am tagging:

1. walking paper
2. wanderings of a student librarian
3. what I learned today...
4. Library Service in the Metro-East

How-to: Make Firefox show the "live bookmark" button in the address bar when viewing your website

2006-02-01T10:58:00.000-06:00

This had been puzzling me for a week or so. But after a little source-viewing I found the trick to getting the live bookmark button to display in Firefox's address bar when viewing the LCLS website.

The secret:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS feed LCLS" href="http://www.lcls.org/rss.aspx"/>

That's it! Just replace the title & href= portion of this with your RSS feed info. Put it in the <head> element of your page. The same place where you link to your style sheets.

Next time you refresh, Firefox should display the little live bookmark button in the address bar (looks like this: )

Yes. I'm sure that is documented somewhere. But I didn't feel like searching for it. And now its documented here too. For the whole 20 people that read this ;)

Tags:

Firefox

Live Bookmark

Lost in another world

2006-01-26T15:36:00.000-06:00

A few days ago I was playing Ghost Recon 2 on my Xbox. After obeying orders from a faceless commander and rescuing stranded soldiers for the umpteenth time, I realized that I was bored. The game simply wasn't challenging me, nor making me think much.

I shut off the Xbox and wandered upstairs to a pile of CDs that is waiting to be put into our new desk. I located something I haven't fired up in years...

Command & Conquer - Tiberian Sun.

Yeah, yeah. Trading one war game for another. But, if you've played any of the other C&C games, or Civilization, Call to Power, etc, then you'll know why they can be so much fun (and suck up so much time).

I fired up C&C and about 2 hours later I realized that my wife was home and wanted to eat dinner.

Last night Rach found her copy of Call to Power II. She installed it and off she went. I was sitting on the bed on my laptop and she was at the desk on our desktop. About three hours later after I had finally managed to destroy my enemies base (after having much trouble gathering the resources and defending my base), I shut things down.

As we were falling asleep, Rach turns to me and says: "Sorry I played my game all night honey. But after I saw you playing the other day it made me want to play my game. I really didn't get to talk to you tonight, hope you don't mind."

Nope. I didn't mind. For three hours we both got to be in our own little worlds, where we were in charge of ensuring the survival of our (virtual) people. She was building a society (and incidentally was able to create the Internet), and I was building an army.

It was three hours of not-so-mindless silence where we both got to take our brains off the day-to-day pressures and things demanding our attention...

Like grocery shopping.

Where we came from and where we are going

2006-01-18T14:00:00.000-06:00

After finishing my previous post about IM for tech support, I just started getting a little reflective. Maybe its the Moby playing in the background or my overall somber mood today, but either way, I decided to blog this.

So, to start this journey, we'll use an old friend...The Way Back Machine.

We start our journey in October 2000, before my reign as the webmaster:

We then visit December 2000 and what are probably my first little changes to the LCLS website.

It isnt until March of 2002 that we start to see some real changes in the site. Things get wider, and bluer.

Looking closely at the March 2002 page, we see an announcement, one that would literally change the way LCLS did business on the web.

On June 17, 2002 LCLS Launched CLeO (although we did not call it CLeO just yet). To this day CLeO remains as the backbone of all the web services LCLS offers. This shot from August 2002 shows a very young CLeO integrated into the LCLS website:

It's not until April 2003 that we first see CLeO on the website as the offical name of our CE registration system.

Then, in April 2004 we can tell that I decided to use the entire screen area available in the browser, as well as a little style change:

That is the last really useful screen from the Wayback Machine. The rest are missing graphics and style information, so they look pretty plain (aka bad).

LCLS Today
The current LCLS website is really a realization of my vision for it. Years ago I saw CLeO as the leverage I needed to push LCLS towards a "portal" (how web 1.0 is that? ;) ) with customizations and services avaialable to those who had an account in CLeO.

Years ago I was told to check into XML. Along the way I tried many experiments with XML (The Extra! used to be stored in XML on the website and formatted with a little ASP scripting).

Today I offer RSS in many places on the website. I use XML for all the menus you see on the right or left hand side. I created an API that lets me access my data in a standard format (using XML). And, at the backend, is a SOAP-based webservice (XML again...) that lets me authenticate a CLeO account from any where else on the net (though I have only used it for cross-domain projects hosted by LCLS thus far).

Looking back, I can't tell you the exact steps I took to get to where we are. I just know that I learned something new every day and I didn't give up on any problem until I found a solution (even if I scrapped it two days later).

One thing I can tell you is that I had (have) a director that supported and encouraged my creativity and staff that understand the value of the web. I think you could have all the talent in the world, but if you don't have the support of people you work with and if they are not on board with where you want to go, then your talent will not reach it's full potential.

Where do we go from here
A big part of what I do also involves taking a look forward. Though I think in some cases I looked too far forward or, at least came with complicated solutions while looking forward.

The web has largely been unpredicatable. New things are always happening, someone somewhere is always innovating, and visionaries are envisioning things that eventually turn into tangible products and services. But let's face it; most of us are not gifted with such vision, nor the luxury of time to envision anything but lunch and the next time we can sleep.

Web 2.0, a term that is thrown around quite a bit lately, puts the web into a different context. A context that I realize in some ways I was working in, though without the label and without many of the things Web 2.0 brought us.

The web is about the users. It's about what they need and their data. I can cram all the features and cool programming I want into a site, but in the end it's all for naught if it has no value to my users.

CLeO was a big push for LCLS. It brought a phone/fax based system onto the world-wide web and forced our users into using a web-based product. That was a true value for the staff at LCLS. It reduced typing and manual labor, it increased access to our data and reduced errors in our CE statistics.

It was a push, but it was the last time I would need to push my users that hard into something. In fact, since then I've been trying to make up for it by offering kinder, gentler services that take advantage of CLeO and add value (hopefully) to our website for our users.

Where are we going? We're going to some places our users are ready for and some they will be soon.

In a way, the little nook of the web I'm responsible for is an endless beta-test. We've found things that work and things that don't. The things that don't work are scrapped; the things that do are enhanced.

At the end of the day I think we've added value to our users' experience by offering web services and enhanced access to data.

Where is this going? I really don't know. But I can tell you that the days of data being locked in closets, accessible only to those with the right software and the right key are gone.

IM for tech support

2006-01-18T13:45:00.000-06:00

The last two days I have been chatting with one of my library directors and one of her staff taking care of some Outlook issues.

When I started using IM at work (and encouraging others to, tho I have slacked in helping get it installed), I envisioned this as one use. So far I am happy with the way it's worked in tackling this problem (corrupted .PST file in Outlook).

During the conversation on IM I got another support call over the phone. That worked out pretty well because I was able to handle both at the same time.

Barb actually brought up using IM for tech support at our GateNet meeting (I was not there, but Bill told me this after the meeting). I think it is a fine idea and am definately interested in testing it out.

Normally I used IM to stay in touch with my wife (most of our conversation is split about 50/50 between IM and voice conversations) and a few friends. The popularity IM is getting for what I'll call "legit" uses (aka useful work uses), has given me some leverage to encourage other staff here and at my members to try it out.

For those LCLS Members that are interested, there are many uses for IM besides contacting me for support.

Aaron Schmidt will be here for his IM Reference workshop and if you're interested, you should go! Aaron is a great guy and has a ton of experience using IM in his library.

In the meantime, here are all the ways to contact me on IM:
Yahoo! : ChrisDeweese25
AIM : ChrisDeweese25
MSN : chrisd_at_lcls.org (replace the at with @)

And no. I am not advertising free IM based tech support. So, I won't handling support calls for other libraries outside of LCLS, unless of course, you're using CLeO :)

Does anyone else watch 24???

2006-01-15T23:54:00.000-06:00

Seriously. After five seasons the writers still amaze me.

If you haven't kept up with this show, go rent/buy/borrow seasons 1-4 and then pick up season 5. It is just insane. My family is hooked and they are trying to catch up on the seasons they missed. Rach has been with me since season 1 and we have been trying to keep it all straight.

You can pick it up at any time really, but the show has so much more impact if you've seen the previous seasons.

Oh man...we still have 2 more hours tomorrow night!

Tags:

Jack Bauer

Am I the last to notice this? (see pic)

2006-01-14T20:27:00.000-06:00

Amazon adds tagging. When did that happen?

Tags:

Amazon

Tagging

Gaming @ your library - Glen Carbon Centennial Public Library

2006-01-13T23:53:00.000-06:00

65 Kids.
15 Pizzas.
More soda than we could track.
2 Xboxes
1 GameCube
1 PS2
5 hours.

Wow. What a night. I was totally floored by the response we got.

The setup:
2 42" TVs, 2 Xboxes (8 controllers total), and Star Wars Battlefront II. Huge hit. I could not keep the kids off it
1 Gamecube, 4 controllers, and Mario Kart - excellent. This got played all night too.
1 PS2, a project, DDR + 2 red octane pads. They were lined up for this one. We had beginners to advanced.

I let the kids run the night mostly, just tried to make sure they rotated through players. Battlefront 2 was the hardest to keep the kids switching out since it can be a really involved game (especially with teams).

I have a lot more thoughts and I'll post more when I collect them.

For now, here's the photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lcls/sets/72057594047863762/

Tags:

Gaming

Libraries

Library2.0

Woohoo!!!!

2006-01-11T18:59:00.000-06:00

Tags:

Gaming

Gaming@yourlibrary

Package Mapper: More Google Maps love

2006-01-11T10:13:00.000-06:00

From Lifehacker, I discovered PackageMapper.com

from the site:

Package Mapper shows you a map of your FedEx, UPS, USPS package routes. Enter a carrier and a tracking number to see your package's progress plotted on the map. Sign in to enter a list of packages and see their current locations on a table or map.

How cool is that? Track one or multiple packages. That is just sweet.

If anyone tries it, let us know how it does.

Can anyone tell me why Google Maps isn't the coolest thing? I hope to post an article soon on how to integrate Dynamic Google Maps using ASP.NET and Javascript.

Tags:

Google Maps

Standard Feed Icon

2006-01-11T10:01:00.000-06:00

Kelli posted about the new feed icons from FeedIcons.com. Hopefully as more people adopt it, it will become the defacto icon for RSS feeds.

I put them into action on the LCLS website this week.

Feed icon in TaBS:

Feed icon in our News system:

Tags:

icons

How To: Add your Library Catalog to the Firefox Search bar

2006-01-10T12:32:00.000-06:00

(For some reason I can't post this to the LCLS Weboratory, so I'm putting it up here)

What you need:
-A text editor: ex, notepad, textpad, something to edit plain text with.
-A 16x16 .GIF or .PNG file to serve as the Icon that shows up in the search bar
-A website to search
-A website to store the .src file and the .html file on.

First lets start by creating the .src file that will tell Firefox how & where to search.

The first part is the Search section. This is where you set up the address and parameters for the search:

<search
version="7.1"
name="LCLS | Catalog | Title Search"
description="Find items in the LCLS Catalog by title"
method="get"
action="http://webcat.lcls.org/search/t"
searchForm="http://webcat.lcls.org/search/t"
queryEncoding='UTF-8'
queryCharset='UTF-8'
>

/* update */
Version – this is not arbitrary. It needs to be set to 7.1 or higher for Netscape Compatibility.

Name – this is what is displayed in the Firefox search box.

Description – honestly, not sure what this is supposed to do; I haven’t seen it work if it does anything.

Method – the method is how the data is submitted. Get uses a querystring (something like: http://mysite.org/search.asp?search=help. Post, posts the values in the HTTP headers.

How do you figure it out? Easy! Go to the page that has the search form you want to search. View the source. Find the form and look for something that looks like this:
<form name=”someform” method=”get”> or <form name=”someform” method=”post”>

The method= line of the form will tell you what method is used. While you’re there, also note the name of the textbox as well.

Action – the “action” of the form, this is the page the values are either posted to or sent to with the get method. The action may be specified in the form tag. Look for it when peeking at the source.

SearchForm – this is the address of the form. It may also be the same as the action.
Encoding and Charset I default to UTF-8. Most everyone would use this.

<input name="SEARCH" user >
<input name="sourceid" value="firefox">

The first input should use the same name as the text box on the original form. The sourceid is just tacking on an extra argument that could be used for statistics by the web server.

Finally we close our search tag and include update information so Firefox knows where to look for changes. This also sets the URL of the icon.

</search>

<browser
update="http://labs.lcls.org/firefox/lclscatalog.src"
updateicon="http://labs.lcls.org/firefox/lclscatalog.png"
updatecheckdays="3"
>

When you are all done, save this as whateveryouwanttocallit.src.

Next we set up the html page. For this, I used the exact same java code that I found on several pages where you could add search options to the Firefox search bar. There is nothing special or of my own creation at all here. I just modified the values.

Place this in a <script > tag inside the head element of your html page.

<script type=”text/javascript”>
function addEngine(name,ext,cat,type)
{
if ((typeof window.sidebar == "object") && (typeof window.sidebar.addSearchEngine == "function")) {
window.sidebar.addSearchEngine(
"http://labs.lcls.org/firefox/"+name+".src",
"http://labs.lcls.org/firefox/"+name+"."+ext, name, cat );
} else {
alert('error adding engine');
}
}
</script>

I modified the addEngine function to include the url of where I was hosting the files. +name+ just fills in the name of the module. +ext fills in the type of graphic (ex .gif, .png).

Finally, add this inside the href= of the link you want people to click to add the search to their Search bar:
<a href=”javascript:addEngine('lclscatalog','png','General','0')”>click me!</a>

The parameters in addEngine are:
-Name of .src file
-File extension for the icon
-Category (I just left it at general)
-Type (I left this at 0)

When you’re all done, put the .src file, the .html file, and the .gif or .png in the same folder on your website. Direct users to the .html file, they click on the link, say ok to add the engine and you’re all done!

Tags:

Firefox

Library 2.0

Yes I'm still here!

2006-01-09T08:30:00.000-06:00

Busy as ever. This Friday is the first Gaming @ your library event. I'm a little nervous, but I think it should go well. Just tying up some loose ends.

I have also introduced four new features on the LCLS website:
-Offical annoucnements of the Google maps enhanced member directory (ok, not totally new, but it's "official")

-LCLS delivery route maps using Google Maps (and the new LCLS API)

-Tagging in our News posting system (which is really a blog)

-TaBS: Tagging, Bookmarking, Sharing. A bookmarking tool that allows our member library staff to store & share bookmarks using their CLeO account.

All these features have been developed over the last month or so. I have worked out most of the bugs (I hope :)).

You will all be happy to know that there is RSS at just about every corner of the News Tags & TaBS. Also, I have integrated the news tags & TaBS data so that if you are in browsing tags in the news archive, you will see bookmarks from TaBS that are tagged with the tag you are browsing. If you're in TaBS you will see news items tagged with the tag you are browsing.

Phew! I don't think I've been this busy in a long time!

If you have any questions or suggestions let me know!

Tags:

Still Here

Library2.0

Improving: the new me resolution

2005-12-28T12:32:00.000-06:00

After 3 days and 2 nights of living in the sick bay (a.k.a. the pull out bed in the couch), I'm starting to feel better. Appetite is back and so is some of my energy. I'm currently laundering and cleaning any items that I may have "infected". My wife does not want a repeat of the nagging cold she had that turned into a massive ear infection.

This has been a reminder of some of the words I posted before going on holiday and some of the words from Michael. We really do need to slow down sometimes. While are minds are capable of so much, our bodies can lag and sometimes we just need to rest.

Common sense? Yes, for those that have it. But we all know how easy it is to let ourselves get caught up in things and then slip into some form of illness or injury. Some of us this plagues more than others (it's 12:45PM and I just remembered to eat breakfast...)

I've taken quite an interest in many health related things; because of what I've experienced in the past, as well as my acknowledgement that aging requires you to treat yourself differently (no more skateboarding for me...). No, I'm not that old, but it doesn't stop me from thinking about my health and my future.

So I encourage everyone to step back and take a break. No, you don't have to take a week off with a flu/viral infection (better for you if you can avoid it!), but, try to find something you can do everyday to improve your wellness. Be it a small change to your diet, increased exercise routine (or starting one for that matter), or picking a time to just relax and do "mundane" things to let you mind unwind (unwinding the mind has a big effect on your ability to sleep at night...).

I'm not suggesting any New Year's Resolutions, because lets face it, those have just become a cliche. Everyone knows if you make a New Year's resolution you won't keep it.

Think of this as a new me resolution. A promise you make to yourself and/or those that love you, that you will do something every week/month to improve your wellness, be it physical or mental.

If you could do something everyday to feel better, why wouldn't you want to?

My tip for the day: Relax the eyes.
How?
Close your eyes. Take in a deep breath and then tense every muscle in your body (yes. like you're straining on the toilet). Release your muscles while you exhale.
Do this a few times on every break you take. Especially if you stare at the computer screen.
[Kudos to the Nov 2005 Issue of Men's Health magazine for this one]

**Disclaimer: I am not a health professional. I'm telling you something I read in a magazine column that was authored by a health professional. I am not responsible if you hurt yourself doing this. You are responsible for you. If something hurts when you try this, then it is not a good idea to keep doing it and you should see your health professional to speak about it.

***Isn't it sad that I feel I have to post something like the above? But really people, use what common sense you have. Seriously.

Tags:

getting

better

Five days offline and what do I get for Xmas?

2005-12-27T12:18:00.000-06:00

The flu! Or some derivative of it according to my doc. He suggested 2-3 more days of staying at home and gave me some "concoction" to help with the soreness in my throat.

So thank you whoever it was that passed me this great virus!

Looks like I'll see everyone sometime after the new year...let's hope this only lasts another day or two.

Tags:

beingsicksucks

Michael Says: Take a break!

2005-12-22T13:47:00.000-06:00

Michael made a post in January 2005, that he resurrected in TTW favorites, that really hits home with me.

"The Balanced Librarian" touches on something I've been struggling with lately. Since Internet Librarian I have been pushing myself at a frantic pace to come up with ideas, programs, projects, and anything I think that could turn into something for our members.

Since then I've started two blogs, a gaming project, enhanced our web services internally, and am getting ready to launch a new web service early in the new year. Not to mention all the new contacts and friends I've made. Of course, my wife and I are expecting our first child in March.

In a given day I have more thoughts that I forget than ones I remember to write down, let alone ones that become a tangible idea or prototype. That has been driving me crazy. At least 3 times now in the past 2 months I have stayed up until 3 or 4 in the morning working on something.

Just the other night it happened again, I was up until 230AM, for no reason other than I couldn't stop working on the program I was working on.

Normally when this used to happen to me, it was a hobby related thing and it would pass. But this is my job. For me, the lines between work and fun have been blurred. The work I do is fun to me, it's challenging, and I can't just stop.

Starting tomorrow (friday dec 22nd) at 5PM, when I leave work, I will not be on the Internet. I am not going to write any more code, I'm not going to make little changes to any projects I am working on. I'm going to see my family, spend time with my wife, and play Nintendo.

I will be back online Tuesday at 8AM when I come back to work. And you can expect nothing but the frantic development pace I've been on since late October.

Tags:

Unplug

relax

Carnival of the Infosciences #18

2005-12-19T08:06:00.000-06:00

I'll blame it on the holidays, but today's carnival tour will be a little short. It seems that many of our infoscience bloggers are not at their computers. Thanks to those who answered my plea and got entries to me late Friday.

Before we enter the carnival I have one service announcement: Bloglines users will be lost today while Bloglines moves datacenters. For most of the day the site will be up, but they will stop updating later today and hopefully tomorrow Bloglines users the world over will wake up to a faster, more responsive Bloglines (though I thought it was doing pretty well for the most part).

Today we start off with one of my favorite topics: Library 2.0. John Blyberg posts his thoughts on the road ahead; how we can reach library 2.0. Just a few days later Michael Stephens and Michael Casey had an IM conversation about where to begin.

Moving right along Laura Blalock reveals a dark secret. She doesn't use tags. Not even on her own content. But worry not my fellow geeks. There is method to her madness. If not method, at least sound reasoning. Hear her out before you decide to unsubscribe to her blog!

If you're sad about Bloglines outage today then you'll have time to try out something the 'Brary Web Diva has been using: Feedblitz. Kelli tells us why she thinks Feedblitz is interesting and a few things she found surprising when learning how people subscribe to her feeds.

The week in controversy: Do conference organizers need to rethink how they treat invited speakers? The Shifted Librarian seems to think so. Who could truly disagree with her plight? Conferences do cost money, but being an invited speaker, you would think that conference fees could be waived at least for the day.

While browsing around carnival hosts of the past I found this from the Lethal Librarian. Seems the Non-Female Librarians Association has got itself a little (unwanted) attention. While I can sympathize with their plight (I am the only male in my office today), one must tread carefully. I'm not much of an association man, but I can't say that I have not noticed I am often outnumbered in this profession. Though my age, more than anything, has really determined how people view me (Oh yeah, I'm the youngest full-time staffer as well). Which is ok by me, I do mostly enjoy change and I love to shake things up :)

Hopefully none of this scares away Joy. But after reading about what she has done to land a library job, I'm not sure she'll turn around and run just yet.

As we exit, I truly wish you all have a wonderful holiday season. Do what you enjoy with the people you like to be with!

While you're taking time off, be thinking of what you can send to Joy for the Carnival of the Infosciences #19. She'll need your entries by January 8th. That's plenty of time to come up with something to ring in the New Year, carnival style.

Technorati tags: infoscience, blogcarnival

Need submissions for: Carnival of the Infosciences #18!

2005-12-16T09:18:00.000-06:00

Hello dedicated readers (all 10 of you anyway ;) )- I need entries for the next Carnival of the Infosciences which I'm hosting on MONDAY DEC 19th!

For information on how to submit an entry read this. Following those guidelines, e-mail me, with:

The title of your entry.
The URI (address) of your entry.
A description or summary of the entry.
Your name or other moniker by which you wish to be referenced.

So far I have one entry submitted, and one that I found and will be including. So help a blogger out and send me some entries so we can make the next carnival a real show.

Send me your entries by 6PM Eastern on Sunday Dec 18th (my wedding anniversary!).

It's the last one before the Christmas & New Year's break so let's make this one help jump start us into 2006!

Technorati tags: infoscience, blogcarnival

Small victory...a personal note

2005-12-14T12:10:00.000-06:00

Probably..this isn't the place to post this given the intent of this blog, however, it is my blog so I guess I can post whatever I feel like.

Some of you may know this, many don't but, five years ago I was the recipient of stem cell transplant, during my second round with hodgkins disease. Fortunately, I was able to donate the stem cells to myself, not requiring another donor. I was told a lot of things, 50-70% cure rate, no chance of having children naturally, blah blah blah. Most of it went in one ear and out the other.

Six months ago I saw my doctor, the usual, doing fine, blood's fine, nothing weird going on. That was just days before we found out my wife was pregnant. We knew a few months earlier that having children was no longer going to require us looking into adoption or other means, but we didn't say anything to my doctor.

Until today. When my oncologist walked through the door, we must have looked like two kids with our hands in the cookie jar, she stopped, looked at both of us and said: "What? What's wrong?" I couldn't help but grin from ear to ear and then I asked Rachel to stand up, and the words I heard next won't leave me anytime soon.

"Is she, wait, she's...no, HOW DID YOU DO THAT??"

That's right. My oncologist asked how we managed to get my wife pregnant. Sparing her the birds and bees story I reassured her, to her disbelief, that it is in fact our baby and things happened natuarlly. She was floored.

In her ten or more years in oncology, I am her first male patient to have fully recovered in every way from a stem-cell transplant. She has one female patient that, under similar circumstances, recovered fully as well.

So, how good do I feel today (did I mention I'm off all day too)? And in another 30 minutes, I get to see our darling daughter again!

For some of the folks at LCLS this story will hit kinda close to home, because it was our former director Susan Lucco who told me to take as much time as I needed and kept a job waiting for me when I was ready to come back to work.

Things do work out, sometimes in ways we'd never expect.

Using Firefox? Add an LCLS Web catalog title search to your Firefox Search bar

2005-12-12T15:28:00.000-06:00

I decided I wanted to know how this worked, so today I came up with this:
http://labs.lcls.org/firefox/default.html

I created one for LCLS and for MLS (because it was so easy).
This will let you do a title search right from the Firefox search toolbar, instead of having to load the catalog, and do it there. I will be posting this to our catalog to invite patrons to try it out if they are using Firefox.

If you're not using Firefox, check it out. It's a great browser. One of the few browsers that has really changed how I use the web. (Can you say Tabs? I knew you could!)

Calling for submission(s)

2005-12-12T08:14:00.000-06:00

On Monday, December 19th I will be hosting: Carnival of the Infosciences #18. So what does that mean!? I need submissions. If you read a great post on one of your favorite infoscience blogs this week, send it my way!

I won't really have a "theme" per se, so whatever you find to be interesting just email me, or post in the comments.

To get an idea of what the carnival will look like, check out: The Krafty Librarian who is hosting this week's Carnival of the Infosciences #17

So check it out and e-mail me (chrisd at lcls dot org) or leave a comment!

Finally had some fun with fd's Flickr Toys

2005-12-08T08:18:00.000-06:00

Made myself a trading card. These are great!

Check out the rest in the Librarian Trading Card Pool on Flickr.

Want to make a card? Check out fd's Flickr Toys

Almost forgot...Videos!!!!!!

2005-12-07T09:34:00.000-06:00

I took a few videos on my Canon A70 camera.

Eli commentating a Mario Kart tournament match - .AVI 12.3MB, 49sec
DDR - Jenny and Jack - .AVI 11.6MB, 46sec
DDR - Eli and Chris K - .AVI 20.2MB, 1min 10sec
DDR - Jenny and Chad - .AVI 27.3MB, 1min 53sec (battle of the Bloggers! Hidden Peanuts vs The Shifted Librarian)

If anyone wants to mirror these, let me know!

Technorati tag:
gaminginlibraries2005

I'm back home...collecting my thoughts

2005-12-07T08:30:00.000-06:00

What a conference. If you weren't there, you really missed something inspiring. But, there is hope...thanks to Blogger Alley, you can read not only notes, but thoughts on what was said and done at the conference.

Who made up "Blogger Alley"? These are the people that made themselves known:
(and sat in the back corner together ;) )

Aaron: Walking Paper
Beth: Game On: Games in Libraries
Chad: Hidden Peanuts
Jenny: The Shifted Librarian
Kelly: Library web Diva
Michael TTW
Me Clam Chowder

The symposium also made it into ALA TechSource: http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/blog_detail.php?blog_id=103

And you can check Technorati: GaminginLibraries2005
For pics...Flickr of course! http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/gaminginlibraries2005/

I met a lot of great people, the bloggers listed above weren't the only ones.

I can see a lot of great ideas and collaborative projects coming from this. My thanks to all the speakers who shared their ideas and especially to Eli. Eli has shared his work at Ann Arbor and given us all a lot to think about. I know his colleague John blogs...but maybe one day Eli would consider it!

Also..as Michael stated..A big, big, big thanks to Jenny. Jenny has the vision to put this kind of stuff togehter. She's not only an asset to MLS, but to Illinois libraries and systems, and to the greater library community. So thanks Jenny! I am definately looking forward to the next one.

Read on...I'll post more of my thoughts as soon as I get caught up and have more time to think on it. Also, look forward to seeing some new ideas worked into my Gaming @ Your Library program. The response by LCLS members has been better than I thought it would.

As it was said at the conference, having gaming in your library is not an "if". It's a "when".

Technorati Tag:GaminginLibraries2005

Gaming in Libraries: “What Libraries Can Do for Gamers Other than Programming” – Beth Gallaway, Northwest MA Regional Library System

2005-12-06T14:24:00.000-06:00

“What Libraries Can Do for Gamers Other than Programming” – Beth Gallaway, Northwest MA Regional Library System

Beth is our DDR queen. She took top honors in Monday night’s DDR tournament run by Eli.

Beth gave a shout out to Blogger Alley

Thanks Beth!

Seven Things You Can Do Tomorrow – To make your library more welcoming to gamers

Use games to do readers advisory
Be a strategy guide
Embrace your inner technogeek
Be flexible
Plan change
Immerse yourself in pop culture…especially videogame culture
Try some games!

See Beth’s blog @ http://LibGaming.Blogspot.com

Games as reader’s advisory:

Instead of:
-What authors do you like to read?
-What are the last 3 books you read?
-What did you like about them?

Ask:
-What movies do you like?
-What TV shows do you watch?
-What games do you play?

Research the games and find what is appealing about the games. That will help you to make recommendations.

Beth has posted a list of suggested author based on what games they liked. She picked MMORPGs first since those are some of her favorite.

Historical simulations – On screen now is a list of “historical simulation games” and types of books that may interest players of those games.

Sports games – what kind of books would players of these like?

Strategy & Puzzle games – what kind of books would players of these like?

First Person Shooters (FPS) – what kind of books would players of these like?
Simulations (things like the Sims) – what kind of books would players of these like?

Japanese/Manga tie-in – Tie in games with popular Japanese Manga/Anime titles.

Gaming Books for Librarians:
John Beck & Mitchell Wade – “Got Game?”

James Gee – “What Video Games Have to Teach us About Learning and Literacy”

Neil Howe – “Millenials Rising: The Next Great Generation”

Henry Jenkins III & Justine Cassell – “From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games”
John Katz – “Geeks: “

Be a strategy guide:
-Don’t be a level boss – in the game world there is usually a “boss” you have to beat. Be a coach or mentor
-Show, don’t tell
-Make it interactive
-Get them started
-Have a free-for-all
-Ask for a demo of expertise – find out what your teens know and may be able to help you with. Get them involved!
-Be open minded – “non-judgemental”. Don’t make judgments about what they play.

Embrace your inner technology geek
-Upgrade – Keep up! If you can’t afford it, write a grant
-Get a screen name – Use IM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is where they are! And of course…it’s free.
-You can’t break it
-Pilot projects
-Read tech news

Try it! This generation does not expect perfection. It’s “cool” if there is something new every week.

Be Flexible
-Change the space
-Flexible furnishings – has more than one use. “Stool, or Tray?” Gamers like to be able to control their environment. Give them options!
-Say yes. “If it starts to feel good saying no…that’s when its time to get out of the public library business.”
-Go meta. Gamers can see a wide perspective. They are attuned to details and can see a wider perspective.
-Customize. Offer different formats, different software, RSS feeds for your blog…(YES RSS, I will not quit talking about it!)

Plan Change
Have a long-range plan; be willing to change it!
-Sticky content – frequently updated, see what’s new.
-Web
-Facility
-Accept Change
-Plan

Immerse yourself in pop culture
-Know what’s hot/what’s not
-Pop goes the library
-Know about crossovers – Movies/music/games – find out what’s coming out and what related items are available.

…Especially video game culture
-Watch Red vs Blue (http://redvsblue.com/)
-Read Penny Arcade(http://pennyarcade.com/)
-View PBS’s Culture Shock You Decide: Video Games
-Skim gaming magazines
-Link to gaming websites
-Pay attention to gaming! Watch the kiosks at Wal-Mart, etc. See what people are playing!
-Join the LibGaming Google Group
-Read the blog: http://libgaming.blogspot.com/

What services from game can libraries adopt?
-24/7 access
-Free services – chat, music, articles, movies, games
-Home delivery/online content delivery
-Social bookmarking or tagging – within the library catalog (I really really want this.)
-Nonjudgement from librarians
-Avatars / immersive library tutorials
-Customizable / modifiable
-Food – we eat at our computers!
-Programs of interest to gamers (gaming fests, readers advisory/gaming tie-ins, etc)

Ok……my fingers are tired..I think this is a wrap up. Beth is finishing up what I think was a great wrap up session. Check the other blogger’s I’ve referenced and make sure you check out the pictures on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/gaminginlibraries2005/

I’ll be back tonight and at work tomorrow with a lot to talk about!

Technorati Tag: gaminginlibraries2005

Supporting a Culture: Gaming at the Library – Matt Gullet and Kelly Czarnecki, Bloomington Public Library

2005-12-06T14:05:00.000-06:00

The second to last session of the 2 day Gaming in Libraries Symposium. As I post this, they are wrapping up with questions on this session.

Supporting a Culture: Gaming at the Library – Matt Gullet and Kelly Czarnecki, Bloomington Public Library

Purposeful programming
What do teens represent in the life-cycle of a library patron?
Builds on the holistic approach to serving lifelong learning
Fits into the overall strategy of technology programming
Maintains purpose space & value in the minds of our public

A key is to make these things a “team effort”. Get people on board and supportive of the program.

Approach asking for resources with confidence. Don’t feel like you have to beg your way into getting prizes/equipment/etc.

Video: Matt is showing a promo video for the game fests. Not only do they use PC games, but they have consoles and regular board games as well.

The PC games they use are Battlefield 1942 and Sims 2. They also are using DDR (PS2) and Mario Kart (Gamecube). For Battlefield they can turn down some of the options to make it less graphic.

Bloomington does theirs quarterly.

How did the GameFests progress?
Funding – Bloomington was awarded some small grants as a technology center in IL
Administrative support
Lessons Learned

These things can impact kids and parents and create a good feeling for the library.

…

Ok I had a few interruptions, so I stopped about halfway through here. Getting back to it.

Creating a culture, ecology, or Community? … @ the Library.
Combining events – Anime / DDR night. Kelly has held some Anime / DDR nights at BPL.

BPL is a Project Next Generation site. This helps fund the after school computer club.
BPL is using a game-creating curriculum from The Learning Community Group’s CyberSchool. This curriculum is used with the computer club.
…

Quick notes – our Internet has still been spotty. And for some reason, there is now an obnoxious hum in the speakers, so it’s been kind of a pain to listen to. We thought it was Eli’s amp for DDR, but nope. Not sure what’s doing it, and neither is the A/V guy here.

Overall, this has been an awesome two days. We still have one speaker left to go. After a day or two, I will post my overall thoughts on what I saw and did here.

Technorati tag: gaminginlibraries2005

Gaming in Libraries: Eli Neiburger, Ann Arbor District Library – “Implementing Gaming Applications in Libraries”

2005-12-06T11:25:00.000-06:00

Ok. If you read nothing else of my notes on this. Read these. Read all the notes on Eli's presentation. AADL is doing this right and they are doing it BIG. The important point is that they started small and it took off.

Eli Neiburger, Ann Arbor District Library – “Implementing Gaming Applications in Libraries”

Eli, is the man when it comes to gaming in libraries. I got to spend a lot of time talking to Eli last night during the tournaments and at dinner. He is a very cool guy and is willing to share what has worked and has not worked for AADL.

His presentation is the true application of what we have been talking about since yesterday.

Why Videogames?
$11 Billion/year business
Fundamental Component of the “Modern Media Appetite”
A new format libraries should not ignore
Boys! 95% of teens boys play videogames.

To circ, or What?
MARC Records
Intense Competition (against video game rental services)
Kiosks and “The Bun” – Gaming kiosks in libraries will have “rules” vs. kiosks at other places where there are no rules.
Quote of the day!!
“If you have to tell your board you want to do gaming, then they are micromanaging you. You should be able to tell your board you are doing gaming. Its just another format for a library program.” –Eli
Establish a brand
Brand your gaming events separately. Call it something different, so you can label it and brand it.

AADL has tournaments:
Super Smash / Double dash
Dance Dance Revolution
Kids’ Kart
Adult Kart and Super Smash
Madden

You can’t try one program and give up if attendance is low. Just keep doing it each month, you can use the same program over and over, but as it gains popularity it will draw more and more people.

One parent commented during last season’s DDR tournament: “Did you know this is the first time all summer he has been out of bed before 11?”
(Imagine drawing kids to your library like that.)

AADL – has not had any complaints from parents about these events.

Their tournaments have age brackets, ex. Grades 1-5 have a Mario Kart tournament.

Libraries have lost the 20 something generation. We need to work on targeting their kids and get them into the library. To change their view of libraries and services they offer.

”If you do not offer them something of value now, you will be irrelevant to them for the rest of their lives”

Libraries must stay relevant. It is important to draw them to the library during their formative years to leave that impression on them about the library.

Gaming events can be a core service, just like story-times.

Once you buy all the equipment, you can reproduce events over and over at a low cost.

“There’s no bottom line for us (libraries). All you have to do is not spend more than you get.” –Eli

Why Mario Kart?
Consoles have an advantage over PC games because the set up is much easier. Usually there is no configuration of IP’s, servers, etc. Also, if you do PC games, especially MMORPGs, you are not adding any social dimension to the game. Those games are social.

Consoles, however, the social dimension comes from playing the game with more people than they could at home. (Home they could have up to 4, but with a network you can link up to 16 consoles [if you have the resources]).

Also with PCs, many games have very high requirements for the processor, memory, etc. So it makes it very hard to play the latest games.

Ideas: Collaborative story events where people come in and tell stories about their adventures in MMORPGs.

Why Nintendo? Their games are some of the “best on the market” for all ages. They are competitive, and fun.
(Using the ESRB ratings to choose age appropriate games)

Why these games?
Game Cube – 3 games use LAN mode, best one is Mario Kart, plays up to 8 players
Super Smash Brothers – no multiplayer, but very easy to do tournaments
Both these have high replay value
Dance Dance Revolution – about 50/50 boys & girls

Super Smash / Double Dash
6 month season
6-hour tournaments
Single Player and Team Events
Sur-Prize Round (A different game each time)
$70, $50, $30 giftcards
Clan Play (organized teams) and Leaderboards
Championship Prizes: PSP, iPod, Nintendo DS, Nintendo Gameboy Advanced

Competitive, Collaborative, and Creative.

Consider setting up the equipment once, and doing a weekend worth of events.
(Check out their blog @ http://axis.aadl.org/)
AADL uses the website and blog to keep kids interested in the “off season”. The kids can sign up and leave comments.

They also use it to show the leaderboards.

(By tying all this together, the kids get a sense that they are a part of something bigger. It becomes a part of their life and something they look forward to)

Running a Tournament
Check-in
Open Play
Build Brackets
Qualification Rounds
Keep Score
Serve Food & Drink (if you do DDR, have water!)
Elimination Rounds
Finals and Prizes
Minimum 2 staff, scorekeeper & m.c.

Above and Beyond
(add these to the event to make it even more valuable to the players)
Play-by-play and color commentary (they choose contestants to provide commentary to the events. How cool is that?)
Project a cube, a camera view, or both (a spare console that you can use to show a view of the game)
Televise (or webcast) it Live! (Ok..so I’m totally sick. They broadcast their tournaments, LIVE, to cable TV)
Music
Make it a season
Track statistics
Open Play and tournament weekends.

Doing it on the Cheap
Find geeks to help and get teens involved
Have attendees bring their own equipment
Partner with Schools and Nonprofits
Sponsorships
Free & Low-cost promotion (post DDR tournaments to places like ddrfreak.com, etc)
Get several events out of a setup

Selling it to the Brass
Popular with parents
Make your library a focus of their interests
Get boys in the door
Guaranteed to induce gasps (When was the last time you told middle schoolers dropped their jaws when you told them about a library program?)
Promote core services to a tough audience (not just on their own, but by promoting the gaming events, they will find out about the other services you offer)
Games are not all “prostitutes and gunplay”
They’re going to be taxpayers someday
Not just for teens
(Tip turn off lights! Kids don’t want to be reminded of school, make it dark like a basement)

Technorati Tag: gaminginlibraries2005

Day 2 - George Needham, OCLC, Keynote @ Gaming in Libraries

2005-12-06T09:21:00.000-06:00

Day 2 – George Needham, OCLC

“What Can Librarians Learn from Gamers?”
(If you have seen the pictures, then you’ll know that George was no stranger to DDR last night, if not, check them out: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/gaminginlibraries2005/)

“How gamers can show librarians a new way of developing and sharing knowledge”.

OCLC’s 2003 Environmental Scan: Pattern Recognition
Trends: Self-service, disaggregation (the web makes it easy to break up information and get what you want), collaboration
Gamers show all three of these trends in action. Gamers represent a change in the way people use the net and access information.

How environmental factors shape life:
Ex. George’s grandfather, Joe Duffy. George is listing all the historical events that happened during his grandfather’s lifetime. We are shaped by the world we live in. Joe Duffy, was shaped by the events that occurred during his lifetime.

First Video Game (via Wikipedia): “Tennis for Two” (1958)
First Computer Game: “Spacewar” (1962)
First Home Video Game: “Pong” (1975)
Nintendo Console Gaming: Japan, 1983, USA 1985; Gameboy 1989
First Multiplayer Online Game: “Air Warrior” (1987)

How many gamers are there?
According to Michael Tchong:
83,000,000 gamers --- everything from online backgammon to Battleground 2.
$11.2 billion/year industry
80% of households with children
Almost half of college-age online gamers are women

What makes gamers special?
They think and process information differently
… (missed something)
… (phone call)

He’s going over some of the information from John Beck’s book on gamers and how gaming has shaped the way they think.

A study by Dr. James Rosser Jr., did a study that showed that gaming surgeons performed better than surgeons that did not play games. Dr. Rosser is a 50 year-old surgeon and gamer.

Gamers want to win, they want to compete. But when they are done, they collaborate on how the game could be better. In online games, veterans often help “newbies” (aka n00bs). Even though, those newbies will eventually be their competitors.

What should librarians learn from this?
Rethink how we offer services
-Provide multiple paths to the same information (you know like, RSS)
-Many formats (like RSS)
-Consider the non-print learners (online tutorials, gamers are very familiar with these)
-The librarian and “information priest” is “as dead as Elvis”
-What can the user contribute? (Can you say Wiki? If not, you need to be thinking about it.)

(George is discussing someone who asked: “Why not do a library mashup?” For example when the new Harry Potter movie comes out, you could display the Book, the Movie, the coloring books, the VIDEO GAMES, etc. Promote the whole package)

Rethink where we offer services
-Physical layout
-Online services are “journeys” not “destinations”
-24/7/365 is barely enough

Bottom line...if we’re not where the users are, they are not using us.

Rethink privacy in this new context
We need to use the data we get from our patrons to better design and target our services.
What about using circ data to buy the 20% of materials that are really circulating? What about leverging paypal to let people buy the library materials they want to see?

What should librarians learn? (cont’d)
Short cuts, not training. Gamers like shortcuts; they want to know how to get to the end and fast.
Risk-taking and trial-and-error are OK. We have to try things; some things will work, some will not. But we should try.
Expertise is more important than titles or credentials. Specialize in what you have expertise in.

Can LIS learn from gaming academic programs?
You must appeal to the different learning styles. Gaming is a learning style. It is just different than the traditional text based style.

How do we apply this?
Play! Try the games, “get behind the console…get on the dance pad”
Stock the cheat books (aka Strategy Guides) (further: post cheats or links to hints on your website!)
Offer services using IM, use text messaging
Throw a LAN party (or have me come out and run a Gaming @ Your Library program! [if you’re an LCLS member])
Bring “Digital Natives” into your planning process (if you have interested teens, bring them into the planning, they will be using the service/attending the event, so include them!)
Respect non-print learning

Nothing is built on stone;
All is built on sand,
But we must build
As if the sand were stone.

Jorge Luis Borges

OCLC report: Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources (http://www.oclc.org/reports/2005perceptions.htm)

Technorati Tag: gaminginlibraries2005

Photos!

2005-12-05T16:34:00.000-06:00

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/gaminginlibraries2005/

Techorati tag: gaminginlibraries2005

"The Gaming Generation and Libraries: Intersections" -Constance Steinkuehler

2005-12-05T15:09:00.000-06:00

Even more Gaming, Learning, and Libraries coverage

Constance Steinkuehler – “The Gaming Generation and Libraries: Intersections”
U of Wisconsin
Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOG)

What is an MMOG?
Highly graphical 2d/3d
Online/social interaction
Persistent virtual worlds
Real-time, perpetually accessible
Loosely structured, open-ended
Players free to do as they please
“Escapist fantasy” yet emergent “social realism”(Kolbert, 2001)

Discussion: Lineage II
MMOGs feature totally immersive environments where players can do whatever they wish (in most cases).

Constance previewed a video of a massive battle she and her clan were part of that involved seizing a castle. Such things can take weeks to plan, and becomes more than just playing a game.

There are millions of people playing these games.

MMOGs have created their own market places. Example: On ebay people are selling items they have earned in game. Because of this, you end up with an exchange rate (ex. US Dollars to game currency).

Intellectually Significant

Collaborative problem solving – ex. Group hunts. Going out to hunt a “Boss” monster to defeat it. I.e. Cross-functional teams – take on a project: planning to follow-up, individuals have functional roles, self-managed, semi-permanent, group goals w/individual accountability. This seems to mirror “fast capitalism”, less of the pyramid structure and more flat. You end up with leaders and followers.

The literacy scare

Books such as: “The collapse of literacy and the rise of violence in the electronic age”
“Video games hurt brain development…”
“Video games…displacing print media…”

Yet…

In-game talk: players can interact through the text-written talk.
Because of so much going on in the game, gamers use shorthand (really creating their own language) to communicate with text.
“orally” delivered narratives
in-game letters
Player generated content becomes more important (and accurate) than the official contents of the game. Fan sites, clan sites (photo albums, forums), personal game blogs, and:

Fan Fiction
Game fans just begin to generate fiction based on the game. They do not see it as writing or a separate activity, but a natural part of their game play.

Games are not replacing print media. They are about literacy activities.
“sure, but quality matters”

Some MMOG literacy practices exceed national reading, writing, & technology standards.

Back to the literacy scare
Fear of technology
Fear of youth culture
Fear of what, not whether (or how well)

Games as an intellectually rich environment

Systems of reciprocal apprenticeship
Features of apprenticeship (she listed many, but I’m just putting a few here)
-Join participation
-Valued / routine activity
-As you go forward the learner takes more control of the activity
-Apprenticed into a particular view of the world (the teachers culture)
“(meritocracy)”

Players can feel they can be something they aren’t because in real life they see their looks/appearance as a barrier to being a leader.

Ex. MadamSin – in real life she is an illegal immigrant welder. In the online world, she was a powerful leader.

Meritocracy
-decentralized authority (Beck & Wade)
socio-technical skills over status
reciprocal apprentice ship

Participatory culture
product/consumption
collective intelligence (Levy)
Awareness of different ‘games’
Multitasking across multiple “attention spaces” (Lemke)
At ease with dynamic & evolving knowledge
Primary of the subjective
McLuhan: “searching not for goals but for roles, a striving for an identity that eludes.”

Video games are a push technology.
Not just hardware, but norms (society/culture) as well.

Why should you care?

Games are intellectually rich, collaborative problem solving, literacy practices, and enculturation into practices and perspectives (shift toward participatory consumption).

Mods: Modifying a game, creating your own content

Social mods: unintended changes in the rules of the game. Ex. Instead of sieging castles, players (even enemies) band together to fight (in game) a group or people that are not playing the game as it was meant to be.

Technical mods: Mods that alter the interface of the game.

For some modders the game becomes about modding. They no longer play, but spend their time making mods for the game.

MMOGs are functioning as third places. A new space for people to build social networks. A place to build social capital.

Games * Learning * Society
June 15-16, 2006 Madison, WI

Technorati tag: gaminginlibraries2005

"The Gaming Landscape" -Steve Jones

2005-12-05T15:04:00.000-06:00

More Gaming, Learning, and Libraries coverage

“The Gaming Landscape”
Steve Jones – UI @ Chicago- Senior Research Fellow, Pew Internet & American Life Project

The Pew survey on gaming
Goals:
market research on gaming tends to focus on game adoption and revenue
social science research tends to focus on social problem areas, such as addition, social isolation, violence

Three categories of games (not mutually exclusive):
Video games (consoles + tv sets, e.g. xbox, ps2, gamecube)
Computer games (e.g., pc only)
Online games (require an internet connection, multiplayer)

If you want to track gaming activity in the library – how do you break it down?
What we know:
70% of students surveyed reported playing video, computer, or online games at least “once in a while.”
65% reported being “regular” or “occasional” game players
100% reported to have played a video, computer, or online game.
27% said they don’t play games at all:
--20% “lack of interest”
--13% “waste of time”

2% cited a lack of electronic gaming resources
The resources for gaming are there
.5% cited unfamiliarity with games
More women than men reported playing computer and online games
60%women / 40% men
Same number of men and women reported playing video games
Gaming was ubiquitos among races

Computer games hold a slight edge in popularity
Computer games also have an edge over video games in time used
Daily, twice as many college students play online or a computer game vs a video game.

Nearly have reported going online just to play or download games.

69% were exposed to video games in Elementary School, 28% exposted to computer games in elementary school, 6% exposed to online games in Elementary school.

How do people decide what type of games they will play?
Deliberate decisions about the setting within which the activities take place.
Ex. Home and bored – play a video game (if you have the equipment).
Ex. Working on a paper – maybe I’ll logon and see whats going on in an online game
Ex. Waiting for someone – maybe I’ll take out my PDA/phone and play the game while I wait

When do they play?
41% after 9PM
8% before noon

Where?
31% - Parent’s house
27% - Friend’s house
23% - Dorm room
2% - Library

Does it impact their academic lives?
66% said no influence

48% said it kept them from studying “some” or “a lot”

Gamers’ reported hours studying per week match that of other college students (about 7hrs per week)

Games for learning?
69% said they never reported having exposure to video, computer, or Internet gaming in the classroom (31% have been exposed)
32% admitted playing games that were not part of the class, during class.

What do they want?
Realistic graphics, excitement, interactivity

Types
Racing, role playing/adventure, arcade
Card games were the predominant interest of computer and online games (e.g., solitaire)
(That’s an interesting finding)

Implications
Integration into other activities. Gaming is not just an activity unto itself. (multitasking)
-Play while visiting friends or IM’ing, as a distraction from doing other work, when “bored” regardless of setting.

Gaming does not seem to be a “pure behavior”, that is, it’s not the only thing they will be doing.

(Just before I left for the airport, my wife and I were “killing” time by playing Star Wars Battlefront 2. Even when her mom got there to go with us, we still finished the game before we left).

Age

Younger are more likely to play games.

As the age of faculty goes up, likelihood they have had game experience goes down.

Is there a “verge”? Will teachers become products of the games they played?

Is there a “gaming divide”?

Higher incomes = higher likelihood of gaming

Race does not seem to factor into this

(Again, this is a place where gaming in libraries could help bridge that divide and introduce people to the culture of gaming)

VICI:
Visualization

Interaction
Collaboration

Immersion

What would this look like?

What will make a difference?
-Global high-speed networks

-Culture and language – what about “cross-cultural game trainers”? Learning to work with other cultures in games.

-Public support

Sites:
http://info.comm.uic.edu/jones/
http://www.evl.uic.edu/
http://www.pewinternet.org/
http://aoir.org/

Still going..

2005-12-05T14:47:00.000-06:00

I'm taking more notes and forming them into posts. Our "pirate" wireless signal is fading in and out as more laptops have entered the room. It seems to last about an hour, then someone has to go unplug the airport and plug it back in. At first it seemed to be a DNS issue, so I messed with the configuration from Michael's iBook (yes..I touched a MAC!).

Blogger Alley is still going strong, at anyone time at least 4 of us are connected.

Hidden Peanuts
The Shifted Librarian
Walking Paper
Tame the Web

Technorati tag: gaminginlibraries2005

Gaming, learning, and libraries - Opening session

2005-12-05T12:29:00.000-06:00

Here we go!

The wireless is back up and Kathryn Deiss from MLS is on the stage. She's on to the housekeeping bits...and a schedule change!

Not as many laptops up as I figured, the back corner here has the largest concentration (aka “Blogger Alley”). There are 131 people here, a great turnout for such a cutting edge program!

I also got a glimpse of AADL's Cobalt Flux dance pads, brought by Eli. Can't wait to try them out!

We all just had a chance to totally embarrass Jenny. How fun is that? :)

Our first speaker is Les Gasser, from UIUC. Les has been teaching a class on gaming in libraries at UIUC.

(I'll need to check out the UIUC GCT Research Poster Session)

Center for computing humanities and social sciences (CHASS)

UIUC seems to be very on top of researching gaming and learning.

Les just admitted he is not a librarian (“IANAL” – I am not a librarian), that's ok Les, I'm not really either. I'm just surrounded by them and I’ve been sucked into their culture. Not a bad thing J

The library "B" model - the box of books model. A repository of information. Libraries collect & organize books (& stuff) and provide it free by amortizing the cost over large numbers of patrons and long time spans. Promotes knowledge in society.

What is challenging whether & how libraries will be able to "fly"? (a.k.a. continue to exist as they do).
-E-books -- content goes mobile
--E-books as game platforms. On screen Les has samples of E-book chessboards & checkerboards
-E-paper -- electronic signage. This stuff looks cool, its electronic flexible paper that you can download content too.
--Readius, takes e-paper and scrolls it.
--Fujitsu's digital paper is a standard paper size, e-paper. One potential use is downloadable restaurant menus.

Ronald Coase - transaction cost economics.

Information Transactions:
Copy, Transport, Translate, Collocate, Index, Arrange, Transcode, Search/Find, others } each has a cost and contributes to the cost of other activities. (Basically the cost of information transactions determines what it really costs you to get that information)
-Copying information is getting easier and less costly. The cost of copying information is below zero, you actually make money for transacting information, i.e. Google. They are making money by transacting information.

Results of these low transaction costs:
Napster, Kazaa, BitTorrent, P2P, Flickr, Blogs, Wikis, MMOGs (massive multiplayer online games), copyright conflict, filtering, “flame wars”, open source

Liabilities of the ITCs (info transaction costs):
Near Zero/Below zero costs drives consumers away from libraries – movies, radios, TV.

Many people do not think of going to the library, because of all the sources of information available now.

There is a pressure to profit from each “customer touch” (a lending transaction)

“disintermediation of libraries”?

Gaming and Libraries, in the B model. “A way to get patrons into the library”. (On the screen, Les has a picture of fly traps). We can increase circulation by “CRM”, customer resource management, by saying: “Come play games, and oh yeah we have books”. By doing that libraries maintain the symbolic status quo of their mission.

((trying to debug wireless issues)) So I missed a few slides J

((ok, more debugging..looks like its DNS releated. Might not be able to fix it for a little bit))

The “K” Model – What’s a library?
-Critical role of innovation for society

--Assimlating the new

--visiting the cutting edge

“Library as a venue of Community & Cultural Innovation”

2-5% of the population was willing/interested/able to become producers – entrepenuers – and move into the new/to shift and innovate. (the early adopters/living on the bleeding edge)

Games as:
-Ubiquitous cultural phoenomena

-Reflection of emerging culture

-Foundation of cultural mythology/transmission

--Games reach kids and shape their Myths – i.e. there are many different harry potters. All the same character, but he exists in video games, the books, the movies, etc.

A relationship must be built between libraries and games. If you look at new movies, you’ll see that almost all new movies also include related games and other materials.

Learning as: “gaining membership in a community (of practice)”. Learning is becoming a member of that community/participating in that community.

Gaming as a community. Learning games and becoming a part of the community in the game. Games like world of warcraft, guild wars (the MMORPGs) become their own communities that people learn to be a part of by participating and interacting.

Issues with gaming

-Open Systems

--Constant changes – practices, environments

--Player directied content – the player is the center of the game. Build their own modifications to games, tell stories from their experiences

--Emergent experience

--Unplanned interactions

--Cultural conflict (e.g. “Grand Theft Auto”)

--Inolving external worlds (e.g GPS) played online, but also have a real world component, geo located. Not just a fixed indoor place, but outdoor as well.

-Essential misfit with existing library structures and processes

--Libraries depend on stability of content, structure, format, and meaning --- in order to catalog it

--Control – libraries can assure the quality of the content.

--Enduring quality

The third vision of libraries – the primer: Neal Stephenson’s “The Diamond Age”

The “I” Model, what could a library be?
-Extended placeness (virtual spaces)

-Multi-modal interacting webs of services

-immersive, persistent

-social, collective

The information environment / information organization (sample screen: Guild wars/World of War Craft). Game environments can be very sophisticated and display a lot of information to the player about the other players, chat conversations, and other happenings.

Virtual Information Systems

Wow…on screen now is a video of a virtual environment called “Cave”. The subject in the video is using his virtual controllers to manipulate the book. But instead of reading, he steps into the page and is immersed in a virtual city with kiosks that have information to help the user find stuff. In the environment, there is a mobile information service (an “avatar”) that is leading the subject in the video around the virtual city and teaching the subject about the environment.

All I can say is wow. I want one of those. The environment is totally immersive and you can interact with many objects inside it.

Wow. A totally interactive learning environment where you can step into the world and into the information you want to learn. I want one.

The “I” model for gaming and libraries

-Virtual Place extensions

-Immersions in experiences

-New venues for services

-4 dimensions of gaming: Competition, chance, simulation, vertigo (exhiliarting physical experience)

In the game “civilization”, there is an in game library; that provides information on how to play the game

What about moving library services into games?

Questions:

Cost of making games, like cave?
What is cheap: Game mods. Making a mod for an existing game (like The Sims), using the supplied SDK. Mods can be made low-tech and cheap.

(Thought: what about a project to build a mod/addon for a game that has interactive library services)

Do games change how we imagine things?
Remember when music videos came out? When you see a video you are being asked to buy into it. Even though it is not your imagination, the environments can still be exhilarating.

A parallel between the way gamers are becoming active in communities of practice and the 2-5% of the population that is producing content.

The same is true with game modding, more consumers than producers. Example: File sharing, more people are downloading than sharing (via P2P networks).

Bridging the cultural gap with gaming – providing the opportunity to those that may have never had it. What a traditional role for libraries, wouldn’t you agree?

((ok that’s the end of the keynote notes))

This session leaves you with a lot to think about, more than just having simple gaming nights at the library. The future implications for library applications to gaming are very, very many. Like all things tech, this is definitely one more aspect that libraries should stay tuned to and think about how they can reach their patrons where they are.

You have patrons in games, what if the library could offer services in those games?

(Just imagine a virtual reference service staffed by librarians across the world where players could ask questions and get answers from in game characters)

Another question:
What if libraries bought software and let people try it out and explore it? Why not? Libraries already offer proprietary information in other ways (cd’s, games, etc). So why not buy software to let people try?

gaminginlibraries2005

Gaming in Libraries 2005 - I'm here!

2005-12-05T08:39:00.000-06:00

I'm here...we're just about to get started. Behind me is a row of Bloggers that incluces Jenny Levine, Aaron Schmidt, Michael Stephens, and a few others I don't know. To my right is Chad, we have the same camera.

They have 8 game cubes set up running several games. No one has started playing yet, I'm tempted too but breakfast is a little more tempting at the moment.

I'll be live blogging each session...more soon!

Announcing: Gaming @ Your Library - A project of the Lewis & Clark Library System!

2005-12-02T11:37:00.000-06:00

Here it is! Just in time for the Gaming, Learning, and Libraries Symposium, I am announcing a project I've been working on for the last few weeks!

Gaming @ Your Library is a new project of the Lewis & Clark Library System. The project will bring gaming events to interested libraries. Two libraries are currently planning Gaming @ Your Library events. The Glen Carbon Centennial Public library will be having the first Gaming @ Your Library event on January 13th, 2006.

Gaming @ Your Library events are designed to attract teens and gamers 12 & up to the library for a night of gaming. Each event will feature several pre-selected video games that attendees will play. The first event will feature a Playstation 2 with Dance Dance Revolution and four Xboxes (supporting up to 16 players at a time) networked to play multiplayer games like Star Wars Battlefront 2 or other multiplayer games.

The Gaming @ Your Library website features an interactive blog, and an RSVP system. LCLS member library staff can logon with their existing CLeO accounts and create a Gaming @ Your Library profile.

If you are interested in the project visit the web site: http://gamingatyourlibrary.com/, or contact Chris Deweese (chrisd@lcls.org) for more details.
Gaming @ Your Library. Bringing together gamers @ the library!

The website is live and so are the RSS feeds. So head over there and let me know what you think!

I'll be asking and listening a lot at the symposium monday & tuesday.

Can you tell I'm excited about this? :)

It's oh so quiet...

2005-11-30T14:55:00.000-06:00

Seven days without a post..wow. Well..in the next two days I am going to be announcing something huge.

So stay tuned.
(which is a lot easier if you're using RSS to subscribe to this blog..because then you will be the first to know when it hits the feeds :) )

My first blog carnival

2005-11-21T13:25:00.000-06:00

Thanks to Joy, I submitted my earlier post about IT Departments as a barrier to services to Carnival of the Infosciences #16 @ Librarystuff.net and my entry made it in. Woohoo!

What is a blog carnival you ask?

"A blog carnival is like a roving journal, a rotating showcase of interesting writing from around the blogosphere within a particular discipline. Individual bloggers volunteer to host a carnival on their personal blog, acting as chief editor for that edition. It falls to them to collect noteworthy items, and to sort through suggestions from the community, many of which are direct submissions from authors."

-From if:book: the blog carnival

Carnivals are also pretty cool because you can find other interesting blogs. Several people have emailed me since my inclusion in the carnival and I have found several others that are now in my Bloglines account.

No wonder blogs rule the web-o-verse :)

Actually...this is really a great example of how the new web is connecting people.

blyberg.net asks ILS vendors to listen

2005-11-21T08:06:00.000-06:00

John @ Blyberg.net posts some very interesting thoughts on asking ILS vendors to open up their systems and let libraries design online services for their patrons, instead of being constrained by what the vendor supplies.

As a web developer, when I saw what III offered customization wise with their OPAC, it really broke my heart. I was hoping that by now vendors would be offering true customization of the OPAC, not just customizing within the contstraints of their own (inflexible) custom scripting language.

Ideally, I should be able to write my own templates and hook into an interface the vendor supplies and enable whatever functionality is needed. But as it stands, I can't do that. And as far as I know, there isn't a vendor that offers that.

But here is what I really don't understand. A free service like Flickr, offers a FREE API (programming interface) that I can hook into and design applications to work with their service.

If you put out an API, people will write programs for it just because they can! What vendor would not want 1, 2, 25, or 100 programmers writing applications, for fun, using an interface the vendor provided? The talent is out there, people will do it because they can. People will share it, it will get better, and guess what? If you ask nicely, I bet people would let you distribute it (at no cost!) with your package.

Our III OPAC functions great. It's easy and it works. But I want to do more to it and enable more in it (like RSS feeds) but I am constrained by what is already there. I have the motivation and the time..I need access. I need APIs.

Note: These are my opinions. My employer does not endorse or support these opinions in anyway. I hold nothing against any ILS vendor. My motto has always been to work with what I've got.

But what I'm asking is that we be given more for what we pay :)

Not another post!! A new blog...new intentions

2005-11-17T11:08:00.000-06:00

This post..should hopefully be short. After taking a look at my intentions for this blog and doing some thinking, I am happy to announce: The LCLS weboratory

This new blog/site will be the home for all the web projects I'm tinkering with at LCLS. I will be using that blog to update on the status of projects and ideas I have. It will be a lot more technical than I'm going to be (from now on) with this blog. But don't rejoice yet. I will post things that are "technical" here. Just not as headspinning technical as I'll be at the weboratory.

Clam Chowder will remain as my The Web, Your Library, and You kind of blog. I will be posting more articles that apply directly to libraries and library tech issues. I will also cross post any interesting items from other bloggers / news sites as well as notes to any Library/Tech conferences I attend.

So...want to know what I'm up to? Check the weboratory (or subscribe to the RSS feed).
Want to know what's going on with tech in the library? Keep reading here (or subscribe to the RSS feed)

Honda will not let me steal my own radio (but someone else could)

2005-11-16T17:25:00.000-06:00

About 5 weeks back, the battery in my 2000 civic was finally at its last. I took it to AutoZone, got a new battery, and after (embarrassingly) seeing how corroded the plugs were, had the new one installed.

Turn on car. Turn on radio.

"Code"

Hmmm. How about CD mode?

"Code"

Ummm. Station 1? No, how about 2..3..4..5

"Code Err"

Uh oh.

Honda's radio anti-theft system has a code that is unique to each radio. This code is supplied to you when you buy the car. So the dealer should have this, right?
Wrong.

Me:"Hi, my battery died and I need the radio code, here is my information"
Honda:"Ok sir, we can only help you if you can give us the radio serial number"
Me:"Ok, well, I dont think I have that. I bought the car 5 years ago where would it be?"
Honda:"Well, I dont know what we did 5 years ago, but usually its in the book, or on a sticker in the glovebox"
Me:"Ok, here are all the numbers I found" (I rattle off the numbers)
Honda:"Well..none of those look like it"
Me:"Well..how do I get the serial number?"
Honda:"You have to remove the radio."
Me:"How do I do that?"
Honda:"You can do it yourself, or you can pay some place like best buy to take it out and get the serial number, and then you can call us to get the code."

So get this. The car that I own, I have to pay, I have to PAY to get my radio back. I ALREADY BOUGHT THE CAR.

My buddy found the instructions. I'm not a car guy, I fix computers. So, taking apart my entire dash (and by entire dash, I mean the WHOLE dash), moving wireharnesses, and finally pulling out the radio to get this number does not seem worth the entire saturday I would spend doing it. (Not to mention..getting it back together).

But here's the kicker. If someone breaks into my car, STEALS my radio, and calls Honda, they can get the code. No ID required, no proof, they can steal my radio and get the code.

Congratulations Honda. Your anti-theft has been so effective, that I am now unable to steal my own radio. (but someone else could, and they could use it to!)

5 weeks now. 5 weeks without a radio. Without my CD PLAYER. My 7 minute drive to work now feels like about 40 with only the sound of my heater and the tires rolling on the ground to power my thoughts.

Good thing I discovered Green Tea. Otherwise I would so not be as chipper when I got to work.
Seriously.

Mini-rant: IT Departments as a barrier-- Why?

2005-11-16T17:12:00.000-06:00

While at the session today, I heard a recurring theme. People needed tools that would help them circumvent their IT departments restrictions.

Why is this so?

I didn't hear this from one or two people, no, most of the audience was nodding when it was brought up that their IT department would not let them us IM software or would block software X or not install software Y on the server.

Why? Why stop your users from using new tools? Is your job of stifling their creativity and innovation that satisfying? Are you afraid that you won't have a job if they have these tools?

Is it security? Ok, lets argue that. If you are worried about security, do not, let me bold this, DO NOT put your computers/servers on the internet. So there is your security solution.

What does that do for usability? Well. Minus the Internet, you have essentially made your PCs useless. Don't believe me?

Ever had a power outage at home and lost your Internet? Sure. You still have your laptop, but how long do you spend on it when you know you can't use the Internet.

By denying requests your users make to have software X or Y, when they have legitimate needs, you are basically making their PCs useless to them. Oh sure, they can work on them, but you may as well take away their Internet while you're at it.

Yes, we need to protect our users. Believe me on that. I have been in IT long enough to have seen plenty of worms, hacks, pirate FTPs on unsecured servers, viruses, and scams. But that has not colored my view of enabling users; giving them the tools they want, to do their jobs in a way that works for them.

In my job as the web devloper at LCLS, I have given the users the ability to create and publish their own content. I was, and still am to some degree, responsible for much of the content publishing but that is happening less and less. In fact, one of my colleagues presented a tour of our website to our board at our November meeting. I was at the gym while she was putting on this presentation.

How could I do that? Easy. I gave them the tools, I helped them use those tools and they took off on their own.

I was an enabler.

Bragging on myself? Maybe a little, but here's my point.

Why are you not enabling your users? Let them try things, let them find things. While you are quashing worms or hunting spammers, let them try new software. What if they find something cool? It is not a threat to you, they want to help.

They want technology to work for them, not against them.

Think about that. And look at what you're doing and decide if you are helping your users or holding them back.

Live Blogging: Everything You Always Wanted to Know about the New Social Tools

2005-11-16T12:50:00.000-06:00

Okay..here is my first attempt at blogging a conference meeting live. NILRC is meeting in Collinsville, IL and Jenny Levine is here to present to the group. Sarah H. from LCLS is here with me, we just had a nice lunch chat with Jenny and now were in "Ballroom B" waiting for Jenny to get started.

By the way...it is freeeezing here and the wind is not helping.

My own comments will be in ( ). I'll try to remember that :)

The lights are dimmed and they're just waiting for a few more people before they get started. There is a pretty good sized group here, about 30 or so, all watching as Jenny is trying to leech the free wifi.

Tip: Many times its better to check the box: "Let windows manage my wireless connections" in the settings. I do this on every wireless PC I use and it has not failed me yet.

John Berry from NILRC has just started his introduction, welcoming everyone and introducing Jenny to the group.
(Maybe I'm typing too much :) )

(( her presentation will be available at: http://www.mls.lib.il.us/ ))

Jenny had all the bloggers, then RSS users, then IM users, and cell users raise their hands. Cell users by far outweighed all, bloggers & IM were in a tie for last.
Apparently, I dont count as a blogger yet :)

The "Information Shift" is a new era where information is coming to us. The millennial generation is the first genration born into and expecting information to follow them.
Pervasive Internet
Wireless/Wi-Fi
3G Networks

Digital convergence in devices
more storage / smaller package
faster

The U.S. is definately behind the curve on what we're doing with our cell phones vs what other countries do. Things like high speed video, kids school schedules, gaming, e-books on the phone, even checking out books with your cell phone at the library.

(we're getting there, but we've still got a ways to go)

The Beloit College Mindset List - a fun site that lists what kids of graduating high school classes have come to know and expect.

Kids now are growing up in a totally networked world, where geographic/personal information is shared and kids think nothing of it.

Things like wearable computers/smart clothing are just around the corner.

Eye Toy (I'm definately getting one of these). Eye toy projects you into your PS2 Games. It's a camera that you stand in front of an actually become a part of the game. (I'm SO BUYING ONE).

Gaming is relevant kids are learning many things from gaming. It's not just the mindless blasting many people make it out to be. Games are social, challenging, and are teaching decision making processes. Games are coming in different formats as well.

Books: What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Literacy and Got Game.

Tip: Don't call yourself a boss. Bosses are video game enemies that must be defeated. Be the strategy guy. (see "Got Game")

Got Game offers some good research on how gaming has shaped kids today. (I see some of these qualities in myself...)

How can we reach this audience that expects information to come to them?
Web 2.0 - the read/write web - the participatory web - the two-way web.
The new web is becoming more interactive and collaborative.

Blogging
Easy way to get your content out there (Definately!)
Blogging can help your staff get content onto your website faster and in a timely manner (this has definately helped LCLS since we converted to a blog style system for our website).

Information needs to get out there and not be held back. Many times if the information is a week or two old its stale. (Information also needs to be archived so those that miss it can find it. Blogs help with that too)

Blogs can be used in so many ways to reach your community. They are simple to set up (Free from places like Blogger) and easy to update (just as easy as using email). (If you arent thinking about a library blog - you should be!)

If you want to see a good model for a library/community blog: Check out the Ann Arbor District Library.

By using these web 2.0 tools, you are inviting your patrons into a dialogue with you, that may never have happened otherwise.

You can also integrate blogs with things like link resolvers and other tools to link to even more content.

Wiki
Collaborative, editable-by-anyone webpages. Users add the content. (Ahh..wiki means fast in Hawaiian..that makes sense now *click*)

(Good idea: A wiki for reference databases - something that librarians could contribute to, and people could comment on the ref databases - see Butler WikiRef)

Using wikis for meeting notes. SLS used this to post meeting notes and make corrections (Hmm..combined with wireless..this could be a fast way to take notes at staff meetings or the GateNet meetings)

Jenny demonstrated the libsuccess wiki. She went into programming - gaming - and then added an entry to the wiki for the Gaming in Libraries Symposium.
(Libsuccess.org has a cool wiki - check it out.)

(see the code project for a wiki/knowledge sharing app)

What about using a Wiki for your online catalog instructions? Let the users post up tips on how they use it.

pbwiki.com - free wiki resource, try it out, see how a wiki works

RSS
"The future of the web" - RSS Lets you create content once and display it anywhere on the web (back to my selling point: imagine going to to one website to see the content of your 20 favorite websites, instead of going to 20 seperate places.)

RSS itself is not for humans to read - computers interpret its display and formatting based on rules. (this is where things like style sheets and xtensible stylesheets (xsl) come into play. You make the rules for how it should look and the computer displays it that way).

"RSS was made for information junkies" - Jenny (great quote I think.)

Even more love for bloglines in Jenny's presentation. It really is a great site. (You really, really, really should just try it. Pick 5 websites, find their RSS feed addresses, add them to bloglines and just trying going to bloglines to check these websites instead of going to the 5 different sites on their own.)

Reading RSS feeds isnt enough. You NEED to start one. The easiest way to get an RSS feed is to start a blog. RSS will get your content out there and findable by even more search engines.

RSS will also let you bring other website content to your site.
Warning: You dont control the content of other websites..choose what content you bring to your site carefully.

(You need to really think long and hard about using RSS, both consuming it and PROVIDING it. RSS will soon be so seamlessly integrated into the browsers and into your operating system, that if you arent learning about it, you'll be far behind when it really becomes mainstream.)

Example: Proquest will be offering RSS feeds. You can subscribe and when you click into the content (from bloglines or your RSS aggregator), you will either be IP authenticated or asked to provide you barcode.

Other things you can do with RSS:
create a page of aggregated resources - things you recommend - and display them on a web page for your patrons.
create a page of recommended RSS feeds
Create a public view of your bloglines account and let people see what you recommend to read
Use RSS for research

With RSS, your content can be used by your patrons? Scary - you should see what patrons do with it. Imagine - a patrons blog or website with a section that displays what they have checked out or what they have on request. People are already doing this.

(III's 2006 LE has RSS support! Look for information on this soon...)

Podcasting
RSS with MP3 files attached. Podcasting is publishing audio via the Internet, usually with Mp3 files. This ties into "time shifting".

How it works: You record content on your computer (using a microphone and software), you take that recorded content (an mp3 files), upload it to a webserver, and if you use a blog that has RSS your file can be streamed across the Internet to your subscribers who can take the file and listen to it on their PC OR put it on their MP3 player.

Software: Ipodder - free software that downloads podcasts for you and saves them to your PC/MAC.

(Could we use podcasting for CE?? Big question..glad I'm blogging this, so I don't forget)
(what about podcasting for meetings?...if you miss one, you can catch up by listening in)

The "casting" part of "podcasting" is putting that MP3 file on a website and into an RSS feed.

Pitfalls:
Copyright - make sure you have the speaker's permission. (If you're creating your own content, OK, but if you have a speaker come in, make sure you ask).

By podcasting - your content can make it into iTunes. There is already a library category there.

Check out OPAL Podcast

Software to check out: Audacity - free software that lets you record MP3 files on your computer.

Podcasting requires RSS 2.0 - check the specifications on how to make sure your MP3 file gets picked up by the aggregators.

Instant Messaging
Kids are using instant messaging more than any other medium. Want to reach them? You need to be using IM.

Imagine: What if you could IM your catalog? Skip the browser, skip searching, with an IM bot, its possible to IM the catalog and get a response over an instant messaging program.

IM is the preferred method of communication for anyone under 25.

(thought: When you disable IM and chat in your library, you are telling your patrons [kids especially] that you don't want them in the library. Same with the cell phones. This is how people want to communicate..why are you stopping them?)

I.T. wont let you around IM? Use meebo.com

The goal is to reach your patrons where they are. That is what they are coming to expect.

Don't forget about "texting" or SMS. Sending short messages over your cell phone. Google has an SMS service where you send a txt message to a number and it replies with an answer.

Libraries should think about using SMS for reference as well as using IM.

Trillian - a good multi-service IM program. Connect to AIM, ICQ, Yahoo!, and MSN in one program.

Cool Tools
Del.icio.us - this is a great social book mark site. (Check my links to the write to view my delicious book marks). Tagging - labelling data with meta data - but using the users vocabulary.

(Tagging is a huge thing. Users can describe their content in their own vocabulary and remember where they put it. This will not be going away)

Tag clouds - a webpage that lists the tags people are using and uses different font sizes to show (relatively) how many items are associated with that tag.

Try del.icio.us. Its like being new to the web again.

Furl - similar to del.icio.us, but not as social, FURL also has ratings for websites. FURL saves the URL, but also a copy of the page. It has a 5GB limit, but on the web, that should take a while to get to. FURL can keep copies of things you may only have access to for a limited time. These copies are not shared, but the people can subscribe to your FURL with RSS. It also preserves the date it was saved.

Blinklist - takes del.icio.us one step further and adds network groups. This lets you hook up with other people and form a social circle to share book marks.

Citeulike / Connotea - Academic versions of del.icio.us

Social tools can connect you to people you may never have otherwise met; people with similar interests/hobbies/work.

Flickr - a social photo-sharing site. Very cool tool, share your photos, tag them, add notes ([read: meta data] that displays over the top of the picture) and put them on the web for all to see. Flickr is all about sharing.

How can you use flickr? How about posting & tagging photos of your library, programs & people @ your library. Check out Flickr and get lost for a few hours and see how people are using it.

(ok..i'm gonna wrap this up)

Jenny is still going through some of the new and fun online tools and how people are using them. Bottom line: there is a lot out there and a lot of things we need to look at outside our usual box. Our users want interactivity, they want responsiveness, and they want things delivered to them.

We need to be running towards these technologies instead of away. Take a while to let this all sink in, come back to it if you have to. At LCLS we'll be offering some exciting tech programs this year. Keep your eye on CLeO (subscribe to our RSS feeds) for these events.

Through technology, the users are now shaping the landscape, we need to be ready to be responsive to that!

Gah!!

2005-11-16T10:07:00.000-06:00

As a "webmaster" it's not fun to come into work with the following error reports in your email:

The page: /Default.aspx returned the following error:

Unspecified error

Base Exception: System.Data.OleDb.OleDbException: Unspecified error

And

System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException: Server was unable to process request. ---> System.Data.OleDb.OleDbException: Unspecified error

So what happened?

Well.......I posted about the CLeO RSS feeds right? I put links on here and announced it to our members.

Oops.

The RSS feeds were working, but they were not properly caching, so I ran out of database connections.

I took a few things offline and am working on making less use of my DB connections. I knew one day I would hit this point. So, let that be my lesson..I need to plan my data resource uses better.

Bad programmer Chris, bad!

The LCLS site is back to working, but I've taken off the CLeO event lists, disabled the CLeO RSS Feeds (the day after I announced them...how bad does that look?), and I'm also redoing code that was a little too dependent on connecting to the CLeO DB.

This seems like it should have been a Monday issue..it's wednesday, right?

Froogle: Wishlists - just in time for Xmas!

2005-11-15T15:46:00.000-06:00

I just noticed this today, but on Froogle you can sign in with your Google account (if you have one, or just use your Gmail account) and create a wishlist by searching for items on Froogle then adding them to your wishlist.

This has probably been around a while, but like I said, I just saw it. I've been reminded several times by my wife to get my list together. So...here it is honey.

Now, I do not expect any of my readers to get anything on there for me (seriously). Most of my family uses email, so this will go straight to their inboxes and hopefully help them get me the right gifts.

Hopefully they coordinate too..because so far it doesn't look like anyone else can take things off your list (which is good, because I would SOOO be finding out what I got long before Santa arrives).

I'll report back after the holidays when I finish collecting all the spoils :)

And no, I did not put the new Xbox 360 on there. Believe me, I want to. Especially since I found the Xbox 360 compatibility list. But last year I got the current Xbox..and the year before it was a PS/2.

Another new CLeO Feature...that's two in a row, look out!

2005-11-15T10:44:00.000-06:00

I've had a few ideas for new features just to add to the things CLeO can do. This one isn't anything ground breaking, but it might be handy, especially if you use Outlook/Outlook Express or another program that supports VCalendar (.vcs) files.

Yes, Paul @ PALS, this is the feature I was alluding to in my comments. I added VCalendar exporting to CLeO. If you check out the LCLS CLeO and take a look at any event, like for instance, this one. You should see a new link that says: " ()"

Clicking on that link (might not work from my blog here) will prompt you to open or save a VCS file. If you are using Outlook/Outlook Express or another program that supports VCalendar, it should open up to a new appointment and let you save it.

Like I said, it is nothing groundbreaking, but for our (and your) users who use CLeO and also use Outlook/Outlook Express it is kind of nice.

Note: This will not register the user for the event. They still have to click the register button as well.

If you're an Illinois Library System and using CLeO, I'll be in touch shortly on where to get it and how to use it if you want. This is another addon, just like the RSS, and only requires a few lines of code added in the event_details file.

What is CLeO? CLeO is an online event registration system that was created by the Lewis & Clark Library System. We offer CLeO (as is) free to any libraries or systems that want it. If you're interested in checking it out, let me know. It's written in Microsoft ASP (Active Server Pages) and uses an MS Access database as the backend and it has been tested on Windows NT4 through Windows 2003.

More love for Bloglines: RSS Feeds added in CLeO

2005-11-14T10:29:00.000-06:00

Last week I worked on adding RSS support for CLeO - our online CE registration system. I now have three feeds available:

Upcoming events - Next 7 days
Recently added events - Added in the last 14 days
Today's Events

How can you use these?
Simple. Get a Bloglines account.

How will it help you?
Track all the websites you like to read IN ONE PLACE. Have content come to you, stop spending your time going to find it.

To save you some more time, here are three events you may be particularly interested in:
How to set up IM (Instant Messaging) in your library - 2/17/2006 - A follow up to the Instant Messaging for Reference Services
Blogs, RSS, and Social Bookmarking websites- using free online tools to reach your patrons - 2/28/2006 - What these tools are, who is using them, and how YOU can use them to reach your patrons.

Also..I hope to very soon announce a new and exciting program for LCLS members. More information will follow VERY SOON.

Make subscribing to RSS easy

2005-11-10T13:30:00.000-06:00

I was browsing for local St. Louis news RSS feeds at ksdk.com when I noticed something. On their rss page, they have buttons that say "Add to my Yahoo!" and "Add to Newsgator".

I thought..hey, how handy. So I took a look at the "Sub with Bloglines" button and realized, DUH, its just a uniform link that uses javascript to fill in the address for the feed.

So...you could make a link like this:
www.bloglines.com/sub/http://www.lcls.org/rss.aspx
Example: Click me to Subscribe to this page with Bloglines!

And when a user clicks it, they are directed to Bloglines, where if they are signed in, they get prompted to add the feed. If not, they are asked to log in OR create an account.

How cool is that?

I plan on adding a "Subscribe with Bloglines" link to the LCLS RSS feed, and I will also add in a subscribe with My Yahoo! and any other service I find that offers such a simple feature. If you know of one, leave a comment!

Want to subscribe to my blog?

Bloglines: Click Here!
Yahoo!: Click Here!

A couple follow ups

2005-11-10T08:12:00.000-06:00

1) I've had several people e-mail to say they are using the AIM status icon. Thanks for the heads up and sorry to anyone who couldn't find my email..I neglected to enable it in my profile. Good job, I know :)

Dennis Smith stumbled across the AIM status icon, and although he's not exactly a library I did make an exception. But, what he did do was clean up the icons a bit so they blend better on any color background.

Thanks Dennis!

2) Via Frappr, I stumbled across the Wanderings of a Student Librarian. Joy is a student librarian over in MO, and she has an excellent Bloglines tutorial:

Bloglines for Librarians in Three (and a half) Easy Steps

If you are interested in Bloglines, check out her tutorial! Its much simpler than my long-winded explanation of why Bloglines is the best ever :)

Also, while on the subject of Bloglines, "jena" left this comment:

One of the great things about Bloglines is that it will "auto-discover" RSS feeds. If you don't know if a website has one or not, you can just type in the site's base address, and Bloglines will try to find a feed associated with it. It's not completely infallible, as sometimes it can't locate a feed that should be there, but most of the time, it works.

There is also a "bookmarklet" that you can drag to your bookmarks folder; then, when you find a site you want to keep track of, you just click on the bookmarlet and it will automatically try to find any associated feeds and let you subscribe to them, without having to go back to the Bloglines page.

I checked it out and added the Sub with bloglines button to my Firefox bookmarks toolbar. It works great!

There are instructions for several browsers here: http://www.bloglines.com/help/easysub?tip=6

My recommended webtool of the day: Bloglines

2005-11-07T14:53:00.000-06:00

This is my second attempt at this post. The first attempt...well, I got distracted and closed the browser window (that's my story and I'm sticking to it!). So...this may be a little different than what I had planned because, well, what I planned left my brain a while ago. (Guess a Pensieve would be too much to ask for?)

What does Bloglines mean to you?

Let's start off with what it does. Bloglines lets you give it the URL (the web address) of an RSS feed and it then goes out and periodically downloads that information for you (checking for new items), so you can come back to it later. Simply go to the Bloglines website, set up an account (needs your name, and email address) and then start adding the RSS feeds you want.

Wait a minute, you said RSS. What does that mean to me?

RSS = Really Simple Syndication

Simply put RSS is about sharing. RSS is a way to share content from one website to another, in a standard way. RSS is a web-standard that was created to share data so web-programmers (like me) would not have to do crazy things like write programs that memorized the layout of a website and pulled out certain parts (aka Screen Scraping).

Ok, so really it was created to share data, and RSS makes sharing data easier (I did not say easy!). So now, with RSS, I could display information from CNN, Foxnews, someone else's blog, or any website that offers RSS (like LCLS). Most importantly I can do this because RSS returns information in a specific format, so I could write one program to interpret data from many different websites.

The easiest way to think of RSS is to think about a news article. You have a title, the byline, author, intro text, and the full-text of the article. That is how RSS stores information. An RSS reader (like Bloglines) interprets that information and formats it so that it is easily readible by you.

Another simple analogy would be to compare RSS to e-mail. With RSS content on the web comes TO YOU (just like all that unwanted e-mail), instead of you having to GO FIND IT.

Tools like Bloglines help you get the benefit of RSS. Bloglines reads the RSS feeds you store and brings you the information in a nicely formatted webpage. No work, other than adding the feed's URL, is required on your part.

By using a tool like Bloglines, you dont have to visit 50 websites a day to catch up. If they offer RSS, you can store all the RSS feeds in one place and go to one (1) website and see all of what your 50 favorite websites have put online recently. (Who can say "time saver" three times fast?)

Bloglines really stuck out to me, because it also has a mode that lets you create a special URL that you can send your friends and they can see what RSS feeds you're reading, and view them through the Bloglines website.

If you visit: http://www.bloglines.com/public/cdeweese, you can view all the RSS feeds I read.

You can control, of course, what ones you make available and what ones you don't.

Bloglines is simple to use, simply visit the main website, create a new account, and start adding RSS feeds. Believe me when I say, a lot, A LOT of places offer RSS. All the major news outlets are doing it, blogs the world over have RSS, and libraries are jumping into the game as well.

There are other tools you can use to download RSS feeds to your desktop as well.

One I use on my desktop is:
-SharpReader. Sharp reader is a desktop application that sits in the system tray and downloads RSS content for you and alerts you when new things are downloaded.
Benefit: Content comes to you (after you start the program, it is similar to outlook/outlook express in that it stays open downloading for you and alerting you when new things are posted)
Downside: Only available to you on the computer you install it on.

Since I started using Bloglines, I have not been using SharpReader as much. But several staff here at LCLS now use SharpReader to subscribe to RSS feeds for the LCLS website, as well as any other sites they like to keep up with.

Creating an RSS feed is a little more work than viewing them, but thanks to sites like Bloglines and desktop tools like SharpReader, viewing RSS is even easier than it was when RSS started.

Where can you find RSS feeds? Most websites list them fairly obviously on their websites, look for the graphic, or a link that says RSS, ATOM, or Web feed.

RSS is not some big sophisticated techno-geeky thing, but the aura that surrounds it because it was embraced by geeks kinda shyed some away. With so many tools available, especially ones as simple as Bloglines, RSS can be integrated into your daily computer habits and it will change the way you interact with the web.

Continuous learning for your inner geek in 2006 @ LCLS

2005-11-02T15:19:00.000-06:00

In February LCLS will host Aaron Schmidt who will be presenting a session on using IM (Instant Messaging) for reference. A few weeks after that (mid-february), I will be hosting a follow up session that will focus strictly on IM software, and setting it up on the PCs in your library.

Near the end of February I plan on holding a session on Blogs, RSS, and Social Bookmarking websites and how you can use these free online tools to reach your patrons. I will have numerous examples of these tools being used by other libraries, as well as showing how LCLS has started using a few of these tools to reach our member libraries.

Also, look for a gaming in libraries session sometime as well (late spring 2006) where I will cover the topic of gaming in libraries and how other libraries are using it. This will be my follow up after attending the Gaming in Libraries Symposium hosted by MLS in Chicago.

Keep an eye on CLeO and our event calendar for these events!

If you are interested in these events let me know. Also, if you are using IM, Blogs/RSS, or a Social Bookmarking site (like Del.icio.us) in your library, let me know, especially if you are from Illinois, or better yet, a member of LCLS.

What are all these things you ask?? Attend the events and I guarantee you will know!!

Add AIM Presence to your website with a simple IMG tag!

2005-11-01T17:49:00.000-06:00

*SEE UPDATE BELOW*

I spent a little time this afternoon working on my AIM Presence project. A lot of people want to put online/offline status icons on their websites so patrons and/or readers can see if the person is online and likely available.

AIM offers its presence service, but the big hold up is that connecting to it requires a knowledge of making SOAP requests using some server side language.

I see a lot of glazed over eyes right now.

This is where I come in. After hearing Jenny's enthusiasm over my addition of AIM status icons to the LCLS site, I realized I could probably come up with a way to make it easy for people to hook into the AIM Presence service via a simple webservice I created.

Version 1
This afternoon I hacked out version 1 of my AIM Presence hook. After a 2 minute IM with Jenny, I realized something. I had not helped at all! I asked her if she knew how to do SOAP requests in Cold Fusion. Duh, Chris, the whole point of this was so people wouldn't have to do that.

Wow did I miss the mark.

Then I remembered something. You see, I do a lot of programming research via Google. A lot. There are tons of coders out there, just like me who write code and share it. When I do projects, I map out what I need to do, and then I hit Google and some of my favorite programming resource sites to find the nuts and bolts of how to do it. So I come across a lot, A LOT of articles.

I found this little gem from from Jeremy Rule's blog over at MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network). What is it you ask? Well, with the power of server side programming, you can do a lot of neat things. One of those happens to be changing the content type you send to the browser.

Ok, what does that mean? That means..I can do things like tell your browser my website is sending you an image, and create that image with programming code either by A) Creating it from scratch and writing the programming to do it, or B) Loading another image and create a new image based off that.

I can write a web page that when you go to it, instead of getting an HTML webpage, you get an image.

Bingo!

So thanks to Jeremy's article (who, incidentally, has no idea who I am...just another anonymous reader), I crafted up a simple webpage that you can put inside an HTML IMG tag and get an online or offline icon.

It's that simple. (For you)

How can you use this on your website?? Easy! Anywhere you want to show an AIM status icon, use this code:
/* UPDATED 1/10/2006 - The old method is going away, please switch to this one */

<a href="aim:GoIM?screenname=PUT_YOUR_SCREENNAME_HERE"><img src="http://big.oscar.aol.com/YOUR_SCREEN_NAME_HERE?on_url=http://PATH_TO_ONLINE_IMAGE&off_url=http://PATH_TO_OFFLINE_IMAGE" border="0" /></a>

Where you see "PUT_YOUR_SCREENNAME_HERE", do just that. Replace that text with your screen name, paste this code into your website and wah-la. Your online status is now available the world over.

Where you see PATH_TO_ONLINE_IMAGE and PATH_TO_OFFLINE_IMAGE, replace those with the http:// path to the ONLINE and OFFLINE images you want to use.

/* This Q&A is no longer valid because of the changes I suggested. So just ignore it */

Q&A
Q: Can I use this one my website?
A: Yes. You are free to use this if:

Your website is a library website (YES, your library related blogs count :) )
You kindly email or IM me with your library name and website URL, so I know who is using it and where they are coming from.

Sometime in the future, I will add a layer of security that will restrict this to the people who contact me. For now, try it out.

For the curious out there, I bet you're looking at my Svc= querystring going, hmmm, why would he make us specify AIM. What else could we put there?

Well, as of now, just AIM. But over the next few weeks I hope to tap into Yahoo!, and ICQ. If possible, I will put MSN on there as well. But as of today, I do not think MSN offers a web presence service like AOL, Yahoo!, and ICQ.

That's it for this evening (I know you're thinking, that's it??). But I'm off to play some Star Wars: Battlefront 2 on the Xbox with my wife, who decided that she had to have the game the day it came out! Seriously, it was her idea!

Back and catching up

2005-10-31T07:53:00.000-06:00

Got back to St. Louis around 2330 (that's 11:30PM) Thursday night. Came in for a little bit friday, still can't get my outlook to send email from home. It worked two weeks ago, but now it doesn't. Maybe it will fix itself.

I have a little catching up to do, but after that I will be working on an AIM Presence web service hook. I plan on making this available to any Illinois Library System as well as any libraries that want to show an online/offline icon for their AIM accounts.

If you're library isn't using IM (Instant Messaging), it is definately something you should think about. LCLS is going to host Aaron Schmidt from Thomas Ford Memorial Public Library who will be doing a program on IM for reference in the library. The date should be announced soon, I think it's sometime in February.

Once I have my webservice up (won't take long :)), I will provide some sample Java code, as well, as ASP & ASP.NET. If anyone uses PHP or Cold Fusion and knows how to make a webservice call (a.k.a. sending post data to a webservice and receiving the result), let me know. I'd like to have samples to cover most everyones needs.

If you're interested in this, contact me and let me know. I won't be posting my webservice URL in the open, but I will give it to any interested parties.

Confused? I'll explain more when I have things ready to go!

Where this is going

2005-10-26T13:50:00.000-05:00

This October has been a busy conference season for me. In the past 2 years I've mostly stuck to the Illinois Library Association annual confernece. Those have been great for networking and learning more about the world of libraries (especially in IL), but the tech side is usually lacking. Jenny Levine and others always deliver a what's new and hot in tech, but other than that, there is not enough room for real in-depth tech sessions.

Enter, Internet Librarian 2005. A few months ago, this conference was another piece of mail on my desk. In what was either a strange twist of fate, or just the randomness of the universe the conference was in Monterey, CA, most notably the home to my wife's uncle, whom she's only seen a few times in the last 10 years.

My wife is now about 19 weeks along with our first child, which as of now might be a baby girl. So I was looking for something we could go away to do, kind of a "baby-moon" of sorts. At first, I was going to bring her to Peoria with me for this years ILA. But then Monterey came into the picture. This chance was perfect for both of us. I would get to go to California for the first time and for the first time visit a real library + tech conference that features some of the savviest tech that libraries across the country have to offer. For my wife, it was a small get away, probably our last and a chance to see an aunt & uncle she rarely gets to see.

Where am I going with this?

This blog is the revolution that happened in my mind while sitting through these sessions, surrounded by other people like me who were blogging the conference and sharing their experiences and photos with their peers and professional friends.

I also have to give Jenny credit (although I'm not sure she realizes what an influence she has been). I have read her blog off and on since I found out who she was and what she did. Most recently I've had a chance to introduce myself to Jenny and to learn more about what she and others in the northern part of the state are doing in their regional systems and libraries.

South of Springfield, libraries are behind the curve. Yes, we have some brilliant and creative librarians and some fantastic libraries. However, when I attend conferences I see all these libraries that are already blogging and using flickr to share photos, and other social tools to interact with their patrons. I see libraries that offer gaming to attract their young patrons. I see all this and I know southern Illinois has the potential to get there.

So consider this a virtual kick in the butt. This blog will be my way of sharing with our libraries what's out there, what I've learned, and what I'm doing that can help you reach out to your patrons over the Internet and reach them where they are.

Because that is what libraries need to start doing. Your patrons are becoming more and more mobile and the time is right to put the things in place so that your library can respond to the needs of not only today's patrons, but the ones of tomorrow as well.