Tuesday, September 30, 2008

End of the journey!


Wow, I've done it! And what a journey! Thanks to the training team for their support and encouragement throughout the process.
Looking back, there are times when I felt lost, kind of like being given all these random pieces of a puzzle-- colourful, definitely of use, but what to do with them and where to start! But as I forced myself forward along with the programme, all these pieces were falling into places presenting in front of me a wonderful Digital world, a world I had before assumed too difficult to navigate through its vastness and wilderness. With the knowledge gained throughout the programme, I am confident now to click into various sites and use some of the amazing tools to get the information I want, create something for myself, and share things with others if I want........I'll definitely re-visit some of the many sites to explore more and further!
I enjoyed exploring Flickr, Image Generator, YouTube, My Library and RSS feeds too! but all this is just the beginning of a lifelong learning experience!!!!!

upstream


upstream
Originally uploaded by -stacey-

Colors, Fire Lake


Colors, Fire Lake
Originally uploaded by Kayak49

Monday, September 29, 2008

social networking

Social networking using Myspace for libraries has certainly got great potential, some issues raised in some of the articles are quite interesting and thought-provoking. Social networking is definitely the way to go for libraries to reach their teenage users as those are the group who are the biggest fans of social networking, be it Myspace or Facebook, etc. They are so "well educated" with on-line information that it would be naive to get surprised by what they know and how much they know these days! It certainly is a challenge for libraries to create something fun as well as interesting and educational to attract them. I quite like Library Loft among other sites.

There's certainly a great space for North Shore Libraries to explore into, and to understand our teenage patrons and create the social networking site to get them connected and contribute would be an ongoing challenge.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Myspace, Bebo, Facebook

I have looked around at these three sites, but I do not feel like that I would want to join any one of them, at least for now. To my understanding, Myspace is more of an entertainment/social networking site with some stuff there quite hilarious or even hideous; Bebo is more or less the same; while Facebook is the one I heard about a lot and saw how it worked when my son was using it. It is really a site for socializing and connecting to friends and sharing ideas with them, etc.

I didn't get to downloading more images to my blog or seeing the NSL Facebook site as I have to join up before I can do them, but I think I may well sign in with one or two of them later when I have more time!

eBooks

While browsing around I can see digital formats’ potential to deliver content to readers rapidly and efficiently. However I still like the idea of a physical book rather than an electronic one.
Project Gutenberg is my favourite -- very easy to use, especially with its Top 100, making it so user-friendly. Searched for a couple of Shakespeare's works, just to test it and found it very quick and easy.

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Podcasts

I looked into different sites and found that Podcasts is the easiest to use, the display is clear and easy to follow. And when I did the RSS feed to my Bloglines, it seemed to me things we learned before are putting into pieces and making a lot of sense now.

YouTube

Wow, what wonderful site to use : love NBA games--at click of my mouse I can just watch any highlights of the game instantly! Tried other subject areas as well, think this will be very useful tool for library to promote any activities.

Web 2.0 Awards

Wow it is so easy to use this site, and browsing through the list of winners I have noticed that there are quite a number of applications which we have either used or looked at as we go along with this training programme -- a sense of satisfaction is how I felt looking at the list and think: 'Yes, I know about that!!!'

Google Maps is super easy to use : type in the address I want to check up, instantly the result is there! Hairmixer is just hilariously fun to play with ; revolutionhealth has got lots of interesting things to learn....... and of course I still love del.icio.us and flickr.

Healthy eating

Healthy eating


Most health experts recommend eating a balanced, healthy diet to maintain or to lose weight. But exactly what is a healthy diet?

The basic components of a healthy diet include the right amount of:

  • smileProtein (found in fish, meat, poultry, dairy products, eggs, nuts, and beans)
  • smileFat (found in animal and dairy products, nuts, and oils)
  • smileCarbohydrates (found in fruits, vegetables, pasta, rice, grains, beans and other legumes, and sweets)
  • smileVitamins (such as vitamins A, B, C, D, E, and K)
  • smileMinerals (such as calcium, potassium, and iron)
  • smileWater

Zoho Writer

Zoho Writer is quite easy to use and fun to play with, and what makes it more interesting and appealing is that any documant created or saved can easily be published in a personal blog -- cool........
http://writer.zoho.com/index.do#

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Rollyo

I wasn't too sure about the uses I would have for Rollyo, I didn't find it particularly easy to work out how to get started and it wasn't easy to navigate -- don't think I would use this site again. But I did find "Adding searchroll to my blog" easy to do.
http://www.rollyo.com/catchupg8/

Library Thing

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/catchupg8

Wow, it's just sooooo cool to go into Library Thing and creat my own Library!It's easy, it's fun, it's just brilliant!!!!!!!!

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

License plate

ImageChef.com - Custom comment codes for MySpace, Hi5, Friendster and more

Image generator

Playing it around is fun and I worked out my image post through http://www.imagechef.com/ic/make.jsp?tid=Growing+Flowers and http://www.imagechef.com/ic/make.jsp?tid=Race+Car+Ad. I'd love to do more when I get the time!

Aren't we beatiful!

ImageChef.com - Custom comment codes for MySpace, Hi5, Friendster and more

catchingup fast

ImageChef.com - Custom comment codes for MySpace, Hi5, Friendster and more

Monday, September 22, 2008

Learning 2.0 SandBox wiki

I looked into some of the favourite "things" and added a comment in the Favourite Receipes. Then I tried to add an entry to the Favourite Blogs, but when I did it I could see something's not quite right: my entry is not hyperlinked and couldn't click to open to my blog as a result, to make it worse I couldn't figure out why and which step I had missed. But finally with the help of my capable colleague, I sorted it out! Thanking her.........

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Learning about wikis

Used Wikipedia before purely to look things up, this exercise has just opened a much broader world in front of me -- knowing that viewers can also be creators is exciting as well as scaring! -- but still love it, especially when libraries can benefit so hugely from it creating easy-to-use guides and referrences,etc. I can happily waive the disadvantage of it(and I'm sure in the very near future things will work out to change that)!

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Library 2.0

It is exciting to think about the possibilities of sharing information. And I can see how wonderfully Web 2.0 has changed the way we use the Internet. I've clicked around some perspectives and realized how libraries can really benifit from it, too! ................. There is certainly heaps to learn!!!!!!!!

Monday, September 15, 2008

Technorati

Well, it's amazing how fast this "Technorati" world is increasing each day and I can see why! But after some clicking around I don't think I would personally use it that much though I would like to go back and have some more practise on tagging when I have the time.

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Del.icio.us -- social bookmarking

Wow, Delicious! Time just slipped away while looking into the social bookmarking site Del.icio.us : so many interesting links, and so easy to get lost in it -- got to know what you really want out of it! Good for libraries to use for publicising, promoting, etc...........

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Search for RSS Feeds

I found Topix quite easy to use and like the display of it : very clear and easy to find what I want....... but I like my bloglines the best -- good to know my favourate readings are always there!

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Exercise #7: RSS feeds and newsreaders

Well, it took me a while to understand RSS and Newsreader. To start reading all about RSS and understand how it works seemed a challange already: so...... much to read. Before I knew it, my eyes sore and my neck stiff -- wish all this are shorter and simpler.

Anyway, I had a bit of playing with it back and forth, back and forth......I looked at some of the feeds and I have also subscribed some interesting topics. Now I've got plenty to read online, cool...........

I'm happy to have done this part of the exercise, because now I can apply this technology to my daily life: get to read many of the interesting stuff without having to search forever before I get to what I want! Plus having subscribed some colleages' blog enables me to learn more and get inspired!

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Technology

Yes, technology! It's technology everywhere, it has come into almost every part of modern people's life and we are all ever so busy in catching up with the breathtaking advancing and development of it! It's almost like you blink you miss out!

But then the good part is we don't have to (don't think we can anyway) know evrything anything about it as long as we can manage to apply some of it to our life, especially those that make our life so much more fun and convenient! A brilliant example is just how much we can do to photos taken with digital cameras: by only using the mouse to click here and there, a picture can go so far from looking perfect to our eyes to secured keeping, to online sharing, publishing, etc. etc...........

I am yet to learn a lot more about it though, but wouldn't it be cool to be able to do much much more!

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Flickr mashups

I am totally overwhelmed by how much more everybody anybody can do with Flickr mashups to creat a third party site, some of which are so clever and look so professional, like some of those sites created by librarians. I can see that this will all get more and more interesting and challenging as we carry on with the training exercise.

Oh, while doing this exercise I saw this beautiful picture and thought other people may enjoy it as well, just click http://www.flickr.com/photos/happyjuristar4allseason/472180979/.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Exercise 4: Flickr

Wow, what a wonderful new world Flickr opens up for me! It's amazing how many images you can view at a click -- had to say it's so easy to get carried away (have done just that!) -- and the pictures I got to view are just fantastic and breathtakingly beautiful, wish I could take photos like that -- it's inspiring! To make it even better I learnt to post whatever photos I like to my blog, and hope I'll be able to do more to them as I go along with more exercise, like editing, customizing them to sit beautifully in my blog! The following is the site I explored into:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29130527@N07/2779188152/in/pool-art_of_nature

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Just registered

Wow! I have just created my own blog -- so much easier than I expected it would be! It's amazing to see how much more I can do with it, and am already excited about all this! Can't wait to start exploring this whole new area. It's going to be fun!!