What do you do with your weekends? I talk about Library 2.0 with other librarians. Fun, yes?
In the course of discussion this weekend, I found myself focusing on one of my favorite elements, shared content. There is much more to Library 2.0 (and Web 2.0) than this, but it’s a big part of it. By “shared content,” I mean being able to display on one website content that originated (and is hosted by) another website.
On a lot of popular websites (like YouTube), there will be links to “embed this video” or “get our widget” or whatnot, and that’s what I’m talking about. It’s an easy way to make your own website more useful and interesting, but it also opens up all kinds of possibilities. You don’t necessarily need to know anything about file formats, ftp’ing, or even HTML coding - all you need to know is how to copy/paste.
So, here’s a bit of roundup of common types of embedded content, and a few ideas for using them to supplement what you’re already offering on your website. The possibilities are really only limited by your creativity, so please share if you have ideas better than mine (and I’m sure you do).
Adding Movies and Video Clips
There’s lots of websites that can host videos, but YouTube is the most common. Whenever you view a video on YouTube, you’ll see a box titled “Embed” with some code in it. The code usually looks like this:
You don’t need to know what any of that means. You just need to copy/paste it into your own HTML page or blog post, and a happy little video will be displayed on your webpage (the video still “lives” on the YouTube server, and you’re just displaying it on your webpage), like this:
Library Tour, or a tour of historical sites around your community
A Teen Movie Making club
Staff introductions (I know, it’ll never happen…)
Training on using library resources
Fun With Photographs
Again, lots of websites do this, but flickr is one of the most popular photo hosting services (it does video now, too). Instead of storing photographs on your own server, you can upload them to your flickr account and take advantage of the other tools flickr offers.
You can embed individual images (flickr gives you a choice of sizes, and provides the code for embedding it), or you can embed a slideshow or flickr “badge.” These two are nice because after you put the code in, it can be set to automatically show your newest pictures. I use a flickr badge in navigation bar on the right, and my library also uses it to display historical photos and photos of our childrens room mural. Here’s a sample of photos I have taken and tagged “Maine:”
What’s the feed, Kenneth?
Lots of Library 2.0 tools offer on RSS feeds. These can be grabbed and displayed on your website, no matter where they come from. One simple tool that converts an RSS feed to code you can embed on your website is Feed2JS - you just give it the feed, and it gives you the code. It also gives you some control over the formatting, too, which is nice. My library uses this to embed our three most recent blog posts onto the library’s homepage - same content, different places.
Another fun set of feed tools let you mix multiple feeds into a single feed. So, if you wanted to get news from CNN, NPR and the BBC, or photos from different family members, you could combine them into a single feed and it makes keeping up easier. My favorite tools for this are FeedBlendr and FeedBurner - just enter the feeds you want to blend, and they produce a single feed for you. This can then be run through Feed2JS to embed on your website, and FeedBlendr also offers tips for using it. Ideas for using this:
Promote your library blog on other webpages
Display blog posts with certain tags on related webpages
Display community news (especially headlines from your local paper)
Promote community connections by displaying feeds from patrons’ blogs, photo streams, or other sources
Make subject guides dynamic Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking website. It lets you “bookmark” websites into your account, which then can be used by you or other people. Del.icio.us lets you tag the websites as you bookmark them, which means that can be organized using your own structured vocabulary.
This is perfect for libraries that maintain online subject guides. It is much easier to add a website to del.icio.us and tag/describe it on the fly than it is to add it to a webpage by HTML. And when you do use a structured vocabulary for your tags, these new websites showing up on your library subject guides is automatic. It’s also nice that multiple computers can add bookmarks to your account, so other staff can be adding websites whenever they see them. Read more about how to use del.icio.us for library subject guides on a previous post. Ideas for using this:
Embedding fun features and communication tools
Once you start looking for them, you’ll find lots of websites offering to embed their content on your website. This is a great was to encourage interaction and involvement, but the utility of the content must be evaluated - don’t just embed things because you can. Ideas for using this:
Polls and Quizzes, to see how patrons feel about an issue or just solicit input (flexipoll.com is one option)
Online chat, to ask a librarian a question or have a discussion (MeeboMe is one option)
Games, perhaps for a game club, to illustrated an article or collection, or just for fun (everyflashgame.com is one option)
Book information, to show new additions or a special collection (LibraryThing.com is one option)
Like I said, the possibilities of this are endless. The goodwill and usefulness can be immeasurable, too, but there are a few drawbacks. First, since this content is coming from other servers, it can be unavailable at times (or worse, go away forever without warning). Also, if you’re displaying the content of other people, you can’t control what they will say or do. This is why it is important to grab feeds only from trusted sources, or embed specific videos or photos, so you’re sure of what you’re getting.
And certainly, don’t be afraid to just try something to see how it works. That’s usually the best way to learn, and the best way to show people what is possible.
Patron: Hello, do you, I, have you got, um, wifey, at the library? Me: Ah, I’m sorry, could you repeat that please? Patron: Is wifey, at the library? Me: Well, I don’t know, but if you describe her, I can walk around and look for her. Patron: What? Me: We don’t have a paging system, so I’ll have to walk around to check and see if she’s here. Patron: She? No, I mean wifey. For my computer. Can I use wifey access at the library? Me: [pause] Oh, yes, we do have wi-fi access here…
…and I went on to describe what we offer. The patron wasn’t nearly as entertained by this misunderstanding as I was - in fact, I think he thought I was an idiot. Oh well; at least we eventually straightened it out.
When he came in later that day, I was able to help him connect his laptop to the library’s wireless network, so that may have restored his faith in librarian competency.
Regardless, I’m going to take advantage of Jessamyn’s incredibly timely post about better publicizing library services (not to mention linking to them so patrons can find local wireless access when the library is closed).
Library-Wide IT Proficiency Workshop
New England Library Association, Information Technology Section
June 12, 2008 - Bryant University, RI
Gary McCone & Grace Sines
I’m writing today from the NELA-ITSSpring 2008 workshop. The handouts are available below, so I’ll just be annotating with a few points throughout the day, and also trying to add pictures to flickr.
Here are the handouts, that were provided to all attendees on a flash drive:
Part I
Overview of the National Agriculture Library, and the services they offer. Being a national library, they are a resource for everyone, so check them out.
Library-Wide IT Proficiencies
Why are IT proficiencies important? It’s important to get IT support right the first time with the end-user, so front-line staff need to feel comfortable in both doing the support and managing expectations (we cannot “fix the internet”).
Keys to success Enable non-IT staff, excellent communications, understand end-users (needs, vocabulary and skills), know where knowledge or information lies within the organization, don’t get stressed - we’re all working towards the same goal
Expect things to change Technology will change, staff and users needs and skills will change - must expect change and be flexible to accommodate it
Listen to end-users Meet with end-users in a non-threatening way to learn directly from them what they need (although it might be delicate, focus on what is wrong, because no one is happy with IT), and work to get ongoing feedback
Part II
Roadmap to creating an IT-Savvy Library Staff
Technology Core Competencies Abilities, knowledge and skill required to do the job - can be itemized based on areas or tasks, such as “printer & copier,” “operating system,” “email,” etc.
Types Can be task-based (skill: refill printer paper) or descriptive (knowledge: know how to surf the internet)
Get involvement from everyone Everyone should be involved in defining them and what is needed to achieve them (management, professional staff, front-line staff, etc)
Plan implementation Everyone knows what’s happening and what to expect, and how competencies can be met
Why have them? Promote customer service, increase motivation, address fear/threats of technology or people with limited skills (and don’t be afraid of providing incentives and praise)
IT Liaison Program Designate one person from each department to be the lead liaison with the IT department - hopefully someone interested in IT, to be the first point of contact
Ideas for training Experts in the library leading sessions, creating fact sheets (your own knowledge base), online training/webinars (free and fee), weekly tips. mentoring programs, regional trainers, keep track of what library staff don’t know (FAQs)
Topics for training Evolving technologies, real-world issues (spam, phishing, flash drives, etc), tour the library website, Google labs, digital rights management, RSS, media formats (flash, audio, interactivity, etc), hardware petting zoo (new gadgets, gizmos and games)
This is a follow-up post to “Using Firefox On Our Public Computers” - a few people have asked me what else we have on our public computers, so here is pretty much everything we’re doing on our public workstations.
I’m really curious to hear what other libraries are doing on their public computers, so please share your library’s public computer configurations in the comments section.
The Desktop
The Background Image - Instead of just having a solid color, we use the wallpaper image to tell patrons how to print (rather than taping the directions to the inside wall of each study carrel). And supposedly, black-on-white is easiest to read, and uses less energy
Directory Shortcuts - We have shortcuts to My Computer, My Documents and the Recycle Bin: My Computer so patrons can access their flash drive, CD or floppy disk, and My Documents to save their work to the hard drive temporarily (see Deep Freeze below). We decided against a link right to the A:\ Drive, to discourage use of floppy disks
Resolution Switcher - We were having trouble balancing the patrons who wanted 800×600 resolution against the growing number of websites designed for 1024×768, so I was very happy when the library’s IT person found ResSwitch. This free program allows patrons control the screen resolution right from the desktop - huge utility (and customer service) in a small package
Firefox Internet Browser - Read more about using Firefox
Microsoft Office - We offer Word, Excel and Powerpoint 2003 (and installed the Office 2007 file converter). We’ve talked about switching to OpenOffice, but MS Office is cheap for libraries and our patrons are comfortable with it
Meebo Instant Messenger - We put a direct link to meebo.com because so many patrons use it socially or for group work. Also, providing this link is easier than installing and keeping up-to-date local copies of the popular IM services
Quick Launch Desktop Shortcut - Just to make the whole desktop cleaner, we decided against loading up the Quick Launch toolbar (by the Start button) with all the offered programs. Instead, we just put the link to the Desktop there, which, after they learn what it is, I’ve seen patrons using
CD Burning with Roxio - A few of our public computers have CD burners, and we use Roxio to handle this. I think it came free when we bought them from Dell, but is now an upcharge. Roxio works well (with a handout we made up), but instead of paying for additional copies, we’ll use use XP’s native CD burning
Time and Print Management
Time Limit Manager - Up until May 2008, we used Library Geek for our timer software. It worked very well for our needs, but it didn’t provide statistics. We switched over to Time Limit Manager from Fortress Grand because it accomplished most of what we wanted and gave statistics. We don’t require any kind of sign up or sign in, and set the session time for 60 minutes.
What I Like About TLM
One really nice feature of TLM is that it lets the patron automatically go into “extra” time if not all the computers are in use - we liked this because we thought it was unnecessary to kick patrons off if there were other computers available
The countdown clock always shows at the top of the screen (although sometimes I feel like it is pressuring me to be efficient)
When a session is up (and all other computers are in use), TLM automatically logs the computer out. This means that if someone was just sitting there chatting online, it closes everything to give them more incentive to give up their computer to someone else. Also, though, just logging out (rather than rebooting) means that any work saved in My Documents will still be there at the next log in
Supposedly there’s a way to end all session when the library closes (or better yet, five minutes before), but we haven’t figured this out yet
What I Don’t Like About TLM (so far, at least - take all of these with a grain of salt, because I’m still learning the program)
The timer can’t be turned off at the workstation - extra time is given via the console installed on the reference desk computers
This control console is a bit clunky, but it gets the job done
The statistics provided are somewhat cumbersome - there’s no way to easily see which computer is used the most, or what day/time is the busiest (at least, none that I’ve found yet)
Printing - We use LPT:One from EnvisionWare, and it meets our needs. We just recently added a color printer for patrons to use ($0.15 for B&W, $0.25 for color), but are still looking for a way to allow wireless printing
Printing to PDF - To allow patrons to create their own PDF files from any program, we installed PDFcreator. It shows up in the printer selection dropdown box, and creates a pdf file patron can then save to disk
Extras and Other
Windows Media Player - We chose to go with WMP because it comes with XP, and works well enough for playing streaming content or music CDs patrons bring in. No desktop shortcut, though, so it only is launched when it is called for by filetype
Adobe Reader, Flash Player, et. al. - It’s always a challenge keeping up with the latest versions of all the plugins patrons need, but that’s life on the internet. Something we learned, after installing the latest versions, was to open them to get rid of all the annoying “I Agree” windows before turning on Deep Freeze
Screensaver - We decided to go with the standard XP picture slideshow screensaver, but we use it to promote library services and upcoming events. We pointed all the computers to the same network directory where we save jpg images for events (example), and then delete them after the event passes. It was a bit tricky to make the screensaver show up properly while the computer was logged out, but we eventually got it. When we upgrade to an RSS-compatible events calendar, we’ll probably switch to a screensaver that can display that RSS feed
Locking Everything Down - For this, the library’s IT person uses a three-pronged strategy:
Deep Freeze, from Faronics, to make sure that when we turn the computers on each morning, they are exactly the same as when we turned them on the previous morning. This also means that anything patrons save to My Documents will be erased when the computer is restarted - this is good for privacy reasons, but can also be disappointing for the patron who comes back three days later wondering where their resume went (but this is usually a mistake patrons only make once). There are similar programs out there, but we’ve never had a problem with Deep Freeze, so we stick with it
Cloning - Once a disk image is configured the way we want it, the library’s IT person used Symantec Ghost Solution Suite to clone it to all of our public workstations. It took her some trial and error to figure out the right order for installing software, but any time this does manage to save is worth it
I should also point out that, as Head of Reference, I am, at best, just a supporting role for computer maintenance. It’s the library’s Head of Technology that does the hard work, turning what I think patrons might need into things patrons can actually use. I’m lucky to work with someone who puts as much emphasis on customer service as I do - thank you, Barbara.
If there’s the least glimmer of money to be made, I suppose anything is susceptible to being corrupted. I recently got a spam comment on one of my flickr pictures.
I’ve heard of IM spam before, and get spam comments here all the time, but this is the first time I’ve seen it on flickr.
I deleted the comment (preserved in screencapture form) and won’t link to the flickr user or his website. I wonder if this is automated or just someone commenting on any photo that mentioned “web designer” just to promote his business.
What do you do with your weekends? I talk about Library 2.0 with other librarians. Fun, yes?
