Musings

This course evidently taught me something! I answered a whole Jeopardy category of questions on emerging technology last night. Questions dealt with such things as RSS and wikis. I did better than the college students competing!

This has been a great course and I would like to thank the members of the ETG for all of their hard work and dedication. I've learned a lot over the past few months and hope to expand my knowlege further. I have incorporated a number of sites, apps etc. into my routines at work and at home.

I plan on continuing my blog. I will strip out the Learning 2.0 material and use the blog to post interesting news and information on genealogy.

Thanks again for a wonderful learning opportunity!

Browser Tools

I already had Firefox installed at home so it was no problem to add it at work. I had never tried the add-ons before, so this was new territory. I tried changing the theme on my at-work computer but it would not take. I repeated the process at home with the same results. While installing an add-on I once again restarted Firefox, and to my surprise there was the new theme. I now have Aluminium Kai 2 on my PC (YESSS!!!).

I browsed the list of add-ons and chose the following which I installed:

• FoxyTunes - finds lyrics, videos, etc. and allows user to control many media players

• StumbleUpon - is a social networking app. The user picks an interesting catagory and then clicks the Stumble! button. This takes you to random sites in the same area of interest. This can be very addictive.
  

I also added MORRIS Bookmarklets to my favourites. This should come in handy when doing searches.

Gaming

I've been interested in computer games since the days of Atari and the Commodore 64 (I'm dating myself, aren't I?). I played arcade games but never responded well to timed-play and impending threat of death. The only one I mastered was a great game called "Aztec Challenge". My real passion was text-based games, where I would spend hours trying to solve mysteries and try to survive. As computer games advanced and I upgraded my computer, I became addicted to Sim City and Myst.

With the advent of the internet, I drifted away from computer-based games and started playing games on the internet. I now gravitate to online jigsaw puzzles, trivia, logic and board games. My favourite is "Daily Mahjong". It changes daily and has three levels of play. The graphics are well-done and are holiday-themed at appropriate times of the year. You can play this game at:
http://www.shockwave.com/gamelanding/dailymahjong.jsp . I also like playing "Bookworm".

Facebook

Facebook is all about connections. It allows one to connect with family, old friends and classmates. Like MySpace it is youth-oriented and the majority of it's users are university-aged. It's a great place to reconnect with old classmates, but if you have been out of school for a long time the pickings are slim. I prefer, when possible, human interaction--either face-to-face or by phone. I know this isn't always feasible but I still find it more satisfying.

The use of social-networking websites like Facebook really show their worth when "things" happen. Case in point is the recent shootings at Virginia Tech. Within minutes the news was flashing across Facebook as people checked to see if friends were okay. UV members immediately set up an "I'm OK" page to let family and friends know what was happening to them. Other universities and colleges around the world set up support pages as well.

MySpace

I toured around MySpace looking at various links and also checked out a number of groups. I'm not interested in setting up an account (too many of them these days!) so I just decided to browse. MySpace is very youth-oriented. When searching profiles, the age groups range from 18-68 only which is fine for the millions of young people that use it for socializing, but it seems to leave out the ever-growing number of seniors that are using sites like Facebook and flickr to keep in touch with families and friends.

This may be really negative, but there seems to be so few posts that are thoughtful, intelligent or worth reading. Most of the posts I have read on MySpace and other social networks are pure dreck.

Del.ici.ous

I'm still undecided about del.ici.ous and Google searches. I did a search on “science fiction alternate history” in both.

Del.ici.ous came up with 33 hits and Google came up with 5,820,000. The site that I expected to be at the top of both was “Uchronia, the Alternate History List”. It appeared at the top of the del.ici.ous list and eighteenth on Google. Other important sites like the Ultimate Science Fiction Web Guide, however, did not appear in Del.ici.ous. Google gave me the Wikipedia article for alternate history at the top of the list, but del.ici.ous did not list this site at all. It did list several other Wikipedia sites for subgenres.

I looked at the content of the del.ici.ous entries for this search and was not really impressed. I got more solid information from Google.

Google Documents & Spreadsheets (cont.)

There is an interesting article titled: Google Presentations: Are We Heading to a Google Office Suite? at the following URL:

http://www.playfuls.com/news_07049_Google_Presentations_Are_We_Heading_to_a_Google_Office_Suite.html

Wikis

I set up a wiki for book recommendations on both PBWiki using the title "Have I Got a Book for You!" and on Wetpaint using the same title "Have I Got a Book for You!" I prefer PBWiki, as it is easier and more friendly to use and to look at. I appreciate the capability of using colour to enhance the blog entries. There is also a better choice of fonts available. The only problem I had was getting the font to match everyone else on the sidebar.

Bloglines vs Google Reader

After weeks of using both Bloglines and Google Reader, I have finally decided that I prefer Google Reader. I like the look of the Reader, it's easier to read and navigate. I also like the fact that the Reader only marks as read those 20 items currently in the right-hand pane. When using Bloglines, all items in a feed are marked as read whether I've viewed everything or not. If I have to leave the feed I loose all of the unread material. With the Reader, I can go back and continue reading at a later time. I also found that it was easier to add feeds with Reader.

Flickr

I finally got my digital camera out and uploaded a number of pictures to Flickr. The process was very easy, and the pictures look pretty good. If anyone is interested, they can be viewed by searching my flickr account (afmccrone). Found this picture of a burmese cat with attitude

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ljj/336212011/

Google Documents & Spreadsheets

Very interesting applications. You can create a document or spreadsheet in much the same way you use Word or Excel and save it to a secure site on Google. This allows you to access the document from anywhere you have access to the internet. You don't have to be at your desk and you don't have to worry that your hard drive might crash.

You can invite others (by email) to collaborate on the document. Documents and spreadsheets can be published to the web or to your blog. You can email these as attachments.

It doesn't have all the bells and whistles of Word or WordPerfect (e.g. limited fonts, text size, formatting) but it's quite good.

Librarything.com

Back when we started Learning 2.0@Mac, my first blog dealt with a new free program I found called Librarything. Last week I inadvertently deleted it from my blog. I noticed that it came up as one of the activities for week 8 so hope that many of you have taken the opportunity to investigate it.

For those of you who haven't it is well worth the look. Librarything is a social catalogue that allows you to catalogue your book collection (free for up to 200 books), and maintain reading and wish lists. You can keep your catalogue private or go public allowing others with similar interests to see your collection.

When you add books to your list, you can search Amazon, the Library of Congress and other libraries from around the world for cataloguing information. When you locate the right book and edition you are provided with all of the bibliographic information as well as LC and Dewey classifications. You can also add your own tags.

My first posts can be viewed at librarything.com. Click on the search button and under "search users" type in "motherthing".

Library Laugh of the Week

While doing IM this afternoon I received what had to be the most unusual request for info that I've had in a long time:

"I'm looking for any reference material that cites the
amount of pressure (psi) needed to crush a testicle"

The requester was quick to add that she ran a women's self-defense webpage. I don't know if this added note was to show that she had a legitimate need for the info and not because she was planning to do some damage;-)

Family Roots Radio

While touring the blogisphere I found an internet radio show devoted to family history. It is called Family Roots Radio and is available on the Voice of America website. The show is “hosted by well-known genealogical author, speaker and researcher, Kory L. Meyerink, the show will feature a wide range of “how-to” elements designed to assist all people interested in family history, from the novice to the professional.

In addition to answering general questions from listeners, spotlighting important family history news and providing research tips from professionals, the show will include guests from among the most prominent genealogists today. The show will also explore effective ways to use software and the Internet in the pursuit of family history, including spotlighting data-rich websites.”

The website (www.familyrootsradio.com/) archives old shows that can be downloaded to your desktop or mp3 player. Very informative!

Online Translation Services

If you are tracing family to non-English countries, you may find yourself lost in translation. The following websites offer free translation in many of the major languages.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

SDL International Free Professional Translation (http://www.freetranslation.com/)

Along with the traditional Spanish, French, German and Italian, this service also translates Dutch, Portuguese, Russian, Norwegian, simplified and traditional Chinese and Japanese. You can translate up to 750 words at a time.


Babel Fish (http://babelfish.altavista.com/)

The granddaddy of online translators does all of the above languages as well as Greek and Korean. You can translate up to 150 words at a time. The site also allows you to translate webpages by typing the URL into the text box.

Organize Your Book Collection!

I've discovered an interesting website called LibraryThing (www.librarything.com) that lets you catalogue your private book collection and lets you use tags to organize them. It's as easy as typing in a book title and then searching Amazon.com, the Library of Congress or sixty other world libraries. Once you find and choose the edition you want, LibraryThing dumps the cataloguing info into the record.

You can share your catalogue with other book lovers and browse their collections. Users can post reviews and get recommendations from other members. You can also join or create discussion groups. The website connects people based on the books they read and share.

LibraryThing is a free service for the first 200 books catalogued. Anything over that number incurs a quite reasonable fee of $10 annually or $25 for a lifetime membership.