I started looking a bit at my chosen next gen catalog, MyLibrary over spring break. The more I examined the MyLibrary resources, I found I was a bit disappointed. Right now MyLibrary seems geared to the academic environment. In fact, it’s currently only been adapted to universities like Notre Dame, University of Rochester and Mississippi State University . So while it is an interesting product, I’m aiming for employment in the public library arena and it, on face, doesn't have the same attraction as products like Chilifresh or Evergreen.
Something happened today to put things into some perspective. I had to charge my cell phone today. Putting my cell on the charger made me think back to an XKCD panel tracing the use of lithium batteries.
It made me realize that a lot of technology and technology applications begin in a more rarified environment and are adapted to a broader audience. While the comic made technological adaptation seem negative, I am hesitant to entirely condemn the practice.
Just as cheap lithium batteries have found use in more trivial items, they also have expanded use in items that improve quality of life (like hearing aids that are comfortable to wear). Monroe pokes fun about the proliferation of cell phones (and I can’t chastise too much having stood in plenty of grocery store lines where I am the captive audience to some stranger’s life) I am thrilled to have one at hand when my car’s battery is dead or some other disaster I am unprepared to meet on my own. It isn’t just about the adaptations, but how we decide on a personal level to apply those adaptations to our lives.

So ultimately, while I’m going to be analyzing MyLibrary for both the class and IOLUG presentation, I’ll also be looking for public library uses for the application.

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Ada Lovelace Day was March 24th, a day where bloggers honor women in technology. I wanted to honor my mom.
My mother is not a great techie. She didn’t start learning about using email until two years ago. When I was growing up, my mom was very involved in the school that my sister and I attended. When the school got it’s first computer lab, my mother was hired to be the lab aide. We would ride into school in the mornings with her and help with turning on the twenty-odd Apple II’s. Thanks to my mom, I got early exposure to computers and grew up without distinguishing technology as a gendered field.
Happy Ada Lovelace Day, Mom.

I am still really enjoying the work laptop. The mobility of it, especially the ability to get internet access has been extremely helpful for school projects. Example, this week I had to get a prescription filled. Instead of waiting the hour and a half at the store, I drove down to the Panera Bread and tried out their wifi connection and worked on homework for my Audio and Visual Resources class. I had absolutely no problem with connecting.
Still feeling the success of the Panera experience I took the laptop with me to the IUPUI library on Wednesday. I had a group project meeting online at 7 pm at the same time had a group of friends who have seen very little of me over the past month and were hoping I could meet up with them at the Rathskeller after the meeting. I got to the library early and went to my favorite study carrousel on the fourth floor. Turned on the laptop and found four different network choices. I had no idea which one to pick. I tried a trial and error approach, selecting one network at a time. Each one provided a nice little warning message that dissuaded me from pursuing a particular option any further. I couldn’t help but be a bit leery; this laptop isn’t a personal toy. I need to keep it in good running order so I can complete any and all jobs that my company.
I ended up shutting down the laptop and walking over to the tech station to see if there were handouts for using the IUPUI wireless network. The boxes where the self-help sheets are supposed to be stored were all empty. I ended up logging on to a campus workstation to access the internet, so that I could find out how to access the internet.
Luckily I wasn’t extremely frustrated by the situation. I could (and did) access the workstations provided. But what if the situation had been slightly different. It definitely makes me think hard about how we store and access information. I know that in my office, we constantly talk about how things will function when we go paperless. At the same time, I’m not sure that I agree that the day will come any too soon. Maybe I’m not very forward thinking, but paper will always be that lowest common denominator – that one piece of technology everyone had an ingrained knowledge of how to use.

Posting 3 -

My Microsoft puppy is waiting for me to write something profound…By this point in the week I think I might have used up anything that smacks of profound. I’ve been working on a nasty collection and development project for another class. I’ve been chasing down electronic resources on videos, both educational and instructional, about art. I think the hardest part is keeping focused. The web offers so many side tracks to be followed and I am usually willing to go anywhere. (Like did you know that there is a complete set of lyrics to “Be kind to our web-footed friends”?– scroll down-). The project has given me a small excuse to look at some really cool museum sites, which takes some of the sting out sitting in front of a computer monitor for 8-10 hours.

I love art, but don’t really have the money (nor the time) set aside for extensive travel to museums. It is amazing how various museums are starting to harness technology to give others a museum-esque experience from their home computers. All three of the museum sites (Smithsonian Art, Los Angeles County Museum, & Museum of Modern Art- MoMA) I listed in my collection recommendations offered viewers the ability to form their own collections, to zoom in on small details or some small film clip that expanded on the object. Smithsonian Luce collection was probably the most user friendly for the home explorer. I also noted that the sites all had podcasts or pod tours. You could down load a sound file at home and bring it with you to a particular museum. I think that you can also still rent the nasty headphones and audiotapes. I think I like the pod tour since it would allow you to more easily tailor your trip to your own interests versus the traditional audiotour.

MoMA and Smithsonian had some neat online games and exploration spaces for kids. The Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian has a small section of picture rollovers that is fascinating (okay, for me its fascinating). Makes me wonder if some of these things could be applicable to a library.

Laptop Envy

For a long time now, I’ve been suffering from laptop envy. Laptops seem to be everywhere I look. I see them at coffee shops, bookstores, lecture halls and classrooms. I envy others of their mobile computing abilities. From classmates who look things up quickly for in-class group assignments to my good friends who show off the latest youtube geek/nerd humor clip, I just look and think “wouldn’t it be great to have one.”
I also have a big practicality streak that has held me back. I have a very nice home setup. So the idea of owning a laptop has remained just that, an idea.
This week at work I finally got a laptop.
I always thought the mobility issue as the coolest possible feature. I was wrong; the coolest feature of my work laptop is the ability to run a dual system on a single machine concurrently. By concurrently, I mean that I am using Quark for Mac (a really great graphic design program) while also having/editing my Excel for PC timesheet, all on a single machine, a single screen. No more toggling. All of this is made possible through a program called VirtualMachine.
All of this computing power has me thinking harder, trying to be more cognizant of what I am doing and what program I am using. I tend to use a lot of shortcut commands. The base key for those commands differs from Mac to PC. This is my first week and I am still trying to call up a blank email using Ctrl+N or open a new tab in my PC version of Firefox with Option+T. Time and usage will help me break these old habits and develop new ones.
The only thing that gives me pause as to the whole laptop... it's a Mac Powerbook. Generally, each successive Mac release has proven more difficult for me to take down.

The Mac and I

Technology is pretty integrated within my life. I have a PC at home. At work I use a dual platform (Mac & PC) station and some fairly snazzy graphics and layout programs. My cell phone makes me happy, but not as happy as my iPod. With my lovely digital camera I can update my flickr account with photographs of finished knitting projects for my Ravelry account. I use and love technology, and so it’s pretty easy to overlook the fact that I don’t always understand it. When I start to get overconfident, my special hidden talent tends to rise to the surface.

I crash Macs. I crash Macs like nobody’s business.

It’s unusual since Apple has always prided themselves on Macs simplicity and user-friendliness. In passing conversations with Mac devotees I’m usually scoffed at until forced to reveal how many times my current work Mac has been reformatted in the span of 3 years. After one such reveal, a fellow student asked me to step away from her brand new Powerbook.

It is fascinating to me how crashing my work Mac changes my relationship with it. While working, the Mac is simply a machine. It displays only that which I command, nothing more and nothing less. However when it stops working in a predictable manner, it is suddenly transformed in my mind as an obstinate mystery, a box of beeps and flashing lights that I weep and plead with that the last auto-save was recent.

The most positive thing about the experience is that it keeps me fairly honest. I think maybe this mental transformation may be how people with less mediation might view technology, an object that may or may not have a will of it’s own, that may or may not be seconds from utter disaster. It’s a mindset that is easily lost as what was rare becomes an everyday necessity. My Mac reminds me of this fact daily.

Plus, it gives me a few good jokes.