Thing #45 -- Cloud Computing

I commented on the rise in web applications in Thing #2. It's an update of early days of computing. Back then, everything was kept on a large mainframe computer, and so-called dumb terminals (basically monitors and keyboards) were hooked up to it. Then desktop computers became more and more powerful, and everything was done locally, using the workstation's own processor and memory. Now we've arrived at cloud computing, which is just the modern day equivalent of the mainframe and not-so-dumb-anymore terminal--applications, documents, all kinds of data, really, are stored on a server somewhere and accessed anywhere via an Internet connection and a web browser.

My primary experience with cloud computing is using Apple's MobileMe service, and account that gives me space on the cloud to store files, and access to my email, calendar, contacts, and photos. My husband and I are able to synchronize between what is on the cloud and all our computers, whether at home, at work, or on our iPods. Eventually we would like to purchase a new router for our home network that would allow us to use the Back to My Mac feature. Then we would be able to access files between computers directly, without needing to upload them to the cloud for sharing first.

For work, I've used both Google Docs and Zoho, and written about them in previous posts. I haven't used Zoho beyond the one, rather unsuccessful, experience. Google Docs, on the other hand, continues to be an important tool as I collaborate on projects with librarians from other instutions.

There's always a tradeoff between access and security, and cloud computing is no different. It's nice to have access to files from anywhere, but that also leaves open the risk of others getting unauthorized access to those same files. Our campus, like most others, has a firewall in place to prevent many kinds of access to campus networks from off-campus. However, as more and more tools I use are web based, I have discovered that I can do increasing amounts of work from home without running into firewall problems. This can be important as the college makes contingency plans for how to continue operations in the event of a swine flu pandemic, or other severe outbreak.

Thing #30 -- More Ways to Use RSS

I use Google Reader for my RSS feeds and once I added the Reader gadget to my iGoogle home page (as part of Thing 28) that became the primary way I view them. I'll usually check several times a week, skimming the list, and only reading the ones that interest me. Organizing feeds into folders really helps. I have folders for general library feeds, specific library subjects, news, technology, and a few others. It helps me keep my reading focused; many times I don't check every folder each time--deciding which folders have interest for me depending on my mood or circumstances. Using folders also keeps any one list of posts from getting too long and overwhelming.

Even so, the technology folder still has a lot in it. Both Lifehacker and Engadget, for example, post several times an hour, and it's hard to weed out the few gems I care about from all the rest. I was glad to discover FeedRinse as part of this Thing, and am experimenting with it. I created "rinsed" versions of my technology related feeds, based on what tags are in a post, and set up a separate folder for those. This will allow me to compare what's getting through my filters with the full blog. Once it seems to be giving me just the posts I care about I'll remove the full feeds from my reader.

The concept behind Spreed is an interesting one. I can see its appeal for some people, those whose job requires them to keep up on all the news in a particular area. It's nice that Spreed provides options to speed read a story or see the full article, and to set the words per minute. I had a hard time with it, though. On slower speeds the story didn't flow--my mind kept treating each screen of 2-4 words as a distinct chunk rather than knitting them together to make a sentence. Increasing the speed made me tense, as my comprehension tried to keep up with my reading.

In the "file it away for later" category is Simple Tracking.com. Next time I have a package to track it will be nice to have a feed that updates when the package's status changes.

I also may try twitterfeed later on, depending on how much I end up using Twitter, and how many people follow me. Twitterfeed would be an easy way for libraries with both blogs and Twitter accounts to keep users informed about the library, by passing blog posts into their Twitter stream. A painless way to reach users where they are, in whichever social medium they prefer.

I'll save more things with delicious for my next post.

Thing #29, part 1 -- Google Tools: Productivity

I should have gotten to this Thing earlier...it solved an annoyance I've been dealing with for several years.

The Background
For what seems like a long time now, I've been using 2 separate calendar applications. My husband and I share several calendars on Apple's iCal to keep track of various schedules, and I use Mozilla Sunbird at work so I can print my weekly agenda and post it outside my office (my library doesn't use our campus' calendar program to share staff schedules). While the 2 applications use the same calendar format, they couldn't share calendars. That meant I either had to remember to enter everything twice, once in each place, or continuously export and import from one app to the other.

The Solution
I had looked at Google Calendar a little over a year ago to see if it was a better alternative than Sunbird, but it wasn't then. This Thing made me take a second look. Upon reading this sentence: "You can sync you calendar with Outlook, Blackberry devices, and Apple's iCal" [emphasis mine] I became excited. Finally, no more double entry calendaring! A quick install of Google's calaboration code on my MacBook, and I was all set. Now, anything I add to my Google Calendar while I'm at work will show up in iCal at home and my husband's work, and anything either of us add to iCal will show up for me at work.

Productivity tool indeed! This Thing is the winner so far for most immediate application of something I've learned.

Thing #28 -- Custom Home Pages

I created an iGoogle home page as part of Thing 13 and decided to stick with it for this Thing. Since I had explored Pageflakes and MyYahoo previously I didn't look at them again, but I did play around with Netvibes. Netvibes is a lot more appealing visually than iGoogle, but I just couldn't see creating yet another account to keep track of, or taking the time to basically duplicate everything I had in iGoogle. Also, I use both Google Groups and shared Google Documents. If the idea is to increase productivity by having all resources in one place, then iGoogle is the obvious choice for me.

Working on this Thing caused me to reexamine what gadgets I had on iGoogle and whether there were any I should add. I did put 3 new gadgets on my page. Two of them I should have added months ago: Google Reader and Facebook. Now that I am using Twitter, I also added a gadget for it.

Thing #25 -- Bloggers' Toolkit

This is a good Thing to have at the beginning, to explore useful tools for blogging. But it's a bad Thing because there's so much to explore it can keep you from moving on to other Things. I've been stuck on #25 for a couple weeks now...

The usability article was informative. It was also validating, as I discovered I'm already following many of the suggestions. I like the one about tag clouds being more helpful than lists of previous posts by date; it makes a lot of sense. I plan to add a tag cloud to my blog--but first I have to go back and add tags to all the posts! It was something I hadn't done originally. That article also introduced me to Copyblogger, where I ended up spending a bunch of time reading.

Some of the 20 usability suggestions were frustrating, however. Since it was written using, and for, WordPress, many of the linked tools are WordPress specific. I'd see something I wanted to try, but not know how to. The frustration was compounded because I don't find Blogger's gadget lists very easy to use. Browsing categories brings up too many gadgets to page through, and searching doesn't seem to produce very helpful results. Kind of strange for a company that built itself on search!

Google Analytics is something I'm familiar with because I use it on a couple web sites I work with. It was simple to add tracking for this blog to the other sites I keep stats for. I noticed my blog has very few hits--not all that surprising. There are so many More Things on a Stick blogs that I've only looked at a small fraction myself.

With such low traffic, many of the Toolkit items don't make much sense. They'd just highlight how desolate my blog is out in cyberspace. ; - ) But I can see their value for more active blogs. I'm thinking about some of the comment tools (recent comments area, post ratings, most popular posts, etc.)

One thing I did add was the ability to subscribe to my blog. That's a key feature that I always look for on other blogs. A section I didn't even explore was the photo tools. I use a couple different imaging tools in my work on various web sites. For me, it's easier to keep using the tools I know than to work with different ones just for blogging.

Thing #13 -- Online Productivity Tools

Once again, on first reading through the Thing I think to myself: I'm already doing a lot of this with my Mac...

• My husband and I share an iCal calendar, and use our iDisk to keep it in sync.
• Mac's OS comes with a built-in PDF converter. Just choose File>>Print>>Save as PDF. I use this all the time, both for converting word processing files and for saving web pages.
• OSX also comes with both a Stickies application and a Stickies widget for the Dashboard.

The other thing I'm noticing (no pun intended) as I work through the Things, is the process makes me take closer looks at things I've been aware of, to a greater or lesser extent, and examine whether there's a place for them in my life or my library. In some cases the answer is yes, in others it's no.

One yes goes to iGoogle. I chose iGoogle over Pageflakes because I already have a Google account (still trying to keep the creeping account-itis down...), although they seemed equally appealing. I had tried My Yahoo! a bit ago, but found it frustrating to customize the way I wanted. One feature I like is creating multiple tabs. I can put work related items on the main tab and things more for personal use on a different tab--still easily accessible, but not right in front of me. I did add both the New York Times and Village Voice gadgets, so in spite of what I wrote for Thing #12 I may stop receiving their content via email.

I had tried Google Calendar previously, and while the web accessibility from anywhere is nice, I was a little uncomfortable with the safety consequences of having my schedule "out there" and stopped using it. I didn't want some hacker knowing that I would be leaving work at night after an evening shift, or that my house would be empty if I was out of town.

It's not exactly a calendar, but one useful tool I've discovered for scheduling meetings is Doodle. It works via a "poll" of available times that participants vote on, and automatically calculates the best time for the most people. Especially if you're scheduling people from multiple institutions and calendar systems it saves a lot of time. There's no need for multiple emailing back and forth.

It's interesting how some of these Things play off and refer to each other. For an earlier Thing I was trying to remember where I had seen something I wanted to mention. I tried searching for it, and while I couldn't find it I did discover Lifehacker, which looked really interesting. I added it to my list of feeds, and now here it is mentioned as a resource for Thing #13.

Thing #7 -- Web Communication Tools

Regarding email: one tip I received from a colleague is to not check email first thing in the morning each day. Her reasoning was that you already know what you need to get done first each day, and checking email can distract you from doing it. Get the priority done first, and then look. I'll admit I don't always follow this. Usually I'll open my email right away and glance through the new messages for any that need immediate attention (with fairly strict criteria for those). Everything else I leave until later in the day. One other thing that helps is filters, and even separate email addresses (I have several accounts) for things like listserv messages. Then they're not cluttering up my work inbox, and I can get to them when I have time.

Creating a set of mail templates sounds useful, and my email program provides the ability. I haven't really made use of it yet, although I've played around some. Mostly if I think I may want to reuse the text of a message later I keep it in my "Sent" folder to cut and paste later. I'll admit this isn't terrible efficient!

My library has been providing IM reference for about a year and a half now, using Trillian, which, like Meebo, allows us to consolidate several IM accounts into one. It doesn't get a whole lot of use, and we plan on making the service more visible on our web site to improve this. One of the problems is remembering to log on to Trillian when we begin our reference shift. I'm a heavy IM user, in both my work and personal life, so it's not a problem for me. Other librarians aren't in the habit so much. Due to the low use, I haven't found it a problem to be monitoring our IM accounts while at the reference desk. Students usually understand when I tell them I'm helping someone else online. Plus, depending on the nature of the questions, sometimes it's possible to help both simultaneously.

I'm aware that some libraries provide online reference via SMS as well, and I'm sure it would be useful for our students--judging by the numbers of them seen texting around campus (and even sometimes in library instruction sessions). We haven't yet explored what the technical requirements are to make it possible, however.

For the most part I've found web conferencing beneficial, although technically trying at times. I've "attended" a few different Minitex webinars, the first over 5 years ago and the most recent last month, as well as one from OCLC. In addition I've attended web conferences from the Library of Congress and The Blended Librarian. All of these have primarily been informational presentations, with little to no interaction between presenter and attendees outside of a Q&A period at the end. Still, it's a way to get valuable information without having to physically gather in one place.