Week 4 : Exercise 2 : Thing 1 - Finding a Feed

Of the four search engines to find a news feed, I found Syndic8.com the hardest to work with. In actual fact, I didn't really spend much time trying to find anything, because the layout was so foreign to me. The search and results pages are very cut back and basic - for example, the results didn't show an excerpt from the feed referenced, so all I had to go on was the title. For me, it didn't feel worth it to drop into each one, just to see if it was right... I need clues on that results page!

This may be because Syndic8.com seems to be a more user-based directory of feeds. Of the other three, they were all what I expected, but the one I most liked was Topix.net.
I thought Topix.net's interactive graph of search results was fantastic, as a visual representation of that news item's "life" in the public conscious. The graph above shows after a search for "rugby world cup" - as you can see, news began around the end of December last year, and peaked when the cup began, going into September. The graph is also interactive, so you can click on any part of it to see what that topic's news items were at any time.

Innovations like this, present access to a wide range of information additional to what I searched for, and allow me to access the same topic in other ways. It is graphical, easy to interpret, and simple to follow. And it is small! I think this is hugely important, because I don't have to scroll through to get information, and it doesn't interfere with what I originally searched for.

I'm quite a fan of this thing! I wonder if the library could use anything similar on the website?

--UPDATE-- Oh, and I reckon one of the best places to find new feeds is in your neighbour's blog! Well... in the blogs you're interested in, anyway! There are often links to other blogs, and from that, to other blogs... and so on...

Week 4 : Exercise 1 : Thing 3 - Oversight

Well, in my Smuggishness of not going with Bloglines, and instead using Google Reader, I missed the bit where it said to try and make my RSS feed public.

Well, not using the Bloglines reader, I couldn't go and follow the instructions to do this! So I did a search. I found this page: which details how to go about it. This talks about putting a blogroll onto your blog, which shows your latest RSS feeds of other blogs/news you're reading.

I followed this at first, but it seems Google has made the process much easier. For anyone who's also using Google Reader, here are the steps:

- 1. make your feeds public. Click on "Settings" (top right), this shows your Subscriptions. Then put all of your feeds to share into the same folder (you may have to create a new folder).

- 2. click the next tab across, "Tags". One of those tags will be your folder that you created, and to the right of this will be a RSS feed icon in grey. Click on this and those subscriptions will become public.

- 3. now it's a matter of following the instructions to add it to your blog. Click "add a clip to your site" which takes you through the remainder of the process. I noticed that it took a little while to show up on my blog.

The good thing about this process is that Google Reader and Blogger are both owned by google, so the interface has been made really (kindof) easy between them.

Week 4 : Exercise 1 : Thing 2 - On RSS

OK! The reader is running - Actually, it was already running - I've worked with RSS for a while... Anyway, thinking about this exercise:

Thinking about how RSS could be utilised at work, I realised there would be a lot of functions it could provide: For a start, it could be integrated into MyInfo on the library's website, so patrons would log-in, not only to manage their record, but to access information. When they log in they see the latest news on new books, specific genres, events at Auckland City Libraries, etc. This could take the place of (or complement) the email subscriptions that are currently in place. Other recommended feeds could be on the site as well. Employees could access Library Zone and CityNet in the same way.

I've found that using RSS has become part of what I do everymorning. I go into my reader, and see the latest articles that have come up overnight. This has become part of my daily habit, and makes accessing that info a breeze! By placing my feeds in reading preference order, the reader allows me to keep up to date with news that I'm interested in - and if there's nothing there, then at the bottom of the list I've got some others that are less important for me to keep up with. The main thing I like about RSS is that it's fast and easy to access info from a wide variety of places and the technique of "processing" these articles (i.e. reading and saving/moving/dispensing) is the same for all of these sites. I know I haven't missed anything, because the feed has all of the articles there in chronological order.

Week 4 : Exercise 1 : Thing 1 - Feeding RSS

Shhh, don't tell anyone, but I didn't get a bloglines reader!

If I've learnt anything with this internet gig, it's that there's always going to be a few competitors out there trying to get my finger clicking attention on their free service, and I have to decide which one works best for me.

One consideration in this "best for me" category is whether I'm really going to remember what that email site is, or the one that shows people where I've travelled or the photos one... or the RSS Feed one... etc.

I reckon, since I'm using Gmail, and Blogspot, and Google Search... I may as well use the Google Reader for my News Feeds... The upshot of this is that I can also combine my RSS reader into my email, so when I find there're no new emails, I can always move onto the latest news. So I'm gonna use Google Reader, but it's the same thing... Really!

Read More: Bloglines, Google Reader

Week 3 : Exercise 3 : Thing 1 - reCAPTCHA

Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans ApartCAPTCHA's are the images that we're presented with whenever we want to join a mailing list, sign up to a web-service, or make a comment on a web-site. The image has a line of warped letters and numbers that an automated computer program can't read, but real humans can. In this way, the CAPTCHA prevents (more) spam being posted and proliferated around the net. Every day 150,000 hours are spent around the world, typing in these codes.

reCAPTCHA is a service that utilizes all of these man-hours and directs them into another problem - reading books!

Books written before the digital age are constantly in the process of being digitized. Unfortunately, the OCR (Optical Character Recognition) of computers isn't always quite up to the task.
By using those portions of text that OCR can't read, reCAPTCHA provides warped words from old books, asking the user to decode it - essentially performing the task of a human digitizer and means that all of those hours we spend putting in meaningless words doesn't go to waste.

Week 3 : Exercise 2 : Thing 2 - Look!

These posts are getting long! And it's not a work day either!

That last post took a lot longer to explain than I expected. I hope it makes sense.

Week 3 : Exercise 2 : Thing 1 - Mashups

Rather than sticking to flickr mashups, I thought I'd go through the latest "mashups" that have been interesting/fun for me.

The first is not technically a mashup in the true sense of the word, but still allows the user to "mash" together two previously un-"mashed" things.

Dylan Messaging allows you to send a message to someone else - the point of difference being that the message appears on the 'flash-cards' that Bob Dylan holds in the music video of Subterranean Homesick Blues. A notification is sent to the recipient, and they click a link to see the video-message you've created. Here's a link to one I created.

[UPDATE] I uploaded a video to play directly from this blog.


Another mash-up of a more productive kind, is the site deliGoo. deliGoo mashes the search ability of Google, with the convenience and productiveness of del.icio.us. In order to describe deliGoo, I probably should describe del.icio.us first.

del.icio.us is a website that works exactly like the favourites and bookmarks that we normally use to save websites that we want to come back to. The difference is that the information is stored under your username on a site, instead of at your computer at your desk. Why would you do this? Let's say you saved an important site to your work computer, then needed to pick it up from home to finish some work. If it was saved on the work computer you wouldn't be able to. Instead you can save those sites to a website, then pick it up wherever you are (as long as you have internet access). It's also possible to get extensions for your browser that make the process of saving sites as easy as saving it to your computer.

The other advantage of del.icio.us is that you can add tags to your saved sites. A tag will relate to what the site is about, acting as a kind of access point for you later. For example, if I saved the ACL website, I would tag it with: auckland, library, books, reference, work. Then if I searched my saved sites for "auckland" it would give me every site I tagged with that keyword (eg. Auckland City Libraries, Auckland Museum, Auckland University). This comes in more handy when you start searching for more specific sites where you can remember what it's about, but not the name... believe me, it's very handy!

deliGoo takes this one step further. As the name suggests, deliGoo allows you to search through not only your del.icio.us bookmarks, but also the pages which those bookmarks refer to. This is like doing a selective Google search through only the pages that have been important to you.

The above function is limited to pages you've already seen. You can also use deliGoo to search through all of the pages in a certain tag others have made. In this sense, you are searching through all of the pages that are important to everyone else. This cuts through a lot of the usual junk that Google can throw at you after the first page of results.

For me, with almost 400 bookmarked websites, deliGoo has been able to cut down my search time exponentially.

Week 3 : Exercise 1 : Thing 1 - Flickr

Whew.

Flickr has soooo much. It's hard to just grab an image, because there are so many - so I thought I'd try random images through the Interestingness feature. This has a calendar like setup which has a log of photos that the powers that be think are ... interesting. Photos represent every day, which act as a portal into that photographer's group of photos. Unfortunately I didn't catch the blogging bug off any of the pics I saw on there...

Instead, I thought I'd have a look for some pics that I have seen before on Flickr: Abstract colour-fields and shapes on walls as a result of demolition. To find them, I played around with searches around demolition and wall.
I like the colour fields created by the different rooms and the symmetry of floors and stairs - kind of a document of these buildings and the lives that occupied them - reminds me of Rachel Whiteread's House sculpture, which won the Turner Prize and the K Foundation Award in 1993 for being the best and worst in British art that year.

Week 2 : Exercise 1 : Thing 1 - Social Networking

Bebo makes me shudder with repulsion every time I go to that page. Against my better judgement, I created a log-in to the site, but I already know that I shall never-ever set a virtual foot into the http://doorstep/ of that site again! The place is a nightmare - I can see how it works in terms of creating/making friends and networking, but the layout options are disastrous if one appreciates a bit of user-friendly design on one's screen! I know that it is very possible to create a nice looking profile page for yourself (and there are a lot on there), but the visual assault of flashing fonts and unreadable colours that you meet along the way make it a horrible experience!

MySpace is a little better, but... not much. One thing that really annoys me is a non-moving background on both of these sites, that makes the text un-readable as you scroll. And the pages that you have to scroll through vertically and horizontally in order to find anything.

I think that these sites have tapped into an anonymous / flashing / gory-colour-ridden / txt-message world that has it's own language of pictures, comments and posting that you can read just fine if you have learnt how to 'speak' it. I can see the attraction for those who speak/read/understand the lingo, but it drains the life from me when I try to decode it myself!

Facebook is a bit different. The layout is very much the same from profile to profile - there is a template that all profiles follow, and fit into, whilst still allowing for some of the individual's creativity (photos/videos/drawings).

The applications feature of facebook is both a blessing and a curse. Applications allow you to play games or interact with your friends. I love Scrabulous to pieces (an online scrabble game you play with facebook friends - each move played whenever they log on), but I am well and truly over the invites I'm sent to become a Werewolf or Vampire (you "bite" your friends and turn them into a member of your posse, then they in turn bite their friends - the more people under you, the more your status goes up - a pyramid scheme kind of like Amway, but without the hard-sell). The thing is, if you want to participate in any of these, you have to "Add" the application to your profile, and so does your friend.

For me, Facebook has been the easiest to use and the most fun. Scrabble games, and the Rugby World Cup Picks application are things that draw me back to the site. The social networking aspect of it has worn off and I don't really use it to keep in touch with anyone, but it's kind of like a medium that houses my tenuous link to people I will only see every so often - we don't try to catch up in real life, but at least we're friends on Facebook!

In summary: it sounds like I'm getting old in my late twenties and am mystified by today's youth... in reality though, I spend quite a bit of time online, and I'm not going to return to a badly put together site - I need the info straight away without having to go to needless effort. This is how websites and services (like Blogger) become more popular - they're, more user-friendly. It just depends on who the user is, and by the looks of it, I've missed the myspace generation!

Week 1 : Exercise 2 : Thing 1 - The Registration

In the blogging tradition of writing about banal things on my mind right now - I wonder if I get a notification email that my blog is registered.

Week 1: Exercise 1 : Thing 2 - The Date

Just a thought - the date was wrong when I looked at my first post - it is set up with Pacific Time (-8) by default. After I wrote my first post, I noticed that it was recorded as yesterday, the 11th. Time can be changed when logged in, under the Setings tab, then Formatting. Local time is +12 Auckland, at the end of the list.

Week 1 : Exercise 1 : Thing 1 - The Start

Post # 1: Not to be confused with weak sand things, the blog has begun.

No problems with first steps as I already have about 4 other blogs - though I have noticed that the template setup has become much easier - no more editing it in html... just drag and drop for most things.