Author: dwakimoto

Fixing Computers and Other Stuff

/ dwakimoto

Sorry for the delay between posts. I’ve been gone the last week and am just now catching up on all the RSS feeds and other news. So today’s post is about fixing computers, reducing waste and having a little fun, naturally.

Do you remember all the talk about how using computers would lead to a paperless office? Didn’t really happen, now did it? I think as we have found out, if anything, it seems like there is more paper around than ever before. To help us all get into a less paper-intensive existence, here is Lifehacker’s great article on Going Paperless. I especially like the ideas for using a digital signature and getting rid of all the junk mail. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go completely paperless, but this article definitely helps to cut down on needless clutter.

Speaking of going paperless, you should check out PC World’s article on your printer and whether it is stealing from you. Basically the article talks about the best and worst printers in terms of cost of printing. You know how printers are cheap, but the ink is super-expensive, right? So check this out and if you are in the market for a new printer, definitely stay away from the “Most Wanted” list. Just another reason to go paperless, no?

Lifehacker has done it again with a great summary article on 10 computer hardware fixes and upgrades. This is a great list to help you successfully upgrade and fix your computer. I really want to try the ideas on how to quiet a loud hard drive on my work computer, but I think the IT department would probably have a heart attack so I’ll try on my home computer instead. Again, great stuff from Lifehacker.

And finally, something fun: check out Unshelved. This week is all about the Internet and the library and the strip is absolutely hilarious.

Have a great day, read a lot, and I’ll be back later in the week with more.

Tips, Tricks, and M&M's

/ dwakimoto

Sometimes, there is more to life than talking about libraries and technology. Specifically I’m thinking about M&M’s and packing fractions. I’ll get to that later. I often feel like there is way too much good stuff to talk about on the technology in libraries front, not to mention too much just fun, random stuff to share. But never fear, once again the Waki Librarian has picked out a few great articles and distractions to make your Friday a little brighter.

You probably write a lot at work, right? There are always emails, reports, proposals and grants to write. All those drafts need to be proofread and perfected before sending out. So here is an article on 10 quick tips for powerful proofwriting. These are really helpful. Do you have any tips on proofreading? I’d love to hear them.

Are you tempted to buy the iPhone or do you already own an iPhone? If it is the former rather than the latter, check out Lifehacker’s:
Bad Apple: An Argument against Buying an iPhone before you buy. I think alienating developers is a really poor move. I think the iPhone look great and have truly changed the mobile landscape, but I wonder if the way it is going is sustainable.

Okay, in a totally different vein, I know it is only the end July, but you should really take a look at Lifehacker’s guide on avoiding holiday debt. Especially with the economy being what it is, it is never to early to think about saving money during the holidays.

Because it is Friday, we need to end with something completely geeky and very fun. Check out the video about guessing the number of M&Ms in a jar. This is a fantastic use of physics and a great problem to give students! I hope my office does a guess the M&Ms in a jar contest soon so I can use packing fractions to my advantage!

Have a great weekend, read a lot and the Waki Librarian will be back next week with more.

Updating the Updates

/ dwakimoto

Do you ever feel like you just have a handle on technology and then it suddenly changes? I’m pretty much feeling the information overload lately, although that might be partially related to the lack of sleep. But as today’s post title says, I’m going to attempt to update some of the most recent updates about technology and tools that I’ve posted to the Waki Librarian blog. So here we go!

First off we have The Bookworm’s Guide to the Lifehacker Galaxy. A great article and compendium of book related websites and tools, some of which were mentioned in a previous post. But this is a great refresher and an excuse to think about books while online or under the guise of getting more organized.

Librarian in Black has a great post on text messaging, Pew Studies, and information overload. Since mobile technologies are so hot right now, it pays to read the study on text messaging and mobile use. As ever, more information to update you on the latest trends and ways of applying the data to your library’s needs.

And, as an update to news about college students and unemployment during this recession, take a look at this New York Times article, In Recession, Optimistic College Graduates Turn Down Jobs. This is something I just couldn’t believe until I read the quotes from students in the article. I can’t believe that someone would turn down a job now when I have friends that have been trying so hard to get employment for months. I am just flabbergasted; there are no words.

So that is the end of the updates of the updates. As always, read lots, have a fantastic day and the Waki Librarian will be back with more later this week.

Increasing Your Knowledge Base

/ dwakimoto

Knowledge management is one of the latest buzzwords (buzzphrase?). While it might get annoying to keep hearing about “knowledge management” no one can doubt its importance. But it isn’t just about knowledge management, you first need to have a knowledge base in order to have something to manage! So, in today’s turbulent economic times, I thought it would appropriate to share some interesting links and resources for expanding your knowledge base and taking care of business.

There is a great article on Lisjobs.com about how Multiple Knowledge Bases=Multiple Job Opportunities. I highly suggest checking it out because as everyone says, you never know where your next opportunity will take you or when it will be presented to you. And aren’t librarians some of the best people in the world when it comes to increasing our knowledge and being “Jack/Jill of all trades”?

Talking about knowing more and making connections, have you heard about linked data? If not, check out this great post on ReadWriteWeb.com on Linked Data. Definitely check out the TED talk and get ready for linked data. I think this is a fantastic opportunity, especially for use in reference questions!

And, because a post on increasing knowledge bases definitely needs to touch on employment, check out Beyond the Job. This is a great website to come to for information about professional development and tips for everyone . Really, it is great and it has an RSS feed so really, no excuse not to check it out.

Everyone should understand the importance of taking control of their data and profiles that are available online. However, you might not know about Google Profiles. So check out the information on Lifehacker about how you can create your own Google Profile.

Lastly, check out Business Week’s article on making decisions outside your comfort zone. It is always good to get outside your comfort zone once in a while. Plus it will help you increase your practical knowledge base.

That is it from the Waki Librarian. Have a great Friday and weekend. More next week.

Books in Social Networking

/ dwakimoto / 2 Comments

I hope everyone is enjoying the summer. Somehow, I always picture summer as being quiet in the library (as in I’ll be able to get everything done that I couldn’t during the academic year) and yet, it never ends up being as quiet as I imagine it.

But no matter, I still have had some time to round up some interesting tidbits when it comes to books, networking and even photo manipulation. So without further ado here they are:

First there is Bookseer. I love the look of this site: old fashioned art and an amazingly simple interface. You just type in the title and author of a book you just read, and Bookseer comes back with recommendations from Amazon, BookArmy and LibraryThing. This is a great use of recommendations from these sites and Bookseer is much better about recommending “what to read next” than a lot of other programs I’ve used. I especially love that below the recommendations there is a line that says “Of course, you could go ask your local bookshop or your local library.” So go forth and play–it might even help with some reader advisory questions. Though, as Bookseer acknowledges, nothing beats a knowledgeable human being for talking about books and recommendations.

So, do you participate in social networks? How about those networks especially for bibliophiles? Well, check out 100 places to connect with bibliophiles. This is a great annotated list of places online where you can indulge and share your love of books and reading. I am a fan of GoodReads, mainly because another friend recommended it to me. And that’s what this list and social networks are about, connecting people together–and what better way to connect than over a book?

So have you got the social networking down pat, but still feel awkward about networking, as in at conferences, events and for work? Then check out this article from The New York Times on networking for introverts. These are some commonsense tips on networking that are worth reviewing before you go out to an event that you hope to use as a networking opportunity. I think what helped me most with networking is to not call it networking. If I just think of it as talking with people, it becomes a lot easier. So what are your favorite networking tips?

And finally, we need to end on something completely off topic and fun. So check out the ever-helpful Lifehacker’s article on Repper. This is fun and turns your photos into abstract patterns that are great for background graphics. When you are ready to play, just go over to repper.studioludens.com. Repper has a very intuitive interface and it is really fun. Plus, I love that all the patterns that are created are licensed under a Creative Commons license. So check it out and let me know what you think.

Have a great day and I’ll be back with more technology and library related news later this week.

EBLIP5 Wrap-up

/ dwakimoto / 1 Comment

Hello or Hej as they say in Sweden. I hope everyone is enjoying the summer. Can you believe we are already halfway through July? Time is going way too quickly for everything I need to get done. So before I get swept up in work again, here is a little wrap-up from EBLIP5.

I’m back from the EBLIP5 Conference (EBLIP stands for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice) and I just have to say that the Stockholm team that coordinated this conference (in conjunction with the international committee) did a fantastic job. Not only were the presentations and keynotes really interesting, the entire conference ran smoothly and the food was the best I’ve ever had at a conference. The next group to host EBLIP6 has a lot to live up to.

Click on the EBLIP5 Keynote and Presentation Summaries for some of my notes from the sessions I attended. Also, check out the EBLIP5 website at: http://eblip5.kib.ki.se/ and you can download all the abstracts and presentations.

You can also checkout EBLIP5’s Photostream on Flickr at:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/eblip5/. For even more photos from the conference search the tag “EBLIP5”.

Let me know how you are using evidence based practice in your organization. I think this is a great movement in the library and information science fields and really does help us improve our practice in a methodical and logical way.

More technology updates will be coming on the Waki Librarian later. Have a great rest of your week.

Stockholm

Stockholm

EBLIP 5 Overview

/ dwakimoto
View of Stockholm

View of Stockholm

 

Hej (hi) from Stockholm, Sweden! The EBLIP 5 Conference is being held in Stockholm this week. It is a great conference and a wonderful international look at evidence based library and information practice. I will have session summaries later, but just wanted to update on a few ideas.

Information literacy has been a huge theme here at the conference. It has been great to hear about what other librarians are doing at their libraries and universities. We had a great discussion about assessment as well.

Knowledge management is also a huge, hot topic at the conference. It is a good fit with librarianship and EBP (evidence based practice) in general. I will definitely have to look into this more.

So more later, lots more about the research sessions and the keynotes. I just have to say that Stockholm is a great place to hold a conference and everyone has been so friendly and sharing.

More later from the Waki Librarian.

Fun for Summer

/ dwakimoto

Hi, all. Sorry for the long gap between posts. Between actually taking a vacation (outside, away from technology) and then getting sick, I haven’t really been up to blogging. But never fear, here is a post full of interesting tidbits and summer tips to help you through your day.

Okay, so the serious stuff first and then we’ll have the fun. Okay, I can’t believe that: 1. Chris Anderson plagiarized from Wikipedia and 2. that the “apology/reasoning” for plagiarizing Wikipedia was so weak. And I wonder, with stuff like this happening, why it is so difficult to get my students to understand the huge intellectual and academic offense of plagiarism.

Here is something semi-serious and kind of fun: CNN’s cost of living in another city calculator. Type in your current salary and select where you live and the city you want to compare it to and you’ll get a handy chart of differences in cost and equivalent salaries. It is quite depressing if you live in the Bay Area.

Okay, I don’t know about you, but I always want to tackle new projects in the summer. So here is a really cool project for those of you who want to do something crafty: create an inverted bookshelf. This looks awesome and as long as you aren’t doing this to house your first edition copies, I think you should be safe. I would love to do that in my office simply for the puzzled double-takes.

Now we are getting into the heart of summer. Everyone, but everyone takes vacation photographs. So, do you want to take better photos? Of course you do! So check out these tips on how to take better vacation photographs. Then, go take a vacation (even if it is just to the park down the street or the library in the next town over) and start snapping those pics!

If you anything like me, you probably get stains on your clothes occassionally. Or a lot if it is summer. Luckily for those of us that are slightly more clumsy (or unlucky) than others now have this handy guide to getting out stains. So summer should be less of a disaster on our clothes.

So get out there and enjoy the summer–just don’t forget your sunscreen! Next week The Waki Librarian will be at a conference so check back here for conference session summaries. Fingers crossed for working wireless access at the conference. Until next time, be waki, read a lot and have some fun. Have a great weekend.

End of the Quarter Bits

/ dwakimoto

It honestly doesn’t seem to make much difference if I’m teaching a class or taking a class, the end of the quarter is still filled with anxiety, last minute chores and lots of panicked students. It also means that I fall behind on bookmarking new web stuff, blogging about new web stuff, and basically just fall a little behind. So here is my attempt at catching up on some of the cool library and tech stuff that has been floating around my RSS feeds–basically just a little of this and a little of that.

So first for the technology bit, here is Lifehacker’s Top 10 Wallpaper Tools and Tweaks. These are amazing tips for creating or just finding desktop wallpapers that not only look beautiful but can help increase your productivity. I can’t wait to start designing a compartmentalized desktop and using the calendar feature– sounds like a good summer project to me. If you have another favorite source for wallpapers, please leave it in the comments.

And for a different change of pace, here is a news post that absolutely infuriates me: Kayne West is a “proud non-reader”. He says in the article that “I am a proud non-reader of books. I like to get information from doing stuff like actually talking to people and living real life.” One wonders then why on earth he decided to write a book. Thank goodness there are a lot of really awesome people who are very proud readers of books. Suddenly, trying to get my students, who are slightly less than enthusiastic about information literacy class at the beginning of the term, to actually engage in the class seems like a cakewalk. At least no one has ever told me they are proud of not reading books. Sheesh.

So to counteract that negativity, because we really need to, here is a great library hero who is Running a Library out of a School Locker. This student is running a library out of her locker at school, and the library is filled with banned books! Can we say born to be a librarian?! This is so amazingly awesome. The comments to this post are great reading as well. I sincerely hope the student did not get caught or in trouble for enabling students to read what they want. People who do things like this and totally get that banning books is pointless and stupid absolutely make my day.

So that is it for today’s bits of fun technology and library information. I hope everyone has a great week and I’ll be back soon with more goodies from the wide, wild world of information!

Data

/ dwakimoto

We live in a world full of data and it is part of the job of the librarian to make sense of it, among other professions that work continually with data. I think about data and information a lot, as I’m sure many of you do too. And I have a couple of tools today for your enjoyment that make data way more fun to play with than just a bunch of numbers in an Excel spreadsheet.

WolframAlpha

6 easy ways to graph your life