Technology

Friday Design Fun

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! Are you ready for the weekend? I was ready for the weekend on Monday night so I’m quite looking forward to relaxing this weekend. First though we should talk a little about design, mobile devices, reading, and writing.

It should be apparent by now, dear readers, that I have a weakness for good design. I love well-designed products, processes, and beautiful visuals. So I was rather excited about Lifehacker’s article, learn the basics of design this weekend. Just ignore most of the comments on the article, most of them are quite unhelpful to those wanting to learn design, but the comment by Ignition on the “hipster” nature of the other commenters is great. And if you have any favorite design resources, please share them in comments. I always like to learn more about design. One of my favorite design resources is Before & After. Their book, How to Design Cool Stuff is a great resource for anyone who wants an easy to understand explanation of design that you can apply to projects almost immediately. And never underestimate the value of playing around with Photoshop, Gimp, or Aviary. I’m a big believer in clicking buttons and seeing what happens. Not exactly scientific, I know, but very fun.

And you can apply your newly found/improved design sense on designing for mobile devices. You should also really check out this great slideshow, Designing Mobile Experiences. It is one of the best I’ve seen at describing the mobile design process and the factors to consider when planning, designing, and implementing experiences, be they native apps or web apps, for mobile devices. It’s really worth going through the entire slide deck.

After you get through the slide deck, check out the article, Is mobile affecting when we read? However, if you are reading this on your iPad, you’ll probably save this article to read for later. No matter. It is still a very good read.

Finally, check out Lifehacker’s why you learn more effectively by writing than typing. Seems to make sense and anecdotally, writing out notes instead of typing them is what got me through my undergrad years of studying biology.

Now, on to the last bit of fun for this Friday post, check out this great video, Every Doctor Who Story 1963-2008 (thanks to Hanna for sharing):

Have a wonderful rest of your day, a fantastic weekend, and I’ll be back next week with more interesting bits of news and fun.

Tech Help for Yourself and Others

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! I hope you are enjoying your Friday and have a lovely weekend planned. Today I want to get back to our regularly scheduled programming of technology tips and advice. I have a bunch of links, lists, and fun bits of information to share with you so that you can share them with others. It’s a round-up of tips for getting more out of your smartphone, figuring out when to buy stuff, and one lovely app from NARA. Allons-y!

Lifehacker has some great articles on smartphones and I want to share a few specifically about Android phones. First is the article on how to speed up your old or sluggish Android device. This seems especially relevant now that it seems that for those who have a Samsung device (in the United States), and haven’t rooted their phone, will be waiting for quite some time to get an OS update. Makes you think twice about rooting and voiding your warranty, doesn’t it? This is also a good article to share with your patrons who complain about their Android device running slowly, but don’t know what can be done about it.

If you haven’t yet succumbed to temptation and purchased an Android phone, you might want to read the article on how to pick your next Android phone: the specs that matter and the ones that don’t. Refuse to be an uninformed consumer of tech goodness.

Now, leaving Android-specific land, check out the tips on how to secure your smartphone. At least make it harder for people to steal your phone and your data.

Also in the realm of security, check out Lifehacker’s enhance your security this weekend article, if you were too busy to deal with this over the holidays. Though I am sure, dear readers, that you already do most of this, but it might be handy to pass on to your library patrons. While enhancing your security, you may also want to look into 6 social media pain points (and what to do about them). Again, good information to share with others.

After you are done enhancing the security of your smartphone, you may want to load the new-ish app from NARA (National Archives and Records Administration). Check out the press release here: Today’s Document Goes Mobile. It is quite lovely and you get one document a day with links to more information, transcripts, the ability to browse collections, etc. Kudos to NARA embracing mobile technology on top of redesigning their website, their logo, their brand, etc.

And because I love lists (and good deals), I had to share this Lifehacker chart/calendar/list on the Best Times to Buy Anything in 2011.

To end our whirlwind tour of technology, enjoy viewing this video using Chameleon Circuit’s “Exterminate, Regenerate” and then go buy one of Chameleon Circuit’s albums over at DFTBA Records.

Have a fantastic rest of your day and a wonderful weekend. I’ll be back next week with more fun in library/archives/tech-land. Thank you, dear readers, for reading.

Connections and the Digital World

/ dwakimoto / 1 Comment

Happy Friday! I’m so happy it’s Friday, aren’t you? Today I want to share some links about connections, communication, and digital preservation, among other things. Really, it all made sense in my head when I was planning this blog post. So just bear with me and I’ll explain.

It’s no secret that I really enjoy Seth Godin’s blog posts and his post on Lost in a Digital World is a really great one. It is very easy to get lost in a digital world, being constantly in communication, but not communicating or accomplishing anything of substance. I know I have to consciously pull myself away from my computer (and my beloved Android phone) when I’m really working. I can’t multi-task–really, I’m horrible at it. And I think we need quiet headspace to really focus and accomplish things and be present enough to catch on to those fleeting ideas that just might change everything we are doing in our lives.

And, as we all know, the digital pieces of our lives and our communication streams are very fragile–not just in terms of the possibility of misunderstandings via email, but in the very preservation of the datastreams. Just go ask your friendly archivist about digital preservation and watch him/her twitch and start going on about preservation metadata standards (at which point you should offer to take him/her out of the archives and down the street for a nice cup of tea). So, for those who want to do something about preserving their personal digital data, check out Lifehacker’s article, Future-Proof Your Digital Photos with Better Archiving Techniques. Take a night and fix your photos. The archivist in the future who may receive your “papers” will thank you.

After being at one of the talks about technology trends at ALA Midwinter, I found this post from Gizmodo timely: 12 Technologies on the Verge of Extinction. So what technologies do you think will become extinct? It’s something fun to discuss with the archivist whom you’ve taken to tea (see above paragraph). Archivists love to talk about obsolete technologies and media.

Technology is great if used correctly and it can definitely help facilitate communication if used well, but I sometimes worry about getting lost in the busyness of the digital world and also about how digital communication is affecting relationships, or rather the strength or depth of relationships. (I promise no long philosophical argument; it is Friday.) We need more than simply being in constant digital contact with people; we need people who will support us and really mean it when they say, “I’ve Got Your Back.”

You need to have your core group of friends (and no, hundreds of friends on Facebook whom you don’t really know don’t count) who will be your cheering squad, your sounding board, and the ones who will believe in what you are doing when everyone else is calling your ideas crazy. Your task for the weekend is to figure out who has your back and who you would truly back, no matter what. And yes, if I tell you that I’ve got your back, I mean it.

The last bit of hyperlink fun for today is Neil Gaiman’s Another Year from New Year’s Day. Yes, I’m aware that it’s the 14th of January, but it is still a good read and if you somehow missed it, you should go read it. It will make you feel warm and happy. Bonus points for sharing it with someone.

To end and give you a nice break for work today, check out this wonderful Infommercial for the TARDIS (thanks to Hanna for posting the video on her blog):

Have a wonderful day and relaxing weekend. Read a lot, get outside if the weather is nice, and I’ll be back next week with more library, archives, and tech-related goodies.

Tech Fun and Relaxation

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! Today I thought talk a bit about some of the recent tech news. There’s been a lot of interesting and important tech news in the last few days and I just want to highlight a couple of things. And I also want to talk about relaxation because, dear reader, this is my last day on campus before the holiday vacation and I’m ready for relaxing. But first, tech fun!

By now you’ve probably heard about the possibility of Yahoo discontinuing the popular social bookmarking service, delicious.I’ve had a delicious account for years (before you had to have a Yahoo account) and love the interface and usefulness of the service. So I know, it’s annoying and frustrating to have to move your bookmarks. After you freak out about this, check out WebWorkerDaily’s 5 delicious alternatives article or Lifehacker’s post on best bookmarking services.

Luckily I’ve been trying Google Bookmarks for a while so I had somewhere to easily deposit my bookmarks from delicious. I just wish the tags had transferred over too. But I guess this will force me to actually clean up my bookmarks.

In other (good) tech news: About.me is now open to all. About.me is a simple to use splash page where you can link together all your online information. And the pages look fantastic with very little effort. I created a page a while ago. If you want to see an example of a page you can see mine here: about.me/dianakwakimoto. [Note: You may not be able to get to About.me (because of an amazing amount of traffic due to Lifehacker’s article, no doubt). But be patient and try again later because it really is great.]

And now from tech news to relaxation. While many of us talk about relaxing over the holidays, I’d wager that a lot of us will be checking work email and trying to get work stuff done. That’s why I’m sharing this wonderful idea from danah boyd on her email sabbatical. I just love this idea and hope to implement it sometime soon because everyone deserves a true break without worrying about an avalanche of email when they return to work.

And because it is the 17th, the video had to be about Tron Legacy. Check out this great video about the sound editing and soundtrack–lots of fun, pretty stuff.

Enjoy your weekend, read a lot, and relax. I may or may not be back next week with a post, but I’ll definitely be back in the new year. Have a wonderful holiday and very happy new year, dear readers!

Lists, Interviews, and Research

/ dwakimoto / 1 Comment

Happy Wednesday! First, congratulations to all the San Jose SLIS students who’ve survived another semester. Enjoy your break! I’m completely enjoying break week here at work because I’m getting so much work done. Plus, dear reader, it has given me the chance to write about more lists and fun stuff. So let’s get right into it, shall we?

I don’t care if you think you don’t care about typography, you must go take a look at this post from I Love Typography, Codex type: the Week in Type. This is one of the most beautiful posts and awesome lists I’ve seen in a while. Makes me just want to design a thousand things instead of finishing up retention dossier.

And, yes, it is the season of lists. Lifehacker has another great list: Most popular photography tips, tricks, and hacks of 2010. This is just perfect timing for all those holiday photos that you just know you’ll be taking when you get together with family and friends. Also, you may want to check out Lifehacker’s most popular DIY projects of 2010 before you meet up with your family and friends because you know DIY projects (and tech support) are almost always on the table when you visit family. Or, at least, they are in my family.

Now for something serious that you should read, take to heart, and share with your patrons: Lifehacker’s article on the main reason why you suck at interviews: lack of preparation. I’ve been talking with friends and interns lately a lot about interviewing and careers and so I think this is a very timely article. Plus, the article speaks the truth–prepare for your interviews! Really. I’m not joking. It’s like a presentation–you don’t try to wing it and you do practice. It takes time and sometimes you feel really silly prepping for an interview, but it is worth it. Before I interviewed for my present position, I did a lot of research about the school, the library, the faculty, the tenure process, etc. I probably looked a little silly at the gym studying books on interviewing techniques and statistics on the school while on the elliptical trainer, but it paid off during the interview. I felt confident that I knew what I was talking about and could actually ask intelligent questions. So practice and prepare.

Okay, I’m off my soapbox and think that we must end with a couple of fun bits because it is the holiday season after all.

First: for those living in the Bay Area, Saturn Cafe is now in Berkeley! This is so exciting for those of us addicted to Saturn Cafe’s yummy veggie food, but sadly no longer live close to the original Saturn Cafe in Santa Cruz. Really, you need to go try the Saturn Cafe. Have the nachos, you won’t be sorry.

Second: you know we have to end with a funny video. So here is Simon’s Cat in ‘Santa Claws.’ Even if you’ve seen it before give yourself a 2 minute and 13 second break and watch it again. You’ll smile and smiling is good for you.

Have a great rest of your day. I’ll be back on Friday with more library, tech, and holiday fun. Thanks for reading.

Lists, Nerds, Tips, Fun

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! Can you believe it’s Friday again? Amazing. I’m excited because 1. I think my cold is finally going away and 2. I get to visit the Archive of Recorded Sound at Stanford. I love going to other archives, seeing what the archivists and librarians are doing, and bringing back new insights to use in our archives. Plus, it is getting close to the end of the year and you know what that means, right? Yup, the start of all the wonderful end-of-the-year lists. Yay! So let’s as the good Doctor would say, Allons-y!

Oh, Lifehacker, how I love that I can always count on you for wonderful tips. But, more importantly, I can also count on you to have lists. I like lists a lot and Lifehacker doesn’t disappoint with Most Popular Top 10s of 2010. Seriously, give this article a read and see if there are any great tech tips you missed the first time around.

Speaking of tech tips, if you are an Android user and find your phone’s performance is, well, lacking, check out Lifehacker’s How to Speed up Your Old, Sluggish Android Device.

Moving on from tech tips to design, check out this informative post Design v. Aesthetics. Now it’s no secret that I adore beautiful designs, but I’m definitely in the camp that if it isn’t usable or readable than it isn’t well designed (no matter how pretty it may be). Happy designing!

Talking about design brings me to Bridging the Nerd Gap’s “Why You’re a Huge Nerd.” It’s fantastic. As I tell all my first year students during our first class together: we’re sitting in class on a college campus and have the luxury of higher education. Not only are we all extremely fortunate, we are all geeks and nerds. You’re in college, make peace with that and the next few years will be a lot easier. In college, as in life, it is so much easier to just accept one’s nerdiness/geekiness than trying to hide it. I love this bit of the post:

There’s something innately attractive about somebody who really gives a crap about something….Seeing somebody’s inner nerd come bursting forth is an inspiring thing…”

I couldn’t agree more. Just say no to apathy and yes to being true to your inner nerd and/or geek. And, by the way, just in case you somehow missed it, today is “May the Force Be With Katie Day” or as her mom renamed it, “Wear Star Wars–Share Star Wars.”

Speaking of nerdiness, I absolutely love this (found via Hanna’s tumblr feed and originally from nevver).

formal apology

formal apology

And, because it is Friday and yes, I’m getting into the holiday spirit, here is a lovely, holiday clip created by Seduff and featuring the tenth Doctor. Enjoy!

Have a wonderful, restful weekend and your weekend assignment, should you choose to accept it (inspired by Bridging the Nerd Gap), is to dig “around in somebody’s head to figure out what kind of nerd they are.” Be nice and share with them what kind of a nerd you are too and then go get a cup of hot cocoa together (’cause it is definitely hot cocoa weather here). I’ll be back next week with more information and random fun.

Thoughts on Education at the end of the Quarter

/ dwakimoto

Happy Wednesday! I’ve been thinking a lot about education lately, probably due to reflecting on my own teaching during the end of this term. I wanted to share some of the most interesting reads and tools I’ve seen lately on the topic of education.

Have you seen edmodo? It’s a way to create private social networking sites for your classes. Since Ning is now charging money, edmodo seems like a good option for educators. The entire look of edmodo is very similar to another large social networking site which should make it feel comfortable to students and edmodo is must more user friendly than most of the learning management systems I’ve seen. If you’ve used edmodo, I’d love to hear about your experiences. I may use it in the next class I teach as I’m always trying to facilitate more interaction and community.

Speaking of education, I highly suggest you read Anna’s post of her responses to questions about unschooling. It’s a fantastic read and will make you ponder (hopefully) your own educational journey and how you want to see education evolve. Like I wrote in a previous post, I firmly believe that there are multiple ways to gain information and create knowledge. Obviously I feel strongly that there is a place for higher education and am hopeful that I can make changes to the process of higher education that will benefit my students. (But going into details of how I envision higher education evolving is best left to another post.)

This post, “Why Design Education Must Change” is a fantastic read. Many of the suggestions for changing design education apply to education in general, in my opinion. For instance, I believe we need to do a better job educating students at all levels in scientific disciplines. And I say this not just because I have a degree in biology and grew up in a house where scientific proofs and logic were held as the standard to which everything was compared. Understanding science is important so you can discern medical flimflam from sound medical advice, figure out whether the statistics in an article are valid or a lot of hogwash, and logically plan and execute studies in the library. I am a huge proponent of a “well-rounded” and broad education, then drilling deeply into one or more areas for your specialties. But that’s just me. Even if you don’t agree, please check out the design education article, it really is fantastic.

I think that is enough seriousness for one blog post, so here is the winner of Unshelved’s Pimp My Bookcart contest. I had to share because University of San Francisco won and the entry is awesome.

Because it is rather dreary here today, I thought we should end with this lovely clip of the tenth Doctor. I don’t know about you, but watching the Doctor in action always makes my day a bit better and less dreary. If nothing else, the Time Lord knows how to give a good “rally the troops” style of speech.

Have a great rest of your Wednesday and I’ll be back soon with more tech and library fun. Allons-y!

Time, Education, Design, and Social Media

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! And it is a super-happy Friday on campus because classes are over and once we survive finals week (next week), we have holiday break! That is definitely cause for celebration. So in honor of surviving yet another quarter, let’s talk about time, education, design, and social media.

One seemingly cannot escape hearing about social media and social media marketing on a daily basis. WebWorkerDaily had a great article discussing How much time does social media marketing take? The answer is, of course, it depends on what you are doing and what you want to accomplish. I highly recommend keeping the graphics from this article on hand to explain social media marketing the next time someone brings it up in a meeting. It’s a nice graphic and it reminds people that, while you might not have to “pay” for accounts on a lot of social media sites, you have to invest time.

This discussion of social media marketing brings up another issue that I hear about a lot from my colleagues: how to learn to use social media. I don’t think I’ve quite gotten across the idea that one can’t just read about social media or take a course to understand how to use social media effectively in a library or academic setting. (I also have yet to convince some people that they shouldn’t wait for a journal article to tell you how to use social media; at that point it’s a little late. Go to the blogs and Twitter and everything will be okay.) It’s like trying to explain Twitter–doesn’t really make sense until you sign up and start tweeting with other people.

Design, like understanding social media, is learned by doing and not just reading about it (although studying successful examples is always a good thing too). It’s like archival processing. I can talk to you until my voice gives out about the standards and protocols for processing a collection, but you’ll only be able to truly understand once I sit you down with an unprocessed collection and let you muddle around for a bit. The lovely, tidy picture of archival processing that is written in the textbooks is nothing like the messy, sometimes moldy, collections you encounter in the archives. In all three cases, practice might not make perfect but it is the way you’ll actually be able to do anything useful with what you’ve read.

On that note, there have been some rather excellent posts and discussions lately on education and the necessity of higher education in particular. (But we are not, dear reader, going to contribute more to the messy dialog about the need for graduate level education in library and archival science. At least, not today.) I obviously believe in the value and importance of higher education since I work in academia. But I don’t believe that higher education is the only path, or even the best path, to take for acquiring knowledge in every instance. I find it especially interesting to read about what other people think about the necessity of higher education for careers in emerging and creative fields. I highly recommend this read on Design and Education, if nothing else, you should enjoy the clean design of the website and Harry’s lovely portfolio of work. Also, if you are interested in the process of design, I suggest reading the messiness of design. And when you get to actual design time for your website, check out what your web design says about you. Isn’t design fun?

I guess all I’m really trying to say is don’t be afraid of wandering a bit on your own and muddling through learning new things. You don’t need to spend a lot of money to learn about web design and social media marketing when there are so many awesome people online who share their work and expertise because sharing ideas generates more ideas (as yesterday’s This is Indexed showed us). So get out there and learn something new. Then be nice and share your knowledge and experience with others.

To end, we must have a video. Because Season 5 of the new Doctor Who is out on DVD (and I finally got to watch the first episodes), we need to end with the Doctor. This video is slightly spoiler-y for episode 1, so you have been warned. Enjoy some of the Doctor’s awesomeness.

Have a wonderful rest of your day and relaxing weekend. Don’t get too caught up in the holiday madness–save some time for reading. I’ll be back next week with more fun things to share.

Round-up of Random, Helpful Tech Stuff

/ dwakimoto

Happy Wednesday and Happy December! Can you believe it is already December? I mean, really, where did this year go? As the year is coming to a close, I thought it might be nice to have a quick round-up of helpful tech for today.

Just to continue the Thanksgiving Day cheer, check out Lifehacker’s great list of 50 Free Apps We’re Most Thankful For. Then start downloading. And yes, I’m well aware that the mobile web is where it’s at, but apps can be fun too.

This Slideshare presentation of Five Ways to Not Suck at PowerPoint is very useful and should be a requirement for all presenters to view. Please, please, please make PowerPoint Presentations that aren’t awful. I’m really hoping some of the presenters at the next conference I go to follow some of this advice because it is so nice to see (and hear) a good presentation (and so painful to sit through a bad one).

Do you have a Google Voice account? Of course you do, dear reader, because you are a savvy technology user. But, maybe you aren’t sure of exactly what you can do with Google Voice. Lifehacker comes to the rescue with a guide of the Most Helpful Ways to Use Google Voice that You’re Not Using.

And just for fun, check out the Hacker’s Guide to Tea. It is definitely tea weather.

And to end, because everyone needs to laugh at least once a day, check out the Vlogbrothers’ outtakes video:

Have a lovely rest of your day and I’ll be back on Friday.

Web Typography and Other Geeky Fun

/ dwakimoto

Hello, dear readers. I know I’m a bit late in publishing this post. I’m sorry, but I plead illness as my excuse and hopefully you’ll find something in today’s bag of geeky fun useful and that will absolve me from the horror of not posting on a Friday. Anyway, as the good doctor would say, Allons-y!

It’s probably fairly obvious by now, but I have a weakness for good design and lovely typography. I’m, not surprisingly, very happy with Smashing Magazine lately for all their wonderful resources on typography, especially this round-up of 100 educational resources, tools and techniques for web typography. Get ready to drool if you have an appreciation for well-designed fonts and layouts.

Speaking of fonts, something else that is fun to play with is WhatFontis.com. Upload an image of a font you can’t identify and (with any luck) WhatFontis will be able to identify it for you. Yes, I know, this could be very, very bad because you might spend hours playing with this site. Don’t say I haven’t warned you.

In other useful, geeky news, check out this article from The Atlantic on taking care of your personal archives. What can I say? I get excited whenever an interview with an archivist gets published in something other than Archival Outlook. Read it and then get cracking on backing-up, remounting, and otherwise taking care of your personal archives.

In other super-important news, today is the 12th Annual International Transgender Day of Remembrance. Please go over to the Future Feminist Librarian-Activist’s site and read Anna’s thoughtful post for today.

In other, not nearly as important, but good for some weekend relaxation and enjoyment news, I have to share with you Joy the Baker’s vegan pumpkin walnut bread recipe. It is superb and makes two giant loaves of bread–perfect for when you find out your new intern is vegan and none of your standard baking recipes are anywhere close to being vegan (just saying). Also, just on the off chance you missed it last week, here’s a link to Stephen Abram’s Geek cred post.

And if you missed part 1 of John Green’s explanation of the French Revolution, or want to see parts 2 & 3, head over to Hanna’s blog where she has posted all of them.

As for me, my pick for a video this week is John Green’s video about his latest trip to Amsterdam because I know a lot of people will be traveling soon for Thanksgiving and will probably be able to empathize with John’s experiences with airports and flights. Enjoy.

Have a lovely weekend, rest, relax, and read (and don’t catch a cold; it’s no fun). See you next week for more tech, library, and archival fun!