Monday, December 8, 2008

Black labradors

A YouTube video that Zoe would like to watch! Some handsome individuals here

Thursday, November 20, 2008

searching for tags or tagging your search

I searched the sites that were mentioned on this weeks blogs. What do I say about the results that were achieved? Firstly Google and Zuula produced so many that I couldn't be bothered to look. MU's catalogue was no help... UQ had four. The others all came up with much smaller numbers, with varying degrees of academic relevance. I liked the tags that were available in del.icio.us, citeulike and connotea. They could be useful... but I can't get past the feeling that it would be a mistake to rely on the information that others have found on the search that I did. There may be a lot more stuff out there that is a lot more relevant to me. I think I'd like to investigate Kart00 a little more. I like the idea of the hierarchies of information that it creates.

But the problem for me is that there are so many ways to go about the same thing and no one resource will give the same result. For those short on time or enthusiasm, what is the best one to use? And will there be another new one that is worth exploring next week? This dilema is one of the issues that web 2.0 throws up for me. Maybe I need to go and talk to a librarian to help me through the maze!

Del.ic.ious I want to explore further. Other than its searching and tagging capabilities, it might actually be a useful tool to help me keep my 'stuff' (both work, pleasure and leisure) in some sort of order, without limiting me to the one computer (or making sure by bookmarks are saved when I move to a new one). We will see.....

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Collaborating around the world

Now that the world is so very small in lots of ways, where people can join together on projects from all corners of the globe, I can see that google docs would be invaluable as a tool for helping that collaboration. It's easy to use, so I could see myself using it if a situation like that arose. In my personal life.... I'm not so sure. I probably don't use the Internet enough at home for it to be useful. But I'll have to think about that a little. I'm sure there are possibilites that haven't even occurred to me as yet.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

The Wonderful World of Firefox

Having been involved in a loose sort of way with getting information about LibX on our website I was aware that Firefox offered some interesting options for us to use, but I had no idea just many many there were. What am I likely to use .... Well I think Aaron's 23 Things toolbar will be very handy. This way i don't have to search through my bookmarks to get to the places I need access in order to be able to get to the end of 23 Things. I have already mentioned the LibX toolbar to my Murdoch student son. But can't wait to tell him about Zotero. As an undergraduate I think it will be terrific for him. Not as sopisticated as Endnote, but he probably couldn't 'be bothered' trying to deal with that.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

23 things Revisited!

It is nearly a year since my last post. We are going through 23 Things again this year and I have made an OLD YEAR resolution to make sure I get to the end this year. Last year I finished Thing 18... so near yet so far!

Lifelong Learning.... What habit do I find easiest? Probably accepting responsibility for my own learning. I have always embraced opportunities to learn new things and experience new experiences. The most difficult.... I'm thinking it would be sticking to my goals. Setting them isn't a problem, just getting there in the end. I'm inclined to let distractions get in the .... witness my failure to finish 23 Things last year.

My goal.... to get to the end, find out out those 'things' I missed out on last year and the new ones that have been added this year.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Framed



I have used the image generator to frame an image of Zoe and her friend. Sadly I have to report the demise of the friend since this photo was take. She burst a seam and was promptly put in the wheelie bin along with the thousands of little white balls that had spilt out everywhere!

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Searching , searching everywhere

I searched the sites mentioned in Thing 10 for "dalmatian coast". Results were quite varied. A couple we academic in nature and while they would have been great if I was interested in "Analysis of the 5' region of the canine PAX3 gene and exclusion as a candidate for Dalmatian deafness 1", it wasn't quite what I had in mind for my holiday plans. Might be good if I was being a little more highbrow with my 23 things exploration! Some sites like Google produced the mandatory hundreds of thousand results, which are really no good to anyone. Dogpile gave me 56 results. I'm not sure about this site and others like it. They always return about the same number of results. This is good if we are looking for the best sites, but if we are looking for something a little more obscure I'd be concerned about what I was missing out on. There is a very bid difference between 56 and >800,000. Kartoo was fun, but I think I would have to spend a bit of time trying to work it out properly, time I do n ot have a great deal of at the moment. Del.ic.ious produced some excellant sites which I will go back to and add the best of to my Europe08 wiki, when I 'get time'.