Thursday, August 30, 2007

week eight; thing 19: Web 2.0 awards


With so many Web 2.0 winners to choose from, that I made it this far in 24 hours was no small feat! I ended up choosing something that appealed to me: 43 Things. It appealed to me for two reasons. First, it offered a continuation of something familiar, (23 Things) and secondly, I like lists. Actually, I spent so much time yesterday discovering my site of choice, that over the course of the day I began to muse over two speculations: "Do 'I want to' lists evoke dreams, or the other way around?..." and "...Maybe list-makers are procrastinators in disquise." (I'm still musing over the latter thought, because it disturbs me to think that all my list-making over the years might really be in fact the very thing I have been trying to avoid by making the lists: ...the p-word!) The number of people wanting to do the same thing in staggering figures led me to conclude that list-making is very popular and people always want to do something. Part of our humanity, I guess.

This site has some nice features for those of us who like to organize and share our dreams of doing something. You can offer and receive encouragement (called "cheers" on this site) as well as reminders of your goal. You can make journal entries about your goals, achievements and/or struggles. And, as with so many social-networking sites, you can get ideas by reading what other people want to do or have done. If you are new to 43 things...don't despair when you look at your profile and it reads: "(your name) has done 0 things, gone 0 places and has 0 cheers." Just keep plugging away and you'll get ....somewhere.... eventually, and if not, you'll have the satisfaction of knowing you're not the only dreamer!

Now, in response to the final question of this nineteenth thing, "How could this site be useful in a library setting?" Hmm.... Besides the fact that it has already been useful b/c Maryland Libraries Learning 2.0 is loosely based on the website 43 things...besides that, I thought more specifically about applications...day-to-day. For instance, maybe there is someone else who has done/wants to do some library-related skill. So I entered a new want on my list of things to do. I had to talk myself into it because it wasn't a sincere want ...and I really don't like fabricating, ...but I rationalized it away and continued...anyway...and it looked like this: "Conduct a power-point presentation." You can imagine my dismay to find out that on this site, this very popular website where thousands of people want to do similar things, I am the only one who wants to do that! And I'm only wanting to do it insincerely, as part of a learning experience!

In conclusion, I think this site is great for personal growth and development (nice cliche words for getting-your-act-together) and that is a worthy application in any setting, including the library.

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

week 8; thing 18: online productivity tools


If someone told me I'd be using a web-based application today, I would have said, "What is that!!!?"..and now I'm really liking the one I'm using. I am typing this document from Zoho Writer where you can do everything Microsoft Word does and more. Not only that, you can publish your documents to your blog, (as will be the case with this when I am finished,) and share your documents with others over the internet. And I found out about more cool features from reading a zoho document that was created by Helene Blowers and edited by Jean Herriges and revised by me with the handy cut-and-paste feature I love so well

1) Your documents can be saved online, so you can access them anywhere and you don't have to carry your USB drive or a diskette around.

2) You can export this file as a Word or .txt file document, which makes it easy to use inside Word.

3) The email feature is easy to use also. It allows you to email this document as a Word file, .pdf document, HTML and many other options.

4) I like that you can publish documents as a public file so anyone (like you right now) can read it as a web page.

5) I also like that you can export a file as a .pdf document or HTML (this is very cool!!)

6) And if you like, you can also use Zoho as a text editor and then publish your document as a post on your Blogger blog.

How To


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HOW TO PUBLISH FROM ZOHO WRITER TO YOUR BLOG:



  1. Create a document in Zoho Writer

  2. Save it (as you would in Microsoft Word)

  3. Click on PUBLISH (top menu bar)

  4. Select "Post to Blog"

  5. Follow the prompts. (FYI, username is email address)

  6. Select "tag" or "draft"

  7. View Blog now...you will find in it your draft if you selected that one...not sure what happens with tag...must try that later!

p.s you can edit your draft when you are in the edit mode of your blog, (as I am doing now,) but all the cool stuff, (smileys, colors, and odd symbols) are back in ZOHO...


http://www.writer.zoho.com/