Infoblog

Archive for the ‘Cool Tools’ Category

If you use Gmail, you may have received an invite to Google Buzz (and then got completely freaked out by the privacy issues that almost immediately followed). I took a look at Buzz, and frankly couldn’t see the difference between Buzz and Twitter. Happily, Lifehacker has created a handy chart to help explain the differences (and similarities) between Google Buzz, Twitter and Facebook.

Happy Friday! If you missed the live event yesterday, be sure to take some time and listen to the archive of Genesis Hansen’s webinar on TEDx for Libraries: Dynamic programming for FREE!. It was full of great information (Genesis actually put together a TEDx event). As Genesis says:

TEDx events give libraries a great way to provide top-notch programming to their communities, for free! Using free content from A-list TED conference speakers and a proven program model, you can tailor an event to your community’s needs, whether you’re planning for 15 or 100 people.

If you’ve never had a chance to listen to a TED talk, check out their website!

If you ever need to show a patron or coworker (or family member or friend) how to use Facebook or Twitter, be sure to have these Mashable guidebooks handy! Each guidebook goes into nice detail (in a nice, accessible FAQ style) on a variety of topics from the basic (setting up an account) to more advanced features (sharing music or video, hiding Facebook notifications). Why reinvent the wheel with great tools like these around? Oh, and while you’re at it, subscribe to Mashable’s RSS feed – you’ll find tons of great info to be discovered.

Thanks to Stephen’s Lighthouse for the lead.

Kudos to the Palos Verdes Library for their new SOPAC (social online catalog)! They worked with the folks at YourLibrarySite to make the magic happen. What’s a SOPAC? According to the SOPAC website:

SOPAC is a next-generation catalog system that takes advantage of online, web 2.0-like interaction to build a rich, engaging discovery layer.

What that means practically is that in a SOPAC you can rate, review, comment on and tag items in the online catalog. This technology (is it technology? maybe innovation is a better term? or revolution in online public catalogs?) was created by John Blyberg and first implemented at the Ann Arbor District Library.

Courtesy of Google Earth 5.0. Once you download the software, you can now select the Moon as one of the planets (as well as Mars and the sky). Once on the Moon, you can view the landing locations of all the Apollo missions, and also view video of the moonwalks. There are also guided tours, and interviews with some of the astronauts. Too cool!! And what a great educational tool!! Here’s a screenshot of the Apollo 11 landing site:

As the law regarding hands-free cell phone use gets closer to going into effect (July 1), I thought I’d highlight a couple of tools that I enjoy. These can be of use to you and/or your users, and will keep you from doing dangerous things like texting while driving.
First up is my favorite, Jott. If you have ever called your answering machine to leave yourself reminders about things you need to do, Jott is for you! Set up an acount for free, validate your phone number, then you call a toll-free number and leave a message for yourself or any of your contacts who are in your Jott contact list (which you build online). If you have entered both the person’s email address and phone number then Jott sends both a text message and email to the person. If you prefer to only send text messages, then make sure that contact has a phone and no email address. If you prefer to only send email to that contact, then make sure that contact has an email address but no phone number.
Pinger is a service that allows you to call a local (to your cell phone) number and send a voice message to any contact you list on the Pinger website. It then sends the person a text message that there is a voice mail waiting for them. Hmm. Pinger also lets you create groups, and you can then send one voicemail message that will go to all members of your group. Pinger also offers voicemail (that could replace your cell provider’s voicemail).
Both Jott and Pinger allow you to save your messages (Jott in voice and text, Pinger in voice), on your personal web page, so you can refer back to them as needed. You can also set up reminders in Jott about an event. Both are free, so give them a shot and see what you think! Jott is one-way, where Pinger allows the person to whom you sent the message to reply.

I frequently find out about new and exciting training tools both from Infopeople and the Continuing Library Education Network & Exchange Round Table (CLENE) of the American Library Association. In June 2007, I read a wonderful blog entry, A Quick Intro to ScreenCasting by Steve Garwood in CE Buzz, CLENE’s blog. Steve describes how he used Camtasia software to record a PowerPoint presentation he did on ScreenCasting as he spoke.
Since I recruit instructors for Infopeople I contacted Steve and voilà, his Infopeople onground course became a reality, Tutorials 2.0: Teaching the Public and Training Staff with Online Screencasts; sessions start this month.
Even if you aren’t ready to take a course, do check out the course description and sample shown in his blog entry to see a really cool tool your library could use to do tutorials for the public or for staff training.

GOOG411 is great for saving money when you need phone numbers and/or addresses. You just call 1-800-GOOG-411 (free) instead of 411 (usually $1.50 and up per call). Especially useful for cellphone users. I programed the number in my phone and named it “info.” Check out their video on it — funny. Another free service from Google.

from Lifehacker’s Top 10 Telephone Tricks

If you know people who want to learn a new language or Spanish or Polish speakers who want help learning English, check out Mango.
You must have Flash installed to use the lessons and register for a free account. At this time, there is no cost for unlimited use of all of the lessons.
When you begin a lesson, you hear a brief conversation, and then you proceed forward and backward through a series of slides at your own pace. Mango does an excellent job of combining audio clips and written text. If you want to hear a phrase again, you just click the sound icon. To skip ahead, you just click the slide advance button.
Billed as “the first Free enterprise language learning course available on the Internet,” the beta release of Mango currently offers 11 courses. Each course has 100 lessons available. The 11 languages are: Spanish, Russian, French, Talian, Mandarin Chinese, German, Japanese, Brazilian Portuguese, Greek, English for Spanish Speakers and English for Polish speakers.
Don’t forget that Infopeople offers a variety of Spanish language related resources.
Currently, for those of you who want help teaching Spanish-Speaking Patrons How to Use the Internet, Infopeople will be offering that onground course beginning in October for only $75.
Also Survival Spanish for Library Staff on CD is still available free.

I just discovered this new (to me) tool today. It’s a peer to peer file sharing tool called Pando. If you have ever had to send, or wanted to share with folks, really big media files (pics, movies, etc) and couldn’t do it via email, then Pando is worth a look. It compresses your file (or folder) into a tiny .pando file that you can then email or share via IM. You and your recipient need the free Pando app to compress or open the files. Pando works with both Macs and PCs. Cool!