Browsing Room

Search Tip: Scoping

2012-02-14T08:25:00.000-08:00

I'm really feeling under the weather today, folks, so I'm going to bow out of a long post, but I came across this post yesterday, and I wanted to share it with you all. So much of a good, effective search requires that you be focusing your efforts in the right place. That's called "scoping,"

Find out all about it here:

http://searchresearch1.blogspot.com/2012/02/tactic-scoping.html

eReader Cheat Sheet

2012-02-09T14:22:00.000-08:00

Do you have trouble remembering what formats your - or a patron's - eReader supports? This handy dandy infographic cheat sheet lays it all out. Thanks, iLibrarian!

View Larger

Wikipedia Wars

2012-02-07T10:50:00.000-08:00

I just came across an article on CNN talking about a big virtual scuffle that's broken out on Wikipedia, where some of Newt Gingrich's staffers are doing their darndest to keep his Wikipedia page shiny and clean. Read the article, then come back here:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/06/gingrich-spokesman-defends-wikipedia-edits/

It's fascinating to me that this sort of thing is now commonplace, and it highlights one of the biggest problems with Wikipedia. In a world where anyone can contribute to a resource that so many people turn to for "facts," there can be trench warfare over what constitutes a fact and what doesn't. As I read it, his aide is trying to downplay elements that might be damaging to the candidate, while others are trying to highlight them.

It's for situations like these that publications need impartial editors. (But then again, are editors really impartial--this same process also has me wondering and thinking about the way editorial power has been used over the years to influence public opinion. Perhaps this is just a new version of an old phenomenon--just more public now that it's happening on a public forum.)

In any case, I don't really have anything more to add to the discussion. Just thought this real-world application of a problem I talk about to students in classrooms all the time was fascinating.

Thoughts?

Awww.

2012-02-02T14:13:00.000-08:00

I'm such a sucker for a pop-up book. Even if it is a commercial.

Field Notes: Red Blooded from Coudal Partners on Vimeo.

Learning new things

2012-02-01T12:17:00.000-08:00

For today's Resource Wednesday, I thought it'd be neat to look at some of the ways the 'Net brings us great new ways to learn. (I plan to dig into some of these in more detail later, so consider this a taste...)

Passionate people, briefly being brilliant:
One of my favorite ways to learn about totally new-to-me topics has become the TED talks. TED started as a series of annual conferences (focused on Technology, Education, and Design), bringing in some of the top experts in the world to give brief (10-20 minute) speeches about the things they know best. They now film them, and make them available (900+ and counting) for free online, and a number of offshoot events have also developed.

I find them fascinating not just for the content (which covers a huge range of fields) but also for what I can learn about making a powerful, fascinating presentation. In some future week, I'll post some of my favorites, but in the meantime, browse away from their list.

Crowd-sourced wisdom:
All right, we all know that just Googling it doesn't work for some kinds of questions, right? (That's a big part of why we in the library are here, after all - there's a lot of academic questions where that's the case, of course.)

But what happens when you want to know something complicated - how to move across country with an odd combination of pets? What's a great free online tool to solve a particular problem? What foods could you make that would take you through a long day of classes and work, without needing a fridge or a microwave?

Enter AskMetafilter. Part of a much larger site (Metafilter itself is focused on discussion of links and online material, the idea being that the cool stuff rises to the top), AskMetafilter is focused on questions and answers. It's been my first stop for several years for general questions where I want well-focused answers to a particular practical issue or interest.

How does it work? You can browse the site all you like for free (you'll see some ads). If you'd like to post a question or respond, you'll need to pay a $5 user registration fee. It's one time (not a subscription), and it helps both support the site, and keep a handle on spamming and other problematic behavior. (It's a method that's unusual in online sites, but works really well for them.)

And a few other notes: the content on the site is widely varying: you may find things that are not to your taste. Discussions do have moderation to keep them within site guidelines, but of course, moderators may not have spotted a problem comment yet. Their FAQ has lots of answers to questions you might have about how the site works. And of course, use your head, and evaluate the information you get from this source, just like you would any other.

Learn something new:
One of my goals for a while has been to learn a little more about programming. (I took a class in college, but that was both a long time ago, and didn't get used again - so it's fallen out of my brain.) I'd started playing with a site called Code Academy, and in January, they started a project called Code Year, where you do a series of short lessons (new ones every week) that take you through a lot of coding basics.

I'm still on week two, but I'm learning a lot. (If you've never done any kind of programming or coding before, the learning curve is a little steep, but they've got forums and other help information - and there's a lot of people doing it, so there are little communities growing up to share ideas and resources.)

Firefox 10 and Web Browsers in General

2012-01-31T10:38:00.000-08:00

For those of you playing along at home, Firefox has updated to a brand new version number this morning: 10.0. Of course, as I've noted before, those new version numbers seem to mean less and less these days than they used to. Case in point? The first (FIRST) listed "new feature" for Firefox 10? They've hidden the "Forward" button until you hit the "Back" button.

Whoa.

Firefox, you just blew my mind. All this time, that's been the one thing that I've been hating most about browsers. That pesky Forward button. Thank goodness it's gone now. I'm so happy we have a brand new version of your browser. Totally worth the wait.

Sorry for the sarcasm, but isn't it a tad ridiculous? I'm not using Firefox these days--still going with Google Chrome, mainly for the following reasons:

It seems to me to be less buggy than Firefox on my machine. Chrome boots up faster and responds more quickly than Firefox. I haven't scientifically tested this, but that's how it feels to me, at any rate.
Chrome handles Google's software and web programs more capably--and I use a lot of Google stuff. I love how easy it is to search with Chrome--just type the query into the address bar, and you're off and running. It even autopopulates web addresses with commonly visited sites. In contrast, Firefox feels stone aged.

And it appears I'm not alone in my preference. Internet Explorer is now at a 20% market share--it peaked back in March 2003, when it was at 88%. (Good riddance, I say. I never liked Explorer. Way too clunky and prone to bugs.) Firefox is now at 38%. It peaked in July 2007, when it was at 48%. Chrome is now at 35%--it's highest share ever. (For exact breakdown of numbers, look here.)

Of course, I'd rather see three, four, or more major players in the browser arena. Any time you have multiple companies competing for the same users, the users win--there's more innovation, more features. It's a good thing. Much worse than the days of IE or else--it was Microsoft's way or the highway, and that's not a good place to be in.

So while it's nice that Chrome is seeing as much attention as it is, I do hope that someone (Firefox or someone else) steps up the game significantly to challenge them.

Eliminating the Forward button ain't gonna do that, Firefox.

To download the latest versions of these browsers, go to

Mantor Monday - The Writing Contest

2012-01-30T14:29:00.000-08:00

Hey, did you know we're sponsoring a writing contest? As one of our "On Our Minds" programming events, we're teaming up with the English Department to bring you The Great Outdoors Writing Contest. Prompted by this year's On Our Minds selection, A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson, we're looking for nature inspired entries from UMF students. Entries can be academic papers or creative prose, fiction or nonfiction - but they must relate to our theme of The Great Outdoors.

Prizes? But of course! There will be two prizes in each category (Academic and Creative works). The top prize is $40 for first place. Runner-ups in each category will win $20.

The contest will run from January 17, 2012 to Wednesday, April 11.

For more information on the contest or how to submit an entry, contact Bryce Cundick. (778-7224 or bryce.cundick@maine.edu.

Yak Trax

2012-01-24T09:47:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know it's Technology Tuesday, and yes, I realize this post is a bit of a departure from the norm, but I'm typing this with only one hand, since I broke my left elbow a week ago today. That makes typing a slow, painful process--so this post will be short.

I just want to put in a plug for a piece of modern engineering that would have helped me avoid slipping last week: Yak Trax. They slip over your sneakers and give your shoes extra traction. I even own a pair--I just wasn't wearing them

The lesson? Modern technology will only help you if you let it.

Stay safe out there, folks!

2011: The Year in Library News

2012-01-19T14:27:00.000-08:00

Technology Tuesday: Website blackouts and SOPA

2012-01-17T09:29:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, you may see some of your favorite websites going black for 24 hours to protest the bill known as SOPA in the Senate and PIPA in the House. (Both bills are currently stalled in discussion, but this is an important issue, and many sites are going ahead with the blackout in order to help provide information and encourage conversation.)

The law is primarily aimed at digital piracy issues (things like people posting entire movies, etc.) but as it currently stands, it is very vague, and likely won't help much with its actual goal. And, as a side effect, would have massive freedom-of-access issues for many legitimate users of these and many other sites.

There's no doubt that this is a complicated issue, so there have been some excellent explanations of what's going on.

Briefly, the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) covers sites in the United States, but is focused on a single user. If Johnny posts something on a site that is under copyright, and the copyright owner files a formal complaint, then the site is supposed to take specific actions (and sometimes, everything moves into a legal suit.) It's a pain for the content creator, and not much fun for Johnny - but everyone else can continue using that site without trouble.

SOPA and PIPA, though, are aimed in part at sites outside the United States (where a lot of pirated work is hosted) but are written so vaguely they can also apply to sites within the US, or sites (like YouTube, Wikipedia, and all sorts of other places) where there's a bunch of awesome user-created material, but also some material that is posted without the copyright holder's permission. In these cases, if the law passes, the US government could choose to shut the entire site down - no access for anyone in the US.

See why people are calling it vague? The best analogy I've been able to come up with is that it's like teachers who say "Just because one of you has been bad, none of you get to go to recess." Ever. And then they enforce it by putting padlocks on the playground, so no one else can get in either, even before or after school.

That didn't work terribly well when we were kids - and it certainly doesn't work very well when you're talking about thousands or millions of people. (And especially when many people are deeply confused about copyright, as lots of people are, and a lot of things like exactly what a derivative work are up in the air still, in terms of legal precedent.)

The basic intention's reasonable enough. But don't we deserve a better designed law?

What can you do?

Inform yourself - there are great posts from a couple of fellow librarians (Jessamyn West, Brian Herzog) and technology geeks (BoingBoing) as well as a bare bones infographic.
Once you've decided what you think, get in touch with your legislators (there's more info at both the first two links) and tell them.
Tell other people why they should care - pass this post on to your friends, neighbors, whoever else you know who uses the 'Net.

Technology Tuesday: Amazon Price Tracker

2012-01-10T10:07:00.001-08:00

Howdy folks. Today I'm here with just a brief bit of info that might make your life a tad better. Assuming you ever shop at Amazon, that is. Did you know that Amazon has a tendency to mess around with its prices? Not just a little, either. They don't have to have their minions scurry around with stickers to change their prices--they can do it with a click of a button. And they do.

A lot.

I have no idea *why* they change them as much as they do, but who are we to question the ways of the mighty Amazon? And in the end, why they do it doesn't matter. All that matters is to be aware of it and to know how to fight it.

Because if there's one thing any good librarian knows, it's that knowledge is power.

Enter Amazon price watchers, stage right. There are any number of these services online--the one I personally use is myPriceTrack, not because I think it's better than any others. It just happens to be the one that I found first. (If any of you out there have services you like more than this one, please speak up. I have no loyalty to this particular one.)

This handy tool allows you to cut and paste the web address of any Amazon product into its search engine, and it spits out the relevant price data for that item, charted over time. So in action, let's imagine you wanted to buy Adobe CS5. You go to Amazon's page for the item and see that it's selling for $650 (right now), marked down from $700. That seems like a pretty good deal, right? Well, when you go to myPriceTrack, you discover CS5 was on sale for $490 back on November 19th, and then again for $500 on December 17th. Maybe you ought to watch the price of it over the next while and find a better time to buy.

You can do this with anything on Amazon. Books, movies, electronics, music--you name it. It'll also show you the lowest "Buy Used" price on Amazon. The price doesn't fluctuate as wildly for some areas, but you really never can tell where it will and where it won't. When I go to buy something off Amazon these days, I almost always at least make a stop by myPriceTrack first to make sure I'm not getting ripped off.

Any of you have any tips you use for online shopping?

Defying Gravity

2012-01-05T11:49:00.000-08:00

Gives whole new meaning to the words "Book Mobile"....

via Codex Infinitum

Thoughts on Apple TV, False Restrictions, and Changing Technology

2012-01-03T12:52:00.000-08:00

One of the Christmas presents unwrapped in my household on Christmas morning this year was a brand new Apple TV. For those of you who might not know what that is, head on over here to find out. Back? Good. I got the Apple TV mainly because I've bought in to so much of the rest of the Apple environment, it finally seemed like a good idea. I can throw my iPad screen on to my TV through it, play my entire music library on my nice surround speakers, look at my photo collection, watch YouTube, Netflix, and Vimeo . . . All for under $100.

My thoughts, now that I've used it some?

Mainly frustration. Don't get me wrong--it does what I thought it would do, and it does that well. It's easy to use, and I think it's been worth the investment. No, what's frustrating is what I feel like it should be able to do, but can't--due to licensing issues in today's entertainment environment.

At this point, there is no real difference between phone, television, and internet. It's all digital. It's all nothing more than a bunch of 0s and 1s transmitted over cables or through the air. You might buy it from your phone company or your cable company, but the actual thing they're selling is identical. Digital bits of information.

What's frustrating is that those companies, in a desperate ploy to remain relevant, are monkeying around with how that content is delivered, enforcing artificial means of restricting it so that our options as consumers are limited.

Decades ago, you got your channels bundled through your cable company because it made sense. There was quality content on them, and you get a discount by getting a bunch of them all at once. These days? That quality content is much more questionable, and the value you get by being forced to select a bundle is middling at best. Sure, you get hundreds of channels, but what use are all those channels if nothing's on them?

As a consumer, I feel like I should be able to subscribe to a select number of channels online, through the internet (and then on to my Apple TV to get it on my television). I would take Turner Classic Movies, Discovery, AMC, ESPN, ESPN2, maybe HBO. Pick and choose the channels I wanted until I ended up with an ideal package just for me. I would even pay more per channel for this option--perhaps channels were as little as .25/channel when they're bundled, but $1 or $2/channel separately. That would be okay. In the end, I'd be paying less, and I'd be getting only what I wanted for channels. Plus, the channels I liked and supported would be getting more of the money, as opposed to MTV8 or The "Learning" Channel.

But I can't do that. Cable companies and satellite companies are terrified that they'll be left doing nothing, so they hold on to those bundles and the licensing agreements associated with them.

Another example: across most of the country, you can get TV signals over the air for free. It costs the consumer nothing. I get lousy TV reception. I feel like I should be able to watch the same content all my fellow citizens get to watch--just online, instead of over the air.

No can do.

Yes, I understand that some of this is due to advertising fees and how that is all structured, but in the end, that again seems like an antiquated way of dealing with today's technology.

With my Apple TV, I should be able to do everything I just described and more. I know it's capable of doing it. But I can't do it yet. Hopefully one day soon . . .

Of course, as this is on a library blog, I feel compelled to bring up a library-specific point in relation to all of this. I hope that we, as librarians, don't fall into the same rut that the cable companies are in right now. Consumers and patrons are getting used to being able to get their books digitally. Quickly, easily. I'd like to think they're okay paying a bit of money to do this in many cases, but there are also people out there who can't afford to pay money, and rely on libraries for their content.

Our job is to navigate the waters to make sure that we stay relevant, but not at the price of placing false restrictions on content. I could easily see libraries becoming more and more local information dealers, distributors, and negotiators--helping each community they serve get access to the information that community needs. I'm worried at times that in our rush to remain relevant, we're too slow to embrace the changes and opportunities offered by new technology.

Then again, perhaps the biggest problem in all this isn't the companies--it's the law that has trouble adapting and changing with the times.

I don't know--thoughts, anyone?

If you're ever in Prague...

2011-12-29T13:19:00.000-08:00

check out this giant sculpture by Matej Kren in the entrance of the Prague Municipal Library. Constructed with mirrors to create the illusion of an infinite vortex of books, this is one rabbit hole I wouldn't mind tumbling down.

photos via My Modern Met

Mantor Monday

2011-12-27T11:41:00.000-08:00

Library hours this week:

Monday through Friday - 8:00am to 4:30

Saturday and Sunday - closed.

Closed Monday, Jan 2nd.

Are you a book nerd?

2011-12-15T13:31:00.000-08:00

Writer Jason Pinter wants to know. He's created the Twitter hashtag #booknerd, and he's getting some pretty funny responses. I've grabbed screenshots of some of my favorites. I feel you, fellow booknerds. I feel you.

final two tweets from Huffington Post.

Amazon and Cut Throat Prices

2011-12-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

I'm usually a big fan of technology. I love being able to do as much as I can online or with techie things. But this past weekend (I think it was this past weekend), Amazon concocted a new approach to stabbing brick and mortar retail in the back--including book stores. If people went in to stores and used its new price matching app, then Amazon would give them up to $5 off on the items they scanned. (In the price matching app, you scan the barcode of an item with your smart phone. Amazon brings up the info for it on Amazon, so you can compare prices and then order it from Amazon right there.)

This strikes me as unfair, and over the top. Amazon has cheaper prices than bookstores. That's almost always a given these days. Why? Because Amazon can afford to. They're able to slash prices on some items (books), because they can make back the money on all the other stuff people buy through them. And I think everyone kind of gets that. If you want to save money--and money is all that's important to you, not local business or anything--then you shop Amazon.

But this latest stunt? That just seems to be Amazon trying to take a lead pipe to local brick and mortar stores' collective kneecap. It would be like Walmart hiring someone to go around after you and tell you how much money you could be saving if you were shopping at Walmart.

What's worse is that Amazon is basically using every other store's inventory as a sort of Amazon Floorspace. The big weakness Amazon has always had is that some people prefer to see things before they buy them. They want to handle the thing. Kick the tires. Look under the hood, so to speak. And Amazon hasn't been able to match that. It's the great equalizer.

But now, you can go to the store, see the thing hands on, then order it on Amazon and have it delivered to your house in two days, for free.

Yikes.

Sooner or later, this will all come back to bite the consumer in the proverbial rear end. If Amazon's allowed to drive all other stores out of business, then something tells me that won't be a good thing for the consumer.

Time will tell, but sometimes, just because you *can* do something with technology, doesn't mean you should . . .

Mantor Monday

2011-12-12T11:06:00.000-08:00

Library hours during finals week:

Monday - Wednesday, 7:45 am to 11:00pm

Thursday - 7:45 am to 7:00 pm (Unless bad weather during the week requires finals to be held on Friday. In this case, the library will remain open until 11:00 pm.)

Friday - 7:45 to 4:30

In other library news, the projector in the enhanced study room on the second floor has been such an overwhelming hit, at student request we have decided to take reservations.

If you'd like to reserve the projector room, please call or stop by the Access Services desk.

Good luck on your exams, and have a wonderful break!

Best. Flowchart. Ever.

2011-12-08T09:04:00.001-08:00

Do you read science fiction or fantasy? You're going to love this. You know what? Scratch that question. Even if you don't like wizards, warlocks, dragons, pirates, dystopian worlds or post-apocalyptic cannibals, you'll still enjoy this flowchart. It's that fun.

The smart people at SF Signal took the NPR's list of reader-ranked top 100 books in these two genres, and turned it into a flow chart with 100 endpoints and 325 decision points. There is a printable version available here. (warning, huge download.) Not in the mood to follow arrows? There's an interactive online version here.

But for pure, colorful, joyful exploration of a cornucopia of best-loved books, take a few minutes to wander around this chart. Just keep an eye out for dragons.

(Click here to enjoy larger version.)

Quick notes about Gmail

2011-12-08T08:21:00.001-08:00

For those of you who use UMF email accounts, you may have noticed a window popping up asking you if you want to change to the new Gmail format.

First, if you are so overwhelmed with everything else right now (it being the last week of classes, of course), you can temporarily put off dealing with this. Just click the button that says you want to. (How long is 'temporary'? Not forever, but Google hasn't told us, either.)

Why the new look?
Google has been rolling this out for a variety of reasons - some have to do with function, some have to do with appearance. The major changes are:

a cleaner looking interface - more modern, more streamlined.
some new themes to customize how your Gmail looks (more in a moment)
improvements to the conversation view that keeps messages on a topic together.
more ways to customize appearance (more in a moment again.)
simpler ways to search and filter in Gmail
easier switching between mail, contacts, and tasks.
a new toolbar that only shows you buttons when you need them.

Common questions:
The two big questions I've heard so far today are about contrast between text and the background, and about the spacing of items in the sidebar/inbox. Gmail gives you options on how to handle both of these.

Spacing:
The items in the sidebar (like Inbox, Important, Sent Mail, etc.) have a certain spacing. You can decide to make that roomy and spacious, or you can make it very compact, so it takes up less space.

If you look at the top of your mail inbox, you'll see a little gear symbol. When you click on it, you'll see the following drop-down menu. Adjust the "Display density" until the spacing suits you. You can also use this menu to revert to the old look temporarily, or to easily get to settings or themes.

Contrast:
Themes are a way to personalize your Gmail. Here's a view of your choices. Some of them have better contrast than others, or may be more pleasing to your eye.

The classic themes came over from the older look of Gmail, and a couple of them look more washed out in the new version, which is why I've been hearing questions about how to make the contrast better. This is definitely a "play around and see what works for you" thing.

One nifty trick is that some themes change based on the weather, the time of day, or have rotating images. If you look at the themes below, the little sun symbol in the bottom right means it changes based on weather. If it's got a clock, it changes based on time of day. And if it's got the three little squares, it has multiple rotating images.

Conversation view:
One thing that can confuse people (though it's not new to Gmail's new look) is that Gmail by default groups conversations (series of emails) together.

If you'd rather not do this, use the settings menu (the gear I talked about above) to go to settings, then on the General tab, look for the "Conversation View" option, about half-way down. You can select "Conversation view off" and you'll see each email individually.

Want to do more?
Finally, if you're now curious about all that Gmail can do, let me point you at an awesome feature, the Gmail Labs tab. (Found in the same Settings window we just talked about...)

Labs are features that are not part of Gmail's default settings. Often, that's because they're still in development, or because they're things some people want, but not everyone. I plan a future post about some of my favorites, but in the meantime, LifeHacker had some great tips earlier this year in a top-ten list, and then ten more experimental features to check out.

More about social bookmarking

2011-12-07T11:58:00.001-08:00

Last Wednesday, I talked about social bookmarking in general - this week, I want to take a closer look at a couple of different options. (Two of which I use regularly, and then talk about a few other choices.)

One of the big names in social bookmarking is Delicious (http://delicious.com). It's had some ups and downs recently (it started as an independent start-up, got bought by Yahoo, Yahoo decided to stop supporting it, and it has now been bought and is getting updated by an entirely different company. Yeah, it was confusing at the time, too.)

Here's what you see if you look at my professional Delicious account. (You may want to click on the image to see it a bit better.)

On the left, you can see when I added each link, and you can see what tags I gave it. On the right sidebar, you can see some basic info about me, and then a list of all the tags I've ever assigned anywhere.

So, how do I add to my links? Most of the social bookmarking sites have a little link you put in your bookmark toolbar. Here's mine - off to the right, you can see a link to delicious, and then to "my delicious". The first one is what I click to add a link. The second takes me to my account and shows me all the links I've saved previously.

When you click on the "add a link" bookmark, a little window will pop up. Most of the time, I just add tags, and don't comment, but commenting is handy if you're creating links that will be shared with other people. (You can share a note about why you like it, what to pay attention to, etc.) As you can see in the bottom left, you can add this to a larger group of links (a stack - more on that below) or make it private (so only you can see it.)

The former version of Delicious had a way to bundle tags into larger groups (so I'd have one for library.profession, technology.tools, teaching.and.learning, and so on, that would gather smaller tags into one group.) The new version of Delicious has "stacks" where you can pick and choose specific links to include (though they make it easy to select whole groups at a time. Below, you can see what a stack looks like when I've added some items.

Finally, it's also possible to follow someone else on Delicious - that means that every time they save a public bookmark, you get to see what they saved. In practice, while I think this is a sort of neat idea (and it can be a very cool collaborative tool for some kinds of projects), I've never used it extensively.

Pinboard: an alternative:
When the future of Delicious was looking pretty uncertain, people spent a lot of time exploring some other options. One popular choice that rose to the top turned out to be a site called Pinboard (http://pinboard.in). They describe themselves as " a bookmarking website for introverted people in a hurry."

Unlike Delicious (which is free), there's a one-time fee (which goes up very slightly with each account created - currently, it's about $9.55.) but it is in fact very quick, simple, and the creator and admins are very responsive to concerns. You can see what it looks like here. (I've got an account for some professional uses, but I use it more heavily on my personal account.)

And here's what adding a new link looks like.

What are some other options?
Twitter has become a great way for some people to share links of interest - the problem is finding them later when you need them. (So a lot of people will save a link to something like their browser, a 'read later' application like Instapaper, or to a social bookmarking site.)

There are a variety of other social bookmarking sites - I've only scratched the surface here. Popular sites include Digg, Reddit, and StumbleUpon, though all three have much more of a social factor than the two I've discussed above. (Great if you're working with popular topics, but sometimes a little weird if your interests are less common.)

Making Sense of HDTV Mumbo Jumbo

2011-12-06T11:08:00.001-08:00

Lifehacker has a great guide up today all about how to understand what all the numbers and letters surrounding HDTVs mean. 720p vs 1080i? LCD vs Plasma? What the heck is a contrast ratio? If you need guidance in the purchase of a new TV, this is a great place to start your research.

Check it out!

I will say that it's remarkable to me how easy the internet has made it to learn about subjects you never had a clue about before. Just over Thanksgiving, I set up my parents' surround sound system, upgrading them from technology that was over 15 years old. I did it all without really having to check anything online--I'd taught myself how to do it all when I installed my own system a couple of years ago.

Through the internet, I've become reasonably proficient at understanding how television antennas work, how to network just about anything, how to set up advanced remote control systems, how to bake anything you can think of--it's all right there, usually spelled out in so much detail that even a complete novice can get it all down pat, if he or she just takes the time to learn.

There's times when I'm just really happy to live in a day and place where things like this are possible.

Sidewalk Canvas

2011-12-01T10:53:00.000-08:00

If you've spent any time in the library lately, you may have noticed these golden eyes gazing down at you from the Discoveries shelf in the Browsing room. This handsome Leo's face on the cover of Sidewalk Canvas jumped out at me as I was reading the New Books List that came out today, so I went and checked it out and spent my lunch break marveling at the works inside. As well as featuring absolutely mind-blowingly talented street artists, Sidewalk Canvas is also a how-to book. I, personally, am self-aware enough to realize that I do not have what it takes to create masterpieces like these. But you might. And one of the things I love about this campus is the proliferation of public art - installations left like gifts to surprise and delight the rest of us. So, maybe, one day, one of these chalk paintings will grace the sidewalk in front of the library. (Hint, hint, artists on campus...)

I've checked the book back in, so it's available if you'd like to come in for it. In the meantime, enjoy these photo essays on this incredible art form:

http://www.demilked.com/3d-sidewalk-chalk-art/

http://blogof.francescomugnai.com/2010/04/3d-sidewalk-chalk-art-40-unbelievable-photos/

http://weburbanist.com/2007/09/21/3-amazing-3d-street-artists-urban-graffiti-from-around-the-world/

Resource Wednesday: Social bookmarking 101

2011-11-30T12:05:00.001-08:00

A couple of weeks ago, I talked about how Google Reader is a great way to keep on top of interesting topics.

But that raises the question: When you find interesting posts, or interesting webpages, how do you keep track of them? That's where my next topic comes in: social bookmarking sites.

What's a social bookmarking site?
Basically, it's a site where you can save your bookmarks. Depending on the site you use, and your settings, you can set them private (only you can see them when you're logged in) or public.

Some sites have ways to make it easy to share other people's bookmarks and see what they've found useful, usually through tagging.

You can take a look at the collection I keep for professional topics at Delicious.com, one of the best-known social bookmarking sites. (I'll talk a little more about some of what you see in future Wednesday posts.)

When are they useful?

If you want to share links with other people.
If you're collaborating with other people.
If you like sharing things you find interesting.
If you use lots of different computers, and want to be able to find articles, pages, or sites you use frequently without syncing your bookmarks between different computers. \

Some people save bookmarks on their own computer and on a social bookmarking site - including me. I bookmark sites I use regularly on the computers I use them on (my work computer, my home computer) and use Delicious and other sites for more general collections of links.

So how do you keep track?
Many social bookmarking sites have a way to group links in some way. Probably the most common is by tagging, assigning a term (that you choose) to a link, so you can group them in ways that make sense to you. Many sites will suggest some tags (including those other people have chosen.) Some sites allow tags to have spaces, others don't. (I can never remember which site does which, so my tags are either one word, or have a . in the middle to join phrases - for example academic.libraries)

What to know before you start using a social bookmarking site:
Basically, be aware of the normal standard privacy issues. If your bookmarks are public, people can see them. They can see what you choose for a tag (so, if you call it really.idiotic.stuff, the person whose site you tagged with that might find out...)

Second, it's always a good idea when using a site to have a way to get your data back out again - sites do get bought and sold or go out of business. It's good to be in the habit of saving a backup every few months (at least, more often if you absolutely must be able to find material again.)

Finally, be aware if you're behind an access-protected area. For example, if you do a search in our databases and find an article you like, you could bookmark it and access it on campus, perhaps without any problems (it depends on the database). But from off campus, you'd have to demonstrate that you should have access to the site (usually by logging in), and sometimes it's very hard to get back to the original article afterwards.

The History of Search

2011-11-29T09:15:00.001-08:00

I just got back from my vacation, and I'm bravely mucking through backlog of email and blog posts. However, I took some time out to watch this video that just came out from Google, detailing the history of Google search from its beginnings to today, and I thought you might be interested in seeing it.

It's really interesting to take a step back and remind ourselves where search has come in the past fifteen years or so, and to wonder where it might be fifteen years from now. Google isn't my favorite tool in the world for every search, but it does a great job at what it's designed to do, and I'm glad there are so many brilliant minds focused on making internet searches even more robust.

What say you?

Mantor Monday

2011-11-21T14:03:00.000-08:00

Need to study?

Come on in! We have group and private study areas, plenty of computers, and two Project Zones.

We're open until 11:00 tonight, 7:00 on Tuesday night, and 4:30 on Wednesday.

And then....

Happy Thanksgiving Break!!! (Enjoy!)

Review Friday: Keep your hands busy!

2011-11-18T12:12:00.001-08:00

It's probably no secret that a fair number of the library staff knit. (So do a lot of people we talk to).

So, as we aim at a long holiday weekend (with maybe some spare time for knitting and crocheting, and all sorts of other fun hobbies), and a lot of people are aiming at making quick presents for the winter holidays, I thought it might be nice to highlight a few recent knitting and related items in our collection.

One great title for quick projects is the One-Skein Wonders series. We just got the Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders (by Judith Durant) in. Sock yarn comes in a great range of colors, is often (reasonably) inexpensive, and as shown here, can be used to make a wide range of items, not just socks. This book has bags, fingerless mitts, children's items, hats, small shawls, and more. Many projects are designed to be relatively quick, simple, and portable - great if you're going to be travelling for Thanksgiving.

Another recent addition is Stitch and Bitch Superstar Knitting: Go Beyond the Basics by Debbie Stollet. This is a sequel to her first book, and it covers cables, bobbles, lace, intarsia, and even designing things yourself. While it's not for the absolute beginner (you'll be a lot happier if you already know how to knit, purl, cast on, and cast off), the charts and pictures make this book a great one to learn from.

Both of these books are currently on the Discoveries shelf in the Browsing Room.

Want more? You can take a look at some of the knitting books we own in our catalog. (And try searches on other terms, too!) If you're new to knitting, the Knitting for Dummies works great for some people, and we have several other titles aimed at absolute beginners.

We also get - through a bundle with a bunch of other databases from the state, access to the Hobbies and Crafts database, which includes a number of crafting magazines (with patterns!) This can be a fun way to browse for ideas or inspiration. (The link will only work if you're on campus or have a UMF library card - but check with your local library to see if you can get access if you're reading this from somewhere else.)

iTunes Match Launches

2011-11-15T10:40:00.001-08:00

After weeks of delays, iTunes Match has finally launched. What does this mean? It's Apple's answer to music on the cloud. You take your MP3 collection, Apple scans through it, and then it grants you access to all those songs, wherever you go. Plus, it does it with a minimum of uploading. (In other words, instead of taking your collection and sending it to the internet song by song (like Amazon and Google do right now), it grants you access to the song directly on its servers.) (Note that Google Music is doing an event today, and their offerings might change soon based on what they announce.) iTunes Match isn't free: it costs $25/year.

I have a lot of music on my computer. Enough that I had to start picking and choosing what I wanted stored on my iPad, so that I had room for other stuff on it. So it made sense to me to subscribe to Match and give it a shot. Installation was easy--you just upgrade to the latest version of iTunes, and then click the appropriate button on the left hand menu. And since you pay for it with your iTunes useraccount, paying was a cinch, too.

It took about an hour for the service to scan through the 3,000 some odd songs I have on my hard drive. Once that was done, it only needed to upload something like 500 of them to the cloud. Because I'm at a university with fast internet, that didn't take long at all--though if you're at home, I imagine it could take quite a long time, indeed.

Switching it on in my iPad was also easy--just go to settings > music and turn on the labeled switch. It ditches whatever music you have on your iPad and replaces it with the ability to stream music from your library, or download individual songs. So far, it's been very easy to use. As long as I have internet, I have all my music--and none of it has to take up any space on my iPad.

I do wish there was a way to make playlists on the fly, and I'd also like to be able to rate music directly from my iPad. To be fair, I haven't had the chance to fully play around with the program, and it's possible that it can do both of these things--but if it can, they haven't made it overly apparent.

All told, it's a service I'm very happy to take advantage of. How about you? Tried it? Thinking about it? Any questions for me? Ask away!

Mantor Monday

2011-11-14T09:24:00.000-08:00

Phone calls are already coming in to inquire about library hours for the Thanksgiving holiday week, so I thought I'd post them early:

Monday - regular hours (7:45 am - 11:00 pm)

Tuesday - 7:45 am - 7:00 pm

Wednesday - 8:00 am - 4:30 pm

Thursday, Friday, Saturday - Closed

Sunday - regular hours (11:00 am - 11:00 pm)

Unbroken

2011-11-11T12:11:00.001-08:00

Veteran's Day is a great day to highlight another of the new titles in our Discoveries collection.

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilence, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand (who also wrote the bestselling Seabiscuit) is the story of Louis Zamperini, an Olympic athlete, World War II pilot, and survivor of Japanese prison camps.

Hillenbrand begins at the beginning, looking at what drove Zamperini to funnel his energies into track and field (he competed in the 1936 Olympics in Munich), and then into the war effort.

When his plane went down, he and his crew survived starvation, shark attacks, and forty-seven days at sea in the Pacific before they made landfall and were found by a Japanese boat. They then endured years in prison camps, and then the years after his release, dealing with the aftermath of his experiences.

What's stunning about the story, though, is something Hillenbrand makes very clear: that while this is one story, powerful and moving, there are thousands of other stories out there, of veterans doing amazing things to survive in the darkest times. As she says, in the article quoted below, "Louis is definitely a hero," she says. "What he did for this country is something that really moves me. I don't, though, want to separate him from all the other men around him who did the same thing. They're all extraordinary. I want him to be representative of all of them, rather than somebody who stands apart from them."

You can hear an hour-long interview with the author via Minnesota Public Radio. (That link also has additional background.) There's more information at the author's website.

And you can find the book in our Browsing Room on the Discoveries section.

Name that Book

2011-11-10T13:36:00.000-08:00

So. Here we are, on a gloomy, rainy afternoon. You know what would be fun? A game. A game of "Name that book", sponsored by the website Better Book Titles. I'll show you a picture of a book that has obviously been tampered with, and you have to guess the real title of the book. Ready? Let's go! (And no fair skipping down to the bottom of the post, where the answers are!)

Too easy? Let's try another:

How about this one:

(Seems like an obvious concept, doesn't it, yet one we humans haven't grasped.) And on to the next two:

Getting them so far? How about this one:

Alright, that one was a gimme. Last one, just because I love the real thing so much:

How'd you do?

Here's the answers, in order of appearance:

A Game of Thrones, George R.R. Martin

The Road, Cormac McCarthy

Cat's Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut

A Visit From the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan

What to Expect When You're Expecting, Heidi Murkoff

127 Hours, Aron Ralston

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-good, Very Bad Day, Judith Viorst

Want more? Head on over to Better Book Titles. Easily offended people, be warned: many are NSFW (Especially Not Safe For Work blogs. Though many had me snorting like a rogue rhino, I wasn't able to post them here.)

Thanks for playing, see you next time!

A Review of iOS 5

2011-11-08T10:28:00.000-08:00

Now that I've been using it for a while, I thought I might get on here to report back on my impressions of iOS 5. Overall, I'd say I'm very happy with it. (Once I finally got all my apps reinstalled. That part wasn't too fun.) There's automatic syncing with iCloud, an enhanced Gamecenter, better integration with Twitter, a cool split keyboard option (which makes typing with thumbs a whole lot easier), tabbed browsing in Safari, better calendar integration, the newsstand feature (which lets you have all your digital magazine subscriptions in one spot), iMessage, syncing without a computer--no one update that changes the whole game, but a lot of small updates that really add up.

Of course, it ain't all peaches and cream. Besides the obvious (the pain and agony it took to get to OS5), there are some other hiccups. Completely anecdotal, but my battery life seems shorter now than it was before. I think some of this is due to the fact that I can't turn off notifications now. I can have no notifications sent to the notifications center, but actually just not getting them at all isn't an option. In other words, I'm always told right away when I have a new move for Words with Friends or the like. In OS4, I could just go in when I felt like it and be updated about that on demand. I think my iPad is using some juice to constantly stay up to date on things like that. (Am I wrong about that--anyone know?) Me no likey.

Another quibble is the fact that iTunes Match has yet to surface. I'm really looking forward to being able to use the service to have all my music stored on the cloud (for $25/month), but it was supposed to launch by the end of October, and here I am . . . still waiting. I don't like the lack of updates from Apple about what's causing the delay, either.

How about you--anyone else out there using the update? How's it working for you? Pleased? Disappointed? Please share!

Mantor Monday

2011-11-07T07:22:00.000-08:00

Join us Tuesday, Nov. 8th, at 3:00 p.m. for a lively book discussion in the Mantor Library Browsing Room. We'll be talking about
A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail.

If you haven't read our On Our Minds selection yet, we have plenty of copies available for check out in the lobby. And while you're picking up a copy, don't forget to take a look at our Facebook Virtual Hike Map in the lobby display case. We've had readers regularly posting how many miles they've walked, ran, and hiked: we are charging up the Virtual Appalachian Trail. Keep posting - we just might make it a round trip!!

A Post about Posts

2011-11-03T13:49:00.000-07:00

Okay, how gorgeous are these?

These posts are the work of visual artist Gordon Young. Young focuses on public art that relates to it's surroundings - such as these typographic solid oak posts, designed for a library. This "visual forest" contains information gathered from users of the library about their favorite books, places and memories. The posts cover 14 literary subject areas, and are placed accordingly around the library.

You can see more of Young's work at his website.

Resource Wednesday: Google Reader

2011-11-02T11:07:00.000-07:00

(Do you have a resource you'd like to see me post about? Or even a "Hey, what resources are out there that do this thing well?" sort of question? Feel free to comment here, or on our Facebook page. Comments are awesome!)

We'll be continuing to touch on UMF library resources as they come up, but we're also branching out into other tools and resources that make life better, easier, or more fun as we try to make sense of all the amazing information resources out there today.

Reading along:
Today's installment is about Google Reader, a quick and easy way to keep up with blogs.

Blogs, of course, are a way to share content online that includes date-based entries, with the most recent material on top. While short-form approaches (microblogging!) like Facebook and Twitter have caught on, there are still lots of topics that work better with a bit more space.

One of the challenges of blogs has always been that you need to remember to go and read them (or get a reminder some other way, like how our blog auto-posts a "Hey, we have a new post" snippet to our Facebook page.)

Google Reader fixes that. How to get there? http://google.com/reader should take you to the reader front page. If for some reason that doesn't work, try the instructions at the end of this post.

Adding a blog:
Before you can read a blog through Google Reader, you'll need to add a subscription. This is a very simple process. Click the subscription button at the top left of the page:

subscribe button

You can enter a search term, or you can paste the address of a blog you like to read. For example, if you wanted to subscribe to our blog, that you're reading right now, you could type "Browsing room Mantor" or you could paste in http://browsingroom.blogspot.com. Either way, if there's a blog you can subscribe to, you'll either be subscribed (if there's only one blog that fits that search) or be given blog feeds that match that search.

Many blogs also have the option to subscribe right from the blog. The most widely used RSS icon looks like the orange square with white lines below, but you'll see all sorts of other icons out there (usually they'll say RSS or XML or feed, something like that.)

most common RSS icon

Once you click on the feed, you'll be taken to a page where you should have the option to choose Google, then Google Reader, as your way to read. (There may be lots of options, which is why using the subscribe button in Google Reader can be a lot simpler!)

Managing your feeds:
Once you get a few feeds, you might want to organise them! You can divide up your blogs into different categories. To do so, you can either use the Feed Settings menu (in the top center) or the Settings tool, found at the top right of the page. (You can also find the help here.)

help and settings menus

To give you an idea what this might look like, here are my folders for my professional blog reading (I have an account for professional reading, and one for personal reading, because I subscribe to a lot of blogs, but read the two sets differently, and at different times.)

Sorting them like this helps me manage my time: I read the UMF folder first, then work my way down. (The humor folder has my subscriptions to a couple of library-related comic strips.)

example organization : my Reader folders

What it's like to read:
Once you have some new posts to read, your Reader screen will look a little like this, with your blogs and other tools down the sidebar, and posts in the larger right hand side of the screen. As you can see, you can get both text and images, but you don't get all the formatting of the original blog. (In this case, the post is about providing paper handouts for conference sessions, and how he handles that.)

reading in Reader

You can scroll down the blogs page. Sometimes I like to read all the new things, in whatever order they arrived (most recent on the top) so I click on all items in the left sidebar. Usually, though, I prefer to read by topic, so I click on the folder I want, read all the topics in there, and then move to the next one. Whatever works for you is great.

As you read, each item will be marked as read by default, but you can change this in the settings menu we looked at just above. You can also manually mark something as unread, or you can star it, to make it easier to find later. You can also browse in expanded view (where you see the entry) or list view (where you just see the titles of posts.) Lots of choices!

Some blogs will give you the entire text in the reader. Others, you may see a link that says something like "Read more" or "Click here to read more" that takes you to the blog. (People do this for a variety of reasons, but often it's because people are taking their text and using it without permission.) I typically open up the blog posts I want to read in more detail into a tab in my browser, then go through and read them all when I'm done, but there are lots of other ways to do it. Do what works for you.

Other neat tricks:
If you have a smart phone, an iPad, or many other mobile devices, there are apps out there that will allow you to use your Google Reader feed to access content on the go or to format posts in a way you prefer to read. (I use one for my personal blog reading called Reeder which I like a lot, but there are plenty of others.)

There are also tools that let you save webpages or blog posts to be read later on a wide range of devices - I'm currently testing out Instapaper, and expect to write about it here sometime soon (and that works with various of the ereaders, including Kindle).

Got questions?
Again, please ask! I'd be glad to use future editions of our Wednesday blog space to answer your questions about any of the resources we've talked about here.

Finding Reader from your email:
If you've got a UMF email account, you already have access. (And if you don't, you just need a Google account.) In the top menu from your email, go to the More menu (as shown below) and select the Reader option.

This will bring up all of the many and varied Google products - and somewhere on that page, you'll find the option that says "Reader". Click on that, and you'll be on the main Reader page.

Doom and Gloom about Libraries

2011-11-01T09:44:00.000-07:00

Okay. That's it. I've been hearing more and more doomy, gloomy predictions about libraries and books over the past year or so, and I feel like it's gotten to the point that I just have to say my own piece. You might disagree with me. That's okay. I might end up being wrong on this one (I have, actually, been wrong quite a few times in my life), but for better or worse, I need to get this out of me.

Libraries aren't going anywhere. Books aren't going anywhere. End of story.

Note: this isn't to say that libraries and books aren't changing. They are--quite drastically in some respects. But change does not equal disappearance. But I hear people saying things like all books are going to be free, which would make me lose both of my professions. Self-publishing will eradicate the need to pay for books, so why need libraries? Why need paid authors? Free free free!

Hogwash.

First point: libraries are more than books. Libraries are information. The casing of that information may change (scrolls, papyrus, books, ereaders, computers), but the information itself is still there. If librarians are information brokers, and the amount of information is increasing, then why in the world should we be worried about our jobs going anywhere?

Well, one reason is because non-librarians inevitably have this Books=Librarians mindset. And so they see a blow to physical copies of books as a blow to librarians as a profession. It could well be that this mindset will strike a significant blow to librarians for a few years. But I have every confidence that such a blow would be short lived. As soon as everybody's trying to find all the information that they've lost track of, they'll come running back to librarians, hat in hand.

But wait--what about Google? It finds you everything you might possibly need.

Garbage.

Google does a great job of finding broad information about something. It's a great phone book and encyclopedia and almanac. But start tracking what you actually use Google for, and how successful or unsuccessful you are with those searches. One of the biggest flaws of Google is that you need to know an information resource exists, or you might well completely miss an important source of information. Let's say you're interested in children's publishing. Allow me to show how such a search might go.

You don't know a lot about the topic, so you start with "Writing books for kids." First off, let me remind you that most searchers don't go beyond the third result in a Google results page. The top three results get 60% of the clicks. The top result gets more than a third, all by its lonesome. So we'll assume you're a typical researcher--not a dedicated pro (like, say . . . a librarian). The top three results Google returns are all ads paid for by their sponsors. Let's hope you're at least with it enough to know to ignore the ads and go down to actual results. Two are for Amazon books, and one is of questionable merit. (Family-based, clunky website).

You ignore the fantastic underdown.org--because it's the ninth result. Only 1.8% of searches get down that far in the results page. So, since you came up empty, you change your search (assuming you're really dedicated here). "Writing books for children." Underdown.org is now the fourth result (not counting the three additional ads that popped up first). 7.9% of researchers will click that one. And this is assuming you know what you're doing and can adequately distinguish the difference between a good website and a bogus one. (Speaking as an information professional, it ain't always that easy.)

What I mean to say is that you need to do research to find quality sources--even using Google. But most people don't realize this. They'll spend hours and hours searching for something that a subject specialist would know off the top of their head. Hours and hours they could have been doing something else. That's a distinct need, folks. And where there's a need, there's a job.

Librarian's aren't going anywhere.

What about books? Books are going to become free, right? Anyone can publish one. People will refuse to pay for one. Publishers will go under. Agents will fall. Dogs and cats will start playing in the streets together.

If you believe that, I've got a bridge to sell you while you're busy writing your free book.

Again--this isn't to say that books aren't going to change. I'm sure they will. But look at the music industry. It was panicked that the entire world would start pirating music. No one would make any money. Mass hysteria! Has that panned out? Not really. In fact, studies show that music pirates actually spend more money on music than non-pirates. Go figure.

People love music. They'll continue paying to support the thing they love.

Books? People love books. They'll do the same.

Yes, right now I could just hit a publish button and have every piece of writing I've ever done online at once. And many people are doing just that. But the more people who publish all the stuff they've written, the harder it is to find the quality stuff you actually want to read. A lot of work and effort goes in to writing and publishing a book. Rounds of edits. Design experience. Bookkeeping. Marketing. Publishers don't just slap a "for sale" sticker on a book and send it out the door. (At least, not reputable publishers.)

It's certainly possible that for a few years, everything will Seem Grim. The sky might look like it's going to fall. But in the end, people will adapt. Change. Authors, publishers, agents--they might not all do the exact same things they do now in the exact same ways, but that's life.

Anyone who tells you differently--who claims that libraries or books are dying--is probably selling you something. Either they're making money working the conference circuits and trying to make a name for themselves, or they're starting their own publishing venture, or they're trying to drum up business for their own pet project.

Don't listen to the doom and gloom. Worrying about Everything Changing is just plain silly, because in the end . . . everything changes anyway. Worrying doesn't do a blessed thing to fix it. Instead, take all that energy you're devoting to worrying and focus it someplace productive. Figure out what you can do to adapt. If you're an author, keep writing books. If you're a librarian, keep up to date on changes in technology. Know the change is coming, and roll with it.

And that's all the soapbox I've got in me today.

Thoughts?

Mantor Monday

2011-10-31T12:23:00.000-07:00

Friday book post: Feed

2011-10-28T12:36:00.000-07:00

I've been holding off raving about this book, because our copy has been in processing. But it's the weekend before Hallowe'en, and the book has zombies.

(The book is entirely tangential to Hallowe'en: these are science zombies, not magic zombies. But still. Zombies.)

In 2014, two scientific breakthroughs combined to create an infection that - once triggered - causes people to rise from the dead. The Rising, as it's called, changed the face of the world forever.

This book, by Mira Grant (also known as Seanan McGuire, author of the excellent Toby Daye urban fantasy series, musician, and author of other upcoming awesome stuff), is about what happens 20 years after the Rising.

It's about growing up in a world where any contact with possibly infected mammals - people, wildlife, anything larger than a smallish golden retriever - means blood tests, and a wide variety of security precautions. About a world where news - going out into the world - is complicated, and a vast network of bloggers combine to create connections and keep the largely housebound population entertained and informed. You have Irwins who poke zombies with sticks to give everyone a thrill, Newsies who write factual objective journalism, and Fictionals who deal with the scary spaces of the world through stories and poetry. And it's about three young adults getting the gig to travel with a major political campaign.

This book, the first in the trilogy, is about the politics of that political campaign, about family, about principle. And about surviving. (The second book, Deadline is out, and the final book in the trilogy will come out next year. Deadline ends with a serious cliff-hanger, so if you don't like that sort of thing, read Feed now, and wait for the last one to hit print.)

Grant sums it up this way: "The Newsflesh Trilogy is a story about blogging, politics, medical science, espionage, betrayal, the ties that bind, the ties that don't, how George Romero accidentally saved the world, and, of course, zombies. It's thoughtful horror, and horrific science fiction, and I'm very fond of it."

I am not usually a huge zombie fan - but the story and the characters drew me in immediately. (It helps that while there's violence of the 'fighting for survival' kind, it's mostly not immensely gory, and only when it actually advances the story.)

As soon as it's processed, you'll be able to find it on our Discoveries shelf, in the Browsing Room.

When is a bookcase like Willy Wonka's elevator?

2011-10-27T12:28:00.000-07:00

When it's designed by Chrome for Google Books, that's when - a bookcase that moves up, down, and sideways with just a click and a flick.

The designers at Chrome were presented with a challenge: what would a bookcase designed to hold a vast collection of ebooks look like? How could they make it both functional and fun?

The answer is a virtual spinning tower of bookshelves, a seemingly infinite helix containing 3D models of over 10,000 (and growing) titles. Set up more for browsing than searching, books are divided into 28 subjects. Click on the box at the top of the shelf to browse subjects, and when you choose, the shelves swoop to that section. Click on the shelves to spin them, or move up and down the tower of shelves. When you click on a title to select it, the book jumps off the shelf. click again, and the book opens to reveal a synopsis and a "Get this book" button, which takes you to the Google Books interface . (There is a category for free books, if that's what you're looking for, but all others are for sale.)

The developers say this WebGL bookcase works best with the Chrome browser (which I use) and a fast computer, so I had no trouble playing with it. Give it a try here. Here's a little intro video that shows how it works:

Happy browsing!

Thoughts about ebooks

2011-10-27T10:00:00.000-07:00

Ebooks really are the topic of the year: more and more thought about both the immediate practical issues and the larger issues are coming up in the blogosphere.

One of the major conferences for libraries and technology (Internet Librarian) just finished, and one of the attendees, Bobbi Newman, just posted a great round-up of links that came up in discussion. You can check them all out at her blog.

I'm really glad to see an increasing depth in the conversation, not just "More ebooks, yay!". I'm particularly glad that more and more people are digging into issues of ...

licensing
privacy
digital rights management (how you can share books, both with others, and simply within your own household)
and the implications for people who, for whatever reason, cannot or do not wish to buy.

A special shout-out here to author Seanan McGuire's post "Across the digital divide: let's talk about poverty" from last month, which is a powerful call to the benefit of physical, tradeable, shareable books (something that is currently true only in very limited ways with ebooks, if you want to read anything written at all recently.) It's got some fascinating bits in comments, too.

It's not that ebooks are bad - they're not. I (like most people who read) am in general favor of more ways to read more awesome stuff. (And I do read a number of titles in ebook version these days, rather than print.)

But they're not perfect, either.

And the things that are problematic about them (privacy, licensing, and access issues in particular) are going to continue to be complicated until readers, authors, and publishers can push through and sort some of those issues out, in a way that makes them truly accessible and effective for everyone. Until then, being informed about the issues is a great place to start - and those links on Bobbi's page are some of the best explanations out there on what you should know, and why you might care.

A Review of Facebook Timeline

2011-10-25T09:40:00.000-07:00

I just enabled Timeline on my Facebook profile. (How did I get the invite? My web-fu paid off once again, and because I care about my readers, I'll share my trick with you: click here. NOTE: It took longer for the invite to come on my profile than described in the linked article. Days longer. Just be patient. Also note that this just gets you in on the developer release. The general public won't be able to view your timeline until it's available to everyone. For now, just other developers can see it. But if you become a developer by following that link, then you can view other people's timelines. Get it?)

So what is Timeline? It's Facebook's new approach to personal profiles, aiming to present the whole of a person, from birth on. It presents all your activity in an easily accessed chronological format, ranging from events to status updates to pictures to . . . everything else. It lets you retroactively put in events--I tried entering where I moved when, and it all worked flawlessly. You can associate pictures with events, too.

Some people have said this is all too creepy and invasive, and I suppose I can see that--although it doesn't bother me. Only you have access to all the information on your timeline, and you can hide anything you want hidden. Actually, it's a good reminder that what you put on Facebook stops really being yours the moment you put it there. Facebook keeps a copy, and it's got a long memory. The moral of the story (in my opinion) isn't to start getting torches and pitchforks and coming after Facebook--it's to be careful about what you post there in the first place.

So what do I think of Timeline?

I love it. I could easily see myself spending a lot of time putting up pictures and labeling them with the approximate date and place. It takes the concept of a family photo album and brings it to the modern day. When I think about how kids born post-Facebook will basically have all this information already available to them--how they can create it as they live their lives . . . that's sort of mind blowing.

Also mind blowing? The fact that I just joined Facebook on July 30, 2007. In just a little over 4 years, Facebook has ingrained itself into popular culture and consciousness to the point that it feels like it's always been here.

I really like the ability to see all my status updates and postings and friend adds that I've ever done. It's easy as all get out to see what I was doing three years ago today. Very interesting (and this feature is private--it's only available to each user on an individual basis--people can't go to my Facebook page and use it. Only I can. Supposedly.)

In the end, it's a great way to organize what was up to now just a running list of events in a person's life. I think it's exciting, and I hope it gets more widely adopted. I'd love to be able to browse through my friends' lives more easily--or at least through the events they don't mind me browsing.

What say you?

All Hallow's Read

2011-10-20T13:45:00.000-07:00

Neil Gaiman, prolific blogger, Tweeter, and author of a whole bunch of really good books, had a great idea. Hey, he said - just tossing this great idea out there to his readers -how about if we all gave people scary books this year for Halloween? We could call it All Hallow's Read. And then, like a shambling zombie on a search for braaaaaaaiiiiiiiins, Neil's idea sort of took on a life of it's own as people re-Tweeted it and blog-posted it, and generally agreed that this was a fine idea indeed.

Now, simmer down, Neil is not advocating the total replacement of candy with books. Would All Hallow's Read have become instantly popular enough to have it's very own website, if it meant abstaining from candy corn? I think not. And it's a nice little website, too, with free downloads of bookmarks and book tags, and suggested scary books for all ages. It even has a printable version of Poe's The Raven that folds into a mini-book, perfect for spooky gifting.

And if you're in the mood for more spooky fun, visit our good friends over at Devaney, Doak and Garret Booksellers (193 Broadway, Farmington, Maine) on Friday, October 28th. They are hosting the 19th annual Late Afternoon of Terror.

Bring your favorite spine-shivery tale to read aloud or perform - or just come to watch and listen...if you dare. The fun starts at 6:00pm.

Resource Wednesday: Mobile EBSCO

2011-10-19T11:31:00.000-07:00

A quick question: Today's resource is a mobile app for the EBSCO database products.

We're looking at how much interest there is in other kinds of mobile apps, including whether it's worth investigating, say, a mobile catalog interface for our catalog. Our current stats show that most people don't use mobile devices to look at our catalog or webpages. If you'd be interested in something like this, drop us a note (in the comments or on our Facebook wall) letting us know what kind of device(s) you use, and what you'd find especially useful.

Let's set the scene: So, you're walking down the street, and you get an urge to look up that article for your research paper. You pull out your smart phone (or your iPad, or whatever other portable device) and head straight to the EBSCO databases, and settle down to read.

Sound unlikely? Actually, it's quite easy. EBSCO, one of the big database providers (and from whom we get a wide range of databases) has a nicely designed mobile app that does just that. Once you set it up and authenticate your account, you can do searches in most of the databases EBSCO provides to UMF wherever you are.

[Here's a secret: part of me thinks that looking stuff up in databases from my phone is sort of silly, even though I love my phone for all sorts of other information seeking geekiness. But part of me thinks it's incredibly awesome to be living in the future.]

What does it look like? Let me show you some shots from the iPhone version. (Since I only have the iPhone, I haven't had a chance to look at other versions, but this should give you an idea. If anyone with other devices - Android smartphones, or whatever, feel free to let me know, and I'd be glad to post a followup.)

initial screen: EBSCO mobile iPhone app

Once you install the application (more about that below), this is the first screen you'll see. From here, you can see recent searches, access saved searches or articles, and get help.

The settings tool will let you select specific databases to search (that's up above what you can see in this image), and adjust some other preferences, like searching for full text articles, peer reviewed articles, or limiting the publication date. You don't have as many choices as you do using a web browser, but you have quite a few.

Try a search: Here, I've tried a search on "mountain lion". You can see there's a number of different results (over 3,000!), and I can sort by relevance or date.

See that Refine button in the top left? If I touch that, I'll get a bunch of options to refine my search. I can limit it to specific subject headings (as shown below) or journals. Touch Ok and I've got a limited set of results.

Reading: If I click into a particular article, I'll either see whatever information is available about it. If that's an abstract, I'll see the abstract and a button to see if full text is available. If a PDF is available, I have a few more options - I can view the text of the article, download the PDF, or email the abstract (or PDF, if I've already loaded it) to myself.

So, how do you get this tool? First of all, you need to have a device it'll work on. Supported devices include

iPhone
iPad
iPod touch
BlackBerry
Android Smartphones
Windows Smartphones
Dell Axim
Palm
Pocket PC

Wander over to the EBSCO mobile access page, and click on the button for your device.

It will bring up a window on screen giving you additional information. For non-Apple products, it will direct you to a FAQ page with instructions.

For iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches, it will direct you to click the link at the bottom of any of the EBSCO database pages. If you click that link, you'll be prompted for an email address. EBSCO will then send an email with a link (for Apple products) to the app store, followed by an authentication link. Copy and paste that into the browser on your device, and it'll set you up with all the same access you'd have had from a computer on campus. Pretty slick!

Try it out, and let us know how it goes!

Library Technology: Integrated Library Systems

2011-10-18T11:10:00.000-07:00

It's a sad fact that when it comes to the tech realm, library software often lags behind the rest of technology land. This isn't because librarians are resistant to technology (some are), but for a couple of other less-fixable ones. Today's case in point? Integrated Library Systems.

What in the world is that, you ask? In a nutshell, it's the software program libraries use to keep track of books in the library. After all, you can't just get a book and stick it on a bookshelf. You need to know where that book is. You need to keep records for when it was ordered and from whom. Is it cataloged? Processed? On the shelf? Which shelf? Checked out to someone? Who? Overdue? The list goes on and on. An ILS corrals all that information into one place, where multiple librarians can access it at the same time. An ILS also provides the interface for users to access all that information: you know it as the library catalog.

Ideally, it would be easy to use, capitalizing on all of the trends of information technology and design in the past few years. In practice, this breaks down. The first big obstacle is this little thing called a budget. Libraries aren't exactly exploding with offers of funding these days, you know. So they have to choose where to spend those precious budget dollars. Which is better--to have a great ILS program that lets you find and keep track of books easily (but not have any books to find, since you couldn't afford to buy any after you got your shiny new ILS program), or have plenty of great books (but have a beast of a time keeping track of them, because your ILS program is old and clunky)?

The bottom line for most libraries is that the good quality materials have to come first. I'm not saying we ignore the good software, but buying a new ILS isn't as cheap as going to the store and getting a copy of Microsoft Office. We're talking potentially six figures--maybe more. So once a library has invested in a particular ILS, it's going to have to do for quite sometime. Upgrades are expensive, too. (Not to mention potential problems in the upgrade.)

Even if libraries could afford it, let's be honest--the companies creating the various ILS programs also have their share of budget woes. Libraries are getting closed down, which means fewer potential customers, which means less profits, which means it's more difficult to make a shiny new ILS, which means library tech falls behind the times, which means people think librarians aren't "with it," from a tech standpoint. And the cycle continues.

There's no real solution to this problem. (Aside from hoping an anonymous donor sends you bags of cash in the near future.) I just wanted to give you an idea of the problems libraries face from a tech standpoint, and why some of the technology in a library may seem to lag behind the rest of the world at times. (Hint: we know it does. We wish we could fix it, too.)

Any questions?

Goodbye, Garden.

2011-10-17T08:18:00.000-07:00

Like many gardeners in Maine, we said goodbye to our vegetable garden last weekend. Frost had blackened the tomato vines and the basil, and the kale had been harvested down to skinny purple spines. It's a bittersweet thing for gardeners: this autumn goodbye. The plants are tired, the gardeners are tired, it's time to put the garden to bed. Or, in this case, it's time to remove the summer annuals, and plant the tulip bulbs for a vibrant spring show.

It helps to know that the garden was a big success, and that the campus community really seemed to appreciate it - we had so many positive comments all summer long. In fact, so many people have asked us to plant another next year, we've decided to do a veggie garden encore next spring.

In late May, when the tulips have faded, they'll make way for the flowers and veggies of summer. It's the way of things.
Goodbye, garden. For now.

Review: Devil in the White City

2011-10-14T10:59:00.000-07:00

Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson is a fascinating book. It's one part true crime, one part architecture, two parts biography, and one part cultural history.

(I should note here that UMF doesn't own a physical copy - though we'd be glad to get one for you through request from MaineCat - but we do have access to an ebook version - click on the Ebrary Subscription link on that page.)

The events of Devil in the White City take place before and during the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, a massive undertaking by the city (and the country) to display the best of American ingenuity, creative thought, and all sorts of other things. Well-known architect, Danial Burnham was working on plans to display Chicago's space for the Fair to its full advantage.

At the same time, a serial murderer was setting up in the city. H. H. Holmes (as he was known) acquired property in Chicago, designing and building a hotel that was both business and deathtrap. Over the course of the Fair, he killed a large number of people, finally to be caught

What makes this book fascinating is the interweaving of the two stories: creation and imagination on one hand, death and misery on the other. Larson does an amazing job wrapping the two together, and putting them in the larger context of 1890s Chicago. Larson is also thoughtful about the more graphic details he includes, given the subject matter.

Walk tall and carry a big stick. (A walking stick, that is)

2011-10-13T10:52:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd use today's blog post to feature the Grand Prize that will be raffled off to participants in this year's On Our Minds programming.

So here, without further ado, is What's In It For You:

A hand-carved cedar walking stick, generously donated by Warren Bryant, of Take a Hike Walking Sticks.

An avid outdoorsman, Warren harvests his White Cedar in the Maine woods. Each stick is hand peeled and sanded, then charmingly carved and hand-painted with whimsical deer, moose, and bears. Animal tracks and bees are other motifs often used in Warren's carvings. Smooth as silk and incredibly light - yet strong - the sticks all come with a leather wrist thong. Custom sticks can be embellished with teeth, claws, or feathers.

You can see our Grand Prize walking stick in the Mantor Library lobby - it's being featured in the Virtual Appalachian Trail display.

How can you win this wonderful piece of functional folk art? Glad you asked. You can:

- Like us on Facebook. (If you haven't already, what are you waiting for??)

- Post how many miles you have walked on our Facebook page Virtual Appalachian Trail. You can post daily, or give us weekly or monthly cumulative totals. For your initial post, and every 10 miles you log after that, your name is entered in the drawing.

- Come to one of our On Our Minds events. Notices of upcoming events are always posted in the library and around campus, as well as in regular Mantor Monday blog posts here, on our Facebook page, and on Twitter. They are also listed here.

So come on, play along; you could be the lucky winner!

Resource Wednesday: Literary Resource Center

2011-10-12T11:53:00.000-07:00

Looking for literary information? One of the recent additions to our database list is the source for you! The Literary Reference Center (access on-site or through UMF library card login)

The Literary Reference Center has a wide range of information about thousands of authors and their works, with full-text articles from reference books, other titles, and literary journals. You can find plot summaries, overviews, literary criticism, author biographies, book reviews, poems, short stories, author interviews, and classic texts!

It also includes access to

Merriam Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature
Continuum Encyclopedia of American Literature
Continuum Encyclopedia of British Literature
Continuum Encyclopedia of Children's Literature
The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics
Beacham's Research Guide to Biography and Criticism (six volumes)
The Oxford Illustrated History of English Literature
The Columbia Companion to the 20th Century American Short Story,
all of MagillOnLiterature Plus™
and much more.

As with other EBSCO databases, you can limit your searches in a variety of ways, using the sidebar at the left. As you can see here, one of the ways you can limit is by the type of source - so you can look just for plot summaries, or reviews, or whatever else.

What's great about this database though, is the initial search options. The search page gives you the chance to limit by an author's cultural identity (so you can look for African American authors, or Native American ones, Gay and Lesbian authors, and much more.) This option is halfway down on the left.

On the right side, you have a number of further options. You can enter a literary author's name, search for female or male authors, national identity - or authors in a given lifespan.

Tip: If you want to search by national identity, enter the name of the country (France, Wales, Egypt) rather than an adjective describing people from that place (French, Welsh, Egyptian).

Finally, you can also search by a literary character, either by name (try the last name or full name), locale (place name), or by the type of work.

Enjoy, and have fun with all those amazing literary people, places, and creators!

Dropbox: The Online File Storage Site You Should Be Using

2011-10-11T09:39:00.000-07:00

Like many of you, I hadn't made the plunge into online storage. I'd heard about it, of course--that thing where you can sign up with a company and they provide you with some space online for free, letting you store files there. And if you paid them money, they'd let you store even *more* files there. But I have a couple of Gmail accounts, and I get free storage there. If I really needed to store something online, I could just email it to myself, or upload it to Google Docs, and I'd be able to get it when I wanted it.

Why would I want or need anything else?

Well, a friend invited me to Dropbox, and my eyes have been opened. Dropbox is an ideal tool for sharing files between computers (whether with yourself or collaborating on a project with a friend or colleague), as well as for automatically backing up important files.

Allow me to explain.

When you sign up with Dropbox, they give you 2GB of storage space (plus 250MB more if you sign up using the helpful link above--aren't I nice?). You install the Dropbox program on your computer, and then it acts just like a typical folder. You can save files there, copy them there, change them there--it all happens just as if you were saving and altering your files normally. The trick is that when you make those changes, Dropbox keeps a current copy of everything in your Dropbox file--and they stick it online where you can access it from anywhere. So if you write a big long paper on your laptop, but then you want to work on it some more at school (and you don't have your laptop with you), you just log on to Dropbox and are off and running.

What's great is that it does all of this automatically. You don't have to remind yourself to make a backup. Once you have Dropbox working, it runs by itself. Beautiful.

It does wonders if you're collaborating on a project with someone else and want to share files. Yes, you could use Google Docs (which is a great collaboration tool). But what if you want to view a bunch of pictures, or have access to a number of files? You can share a Dropbox folder. Now, anything one person puts in is seen by everyone else who shares the folder. You're even notified when something changes or is added. Super convenient, super easy.

Dropbox even has apps for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Blackberry--so you can work on a document on your computer, then go and access it on your iPad. No need to email it anywhere or save it specially. It just works.

Anyway, I just thought I'd take a moment to let you all know about the wonders of online file storage. The fact that this is all free is mind blowing to me. I've been using it for a good half year or so now, and I haven't been plagued by spam--I haven't had a single speed bump.

What about you? Have you used a program like this before? Any thoughts or suggestions? Speak up!

Book Review Friday: Stiff

2011-10-07T11:26:00.000-07:00

I was enthusing about Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers (by Mary Roach) to a co-worker last night, and realised it'd be a great book to talk about here.

First, a little background. Mary Roach's gift as an author is to investigate complicated topics with a combination of humor, thoughtfulness, and curiosity that makes for a wonderfully readable and informative book. Makes sense, when you realise that she's tackled what happens to donated cadaver bodies after death, sexual physiology, the practical complications of spaceflight, and the question of ghosts, the afterlife, and things like near-death experiences.

What I like most about her books, really, is that sense of curiosity - of being willing to ask questions and explore topics that are so often not talked about in our society. I learn something new from reading her books in every chapter. The other thing I like is how she goes and talks to people, rather than just theorising from her own experience, or synthesising reading. Those things are good, don't get me wrong - but it's even more interesting to see her interactions with passionate ghost hunters, mediums, and scientists.

Stiff is her first book. In it, she explores how plastic surgeons and reconstructive surgeons use cadavers to learn critical skills, a great deal about forensics, crash-testing cars, testing how to survive minefield explosions, and the question of what happens at the moment of death. While that sounds deeply gruesome to many people, she handles the topic with a decided amount of delicacy. Her writing leaves you aware of the people involved in a compassionate way, while also being clear about the science and pragmatic results of the research. It's an unlikely but very readable and informative combination.

Highly recommended - and I recommend her other titles, as well, though you'll need to request them from other libraries.

Taking It To The Street

2011-10-06T07:27:00.000-07:00

"There's something happening here

What it is, ain't exactly clear...."

It may be 44 years old, but Buffalo Springfield's iconic protest song could have been written about the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon. Here's what I find truly amazing: that along with food and rudimentary shelter, one of the first things to be organized in the week of September 17 - the very beginning of Occupied Wall Street - was a library.

A real library, with real books.

Members of the most digitally versed, technologically advanced, media savvy generation in the history of the world came together to make their voices be heard, and they made a library.

It started out in cardboard boxes. Later, donations of plastic bins and tarps better protected the collection from the elements. A call went out for librarians to volunteer their services to the People's Library, as it has been named, and the call was answered.

"Information is liberation. Offering people the opportunity to explore the world themselves through the written word is why I became a librarian. Connecting readers to writers is what I do. Doing that in the heart of what is rapidly growing into the strongest mass social movement since the 1960's is an experience I will always treasure." - Mandy, volunteer librarian.

The library continues to grow, and the collection is being cataloged. Borrowing is free, trading is encouraged, and if a patron would like to keep a book, that's fine: the librarians just ask to be notified so that they can remove the book from the catalog.

The People's Library has it's own website and Facebook page. Today, the Progressive Librarians Guild issued a statement in support of the initiative that reads, in part:

"We applaud the commitment and creativity being shown in providing a space for the articulation of opposition to the whole apparatus of the one-sided class war against workers, unions, the poor, immigrants, minorities, people of color, women, students and other sectors which make up the vast majority of Americans. We applaud the movement’s resistance to the greed,,injustice and inequality which is corroding the fabric of American society and its desire to imagine and help build a better future ,starting right now , for all Americans, by freeing ourselves from the destructive grip of unaccountable elites , insatiable profiteers and ruthless and cynical corporate plunderers.

We note that the Occupy Wall Street community has seen the need to create a “library” as part of its essential infrastructure even under the very difficult conditions under which the occupation has to operate in the streets. We call upon members of the Progressive Librarians Guild and all librarians of conscience to assist the movement with resources and technical aid. Please support the Occupation movement, document its development and report back to the library community to encourage greater understanding and wider support among our colleagues and in our communities."

Stop, hey, what's that sound?

It's the sound of pages turning in Liberty Park.

Donations of reading material for the People's Library can be sent to:

The UPS store

Re: Occupy Wall Street

Attn: The People's Library

118A Fulton St. #205

New York, NY 10038

Resource Wednesday: Academic Search Complete

2011-10-05T08:35:00.000-07:00

Welcome to today's installment of Resource Wednesday, when we're going to look at Academic Search Complete, a great start for general database searches.

Why is it a great place to start?
Academic Search Complete includes more than 8,000 full-text periodicals (7,500 of which are peer-reviewed, great for your academic projects). It also indexes and provides abstracts for more than 13,200 other publications. And it does that while covering many different academic areas - everything from anthropology to humanities to science to zoology.

While you might want to use a more tightly focused database for higher level classes or focused research, Academic Search Complete is a great place to start for more general searches, or while you're trying to get a feeling for a particular topic or area of interest.

Getting there:
You can get to Academic Search Complete in a couple of ways. One of the easiest is to go to the Mantor Library Homepage, click on the Databases tab (shown below) and select Academic Search Complete from the dropbox that says "Select a Commonly Used Database". You can also browse our A to Z listing (the link on the left), or the CourseGuide for your class may include a link.

Using the database:
Your inital screen will look like this at the top. (If you can't see an image clearly, click on it to load just the image at a larger size.) There are lots of options, so let's look at them group by group.

In the top left, you can enter search terms. Just to the right, you can choose to limit a search term to a particular field - so you could enter the author's last name, and only search on the author field, or a word you know is in the title of the article.

You can also choose how you search. Boolean/phrase means you can either use a combination of AND, OR, or NOT terms, or you can enter a phrase. SmartText searching means you can copy and paste text (up to about 5000 characters). You can learn more about all of these options in the help files.

A final set of options lets you determine what kind of results you get back. You can limit to full text articles, scholarly journals, a particular publication, a particular kind of document (like an article, review, or more.) You can also limit to a particular language, or when the article was published.

Refining your results:

Once you run your search, you'll end up with a list of results down the right side, and a left sidebar that has all sorts of useful tools.

The top of the sidebar (shown here on the left) tells you how many results you have. You can then refine your results by clicking the boxes to limit to full text, or scholarly journals, or articles with references.

I really like the sliding bar that lets you limit the date range (and see very clearly how old the oldest articles in your search are. And of course, you can limit to a particular type of source.

Below that, you have another neat feature. Often, when we're new to a subject, we're not sure what the best terms are. The Thesaurus Term and Subject areas of the sidebar help you figure that out. (If they're not visible, click the little arrow to the left of the header.)

Once you get sort of close to the right topic, you can use these headings to narrow things down, or to take your search in a more focused direction.

Either way, once you find an article you're interested in, click on the title of the article to go to the page with details about it.

Working with an article:
Now that you've found your article, you can do all sorts of things with it.

The left sidebar will have a link to the full text version if there is one. You can click on it to read the article. (If there isn't a full text version, you can find out more in steps 5 and 6 of our Finding Articles CourseGuide - and I'll talk more about that next week, too.)

You can also click on any of the subject headings to search on that heading. And on the right sidebar, there are all sorts of tools to help you save the article. You can send it to your email, save it, export it to RefWorks, and much more. (You can find more about exporting in our RefWorks CourseGuide - follow the directions for EBSCO for the Academic Search Complete database.)

Fresh Off the Press: Apple Announcement

2011-10-04T11:51:00.000-07:00

Apple had a big To Do over in California today to announce a heap of different things. As Apple is wont to do, it went on for quite a long time, and while some significant new pieces of hardware and info were introduced, the proceedings were much like an American Idol results show: lots of hype for 5 minutes of actual information. But I followed it so that you don't have to. Aren't I nice?

The highlights?

iOS 5 will be released a week from today. This lets enhances iPads and iPhones will all sorts of features, including the ability to sync your device without hooking it up to a computer. (Nice.) There are also camera enhancements, message tweaks, Twitter integrations--just a lot of nice extras. And it's free--always a plus.
iCloud--Apple's free(!) online storage space for iOS users. Your photos, documents, apps, music--all available anywhere you have an internet connection. For an additional small fee, you can access all your music, not just the stuff you downloaded from Apple. ($25/year--available by the end of October in the US.) This has the potential to be a real game changer. 5GB free, more for extra fee.
Find My Friends--A new feature that lets you broadcast your location out to people you've approved to be able to view it. Now all your stalkers can find you that much more easily. Thanks, Apple!
A new iPod Nano--Complete with updates and new features, like the ability to track steps and fitness right out of the box. Available today.
New iPod Touch--Now available in white. (Seriously--what's up with the obsession with white?)
iPhone 4S--Up to seven times as fast, longer battery life, iOS 5 and iCloud compatible. GSM and CDMA (meaning you can use it internationally, as well). Better phone (8MP, better light sensor). 1080p video recording. $200 for a 16GB phone. Launches in 10 days.
Siri--The ability on an iPhone to use voice recognition with natural language. Seems like it could be pretty cool, though I'll have to see it in action before I decide for sure. Voice recognition has been spotty in the past. I'll admit this looks like it has a lot of potential, however. Set up appointments, reply to messages, look up information--all hands free. But demos can look awesome and fizzle in practice. Just sayin' . . . Full voice dictation also available with this.
Vanilla iPhone 4 is now $100. iPhone 3GS is now free (with contract).

The impact of all this? Apple continues its domination in the world of mobile computing. More and more, whatever Apple does or doesn't do makes a huge impact on what the world does or doesn't do. I don't mean to overstate my case here, but when you look at sheer numbers and trends in technology, much of what goes on these days really comes back to Apple, whether as a response to Apple or a move by Apple itself. That's a lot of influence for one company to have.

Then again, in today's world of technology, the company that's on top of the pack one moment quickly finds itself slipping down. But for now, at least, Apple seems to be doing what it needs to to stay at the top.

Thoughts?

Mantor Monday

2011-10-03T08:55:00.000-07:00

On Our Minds "The Great Outdoors" Event

Wednesday October 5, 7:00 pm

Mantor Library Browsing Room:

"Pheobe & Hackmatack's Excellent Adventure"

Wonder what it would be like to hike the Appalachian Trail? Join us for an informal chat with Amy Graham and Bill Haslam, local residents and Appalachian Trail thru-hikers. Pheobe and Hackmatack (trail names adopted for the trip) will be sharing their experiences and answering questions about hiking the trail. Chocolate chip cookies will be provided!

It's Banned Book Week

2011-09-29T14:30:00.000-07:00

"Censorship is telling a man he can't have steak just because a baby can't chew it." - Mark Twain

Go forth and read something shocking.

(image via Libraryland)

Resource Wednesday: borrow for your Kindle

2011-09-28T05:26:00.001-07:00

The big news of late last week was the announcement from Overdrive (the company who handles ebook lending for most libraries who offer it, including Mantor Library and Farmington Public) that they'd launched the ability to borrow books in Kindle format.

So, if you have a Kindle - or a Kindle reader app for your other devices - you just got access to a bunch more great things to read. (And there are reader apps for pretty much every major device out there.)

How does it work?
1) Go to the Maine InfoNet Download Library page. (You can also browse there from our databases page.)

2) Find a book you'd like to read. You can search for a particular title, browse by genre or subject (using the lists in the left sidebar). You can also browse from the entire list of subjects. And you can limit just to Kindle titles by clicking the "Now Available: Library eBooks for Kindle" image in the left sidebar.

If you'd like a book right now, once you select a genre, you can limit to books currently available (as opposed to those where you'd have to wait) by checking the box right under the search box that says "only show titles with copies available", and click the search button again.

3) When you've found your Kindle ebook you'd like to read, click on the add to cart link. You'll get taken to a page where you see a list of any books you've selected and information about the loan period. (You have 45 minutes to complete the checkout process: after that, the book is automatically returned to be available for other people.)

4) Check out the book by entering your barcode.

5) Click the Get for Kindle button. This will open the Amazon website (you may need to log in if you aren't already).

6) Select your Kindle device or reading app, click the Get library book button. Then sync your device or app, and the book should appear on your reader.

Important details!
1) You can only get books using Wi-Fi or USB connections - Kindle for Libraries does not work over the Kindle 3G network. If your Kindle doesn't have Wi-Fi, or you're not near a Wi-Fi connection, read Amazon's instruction transferring by USB.

2) At the end of the loan period, the title will be automatically returned, and you'll need to go through the checkout process again.

3) If you can't find the title, check your archived items area.

4) Just as with physical books, books that are checked out won't be available for an immediate loan - this is part of the licensing process. You can place a hold, and you'll get an email when the book is available.

5) The loan period is set by the library consortium we're a part of - we don't have individual control over the length of the loan.

(Got other questions? Feel free to ask them in the comments, and we'll be glad to help find the answers.)

Want more help?

Overdrive created a video guide to the process (now with closed captioning if you click through to watch it on YouTube)
Here's a great guide with screenshots of each step of the process from the Essex Public Library in Essex, CT.
And here's another photo guide, from Brier Dudley at the Seattle Times.

Facebook's Vision of the Future

2011-09-27T10:40:00.000-07:00

Unless you've been hiding under a rock (or you're not on Facebook, which some people think is tantamount to the same thing), you've noticed that Facebook has changed in the past week. It's made some fairly radical changes (and even more are in store), moving from a fairly static page that updated when you told it to into a free flowing page that seems to update at will (and randomly).

I personally love the new direction, but abhor the lack of organization. (Maybe that's the librarian in me coming out.) To me, it would be fairly straightforward to fix: let the users determine who they want to have the most updates from and how. And bring some method to the madness. Before, I could know with a fair amount of certainty that I was seeing all the updates from my friends that I wanted to see, since I could view all the updates in chronological order. But Facebook has now taken that chronological order and removed the "logical" part of it. Updates are scattered over the page in four different areas: recent stories, top stories, other recent stories, and the latest updates. To make things even more confusing, it's now showing me practically all the activities of all of my friends.

Now, I'm not one of the people heading for the pitchforks and torches. I'm willing to give Facebook some time to iron this out, and in their defense, it's gotten a bit better over the past few days. It's hard to get such a big change right all at once. (And since I don't pay anything for Facebook, I can't very well demand better service. What's the alternative? Google+? Please. That place is still snoresville every time I remember that I really ought to poke my nose in to see if anyone's actually using it yet.)

One of the reasons Twitter's interface works so well is that as a user I have control and knowledge over what exactly I'm looking at. I get a chronological feed of Tweets from the people I follow, and Twitter lets me know when I have new Tweets waiting. I click a button, and it's clear what's new and what's not. Easy. Simple. Nice. If I want to have smaller groups of friends I follow, I can easily set up lists to corral similar friends into categories of my choosing, and then the updates of those lists work the same way as the rest of the site. So it's really customizable, but also simple.

So why isn't Facebook like that?

Well, some of it might be due to the vision that Facebook has of the future. I think they've been doing a crappy job of explaining it, so allow me to give it a whirl. Picture a world where you can hang out with your friends regardless of where you live. If I want to sit in my living room in Maine and play board games with my buddies in Utah while listening to the same music or watching a TV show together, I can. I can go online and see someone's there waiting for me, and I can be chatting with them, and channel surfing at the same time, each of us making snarky remarks on what we're watching--together. At the same time.

I want that future.

Facebook wants it, too. Of course, I want it because it's cool, and Facebook wants it because it would make a lot of money off the process. That's a key difference, and it has to be noted. But still, if I can get that future, and it comes via Facebook, I'm okay with that.

But how do we get from here to there?

Facebook's approach right now is to jam it down our throats, whether we want it or not. It's the brute force method. It has almost a billion members, and Zuckerberg's decided to go all in on that vision, with Facebook leading the way on a road paved with the gold earned from data mining its user base. Listen to a song on Spotify? Your friends will know. Watch a movie on Netflix? Your friends will know. Check out a story on CNN? Your friends will know.

Um . . . can we say "creepy"? Maybe I don't want you all knowing that I watched 15 episodes of Strawberry Shortcake yesterday. Or that I have a penchant for listening to Eminem when I think no one's watching. Or that I habitually read ever news article about goat cheese. (Only one of those statements is true, by the way.) Why doesn't Facebook just let me post updates when I . . . you know . . . actually want people to read those updates? (You can stop Facebook from tracking your every internet step, BTW. Here's how.)

I think it's because Facebook's worried it'll be sort of like Google+ It's an excellent idea, but until people start actually using it, then what's the point? In my vision of the future, it all falls apart if every time I go to hang out with my friends, no one's there. Not because none of us are there, but because none of us are actively sharing and saying "I'm here!"

Catch-22. Chicken and the egg. Whatever you want to call it, it's a problem, but it's only a problem getting there. If we're in a spot where we all know that everyone can share whatever he or she wants whenever he or she wants, then we get to a point where enough people are using that service (online, ready to hang) that when YOU are ready to hang, you can go and find some of your friends who want to hang, too.

Make sense?

And this is ignoring other nasty little roadblocks between me and my vision of the future. Roadblocks like copyright law that's dated and a legal system that can't keep up with how it pays itself, let alone how to handle the ever shifting realm of technology.

And have you heard about Facebook's next step in its plan: the timeline? Picture a profile page that represents all your actions, from birth to death. Needless to say, there are some concerns about this change, too. I've already signed up for the beta. Hopefully my profile page gets it soon, and I can evaluate it.

Because like it or not, the future is here. The rate of change is increasing all the time. Gone are the days when you can lean back and feel comfortable that you're On Top of Things for the next decade or so. Life as we know it will be different a year from now, and drastically different in five years, and unimaginable in a decade. I really believe this, and I think history backs me up.

This makes me excited, even though I also understand why it scares some people (or even terrifies them). What do you think? Chime in!

Mantor Monday

2011-09-26T14:26:00.000-07:00

So....here I am, just sitting around the old Facebook Page, waiting for people to come along and help us rack up some miles on our Virtual Appalachian Trail. You know about our trail, don't you? No? Let me fill you in: we're reading a book about the Appalachian Trail for On Our Minds this year. We thought it would be fun if we all, as a campus and as a Facebook community, logged all the miles we walk every day, and see if we could get anywhere close to the 2181 miles of the actual Maine to Georgia trail.

So far?

We've barely crept across campus.

Maybe part of the problem is, you just don't know how far you walk every day. I can help with that, and it won't even involve buying a pricey pedometer. I'm going to teach you how use the Google Distance Measuring Tool, for FREE.

Go to Google Maps. Click the little gear image up in the upper right corner. Choose map labs. Then enable the Distance Measurement Tool. (Don't forget to click the "save changes" button.)

Next, do a Google Maps search for the area you'll be walking in. There will be a little blue ruler icon in the very bottom left corner of the map. Click on it, then double click on the starting point of your walk. Drag your "path" along the map, double clicking wherever you need to change directions.

That's it, that's all there is to it. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Oh, and then you take that distance measurement right on over to Facebook, and tell us how far you walked. And we will say "Yay, you." I promise.

Finding your way (Resource Wednesday)

2011-09-21T10:22:00.000-07:00

One of the most common comments we've heard in the past few weeks is how confusing the building is. Just to complicate things, we've been moving items around, so some items are in different places than they were last spring. (But we think the new locations will make things a lot easier.)

Why is it like this? Well, the library's made up of two different buildings that were connected. One side has the book basement, first floor, and second floor. The other side has the first floor, mezzanine, and third floor (and a tiny bit of second floor that's mostly library staff space). And then there are six staircases.

To help you out, we've updated our website. If you take a look at our How To Find Your Way Around page, you'll see links to current maps of each floor, information about what you can find in each location, and much more.

Here's a few more highlights:

No staircase goes to all floors - but the elevator does. So, if you get totally lost, the elevator can be a really good solution. (The one place the elevator didn't go, the former periodicals basement, is now staff space.)

We've condensed our shelving so it's easier to find things:

The Book Basement has books with call numbers beginning P to Z
The First floor has the Access Services desk, computers, reference, and periodicals (both current and older copies).
The Mezzanine has our media collection.
The Second floor has books with call numbers A to N and some staff space.
The Third floor has the Juvenile and Young Adult collection, the Peter Mills Electronic Classroom, and another set of staff offices.

Again, the How to Find Your Way Around page has a lot more information, like what kinds of study spaces, computers, and other resources you can find where.

We have motion-sensitive lights like a lot of the rest of the campus: If you're working (especially in the book basement) and the lights go out, wave your arms or move a step or two. (Down there, we have sensors at the end of each row, to help with this.)

When all else fails: Come ask at the main desk (Access Services) that's on the right as you first enter the library. The friendly people there can point you in the right direction. The Library Information Services staff (on the third floor) are also glad to help if you're upstairs.

Dear Netflix

2011-09-20T09:43:00.000-07:00

Netflix. That wonderful little service with the red envelopes and the online streaming. That poster child of pop culture distribution goodness.

My how you've fallen.

Back in July, you were riding high. Your stocks were selling for $300/share. You were the shining beacon of how a company should operate. You kept coming up with new ways to please your customers and keep them happy. You had a tremendous reputation for Bang for Your Buck quality. Streaming. DVDs. Blurays. All in one. And for a while, you could do no wrong.

Then you decided to double your rates, offering nothing more for that price increase than a generalized "there'll be more good offerings coming later." Customers were furious, and rightfully so. (Granted, I understand why you hiked the prices, and I understand why it was necessary. But as far as a price increase goes, you're now the poster child for how *not* to roll one out--especially how not to roll such a large one out.) There were threats of canceled subscriptions. You said it would all be okay. You'd taken that into account.

Then 1 million more people canceled than you were anticipating.

Clearly the writing was on the wall. People were unhappy, and you'd do something to fix that. You did something all right. You went and split up DVD by mail and streaming offerings. And you said that you were doing that in order to rectify the previous mistake? How does this help? Your stocks are down to $130/share as of this instant. You've sunk 57% in two months. Way to go.

So . . . where do you go from here?

First, some background for your (former) customers. Streaming is the future. I get that. More and more people are going to be moving away from DVDs as their delivery choice for media. I know I stream much more than I watch on DVD or Bluray. It's more convenient. And as more people stream, the cost for those precious streaming licenses goes up. So you need to get money to get those licenses. It's a Catch-22. I'm sympathetic.

But remember this: your competitors (Apple, Google, etc.) have wallets. Deep wallets. Wallets so big, they boggle the mind. You can't compete with those wallets. If streaming rights go to the highest bidder, and those companies feel like bidding, you lose. The end.

But what am I saying? You have to be aware of this. Maybe that's why you're doing what you're doing. The best scenario I can see for consumers right now is that you're prettying yourself for an acquisition by Google or Apple. They swoop in and get your great (or formerly great) brand, and you get their big wallets. We the movie watchers get better streaming deals, and everyone is happy. Those are the rumors, at least.

I hope they're right. I really want to like you, Netflix. You've been good to me in the past. Help me help you. :-)

Mantor Monday

2011-09-19T07:37:00.000-07:00

We're kicking off a new season of programming for our 2011-12 "On Our Minds" reading program this week. On Wednesday, Sept. 21, Associate Professor of Geology Doug Reusch will be giving a talk and slideshow entitled "A Voyage Through the Rocks: Discovering the Iapetus Ocean in the Appalachians." If you're interested in learning how New England got it's rocky spine, come hear Doug talk about the birth of the Appalachians in Room C-123, Olsen Student Center, at 11:45.

Multiple copies of the 2011-12 On Our Minds book selection, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering American on the Appalachian Trail, by Bill Bryson, are available in the Mantor Library lobby.

(Image of Katahdin via Maine.gov)

Friday Review : Shadow Divers

2011-09-16T10:26:00.000-07:00

What do you get when you combine dangerous exploration, a historical mystery, and a lot of research? One really fascinating book.

The full title is: Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II, and it's by Robert Kurson.

What it's about is a little more complicated.

In 1991, two deep-sea divers found a mysterious wreck 230 feet below the surface (right around the limits of technical deep-sea diving at the time.)

The mystery comes in trying to figure out what the wreck is - and more importantly, what it's doing there. Identifying it in general terms was pretty easy - it's a World War II U-Boat. But there's a catch: so far as the existing records said, no U-Boat should have sunk in that location.

The book tells the story of both the diving investigation (along with the risks of doing very deep dives and figuring out what combination of gases in the dive tanks worked reliably) and of the research once they'd found identifying information on the wreck, which culminates in them identifying some of the German sailors lost on the wreck and speaking with their surviving families. It's a great example, for this reason, of how the research and learning we do connects with real people and their hopes, dreams, and tragedies.

The book has come under some criticism for depiction of various events, but despite that remains an interesting read, with some fascinating side trips into related topics. Well worth a read by anyone interested in high-risk sports, the ocean, WWII history, or the joys of research.

Mysterious Book Art

2011-09-15T08:45:00.000-07:00

If you've been following the Browsing Room for a while, you already know that I love book art. (Here and here.) I also love a good mystery.

When you combine beautiful, whimsical book art, an anonymous artist, and the fact that these works are being mysteriously found in libraries across Scotland? Sounds like a no-brainer for a Thursday post to me.

The artist is using his/her pieces to voice appreciation and support for libraries, which are experiencing brutal budget cuts and closures all across the U.K.

Enjoy the story and gorgeous photos here.

CourseGuides show the way

2011-09-14T10:32:00.000-07:00

photo by Nancy Phillips (NKPhillips)
shared under Creative Commons

Feeling a little lost?

If you've been in a library session with one of your classes this semester, you already know about one of the awesome tools the library offers - CourseGuides.

If you've looked at the library website (and I hope you have!) you already know that there's a lot of information on it. Sometimes, it feel overwhelming - there's so much there that it's hard to tell where to start, or which part of the site has what you need.

That's where CourseGuides come in.

Using a tool the library subscribes to, we can create different guides for all sorts of specific needs. Sometimes, we create them for common needs or questions, like finding books, finding articles, evaluating or citing your sources, or how to find a scholarly source. Sometimes they help with larger issues, like copyright or ebooks.

We also create guides for both general subject areas (computers and technology, for example) and for specific classes. As an example, most of the First Year Seminar classes have a guide designed just for them to help with particular projects or needed resources. (Lots of other classes do, too.) We can easily build in links to other guides, so it's a one-click trip if you need help with citing your source, finding an article, or evaluating something you found.

And finally, we include guides about major campus events - both our own On Our Minds program, and events like the Native American Film and Performance University Forum this fall.

Here's a few more useful tips about the course guides:

We have a lot of guides. If you're looking for a specific topic, we suggest browsing down the left sidebar on the main index page and clicking on your subject area, then looking for the specific class or topic.
Each guide includes a sidebar with information about the librarian who created it, and how to contact them. Feel free to use this if you have a question about that guide or a particular resource.
You can see how recently a guide was updated by looking at the summary information on the index pages. (Most of ours are checked at least every semester.)

Enjoy exploring the guides!

Amazon, Netflix and Libraries

2011-09-13T10:41:00.000-07:00

There have been rumblings this week that Amazon is considering starting a book rental service similar to Netflix (except with books, not movies--obviously). They would use the Kindle as a delivery device, and people (perhaps Amazon Prime subscribers) could get a number of books delivered each month to their Kindle at no extra cost.

On the surface, I suppose this sounds like a cool idea. Books delivered to you at home for a low cost. But the more I think about it . . .

Isn't this what libraries kind of do already? Except charging money for it instead of doing it for free?

I'm all for technological progress, but to me, having a company step in to start doing what's already being done very well--for free--seems a bit much.

Of course, the reason this is all muddied so much is that eBooks are changing the way we approach books. Libraries have been lending movies for a long time, and I didn't get my hackles up when Netflix started doing the same--that seemed to me an extension of video stores, not an encroachment on libraries. So what's the difference?

The difference is that books aren't movies, for one thing. The way licenses work is very different. When an author writes a book, she sells certain rights to that book to a publisher. North American rights, movie rights, eBook rights--whatever rights are involved in the deal. If the author was smart (or had a good agent), she retained all other rights for herself. In other words, if it ain't sold specifically in the contract, those rights are still hers.

The right to rent books? Um . . . I'm guessing that's not really in any contract.

But, you say, where was the right for libraries to lend print books for free?

Here's where things get messy. Library books have been governed by the right of first sale for a really long time, meaning that once an item is bought, the purchaser of that item is allowed to do whatever the heck he wants with it. Resell it, lend it to a friend, etc. However, on the digital side of things, software isn't usually sold. It's licensed, and the copyright laws for licensed products are a whole other kettle of pickles. eBooks are sort of kind of books and sort of kind of software. They're in a no man's land that's really murky right now. (Note: I'm not a lawyer. I might be getting some of the finer points of this wrong, but the general gist is there.)

Until our lovely judicial system works out what exactly an eBook is and how it should be dealt with, there's going to continue to be a lot of confusion in this arena. And that judicial system isn't going to be able to wrangle with the problem until there are some law suits. (Don't you love the way our country operates sometimes?) Maybe Congress would address the problem before then, but something tells me they're too busy yelling at each other to get much done in the copyright arena right now.

Which is really too bad. eBooks are the wave of the future, and it would be nice to have some clarity. But for now, we'll continue to have a variety of readers, with a variety of formats, with a variety of approaches to making money, with a whole lot of confusion. What's a lowly library to do? Press forward the best it can, and yell loudly when boneheads like Amazon try to poach our territory.

Thoughts?

Mantor Monday - Ready to Scan!

2011-09-12T11:52:00.000-07:00

The good news: if you have a UMF log-in, our awesome new microfilm/fiche reader and scanner is ready for action! The Scanpro is ridiculously easy to use: turn on the computer and the scanner, find the Scanpro software in the computer's list of programs, and open it. Then, select the type of film you'll be viewing (by clicking on one of the nice, big pictures of film or fiche), pull the film carriage forward, and voila! An animated graphic pops up on the screen, showing you how to load the film. From there, you're off and running. Controls to rotate, edit, clarify, zoom and magnify are right there on the sidebar. Want to scan an image? It's only a click away, and you can save your image to a portable drive or email it to yourself. Feedback from users has been terrific: it's fast, easy, and fun.

If you're used to old-school readers and feel a little intimidated by the Scanpro, not to worry. A library staff person can get you up to speed in just a few minutes. There is one ironclad, no-foolin', You Must Obey Or Else rule with this machine:

MAKE SURE THE GLASS PLATE IS CENTERED BEFORE PULLING THE CARRIAGE FORWARD.

Seriously. Otherwise, the glass plate could crack, and the guy who trained staff on the Scanpro said that that little repair would set us back about one jillion dollars. Okay, it wasn't that much. But it was a lot. A whole lot. Enough to make me yell at you in all caps, and I'm not a yeller, generally.

Now for the bad news: we haven't figured out a way to make the Scanpro accessible with community patron log-ins yet. We're working on it, and we'll let you know if we crack that nut.

Review Friday: Little Brother

2011-09-09T07:59:00.000-07:00

There are many reasons I love this book.

1) It does a great job building some complex information about technology, privacy issues, and real vs. presumed security into a compelling story.

2) It doesn't duck the hard questions about those topics.

3) It's a great example of leveraging new technology - Cory Doctorow, the author, makes all of his books available for free online. We own a print copy, but you can check out the ebook version, in lots of formats, on his website.

So, what's the book about? Basically, Marcus is a high school student who gets caught up in the midst of a terrorist attack in San Francisco. As he's trying to figure out what actually happened - and what happened to his best friend - he gets caught up in a much larger story, and a much larger set of questions about how we share information, what we do with it, and what can go wrong when we don't question some assumptions. And in between, he builds some great friendships, and other connections, and you get a glimpse into lots of different technology areas and issues.

If you like this, I also recommend Doctorow's For The Win (that link will take you to the download info for that...) which does the same sort of story+lots of great info to think about, only this time using a combination of Massive Multiplayer Online Games, global economics, and union organising.

Here we go again...

2011-09-08T11:19:00.000-07:00

Well, that didn't take long. I finally broke down and bought an ereader, and for one brief, shining moment I was on top of the digital reading technology world. And then - wham - today I am knocked rudely off my Queen-of-the-Mountain sand pile by a new kid on the electronic playground: Booktrack. Have you heard of this? This technology, which currently works with Apple devices, Android, and PCs, but not all ereaders, provides a soundtrack for ebooks. Music and sound effects, to "enhance" the reading experience, and all magically synched to your reading pace.

Go ahead, watch this. I'll wait.

What do you think of this idea? Me, I think I'd find it more of a distraction than an enhancement. Having been gifted with what some might consider an overactive imagination to begin with, I don't feel the need to have my reading material turned into a multi-media infotainment extravaganza. But if you're the type who enjoys listening to music or watching tv while reading, Booktrack might just float your boat. Here's what the Booktrack version of a Sherlock Holmes tale would sound like:

Resource Wednesday: Where's that book?

2011-09-07T05:46:00.000-07:00

A student question yesterday reminded me that our catalog can be a bit confusing - so today's Resource Wednesday is here to help you figure out exactly where those items you're looking for might be.

First of all, I'm sure you all know by now that URSUS is our online catalog - the place you go to look for books and other materials (like DVDs, sound recordings, and more) in our library. But did you know that we share that catalog with a number of other libraries? In fact, URSUS will show you materials in all of the University of Maine system libraries, the Bangor Public Library, the Maine State Library, the Maine State Law and Legislative Reference Library, and the Maine State Archives. Whew! That's a lot of materials.

The two things you need to know are pretty simple: you can request books from any library in the system (assuming they're available). However, it'll take them a little time to get here. (3-5 business days). If you're a commuting student, and you live closer to another library in the system, you can have the books sent there, instead.

The image below shows you a sample search. (Click on it to see a larger version.) If you look by the red arrow on the left side, you'll see a list of locations. Books that are on our campus start with FAR.. The call number tells you where in the library it'd be located, and the status tells you whether the book is available or not. (This is the record for the hardcover version of the book: if you search the catalog, you'll see we have a bunch of paperback copies for our On Our Minds program too.)

If the book isn't available on our campus, you can request a copy by clicking on the Request icon (see below, and follow the arrow: it's the circle with a checkmark through it.) You'll be asked to enter your name and barcode. You can also enter a date to automatically cancel the request (but choose a date at least 7-10 days away, or the request might get cancelled before you get it.)

You'll get an email when the book arrives. If you had it sent here, you can pick it up at the Access Services desk. (As always, you'll need your ID to check it out).

What happens if you need a resource right now? You can limit your searches just to items in our library by selecting the library you want to search on the initial search screen. (You can do the same thing for any library in the system.)You can also limit to some parts of our collection, like the Kalikow Center, our Juvenile and Young Adult collection, or our Archives.

And finally, if you're not finding what you're looking for in the URSUS catalog, you can search MaineCat, a larger database of materials throughout the state including many more libraries, or use Interlibrary Loan, which can help you get materials from other states. (These options both take longer...)

You can learn a lot more about these options (and get some additional help with URSUS) by reading our online guide to Finding Books. And of course, the library staff would love to help you - stop by, or use our online chat option to ask for help.

A Virtual Hike (as Opposed to Virtually Hiking)

2011-09-06T08:09:00.000-07:00

For today's Technology Tuesday, I've decided to switch things up a tad and announce something slightly tech-related, but definitely Facebook-focused. As some of you may be aware, Mantor Library does a yearly "On Our Minds" book program, where we choose a book each year and sponsor a variety of programs focused on that book. Up this year? A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson. You can read more about our On Our Minds program here.

What does any of this have to do with technology? Allow me to explain. In the book, Bill Bryson focuses on the Appalachian Trail: 2,181 miles of continuous hiking trail through the Appalachian Mountains. It ends in Maine--hence, a local connection. As we were discussing different programming options, I thought it might be fun to try and virtually hike all 2,181 miles of the trail as a campus and community. People could go online and post on our Facebook page to say how far they'd hiked (whether it was around town or off in the hinterlands), and we'd keep track of the total number of miles.

For example, last week I hiked Tumbledown, a mountain not too far away from campus (about a half hour drive). It's five miles, round trip. So I'm going to go to Mantor's Facebook page and post that. After my 5 miles, we'll only have 2,176 miles to go. Clearly I won't be able to do this alone.

So come on by our Facebook page and post whatever you can, in half mile increments. Go jogging each morning for a mile? Super! Run a marathon? That counts! I suppose we might do so well that we end up doing a round trip on the trail--who knows. Or maybe we get stranded somewhere half way there. It's the effort that counts. :-)

We'll try and keep you up to date about how far we've come on the trail as the weeks go by. The goal is to be finished by the end of spring semester. Think we can do it? Start hiking!

Review Friday: At Home

2011-09-02T11:01:00.000-07:00

Have you checked out our On Our Minds book of the year, Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods? Do you want more with his blend of humor, information, and ideas to get you wanting to learn a lot more about a great many things?

Check out one of the new additions in our Discoveries collection, Bryson's latest book, At Home.

Bryson is best known for his wide-ranging travel books (everything from exploring Australia to hiking the Appalachian Trail), but here, he stays home, exploring the history and culture whose results can be seen in his home, a former Victorian parsonage.

Along the way, we get to take in the great engineering feats of the Victorian era (like the Crystal Palace), a social history of domestic service, the spice trade, the history of sanitation, and a whole range of everyday items ranging from ice to furniture to fashion to cookbooks. There's a little bit of something for every possible interest in here, all told with Bryson's flair for amusing anecdotes.

If you're interested in hearing a more conversational approach of the book, there's a great hour-long public radio interview with Bryson from Minnesota Public Radio from last fall - you can listen on their website or download the podcast.

It's the most wonderful time of the year....

2011-09-01T07:27:00.000-07:00

Welcome back, UMF students & faculty. We missed you.

Resource Wednesday: Chat reference

2011-08-31T11:05:00.000-07:00

Ever wondered about that chat box on the right side of our website? That's our chat reference tool.

When a librarian is available (it'll say "Reference Desk Online"), you can ask your questions in the chat window, without having to come to the library (or ask at the access services desk...) It's a great way to get some quick help, or get started on a research question. Even for complicated questions, where you need to come visit us to look at resources, we can probably get you started online.

This semester, we've scheduled chat reference more regularly, and with extended hours compared to last year.

You can find help via the chat tool:

9am-3pm every weekday
5pm to 9pm Monday-Wednesday
6pm to 9pm on Thursday

(We have fewer staff in the building on weekends, so we can't staff chat in the same way.)

Take some time to explore the chat tool this semester, and let us know how it works for you! We want to make it as easy as possible for you to get help with your research needs and questions, so we'd love your feedback.

And of course, we always love to help people in person - just stop by the main access services desk (on your right as you enter the library), and the staff there will answer your questions or help you connect with the best person to help you.

When Websites Change

2011-08-30T12:57:00.000-07:00

I went on to Amazon today and discovered to my dismay that they'd changed their site design again. And I was planning on blogging about something else today, but that just had to be addressed: dealing with change and the web.

We've all been there. You get to know a site well. You know how to find what you want in the wink of an eye. Everything's all good. Sure, it might be a bit dated, but it's like an old pair of jeans: ragged in a few places, but familiar and comfortable as all get out.

Then they change it.

Suddenly, you don't know where anything is. You're lost in a sea of "Huh?" And the feeling you have more than any other is frustration. You've been betrayed by your old, friendly site. How could they do this to you?

This is something you see happen all the time with Facebook. As soon as they make one tweak, thousands of people are up in arms. "Bring back the old Facebook!" There are groups formed that promise that if they get enough people signed up in them, Facebook will have to go back to the old design. Of course it never works out like that.

And from a big picture perspective, it's easy to see why. All you have to do is look at old versions of your favorite sites (Amazon or eBay or Facebook or Google), and you see how dated they look. How silly and unmodern. But if we never let those small changes--and yes, even big site redesigns--take place, then that's what would happen. Our favorite pages would become stagnant, boring, and unusable.

So my message today is simple: change is good. Yes, it can be frustrating, and yes, occasionally some sites get it wrong and have to revert to the old, but in the end, it's a learning process, and the web gets stronger for it.

Now if I could just find what I was looking for on Amazon . . .

Mantor Monday

2011-08-29T07:49:00.001-07:00

Welcome, new students and faculty!

Are you ready to untangle the Mantor Maze? We're all geared up (and dressed in spiffy library staff t-shirts) for two sessions of our library orientation activity, today at 1:15 and 3:00.

With it's bewildering staircases and multiple floors, Mantor can be a confusing place to navigate. The Mantor Maze activity is a fun way to explore the building, learn about the resources available to you here, and of course - meet the friendly staff! Oh, and did I mention candy and prizes? Master the maze, and you will be showered with rewards.

And if you get lost in the attempt, we will come find you, and we will still give you candy. It's all win!

A reminder about library hours - we return to regular academic year hours - open weekends and evenings -, on Wednesday. We will be closed next Monday in observance of Labor Day.

Review Friday: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

2011-08-26T07:09:00.000-07:00

This book is one of my favorite recent looks at the world of science. (And it's available in our Discoveries collection, found in the Browsing Room opposite the Access Services desk of the library.)

The first question on your mind is probably "Who is Henrietta Lacks?" The initial answer - that she was a poor African-American woman who was treated for cancer at Johns Hopkins in the early 1950s - is probably not too exciting.

But what if I told you that she, in a very pragmatic way, helped with the following?

testing the 1952 polio vaccine, which protected millions of children.
proving that we have 23 chromosomes, helping with the diagnosis of a wide range of genetic conditions.
providing the initial spark for scientists to figure out how to keep a single cell alive and grow a line of cells from it (used for everything from in-vitro fertilization to cloning).
offering ideas for creation of anti-cancer drugs now in clinical tests.

What did she do? Her cells were taken to create a cell culture that has become the longest-lasting human cell line used in biological science, long known as the HeLa line.

Here's the thing, though: she didn't give informed consent. (She wasn't even asked, which was common at the time for everyone.) She died in poverty. Her extended family, many of whom are still alive, continued to live in poverty, unable to afford the technological advances that her tissue helped doctors create. They spent many years not knowing what that cell culture meant, or what she'd contributed. And for decades, her very name disappeared from the record.

Henrietta's story is about a lot of other things. What right do we have to our own tissue, even after it's removed from our bodies? What does it mean to be an informed health consumer? What does access to health care really mean? What is the intersection between personal choice, research, and commercial profit? And what should happen if - like Henrietta Lacks - our cells turn out to have some unusual quality?

Rebecca Skloot takes this complicated story and makes it readable, interesting, and compassionate as she begins by figuring out why the HeLa culture was called that and winds up diving deeply into the life of the Lacks family (to help them find answers). It's a fascinating read, with clear language that's friendly to the non-scientist, and it's sure to get you interested in other questions of bioethics, health care access, and science.

If you'd like to learn more, Rebecca's website has lots more information, including an extensive FAQ (and a movie is in the planning stages.)

9/11 Ebook Collection

2011-08-25T08:17:00.000-07:00

In recognition of the upcoming 10th anniversary of 9/11, ebrary is offering free access to a collection of relevant ebooks. A press release from ebrary states: "We hope that this collection provides a valuable resource to anyone hoping to learn or understand more about this tragic event, or reflect on it's world impact."

The 9/11 titles will be available through the month of September.

To view the collection, click here.

Facebook Privacy Gets an Upgrade

2011-08-24T10:32:00.000-07:00

One of the great things about competition is that it helps the consumer. When companies compete, we win. Case in point? Facebook and Google. As you know, Google finally came out with a social network that actually works: Google+ And they're doing their darndest now to differentiate themselves from Facebook and prove to everyone why they should switch over to Google's offering.

The only problem for Google, of course, is that Facebook can sit back and watch what Google does well, then imitate that on their own site. In some ways, it's like Facebook didn't get a competitor, they gained a free R&D branch of their company.

Just take the recent development of Facebook tweaking their privacy settings. Google+ had some privacy settings that ended up being admired by many (namely, the ease with which users could choose what information was available to whom on Google+). Then again, Google also has some privacy settings which people don't like at all (being forced to use real names, for example). So what did Facebook do? It casually adopted some of the things Google had figured out worked.

Gee, thanks.

Some people are making fun of Facebook for doing this, but in the end, it's just good business. They have the high ground, and as long as they keep being open to change and willing to adapt, that's a very difficult thing to lose. (But it can be done--just look at Internet Explorer.)

My advice? Don't be too in love with any one online offering. If/when Google+ beats the pants off Facebook, I'll make the switch. For now, I haven't been blown away, and I'm still happy with FB. But only fanboys get so enthralled with a service or company that they ignore better products elsewhere. In the end, competition means innovation, and innovation means the consumer wins.

So by all means, FB and Google, fight on.

Mantor Monday

2011-08-22T06:15:00.000-07:00

The 2011-12 academic year is almost here...and we're ready! We've been busy updating computers, setting up new equipment, and welcoming new staff. Tomorrow, Tuesday the 23rd, the library will be closed for the day. Library staff is flying the coop for an all day retreat: food, fun, and team-building at Pineland Farms.

Next week, the year kicks off at Mantor with our Orientation activity for incoming new students on Monday, August 29. We piloted "The Mantor Maze" - a treasure hunt that has students learning about the library's resources as they travel our three floors, mezzanine, and basement in search of clues - back in June with Summer Experience students, and it was a big hit. We've tweaked it a little bit, based on feedback from the trial run, and we're excited to see if the changes make the Mantor Maze experience even more fun for all.

The library has been running on our summer hours schedule, but will resume "regular" hours on August 31. Those hours are:

Monday - Thursday 7:45 am to 11:00 pm

Friday - 7:45 am to 5:00 pm

Saturday - 9:00 am to 5 pm

Sunday - 11:00 am to 11:00 pm

Time's Top 50 Websites

2011-08-17T13:37:00.000-07:00

Time Magazine just released its yearly "50 Best Websites of 2011" list, and it got me thinking. There's such a variety of websites on the list: everything from hipmunk (a new airfare search engine that utilizes a cool graphical interface to display flight results) to Khan Academy (a new teaching tool that just might revolutionize the way our country approaches education). I follow technology fairly closely. I read about upcoming trends, explore new websites, and generally do my best to keep up to date on anything that might affect universities, libraries, students, or librarians. And yet many of these sites were new to me. As in, I'd never heard of them.

Why is that?

The answer is simple: there's just too much information in the world today. There's so much information that even the best tool for keeping on top of it all and sorting through it (Google) isn't up to the task of actually finding you the best information. Don't get me wrong--Google (and other search engines) does a fine job at finding you information.

It's just that there's a difference between information and the best information.

I don't know about you, but when I search Google these days, a lot of the same sites keep cropping up into the top levels of my results page. Wikipedia. About.com. eHow. Things like that--unless I'm searching for a specific website, like the home page of a company. The problem with search engines is that they so often give you what's popular--they give information that's "good enough." But things can be so much better when you get really valuable information.

There's a famous quote by Donald Rumsfeld (which he got made fun of for making), but it applies in this situation:

[T]here are known knowns; there are things we know we know.
We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don't know we don't know.

When you know what you don't know, then it's fairly easy to go out and find it. When you don't know what you don't know, no amount of googling will help. If you don't know a website exists, you can't very well search for it--you have to rely on finding it through other means. Means like Time's top 50 list.

But with so many different great websites coming out each year, the top 50 list approach turns into a revolving door--you see a great site one moment, then forget about it when the next great site is presented to you.

Ideally, that's where information professionals step in. People whose job it is to know what's out there and how to get to it. People who can identify a problem and know where to find the solution, all in one fell swoop.

This post has sort of rambled on by this point, so I'll wrap it up by encouraging you to get out there and explore the internet--check out the top 50 list. And support your local librarian. :-)

Happy Birthday, Woodstock

2011-08-15T09:25:00.000-07:00

On this date in 1969, nearly half a million people descended on Max Yasgur's dairy farm for the concert that became a defining moment for a generation.

100,000 tickets were sold to the event, but tickets quickly became irrelevant - it was impossible to stem the tide of spectators who had come to be a part of the happening. Roads to the farm became so clogged that the performers had to be flown in by helicoptor. And what a list of performers it was: Santana, The Grateful Dead, Credence Clearwater Revival, Janis Joplin, The Who, Joan Baez, Sly & the Family Stone, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, to name just a few. And on the morning of August 18th, the fraction of the crowd who had outlasted the rain, the mud, the food shortages, and the sanitation issues witnessed the finale, a two hour set by Jimi Hendrix that included this electrifying version of the Star Spangled Banner:

If you'd like to learn more about this pivotal moment in music history (Or, if you were there, and need some - ahem - memory reconstruction) we have a couple of resources for you. Come check them out, and celebrate three (plus) days of Peace & Music.

Woodstock: the Oral History

Remembering Woodstock

The eBook Wars Continue . . .

2011-08-10T11:43:00.000-07:00

In the continuing saga in eBook land, another salvo was made today. In case you lost track of where we are in all this mess (and who could blame you?) allow me to recap:

First, you've got a mess of eReaders. Some of them are dedicated readers (the Kindle, Nook, Sony eReader, Kobo, etc.) Some of them are multitaskers (the iPad, iPhone, etc.) Or you can just use whole computers (laptops, desktops, netbooks, etc.)

Second, you have eReader software. This usually corresponds to a flavor of eReader. So you've got Kindle Reader, Kobo Reader, iBooks, web browser applications--you name it. Most of these function on various devices: Kindle has apps for iPhone, iPad, computers and more.

But here's the rub: it's all about money. Up until recently, you could download a Kindle app on your iPad and use it to buy Kindle books using your iPad. Apple wanted none of this: it wanted a piece of the pie. So it banned apps that included links to take you to content that could be purchased outside Apple's App Store. (Apparently in hopes that this would divert sales to its App Store, where Apple gets a 30% cut of everything that's sold. No wonder they're making so much money.)

Kindle has now fought back with a new announcement today: the Kindle Cloud Reader. Using it, users can search, buy and read eBooks from a variety of browsers instead of apps. So you can use Safari on your iPad to use Kindle books.

I'm sure all of this makes sense to someone, but to yours truly, it all smacks a bit of kids playing on a playground and arguing over a prized toy. Next thing you know, we'll see news releases along the lines of "Apple: Liar Liar Pants on Fire."

I wish we could just skip this awkward eBook stage and jump straight to a uniform standard we all agree on, but that's just wishful thinking . . .

Mantor Monday

2011-08-08T12:17:00.000-07:00

Big news: our new IT librarian is here! Here's the official scoop on Jen Arnott:

Jen is delighted to return to New England. Born and raised in the Boston area, she spent 12 years living in Minnesota, where she loved the lakes and rivers, but missed hills, mountains, and the ocean a great deal. Her work life has been solidly centered around libraries and technology, especially user support and education. She has worked helping faculty create technology projects, doing user support for a consulting company, and for 10 years at an independent high school in Minneapolis, both as the library paraprofessional and then as the Teacher Librarian. She's a graduate of Wellesley College (BA) and Dominican University (MLIS).

Jen is particularly interested in how we support creative projects, use our online time in a way that feeds our lives, and in issues around online privacy, digital citizenship, and meaningful interactions that include online settings. Other interests include reading anything that sits still long enough (with a particular fondness for SF, mysteries, and narrative non-fiction), music (voice and folk harp, mostly), fiber arts (spinning and knitting), and baking (bread, but also cookies). She has a blog at http://modernhypatia.info where she talks about various library and technology interests.

Jen is going to be serving as the front line person for technical support in the library, as well as guiding us in the implementation of emerging technologies. The library world is changing rapidly, and we're lucky to have a librarian as "plugged in" as Jen is to help us make informed decisions about the the products, services, and technology we offer patrons in the future. Welcome, Jen!

A Review of Spotify

2011-08-03T12:38:00.000-07:00

A new (in the United States) music streaming service launched a bit ago: Spotify. I've downloaded it and put it through its paces, and I thought I might share my thoughts with you, the general public.

We've come a long way from the days of the CD. Now, most people have their music on everything from their computer to their cell phone. But all that music takes up a fair bit of space on a hard drive. That's where the cloud comes in. The next big thing in digital music is being able to play songs directly from the internet--no need to store all the music on your own device. Some services (like Amazon) let you upload your songs to their servers. This takes a lot of time, but it can be effective. Others (like Pandora) let you stream "radio stations" online for free--songs that are similar to a certain artist or song.

Spotify is a service that's been going gangbusters in Europe for the past while. I essentially lets you listen to any song for free--regardless of whether or not you own it. You have to have an internet connection and a computer, but that's the only requirement. (You can, of course, purchase the song to be able to listen to it without a connection, and for a fee, you can be a premium Spotify member, which lets you stream your music to an iPhone or other device). It's taken forever for it to come over to America (mainly due to music licensing issues), but it's arrived at last. I signed up right away.

How is it?

I'm honestly not blown away by the service. In theory, it should be really cool. The ability to share music with friends on Facebook, post public playlists, listen to your music on any computer--all very nice. But the sharing seems like the biggest offering, and its execution is clunky at best. When you share a playlist, not everyone can see all the songs on it. They can only see the songs in it that they already own--unless the subscribe to the playlist, at which point the songs become visible.

I think.

That's the thing--I'm not sure. The user interface leaves much to be desired. I've used it, read about how to use it, experimented with it, and I'm still not sure I'm doing everything with it that I can. That's frustrating, especially in an age where I'm so used to having something made in such a way that it's so intuitive, the manual seems redundant. Not so with Spotify. It doesn't help that their online help section leaves much to be desired, too.

It seems to me I should be able to add music freely to my library--the one I can listen to on a computer for free. I guess you can, as long as you add them to a playlist first. I'm sorry for seeming so confused--it's just a reflection of my frustrations working with the program.

In the end, I'm not sure how much I'll use Spotify. It feels to me like an over-hyped summer blockbuster. You hear and read so much about it, that by the time it's released and you get to see it, you can't help but be disappointed.

How about you--anyone out there already use Spotify and love it? What am I doing wrong? Do share . . .

Mantor Monday Sneak Preview

2011-08-01T11:18:00.000-07:00

Guess what we just got.

Go ahead, guess.

Did you guess a fancy-schmancy new microfilm and fiche reader that makes our old reader look like a relic of the Pleistocene?

If you did, well played. (If you guessed pony rides you're wrong but it's still an excellent suggestion.)

Our new Scanpro 2000 was delivered today, and it's not ready for prime time, but stay tuned - we'll be offering much more information when it's available for use.

Speaking of ready to use: have you seen our "On Our Minds" garden lately? Kale, cabbage, basil, nasturtiums and Lemon Gem marigolds all ready for salad-on-the-fly grazing. The Sungold cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen and will soon turn into a bright orange tidal wave of tomatoes: help yourself as you walk by.

And last, as a special First Day of August treat for you, I invite you to escape your Monday and lose yourself for a few moments in a land of books:

This Is Where We Live from 4th Estate on Vimeo.

Google/Search Tip: Reverse Lookup

2011-07-20T11:46:00.000-07:00

Still on vacation, but I'm back to bestow another worthy link on your eager eyes. This week's tip is all about reverse search: the process of using a definition to look up a word. Sometimes this is useful just because you want to find the right word, and all you're coming up with is approximations. In searching, this is especially important--particularly when you're dealing with Google. Google returns so much information that having just the right word can make your search that much better. Instead of racking your brain for synonyms for a particular word or concept (especially in a subject you're not that familiar with), just do a reverse lookup search and your problems are solved.

For more information on how to conduct one (and what tool to use), check out this post by a Google exec: http://searchresearch1.blogspot.com/2011/07/using-reverse-dictionary.html

Amazon Launches Kindle Textbook Rentals

2011-07-18T07:09:00.000-07:00

Amazon launched it's Kindle e-Textbook service today, which will allow consumers to rent rather than buy textbooks. With discounts up to 80% off list price, and the ability to store margin notes and highlights in the cloud even after the rental expires, this might be an attractive option for many students.

Don't have a Kindle? Not to worry. Amazon's Kindle Reader application is available for downloading to your PC, Mac, and/or mobile device - all Whispersynced, so you can rent once, but read on all your gear, seamlessly.

Amazon is offering flexible rental periods: from 30 to 360 days, and if you need an extension - even if it's just a single day - you can purchase extra time.

E-textbook rental is not a new concept, but Amazon is hoping that the convenience of cloud note storage, Whispersync technology, flexible rental periods, and discount pricing on tens of thousands of titles will edge out competitors like Chegg. What do you think? Does this sound like a service you would try?

Overview of the Current State of E-Books in Libraries

2011-07-13T11:37:00.000-07:00

I'm officially on vacation, but I came across this post about the latest update on e-books in libraries that I thought I'd share with you: http://www.davidleeking.com/2011/07/05/ebook-vendors-at-ala11. He makes some excellent points, and gives some great links for you to click through to find out more information. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: e-books are still very much in a formative stage. What they look like today is almost definitely not what they'll look like five years from now. It's exciting being able to watch it all unfold, even if (as a librarian) it can be incredibly frustrating at the same time.

Let's Shelve it

2011-07-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

I got an email from one of my co-workers last week, with the subject line "I want this house!!!". The link she sent led to a story about the Shelf Pod house - built entirely of interlocking shelving for the owner's extensive book colllection. Even the stairs and furniture are constructed of the latticed grid shelving. I emailed her back: "I want it, too, as long as I can get someone else to do the dusting!" I forwarded the link to another book-ish friend, and she replied "Hey, Shelf Pod owner: Ebooks. Embrace the concept."

So that's two yeses and one no, by my count.

What's your opinion on the Japanese Shelf Pod house? Plenty of pictures here.

Facebook Changes

2011-07-06T11:23:00.000-07:00

Facebook made a big stir today by announcing Skype video chat via Facebook. There's no need to install any plugins ahead of time--someone can call a Facebook friend, they click a link, and 20 seconds later, they're chatting. This is cool, and it seems to be a direct response to Google+, Google's new social media venture. The difference is that while Google+ is just starting out, Facebook is already populated with all of your friends. The video chat was one thing Google+ had that Facebook didn't--and now that just got smashed. So . . . I'm not sure if Google+ will have enough to distinguish itself and make it important enough for people to jump ship from Facebook.

The thing about social media is that it only really works well when it's done on a massive scale. You go to where the people are, and you tolerate the interface. As long as the interface stays relatively useful, you stick with what you've got. Persuading all of your friends to jump ship is difficult if not impossible. Still, I want Google+ to succeed, if only because increased competition usually brings about an increase in product quality as well.

Facebook also announced a slicker Group Chat interface, which should help bolster that for Facebook, too. It's all easy to use--at least from the look of it. Better yet, you don't need to know how to do anything to set it up--someone can invite you to video chat, you click a "yes" button, and you're off and running. Finally, it promised a "better chat interface tool" that I want to see before I believe.

Certainly a lot of promises--they're supposed to be rolling out in the next few weeks, so keep an eye on your Facebook account to see for yourself.

Mantor Monday

2011-07-05T12:18:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. It's not Monday. It's Tuesday. But since I haven't posted in a couple of weeks, I 'm going to post today - even though, technically speaking, the long 4th of July weekend gave me an Out.

Because it's summer, and because we do like to occasionally get out of the library and do vacation-y things instead of library things, posts might be a little lighter than usual in July. But don't worry, we'll be around to report on Mantor doings, and I'll still be bringing you the odd flotsam and jetsam of the library/book/art/culture world that comes my way. Case in point: have you ever found an inscription inside a used book, and been curious about the book's former life? I have, often. And apparently, I'm not alone. An entire site has been created to share "personal messages written in ink (or pen or marker or crayon or grape jelly) inside books"

It's called The Book Inscriptions Project. Here's one of my favorite images:

It says -

"For Tara,

Because no one ever gave
you a book with an
inscription before,
because you love photographs,
because we are obsessed with
Elliott, and because I’m
in love with the world
through the eyes of a girl.
Seth

I know, right? So romantic. But hey, if romance isn't your thing, there's always sibling warfare:

Review Friday: Treasure of the Sierra Madre

2011-07-01T10:27:00.001-07:00

"Badges? We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you any stinking badges."

That line is a gold mine. It's almost as versatile as Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, with the added benefit that if you say it loud enough, you sound awesome, instead of just precocious.

I had the pleasure last night of introducing a friend to Treasure of the Sierra Madre (actually to Humphrey Bogart movies in general, as well). And it occurred to me while watching it that a lot of my readers out there might not have seen the movie (voted as AFI's #38 best film of all time). If you haven't seen this film, then you owe it to yourself to rent it (or check it out from a certain library--hint hint.)

It focuses on Bogart, a down-on-his-luck drifter who's desperate for money. He dreams up a plan to go pan for gold and strike it rich, even though he has no experience with the wilderness at all. He meets an acquaintance who decides to go in with him on the expedition, and they convince and old-timer to be their guide. Naturally, gold is found. But the movie isn't really about striking it rich--it's about the effect of money on people. The lack of it, the abundance of it--money money money. The old-timer (director John Huston's father) has a quote that sums it up: "I know what gold does to men's souls."

If you're not a regular classic movie watcher, then you need to realize going into this that the movie is paced differently from the adventure movies of today. There are fight scenes, there's tension, but it's a different rhythm, and you need to give it time to develop. Bogart has a superb performance--one of the best of his career, and really an iconic one at that. I don't recall a more believable and disturbing descent into insanity and paranoia captured on film. Really great stuff.

In any case, give it a shot. The last time I'd seen it, I was in my young teens. This is a movie that gets better with age. Four stars.

Google Search by Image, and a 1982 Look at the Future of Technology

2011-06-29T12:24:00.000-07:00

Every so often, the internet presents me with some sort of new technology that just makes me happy to live in a society capable of producing such a thing. Today's wonder? Google's search by image. You can drag any image into this little tool, and Google searches for information about the image. It's like Google Goggles (the ability to take a picture and search for information about it online) without the picture taking. I suppose it's just an easy step from that, but it still is cool enough that it makes me really excited. Here's a video--check it out:

And in other news, here's a link to a 1982 article by the New York Times that explored where technology would be by the end of the century. They got some of the specifics wrong, but as far as the broader implications of technology, they seemed to be pretty spot on to me. Makes me wonder where we'll be in another 20 years.

Ridiculous Updates: Firefox 5 and Chrome 12

2011-06-22T09:15:00.000-07:00

Firefox released a new version yesterday: Firefox 5.0. For those who want to update, go for it. I have, and . . . it's pretty much no different than before. (You can update here, for what it's worth.) It's been three months since Firefox 4.0 came out, and supposedly in another three months, Firefox 6.0 is on its way.

Folks, this has to stop. Version numbers are supposed to mean something, not just be a marketing gimmick. When you go from 1.0 to 2.0, that means there's a significant upgrade. Significant enough that you'll likely have to relearn how to do some things. The speed will be faster, there'll be a lot more functionality. If the update is less than that, then the main version number shouldn't change. It should go from 1.0 to 1.1. That means some significant bump ups, but still pretty much the same experience. Even more minor changes get extra decimals. 1.0.0 to 1.0.1

That's how it's worked for years, and we're all happy with that. But then Google starts churning out new versions of Chrome every other weekday. (Seriously--they're up to version 12 now. 12?!? The first version came out in December of 2008. That means they've had a "new version" every other month or so. Come on. Get real. At this rate, we'll have Chrome 24 on its fifth birthday.

Maybe I'm just old fashioned or crotchety, but to me, this "new version" craze is as bad as the "As Seen on TV" branding of infomercials.

Blah.

Anyway. Firefox 5. Yay? Update if you want to. It'll be marginally faster, and it should run some web pages better. I'm not saying you shouldn't update, but just don't think you're going to get a brand new experience.

Movie Collection Highlights: Westerns

2011-06-17T08:31:00.000-07:00

Last week was Kurosawa films, this week I've chosen westerns to focus on. And while Mantor might not have a tremendously deep western collection, I do think we have some gems:

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance--John Ford directed it, and it stars Jimmy Stewart and John Wayne. "A senator, who became famous for killing a notorious outlaw, returns for the funeral of an old friend and tells the truth about his deed."
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly--The Clint Eastwood classic. It brings shifty eyes to a whole new level of zen. "A bounty hunting scam joins two men in an uneasy alliance against a third in a race to find a fortune in gold buried in a remote cemetery."
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid--Paul Newman and Robert Redford should have been in 20 movies together. At least. But at least they were together for this one. "Two Western bank/train robbers flee to Bolivia when the law gets too close."
Rio Bravo--Howard Hawks was another big figure in early westerns. This is a great example of why. John Wayne, Ricky Nelson and Dean Martin help, too. "A small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a cripple, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy."
The Searchers--Another Wayne/Ford classic. "As a Civil War veteran spends years searching for a young niece captured by Indians, his motivation becomes increasingly questionable."
Stagecoach--The movie that put John Wayne on the map. "A group of people traveling on a stagecoach find their journey complicated by the threat of Geronimo and learn something about each other in the process"
Shane--You'll be saying "Shane!" over and over for at least the next three days. Probably more. "A weary gunfighter attempts to settle down with a homestead family, but a smoldering settler/rancher conflict forces him to act."
Unforgiven--Eastwood returns to the western genre, older and possibly wiser. "Retired Old West gunslinger William Munny reluctantly takes on one last job, with the help of his old partner and a young man."
The Wild Bunch--Well known for bringing gore and brutal violence to the genre. "An aging group of outlaws look for one last big score as the "traditional" American West is disappearing around them."
High Noon--Some fine suspense, and Gary Cooper. "A marshall, personally compelled to face a returning deadly enemy, finds that his own town refuses to help him."

There are some more in addition to that, but I didn't want to give them all away--some of the fun of a library is the joy of discovery, after all. Anyway--how about it? Are we missing any complete and utter classics that you're abhorred we've forgotten? Make a suggestion! I'm always listening. How many of these have you seen? I'm 9/10. I haven't gotten around to The Wild Bunch yet, but I will.

Technology Updates: iOS 5, iCloud, and Tips on Buying Electronics

2011-06-15T10:16:00.000-07:00

A few updates for you today. First off is the rumblings from Apple: a new operating system for iPhones and iPads is on the way. What does that mean? A number of improvements:

Better notifications
Integration with Twitter (which is huge--and a big blow for Facebook, who had been rumored to be in the mix for this sort of thing with Apple)
A way to text people without paying for texts (assuming you both have iPads or iPhones)
Tabbed browsing to Safari
The ability to update your iPad/iPhone without connecting it to a computer (at last!)

The next update is also Apple-related: iCloud. In a nutshell, Apple is entering the cloud fray at last. What's the cloud? It's the current trend to move your documents, music, pictures and more off your hard drive and on to the internet. Amazon's doing it. Google's doing it. And now Apple's joining up. With iCloud, you can write something on your iPad, and it's automatically also on your computer, or your iPhone, or whatever. Take a picture with your iPhone, and it gets pushed other places, too. More importantly, with iCloud, Apple will let you get access to cloud-based copies of all the music you own--for $25 a year. This is actually pretty huge. Amazon and Google weren't able to pull it off. With them, they'll let you upload all your music to their cloud service. When you're talking about tens of GB of data, that's a lot of time. With Apple's offering, you just show them what music you have, and they give you access to that music on their servers. No uploading required. Worth $25? Time will tell.

Finally, here's a link to a good New York Times article about where you should focus your attention when buying new electronics. Highly recommended reading, especially to people who aren't as confident in their tech-buying kung fu.

Mantor Monday

2011-06-13T12:17:00.000-07:00

While we are busy planning programming for the 2011-12 season of On Our Minds, there is one last piece of programming in the works for our "Food for Thought" theme: edible landscaping in the planting bed along the library walkway. As the season progresses, we hope you will browse among the organic Sungold cherry tomatoes, herbs, colorful edible blossoms, and assorted other veggies, and harvest yourself a yummy snack as you walk by.

I'll be checking in with more news of the "Grazing Garden" over the summer, to keep you up-to-date on how our garden grows!

Movie Collection Highlights: Kurosawa Films

2011-06-10T07:28:00.000-07:00

I thought I might take today's typical "review" time to highlight some of the DVD collection we've been amassing at the library. I've made an effort to branch out in some areas of the collection--to get some films in various genres that perhaps some people wouldn't think a university would own. Today's focus? Samurai films. Specifically, Samurai films by Akira Kurosawa, one of Japan's greatest directors. Here's a list of five movies you might want to check out to get a good overview of the basics:

Seven Samurai--"A poor village under attack by bandits recruits seven unemployed samurai to help them defend themselves." It doesn't get more classic than this film. It's gone on to influence all sorts of movies, and it's one of the best movies out there, hands down.
Rashomon--"A heinous crime and its aftermath are recalled from differing points of view." This one isn't as much of a straight up Samurai movie, but it's still considered one of the greats.
Ran--"An elderly lord abdicates to his three sons, and the two corrupt ones turn against him." Samurai meets King Lear. Another Kurosawa classic.
Yojimbo--"A crafty ronin comes to a town divided by two criminal gangs and decides to play them against each other to free the town." More of a light-hearted movie.
Sanjuro--"A crafty samurai helps a young man and his fellow clansmen save his uncle, who has been framed and imprisoned by a corrupt superintendent." The follow up to Yojimbo.

So there you have it. Have you seen any of these? Got a favorite? How about another Kurosawa movie I didn't touch on? Or a different samurai film? Do share!

iPad 2 Review

2011-06-08T10:46:00.000-07:00

I upgraded from an original iPad to the iPad 2, and I'm here to tell you whether it's worth it or not, feature by feature. Ready? Here we go.

The cameras. This was the biggest point against the iPad 2 from the reviews I'd read. It was one of my big hangups in upgrading. The cameras weren't supposed to be very good. Now that I've used them, I'll say this. If you're in poor lighting conditions, the cameras are pretty bad. If you can up the light, the cameras are completely fine. I haven't printed pics taken with my iPad, but I've posted them to Facebook (along with video), and it works like a charm. Yes, I feel like a bit of an idiot, using something so big to take a picture or film something, but at the same time, it's kind of bizarre to have that much screen to frame the shot. It really feels like doing something other than taking a picture. The cameras are great for posting things online, and I love not having to get cables out to transfer pics from my camera to my iPad. If you want a camera--and don't need a super deluxe camera--then don't listen to the naysayers on the iPad 2. It works fine.
The speed. I didn't think I'd notice that big of a bump. Yes, it's supposed to be faster--but it's *faster* and more reliable to boot. A lot of programs that took a while to load on my old iPad now breeze through things with nary a bump. (I'm looking at you, Friendly.) The games work better, Pages is great, browsing is faster--I notice it all the time, even now--after having used the new iPad for a few weeks--I still see speed increases. It feels faster, and that's a very good thing.
The feel. The case is pretty darn cool. The iPad itself is significantly lighter. Now that I'm freed from the bulkier Apple case, the whole thing is much smaller. It easily fits places the old iPad had to squeeze into before (pockets in my laptop case, for example). Again, the overall effect feels like a significant upgrade.
The battery. Honestly, I'd say it feels like the battery isn't quite as much of a trooper as the first iPad. It still lasts a long time, but seems to dip faster. That could be just because the battery life of the first one was such a surprise, however. No complaints about the battery--it just *feels* a bit shorter.

Summation. If you don't have an iPad, you really ought to get one. Just so we can be Gamecenter Friends (seriously--add me. My name is M34NDR. I want to see how many games you have, and if I have more achievements than you. It's all about proving my virtual worth.) If you DO have an iPad 2, I'd have to say upgrading is probably not worth it, with one exception. Are all the improvements worth another $500 of your money? Even if you sell your old iPad, it'll still probably set you back $200-$300, easy. And I don't think it's worth that.

On the other hand, if you have someone in your family clamoring for an iPad, then there's certainly no reason to wait for the iPad 3. AND--if you can count your iPad purchase as a business expense, then it's a no brainer. Totally worth it.

In any case--those are my thoughts. Any questions? Need any clarification? Ask away.

We've got new stuff!

2011-06-07T06:42:00.000-07:00

When doing research, it's easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of available information - especially on the Web. You can cut down on the information clutter by learning to quickly evaluate different types of sources and the material you find there. Is it reliable? Is it current? Is it appropriate for your research? We've got a brand new tutorial to help you accurately assess information and get the best possible results for your assignments. Check out the tutorial here, on Libguides.

Also new: 111 items available for circulation! Woot! Vampires, politicians, children's books, arts and crafts, poetry and scholarly works -as always, there's a flavor for everyone. New Aquisitions can be browsed here.

And, last but not least, the 2011 -2012 On Our Minds books are in the lobby and ready to set out with you on an Appalachian adventure. If you're looking for a great hammock read, come in and grab a copy of A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail.