File Converters

Thank you for this exercise- I'm sure it will come in handy!

Having battled initially, (some instructions seem to be missing from the beginning of the exercise!), I managed to download/upload(?) the document into Google docs.

However, although most of the information converted successfully, one must be aware that some formatting may be lost and images and graphics may change.

I was amazed that the table remained intact with the correct wording in the spaces, although the main heading italic font had changed. The bullet points had changed for the better, but the graphics had disappeared altogether.

I had thought originally that it would be the same as not being able to print documents at times.In this case, one would just copy the existing document, and paste it onto a word document. I then realised that this would only literally copy the document in order to print it out, not to enable the patron to print off a document that had been loaded in a different software format from a different pc.

Evaluating websites

Any website must be viewed with caution and users can use certain techniques and strategies to evaluate the content. Questions regarding the authority of the authors, the accuracy and currency of the information, and the purpose of the site can be asked, and if answered satisfactorily, this is a good site.

Good websites cater for a particular audience, whether it be adults, scholars or children, and the content, purpose and layout must be suitable.

Should a patron wish to join an online book discussion club, I would recommend a site like "guardian book club". This is hosted by a professor of english at a university college, and discusses various topics and themes. His name and qualifications can be verified on google.

Should that site not be to their liking, perhaps they could try "the book club online". One must register to join so the assumption is that someone is in control of the site and content. Information about the organisation will be present somewhere on the site.

There are various groups to join in discussing books, such as popular websites like "yahoo book club" and "google book club".This depends on the users preference and a quick visit to see if the content (and the links) are still active and/or fairly current is recommended. At the moment Yahoo caters to fans of "Twilight", Diana Gabaldon and paranormal, mystery and regency romance among others. Google features Stephen King, Terry Pratchett etc.

All these group discussions enable one not only to discuss their current reading matter but also to discover other similar books and authors.

Online book suggestions can be found easily on "The Book Seer", merely by following the prompt. Suggestions are supplied by Amazon and LibraryThing, both reputable suppliers of books and information pertaining to books. Being online, these are totally up to date and new items added continuously.I did not really like LibraryThing.

"What should I read next" is my favourite, and appears in most libraries in hard copy as well as being available online. The recommendations are very apt as I have been pleasantly surprised with their suggestions. The authority of the publishers and contributors are stated in the hard copy book. The content and layout is nicely laid out.

an authors perspective

I wanted to hear a podcast about an author I was familiar with (eg Brian Falkner) , but could not find one. I found his listing on NZ Book Council's NZ writer files, and while the information was interesting, and his website was fascinating with crawling spiders, no podcast.

An interview of Bill Bryson on Powell's Books; Author interviews was conducted in a typed format, as a conversation.

Eventually, on Authors on tour live, I found podcasts. Again, I wanted to hear an familiar author but had to settle for their prescribed list.The podcasts are taken from real life author events and some authors are not that comfortable talking out loud about their books. Justin Cronin, author of "The Passage" seemed a little uneasy and this medium is quite unforgiving as only the speech is heard without the character of the author coming through.

I think I would only like to listen to a podcast after I have read a particularly memorable book to find out what the author's rationale was behind the story.

readers and lovers

Normally, I would look in "What should I read next?" for a recommendation following a favourite book ("Deep Storm" by Lincoln Child). Being hard copy, this listing could be rather dated, so I was delighted to find this service online. The list of similar books were impressive. I had already enjoyed 80% of the recommendations and can't wait to read the other 20%!

I could not get Book Suggester to work but the Book Seer (after some time and in cahoots with Amazon) reluctantly yielded a rather meagre suggestion of one (very apt) by Douglas Preston. The LibrayThing suggestion is still loading.

Regarding LibraryThing, the only use I can make of it is being able to compile my own list of favourite books. I can't seem to get into any one else's recommendations or reviews.

I am very impressed with the NSL 'syndetics' feature of being able to access various book reviews by clicking on the book cover in the catalogue. Some reviews suggest alternative authors as well as the opportunity to read a complete first chapter of the book in question.

Specialist search engines

Google search engines seem to cover ANY query!

The image search can be used for posters, to enhance assignments and to satisfy any curiosity. Being able to limit images by size, type or predominant colour is fantastic. Copyright must be considered when using any image. Flickr seems to focus only on photographs but with additional information such as the authors name, where the photograph was taken and sometimes a little more information. It's creative commons feature allows one the use of the image with acknowledgement to the creator.Google, yahoo, bing and exalead have very similar features.

The video search can be used for anything that requires viewing eg: "how to prune roses", "how to make the perfect omelette", and the demonstrations are particularly useful when learning how to use certain applications eg:Web 2.0. Searching for subjects was very easy with options provided for 'related videos, funny, popular, etc. I found amazing video footage of "Angkor Wat" on YouTube, Blinkx and Bing and it was very interesting to see Heather Stone doing "The Reference Interview"! Blinkx was particularly useful for viewing past episodes of television programmes and, although it only seemed to offer prescribed programmes, one could still choose the genre.

Google book search was excellent in tracking down books, by using keywords, if one has forgotten the title. It also provides reviews, related topics and books, the ability to read popular passages as well as references from various sources.

Using Google's book search to find articles in magazines was unbelievable! Patrons are always asking for articles they found in magazines and this is a fantastic way to track them down. Thumbnail covers of magazines are shown although the magazine name can also be entered in the search box. The quickest way is to use the advanced search option of title, exact phrase, full view text and date limiters. I found an excellent article about the Vietnam War from Life Magazine January 1975.

Google Web Searches

General Searching: I am amazed at the different number of results generating from searching singular or plural, and also the way results change, sometimes hourly! If anyone can explain why, or how to ensure only one set of results occur, I would be very grateful.


As google generates millions of results, it is always good to refine the searching terms. This can be done using the radio buttons for the web or NZ, or/and "Advanced search" by using "phrase searching" and limited by date.


I have always enjoyed the various options provided by google (web, news, images, video etc) but was very impressed with the other (even more) options available ; "reviews, blogs, discussion search, wonderwheel and timeline".


The related searches and linked catagories that come up are very useful.

Although most of the search engines have the same options of: related searches, related catagories, quick limit searches to entire web or only nz, as well as the possibility to view searches by images, video, news, blogs, forums etc, some are more suitable than others for certain subjects.




Google wonderwheel would be very useful for students undertaking research as it provides a "mind map" to assist in organising information. Timeline is another very useful device in determining when past events actually occurred.



Yahoo: Information is already organised in different categories so searching can be less time consuming. A 'searchpad' facility is provided to make notes to refer to later, and of course, the images and Flickr are amazing.

Bing "organises answers in such a way that results can be found faster".The page layout is plain and simple but a hovering mouse leads to further information. Bing does not offer any 'advanced search' facility.

Exalead has 'thumbnail' pictures of the web pages (handy for memory jogging!) and 'bookmarks' can be added if required. The 'advanced search' is all on the same page - very useful.

I tried to find a subject (plexiglass) that wouldn't generate too many hits (!) Google had the most hits but also has the options to limit and refine the search to suit my particular query. A lot of searches were duplicated in all the search engines and although I liked the simple layout of both Bing and Exalead, I prefer searching Yahoo!Xtra.

Google seems to be the default on every pc, so a quick search for a 'ready question and answer' is very convenient.

module 3 Topic 2- google alerts

I looove Google alerts! The best thing is that updated mail is only sent if something new is reported so it is a very efficient way to keep tabs on a particular subject, event, person etc without having to trawl through all the old history.

My search originally started with "metastatic melanoma" but as I was only really interested in the developments concerning Dr John Pollock, I used his name as my "feed alert".Unfortunately, I could not find any "feed alert" so had to resort to RSS'ing the headlines instead!

A more successful exercise was using the "feed alert" for my daily dose of the "Sideswipe" column in the New Zealand Herald.This was confirmed by Google in minutes.

I have discovered that not all items have "feed alerts" but at least I am aware of them now.

I think these alerts would be very useful to patrons following a particular author or pop star in discovering exactly when they have written a new book or new release etc.

RSS Feeds

I tried putting an RSS feed from AccessScience, Proquest and Science Journals but it constantly drops out while waiting between "save" and "create RSS feed". At least this exercise has alerted me to the potential of both these time saving ways of keeping up to date with selected information, AND being able to view this information in 1 place!!

I was wondering if this can only be set up with services that supply RSS feeds? and if not, then how?

The NSL website was fascinating, showing information about the latest computer classes, new book titles, book reviews etc.

Twitter and Libraries

1. Some interesting tweets about recommendations of other books enjoyed by patrons eg: "If you enjoyed Stieg Larsson's 'Girl with the dragon tattoo', try Nora Ephrons' parody. Some mindless tweets about one's wardrobe for the day!

The vast quantity of tweets makes it impossible to follow any particular one.

2."....if I have to listen to 1 more mother extolling the 'advanced reading age' of her child, I will guffaw loudly while remembering the "Belynda Broadcast" at the Childrens Reading experience!"

Twitter continued...

Lazytweet: This sounds like a better idea....Apparently, just by adding "lazytweet" to your question, it may be answered, without having to sign up to Twitter! I would really view any information with great caution.

Searching Twitter

(1) Tweepsearch:I understand that one can find people on Twitter either by location or by name.

So, location :"New Zealand, Auckland" or by name "name: ****". No results.

Searches can be combined,

" location: auckland name: *****". In spite of changing the option to New Zealand in ChirpCity, the only results were from the USA.

I was wondering if the user had to join Twitter first to find people or whether the person you are trying to find also has to join?

(2) Again, using Tweepsearch, I searched for John Key in Vietnam in both basic and advanced search. I knew he had 70 photos of his recent trip from the first Twitter search.

Eventually, I entered "John Key in Vietnam" in the searchbox and lots of unrelated images came up although containing both search terms eg John Lennon, low key guy etc.

Any information regarding both these unsuccessful searches will be gratefully received!

(3) Twazzup - The best feature of twitter is "news as it happens" so I entered "All Blacks" hoping for the latest score (not that Im the slightest interested in rugby!). One very uninteresting sentance came up, followed by a rant about a majority white jury in a court case in L.A. As Twitter is limited to only 140 characters, I found it difficult to understand what it was all about.

I assume that once you join (and/or have the time) you can access all the related tweets and follow the links to their home page to find out whats it all about. As Twitter deals with a social networking environment only, I would preferably use Google to search for results.

Introduction to twitter

I was surprised to see twitters attributed to certain authors actually have other people twittering for them. Some tweets are VERY boring (thank goodness they are restricted to only 140 characters!) but some could be quite interesting.Some tweets do not make much sense due to this restriction but apparently if you subscribe you can access the information more fully. The use of '#' is a very good idea for a quick reference to themes instead of having to wade through lots of twits' tweets (hahahha).



Meg Cabots' tweet had some very banal entries - but also a very interesting one about Olivia who is doing drawings of birds to sell to raise money for the Gulf coast birds affected by the oilspill.

John Keys' tweet appears to be about self-promotion and events.

Regarding our library, this would be a good way for our library users to view reviews of our latest books if we didn't have a link to them on our librarys home page.

I did enjoy the information available from"grabaseat", "NZ history online" and "cookbook via twitter" even though the recipes did appear to be written in Yiddish!

Open ID

Using Open ID does save time as numerous different accounts and user names do not have to be set up. It is also a very good idea for those users that are liable to forget passwords. You still do have to register all your details and passwords with another site, however, so your own security and privacy can still be compromised.

Personally, I do not know anyone who uses Open ID but it may be a good idea for setting one up to use for future Web.2 programmes.

Creative Commons

(a) 6 baseline rights were laid down for allowing one the rights to use certain web programmes, images, music etc but with certain conditions. The images are allowed to be shared, copied, distributed and adapted but the author must be acknowledged. Should the image be altered in any way, it can only be distributed under the same creative commons license as the original.It is recommended that the image used should be accompanied with a link to the web page.





(b) Here is the link to my image : http://www.flickr.com/photos/tylerdurden/361274809/sizes/l/

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Testing again...

Module 1 topic 1

The more people are informed about the disadvantages as well as the advantages of using the www, the better. Our library patrons (or anybody) should be made aware never to let anyone know, or use, their passwords.They should not leave their passwoods lying around or leave sensitive information on the screen when absent from the pc. Passwords should be fairly complex consisting of letters, numbers and symbols. Always keep in mind the "safeness" of the venue when sending sensitive material for eg, I feel that banking online would rather be carried out in our library rather than an internet cafe. Always ensure you log off properly.