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Day 12 Dec 06

Entries 3 Total

verbotomy

Dec 12, ’06 1:41 PM

If you’re a librarian I bet you have a thing for words. Here’s the game for you. Verbotomy is a bit like a structured version of Wordie. However, instead of listing words that you like you’re presented with a definition and you have to create the word for it. Also included is a funny comic that is an example of the word in action. Today’s definition is:

DEFINITION: To offer non-denominational, inter-faith seasonal greetings, which are nevertheless a tad politically incorrect.

My first thoughts were tannenbomb and holigrate but you can do better.

The community of players votes on the words provided, and points are assigned.

There’s even a Verbotomy RSS page where you can grab your preferred flavor of feed so you don’t have to remember to go to the page.

Comments (1)

rescuing data from the OPAC

Dec 12, ’06 9:09 AM

Part of the long and major redesign of the Thomas Ford Memorial Library website mandated a browsable list of the feature films available. The idea, I’m pretty sure, is to have an online version of the title list binder that sits by the movies. There are a number of ways I could have accomplished this. Here’s a list or possible methods, ranked effort required and the resulting usability:

  • link from the website to the Word doc that already exists
  • link from the website to a PDF
  • copy and paste the titles into a Movable Type post to display them on the web
  • copy and paste the titles into a Movable Type post, but link the titles into the OPAC
  • make an individual post for each title, including a link to the OPAC, info about the film, a link to the IMDB’s entry on the film, and a place for user comments

films at the ford
There might be some more usable and labor intensive ways to do this, but let’s stop there because that’s what I decided to do. On one hand, it was bad that I couldn’t get access to the ILS and have some awesome scripts to automate this a la the WPOpac, but on the other hand, doing what I did wasn’t that much more terrible than linking titles to the OPAC in a plain old HTML document. Plus, since it is in this blog post format, other staff can easily keep the list up to date without the need for much instruction.

The pages could use some design tweaking, but since we’re going to have a whole new design in the next few months, it doesn’t make sense to spend that much more time on it. The important part is that the content and mechanics are in place. Speaking of mechanics, comments are moderated until approval. I don’t see this changing, mostly because this is built on Movable Type so spam will be very difficult to control.

infernal affairs

I see this little project as an experiment. If successful it will be an indication that the very lofty goals we initially made for the new site (now relegated to Phase 2) were on track, and that we shouldn’t forget about them.

You all are getting a sneak preview since this isn’t yet linked from anywhere on the TFML site. Poke around, see if you find anything goofy, and leave some movie reviews or comments.

Films at the Ford

Comments (8)

meebo love

Dec 12, ’06 8:08 AM

Jessamyn and I got mentioned on the meebo blog today:

Turns out that locked-down computers, reference librarians who always want to be in touch with their patrons, and the desire to make libraries fun and friendly have given meebo and meebo me the perfect opportunity to shine.

Just recently, we smiled when reading Jessamyn’s blog where she helped a librarian post these posters advocating the use of meebo instead of download clients. Also, Aaron has been traipsing around libraries promoting meebo me as well. He explains, meebo me doesn’t require a download and the widget can be placed directly on the library’s website.

Thanks for keeping meebo in mind when you’re visiting your local library and public computer clusters. We’re happy to help out!

Just in case you haven’t seen it, meebo me is a small web to IM gateway widget that librarians can put on webpages that allows people without IM accounts to IM the library’s screen name. It is pretty much 90% of the functionality of vendor driven web-based chat products….but it is FREE. And it just works. And doesn’t commandeer their whole browser. Etc, etc.

Here’s the full post on the meebo blog: librarian love. There are a few nice, “Yay libraries!” comments on it.

Disclaimer: I would have posted about this even if meebo hadn’t just sent me a sweet t-shirt.

[thanks rob!]

Comments (4)