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bi-monthly wrap up of NOLA news and information, be sure to check out NOLA Notes!
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| From
the Director's Desk - Paul Pormen |
I’ve been interested in technology since I was a child and bought my first used wire recorder. Yes a wire recorder. This was a machine that recorded sound on a very thin wire before reel-to-reel tape recorders were invented. It has been great to live in this time of great technological advancement. One thing I have learned through all
these technical changes is that no one knows it all and that networking is the only way to keep up with a world where change seems to be happening at a faster pace each month.
There is so much information and so little time to absorb it. To that end, I would like to share some to the technology info that has come to my computer in the past few weeks. Hopefully some of it will be of use to you. Likewise I would encourage you to share information of interest to the profession with others by submitting your “finds” to us. We will be glad to publish these in future issues of Desktop News.
Technophobia
Fly, crash and burn, and start again. No matter what our technology skill level, we all suffer from Technophobia from time to time. Here is some advice from Peter Cochrane in an article “A Guide at the Side or a Sage on the Stage” from the Times Educational Supplement.
Technophobia is a natural reaction to the pace of change we now have to live with, but there is a cure - get immersed and use the technology to advantage! But how are isolated individuals to do this? Specifically, how is a teacher to afford such a personal facility? Without doubt getting on a machine, by yourself, and avoiding that critical eye when making mistakes has a lot going for it. An understanding friend who has recently survived the same learning curve can also be of great benefit. Reading the handbook and going through the tutorial is not! Learning IT skills is more about playing than formalism. Watch young children on PCs, they never look at the handbook, they play and share their experience, they have no inhibitions about making mistakes and looking foolish in front of their peers. They just fly, crash and burn, and start again. This is something adults can learn to do and enjoy too - even in front of a class!
The complete article can be found at: http://www.labs.bt.com/library/cochrane/papers/asageont.htm
Election Controversy
If you have not had enough info on the Presidential Election try the Hayes – Tilden Electoral College Controversy of 1876-1877:
http://elections.harpweek.com/controversy.htm
Description from the site:
HarpWeek has created this Website, primarily from the pages of Harper and the general public with the historic
events of the Electoral College controversy of 1876-1877.
The organization of the site allows users to follow events day by day, to acquire a more in-depth understanding by
reading the overview, and to gain insight into the press
period cartoons (most by Thomas Nast), along with corresponding explanations of their historical meaning.
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Reference Staff
Increasing
“The number of reference specialists working in public libraries has
increased by 56 percent in the past five years, according to Market Data
Retrieval, a subsidiary of Dun & Bradstreet that provides information
on the education market, including public libraries.” CNN recently did
an article on Reference Librarians and their profession, with emphasis on
the technology role of the profession.
Check it out at their site
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Items submitted by:
Paul Pormen - Email
Interim Executive Director
NOLA Regional Library System
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eBook News
There is a “Cribsheet on Electronic Books” that covers technologies, benefits, drawbacks, opportunities for libraries, and industry/overview with seven vendors and five public domain sites at:
http://www.rcls.org/ebookcrib.htm
NetNotice
I often wish the library would let me know that my library books are due. Cleveland Public Library has a new technology service called NetNotice that can do that and tell patrons of reserve pickup and lost item notices, or get new-title news in eight genres. For more information click on the NetNotice logo at:
http://www.cpl.org
Robert Cormier Collection
We were all saddened to hear that Robert Cormier passed away in early November. The Resource Center at Random House has an
extensive collection of materials and works of Cormier.
OELMA's New Website
OELMA (Ohio Educational Library Media Association) has a new Web site. Take time to look at all the inside pages, as well - there's some new information there, including the testimony at the State
Standards hearing.
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| From
the Field - Brad Stephens |
Will .Net fly?
Microsoft is experiencing some problems with their .NET service, which is an Application Service Provider (ASP) approach to deploying Office 2000. In an ASP environment a central company hosts the Office applications with users connecting and using the software over the Internet. Support is centralized, there is no software to install and all data
is stored on a central sever. Sound too good to be true? For now it is. Connections are a bit too slow, support too shaky, and users too
uncomfortable with storing their personal documents on remote computers over which they have no control.
Will this change? Certainly, many companies will begin to look at ASP's as a viable solution for certain limited use applications within the next 12 - 18. Once users become comfortable with this approach and high-speed network availability increases, ASP deployment of heavily used applications, such as Office, will grow.
|
 The
smell of success
About a year ago Digi-Scents, a small startup company, was mentioned it Desktop News. The company developed a technology that allows scents to be encoded in a web page or software application and reproduced for the end user. Likely users of this technology are food oriented web sites, perfume and floral shops, tourist sites, and video games.
Imagine visiting the DominosTM web site and smelling the pizza's baking or sending flowers and being able to smell the arrangement. With nearly $20 million in recent funding expect to see this and more as the computer speaker-sized iScent devices begin appearing mid 2001. Now just think of all the fun new smells you can add to your library! (only kidding). But don't write this technology off, two likely uses for libraries in the near future would be in association with eBooks and DVD's .... imagine watching Titanic and smelling the sea air or reading an eBook and experiencing the smells described by the author.
Read more: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001203/tc/fragrance_digiscents_dc_1.html
Visit their site: http://www.digiscents.com/
Pay for use eBooks
Coming soon Ebrary.com, one of the first "Pay per Use" eBook libraries. Ebrary will
initially offer access to more than 17,000 full text research titles in digital format. Patrons can read titles for free or pay a per page fee of $0.15 - $0.25 to print or electronically copy the content of the book. Patrons will also be able to "purchase" the title either electronically or print on demand. Interested libraries can implement the service for free on their websites, and will receive 5% of all revenues generated by patron use.
Find out more: http://www.ebrary.com/
Ready for the New Year?
As libraries slow down during the holidays it's often a good time to apply security patches to network systems. If you don't regularly look at
security sites it would be a good idea for system admins to visit the following sites, so that you can insure an happy new year.
Windows NT: http://www.microsoft.com/security
Novell: http://support.novell.com/filefinder/
Solaris: http://sunsolve.sun.com/pub-cgi/show.pl?target=patches/patch-access
IBM AIX: http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/aix/download/index.html
Items submitted by:
Brad Stephens - Email
NOLA Regional Library System
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Why is my son an assertive, go getter and his sister just wants to sit around and do nothing? Are organized sports good for my six year old? If my father and grandfather were alcoholics, will my children become alcoholics too? Discover how much of human behavior is determined by genes, society and other factors at
Reflinks 155, Differential and Developmental Psychology
Personality: What makes us who we are Slip into the unconscious mind, explore thoughts, feelings, and human nature. While your
unconscious, delve into the mysteries the sleeping mind at Reflinks
154, the Gallery of Mattresses, Dream Center. Are you a dream prophet? Can dreams influence your waking life? What exactly does it mean when I dream I'm a
goat herder in Peru walking on a high wire stretched over Madonna's bed during a solar eclipse? hmmm...move over Freud.
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Items submitted by:
Reflinks Members [email protected]
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