Thing 25: Widgets and Gadgets

This was surprisingly frustrating. So many of the most useful widgets are about publicizing hits and visits to your blog. Not that many people come to my blog, so I don't feel great about publicizing it! Also, I didn't have good luck finding Blogger widgets that corresponded with the Word Press widgets in the "20 usability tips for your blog" article.

I set up the widget that will allow me to post by e-mail to my blog. I'm not sure how much functionality it really added, though.

I added a "Winston Churchill quotes, a YouTube gallery, "Interesting Photos on Flickr,"and had earlier added a countdown to the More Things deadline. It happens I also used Picture Trail widget, from the first 23 Things, in my Paper Baubles blog today. Widget-minded, I guess. I didn't like the ads on the Churchill widget.

None of the playful widgets, like the art, or quotations, etc., seemed like something I'd go out of my way to put on my blog. They seemed commercial and "cold," not unique or interesting.

I spent some time looking for pictures on some of the picture sites, but ended up going to Google images and amazon.com because all of the pictures I selected had apparently opted out of Big Huge Labs. Then I switched to a PictureTrail flick, but I just stayed with the pictures I was confident of, since by then my hours on this Thing were piling up.

I enjoyed the "Typealyzer!" My blog type is just about opposite from the Myers-Briggs type that has remained consistent for me for over 30 years! That's good, though, because I was going for a particular style, one that fits well with the Type the Typealyzer analyzed! (Say that three times fast!)

I played around with the tag cloud too, but was ambivalent about the results.

My big goal, after doing this Thing, is to shape up my primary blog, "Paper Baubles," per the "20 Usability Tips for your blog," not a Thing 25-related goal, but the article was just what I needed to refocus my blog.

I might add some sound to my blog, and I definitely want to pursue backing up my blog. That is really useful -- I've been wondering if there was a way to back up, but hadn't gotten that far on my "explore how to" list.

I'm trying to keep pace with the Things this time and not have to do them in a rush at the end. So why am I doing them in a rush now? I don't know, it just works out that way! Today is the day I assigned myself to start Thing 26, so I'm declaring myself done for now. I;ve spent 4-6 hours on this, not completely excessive, but enough for me for now.

Once again, and I suppose this is an acceptable outcome, I'm left with a lot of things I'd like to continue to explore.

Thing 8: Share your creations

One of the constant problems we experience at work is when people with no computer skills need to do something on-line. It really takes more staff time than we have to coach them through how to use a mouse, use e-mail, send attachments, etc.

It would be cool to set up an easy-to-access slide presentation with basic computer and internet use instruction. It wouldn't be the final answer, but it would be a start for people who are really struggling, and it would be more efficient and consistent than instruction depending on the time available to the library staff.

I know there are on-line instruction modules available that academic libraries produce, and that they may use more complex software, but even a set of screen shots might be very worthwhile.

The photo aps are fun, and would be an appealing marketing tool for the library.

I set up a Picture Trail "film strip" and it was amazingly easy. It was quick and worked the first time! I couldn't get it to post automatically to my blog, but the code was right there and the instructions were very clear. I'd recommend it to others, definitely!

I haven't gotten into digital photo sharing but I will do more now that I've used these tools.

eFolio

I was really pleased to see the eFolio. I had just been thinking about whether to try to create something like that for job applications. Cool! Now I can.

AFTER the rest of the 23 Things. Or as many as I can fit in.

I use a Word table to keep track of the books I read, for Readers' Advisory. I wonder if that can be imported to the database software? I may check on that later, too.