Comments week #14 Readings

Dustin's blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=1693482552938456993&postID=5501171602175938206&page=1

Jake's blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=633484337573796975&postID=1786636238241762083&page=1

Readings week #14

This weeks readings were about the future uses of libraries and cloud computing. I was unfamiliar with this term and confused after reading the article. Again this is a term that can mean many different things depending on which money making entity is using it. I felt that the video did a much better job of explaining the concept since it wasn't trying to sell you a certain service at the same time. The video compared computing with cloud computing to obtaining electric energy by accessing the electrical power grid, liken cloud computing with utility computing. SaaS--Software as a service and HaaS--Hardware as a service are two types of possible cloud computing services, which would connect ones computer to software and hardware as an online utility. I discovered that I already cloud compute since I use an online security suite. Who knew?
A further discussion on the leveling of the playing field since businesses could reduce capital costs didn't really sell me on the idea of cloud computing. In light of the current economy I don't trust the business world to do anything for the common man with their savings. As an individual I wondered if I want to subscibe to another monthly bill for access to the cloud. I don't have cable tv and only started to pay for internet access when I started school. I also considered the fact that many people today do not have electricity. Will cloud computing do anything but exacerbate the digital divide?
This brings us to the last reading about the future of libraries. I felt this was an overly optimistic view of the future as well as the future of libraries. Again, in light of the current economy I wonder where the financing for all these technological developments will come from. And, I admit it, I would hate to see the end of the book.

Week #13 Muddiest Point

Why it is illegal in the United States to use 128 key encryption? Isn't the purpose of encryption to protect privacy? Is the US government less interested in privacy and more interested in spying on its law abiding citizens?

Reading Comments Week #13

Dustin's blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=1693482552938456993&postID=9057758121596538993&page=1


Maggie's blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4657309357315020681&postID=4495916162585289725&page=1

Muddiest Point Week #12 Revisted

After viewing the class presentation on Sunday morning I was wondering why so little class time was spent on podcasts? I am familiar with blogs and wikis because of school assignments but I know little about podcasts.

Muddiest Point week #12

No video was posted so its difficult to have a muddy point from class. This week's topic was social software. I looked through the power point slides but it left alot to be desired without a video or audio presentation. The university is closed for the holidays so I assume no one was there to post the video before the muddiest point due date.

Readings week #13

2 readings and 1 video for this week. The 2 readings were 2 websites.
No Place To Hide Website--Robert O'Harrow, Jr. and the Center for Investigative Reporting
This website has many links. The website presents multimedia investigations by news organizations working together concerning the government's expanded surveillance authorities and activities in the wake of September 11, 2001. The government uses private data collection to watch its citizens in the name of security. This site also comments on the passing of inaccurate information among government agencies.
Electronic Privacy Information Center Website
Another website with many links devoted to privacy and security issues in an electronic age. This site discusses the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and "Total or Terrorism Information Awarness" (TIA). TIA sought to establish a "grand, virtual, centralized database" by using data mining or knowledge discovery tools in order to deter terrorism. Law enforcement was suppose to be given access to private data such as the financial, medical, communication, and travel records of individuals without a suspicion of wrong doing or a warrant. This agency's funding was eliminated in 2003, but, according to this site, this did not end this type of government activity. Data mining by the government using private information databases continues.
The video was title "Is Privacy Dead" by Jeffrey Rosen. Some good points were made by Mr. Rosen concerning the design of technology to both protect privacy and aide security. He stated that surveillence issues are not technological issues but political and cultural issues. He also talked about the US governments data mining activities. He also compared policies in place in Britain and the US. He used examples of "naked machines" at Heathrow and Phoenix airports and the use of surveillance cameras through Britain. Interesting ideas on democratic and heirarchal thinking as well as classification and exclusion and cultural differences. It was interesting that cameras in Britain have not deterred crime.

Reading Comments week #12

Amanda's I.T. blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4815117704244121663&postID=7919017436162120728&page=1

Rebecca's Intro to IT blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=5720842264846496247&postID=3966162379616194587&page=1

Muddiest Point Week #11

I was wondering about the physical set up of a digital repository. Is it on site at the university? Does it have built in redundancy either on site or at another geographical location? How are issues of equipment failure, natural disaster, and information loss handled?

Readings week #12

Week 12's reading seemed to center around so called "social software."
The first article was about weblogs or commonly called blogs. This article contained a brief history as well as some ideas for using blogs. I appreciated this article since it gave definitions for commonly used terms. I also found the discussion on push/pull types of technology useful.
The second article was about using wiki technology to better serve patrons in a library setting. As with blogs, free software is available to enable this technology. Wikis promote shared knowledge and cooperation to create resources.
The third article discussed social tagging, the creation of bookmarks for websites that are saved online. These tags have subject keywords and description attached for searching purposes. The del.icio.us site was described as a place to collaborate by sharing tags and discovering new resources. Problems with social tagging include variations in tags, user understanding of keywords, and spagging (spam tagging).
The final reading was actually a video of Jimmy Wales, the creator of Wikipedia. It was enlightening to realize the huge size of Wikipedia, the international use, and the number of paid employees-one. Additionally, it operates on a free license and is funded by donations and is run by volunteers. Jimmy Wales is also often misquoted by the media. It was also interesting to hear about how the entire Wikipedia functions with regard to deleting pages and who has the final word. Also of interest was the discussion over the citation merits of Wikipedia since this is a topic that has been of interest in other classes.

Comments week #11 Readings

Analog failure
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=84548656281186042&postID=1818833400642052070&page=1

Maggie's blog
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4657309357315020681&postID=1295012642050597602&page=1

Muddiest Point week #10

People manipulate a web crawler by increasing links in their work. How do web crawlers recognize this and fight against it?

Readings Week #11

Two of this week's readings were about digital libraries and one was about institutional repositories.
Digital Libraries Challenges and Influential Work
Federal support funded the Digital Library Initiative, DLI-1 in 1994 and DLI-2 in 1998. The purpose of the DLI projects were to make large scale digital resources and collections accessible and interoperable. University led teams worked with commercial vendors and software companies to define and identitfy important document, data, and metadata standards and protocols for Web based searching. The DLI program contributed to the development of best practices. Significant technology was transferred from this program. A spin off from DLI program resulted in Google.
Dewey Meets Turing Librarians, Computer Scientists, and the Digital Libraries Initiative
This article discussed the association of the National Science Foundation with the Digital Libraries Initiative in 1994 . It also mentioned that Google emerged from funded work. This article dealt mainly with the relationships between Librarians and Computer Scientists as a result of their working together on Digital Libray projects. Publishers are also mentioned as interested parties to Digital Library development. According to this article the DLI project is seen as broadening opportunities for library science since the core functions of librarianship, organizing, collating and presenting information still need to be preformed.
Institutional Depositories: Essential Infrastructure for Scholarship in the Digital Age
This article concerned the need for universities to move beyond their historically passive roles of supporting publishers and into the development and maintenance of digital repositories. Recent technological trends and developments, such as the drop in online storage costs and standards development, have made this possible. The development of an institutional repository requires collaboration among the institution's community as well as a commitment to organization, access, distribution, and long term preservation of digital materials produced by its members. In this article an institutional repository is seen as "complement and a supplement rather than a substitute for traditional scholarly publication venues." This author of this article warns of possible problems with institutional repositories, among which are the problems associated with material loss due to technical failure. Little built in system redundancy is also mentioned.

Comments week #10

Renee's Published as week 11
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=7804417981817162815&postID=7468087571052576296&page=1

Analog Failure
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=84548656281186042&postID=8457762204976437600&page=1

Assignment #6 My Website

View my website at:

Susanna's Website

Muddiest point Class #9

I am still alittle uncertain about XML. When it is said that XML does not use predefined tags, that you define your own, wouldn't that lead to alot of computer confusion? Or is it the use of the DTD or XML Schema that tells the computer what your tags mean?

Readings week #10

The article by David Hawking was all about search engines. Search engines index and answer billions of queries per day. They provide high quality answers and reject low value content. The major search engines named in this article are Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. A large, geographically distributed infrastructure is neccessary in order to support a search engine. Search engines use crawling algorithms to compile lists of URLs. Crawlers use links in documents to find high quality websites. Documents without links are often not searched by crawlers. Crawlers can be prone to system problems and failures, and spammers in addition to a failure to consider unlinled documents. The second part of this article concerned the methods used by crawlers to index documents, usually by creating an inverted file that is stored, often compressed, in memory. Search engines often maintain lists of common queries in order to return search results quickly.
The next two articles concerned the deep, hidden, or invisible web as opposed to the surface web. Search engines usually do a poor job of accessing quality content from the deep web since article in the deep web are often html documents without links. The article about the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting discusses the open access method for gaining federated access to eprint archives through metadata harvesting and aggregation. OAI's goal is to develop and promote interoperability standards and efficient dissemination of content. The OAIPMH protocal is based on common standards and was funded by grants. OAIPMH attempts to provide better communication between data providers who build repositories and collections with important content and services providers who are harvesters that build services for collections and contents. The final article, which was a bit dated concerned the use of a for cost product called "Brightlight" which claimed to be a search engine capable of searching the entire web, the surface and the deep web.

Reading Comments Week #9

Maggie
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4657309357315020681&postID=2568972663544538000&page=1

Jenny
http://jzlis2600blog.blogspot.com/2008/10/week-9-reading-note-entries_21.html?showComment=1224995280000#c1363056804416574005

Week #8 Muddiest Point

I'm not sure if this is technically a muddiest point or a rant. I checked Thursday night, after 9:30PM for the class video. It wasn't there. I worked all day Friday. I checked when I got home and there it was. I changed my plans so I could view the video and post my muddiest point. The video had numerous problems that made it difficult to watch, including slides not matching audio. Do I understand HTML and CSS and web site design? I'm not sure I do. Professor's He's frequent use of website viewing is not very helpful to me as an online students. I will print out the slides and attempt to visit some of the sites on my own.

Readings week #9

All four of this week's reading concerned XML (extensible markup language). XML is a subset of SGML (standard generalized markup language). Using XML is suppose to make it easy to interchange structured documents over the Internet. XML is considered important for presentation, exchange, and management of information. XML is not a predefined set of tags that can be used to markup documents like HTML. XML documents are composed of a series of entities or objects. Each entity has one or more logical elements. Elements have attributes or properties. XML is a formal syntax for describing the relationships between entities, elements, and attributes. XML allows the bringing together of multiple files to form compound documents. XML identifies illustrations to be incorporated into text files, provides processing control information to support programs, and allows the addition of editorial comment to a file. XML coded files are ideal for storing in databases because it is object orientated and heirarchical nature. XML usually contain a DTD (document type declaration) which defines the structure of XML.
XML is a rapidly growing technology that has been undergoing standardization. According to Survey of XML Standards, standards are any specification that is significantly adopted by a diversity of vendors or recommended by a respectable vendor-neutral organization.
XML Schema is an XML based alternative to DTD that describes the structure of an XML document.
The readings and tutorials really became technical. The last tutorial recommended a basic understanding of HTML and XHTML, XML and XML namespaces, and DTD. I'm not sure that reading a few readings is enough to obtain a basic understanding. Hopefully some hands on practice with do what mere reading can't.

Assignment #5 Collection Building in Koha ILS

View my virtual shelf

HRM (Human Resource Management)

http://pitt4.opacwc.liblime.com/cgi-bin/koha/opac-shelves.pl?viewshelf=11

Week #8 comments

Joyce
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=6411265268178233609&postID=7294847848083393623&page=1

April
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=8747228788318880740&postID=1300087712881499503&page=1

Muddiest point week #7 class

I am confused about when reading assignments are due when there is no class scheduled for the next week. I asked in the discussion board, no answer. I went to the online chat, but no one was there. The video of class did not cover this. Maybe I should ask a pitt virtual librarian? (hah, hah)

Readings week #8

The first 2 readings were really tutorials on HTML and CSS. I have never created web documents so the tutorials were all new to me. The 3 reading was a HTML cheat sheet. Why no cheat sheet for CSS? Easily found on the web though.

Beyond HTML: Developing and re-imagining library web guides in a content management system
This reading was a case study. The Georgia State University Library developed, in house, a content management system to manage web-based research guides. Of interest to me was all the collaboration that took place between the system developers and the users. A successful database requires user input and in this example repeated methods such as numerous surveys and liaison groups were employed to this end. Technical issues and user issues were given equal attention.Even the migration from the old "file and folder" system to the new database-driven website system was phased in gradually. I found this unusual because in my experience these types of system changes do not go smoothly. The upgrade to the content management system standardized the content of the research guide and provided better system security. Additionally, the new system reduced data duplication and was much smaller in size compared to the old system. More training both initial and on-going was found to be needed which seems to be a problem in most conversions.

Assignment #4 Working with Jing

Jing video
http://www.screencast.com/users/woodss53/folders/Jing/media/5723af0c-e005-438b-84c9-05f1380ffeba

Jing images on Flickr
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/2907860283/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/2907875475/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/2907882651/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/2908741142/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/2907904323/

Week 7 Comments

Jenny
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=61837130736160649&postID=4740099175044384559&page=1

Sr. Becky
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2369947867373070193&postID=3541465736579393008&page=1

Muddiest point week #6

I have questions concerning fiber optics. Is this the wave of the future or is wireless? Is fiber optic wiring to your home or is in also in your home?

Weekly Readings #7

How stuff works--Internet Infrastructure
Great explanation of networks, routers, IP addresses, the Domain Name System, URLS, servers and clients.

Inside the Google machine.
Another sales pitch. It was obvious to me that Google is a business with revenues from advertisors tied to searches. Google wants to make the world a better place while making money. I did like the 80%/20% idea of spending 20% of work time on what you think is important. Unfortunately, watching the video was alot like watching the video of class. You can't really see what's happenning on their screen and during questions and answers its hard to hear the questions. Also, this video was from 2004. In the age of instant communication this seemed old.

Dismantling Integrated Library Systems
This article was also from 2004. I tried to think of it in terms of the library where I work. We migrated from DRA to SIRSI awhile back. I didn't really understand why at the time but now it makes sense to me because DRA went out of business. In operability with the Web is not a problem at my library.
This article semi-annoyed me. I often wonder why systems designers don't take into account existing technology when new systems are designed. Or do they? Having to purchase completely new systems is a very lucrative revenue stream. I wonder if there is enough funding available to keep public libraries technological updated.

Comments week #6

Maggie

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4657309357315020681&postID=2344548930214601528&page=1

Amanda
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=271112965323219834&postID=4136068326121933023&page=1

Muddiest point #5

When I try to watch a streaming video the video starts and stops and then restarts. Is this a problem with my connection?

Readings week #6

This weeks readings plus videos from YouTube were relevant to my current employment situation. I work at a large urban public library and the information about RFID was useful. We use a bar code plus target system for tracking and security. Material often goes missing and is never seen or heard from again. I wonder at the need for RFID since the trends are toward digital libraries. Why convert to an RFID system when actually physical materials in libraries are suppose to decline? The money could be spent elsewhere.
As for the privacy issues concerned with RFID, I certainly don't want to be tagged and tracked. Librarians are often concerned with privacy issues, so I can see that acceptance of RFID would be a hard sell from that vantage point. And as mentioned RFID can be blocked with sheets of aluminum foil. If we know that, thieves know it too. Also, the tendency in my library is to get the cheapest form of any technology which is usually the least effective. In the down turning economy it seems like a big investment in new technology at an inappropriate time.

The other readings and video concerned networks. LANs, WANs, PANs, MANs, CANs etc. It seems as though the boundaries between the different types of networks are blurring as new technology evolves.

Assignment #3

See my citation library at:

woodss53

http://www.citeulike.org/user/woodss53

Comments week #5

Jenny Z
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=61837130736160649&postID=6867533606216665537&page=1

Rebecca
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=5720842264846496247&postID=3966077891775309429&page=1

Muddiest point class #4

Popular data models for databases are now relational, object-oriented, object relational, and multidimensional. Mentioned in the class video were network and heirarchical models that are considered out of date. What happens to the databases based on those models that are now out of date?

Readings week #5

Imaging Pittsburgh...
I found this reading to be extremely interesting since it related directly to my perspective field. This article related the challenges and issues surrounding working with different institutions as well as the challenges inherent in any digitization project. Of the most interest to me were the communications challenges the project faced. Do all the technological communication methods available lead to aceptable communication?

YouTube and libraries...
This article seemed like an advertisement for YouTube. It didn't really interest me at all. I don't have video recording equipment so I have no need to create an account. I have viewed videos on YouTube but they were for entertainment, not for instruction or training.

Data Compression
Two articles were about data compression using either lossy or lossless technology. I understand the need for compression in order to more efficiently store and transfer data. I now have some understanding of the different methods used to compress different types of data such as text, audio, and video. I also now understand that if you use a compression program to encode your data the receiver of the data must have the same program to decode the data. I am alittle concerned by lossy data compression in that the data obtained after decoding is not necessarily identical to the original. Although this method is usually used for images and audio I have to wonder if this is always the case. Who knows what text has been victimized by lossy data compression?

Assignment #2

Flickr photos

www.flickr.com/photos/woodss53/

Comments week 4 readings

Sr. Becky
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2369947867373070193&postID=7977490293481423923&page=1

Mazy
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=6887347751761325191&postID=264760058908056757&page=1

Muddiest point class #3

What effect will exclusive use of web browser have on older computer hardware that is no longer supported by current operating systems?

Readings week #4

The readings this week focused on databases. The 3 articles combined with the chapters in the book were somewhat confusing because it seems that the same vocabulary has different meanings depending upon the author.
The article in Wikipedia originally caused confusion, namely concerning database models and database management system models. I realized that I confusing a structure to store data with a type of software used to organize the stored data. The database management system models in the Wikipedia article did not match those described in Discovering Computers 2009. I wonder why since both are suppose to be up to date?
The article on the Dublin Core Data Model was enlightening. In a global setting there is need for some standardization of databases, since the goal is to access information. The goal of this effort is to foster interoperability between databases by establishing a formal data model by identifying a set of metadata (data about data) elements that can be used to describe and search across information sources.
"Setting the Stage" was an article about metadata and its use in databases and other digital and non-digital information systems. This article also made reference to library situations! Also mentioned was the importance of structure of information objects and the need for some sort of metadata standards. The Dublin Core Metadata Element Set was also mentioned, as was the need for standards for purposes of interoperability. Information is processed data that is organized, meaningful, and useful, and hopefully retrieveable both now and in the future.

Discussion question ditgitization

A comment to the digitization question was posted by me
https://courseweb.pitt.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_9047_1%26url%3D

Muddiest point class #2

My question has to do with storage media life expectancies. I work with microfilm which has fallen out of favor for a number of legitimate reasons. Microfilm is being replaced by storage media that seems to have a guaranteed life expectancy of 10 years at the most. What happens then? If the media has to be replaced who will bear the burden of the cost? Is this a hidden cost of digitization?

Comments week #3 Readings

Sr. Becky
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2369947867373070193&postID=8474964051354392271

Renee
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=7804417981817162815&postID=2717220004531265370

Week 3 Readings

These readings concentrated on operating systems, specifically Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows Vista. The Linux and 2 Mac OS X readings were very technical. The Windows Vista reading was more like a sales pitch and not technical at all. As a person who is not very technically inclined, I think this is the appeal of Microsoft products and advertising. Like many other computer users, I jut want the system to work. That being said I have not upgraded to Vista at home because of negative experiences with Vista at work. Before Vista we were able to scan microfilm and email the pdf file to our patrons. This program was and still is uncompatible with Vista. We had to go back to XP in order to continue to support this service.
I agree that there apparently is no perfect operating system. As stated by Amit Singh in "What is Mac OS X" a user should determine which operating system fits their needs.
I thought that the articles demonstrated an interesting contrast between users of the different operating systems. Microsoft seemed to abe able to do no right, while Apple could do no wrong. Linux users seemed to be above the fray. More people use Microsoft which may be the reason they seemingly recieve more complaints.
Another interesting part of the readings was the sections concerning continued support of older operating systems by both Microsoft and Apple. Amazingly, the operating systems that one has to pay for will terminate support of certain "classic" system in set time frames, while Linux, the free system, runs not only on new computers, but "is also the system of choice for old and exoctic hardware that would be useless if Linux didn't exist" (Machtelt Garrels Intoduction to Linux).
I developed a real interest in Linux as a result of the readings. A free operating system tested by a mutitude of tester with no obvious monetary interest is unusual.

Comment--week 2 muddiest point

Maggie
http://maggie215.blogspot.com/

comments reading 2

Jens
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=1475137707322366107&postID=4369327965986919722&page=1


Bailey's

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=6429290265389116562&postID=4870382550127313560&page=1

comments reading 1

Jen
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=1475137707322366107&postID=4610856382941073217


Dustin
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=1693482552938456993&postID=5202360343339771744

Week 2 readings

First--Thanks to all who helped clear up my confusion.

The readings concerned Moore's law, computer hardware, and the Computer History Museum. I had heard Moore's law stated and misstated frequently. I was surprised to discover that the law is suppose to apply to semiconductor circuits only. The computer industry has used this law to set an industry standard that has fuel growth and, in my opinion, environmental pollution.

The reading on computer hardware was fairly straight forward. It explained terminology that I had heard used but did not really know what the terms meant.

The visit to the Computer History Museum site was amazing. Besides facts such as the first computer in 1939 and the beginning of the Internet in 1972, it made me think of Moore's law and the speed of computer development.

Muddiest point

I am unclear as to when readings, blog comments, and other assignments are due. Help! This seems to be a common problem expressed by other classmates in their blogs. Additionally, I am now confused about how to link my comments on others' blogs to my blog.

Readings and my first attempts at blogging

I am new to blogging but I'm going to give it a try.

I thought the articles were interesting, but somewhat technical. The article by Clifford Lynch was ten years old, but still relevant. My information technology literacy was previously limited to a "set of largely route skills" and I have felt that I have fallen behind the computer learning curve as a result.

I could really relate to the article by Jason Vaughan about the Lied Library since I work in a large urban library. Finite budgets and infinite, competing information "containers" are problems at most libraries. My library now leases a majority of computer equipment on a three year basis in order to remain current. We also use computer sign-up software to monitor and assign computer time.

The OCLC article addressed trends in information systems but seemed to be focused on those who are already computer literate with access to the internet. In my urban library setting the focus is on providing for those without skills or access. This article made me think about the ever widening "digital divide."