Muddiest Point: Lecture 14

We looked at a few different conversion strategies, and I can see how each would be useful in different situations. But are there ever cases where it wouldn't make sense to do some sort of pilot conversion ahead of a full conversion of any other type?

Muddiest Point: Lecture 13

Are some types of encryption more secure than others? Are some types used more often than others? And are the most secure types used the most often?

Week 14 Readings

The article on cloud computing was a bit too technical for me, and all I really took away from it was the promise of large companies selling online storage space and virtual servers to other, smaller companies. The video on the same subject was much more helpful, even if Christopher Barnatt's ceaseless rocking made me seasick after a while. Reducing our dependency on particular gadgets to perform particular tasks could prove a real boon. I especially liked the analogy between the switch from standard computing to cloud computing and the switch from everyone producing their own power to everyone jacking into shared power grids.
The article on the future of libraries brought up a few good points but also a couple of ridiculous ones. I find it especially hard to believe that anyone could think that literacy will be dead by 2050. (Even if schoolchildren were prevented from learning to read, effective tomorrow, there would be older literate people alive for decades past that marker.) I consider it old news that the developed world is moving farther from products and closer to services, but some of the other predictions more directly related to libraries were nice. I'm not entirely sure what a transition from "center of information" to "center of culture" would entail, but I can appreciate the sentiment.

Week 13 Readings: Comments

http://pittlibrarian.blogspot.com/2008/11/week-13-require-readings.html?showComment=1227844920000#c9187200440824591970

http://corrinewxly.blogspot.com/2008/11/week-13-readings.html?showComment=1227845340000#c2591608225975393553

Week 13 Readings

There are a few disconnected things worth saying about "No Place to Hide", but none of them have anything to do with library science. When considering companies that gather data about behavior, it's crucial to consider whether or not that data is connected to individuals by name. I understand that the CIA and the FBI not communicating with each other is a huge problem, but I don't understand how it's supposed to be a concern for the average American. "No fly" watch lists are ridiculous and need to be practically wiped clean.
I have to say that I'm glad the Information Awareness Office never quite got off the ground. The idea of attempting to monitor all actions of all people at all times is moronic at worst and Orwellian at best. Also, the Office's original logo was totally creepy. I should note that the one video we were supposed to watch this week is no longer available. Could this be the work of the IAO, continuing its mission in the shadows? Start your conspiracy engines!

Muddiest Point: Lecture 12

When libraries decide to put digital collections online and let users help out with the tagging, what can they do to deal with incorrect or malicious tags?

Week 12 Readings

The article on blogs hit home for me with one of its points about what it's like trying to collaborate with people for a project via e-mail. That's what I'm doing for my poster project in 2000 right now, and - like the article predicted - my inbox has quickly become twice as full as it was before.
The article on library instruction and wikis recalled for me time wasted in my undergraduate studies not too long ago. While I did occasionally learn something from these sorts of sessions, I usually just wanted to zone out. If I could have instead taught myself what I needed to know when I needed to know it by reading wikis, that would have been an improvement.
I wasn't terribly persuaded by the article on "folksonomies" - a term I feel justified in placing in scare quotes since it's only been around for three years and it sounds ridiculous. Why enlist faculty or librarians to create special bookmarks when they could simply submit lists of useful sites along with their respective hyperlinks? Allowing users to post their own tags sounds almost as stupid as the you-won't-find-that-in-any-dictionary term for it: "spagging".
Even though I knew plenty about Wikipedia before watching the video on it - shot in mid-2005 - I still learned a few interesting facts about the site. Those facts are: 1) only 1/3 of the traffic to the site is to English-language pages, 2) perhaps 1,000 people are responsible for the majority of edits made to the site, and 3) freely-licensed textbooks are in the works. That last point is actually quite exciting!

Week 11 Readings: Comments

http://melhohman.blogspot.com/2008/11/week-11-readings.html?showComment=1226896080000#c8274968040693073173

http://ngrey666.blogspot.com/2008/11/reading-notes-ten.html?showComment=1226896260000#c8612782946294630302

Muddiest Point: Lecture 9

We were told that every XML document begins with a prolog stating what version of XML is being used. What major changes have been made to XML as it has repeatedly advanced from one version to the next?

Week 10 Readings

The article on digital libraries' challenges opens with the observation that "we live in interesting times". As is often the case when I hear that expression, I can't help but wonder whether it's meant as a positive or a negative. Carnegie Mellon's development of "integrated speech, image, video, and language understanding software" sounds like an interesting positive. When the interesting negatives come along, I guess we'll just have to reach for the tools "in our armamentarium".
The article on digital libraries' origins seems to dramatize the conflict between librarians and computer scientists. I'm not sure what the big fuss is about. Then again, I'm still not even sure what digital libraries are all about. Is there anything more to them than catalogs, finding aids, and digital media accessible from afar? That all sounds like old hat at this point, as opposed to something worth fighting about.
In the article on institutional repositories, Clifford Lynch does a good job of describing the kinds of services that librarians need to provide in order to be effective. Among other duties, we should capture events digitally, open up new forms of communication, and ensure that patrons know what materials are available to them. The main idea is that we ought to be making information as easily accessible as we can, and that seems like a reasonable goal.

Assignment 6: My Web Site

http://www.pitt.edu/~rph9/

Assignment 5: Koha

http://pitt4.kohawc.liblime.com/cgi-bin/koha/bookshelves/shelves.pl?viewshelf=42

Assignment 4: Jing w/ Flickr

Jing Video Set:
http://www.screencast.com/users/randhall/playlists/twitter_tutorial

Note: I taped my tutorial in three segments, not realizing that Jing doesn't allow you to edit clips together. The above URL links to my playlist of those three clips; please simply watch them in order and think of them as comprising a single video.

Flickr Photo Set:
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2919556395/in/set-72157607800019414/
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2919557807/in/set-72157607800019414/
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2919560359/in/set-72157607800019414/
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2919562945/in/set-72157607800019414/
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2919566637/in/set-72157607800019414/
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/2920413380/in/set-72157607800019414/

Alternately, you can watch a slideshow of the six photos with just one click:
http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/sets/72157607800019414/show/with/2919556395/

Week 7 Readings: Comments

http://ngrey666.blogspot.com/2008/10/reading-notes-seven.html?showComment=1223311740000#c2950138452860498583

http://dgs18.blogspot.com/2008/10/week-7.html?showComment=1223312220000#c3626771852330189046

Muddiest Point: Lecture 6

I understand that computers send messages over networks by splitting each message into packets and sending those packets out individually. However, I don't understand how packets get put back together again to reform messages. How does TCP work?

Week 7 Readings

The article on Internet infrastructure was most helpful for me when it explained how caching works. I understood that my computer was saving some sort of information to make for faster loading times, but I didn't understand the principles involved until now. Article author Jeff Tyson is right to say that Domain Name Servers' ability to work together to handle billions of requests every day is a testimony to their design.
Reading the article on Integrated Library Systems felt a bit like being thrown into the deep end; I can't remember the last time that I read anything so impenetrably jargon-laden. If I understand the gist of the article, libraries have had no luck establishing standards for themselves, and vendors can't be persuaded to design interoperable modules. But the upshot is that the Web is currently making both of those problems irrelevant. Right?
The video on Google was fairly interesting even though it was filmed over four years ago. I found it amusing that when I did a search for Google Answers, I learned that the service was discontinued two years ago. I then found it even more amusing that when I did a search for Orkut, I learned that over 60% of the site's users are now located in Brazil. I can only imagine what was on display at Google's invite-only meeting this year!

Assignment 3: Zotero & CiteULike

http://citeulike.org/user/randhall

Note: every time that I tried to import new articles from CiteULike to Zotero, I got an error message stating, "An unknown error occurred while saving this item." I posted about this problem days ago on the Technical Discussion board, but no one was able to help me. So, for the second time in a row, I've been unable to do everything that was assigned, through no fault of my own.

Week 6 Readings: Comments

http://monicalovelis2600discussion.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-readings.html?showComment=1222472460000#c6996120905331742559

http://egriswoldlis2600.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-readings-computer-networks.html?showComment=1222473360000#c4567931830942777900

Muddiest Point: Lecture 5

I was most interested this week by the comparison of the many different image file types that are available, and I was wondering: if PNG seems like the best-of-all-worlds, is there any reason not to discontinue the use of GIF and JPEG entirely?

Week 6 Readings

Encarta's article on computer networks offers a shorter, more authoritative definition of LANs and other networks than anything available on Wikipedia. Most of this information I already knew: LANs handle small distances, WANs (like the Internet) handle huge distances, and Ethernet is used to wire everything together. The YouTube video was helpful for its brief descriptions of PANs and MANs, neither of which I had noticed before. In sum, this was all pretty basic information, and I'm sure it will be covered almost identically in our next lecture.
The article on RFID tags in libraries was actually a really interesting one. I'd read about the technology's applications for fast transactions and package tracking, but I hadn't thought about its potential applications in our field. The several limitations noted - for example, size and cost - are a little discouraging, but the technology is improving all the time. I was most impressed with the idea that RFID tags could prove helpful even when books aren't going anywhere, just by facilitating inventory sweeps. Shelf reading, we hardly knew ye!

Week 5 Readings: Comments

http://bkf1lis2600.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-five.html?showComment=1222043460000#c272688998892353908

http://amarti27.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-5-readings.html?showComment=1222043880000#c8573409077984132830

Muddiest Point: Lecture 4

We briefly noted that there are four main types of databases: relational, object-oriented, object-relational, and multi-dimensional. What's the difference between an object-oriented database and an object-relational one?

Week 5 Readings

As much as it pains me to say it, the Wikipedia article on data compression was really helpful for understanding what the concept is all about. The basic example provided to show the difference between lossless and lossy compression was such a useful one! Sure, it's cool that you can compress 25.888888888 to 25.[9]8 and save space without losing any information, but if you just round to 26, you can save even more space... as long as you don't mind losing some of your original information.
The article on imaging Pittsburgh was amusing for its anecdotes on the difficulties inherent to any grand cross-institution project. The author writes, "Speaking as project leader, it’s difficult for me to judge whether the silence means everyone knows exactly what to do and are doing just that, or they are so busy doing other jobs that they don’t have time to communicate. Likely it is a bit of both." Dear Mr Galloway: likely, everyone involved grew silent because they stopped caring about the quality of their work once they realized that virtually no one will ever want to seriously utilize a database of old pictures of Pittsburgh.
My favorite article, though, had to be the ALA article on YouTube. It is totally, absolutely true that libraries could conceivably make little home movie how-to videos and upload them for patrons' benefit. It's just funny to think that librarians will be uploading these self-help clips to the same site that I use to watch music videos and Rick Roll my friends. In all seriousness, though, the potential for distance learning is enormous.

Week 4 Readings: Comments

http://aaj8.blogspot.com/2008/09/reading-iv.html?showComment=1221353700000#c4372900456066962861

http://kerricimineralis.blogspot.com/2008/09/blog-3_12.html?showComment=1221358980000#c81710883548567736

Week 4 Readings

The article on databases was interesting in that I hadn't known before that there were so many different ways of organizing data: according to the hierarchical, network, and relational models, at the least. It makes perfect sense that not every block of data can be organized in the same way as every other, since there are so many ways that data can relate to one another.
I also didn't realize how many applications there are for metadata. It's somehow odd to think that every time I tag a picture online or write a caption, I'm providing information about information, even though that's a fairly straightforward description of what I'm doing. The fact that some metadata actually exists from the time of certain data's creation is noteworthy.
The Dublin Core Data Model article reminded me of some of my readings in the philosophy of language over the past few years. It really is difficult to try to invent a natural way of naming and connecting every thing in the world. And that task just gets more difficult when you realize that you have to somehow leave room for speakers of other languages to insert their own names and make their own connections. It's scary to consider!

Muddiest Point: Lecture 3

As usual, there really wasn't much confusing about this week's lecture, so I'll just ask another question out of curiosity. With regards to the history of different versions of Windows, why is it that so many after 95 have had such short lifetimes? It seems that NT, 98, 2000, and Me were each considered top-of-the-line for only 1-2 years each. What's different about XP that has allowed it to succeed despite so many earlier versions having failed?

Assignment 2: Flickr

http://flickr.com/photos/30346155@N04/sets/72157607204900490/

All ten pictures are available in five sizes.
(Just click "All Sizes" above each picture.)
To view each master copy, select "Large".
To view each resized copy, select "Medium" (or "Small").
To view each thumbnail copy, select "Thumbnail" (or "Square").

Week 3 Readings: Comments

http://melhohman.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-3-readings.html?showComment=1220926140000#c6545428521112617052

http://jwi5.blogspot.com/2008/09/reading-notes-3.html?showComment=1220926680000#c3082898237196693293

Week 3 Readings

Of the three articles we were to read regarding operating systems, the one on UNIX/Linux was easily the most interesting. It's a relief to know that before I was even born, someone had the knowledge, motivation, and talent required to design a free, universally-compatible operating system. All I've ever heard about UNIX/Linux has been negative - specifically, that it's difficult to learn to use and that only total geeks opt for it - and while all of that seems to in fact be true, I can't help but have a much healthier respect for the OS now.
The Mac OS X article was for the most part too jargon-heavy for me to make much sense of it. I understand that Macs in general have benefits other than easy media manipulation and system stability. Unless I'm missing something, it seems that OS X is mostly more of the same, but with some nifty new applications such as Exposé and decent speech recognition.
I'm not entirely sure what we are meant to gather from the article on Windows XP, Vista, and a ways-off Version 7 other than what most of us already know: the majority of PC users - such as myself - have XP and see no reason to switch to Vista, yet Microsoft is doing its best to force Vista upon us, even implicitly threatening that we'll never be able to fully acclimate to Version 7 in the future if we don't start learning Vista now. I can't say I'm scared.

Week 1 Readings: Comments

http://iit2600.blogspot.com/2008/08/notes-for-week-one-iit.html?showComment=1220661120000#c8651963118663218317

http://michellesintrotoit.blogspot.com/2008/08/reading-notes-for-week-1.html?showComment=1220661660000#c1438943155978952704

Muddiest Point: Lecture 2

Most of Lecture 2 was straightforward, so there weren't too many muddy points to choose from. Out of curiosity, though, I have to ask what the connection is between USB cables and computer buses. The lecture made it seem as though buses are purely channels that allow devices within a computer to communicate with each other. If that's the case, then what makes cables that connect devices to computers externally "Universal Serial Buses"?

Assignment 1: Week 1 Readings

While reading the OCLC article from 2004, what most struck me was the realization that we are already living in the future therein described. The vague mention of "moblogs" has come to life with sites like Twitter, and print media has indeed entered a steady decline. While I could be persuaded to agree that the central task of libraries might shift from storing information to verifying the provenance and authenticity of information, it remains to be seen how exactly that would be done.
Vaughan, in his article on Leid Library, managed to make an awful lot of simple problems sound more complex than they really are. It's not rocket science to re-use the boxes that your new monitors get shipped in to ship out your old monitors, and it's a no-brainer that you're going to have to kick community users off of your work stations when students need to use them. And while some of his brief history is more helpful, it is of limited practical use to smaller institutions that lack the funds to replace their PCs every three years or purchase ten-ton AC units.
Lynch's brief position paper is, I suppose, most noteworthy for the accuracy of its predictions. In sum, information/tech literacy is becoming ever more essential to ever greater numbers of professionals. But of course, we LIS students already knew that.

Week 2 Readings: Comments

http://woodss53.blogspot.com/2008/08/muddiest-point.html?showComment=1220025060000#c5451725186316239361

http://petersblog-landark.blogspot.com/2008/08/reading-notes-for-week-2.html?showComment=1220043720000#c7267749768817356761

Muddiest Point: Lecture 1

I'll join what I perceive as the majority by identifying Lecture 1's muddiest point as informing the class of when our assignments are due. Certain assignments are only "readings" and the posts on blogs such as this one wherein we discuss what we've read, but certain other assignments are real "assignments"... some of which are in fact only readings themselves. Readings are due on Fridays, and assignments are due on Tuesdays, which somehow translates into Week 1's reading being due next Tuesday after Week 2's reading, which is due today. At least, that's my understanding from the part of the lecture where the final requests for clarification arose, found around 1:26:00 in the Lecture 1 video. So, I've already got "Week 2 Readings" posted, although I won't have "Week 1 Readings" posted until next Monday or Tuesday.

Week 2 Readings

I didn't find the Wikipedia articles for either computer hardware or Moore's Law to be particularly helpful. The computer hardware article uses few complete sentences, and the Moore's Law article spends nearly half its length discussing laws other than Moore's. Luckily, I found alternate web pages that discussed these two topics at Hardware (computer) and Forty years of Moore's Law.
I already knew almost everything that the articles on computer hardware had to teach me: i.e., there is input hardware, output hardware, and storage hardware. I did learn a thing or two about the standardization of cables such as serial and USB, though.
Moore's Law I was also pretty familiar with, although it was nice to have a refresher on the details. And it is of course fascinating to speculate as to what will happen when transistors shrink to the "electron leak" stage in about ten years. The video that we were assigned to watch did well to point this problem out and to visualize the impressiveness of constant doubling.
As for computerhistory.org, I have no idea what we're actually supposed to read, having been assigned a website as opposed to a web page. I guess we're just meant to browse the site for a few minutes according to what interests us?