Muddiest Point

Is there or will there ever be a virus proof computer or software? Is it possible to have a computer completely safe from viruses, worms or trojan horses?

Muddiest Point

This is more of a statement rather than a question but it does concern the web and social media aspect of librarianship.  As a current student of information science I increasingly see a rapid growth of internet related or computer related jobs within the library field.  With the emergence of Library 2.0, patron tagging, and social media will the need to stay on top of emerging technologies be essential for the library to stay relevant to the public?

Assignment 6: My Website

Here is the link to my website...fingers crossed it works!  I have tried it several time but who knows, this computer stuff keeps ya guessing...

http://www.pitt.edu/~kkd7/index.html

Muddiest Point

I am a little unclear how the Vector Space Model actually aids in retrieving information, how is relevance calculated/shown using this model?

Assignment 5 - Koha Virtual Bookshelf

user name: kkd7
virtual bookshelf name: Karin Dickens 2600

Link to my bookshelf:
http://jade.exp.sis.pitt.edu:8080/cgi-bin/koha/virtualshelves/shelves.pl?viewshelf=39

Week 11: Digital libraries

Challenges and Influential Work - D-Lib

• Currently, there are just too many ways to find information digitally.
• To effectively search and find relevant articles is made difficult by the shear number of different places to look.
• Information is digitally published in too many places for it to be efficiently found.
• Digital libraries goal is to bring together these sources and make it easier to find and navigate.
• Federal projects have been important to achieving these goals.
• DLI-1 - six federally funded projects in 1994.  Consisted of NASA, the National Science Foundation, and the Defense Advance Research Projects Agency.  Looked toward the future at technologies that could bring together information as well as be relevant in the long term.
• DLI-2 - began after DLI-1 ended. The group grew to include National Library of Medicine, Library of Congress, the FBI, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Funding was also made available to pursue some of the DLI-1 planned programs.
• DLI-1 funded 6 academic programs to explore technologies that would bring together information collections and have them work together as a system.  The academic programs consisted of  multidisciplinary departments and software companies.
• University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne made a significant contribution through this testing program by allowing publishers access to technology that would permit them to publish full-texts online.
• As technology as advanced so has digital library systems.  Standards, access, and programs have all evolved through the years to be greatly advantageous to the main goal set forth in 1994.

Dewey Meets Turing - D-Lib

• Most influential aspect of DLI was the merging of librarians and computer scientists.  This pairing has contributed greatly to the dissemination of information.
• For computer scientists the partnership allowed them to apply what they knew about technology to the familiar field of library/information.  They could make a wider more intellectually deeper impact on society.
• For librarians the partnership allowed them to gain funding to further advance what they deemed important, their impact on the advancement of research and learning.
• The rise of the internet changed the face of the technological world.  The partnership between computer scientists and librarians were now faced with a challenging rapidly evolving resource.
• The web let the computer scientists explore areas restricted in earlier parts of the project.  They were interested in sharing information beyond outlets dictated by publishers.
• Before the web this information was held tightly by publishers and copywriters in separate collections held by libraries. Libraries were concerned about the integrity of their collections.
• Conflict came about because for computer scientists the free flow of information is common and encouraged however with libraries information is kept guard and access is only allowed with permission.  The web magnified this difference of procedure.
• It was easy to see how computer science, the web, and information could all come together for the benefit of search and retrieval.
• Libraries on the other hand couldn't see how the web could help them.  They felt that losing their tight hold on their collections would lead to their diminished relevance.
• Discourse was evident between the computer scientists and librarians.  The librarians feared the unknown technologies of computer science and how it could change their collections.  Computer scientists were unsure why librarians did not see matters like they did.
• Librarians now see that they have not lost relevance with the dawn of these new technologies.  They are still need to organize, collect and distribute information held within their repositories.

Institutional Repositories:

Having trouble accessing.  Will try again before class.

Muddiest Point

I am unclear what is meant by "an element has to be fully embedded" when talking about XML?  What is "fully embedded"?

Muddiest point

Which is more advantageous - to have an external or internal stylesheet?

Week 10: XML

eXtensive Markup Language:

• XML is a derivative of SGML used to give structure to online documents
• better suited for web based documents than SGML
• does not use a predetermined set of tags like HTML
• It's primary use is to allow the format of documents to be read across platforms - standard of rules
• XML can be used to describe the formats of many types of documents
• XML hierarchy:
• Document
• Entities
• Elements
• Attributes

• All of this tells the computer how the document is formatted 

• XML is the container in which the parts of the document are contained and clearly defines each one
• XML cross checks with the document type definition (DTD) and to tell it how all of these part relate to one another
•  DTD defines the structure of the document
• tags are determined by organizations with their own language that will fit their specific needs
• the tags clearly show the beginning and end of each element but say nothing of how the document is to be formatted.  This is the point of XML the data can be adapted to any format the user may desire

• XML catalogs - defines the format described by the entities in an XML document
• XML namespaces - allows for naming of elements and attributes 
• useful when the same name is used for elements by different codes

• XLINK, XPointer, XPath - ways of linking to paths of other documents contained on the web
• XML's way of hyperlinking

• Like HTML, XML has a stylesheet 
• XSLT - allows XML be turned into HTML - skips formatting language

Muddiest Point

How many times has HTML been updated?  Will there ever be a standardized markup language for the web that doesn't change? 

Week 9: CSS

CSS:

• made HTML easier by having a separate area for formatting code (the design elements)
• saved a lot of time in designing web pages for developers
• a rule is a line of code that states the style of the particular element
• CSS is broken down to two parts: the selector and the declaration
• the selector tells the computer the area to modify (the body, paragraph etc.)
• the declaration specifies what you want to change or add
• the declaration is split into two parts (split by a colon) the property and value
• the property specifies the style like color or font and the value specifies the specific of that style like font size or the actual color. 

• declarations can be grouped together, separated by a semi colon, if more than one style is applied to the same element
• it is also possible to group together elements that you want to apply one style to, for example head 1, head 2 and head 3 all need to be in bold

• there is also the ability to add in your own comments into the coding, this lets you have the ability to look back at the code and know exactly what it is intended for if you want to make adjustments later
• id selector-lets you add a style to just one element
• class selector-lets you add a style to a group of elements
• there are 3 ways of adding CSS
• externally - consists of one file that can be applied to multiple pages
• does this by including code on the page that will link back to that file

• internally - there is one page that has it's own style

• inline - not advisable to use because the style is included in the tag

• backgrounds - allows you to customize the background of the page
• color is described depending on the type of color it is ex. RGB
• can add an image, CSS will repeat the image so it will cover the whole area
• CSS will also allow you to add text, font type, color, alignment, decorations, links, tables etc to the background as needed by your design

• browsers - must use a browser that recognizes CSS
• this can be a trial and error process to find the right browser and CSS that can work together, can be buggy

• inheritance - elements in HTML will inherit the styles from the CSS style sheet

• Basically CSS is the creative force behind web page designed.  It was established to make the process easier and separate from building the web page content that HTML is set up for.

Assignment 4: CiteULike

My url for my citeulike library:

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

Week 8 HTML

Notes for HTML

• HTML - hyper text mark up language
• I have always thought HTML was computer code, how to create web pages and such, this it is not, it is a mark up language that the web reads in order to describe web pages

• HTML documents describe web pages that are displayed via a browser

Case study involving Georgia State University, 2000

• The library as well as subject librarians from around the university were given control over individual web pages via Front Page software.  They set up, organized, and ran each page according to their own needs.  The result was confusion.  The pages were created with no restrictions which resulted in flawed web pages.  They were not helpful to students or staff and had poor visual consistency. 
• These pages were also technically inferior.
• In 2000 the library sought to remedy these problems and hired someone to manage the library web pages and their content
• A quote on the definition of content manager "Content management (CM) can be defined as the process of collecting, managing and publishing content (Boiko, 2001; Thamaraiselvi, 2002)."
•  The library and web manager knew they had to seek something besides Front Page to handle their information needs
• They chose to go with a database design featuring MySQL
• The MySQL had tables for the various library holdings (journals, books etc.) and associated information
• Greater control for the librarian to handle the information within the tables and how it looked on the web page
• After some time working within this system they decided to hold a survey before conducting an update to see how this system was received.
• The result of this migration to a CMS was generally positive and achieved the goals of the library.

Overall this article was informative and interesting though I did get a bit unclear as to the details of the CMS and the technological terms used to fully explain how this migration took place.  Am interested to learn more in class so the finer details can become clearer.  

Muddiest Point

I am a bit unsure of the difference between DOI and PURL as identifiers.  How do they differ from one another? How does DOI work?

Week 7: Internet

Notes from this weeks reading:

The pieces of the internet:

• If connected to the internet then that computer is just a single piece within a larger network of millions of computers
• When the computer connects it is though a ISP (internet service provider)
• There is no one entity that controls the network, rather a group networks that are of a higher level
• NAP - network access points
• at the network access points all other computers connect with the higher levels computers and thus are all interconnected
• Routers help your computer to communicate with others; they do this by figuring out where to send the information
• Routers are like a bridge that connect one computer to another
• What is referred to as the backbone is the physical representative on this network - the cables 

 Google video notes:

• The graphic of the dots of lights that indicate Google searches is impressive, it makes real how many of us really use Google at any given moment in a day
• The globalization of the world through Google is amazing
• The one second slide- again how amazing to see how much we rely on Google services.  Not only just on Google but if we look at in the most simplistic terms, Google is just one avenue people you to access information and look how often it is implemented in a second.....that is A LOT of information being accessed through just one search engine.

Assignment 2: Jing

The url for the Jing Video -
How to search and purchase a song via iTunes.

file://localhost/Users/karindickens/Desktop/2011-10-01_2154.swf

The url for the Jing photoset through flickr -

http://www.flickr.com/photos/13514678@N00/sets/72157627751474432/

Muddiest Point

As I understand it content management is similar to the position held by a records manager, is this correct.  Is this just the technological equivalent to the records managers, or rather a computer system that enables the records manager to organize, sift and collect records (content)?

Week 6: RFID

The discussion about RFID (radio frequency identifier) has been touched upon in several classes this semester.  Like any new technology it is met with some apprehension in the library setting.  Cost/risk analysis as well as privacy issues seem to be the two points of concern.  In the article included in this week's reading "Management of RFID in libraries, from the Journal of Academic Librarianship by Karen Coyle, she discusses the merits of RFID in libraries. 

The role of RFID in libraries seems to focus on two areas of functionality: security and inventory.  Unlike barcodes that have to be within the sight of the reader, RFID can be scanned while embedded in an object, in this case a book.  This already presents a greater efficiency and usability. With security Coyle (2005) argues that though it doesn't present anything revolutionary it is not necessarily worse either; it maintains the same level of security already present in libraries.  It's merits come with what else it can provide in addition to security.  Because RFID has an ability to hold information it can also provide libraries a way to store book information, record it's location within the building or track the book through the return process.  I believe as the technology is embraced by libraries the use for RFID will only grow, allowing for a more efficient system that can be to the benefit of an already tight budget.  

Though Coyle mentions the fully automated check-out system that RFID can provide,  as tempting as that may sound I believe having a duel system is more ideal, specifically self check-out and a staffed check-out.  With RFID still being developed, with unknown limitations and high cost of changing systems, this allows the library to start to move into the future of new technologies without leaving the older more familiar system behind.  

As a side note the two article via wikipedia covering networks was both informative and eye-opening.  I was happy to see technological terms I was familiar with and have come into contact with (LAN, ethernet, and wireless technologies used in cell phones and wi-fi networks), though I was unclear about some of what was discussed I look forward to getting clarification in class.  

Week 5: Meta data

I have heard the term meta data being thrown around regularly since entering grad school.  I knew that I should know this term but to be honest I had no idea exactly what meta data meant, prior to this week's reading.  I understood it's relevance but I had no real grasp on the term.  Finally it has come to light what the term meta data really means and how it applies to me as a soon-to-be information professional. 

Anne J. Gilliland in her chapter "Setting the Stage" presented a clear, concise, well-rounded description of meta data.  She starts by clarifying that the term means different things to different people depending on the professional context and user.  She goes on to define meta data as "the sum total of what one can say about any information object."  She then explains that an information object "is anything that can be addressed and manipulated as a discrete entity by a human being or an information system."  Finally a definition that summed up the term in an understandable way.  Simply put it is how something is described.  As the chapter progresses she introduced the many types, functions and uses for meta data, specifically in libraries, museums and archives; all this adds to the deeper understanding of the term.  Personally, coming from a museum background, it helped to embed the term within a familiar environment. 

I found particular interest in the questions/issues she raises at the end of the chapter and I believe it illustrates just how important it is to have a system in place that will insure the reliability of information accessibility.  

Week 4

Databases and their benefits

So I have worked with databases in the past, mostly just simple Exel spreadsheets, but as I read through these articles and wikipedia entries I realize I have only scratched the surface of what they are - in fact one may argue that I really haven't worked with databases at all.  When I take into account the complex nature of the types of databases as well as the software that manages and runs them, I question knowing really what they are and how benefical they are to the processing and recalling of information in a form that is helpful to a professional. 

Some key points I learned:

•  Hold multiple uses; not just a gathering of information
• If you have a database you have a database management system (DBMS); there is just too much information to manage otherwise
• Databases help organize information in such a way that complex relationships between the information can be found
• The data comprises the database and it all runs on software that manages the data and it's organization
• A number of information can be benefited by the use of databases: bibliographical information, financial figures, statistics, music
• Databases came about from the need to store and access large amounts of information.
• Databases and DBMS are extremely complicated and have a large complex network of vocabulary associated with the management of information 
• I am surprised at the amount of database types there are and how specialized they can be depending on the user's need and information handled.  They are as diverse as we need them to be.

As I am not a computer science student a lot of this information was informative but also confusing, especially when complex technological terms where discussed i.e., when describing network model, inverted file model etc.

Though I understand that most of the terminology was lost on me I did understand the relevance of the information given through Wikipedia and associated articles.  I believe as a future information professional I will be called upon to work on many types of databases and maintain them.  This gives me a good resource to come back to when I need to fill in unknown information.

Assignment 1: Flickr

Ten photos of various objects in two versions: standard and thumbnail.  You can view them here.

Week 3

"Imaging Pittsburgh: Creating a shared gateway to digital image collections of the Pittsburgh region"
by Edward A. Galloway, outlines a grant funded program whose mission is to provide a singular outlet for historical Pittsburgh photographs.  At first glance this may seem simplistic in focus, provide a website that can allow access to historic Pittsburgh through visual media.  Upon breakdown there were many more obstacles to hurdle then what was expected.  

Three institutions with multiple views and gains sought to work together to document change - cultural, economic, and structural- in and around Pittsburgh.  The main aim was to host a website containing 7,000 - 10,000 images to allow a "whole picture" aspect to the city.  The website would allow the public to keyword search, browse within several parameters as well as request reproductions.

I think what struck me most about this project was even though these instutions were working towards a common goal they all had different aims in the selection, description and organization of the images.  The challenges to the project seemed to display that though there is one finish line there are many different ways to get there.  The lack of communication, aside from planned meetings, posed a threat to the efficiency and transparency of the project.  How do you avoid inconsistencies that may present themselves as the project moves forward?  With each institution came a different method of how to accomplish a particular step of the project, a different vocabulary to describe, a different level of quality.  As a leader how to you overcome such challenges?  Is it worth the time to build a bridge between all of these methods? 

I think so.  As each one of the challenges presented themselves there seemed to be a sharing of ideas, something I believe benefits each institution involved. Learning not only how to handle the conflicts that arise but also to learn from each other, building upon the base of knowledge they already have.  Through this project they came together to solve the standardization issues and ultimately created a very important visual resource for Pittsburgh.