Quick cool software find

After having my little one turn on sticky keys and filter keys on my computer this weekend (and being temporarily shut out of typing the letter R and a few other things) - while she was playing Tux Paint - I saw this Kid-Key-Lock on LifeHacker and thought, "OH! that would be great for my home computer!"

You could, for instance, use Kid-Key-Lock to lock out system key combinations to prevent your little ones (or your own little fingers) accidentally booting out of a game or important app again. Alternately, you can lock the keyboard to just let in letters, numbers, or spaces to help a young typist learn the basics. The mouse can be locked with a similar range of finesse, with individual buttons, the scroll wheel, and double clicking allowed or halted. Kid-Key-Lock is freeware, Windows only.

Of course it may also help your public machines as well - I mean what better way to keep want-to-be script kiddies from trying to mess with your public machines than to shut down the ability to use certain keyboard short cuts. Of course that could also impact the playing of runescape. ;-)

Border Queen Book Festival March 29th!

People may not realize how many literary festivals Oklahoma has on a regular basis. Here's one for you to add to your calendar.

The Border Queen Book Festival at the Asbury Complex in Comanche, OK on March 29th.

All set ups are free to authors, there is no fee for the festival. Food can be purchased in the adjoining dining hall during the noon hour.

There will be authors who write books about crafts, pet care, screenwriting and so much more.

Parents are encouraged to bring their children to this festival; a wide variety of childrens and adult books from all genres are there for you to purchase an autographed copy from the author and plant a dream in a child or adult to achieve and reach further.

And if that isn't enough to get you there consider this - The festival will be filmed to be on Discover Oklahoma for the next years program since this year is filled.

ABC's of DNA @ ODL

Do you want to know more about your own genetic traits and conditions? Are you curious about genetic issues that you hear about in the news? Are you uncomfortable when customers ask you questions about genetics?

The National Network of Libraries of Medicine, South Central Region will present the class ABCs of DNA: Unraveling the Mystery of Genetics Information for Consumers at the Oklahoma Department of Libraries (ODL) in Oklahoma City on March 12, 2008. This free, 4-hour hand-on class explores basic concepts such as genes and chromosomes and offers an overview of genetic disorders, genetic testing, genetic counseling, and the Human Genome Project. Ethical and legal issues associated with genetic disorders will be covered with regard to privacy, discrimination, and potential legislative impact on medicine and society. A variety of reliable health information resources will be demonstrated, including, but not limited to: Genetics Home Reference, ClinicalTrials.gov, NORD (National Organization for Rare Disorders), and MedlinePlus.

Upon successful completion of this class, each participant will receive 4 hours of continuing education credit awarded by the Medical Library Association. This class is approved by the Medical Library Association for the Consumer Health Information Specialization Program (http://mlanet.org/education/chc/). If you have any questions, feel free to contact Karen Vargas at karen.vargas@exch.library.tmc.edu

ABCs of DNA: Unraveling the Mystery of Genetics Information for Consumers
March 12, 2008, 9:30 am to 3:00 pm
Instructor: Karen Vargas, Consumer Health Outreach Coordinator, NN/LM SCR
Oklahoma Department of Libraries, Computer Lab
To register for this class, contact Steve Beleu at sbeleu@oltn.odl.state.ok.us
For more information about the class: http://nnlm.gov/training/genetics/index.html

Following this class, the ODL’s Regional Depository Librarian, Steve Beleu, will teach an advanced 1.5 hour class, Nucleotide, Protein, Genome: Beyond the A, T, C, and G’s of Genomics.

Why should librarians care enough about the scientific tools of online genomics learn anything about them? Dr. Elias Zerhouni, Director of the National Institutes of Health, is determined that genomics will become mainstreamed into our nation’s healthcare services. This is already happening in parts of our nation. To know enough about the basic online tools of genomics to provide referral services for them is this workshop’s goal. We will examine these major online tools—BLAST, RefSeq, Entrez Nucleotide aka Genbank, Entrez Protein, Entrez Genome, Map Viewer, and additional online tools as time allows.

This workshop will focus on learning these online tools for REFERRAL purposes rather than REFERENCE purposes. You can either work in these tools in an active mode, or simply watch the instructor demonstrate them.

Steve Beleu attended a 3-day workshop at the National Center for Biotechnology Information in Bethesda, Maryland titled Introduction to Molecular Biology and Information Resources to learn how to use these resources.

Nucleotide, Protein, Genome: beyond the A, T, C, and G’s of Genomics
March 12, 2008, 3:00 pm – 4:30 pm
Instructor: Steve Beleu, Regional Depository Librarian, Oklahoma Department of Libraries
Oklahoma Department of Libraries, Computer Lab
To register for this class, contact Steve Beleu at sbeleu@oltn.odl.state.ok.us

Free Classes at OSU-Tulsa

The NN/LM SCR will be offering Keeping Up with PubMed at the Oklahoma State University – Tulsa Library 8:30am - 12:30pm on December 7.

Course Description: With a hands-on approach, this class will show attendees how to use the features of PubMed effectively. Attendees will be able to describe the contents of PubMed; formulate basic search strategies; display, print, and save results in various formats; revise and refine searches; and use special features such as Related Articles, link to journals, Citation Matcher, and Clinical Queries. The instructor will demonstrate online searches and students, at computers connected to the Internet, will be invited to follow along. Time for individual practice will be provided.

Upon successful completion of this class, each participant will receive 4 hours of continuing education credit awarded by the Medical Library Association.

The NN/LM SCR will also be offering Getting the Best from DOCLINE 3 at the Oklahoma State University – Tulsa Library 12:30pm - 4:30pm on December 7.

Course Description: Attendees will learn how to use the features of DOCLINE effectively. Instruction will include how to properly input and maintain their institution’s record and serial holdings, search for and request materials, and fill other libraries requests. Additional topics include DOCLINE upgrades, reports, Loansome Doc and EFTS.

Upon successful completion of the class, each participant will receive 3 hours of continuing education credit awarded by the Medical Library Association (MLA).

To register: http://nnlm.gov/scr/training/register.html

These classes are free and open to anyone.

If you have any questions, please contact Karen Bulow at karen.bulow@exch.library.tmc.edu or 1-800-338-7657.

Social Networking Sites | Articles from Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication

Found this via BoingBoing

The Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication has an entire issue dedicated to Social Network Sites.

Includes the following articles:

Email Flaming Behaviors and Organizational Conflict
by Anna K. Turnage
Are the attributes listed in the literature on flaming considered characteristic of flaming by actual email users? This survey study finds that six of eight common attributes form a coherent set that correlates positively with perceptions of flaming.

Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship
By Danah M. Boyd and Nicole B. Ellison
This introduction describes features of social network sites (SNSs), proposes a comprehensive definition, presents a history of their development, reviews existing SNS scholarship, and introduces the articles in this special theme section.

Whose Space? Differences Among Users and Non-Users of Social Network Sites
by Eszter Hargittai
Are there systematic differences between people who use social network sites and those who stay away? Based on data from a survey administered to young adults, this article identifies demographic predictors of SNS usage, with particular focus on Facebook, MySpace, Xanga, and Friendster.

The Creative Commons and Copyright Protection in the Digital Era: Uses of Creative Commons Licenses
by Minjeong Kim
Using a mixed-methods approach, this study characterizes Creative Commons (CC) licensors, the ways that they produce creative works, and the private and public interests that CC licenses serve.

There are 18 articles total -- and well worth a quick scan, if not an in depth read

Free access to Oklahoma legal notices

Bill Y sends this Library Story:

Oklahoma newspapers have launched a new website that provides the public with free access to legal notices:

http://www.oklahomanotices.com/

>From the site's home page. . .
Government should be accountable to the public and warn citizens of government actions affecting their way of life.

Printed public notice is part of our national heritage. For hundreds of years, newspapers have been the best form of public notice. Oklahoma newspapers take this responsibility seriously and are committed to broad dissemination of notices to the public.

Now you can read the same notices on the Internet that appear in Oklahoma newspapers. It's print power with Internet ease.

Oklahoma newspapers voluntarily created this free site at no cost to government to help citizens find information that affects their way of life.

Zombies in plain English

CommonCraft is a great place to go for short informational tutorials - and if by chance this topic comes up at the reference desk you now have something to show patrons.



Oh and according to my stats tracker -- Librarian Halloween Costumes seem to big again this year

Online Collaboration, Library Services, Sustainability, Rural and Small Libraries, Webinar, Featured Guest Post

What does the phrase “library as place” mean to you? How does it differ from “experience library” or “destination library”? What do these concepts have in common? At the next Rural Webinar, we’ll explore these concepts and share our strategies for making our library spaces inviting and useful to our “inhouse” visitors.

Please join Rural Webinar moderator, Brenda Hough and Cindi Hickey on Thursday in Live Space at WebJunction. Here are the meeting details:

Thursday, October 25, 2007
11:00 am PT/ 2:00 pm ET
For connection instructions, please visit:
http://webjunction.org/do/DisplayContent?id=13377

Bring your ideas and success stories!

P.S. Want a preview? Check out Library As Place, posted by Peter Bromberg at the Library Garden blog.

Collection of codes tools for the web

Mashable has a great list of over 250 tools and resources for coding for the web.

Everything from Ajax to XML. Not just a list for advanced users -- it contains links to tutorials on the new web basics. Give it a looksie and perhaps you'll find something you can use.

flauntR

Found this via MoMB. And you know if a product has a cool hot pink R then it's gotta be super neat-o, right? All kidding aside this is a neat tool (and there are tons out there that do this -- but this one peaked my interest).

Libraries are always asked for photo editing software for patrons' myspace, facebook, flickr, hot or not, etc profiles -- well this site, flauntR (which is in alpha or so they say), might be a solution for those of you who get asked a lot for that functionality of public computers. Plus registration is free and easy.

I've always had issues with patrons placing photos on a library's computer -- privacy, creepiness, etc issues always come into play for me. But this allows the patron to create a profile, load up their image and edit it elsewhere -- so it's not actually resting on your library's machine. I know you all have to have your favorite site for this as well -- please share the links to them!

Here's some examples of what I could do with a photo of my daughter on flauntR:


Common edits: red eye, cropping, tinting, etc...

Fancy Border

Puzzle

"warhol"

With Mango you will learn the language of...

Found this via Mashable.
Mango is a

new site that lets you take language lessons for free. The site has just launched in beta.

Creating an account is super easy - just fill in your name and email address and you are off. It does run in flash so you need to make sure that's installed/enabled on your machine. You'll also need speakers so you can hear what is being said.

They indicate they will have the following languages available:
Spanish
Russian
French
Italian
Mandarin Chinese
German
Japanese
BrazillianProtuguese
Greek
English for Spanish Speakers
English for Polish Speakers

So why don't you ESL folks give it a try and let me know how it stacks up to Rosetta and some of our other pay options we offer in libraries.

Oh and Mashable points to these other language resources online XLingo and Tutorom.

Free NASA workshop!

We invite you to participate in Mars In and Out. A free NASA-supported workshop designed to bring earth and space science into your library and after-school children’s and community programs November 8 and 9, 2007.

The Office of Library Development
Oklahoma Department of Libraries
200 NE 18th Street
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73105

Mars Inside and Out! will acquaint you with everything you need to know about the mysterious red planet to bring exciting programs to your community. You will learn about how the Martian environment has changed through time, the possibility for life on Mars, past, present, and future NASA missions to Mars, and plans and challenges for having humans living and working on Mars.

Scientists and educators from the Lunar and Planetary Institute will share space science information, resources, hands-on activities, and demonstrations developed specifically for librarians and after-school program providers to infuse into their programs with children ages 8 to 13 and their families.

During the workshop you will:

* Meet NASA scientists and engineers involved in Mars exploration
* Learn about Mars science, missions, and future exploration
* Receive training in related hands-on science inquiry activities, designed for children ages 8 to 13
* Receive related resources and materials that you can use in your programs
* Explore ideas for presenting space science programs to young audiences and to other colleagues
* Collaborate with other after-school program providers and children’s and youth librarians in Oklahoma and become part of the growing Explore! community
* Receive a $100 stipend for attending!

The workshop is free. You will receive Mars Inside and Out! presentations, activities, and resources (posters, book lists, suggested Web sites), and the first 25 participants to register will receive a $100 stipend for completing the workshop. The materials are ready to be incorporated into your existing children’s and youth programs.

But wait — there’s more! You will also receive materials for ten additional Explore! space science topics (rockets, space stations, space colonies, egg-stronauts, solar system, shaping the planets, comets, staying healthy in space, and the Sun-Earth connection). Each of these topics has complementary hands-on activities and resources that can be found on the Explore! website.

The workshop begins at 9:00 am on Thursday, November 8, and continues until the close of the day, 5:00 pm, on Friday, November 9. Light breakfasts, lunches, and afternoon snacks will be provided and, of course, chocolate will be available, too! Participants are responsible for travel, housing, and dinner costs, and all logistical arrangements.

Space is limited; please register by 5 October to reserve your place in the workshop. Come join us for a fun-filled and learning-filled two days. We look forward to exploring Mars Inside and Out! with you. Drop me a request for a registration form.

Campus Edition of Firefox

The Chronicle reports

It’s the time of year to stock up on school supplies — new spiral notebooks, pens, and … a new Web browser. Last week Mozilla, maker of the popular Firefox Web browser, released Firefox Campus Edition for free download.

A key feature of the new browser is the Zotero citation system developed by George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media... The system is designed to help students and scholars mark and manage information on the Web that they want to cite in research papers.

The campus edition browser is not all work and no play, though. It also includes a plug-in called FoxyTunes that helps manage the soundtrack to cram sessions, and StumbleUpon, a service to quickly jump among favorite blogs, online videos, and photo Web sites.

Poster contest for kids!

Ok sure it's from Kansas -- but no reason why an Okie can't win...right?

News to share, the Gov Doc Kids Group presents a poster contest for Constitution Day, September 17, 2007. Any child K-12 is welcome to participate.

Pass the word to teachers, librarians, home schoolers, and anybody else who might be interested. A couple of suggestions--forward this message to other listservs, friends and colleagues, post the form and poster on bulletin boards, and put copies of the contest form out for anyone to pick up.

A gift certificate valued at $125 for an 8-week art class offered by the The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art will be awarded to a winner from the Kansas City Metropolitan Area.

PRINT AND POST http://govdocs4children.pbwiki.com/f/PosterContestPoster.pdf

The GovDoc Kids Group is made up of librarians from Johnson County Library, Overland Park, KS and Emporia State University, and an archivist from the National Archives-Central Plains. The Group is co-sponsored by Kansas Library Association Government Documents Roundtable (GODORT).

An interview with Open Library

Open Library is a new online tool for finding information about books – even (perhaps especially) for titles that are out-of-print, scarce, or likely to find one reader per decade, if even that. It is, so to speak, a catalog with benefits. If a text is available in digital format, there is a link. you to it. Citations and excerpts from reviews will be available. Likewise, cross-references to other works on related topics. A user of Open Library can see the cover of the book and, in some cases, search the contents.

The project is still very much under development. Force of habit makes us speak of the pre-optimal version of a site as its “beta” version. With Open Library, given its ambitions, chances are that “gamma” is probably more accurate.

But here’s an encouraging sign: The basic framework is being established by my appallingly accomplished young friend Aaron Swartz — who, at the age of 21, has already helped create RSS (that was in his early teens), published a couple of computer-science papers, and developed Infogami, a system enabling his digitally clueless elders to set up their own websites...

Read the interview here.

1st book eligiblity

Adrienne shares how you can be eligible for the 1st book winnings

Dear Librarian,

Congratulations to everyone who helped Oklahoma win the national First Book contest. As a result of our efforts, the state will receive 50,000 new books to give to children at-risk for low literacy.

The First Book contest tallied more than 133,000 votes. More than 34,000 of those votes selected Oklahoma as the state to receive the windfall of books.

This contest provided a wonderful demonstration of what can happen when many organizations join together to share the gift of reading.

The big book giveaway is tentatively scheduled for September 20 in Oklahoma City.

Many of you have been curious about how the books will get into the hands of children. Eligible organizations throughout the state may apply to receive a portion of the books for giveaway to young readers. Eligibility requirements are:

* programs that predominantly serve children from low-income families; and,

* programs that do not discriminate based on race, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, or physical or mental disability.

Is your library eligible? Perhaps. Your library may be located in an area that predominantly serves low-income children, or you may have an early literacy program targeting these youngsters, or you may be aware of organizations in your community that would be eligible. First Book will make the determination of eligibility as well as the quantity of books to be distributed to qualifying organizations.

To be considered for participation, organizations must register at http://register.firstbook.org

The next step will be to fill out an application in order to receive free books. Very soon, First Book will be forwarding a link to this application form to those who are registered. So, if you are interested, please register as soon as possible.

Once the online application process begins, selection of free book recipients will be made on a first come, first served basis.

Organizations approved to participate will need to have someone attend the Oklahoma City event on September 20 in order to pick up their free books.

Congratulations, again. We did it! I am so proud to be State Librarian of Oklahoma—where there has been this tremendous outpouring of support for children and literacy.

Sincerely,

Susan McVey, Director
Oklahoma Department of Libraries

Oklahoma #1

First Book Declares:
We asked—you answered!
This summer First Book is celebrating its 50 millionth book given to children in need. We asked you to tell us what book got you hooked on reading, then vote for the state to receive 50,000 new books.

Red Dirt Book Festival Registration Open

Registration for the Red Dirt Book Festival is now open!

The third, biennial Red Dirt Book Festival, an official Oklahoma Centennial event, will be November 2 and 3, 2007 in Shawnee, Okla. at the Heart of Oklahoma Expo Center. The mission of the Red Dirt Book Festival is to celebrate the art and craft of writing through an event that brings together Oklahoma readers, writers, illustrators, publishers, storytellers, scholars and performers.

“READ, WRITE, TALK,” continue to be the festival’s thematic strands. “Oklahoma Character,” is the unifying focus for the 2007 festival. The festival’s goal is to identify what is unique about Oklahoma character as reflected in our literature. This may include the unique character of our history, our landscape, our lifestyle and our Oklahoma “characters.” Through a series of lectures, panel presentations, and group discussions, participants focus their attention on thematic questions. Other festival attractions are a banquet and luncheons, book signings, exhibits, storytelling and performances....

Disclosure --
My coworker, Kevin, and I are the 2 person web team behind Red Dirt. We are using Joomla (which is the CMS we are going to do to redesign our work website this coming year). We've already tested some features on the Big Read and learned a lot about the software and users -- so the more folks who use the online functionality of Red Dirt the more Kevin and I get to see how the CMS holds up. So be sure to shoot any design/function commentary my way! :)

Free your content! RSS for Libraries

Free your content! RSS for Libraries

Presented by:

Paul Pival - Distance Education Librarian, University of Calgary, and

Meredith Farkas - Distance Learning Librarian, Norwich University

Tuesday, August 7, 2007, 11 a.m. - noon Eastern / 8 a.m. - 9 a.m. Pacific

RSS feeds - for the Library User and the Library Professional

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is an XML-based format for syndicating content on the Web. It's a common thread behind almost all social technologies. Blogs, wikis, social bookmarking sites, Flickr, podcasts, and many other Web 2.0 sites all have RSS feeds that allow consumers to receive content without having to visit the site where the content actually lives. RSS separates content from presentation, allowing the content to be reused in multiple places and combined with other content to create unique resources. Another great feature of RSS is that it's actually easy to utilize, even for people with little technical background.

Register below to take part in this FREE webinar.

Paul and Meredith will describe what RSS is and how to use it in a variety of ways in libraries: to make it easier for users to find out about your collections and programs, to push subject-related content to patrons, and to publish dynamic content on a variety of pages. There are many tools that make generating RSS feeds, subscribing to RSS feeds, displaying RSS feeds, and mixing RSS feeds an incredibly simply proposition for those with little technical knowledge. In addition, the presenters will show you how to use RSS to easily keep up with the topics you are interested in without having to visit multiple Web sites each day.

Register for this SirsiDynix Institute webinar at:

https://events.livemeeting.com/SirsiDynix080707Reg.htm

If you have missed previous SirsiDynix Institute events or are unable to make this one, we have an extensive archive posted at http://www.sirsidynixinstitute.com/archive.php.

You can check out past events at any time.

For more upcoming 2007 SirsiDynix Institute events, go to http://www.sirsidynixinstitute.com/.

Something fun for your site?

Found this via Mashable -
Want to add a game to your site but don't have the software or skills? Have a librarian you really should be featured in a game? Well PlayMyGame.com offers a place for you to create and play such things for free.

Here's enjoy throwing darts at this librarian taunting you for having a late book!

Link: PlayMyGame