CogBlogged from ‘July, 2005’

I really need to stop finding cool stuff and get some work done! But I could not pass on the Flickr Postcard Browser which takes any flickr tags and presents a view like a collection of photos laid out on the table, e.g. hitting some of my own on the tags “strawberry flower” for flower photos at our cabin: And click any image allows you to slide around and admire them up close: Another great find via Tim Lauer! Now quit finding this stuff, Tim, I have work to do!

Tagging is in. You’re It! From tagging web sites to bookmarks, to photos it is changing the way we look at and organize large globs of information. It is spreading to other content, like news, music, movies, heck, maybe even learning content… Yes, folksonomy is hip and happening, eveolving and causing disruption. However, it thrives in the examples above where there is a large base of users to add to the tag pile, to self-correct, to make it come alive. Tagging down in the tail is another story. Yes, tagging it is not a magic bullet and may not be an instant success. But I believe in what it might offer. I set up an experiment a few weeks ago. A colleague has asked for a recommended list of “online professional development” opportunities for faculty, and rather than just cooking up a list and emailing or posting as a static [...]

Out of some idle curiosity, I checked up on the mirror sites of our Feed2JS site that allows folks to embed RSS content into their own pages. Currently there are 7 mirror sites and it looks like we may open up a few more. Checking up on these by going to the examples page– it lists the number of cached feeds as a crude measure of usage: The Original Feed2JS (Phoenix, Arizona) ~20,000 cached feeds per day (note, we flush our cache every 24 hours, but average about 13 new feeds cached per minnute) OpenGUI (California, USA) 89 total cached feeds Astra Systems (U.K.) 90 total cached feeds trendnetters (The Netherlands) 373 total cached feeds firebase software (Dallas, USA) 20,083 total cached feeds KinScape (Michigan, USA) 105 total cached feeds incsub.org (California, USA) 188 total cached feeds UNITEC (New Zealand) 137 total cached feeds It is really useful when the [...]

From the inbox, a reference to our Writing HTML tutorial which is still active after being on the web for 11 years (and sadly in need of a re-write). Hello, Alan, I haven’t bent your ear for awhile. I check the links on the “Volcano” pages occasionally, and it appears that the “Pliny the Elder” link on the first page (following the initial splash intro) is now a broken link. I’m sure, if it is, that you will be able to find a suitable replacement. I continue to be amazed at what can be found on the internet. I started your tutorial in 1972 (I’m listed by you in your “Version History”) I now am 75, and still enjoy creating web pages. Mostly, now, I make little one-pagers to send as e-mails. I still have to refer back to the tutorial a lot, and am grateful for it—and grateful to [...]

Podcasting has been an interesting phenomena to observe. It really did not exist a year ago, and has been riding like a bullet up the technology charts, most recently fueled by inclusion of its features in Apple’s iTunes. It’s all good. I’ve been trying to sample more from a variety of sources, mostly on my idle time of bicycle commuting or running. I’m hard pressed to say if I would really devote the time to them other wise. The best for my interests has been far the offerings of ITConversations, mainly due to the quality of the productions, but more so, the quality of the personalities I can choose to listen to. What I do not buy is the “subscription” model because I cannot say I have found a source I would want to listen to most of the content most of the time. I do not do that with [...]

Creating a web browser icon for your blog or web site is hardly mission critical, but in case anyone out there is looking for the easy way to do this, especially the WordPress crowd, here is how I did it with minimal fuss. The typical method involves creating a facivon.ico image file and placing that in the root level of your web server. Generating the image file used to be rather complex, but the nifty and free (well a $5 appreciation ware fees is nice to give) ICOFormat – Windows Icon (ICO) file format Photoshop plugin does the trick. Note that the “Windows” part of that refers to the funky file format- the plugin works for both Mac and PC versions of PhotoShop. The hard part is coming up with a decent image that works well as a 16 pixel square image. There is also the free favicon java image [...]

I am not trying to start a boycott, but am making my own pointless statement about my fatigue with the format and limited outcomes of attending the large educational technology conferences. I’ve barked and moaned previously (see “I’m Bored As Hell And I’m Not Gonna… zzzzz”) about the staleness and sad irony of the 50 minute lecture to a passive audience being the primary mode of information sharing at professional gatherings and the minimal information density of conference presentations. This past year I attended both the mammoth EDUCAUSE 2004 conference (Denver, 6000? attendees) and the League for Innovation in the Community College’s Innovations 2005 conference (New York City, 3000+ attendees). Beyond meeting up between sessions with colleagues and doing fun stuff away from the site, I am hard pressed to list much as a take away. I get little out of listening to people read me their powerpoints, or spending [...]

Dredged from combing the junk filter folder is evidence that shows some folks have been spamming since 1938, which would be long before Al Gore’s father handed down that Internet idea to his boy: Wow, that old spam sure smells bad! It’s a good thing Thunderbird can spot it from a mile high.

I’m getting prepped to do some upcoming audio interviews wia Skype or iChat A/V — I have a new iRiver mp3 recorder with a line in, and was fussing with hooking that up with a microphone to record me talking and external speakers for the interviewee… If I thought my previous iRiver had a confusing interface, the IFP-799 takes the confusion cake… the manual is 50+ pages, and there is a 10 layer deep sequence of obscure control settings. I am sure it will just take time, from a user design, it… well sucks. Someone please send the iRiver folks a palette of Donald Norman books please. This contortion was because my previous attempts using WireTapPro were limited because you could only choose to record audio line in OR audio out, not both; doing so required a third LineIn mixing software that gave me grief. Since the software would not [...]

Our center has a posted opening for an Instructional Designer position working with projects listed on the main MCLI web site. If this sparks any interest, be sure to apply directly to the Maricopa HR department. Any resumes or materials sent to me will be automatically trashed, and I cannot provide any more information than what is in the job description and what you can find out about us on the web. I will share an important note. This position is NOT one of designing instructional materials nor is it a technology developer/designer position. This is a leadership position, one of managing programs, coordinating large projects within and outside of our system, being a consultant to our colleges and faculty groups. This is not a position creating web pages, designing course materials, developing training materials for Blackboard etc. The instructional design background is critical for being grounded in learning theory [...]