As 2007 winds down, libraries are gearing up for the 2008 edition of The Big Read. This project, an initiative of the National Endowment Of The Arts, is:
". . . designed to restore reading to the center of the American culture . . . [by providing] citizens with the opportunity to read and discuss a single book within their communities."
Coming off a highly-successful 2007 campaign, in which Steinbeck's The Grapes Of Wrath was chosen to reflect our Oklahoma centennial fervor, the library system for which I work has selected Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya for '08. Today the library is getting an early jump on The Big Read by hosting a luncheon for local business owners where the book will be introduced. Lucky for me, I was asked to play a short set of guitar music, so I've put together a melange' of Latin-themed pieces and Christmas standards for the event.
There are 22 books from which to choose, so take a look at the Big Read website and see how you can involve your community in this great event.
Friday, December 7, 2007
Monday, December 3, 2007
"It's fun to play with the H.T.M.L . . ." (apologies to the Village People)
To celebrate finishing up my 5433 web project, I decided to celebrate by . . . building a couple of web pages.
Ridiculous, I know, but you already know something about my obsession with manipulating sound, and since I learned to integrate Flash players into a webpage, I can't seem to do it enough.
So, I created a "lovely parting gift" for my fellow 5433ers, and anyone else who happens across this blog. It's a bunch of esoterically-arranged Christmas tunes I recorded last year with a drummer buddy to promote a local business. They're all free to download in MP3 format; just right-click on the song title and select 'Save As.'
This page has all of the songs, along with a preview snippet of each tune:
http://wrockon.x10hosting.com/JUMPCHART%20site/bonustracks.html
This page just has links to the MP3 files, for those who don't want to wait for the "preview" page to load:
http://wrockon.x10hosting.com/JUMPCHART%20site/bonustracks2.html
Feel free to share these tunes with everyone you know!
NOTE: If you want to burn them to a CD, you'll have to convert the MP3s to WAV files. If you don't already have a preferred app for this, I recommend FreeRip . It's not opensource, but it is free, and will do multiple conversions at once. CDBurnerXP , another free app, is great for the burning process itself.
Happy Holidays!
Ridiculous, I know, but you already know something about my obsession with manipulating sound, and since I learned to integrate Flash players into a webpage, I can't seem to do it enough.
So, I created a "lovely parting gift" for my fellow 5433ers, and anyone else who happens across this blog. It's a bunch of esoterically-arranged Christmas tunes I recorded last year with a drummer buddy to promote a local business. They're all free to download in MP3 format; just right-click on the song title and select 'Save As.'
This page has all of the songs, along with a preview snippet of each tune:
http://wrockon.x10hosting.com/JUMPCHART%20site/bonustracks.html
This page just has links to the MP3 files, for those who don't want to wait for the "preview" page to load:
http://wrockon.x10hosting.com/JUMPCHART%20site/bonustracks2.html
Feel free to share these tunes with everyone you know!
NOTE: If you want to burn them to a CD, you'll have to convert the MP3s to WAV files. If you don't already have a preferred app for this, I recommend FreeRip . It's not opensource, but it is free, and will do multiple conversions at once. CDBurnerXP , another free app, is great for the burning process itself.
Happy Holidays!
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Bacchanalian Libraries, Part 2
Okay -- so there's not really anything particularly salacious about centennial celebration events at Oklahoma public libraries, but I thought I'd get a little more mileage out of that singularly oxymoronic title . . .
With all the Oklahoma centennial hubbub dying down, I wanted to take a second to reflect on what a great year it has been to be a public librarian. After a Potter-rific summer which saw the release of Deathly Hallows and the movie version of Order of the Phoenix -- and the wealth of Wizard Rock tours that followed in its wake -- my library system then shifted to the celebration of Oklahoma's 100th birthday, and there were events galore. I had the good fortune to be asked to play some instrumental music at several of these, and got to revisit the bluegrass and southern gospel tunes of my youth. The most fun was a kids' party where the attendees were also honored with cookies and lemonade for their participation in the Summer Reading Program ; there was some very kinetic clogging and jigging at that one!
So, once again, hats off to public libraries and their roles as community centers and celebrators of local culture. I'm very grateful to be a part of it.
With all the Oklahoma centennial hubbub dying down, I wanted to take a second to reflect on what a great year it has been to be a public librarian. After a Potter-rific summer which saw the release of Deathly Hallows and the movie version of Order of the Phoenix -- and the wealth of Wizard Rock tours that followed in its wake -- my library system then shifted to the celebration of Oklahoma's 100th birthday, and there were events galore. I had the good fortune to be asked to play some instrumental music at several of these, and got to revisit the bluegrass and southern gospel tunes of my youth. The most fun was a kids' party where the attendees were also honored with cookies and lemonade for their participation in the Summer Reading Program ; there was some very kinetic clogging and jigging at that one!
So, once again, hats off to public libraries and their roles as community centers and celebrators of local culture. I'm very grateful to be a part of it.
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Red Dirt Redux
Had the good fortune to take part this past weekend in the Red Dirt Book Festival, under the auspices of the Pioneer Library System, for which I work. I was remiss in not creating this blog post before the event, whereby I could have promoted it a bit. Still, it was such a great experience, I want to give it some props ex post facto.
I had the chance to introduce a great presentation by Hannibal B. Johnson about Tulsa Oklahoma's Greenwood District. Mr. Johnson has written an excellent book called Black Wall Street: From Riot To Renaissance In Tulsa's Historic Greenwood District. I'd never taken part in a book festival before, and to get a chance to meet some of the authors and vendors and mix with all the folks who were there was a great experience. To be a part of it in Oklahoma's centennial year made it even more special. I even got the chance to perform a short set of centennial-themed guitar music during the opening session.
There's another Red Dirt Book Festival already in the works for 2009. I'm looking forward to it already!
I had the chance to introduce a great presentation by Hannibal B. Johnson about Tulsa Oklahoma's Greenwood District. Mr. Johnson has written an excellent book called Black Wall Street: From Riot To Renaissance In Tulsa's Historic Greenwood District. I'd never taken part in a book festival before, and to get a chance to meet some of the authors and vendors and mix with all the folks who were there was a great experience. To be a part of it in Oklahoma's centennial year made it even more special. I even got the chance to perform a short set of centennial-themed guitar music during the opening session.
There's another Red Dirt Book Festival already in the works for 2009. I'm looking forward to it already!
Monday, October 22, 2007
Blame It On Emerson . . .
In an earlier post, I railed against long pages and the need to scroll for miles to get to the bottom of a blog or article. Such is the nature of the web, particularly when room must be made for user comments, banner ads, etc. Still, uber-scrolling is something I try to avoid.
So, I go to work on my term project for LIS 5433 -- a website designed to show budding Wizard Rockers how to create and distribute their music for free, using exclusively no-cost, downloadable software -- and guess what?
Scroll Hell, that's what.
With all the step-by-step processes I have to list, the pics I'm using to illustrate them, and top-and-side navigation for ease of use, there's no way around the "long-ass pages" I so crassly derided a few weeks ago. So, those words now cling to my buttocks with their sharp, pointed teeth.
In my defense, and for the edification of all readers, I close with a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Self-Reliance," because it's a good thing to re-read every now and then. If ever a case can be made for reading a long-ass page, it would be for this essay.
"With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with pockthread, do. Else if you would be a man speak what you think today in words as hard as cannon balls, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today."
Oh, and there's this part, which I'm sure Emerson would apply to my scroll rant:
"To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius."
Long live scrolling.
So, I go to work on my term project for LIS 5433 -- a website designed to show budding Wizard Rockers how to create and distribute their music for free, using exclusively no-cost, downloadable software -- and guess what?
Scroll Hell, that's what.
With all the step-by-step processes I have to list, the pics I'm using to illustrate them, and top-and-side navigation for ease of use, there's no way around the "long-ass pages" I so crassly derided a few weeks ago. So, those words now cling to my buttocks with their sharp, pointed teeth.
In my defense, and for the edification of all readers, I close with a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Self-Reliance," because it's a good thing to re-read every now and then. If ever a case can be made for reading a long-ass page, it would be for this essay.
"With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with pockthread, do. Else if you would be a man speak what you think today in words as hard as cannon balls, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today."
Oh, and there's this part, which I'm sure Emerson would apply to my scroll rant:
"To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius."
Long live scrolling.
Sunday, October 7, 2007
Bacchanalian Libraries!
The public library where I work is an amazing place. It's every bit as much a community center as it is an "information repository," and there's always something cool going on -- day-long festivals celebrating the Hispanic or Native American cultures, teens getting together to try out the latest games on XBox 360 or PS3, or a huge celebration of the Harry Potter series that spills out onto Main Street and culminates with a Wizard Rock concert.
Which brings me to a quote I read in a recent copy of a locally-published magazine regarding our library, specifically:
"Those who think of a library as a quiet place where serious people go in order to read, study, and contemplate will agree that ***** lost its library years ago. It evolved into a noisy recreational center where small children and large children, mistakenly called "adults," visit for fun and recreation. The staff, desperate for popularity with the mob, happily indulges them with Roman circuses."
I certainly feel for the person who wrote the letter; I experience similar emotions about the direction it seems many churches are going, where worship services are more like an 80's arena-rock show than the old open-your-hymnals-to-page-187 litany that I fondly recall. That said, I think that public libraries do well to sponsor and create such events. As a result of such activities, our library maintains a high, positive profile in our community and maintains an image as a vital, vibrant institution and a great use of taxpayer money, which in turn allows for an even better library.
So, here's to Bacchanalian Libraries and the "Roman Circuses" we conduct. May we always be so scandalous!
Which brings me to a quote I read in a recent copy of a locally-published magazine regarding our library, specifically:
"Those who think of a library as a quiet place where serious people go in order to read, study, and contemplate will agree that ***** lost its library years ago. It evolved into a noisy recreational center where small children and large children, mistakenly called "adults," visit for fun and recreation. The staff, desperate for popularity with the mob, happily indulges them with Roman circuses."
I certainly feel for the person who wrote the letter; I experience similar emotions about the direction it seems many churches are going, where worship services are more like an 80's arena-rock show than the old open-your-hymnals-to-page-187 litany that I fondly recall. That said, I think that public libraries do well to sponsor and create such events. As a result of such activities, our library maintains a high, positive profile in our community and maintains an image as a vital, vibrant institution and a great use of taxpayer money, which in turn allows for an even better library.
So, here's to Bacchanalian Libraries and the "Roman Circuses" we conduct. May we always be so scandalous!
Monday, September 24, 2007
"Testing . . . 1, 2, 3 . . . "
In Don't Make Me Think, Steve Krug devotes a good chunk of the book and a great deal of passion to the topic of usability testing. "If you want a great site, you've got to test," says Steve on page 133, and elsewhere he states "Testing always works, and even the worst test with the wrong user will show you important things you can do to improve your site."
Which brings me to today's mild rant. Somehow, the following item must have slipped through the cracks. Below is a screenshot of the "Advanced Search" function of the catalog my library uses to procure interlibrary loan books through participating Oklahoma libraries. Since the day I started using it, I've been irked by the location of the "Clear Search" button:
Why would the "Clear Search" button be right in the middle of the box, just below the search fields -- i.e., where users are most likely to click by instinct?! "Counterintuitive" is the word that comes to mind. More than thrice I've typed all my search terms neatly in their boxes, sidled my hand over to the mouse, and promptly banished them into the ether by clicking this accursed button. I'd venture to say that most of my coworkers have done it more than once, too.
Aside from that (and the fact that the default search setting is our own library system -- what's the point?!), it's a good interface, but this one thing has always struck me as palm-to-the-forehead ridiculous. Just a good reminder to keep my eyes peeled for such problem areas as I begin designing my own website project for my MLIS coursework.
(props to TT for validating my frustration!)
Which brings me to today's mild rant. Somehow, the following item must have slipped through the cracks. Below is a screenshot of the "Advanced Search" function of the catalog my library uses to procure interlibrary loan books through participating Oklahoma libraries. Since the day I started using it, I've been irked by the location of the "Clear Search" button:
Why would the "Clear Search" button be right in the middle of the box, just below the search fields -- i.e., where users are most likely to click by instinct?! "Counterintuitive" is the word that comes to mind. More than thrice I've typed all my search terms neatly in their boxes, sidled my hand over to the mouse, and promptly banished them into the ether by clicking this accursed button. I'd venture to say that most of my coworkers have done it more than once, too.
Aside from that (and the fact that the default search setting is our own library system -- what's the point?!), it's a good interface, but this one thing has always struck me as palm-to-the-forehead ridiculous. Just a good reminder to keep my eyes peeled for such problem areas as I begin designing my own website project for my MLIS coursework.
(props to TT for validating my frustration!)
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