Blogging Reflection

http://ace-lismsstudent.blogspot.com/

“What did I learn from this experience?”
I have to say after 15 weeks of maintaining a blog; I have realized that I am not of the blogging type, if there is such a type. Keeping up a blog takes more time than I thought that it would and more creativity than I think I give myself credit for.
When blogging the information in my opinion, should not only be resourceful, but also capture the interest of a variety of readers. This was difficult for me. However my fellow bloggers have a great talent for this type of communication. They provided an abundant amount of helpful websites, videos, and podcasts for all of us to gain understanding and discover new ideas.
I believe that a major requirement in order to maintain a constructive and functional blog is for the blog creator to have a love of/for communication. As a trainer, most people would think that I would love to talk, but this is not true. I love my job as a trainer, but when my day comes to an end, I prefer not to communicate with the outside, in any form if I don’t have to and instead go home and relax with my family. Another part of my personality is that if I have to talk I prefer to talk on the phone and not via a computer. I think most people that blog enjoy writing and journaling and not talking on the phone. Se blogging is an easier alternative form of communication for them.


“What can I do to improve my blogging?”
As I said above, if I had more dedicated blog time and more of a desire to blog, this would eventually help me improve on my existing blog and the information that I provided.
I also think that if I was going to continue blogging in the future that by blogging about something that I enjoyed talking about and not something that was assigned would make the experience more interesting for me and my readers. Consequently this may create a more time for me to blog and even compel me to learn to love it.

Some of the sites that I found that use RSS feeds to their advantage are

NASS (National Agricultural Statistic Service) uses the service for both News and Coming Events. In the future NASS expects to offer an RSS material based on user feedback.

IBM has also created a website to aid e-businesses to globalize there business
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/globalization/rss/index.jsp

A group called the K-12 High Speed Network of California had a program last year that taught participants about E-rate and how to use and RSS feed to receive the training information.

ftp://ftp.cpuc.ca.gov/puc/telco/public+programs/program_update_august07%5B1%5D.pdf

This website is so easy to use. It helps the user create an RSS feed or and RSS reader, by providing a tutorial for the user to follow. This article also talks about another syndicated format product called Atom. The article describes the RSS feed process, but also shows the reader visually how it works.

http://www.faganfinder.com/search/rss.php

This site talks about the latest website trends which includes, RSS feeds, Podcasts and Webinars

http://www.inherent.com/documents/Latest_and_Greatest.pdf

This article by Peter Cliff helps the user create an RSS feed, as well as describes what RSS is and why the user should have it. At the end of the article it also provides several the authors’ references, which provides the reader with even more information about RSS.

Cliff, P. RSS - Sharing Online Content Metadata, Cultivate Interactive, issue 7, 11 July 2002URL: <http://www.cultivate-int.org/issue7/rss/>

Here is an article about RSS feeds and how they are so secure that they may prevent Phishing Scams before they happen.

http://www.silverpop.com/rssdirect/about_rssdirect/phishing.html

The book listed below by Ben Hammersley provides a thorough explanation of RSS standards, specifications and modules for XML.

Hammersley, B. Content Syndication with RSS. O'Reilly UK, 2003

This article by Jonathan Eisenzopf provides a wonderful description of how RSS was created and the future uses of the technology.

http://www.webtechniques.com/archives/2000/02/eisenzopf/

RSS is an acronym for Rich Site Summary or Real Simple Syndication and was created by Netscape in XML format in order to organize content from one site and delivery it to other sites. RSS readers can provide alerts to users about updates on websites the readers do the work for you by collecting feeds from sites that you have visited and then combine them into one place, and delivers them to the user. The more sites you visit, the more you benefit from using RSS. RSS is helpful for those websites that are updated frequently like News Sites (New York Times) RSS links or feeds include a title, description and a link to the particular web page

There are several versions of RSS, but almost all applications that handle RSS feeds can read all the different versions. You can find several RSS readers for free on the internet, but you can also pay for RSS services.

http://www.llrx.com/features/rssforlibrarians.htm

Week 8

For this last week of my technology I thought it would be fun to look into how geocahing has encouraged children to be outdoors more. This one site below introduces children to the sport by telling them that they can learn about nature, other cultures, history, and new technologies.
http://eduscapes.com/geocaching/kids.htm

This next website is an easy intro for young children to understand the new sport
http://www.geocachingkids.com/

This week we are talking about Pod casting in class. This is actually all new to me I am not as savvy with that technology as I would like to be. So I found this great website about geocaching and Pod casts :-)

http://www.cacheamaniacs.com/index.php?post_id=159609

I was looking through articles about the type of people that geocache and I found this one in Scientific America by Mark Clemens. It is called “A Walk in the Woods”. It not only tells about his experience in Lake placid NY with the new sport, but also provides some background on GPS devices and geocahing in general.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0008078F-DC62-1FF8-90AE83414B7F0000&sc=I100322

Week 6

So I have been asking my self this question over the past couple of weeks, Why would someone want to become a person who Geocaches? I found a great paper that was written by Margot Anne Kelley. She describes why she started geocaching. She says that it was mainly for the great new walking/hiking adventures, but then she discovers that it is more about the exploration of the United States and trying to understand other geocachers.

http://www.margotannekelley.com/Why_Geocaching_Now.pdf

Now that you have had time to look at the links provided the other day, I thought it would be interesting to talk about the money that could be made in this type of game. Of course the GPS creators would like to get in on this idea, so the website I have attached is all about Garmin and how Garmin users can sign up via this website and start geocaching using their product.

http://www8.garmin.com/outdoor/geocaching/

Bluetooth and Geocaching

Last week talked about Bluetooth technology in our group discussions. Well many GPS devices have Bluetooth technology. So geocachers are utilizing these devices in when they are hunting for their cache. The advantage is that most of these devices run on some sort of battery power, but the disadvantage is that they have to carry two devices instead of one.

http://www.pocketpcmag.com/_archives/oct06/geocaching.aspx

This is the official website according to them of Geocachong. It isGlobal GPS Cache Hunt Site. http://www.geocaching.com/ It has a link on the website that answers Frequently asked questions. This is where I went to find out what Geocahing was exactly http://www.geocaching.com/faq/

Basically individuals and/or organization leave a cache(treasure) at a particular location and then share this information with other participants via the internet. Then the participants utilize there GPS systems to locate the particular caches. Once they find the cache, they are asked to leave something in its place. Though finding the location may be simple once you arrive at that location finding the cache might be a bit more difficult and for most geocachers this is where the fun of the adventure begins.

Look at the FAQ link to find out more about this interesting exploration

Learning

I am sad to see that no one has posted anything on my blog yet. I am learning slowly how to use this new technology and I think it is interesting, and offers a lot of options to the users

First time blogger

I am a Graduate student at Syracuse University. One of my assignments as a Library Science Major is to create and maintain a Blog. This is all new for me, since I have never had a Blog or even utilized them.

So as the weeks go by, and I start to become more familiar with this technology, I will hopefully be posting more interesting information than I am on this first attempt



:-)