Friday, February 17, 2012

Adding Twitter link, Thing 3 and where did the '23 Things' page go?

The goals for today were to add the Twitter link to my tweets and complete Thing 3 and 4.

Now that I know about the template designer I found adding the link relatively easy, finding my way around the blog and back again (I was also able to enlarge my title heading to be more easily read against the background picture. All I have to do now is start using Twitter as the three entries displayed are the only ones I have made and they are at least a year old!

It was while I was working on Thing 3 I realised that my 23 Things page had disappeared. As I had been particulary vigilant in saving drafts I was suddenly distressed that all that work ay have disappeared. Thankfully I used the 'back page' button, found it and copied it to a word doc., just in case. Man the fallibility of these technologies keep you on your toes. Ahhh...eureka moment - posts are saved then published, pages are saved as drafts, which you then have to publish.

Thing 3, about personal branding, was a most worthwhile exercise, getting me to think about my online presence, what is presented about me, and how I wanted it to attract like minded people with similar interests within the library world to spur and broaden my own. I have added to this blog accordingly but imagine I still have a way to go.

Thing 4 introduced me again to Twitter, this time with a couple more clues as to what it was for, but I have still come away non-plussed. Need to do further searching for interesting groups. Will continue with Thing 4 next week.

Throughout the morning the internet was incredibly slow which meant frustration at trying to get things done within the time I have set aside.

Friday, February 10, 2012

23 Things, Aargh! and template designer

So today's tasks were Things 1 and 2 on the 23 Things. We got there in the end but only after the sudden vanishment of a good hour's work on this blog - hence the Aargh! The first rule when computing anything worth saving - regularly save it! I know that now. Certainly makes you think about what you're writing about, trying to remember it all, especially the good bits, for a second time.

This Aargh! moment occurred as I was writing about what I hope to get out of the programme (see Thing 1). One moment everyting was as it should be, the next gone. But wait, a new development! In creating the previous 'Thing 1' link I have discovered my vanished work - as a draft within 'Edit Posts', and here it is ...

First task this morning was to check if my sign-up to the 23 Things had been registered. It hadn't. After reading through previous sign up messages I discovered that as the 23 Things programme is no longer 'live' the people responsible for the blog are not updating their registrations as often on either the blog or the del.ic.ious tags. Following the lead of previous registeree's I have left a message asking them to confirm that a) I am registered and b) it is still worthwhile contining through the programme even though it is no longer 'live' (previous reply comments to messages suggest it is).

I'd forgotten I'd wrote that so good to find it. Unfortunately it wasn't all I remembered writing but I've managed to rewrite what I need.

Looking around some of the other blogs on the 23 Things blog gave me an insight into how much (and how little) people had done. Also, by following the instructions on Thing 2 and my own nose I was able to add an image and change the header colour (through the Template designer edit function) to make my own blog front page a bit more inviting to the visitors (none thus far) I have now ensured can access and leave messages. Even managed to add a profile picture and brief blurb.

Friday, February 3, 2012

23 Things and Mātauranga Māori

After a week on annual leave I am back to blogging. As I do more posts and pages I am becoming aware of layout requirements, in this case what post headings to use, thinking into the future about how I want titles to look and how easy it will be for reader's to locate archived entries. Hence the date title, although I'm still not certain that this is the right information. I need to look at other blogs for ideas.


I also need to look and see if my enrolement to the 23 Things library blog has been either accepted or even acknowledged. I will do that now...


Well that was wierd! Wondering if this blog was actually live I searched for 'Librarian Grazer' on the web and instead found, listed as the first result, the 23 TfPD site with 'Librarian Grazer' aleady signed in! It seems I am indeed accepted...still don't know if this is a live blog or not though.


Just back from a look around this site and the web. While I cannot find any links to this blog online I still somehow think it is live... I also realised that using the date as the post title is redundant as each post is dated anyway. Back to the drawing board on that one.


And back to my Matauranga Maori write-up page to finish that off.


Two hours or so later and I have finished the Matauranga Maori  pages. I have also changed the name of this post to reflect the topics within it in the hope that doing so increases the hit rate of people searching under these terms.


The 'two hours later' aspect reminds me of the conversation I had with my Team Leader regarding the Libraries acceptance of people spending library time working on their professional development. I do not feel so guilty now about blocking out so much (and more) of my Friday.