TechBits

Um, excuse me? Weaponized PDFs?

I was going to do a Tech Bits post about Carla Hayden's (Librarian of Congress!) proposal to digitize the  Library of Congress (!!!) but I ran across this other article and thought "What?!  Like with little guns and knives and stuff?"  

American Libraries linked to an April 19, 2019 article on the Nextgov website that has the title "Report: Weaponized PDFs on the rise." (sounds like an excerpt from a Terminator movie, right?) But it is no fantasy my friends, just the next generation of malware, scamming and spamming.   

So in addition to reminding your patrons, staff and coworkers about suspicious emails, ads and hyperlinks you also need to warn them about weaponized PDFs.

Welcome to the 21st century.

 

 

 

Google Slides Updates

With WAPL and other presentations coming up, I've been using Google Slides quite a bit and wanted to share a few updates with you. Last year, I wrote about the Unsplash add-on for adding photos to your slides. I use this add-on all the time.

If you use videos in your Google Slides, you can set start and end times in the video formatting tools. This is a great option for when you need to show a segment of a longer video. You can also set the video to audoplay when you advance to that slide.

Want to add audio? You can now do that in Google Slides - if you have the audio file in your Google Drive account. You can add audio by using the "Insert" menu. Similar to video, you can also set the timing of the playback and more. I haven't tried this option yet and will let you know how it goes.

And, lastly, you can now customize the color palettes in the themes in Google Slides. You've long been able to do this in PowerPoint and I'm so glad that it's finally available in Slides. I'll be testing this out in the next presentation that I create.

All three of these tips came from Richard Byrne, author of Free Technology for Teachers, one of my favorite technology experts (outside those in the SCLS offices, of course!)

Help Desk Tidbits

Early morning work on staff and patron PCs

When SCLS tech staff arrive in the morning they check on different things with both staff and patron PCs. Things like the status of the anti-virus and disk locking software. If we see a problem and we know the library isn't open yet, we will remote in to fix the problem. So if you are working and you see a PC move by itself that is just us working on it. Please don't shut off the PC thinking it has been hacked because we may be in the middle of fixing a problem. If the PC is rebooted it may cause more harm or we may have to start over and run the risk of still be working on the PC when you open. If you want to verify it is us you can always feel free to call the Help Desk and find out for sure.

Help Desk Portal gives "Connection not secure" error message

We've been getting a few calls lately reporting that when going to the Help Desk Portal people are getting an error message saying "Your connection is not secure." This is only with Firefox and is being caused by the fact that we secured the portal with a self-signed security certificate. We have a fix posted on our TechBits page and you read all about it by visiting this page.

Slow Staff PCs

We've been getting a lot of calls lately about slow staff PCs. Before you reboot those PCs, please call the Help Desk so we can remote in and hopefully see what is making the PC slow. Once we remote in what we'll probably do is run a virus/malware scan on the PC and this takes at least 20 minutes to complete. So hopefully you can be without the PC for a while as we look at it.

Voice Assistants

Voice assistants (Amazon Echo, Google Home, etc) seem to be everywhere these days. What are libraries doing with them?

 

Some libraries are loaning them to patrons or educating their users about them...

• Skeptical of Smart Speakers?
  https://dppl.org/blog/post/skeptical-of-smart-speakers
• Framingham Public Library is pleased to offer Google Home...
  https://framinghamlibrary.org/google-home

Some library staff are just starting to think about and experiment with how they might be used in libraries...

• Library and academic related services on Google Assistant and Alexa - a preliminary survey
  http://musingsaboutlibrarianship.blogspot.com/2018/06/library-and-academic-related-services.html
• Conversational Systems and Libraries
  http://www.davidleeking.com/conversational-systems-and-libraries/
• ALA: Voice Control
  http://www.ala.org/tools/future/trends/voicecontrol
• Alexa provides a new resource tool to the Missouri Valley Public Library
  http://www.enterprisepub.com/movalley/news/alexa-provides-a-new-resource-tool-to-the-missouri-valley/article_fc739dd0-7a82-11e6-b694-3b99d28d9504.html

Some libraries are developing skills/actions for the devices* to make their libraries' information more accessible to patrons using the devices...

• Designing an Alexa Skill for the Public Library
  https://medium.com/@alexcollier/designing-an-alexa-skill-for-the-public-library-6ec43604062a
• Worthington Libraries: Voice Assistants
  https://www.worthingtonlibraries.org/visit/services/voice-assistants
• Online Searcher - "Serving Patrons Using Voice Assistants at Worthington"
  http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=133216866&site=ehost-live  (available through BadgerLink)
• New Alexa Skill debuts this week at DCDL
  https://www.delgazette.com/news/59607/new-alexa-skill-debuts-this-week-at-dcdl

And some libraries are promoting library services that can work with the devices.

• hoopla Now Suports Amazon Alexa Devices!
  https://www.lapl.org/alexa-meet-hoopla

Some takeaways:

• Voice Assistants are designed to be personal/home devices and may have some challenges being integrated into a library environment
  • library networks are designed to keep users' data private, where voice assistants would like to communicate with other devices in the area
  • how comfortable would patrons be interacting with a voice assistant in a public space?
• This is a technology that will likely become more and more popular over time
  (Remember how the crew on Star Trek would ask the ship's computer something and it would answer?** It sure seems like that's where we're headed.)
• Libraries' best option may be to make their content more easily accessible to these devices and to promote content and services that work with the devices at patrons' homes

Do you have a voice assistant at your house? What is your impression?
------------
* Check out libraries with Alexa skills and with Google Actions
**Amazon now allows users to change the "wake word" for its Alexa voice-enabled assistant and allows "Computer" as a wake word, to the delight of Star Trek fans: http://time.com/4645187/amazon-echo-star-trek-computer-voice/

How to refresh your web browser without clearing your browsing history

Isn't it aggravating when you KNOW a webpage should be showing an update, but clicking the browser's "refresh" button (or hitting Ctrl + R) isn't showing the change? You might run across this when updating a website or even checking email.

Sure, you could log out, close all your tabs, and delete your browsing history to start completely fresh, but who wants to do that? Try these tips instead:

Hard Reload (two ways)
Ctrl + F5
or
Ctrl + Shift + R

Hold down the Control key and press F5. Or, hold down Control and Shift, and then press the R key. This will force the browser to reload and will work in Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer.

Empty Cache and Hard Reload (Chrome browser)

The "cache" is the group of images and files your browser saves to help load previously-visited web pages more quickly. Clearing cached files and then reloading forces the browser to get the most current versions of all those images and files.

1. In Chrome, press the F12 key. The DevTools menu will open.
2. Right click on the reload button and select Empty Cache and Hard Reload.
3. Breathe a sigh of relief that the page has refreshed, but all your tabs are still open and you are still logged into everything.
4. Hit F12 again to close DevTools.