Wicked Cool

Wacky Websites: How to Spend Hours Looking at Web Tutorials

Step 1:  Find a website with the weirdest possible how-to's (or most useful, depending on how you look at it).  Here are some good starting points:

• WikiHow:  Written how-to's, in wiki format -- so if you see any bad advice, you can set the record straight for other folks.
• 5min Life Videopedia:  Short how-to videos.  Many of these attempt to be funny; some of them succeed.
• Instructables:  If anything is wicked cool, it's this site, which combines written instructions, pictures, videos, image annotation, comments, and an amazing range of topics. 

Step 2:  If you're curious, you'll have no trouble finding something interesting to learn how to do.  But if you need a little push, try looking at how to make an invisible book shelf, lavender oil, or ninja mittens.  Or how to create a calmer household.  Or keep your bike from being stolen.  Or clean pennies.  Or win a cubicle war.  It just goes on and on!

Libraries Are for Web People Too!

Check out William Hicks's recent article "Getting the Most Out of Your Library" in Digital Web Magazine -- all about what the bricks-and-mortar library has to offer web professionals (a lot -- but that should come as no surprise!).

Contribute Tip: Alternate Text for Images

The problem:  Contribute makes it easy to add images, but it doesn't prompt you to finish the job by adding alternate text for them.

What's alternate text?:  Alternate text is a snippet of text that takes the place of an image on a website when the image cannot be displayed.  Some situations where alternate text would appear instead of the image:  a bad image URL causing "Image not found" errors, anyone using a browser with images turned off to make pages load faster over a dial-up Internet connection, or a visually-impaired person using a screen reader to access a web page. 

Why it matters:  Best practice is to add alternate text to images that carry meaning as a safeguard for any of the situations mentioned above.  It's part of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and the Section 508 Standards -- and if that's not enough encouragement, it's also common courtesy (it's a little rude to make people guess what an image means when they can't see it).

The solution:  Use Contribute's "Image Properties" button to add alternate text to any meaningful image you use in your web pages.  (Click on the images to view a larger version in a pop-up window.)

1. Insert an image into a page as you normally would
2. Click on the image to select it
3. Click on the "Image Properties" button (or right-click on the image itself and select "Image Properties")
   
4. In the popup window that appears, type the alternate text in the "Alternate Text" box
   
5. Click "OK" and continue editing the page as needed.

Writing Effective Alternate Text:

• Be concise and shoot for 50 characters or less.  Technically there is no length limit, but some browsers may cut off very long alternate text if image-loading is turned off or if they cannot locate the image.
• Do say what the picture represents, or summarize its function
• Don't say "Picture of..."
• Don't add alternate text if the image is purely decorative or does not add meaning to the page
• Good examples: "Patrons enjoying the library," "Beach Reads on display in the library," etc.

"7 Things You Should Know About..." Is Worth Knowing About

A few months ago LibrarianInBlack mentioned "7 Things You Should Know About..."  It's a series of 2-page factsheets produced by the Educause Learning Intiative, on emerging technologies gaining traction in teaching and learning. The most recent topics are Wii, Second Life, Multi-Touch Interfaces, Ning, Google Apps, and Flickr -- pretty much a laundry list of libraryland buzzwords, if I'm not mistaken!

So keep "7 Things You Should Know About..." in mind for current awareness of new technologies.  The factsheets handle basic questions about each subject, like what it is, how it works, where it is going, and why it matters to teaching and learning -- and at 2 pages, it's just the right size.  Now if only they published an RSS feed...

Take Another Look at the Digital Download Center

If you remember hearing about OverDrive and the Digital Download Center and never really explored it, it's time to take a closer look.  The Wisconsin Public Library Consortium is building a great collection of digital audiobooks, music, and video that your patrons might enjoy -- but they can't benefit from it if they don't know about it, so here are some ideas to help get the word out:

1. Request a link on your library's homepage.  Easy-peasy!
   
   
2. Make sure someone on your staff is knowledgeable about the service.  The QuickStart Guide will get you familiar with how it works, and the Digital Book Center FAQ has answers to patrons' most frequently asked questions.
   
   
3. Ask your reference staff to mention it as another option for patrons looking for audiobooks.  Anything "free" and "available 24/7" usually goes over well.
   
   
4. Strategically place bookmarks and flyers around your CD and cassette collections where patrons can find them. These folks already like audiobooks -- they might appreciate getting them in an additional format.
   
   
5. Track the monthly statistics for your library to measure the outcome of your efforts.  The June statistics by library (in .XLS format) might have some surprises for you!

With or Without WWW

If SCLS manages an alternate domain name for your library's website, the alternate domain name will now work either with the www or without it.  It's been a long time coming, and it took some negotiating to get it... but it finally works!  No more missing websites.  No more patrons complaining, "I typed in the right address, but all I got was this weird page..."  Whether you type in "http://www.mylibrarywebsite.org" or "http://mylibrarywebsite.org," you will still end up in the right place -- at the library's website.