Week 4: Wikis

So far we have explored Blogging as a way of quickly and easily publishing content to the web and we have also explored RSS feeds as means of syndicating such content. While Blogs can be undertaken as collaborative enterprises, the 2.0 technology we will be looking at this week is particularly suited to online collaborative authoring — Wikis. This week we will take a look at what wikis are, how they are used, and what features are common to most.

Start here!
If you enjoyed last week’s video on RSS, you’ll love this week’s called “Wikis in Plain English”. The folks at Common Craft are at it again, explaining 2.0 tools in easy-to-get ways, and this short video about wikis is a great way to jump into this week’s content!

So, what’s a Wiki?
A wiki is a type of website that allows users to easily add, remove, and otherwise collaboratively edit and change content that can be quickly published to the web. This ease of interaction and use makes a wiki an effective tool for collaborative authoring. You do not need to know HTML to edit a wiki (although many allow for the use of HTML editing in addition to Wikitext or Wiki Markup) and all you need to edit a wiki is an internet connection and a web browser. Wikitext, a form of markup which is simpler than HTML, may also vary to a degree from one wiki to another, here’s a sample of Wikitext used in MediaWiki. There are numerous kinds of “wiki software” or “wiki engines”, these can vary widely in look and functionality. Features common to most wiki software include: Recent activity display, discussion or comment features, and varying degrees of access / edit permissions for users, WYSIWYG editing and edit history.

Wiki software can be downloaded and installed on a private network; you can even get your own personal desktop wiki! (Such as MoinMoin Desktop), but most wiki users go to a Wiki farm. A Wiki Farm is a server or a collection of servers that provides wiki hosting. Wiki farms allow users to quickly sign-up and establish their own wiki with no software downloads either for free or for a nominal change (free wikis are supported by revenue from advertising).

Examples of Wikis in Career Services & other campus services:

• Oregon State University Wiki
• McMaster University Library’s Wiki: The Mac Library Experience
• Rochester College Current Students’ Wiki
• Northeastern College of Computer and Information Science Wiki
• Colorado State University Libraries Public Wiki

What’s the difference? Choosing the right wiki
TWiki, WetPaint, Stikipad, PHPWiki, SeedWiki, PBWiki, Wikispaces, MoinMoin, Netcipia… with all these different wikis to choose from you might have a difficult time deciding which wiki is most suited to your project. A tool you might find useful for comparing the features of various wikis is Wikimatrix. The Wikimatrix website has several useful features for comparing any number of more than 80 wiki engines listed. So what are some of the features common to Wikis & what are some differences?

• Wikis allow you to assign different access permissions to different users. The site creator (Administrator) can assign other Administrators or Moderators to the Wiki. Wikis typically have several levels of contributors with varying degrees of access, such as Admin, Mod, Writer, Registered User, and Guest.
• Many wikis allow users to subscribe to them either via email or RSS feeds. Some allow users to subscribe to specific pages and keep apprised of recent edits.
• Personalization of user accounts can be quite different from wiki to wiki; some allow for the creation of detail user profiles, private messaging, and commenting upon individual profiles.
• Many wikis are tiered with both free accounts and ‘premium memberships’ that often have added features such as a higher page limits or greater storage capacity.
• Pages edit history & Revert. Wikis allow users to view the history of specific pages, and mark up recent changes. Many have more advanced edit comparison features that may allow users to compare the changes to an entry over the course of months! Wikis also typically have a revert feature that allows those with sufficient access permissions to rollback a page to an earlier edit.
• WYSIWYG. Not only do most wikis allow users to use Wikitext instead of Html, but wikis also have “What You See Is What You Get” editors that make it even easier for anyone to contribute!

Activity #1
The first activity for this week is to try some basic editing in a wiki. I’ve set up a wiki called “my favourite books” (password to edit=Mills): try adding pages, links, comments, and look at the page history feature. Once you’ve had a chance to play around in the wiki, post your thoughts and comments to your blog. If you’ve already used PBWiki in the past, feel free to examine and compare the features of wikis you haven’t used before, you can always set up a free account with any of the wikis below or use Wikimatrix to find others to explore.

• Netcipia
• SeedWiki
• StikiPad
• Wikispaces
• Moinmoin

Need help getting started? Check out the link on the main page of “My favourite books” for the link “Here is a list of a few features you may want to test on PBWiki” for the basics of editing.

Further readings (optional)

• Chawner, B., & Lewis, P.H. (2006). Wiki Wiki Webs?: new ways to communicate in a web environment. Information Technology and Libraries, 25(1), 33-43.
• Farkas, M. G. (2005). Using Wikis to Create Online Communities. Web Junction.
• Singel, R. (2006). Veni, Vidi, Wiki. Wired News.

Week 3: RSS

Last week we looked at blogs, and since most of you have already set up your own blogs, you might have encountered the term “RSS”. Or perhaps you’ve seen one of these icons during your web travels –

Well, this week is all about demystifying RSS! Read on for an introduction to the technology, some ideas on how you can use it, a few links to RSS search engines and directories, an explanation of this week’s activities, and finally some optional readings for those who’d like to explore a little further!

What is RSS?
This video, put together by the brilliant folks at Common Craft, is a great place to start:

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is an XML file format for delivering content on the web. You will also find RSS referred to as “web feeds” or just “feeds”. A good way to understand RSS feeds is to think about them as magazine subscriptions: rather than having to frequently visit the newsstand to check for a new issue of your favourite magazine, you can just subscribe to it and sit back & wait for the new issues to come to you. Well, RSS works the same way. If your favourite website publishes an RSS feed, you don’t have to keep visiting it to find fresh content; you can just subscribe to the RSS feed and wait for that fresh content to come to you! And, unlike magazine subscriptions, RSS is free!

If you’re feeling brave and would like to have a look at what an RSS file looks like, click here. Yes, that looks like a bunch of scary code, but the good news is, you shouldn’t ever have to look at that code (unless you want to!), because that’s what RSS aggregators do.

What are RSS aggregators?
RSS aggregators are applications that read RSS feeds. An aggregator will take an RSS feed (like the one linked above) and convert all that coding into something that is readable, with a defined title, formatting, and hypertext links that you can click on. The other important feature of an aggregator is the built-in update function that checks the feeds you’ve subscribed to for fresh, new content. If new content is found, your aggregator delivers that to you.

Aggregators come in a few different flavours:

• Desktop: these are software applications that required downloading and installation on a computer.
• Web-based: online aggregators live on the web and require users to set up a username and password to access them. To access a web-based aggregator, you go to the site, login, and read your feeds online. The advantage of web-based aggregators is that you can access them from multiple computers (home, work, service desks, etc.). Two popular web-based aggregators are Bloglines and Google Reader.
• Browser- and email client-based: the latest versions of many browsers (like Firefox and Internet Explorer 7) include the ability to subscribe to and read RSS feeds right in the browser. Also, a couple of popular email clients (like Outlook 2007 and Thunderbird) include a feed reader.

So, how does it work, exactly?
If a website publishes a feed, it is usually indicated on the site in at least one of the following ways:

• a hyperlinked orange icon (three examples are included at the beginning of this post);
• a link called “RSS” or “XML” or “Subscribe” (or some variation thereof);

Most often, when you want to subscribe to a feed, you have to right-click the link to the feed (which, again, can be indicated by either an orange icon or a text link), select “Copy Link Location” or “Copy Shortcut”, and add the link to your aggregator. Specific instructions for subscribing to feeds in Bloglines and Google Reader are included below under Activity #2.

Finding Feeds

• Directories & Search Engines: yes, there are search engines and subject directories devoted JUST to RSS feeds! Check out Feedster and Search4RSS, for example. Both allow you to do a keyword search and bring up results with easy-to-grab links to RSS feeds that you can subscribe to. Also, most web-based aggregators include an RSS search engine, so when you set up an account in Bloglines/Google Reader (this week’s Activity #1), you can use either of their search engines to find feeds.
• Serendipity: chances are, you probably won’t remember how you found most of the feeds that end up in your aggregator because most of your subscriptions will probably result from your general web meanderings! When you’re on a web site and you’re wondering if they publish an RSS feed, remember to look for the orange RSS icons or for a link labeled “RSS”, “XML” or “Subscribe”.

Examples of RSS feeds in Career Services & other campus services:

• Career Center at UC Berkeley Calendar RSS Feeds
• UC Irvine Career Center Feeds
• RSS Feeds & Podcasts at UCLA
• University of Arizona Career Services RSS Feeds
• NC State University Division of Student Affairs
• Westminster College RSS Feeds

Activity #1
The first activity for the week is to set up an account on either Bloglines or Google Reader. Both aggregators offer similar features and functionality and the choice between the two usually comes down to personal preference. If you need some help deciding between the two, take a look at this article for guidance. Or, if you feel like exploring, set up accounts on both sites, play around in them (once you’ve added some feeds, which is Activity #2 for this week), get a feel for the interfaces, and decide for yourself!

Activity #2
Once you’ve set yourself up with an aggregator (Activity #1), you’re going to need some feeds to subscribe to!

• Start by subscribing to the feed for this blog. The feed for this blog is located at http://csatmac.wordpress.com/feed. To subscribe to it, right-click the feed URL, select “Copy Link Location” or “Copy Shortcut”, open up your aggregator, and subscribe to the feed using one of these methods:
  • If you’re using Bloglines: login to your account, click “Add” at the top-left of the screen, paste the feed URL into the “Blog or Feed URL” box, and click “Subscribe”. The next screen will give you some options on where you’d like to save the feed (you can organize your feeds in folders), once you’ve made your choices, click “Subscribe” at the bottom of the page.
  • If you’re using Google Reader: login to your account, click “Add subscription” at the top-left of the page, paste the feed URL into the input box that appears, and click “Add”.
• Once you’ve subscribed to the feed for this blog, check out some of your colleagues blogs (listed on the right under “participant blogs”) and subscribe to their feeds! To find their feed addresses, you will have to visit the blog and look for one of those RSS icons or an RSS/Subscribe link.
• Still looking for more feeds to subscribe to? Check out one or two of the RSS search engines or directories described above to find feeds of interest to you & subscribe to a few of those feeds.

Make sure to visit your aggregator at least a couple of times this week to check for new content in the feeds you’ve subscribed to (you’ll be surprised at how addictive RSS feed-reading can become!). And don’t forget to blog about your experiences using these tools!

Further Readings (optional)

• Feed Me: A gentle introduction to Internet feeds
• RSS for Non-Techie Librarians, Steven M. Cohen (this article is librarian/library-focused, but the explanations are approachable and the ideas are easily adaptable to any context)
• Blogging and RSS: The “What’s It” and “How To” of Powerful New Web Tools for Educators, Will Richardson
• Keeping Up by Using RSS, Roy Tennant

As always, if you have any questions, leave a comment here or send me an email. And enjoy the world of RSS!

Week 2: Blogs

Now that you’ve explored the Learning 2.0 @ Mac blog and found out all about the programme, it’s time to jump in and start playing with the tools & technologies! This week, we’re focusing on blogs. This post will give you a brief overview of the technology, explain the activities for the week, and provide links to some additional readings for those who would like to know more!

Blogs: An Overview

A weblog (or “blog” is a format for publishing content on the web. As the name suggests, blogs are, quite simply, web-based logs of information that have the following features in common:

• content that is organized in reverse chronological order, with the most recent entry appearing at the top of the Web page;
• a date and timestamp to indicate when the content was published to the blog;
• archives that are automatically generated by the blog software;

Most early practitioners and blog commentators agree that the blog format began with the simple “What’s New” pages that littered the Web in the early days of web publishing. The blog format was formalized when web/tech savvy individuals began writing their own programs and pieces of software to make it easier and quicker to publish these sorts of pages, where it was important that current content appeared at the top of the page. And once these programmers made this software freely available online, the now widely-used blog format was born.

While the media still tends to treat blogs as the domain of teenage girls (who have nothing better to do with their time than talk about the minutiae of their lives in agonizing detail), you can now find blogs being written by everyone from politicians, to CEOs, published authors, educators, and librarians! Here are a few examples of blogs used in a number of universities for a variety of campus services:

• School of Information Career Services Blog (University of Michigan)
• Appalachian Alumni Association Blog (Appalachian State University)
• McMaster University Libraries Research Help Blog (used for internal communication amongst Reference desk staff)
• Blackstone Hall Project Blog (Clark University) (used to accompany a building project)
• Library Suggestion Blog (Virginia Commonwealth University) (used as an online “suggestion box”)

Blogging Software

We don’t want to get too hung up on software talk, but it’s probably a good idea to understand the basics:

• There are 2 types of blogging software tools out there: hosted and installed.
• Hosted blogs allow users to sign up for an account and a free blog. The company providing the software usually takes care of everything for you, and all you have to do is choose a name for your blog and write! We will be using hosted blogs for this programme.
• Some of the most popular hosted blogging services are Blogger, LiveJournal, WordPress.com, and Vox.
• Installed blogging services provide you with the software that you can download to your Web server. Installed software tends to be more powerful and gives you more control over the functionality and look & feel of your blog.
• Some examples of installed software are Movable Type, Textpattern, and WordPress.org.

Activity #1
Ready to start blogging? Good, because Activity #1 is to set up your own blog and add your first post!

• Use either Blogger or WordPress.com to set up your own blog. Both are free, hosted blogging tools where you can set up an account and start a blog. On Blogger, click the “create your own blog now” link; on wordpress.com, click “start your wordpress blog”. You’re free to choose either tool, if you need some help comparing the two, check out this page.
• If you set up your blog on Blogger, your blog address will be http://nameyouchoose.blogpost.com; on wordpress.com, your blog address will be http://nameyouchoose.wordpress.com.
• If you already have a blog and would like to use it to track your progress during this programme, feel free to do so!
• How you choose to identify yourself on your blog is your choice. You can blog under a screen name, anonymously, or as yourself. However, in order to track your progress, you will have to let me know your blog URL & real name. More info on this when we get to Activity #2.
• Once you’ve set up your blog, go ahead and write & publish your first post! The content of your first post can be anything you’d like — one idea would be to simply introduce yourself. I’ll be posting some blogging guidelines for this programme later this week, so stay tuned for that!

Activity #2
Activity # 2 is simple: once you’ve set up your blog, send me a message with the following info: :

• your name
• your blog URL

I’ll compile a list of participant blogs and post it right here (in the sidebar) so you can follow your colleagues’ progress!

Further Readings (optional)

• Anatomy of a Blog (skip section 2.8; we’ll get to feeds next week)
• Blog, Wikipedia article
• Weblogs: A History and Perspective, Rebecca Blood
• The Ethical Blogger, Karen Schneider
• Why and How to Use Blogs to Promote Your Library’s Services, Darlene Fichter

If you have any questions, leave a comment here or get in touch with me. Happy blogging!

Week 1!

Welcome to week 1 of Learning 2.0 @ Mac for McMaster Career Partners!

There’s only one activity for the week: read this blog and find out more about the programme! Here are the important posts & pages to check out:

• about the programme
• the list of weekly activities
• the list of participants

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me. And, tune in next Monday (Nov. 12) when we move on to our first topic/activity: blogs!

Welcome!

Welcome to the blog for Learning 2.0 @ Mac for Campus Partners! My name is Amanda Etches-Johnson and I am the User Experience Librarian at Mac. I also chair the Emerging Technologies Group, which is the group that offered the “original” Learning 2.0 @ Mac programme for Library staff earlier this year.

I’ll be your guide during our learning adventure over the next 14 weeks! The programme launches on Monday, November 5th, so stay tuned