Starting on WordPress and the joys of HTML

We have quite the assignment due on October 8th which requires us to create a faux library website using WordPress. I have spent the better part of the week reading articles on WordPress. I even pulled out my HTML 4 for Dummies book I purchased eons ago when I first considered creating my own website. Today I actually took the plunge (well sort of) and set up my account using the link to byethost.com. That process alone turned into a few hours of my swearing at the computer gods as repeated attempts to actually log into my newly created account failed. I was dammed sure I was using the correct password you see. In a moment of lucidity I went back to the original confirmation e-mail. Yep, I had been entering the password I thought I had created wrong. Funny how a single letter or digit can muck the entire thing up. Now sitting here at almost eleven in the evening, (well past this old man's bed time) I am making progress of a sort. I have successfully created a paragraph using HTML. I feel like a god! 

Anyway, tomorrow I have a my other job I need to do so I will not make much more progress at this for now. October 8 hangs like a Sword of Damocles, but the show must go on. You see I have a side business drawing caricatures and I have a gig in the Greensboro, NC area. On the plus side I might be able to work in a side trip to meet with my professor, who also happens to be my adviser, and talk to him about independent studies. I am sure I have many late night ahead of me this coming week as I traverse the mysteries of  HTML coding and the thing that is WordPress. 

Later,

Kim

Oh and here is a sample of my caricature work and the link to my webpage. (Created using Google Sites and not WordPress!)

A self portrait from when I had more hair. :)

https://sites.google.com/site/theartofkimallman/

Trying to catch up as things are hectic with work, home, and of course graduate school.  We are currently going over content management systems (CMS) which is one of the things I have been looking forward to learning more about. The reason for this is that in the law library that I work in our library blog is a critical function of how we communicate with our patrons and the larger community. It is not a surprise that our Metadata and Serials Librarian chose Wordpress to set up the Charlotte Law Library blog. She has been able to create a wonderful venue and every member of the Law Library team is required to regularly contribute toward providing content. 

I have not tried my hand with Wordpress as of yet but will follow up with more about my progress. Learning Wordpress and other forms of CMS functions is, in my opinion, becoming a critical skill for current and future librarians. While there are libraries with the budgets to have IT staff, the simple fact is libraries are having to do less with more. Being able to update and provide content online for the library that you work in is an opportunity to connect with more of your patrons and provide a chance to promote your libraries mission and benefits. The Law Library blog not only provides articles related to the study of law but has articles written by staff and student quest bloggers about what is happening in the city and topics of local and legal interest. If you are curious, just follow the link below. And yes I am a regular contributor to the blog and was even drawing a semi-regular comic strip. 

Kim 

http://charlottelawlibrary.wordpress.com/

Brief Thoughts on being a 2.0 Librarian

I have been catching up on all of the readings and articles that are posted in our assignments.  I will confess that when I first heard the term Web 2.0 five years ago, it just seemed to me to be hype.  It did not help that Web 2.0 was one of the buzzword (along with other corporate speak) that was circulating at the time.  Regardless, whether it was hype of real it was not relevant to what I was doing at the time. Well I was wrong.  

The fact is we are witnessing seminal changes in how culture and society interact.  The concepts of libraries transforming and becoming the conduits for creativity, providing the venue through which new content is created, disseminated, and shared, is profound.  Of course, there is always resistance to change.  Unfortunately, in particular with the public library, the need to adapt to the new paradigm is paramount.  Academic and specialty libraries will have to change, yet the means of adaptation may prove easier especially to those libraries that primarily cater to the scientific or technical researcher.  Such a patron will demand rapid adaptation to the 2.0 concepts. 

The more traditional college or university library may have a difficult time determining just where to put the dollars in order to move forward. As I have seen and learned in my quest for the MLIS the 2.0 librarian will have to be an adaptive creature.  My original ideas about librarianship in general have been turned on their proverbial head more than once as I expand my scope. 

Kim