Final blog

11 blogs and 19 things - at first I thought I was well adrift but when I actually read what I had written, everything was covered.
So how was it for me?  Fun, nicely paced, just about the right amount to do each week.
Has my attitude changed since my first blog?  No - well you did ask...
Best Thing was Images because it was useful knowledge, worst was Protopage because I knew I was not a fan of start pages.
Use at work - images, CiteULike (hadn't realised free packages are so good now) and meet-o-matic
Feelings now it has finished - looking forward to Christmas, very busy so relieved I have completed it.
Improvements - nothing really, it was very well organised and see my positive comments above - a pity that the limitations of the NHS restricted 'Things' we could do.  A big thank you to all who wrote Things - I hope that proved to be a useful CPD exercise for them.

CiteULike

This was fun - free reference management software has come a long way since I last looked at it (many years ago).  Nothing is without its irritations of course and the first one I encountered was that the username PaulineBlagden was already taken. Scary thought, a namesake.  After that things went quite well.  As I was doing this at home, I put in terms that interested me.  The first 'Roman' turned up some fascinating stuff - fairly random though - maybe it was too general a term.  Then I tried Norman Sicily, hoping for articles about Roger etc but most of the results were about genetics or the mafia.
Then I tried importing stuff from Google Scholar - one worked and the other didn't.
At this point I gave up before I identified too many articles which I would really love to read but don't have time to.

My Librarything

You are going to find these books really boring unless you are interested in Roman archaeology but I went to Pompeii this summer and was really glad I did some reading beforehand.
http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?offset=0&view=paulinblagden&collection=290445&shelf=shelf

Librarything

I loved this and am wondering whether to use it as a sort of wish list, all the books that I would like to read - might get rather long and therefore depressing though.  For the purposes of 19 things, I just used it to list some books that I have read this year - more than one so I count that a success.  I do like the way it shows the covers, much prettier than all the bibliographic data.

Meet-o-matic confession time

I did not exactly follow instructions here - sounds really sad but I did not actually want to set up a meeting so what I did was to send messages to myself using my various email addresses.  This meant I could work through all the various stages of the process without having to turn up.  It was very easy to use and definitely more efficient than having emails flying back and forth to try to find a date when everyone is free.

My blogging history

When I created a blog for 19 Things, I was amazed to discover that I had created blogs years ago, and my profile says that I have been a blogger since July 2003 - obviously not a very dedicated one since I had no recollection of doing so.

I am so glad that we have had such excellent instructions for the various tasks.  I shall save them all for future reference.

The most useful bit for me has been about Creative Commons - important to get that right.
Wordle was most fun, really easy to do,  and makes an impact if not over-used.

7 more things to go and then I guess it will be nearly Christmas!

Just a thought about RSS feeds

Some of my favourite sites eg Current Archaeology do not have RSS feeds but invite me to keep in touch using social media - definitely more attractive.

Start Page

I really enjoyed the process of creating a start page, choosing what to put on it and especially what colour scheme to use, but, having done that, I did not give it another thought all week so when I came back to it, I had forgotten both the name and the password.  Adding the RSS feeds was fun and easy but realistically, I don't think I will use the page much in the future.

Protopage

I just created a Protopage start page for myself with a few basic widgets like weather, news, clock and Protopuppy.  Choosing the colours was fun.
I did have a Google start page at home many years ago but I gave up with it because it took so long to load - I guess technology has moved on since then so I might try again with Protopage.
From a work point of view we use Netvibes for current awareness services.  The browser problem is a big one, if our customers cannot use the page from their work computer.
I looked at several of the start pages on Catherine Ebenezer's list.  Those I looked at seemed to me very cluttered and visually unappealing - not sure I would want to use them regularly.

Images

Couldn't resist something furry. So here is a Japanese chin.  The first version is what I found on Google images then I opened it in Paint and added some text on the image.

Browsers

It was fun to try out different browsers and I learned how to do lots of things I had never tried before - not sure how useful they will be on a day to day basis but I enjoyed playing around. I really would like to understand why the NHS is so inflexible! I tend not to change browsers at home because Google Chrome does what I need it to and quickly eg logging into my gmail account, my drive and searching for stuff. I notice the latest version offers me links to recently used websites underneath the search box which is neat. I tend not to use favourites any more, though I used to have a great long list, but I worked out how the different browsers dealt with them. Yes, I regularly update my home computer and use Virgin Media Security which seems to do the biz whatever dodgy websites my son has visited.

Getting started

Really enjoying 19 things, great it's so flexible and I can fit it in when I feel like it. Most of the instructions have been easy to follow and the only frustration was when Wordle did not work at work. At home, of course, I had access to lots of docs that were NOTHING to do with libraries and I chose an essay about Kamikase pilots which my daughter wrote years ago. That looked good in battleship grey and red...enabled me to be creative. I once saw Wordle used as an evaluation tool and that worked well - quick for the trainer to do as well! Great as long as you don't overuse it is my general view. QR codes were a breeze as I had used them before and my phone was 'QR ready' - good on publicity materials in the library and I do occasionally use them outside work to get to more frivolous websites..... Blogs - well now, I know some people who are great fans but I remain to be convinced. First I am not sure anyone would really want to read what I write and then for me, I simply forget about it unless something lands in my inbox. I suspect this attitude is not uncommon. There could be a place for blogs in our library service but we need to be very clear about the purpose and engagement is the key. I have seen them used to good effect for constucting an e-learning module for example. As for using a blog to organise my personal information - no way.