Reflections

I have found this assignment to be a real challenge, but a challenge that I have enjoyed. Having only a small amount of familiarity with a lot of the subjects addressed within the first five weeks, I was easily daunted by the ideas and technologies that we were going to use. However, as we tackled them one by one, I found that they were interesting and enjoyable. I think a great advantage was working within a group, where we were able to support and assist each other as we progressed.

I never thought that I would enjoy HTML as much as I have been! I've never used HTML before, and was scared by the very thought of it! I think that when you see it, without knowing that there is a strict procedure and rules that you can follow, that the very sight of it is confusing. But now, after using it a bit, I'm able to understand it and use it. I'm still progressing through Codeacademy, onto CSS now, which is a bit harder I think but still, easy to understand so long as you follow the rules. This is probably the biggest thing that I'm going to take away from this subject - that I can use HTML, and that I'm actually quite good at it. I think it's the logic of the coding - it appeals to my preference for order.

Other things that I learned through this course

• How to embed a map
• How to use Twitter, why we should use Twitter, and how to embed a tweet (I was very proud of that one, it was my first attempt at HTML, and I was practically giddy with delight when it worked)
• What a document is. I'm still quite interested in that, but I really think that Suzanne Briet's claims about the leopard being the document is the position that I agree with.
• How to use Endnote. This tool is great, and one that I will definitely be using in future studies.
• This one is really just to point out that look, I just made an unordered list using HTML and isn't that amazing?

The biggest thing that I will take away from this assignment, however, is awareness. Previously, I had all of my social networking sites open to the public, all of my information freely available, and I was using only a couple of passwords, often for more than one website. Now I have a lot of different passwords, all complicated and different, as well as changing the settings for privacy for a lot of sites. I think that privacy is going to be a huge issue in the coming years. And it is something that I feel slightly more ready for after this course. 

EndNote and the joys of Trove

In class this week we (those of us that didn't have it) downloaded EndNote, a referencing system which will surely make life easier when writing our assignments. I've never used it before, it wasn't around when I was at Uni last time. It definitely would have helped during my Arts degree, where there were heaps of references for each essay. I used to spend hours making my reference page perfect, mostly as way to defer the actual writing part.

Also this week we were editing articles on Trove and Wikipedia. I've never edited anything on Wikipedia, never really had a desire to, but Trove is much more my style. It's a bit like a crossword, or a word search, and I love a crossword. I have been working on my cryptic crossword abilities, but a straight crossword I'm very good at. So the work that Trove needs, the editing of the text, is something that I can do for hours.

An interesting blog that i found this week is judyoconnell.com. She writes thoughtful pieces on libraries and connectivity that I've found quite helpful. She's a Teacher Librarian now working at Charles Sturt University as Course Director in the School of Information Studies. Many of her blog posts are closely related to what we're studying here, which is great.