New Facebook feature to cite books!

There's a new application you can add to your Facebook account that can really speed up the process of creating work cited pages.

When you type in the name of a book in this widget, called CiteMe, it produces a perfect citation in all the popular documentation styles. As an added bonus you can also use this feature to search for books at the Ritz Library too!!

Interested? Once logged onto Facebook, seach for the term "citeme". At the CiteMe information page, follow the instructions for installatiing the widget and you're good to go.

Got the programming blues?

Tired of having to manually check every link in a webpage you've designed? Frustrated with using a website whose links seem tenuous at best? Check out this Firefox extension called LinkChecker: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/532

Ok, so you've downloaded it - now what? Go to View --> Toolbars --> Customize and look for the check mark. Drag and drop the button onto your toolbar. Go to any webpage, click on the check and see what happens. If a link is valid, it will highlight in green. If a link is invalid, a reddish pink highlight occurs, and if a link is a forwarded or forbidden link, it will appear in yellow.

Instead of spending hours verifying links, LinkChecker will check them all for you in seconds!

Color your world

Dress up Firefox or Flock with a little color when using tabbed browsing! The colorful tabs extension brings a little spice to the look of your browser. ColorfulTabs for Firefox is located at https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1368 and ColorfulTabs for Flock is located at http://binaryturf.com/software/colorfultabs-for-flock/


You can select a specific tab color by right clicking on the tab and selecting "ColorfulTabs" and "select a color". If you right click on ColorfulTabs and select "options", you can then choose to use a default palette for color generation, you can generate colors by URL or you can stick with teh default to generate colors randomly. Enjoy giving your browser a splash of color!

Goodreads

Awhile back I spoke about LibraryThing, a website that allows you to record the books you read in your own personal library. Having become an avid LibraryThinger, I can't imagine reading a book without entering it into my account. I've found keeping track of what I read allows me to make recommendations to others, enables me NOT to buy the book, reminds me of the plots and gives me clues as to what types of books I am enjoying at the moment. Plus, by using tags I can categorize my items in ways that make sense in my brain.

Goodreads is also a book cataloguing site with a bit more emphasis on the social end of book sharing. It automatically prompts you when you log in to check to see if you'd like to connect with more friends. The "my books" tab allows you to enter new books into your library and Goodreads lets you determine what book shelf those books are to go on. There are 3 default shelves:currently reading, read, and to-read with the capability of creating any number of additional shelves. You can assign a book to as many shelves as you'd like to. Like LibraryThing, Goodreads offers widgets to place on your blog or website and has active applications in Facebook and mySpace. So far I've been unable to determine if there is a limit to the number of free books that you can enter on Goodreads (200 is the number on LibraryThing before you need to pay a fee), so I'm working off the assumption "no". They also have a tab that I find enticing - the authors tab. The authors tab allows authors to connect with readers through the author program. Through the "meet people" tab you can see who is currently online, check out their shelves and recommendations, and try to connect.

Before I sign off here, you may want to check out Novel Action which is a book exchange program with minimal fees. Click here for information on "how it works".

Enjoy a good audio?

Do you enjoy audiobooks? If so, check out LibriVox whose tag line is "acoustical liberation of books in the public domain" and whose latin translation is "book voice". LibriVox has over 1500 titles already set up for download in mp3 format. Downloading is FREE! If you'd like to check out their offerings, click on LibriVox Catalog and either use the search box that comes up or click on Browse entire catalog for a running list of titles. When downloading, look for the "zip file of the entire book" link.

What's particularly interesting about LibriVox is that YOU can volunteer to read for this project. All you need is a computer, some free software and a microphone. They have a forum set up so that questions can be asked and answered and people can contribute to on-going discussions. Whether you contribute only a few chapters on a collaborative project or single-handedly read an entire book for audio publication, you are making a positive contribution to the "acoustical liberation" effort. So, here's an opportunity to help bring your favorite works of classic literature to the internet world. Oh yea, in case you are wondering, the materials that are considered to be in the public domain are all works published prior to 1923.

Another free audiobooks site is http://freeclassicaudiobooks.com/. There are far fewer titles at Free Classic Audiobooks, but the site is simple and easy to use. Plus downloads are also offered in the m4b format for iPods and iTunes. If you've never experienced an audiobook, it is a fascinating way to "read". Audiobooks can bring literature to people who have trouble concentrating on the written word, who have learning disabilities, who are physically disabled, who prefer to learn through listening - any number of scenarios apply. Once the materials are downloaded, you can cut CDs to listen to them while driving or in some cases download directly to an iPod. It's another approach to reading!

Not sure what to read this summer?

If you're at a loss for what book to read next, here's a couple of websites to check out: What should I read next? and Literature Map.

www.whatshouldireadnext.com is a simple to use website that looks for you to input a title and author of a book that you enjoyed reading and to hit enter. Once you do that, you will be returned with a list of books and authors that you would likely enjoy. From there you can decide what you'd like to do.

www.literature-map.com is also an easy to use site - it requires you to enter the name of a favorite author and it returns a graphical image with your author at the center surrounded by the names of others who write in that genre. The closer the name is to your author's name, the more similar the writing styles. Be advised, enter the full name of the author, and not just the last name. You end up with better results that way.

Let's talk... 3G technology

Wondering what 3G technology is? Well, me too. At least until a short while ago. 3G stands for third generation voice protocol technology and in a nutshell, 3G allows for conventional telephones or fax machines to connect to IP based networks. Taking a step back, IP stands for Internet Protocol and is a connectionless protocol for the transfer of data using packet-switching between computers that may never have communicated before. For additional explanation, click here.

Why use 3G technology? For one thing, some software groups provide cheaper access than the typical phone system. Downloadable programs such as Skype allow you to place phone calls/video calls from your computer to another computer (free) or phones/cell phones around the world (inexpensive). Unlike the typical modern home phone set up, 3G technology allows you to videoconference with someone near or far if you have a webcam on your computer. In using Skype, you also have access to chat, voice mail, call forwarding and a host of other services, including distance learning. Check it out at http://www.skype.com/.

To be clear here, 3G technology is not limited to computer-to-computer usage. Most of the major phone carriers are now using 3G technology, especially with their mobile phone services.

For further explanation of what 3G is, click here. The world is no longer a wide, wide, place...