Ed's Tech Tips

Last month (I cannot believe how quickly the past month has gone by) the Alumnae Association hosted  an Alumnae Summit which was a gathering of the alumnae volunteers that sit on various boards and committees of the Association. One of the items I developed for the  club committees was a Google map that identified the locations of all of the domestic and international clubs. There is a sidebar that list the clubs in alphabetical order. Click a club name and the location marker is highlighted and a pop-up balloon list the contact person and a club web site link if applicable. 

One of the coolest things about the map is what you do not see. The data for the map is listed in a Google spreadsheet. When the spreadsheet is updated, so is the map. Also, the spreadsheet can be updated via a form that can be delivered via email or embedded on a web page.  Check it out on the clubs overview page. It looks best in Firefox, OK in Internet Explorer, but does not work correctly with Safari.

I have not blogged as much lately because I have been pretty busy lately. One of my current projects is updating an Access database used to handle registrations for the upcoming alumnae reunions at the end of May. The database does more than just list who is coming (I wish). It is used to help coordinate meals and housing on campus, along with tracking class fees, One cards, keys, dietary restrictions, children's programs and name tags. Some of this stuff does not change much from year, while other items do. For instance, this year we are using a ala carte system, instead of packages which offers more flexibility to alums for pricing their reunion trip. But on the other hand it contributes some some additional complexity to the database in some ways, but simplicity in others. Needless to say it has it's challenges. I make my wife's head swim just trying to explain parts of it to her.

Another reason I am busy is because a co-worker, Stacey - our web content coordinator left us last week to move closer to her family. We do not have a replacement for her so I have picked up some of the tasks she use to do, such as, the broadcast emails for classes and clubs, along with providing technical support to classes and clubs for their web sites which they are eager to update before reunion. I'll miss her, probably more than I had previously imagined.

Instead of blogging, I've been doing more Twittering which is much easier when you only have 140 characters to use for each post. I've embedded a Twitter reader in the right sidebar of this blog, so readers can see what I'm up to. I just enabled the Twitter plugin for this blog, so new articles should be posted to Twitter as we post them here. I did the same thing for the Alumnae Quarterly which has some followers.

It's time to get back to the database.   

This is another cool tech tip sent in from M. J. (who by the way, also works at Mount Holyoke College). Zemanta is a brand new application that acts as a research assistant for bloggers. Unfortunately, it does not work with LifeType (yet), but it does work with WordPress, Blogger and Tyepad. What it does is suggest related photos, articles, links and tags (keywords) based on what you are writing in your blog. Plus, inserting items is easier than copying and pasting, just click to select an item from the list and Zemanta inserts it into your blog. This is pretty clever and helpful. It will make blogging more fun when additional information comes to me, much like when my readers send me ideas for articles. 

Zemanta indexes around 300 top media sources and numerous blogs of our users. Therefore the more people that use the more resources it will have to pull from and a real benefit is that  links to recent blog posts frequently result in return traffic.  

I was reviewing the Alumnae Information Services presentation for the Reunion Planning Workshop that I created last year with PowerPoint and was not feeling comfortable with it. Then I read an article that pointed out that many PowerPoint prentations are little more than teleprompter displays for the speakers and are not very helpful in the communication process. Then I came across Presentation Zen, a blog that empasis simplicity in designing presentations. There was an article that contrasted the styles of Steve Jobs of Apple and Bill Gates of Microsoft. It was rather eye opening and I decided then and there to completely rework the presentation with the following goals in mind:

• The presentation by itself would be practically meaningless without the speaker
• No bullet points
  
• No ugly backgrounds
• Minimal if any transitions
• No animations 
• Slides would be more visual and enhance what the speaker was saying and not repeat what the speaker was saying
• One image per slide 
• Display no more than 5-7 words per slide
• Provide a detailed handout after the presentation

I was able to stick to most of my goals. I did use one slide with bullet points to summarize some possible future projects. I was not going to use any transitions, but I liked the Fall transition in Keynote that is simple and consistent. Hopefully, the audience will find this year's presentation more engaging, informative and entertaining.

I have an eclectic taste in music. I like a wide variety of music including blues, jazz, rock, folk, classical and so on. I also like to discover new music, but I do not want to purchase CD's I have never heard of before. The 30 second music clips at iTunes are not long enough for me and I do not want to stand around with headphones on at Barnes & Nobles music listening stations. So what do I do? I go to Pandora.com.

Although the web site shares the same name as the infamous box, you'll be happy you opened your web browser to Pandora.com. You just need the Flash plugin (which you probably alreday have) and you are ready to go. There is nothing to download. You can create your own custom internet radio stations (up to a hundred) by entering athe name of a favorite musical artist or song. Pandora compares your entry with an extensive catalog consisting of over 10,000 artists developed by the Music Genome Project which has identified over 400 different attributes that might be assigned to a song.

The service is free with some minor advertising and links to iTunes and Amazon if you want to purchase the music it plays for you. It is great service. the music selection is extensive and right on the money in opinion in most of the selections it makes. It has exposed me to many very good artists that I had not heard of before.

If you have a Mac, check out PandoraMan. It is a small application that accesses Pandora's music player so that you do not have to keep your webb browser open.

Welcome to my blog. I am the Technology Support Specialist for the Alumnae Association. My title is a little misleading, because it suggests that I am a "specialist", but I am actually a jack of all trades related to "technology" which has become a rather broad category. I administer the local area network at the Alumnae Association office in Mary Wooley Hall, as well as, maintain the web server; update, repair and replace computers and printers; train staff on the use of software and hardware, photograph events, and do pretty much anything else there is to do related technology.

This purpose of this blog is to offer my experience, knowledge and opinions in the form of suggesstions, reviews, how-tos, answers to frequently asked questions and discoveries regarding software, the Alumnae Association web site and technology in general. You the reader can comment on my articles and ask additional questions.

As for my background I have been using computers for a while. My first computer was the Texas Instruments TI-99/4a in the early 80's. Although I do have a Bachelors degree in Philosophy/Religion and Social Science with a concentration in Psyschology from Flagler College in St. Augustine, I have worked as a Technical Support Specialist and Knowledge Base Developer for Sony Electronics and Yankee Candle Company before arriving at Mount Holyoke College a year ago.

The Alumnae Association recieved a very nice thank you email from a parent of a graduating senior that participated in the Strawberries & Champagne event on May 9th:

I wanted to let you know how much I, as a far-away parent of a graduating senior, enjoyed the slide show of the Strawberries and Champagne event that is posted on the web.

Please congratulate the photographer and all else involved in putting it together. What a great way to use technology to allow all kinds of people, wherever they may be and whatever their connection to the graduates, to share in the joyous occasion!

Thanks again, and good job!
Joan Giglierano
Mother of Emily Giglierano '06

This is just the type of response we had hoped to solicit from alumnae, students and parents. I was the photographer for the event, but I must admit that I lucked out with very good lighting for the outdoor event in spite of the light drizzle of rain. I also had a very nice digital camera to work with, the Sony DSC-H1. Read more about at Dpreview.com. It is an excellent all around camera that I highly recommend.

The camera is a 5 megapixel model with a 12X optical zoom which allows me to zoom in for close-ups. I was trying to capture the emotions on the students' faces as they celebrated the completion of their careers at Mount Holyoke College. I purchased a 1 GB Memory Stick for the camera and some extra rechargeable batteries. I took over 150 photos, out which I selected the 50 that are in the gallery. A secret of good photography is taking a lot of photos and only selecting a few of the best ones.

Hopefully, I'll have the same level of success with the virtual Global Reunion, which will not only feature numerous photos, but video and message boards as well.