Monday, 16 December 2013

Prizes!


The Thames Valley and Wessex Health Libraries Network Christmas Study day at Winchester on 12/12/2013 was the venue for the grand 19Things prizegiving.



Nottingham Trainees - Prizes
Eversheds International Creative Commons License


Congratulations to all the Completers and Explorers who either received their certificates on the day or will shortly be receiving them from their managers.

Special congratulations to:
whatsallthisaboutthen    Best blog ,  
coffetimethings               Best reflective post
Newforestgateau            Best blog name (as voted for by TV &W staff on the day.)

Many thanks to all the people who helped make the course possible by writing content and helping with the blog and especially to Caterpillarlizzie for the original idea and much of the administration.

The blog will remain live for the foreseeable future to enable people to complete all their “Things” or for anyone who would like to re-use the content.

Finally, the 19Things Team would like to wish A Happy Christmas to all our readers

By Unknown 1932 (Scan old postcard) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons


Monday, 2 December 2013

Thing 19: Registering your completion

To successfully complete the 19ThingsTVW programme you must have explored all the ‘Things’ and blogged about your experiences of using them.

Once you’ve done that, please register your completion by emailing tvwlibrarians@gmail.com

Thing 18: Final blog - What was it like for YOU?



Hopefully you have finished all your “19things”, some you will have enjoyed using and some not so much, some you will continue to use at home and at work, some you hope to never see again!

 All your experiences will be different and this is what we would like you to write down.
It does not have to be long and exhaustive but should include some of the following:

• Did you enjoy it? (There is no right or wrong answer here!) 

• Look at your first blog, how has your attitude changed since starting?

• What was the best Thing and the Thing you least enjoyed?

• What Thing would you use/adapt for work? If none, why not?

• How do you feel after completing this – proud/tired/frustrated/delighted? 


• How would you improve the whole “19Things” training package? We will not be offended but would welcome any constructive criticism.

To register your completed blog, you must blog about the 19ThingsTVW Experience, even if you perhaps skipped one or two Things because you were familiar with them. If you skipped anything for this 
reason please mention it in your blog post 

Monday, 25 November 2013

Can you see the finishing line?




Use this catch-up week to explore and write about any of the ”Things” you haven’t yet looked at.  In case you needed any further motivation, all those registering completion next week will automatically:
  • Be entered into our prize raffle 
  • Qualify for entry into one of our prestigious awards: best blog, best post, best blog name, 
  • Receive a chocolatey treat!
File:Todos Santos Chocolates, Santa Fe NM.jpg
Attributed to John Phelan licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

Monday, 18 November 2013

Thing 17 CiteULike

CiteULike is a reference manager.   

What is a reference manager and why is it useful?

Reference management softwarecitation management software or personal bibliographic management software is software for students, teachers and authors to use for recording and utilising bibliographic references. Once a citation has been recorded, it can be used time and again in generating bibliographies, such as lists of references in scholarly books, articles,essays and reading lists.
Citations can be published in a variety of formats eg Harvard, APA, Vancouver, so that you can reproduce them in the format required by a University or publisher when handing in an essay or submitting an article  for publication.

Some expensive commercial reference packages such as Endnote or RefWorks, are often available free through universities and colleges. They both offer 30-day free trials to the wider public. However if you have no connections with an academic institution or need something more permanent a free online reference manager like CiteULike can save time and stress.

Useful for non-academics too.
We don’t all intend to produce high-level research or publish an article!.

There are several ways that a reference manager can help us as information managers in our day job, help organise our own work and improve things for our users too.

Register for MyCiteULIke


To take advantage of all CiteULike’s facilities you need to sign up for MyCiteULIke to create your own library.
Click on the  Join Now button. If you already have an account, log in at the top right.


Use the drop-down menus on the grey toolbar: CiteULike and MyCiteULike to explore other options.


 There are FAQs and a help page too if you get stuck.

Search citations added by other CiteULike users by clicking on the Search button further to the right on the grey toolbar. Enter a word or phrase eg nurse-prescribing and click search.
  • Click on one of the articles you want to read or keep for later. It will display the abstract and any links to full text.
  • Click the Copy button at the top of the display to save it to your own library.
  • Click the Citation button and you can choose to see how it looks in different formats eg APA, Harvard, Vancouver etc.
  • Click the Export button and choose the format you’d like your reference to appear in: RTF, PDF or plain text. 

Search  Pubmed  or Google Scholar for articles of interest to you . Use the Posting the URL link in the MyCiteULike drop down menu to add citations of your selected articles to your Library  by posting the URL, DOI , PMID code, ISBN or adding bibliographic details manually. 
You can tick the Privacy box if you want.

Privacy:Don't let other people see that I've posted this article


Library readers may like others to see what topic they are interested in; If they  leave this box unticked and save 20 favourite articles they can receive recommendations of relevant articles from other CiteULike users 

If you are using CiteUlike at home you can choose to add the CiteULike button to your browser or Favourites toolbar to make adding citations easier
  • Go to the CiteULike dropdown menu
  • Select the Browser Button option
  • Follow the instructions.

You can now add articles and books from the wider internet as you come across them. 

Exercise:
Collect some references into your MyCiteULike Library  and export them in your selected format.

Explore some of the ways you can use it to save time and tidy up reports, search results or reading lists.

Blog your experiences and share with others.

You can do other things with CiteULike too. Try some of these:
  • search using the term CiteULike for articles on how to use it and its many features
  • create a list of items you have come across or found useful during the 19 things
  • search for articles on a different topic you are interested in
  • join a group to post one of these articles or books you have found to share with people who have similar interests
  • Link to your Facebook profile 

If you have time, try using some other free reference managers eg http://www.mendeley.com and http://www.zotero.org

I even found another one www.hubmed.org  from signing up to CiteULike!
Citation with link to full text at http://www.citeulike.org/user/A_Hoogendam/article/781097  Maybe this could provide us with better results than we get from PubMed. Any offers to convert the doctors?

Monday, 4 November 2013

Thing 16-LibraryThing

After completing Thing 16 you will have explored LibraryThing and understand how it can be used by libraries.

LibraryThing is an online service which allows users (libraries and/or individuals) to  catalogue and display book collections very easily.  In addition the site offers “social” features, enabling contributors to add reviews and discuss the books.

You’ll need an account at Librarything.com…it is quick to register.   The site is free to use for up to 200 books, a small charge for >200.  It does have good Help pages with clear, detailed instructions.

To add books to your account click the Add books tab. By default, the books will be added to the main collection (folder) called Your Library, but it is easier to define a new collection first.  Click Edit collections, then Add new collection.  The quickest way to select books is to swipe the ISBN with a barcode reader, or you can type in the title/author.  The identified book will appear on the right side of the screen. Click the book and it will appear in your collection.

Once you have completed your book list you are ready to generate the link. This picture shows the list in the covers format.  There is also a list format which gives more bibliographic details – but is not as eye-catching!  



To send a link to your page eg. to publicise your latest books, you have to use the Permanent link bottom left of the screen. Click on this button and the URL that appears in your menu bar is the one to copy and use in your publicity. 

Think about how LibraryThing could be used both in the Library or to record your personal reading or book collection.

As an example LibraryThing was used to consult librarians on the best textbooks to include for an updated Medical Core Collection: http://www.cilip.org.uk/health-libraries-group/core-collections/core-collections-detail

Thing 15 Add Meet-O-Matic to your Protopage

Login to Protopage

Click on the Add widgets tab at the top of the screen.
A menu will appear on the left of the screen. Scroll down the Add widgets menu and click on Web page.

Click on the Blue strip at the top of the new widget box and drag the new widget to add  to your Protopage.
Then click on the Edit link on the Blue strip at the top of the new widget box.
A new box will open lower down the screen. 

  • Cut and paste the web address of Meet-O-Matic into the Web site address box 
  • Type Meet-O-Matic into the widget title box
  • Click on Save