HTML FOR THE TECHNOLOGICALLY CHALLENGED
For those of you who are already doing web publishing with ease, I will publish in the near future a great article on site design by Amer Neely, a professional web designer. This article is for those of you who are about where I was when I began four years ago -- I had 2 computer skills: I could point and I could click. Here is some advice on how to write html safely, without destroying your library's web site. (At least that was what I was afraid I'd do when I was getting started.)
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Build your first page on the hard drive of your own machine. Nobody but you knows it's there, and nobody but you can view it. That means it's utterly safe to screw up, because it doesn't affect anybody else.
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Even if you are going to use Front Page or similar software to write code for you, learn some of the basics of html so you have some understanding of what your software is doing.
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Learn by playing. If you have an html editor, take some text and put it inside each of the different button options and see what your text looks like inside those brackets.
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Learn by manuals, if that's how you like to learn. There are some excellent guides on the net, my favorites being Mary's Tips (http://www.superconnect.com/marystips)
and
the Yale Web Style Guide (http://info.med.yale.edu/caim/manual).
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Learn by viewing other people's source code. When I see a feature on somebody's web page that I'd like to put on mine, I always click on View on my browser's toolbar and click on Source to see how they coded it to make it look like that.
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When you are playing with somebody's existing html code, you can do it safely by doing a "save as" command and renaming your file. Or you can copy an existing page of html and paste it onto a new document. Either way, from that point on, you are only playing with your own copy of that text, and are doing nothing to harm the original.
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You can even safely mount your page on the server so that you can access it no matter where you are. If nobody has linked to it, nobody but you knows it's there.
- One good way to begin is by using html to organize your bookmarks. Take a look at my bookmarks page, which I have set to be the home page on my browser: http://marylaine.com/home.html, where I have used a relatively simple table format to organize the sites I visit regularly.
The point is, you can safely learn this stuff at your own pace, making mistakes and learning from them, without endangering your library's web server.
You may even find out it's fun. Happy HTMLing!
EXPLAINING AMERICA
I was just reading a piece from the New Yorker that Philip Hamburger wrote in the 1930's about the New York Public Library. One of the challenges for its librarians during that time was helping refugees from Hitler learn about America.
I found that an interesting question: what books would you recommend to help new immigrants understand this, their new country? Are there essential novels, and if so, what are they? What are the key works of history and culture you would recommend to them?
I have written a column about my own ideas on this question, "They've All Come To Look for America," (http://marylaine.com/myword/america.html), but, since we all come from such varied backgrounds, and are passionate readers, a second column combining your thoughts should be even more interesting. Please send me your recommendations and justifications at: marylaine at netexpress.net.
I've done this kind of collaborative column before with my Fahrenheit 451 question -- if the only way to keep books alive was to memorize them, which book(s) would we choose to become? Becoming a Book, Parts I and II are available at
http://marylaine.com/myword/451.html
and
http://marylaine.com/myword/451part2.html
SOME OF YOUR FAVORITE SITES
This note comes to me courtesy of , of the Highland Internet Interest Group. You think it's a challenge for me to choose only four great sites on a topic? Try limiting yourself to just one favorite site, as each of these librarians did:
Last week I attended the Highlands' Internet Interest Group Meeting. Everyone was invited to bring along a copy of the first page of a website that they like. I took "Search Engine Express" [sorry, he didn't give a URL and I couldn't find it--mb]and Surf with Dewey/LC (http://web2.bccls.org/reference/dewey/Welcome.shtml). Here are the websites that the rest of the group brought:
Advanced Book Exchange
http://www.abebooks.com/
"Free online searching of the combined inventory of our member booksellers, by author, title, publisher, and keyword. Still can't find your book? Then click to save the search with us (also free) and we'll keep trying it nightly; you'll be Emailed when we find a match. Soon expanding into records, CD's, Videos, LP's and more."
AJR NewsLink
http://ajr.newslink.org/
AJR stands for American Journalism Review. This site may be of interest to journalists but it will also be of interest to anyone who wishes to access web sites of newspapers, magazines, radio or television stations, or any of the numerous news related sites which can be found listed under Resources.
Balkan Conflicts
http://home.revealed.net/albee/pages/balkans.html
This is an extremely extensive guide to web based sources. It is from a web site called "Needle in a CyberStack - the InfoFinder" which I had never encountered before. Have you?
The Federal Web Locator
http://www.law.vill.edu/Fed-Agency/fedwebloc.html
"The Federal Web Locator is a service provided by the Center for Information Law and Policy and is intended to be the one stop shopping point for federal government information on the World Wide Web."
HISTORY in Song
http://www.fortunecity.com/tinpan/parton/2/history.html
The time period spanned by this site begins with the American Revolution and extends to the 1960s. Lots of information, pictures, links, and lyrics.
How Stuff Works
http://www.howstuffworks.com/
When I was a kid one of my favorite books was "The Way Things Work." I think I like this web site even more. The explanations and illustrations are great and the list of topics is broad. There's also a great list of links called "Great Web Links."
The Internet Public Library http://www.ipl.org/
This site needs no introduction.
The Kitchen Link
http://www.kitchenlink.com/
This site is huge and it takes some getting used to. Once you learn your way around you may find that it was worth the effort. If you enjoy discovering new recipes you'll find plenty of them here.
I'll print the rest of the list in a future edition.
