Amanda Goodman

Downwards

Amanda — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 03:10:42 +0000

I opened and closed my day by talking to the Children’s Library about their website. It’s a large process — perhaps the most complicated since they post frequently and are very popular with the community. So it is a delicate operation to get their site just right. This means lots of spontaneous meetings to discuss various aspects. I am trying to circle around to meet their needs precisely, but that is a bit challenging. One problem I am trying to solve is how to create their registration posts. They have a lot of programs open during this period so they need a clear, precise system. We will see what happens as we compile website examples to draw inspiration from and get information back from the user studies.

After that first meeting, I went around taking photos. I am particularly proud of this sunflowers (?) shot. Then I dealt with a few dozen emails which ate up a lot of time. I met a new intern which led to talking about digital collections (love!), and helping a patron out via IM. I then began using the Views Bulk Operator to see if that would help automate some of my tasks for the Children’s Library revisions. Unfortunately, it is not a perfect fit…

Then I had a meeting about one of our projects (which I don’t think is a secret anymore) and then went to a staff training session on Lynda.com. It accidentally turned into Amanda-giving-too-much-input when the presenter kept looking at me to help answer questions. >_> Afterwards, I did some research on a few questions that came up during one meeting, did some more website testing, then set up Pidgin on staff computers. Soon most of the staff will be available to answer patrons’ questions directly by chat!

Catching Up on the Weekend

Amanda — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:36:50 +0000

Today was all about the odds and ends. Most of the strings came in via email or were sent out by me as I checked up on other staff members’ place in projects. Then I made a few new panels including another stab at an animated one in Keynote. I also had to dismantle my child theme because there is a block preventing some of the parents’ stylesheets from being picked up. While disappointed, it was at least easy to copy a few lines from Twitter Bootstrap and place them in my regular style.css.

I also started moving towards getting another department online with their own chat box so they can talk to patrons. This meant creating LibraryH3lp accounts for several coworkers, making a new chat widget, and then testing it out. Tomorrow I have to install Pidgin on the staff members’ computers. I then rounded out the day in the computer labs for two hours and forty-five minutes. Working on anything of substance is difficult, but I was able to study some Drupal-related issues between patrons.

Forthcoming Good News

Amanda — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 01:50:57 +0000

I can’t give any details yet, but I will be announcing two more freelance professional gigs soon. :-)

Websites Ahoy

Amanda — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 01:48:21 +0000

Thursday
I spent pretty much the entire day building this extremely simple site on our test server. This meant creating a Drupal child theme so I could port in Twitter Bootstrap, making adjustments as I commented out sections of the css so it would not interfere with the functioning of the website. It was very satisfying digging around in the code.

Friday
We received some calls about our digital sign system, so I talked to another library and answered the usual pile of emails. I then received word that the mini website I had built on the test server needed to be transferred over to the live site immediately. As part of this, I walked around asking people which font they preferred on the website. The overwhelming answer was Twitter Bootstrap. There were some more unforeseen hitches in turning on the child theme on the live website (since the live and test sites are not 100% identical), but it was not too hard to correct. I then helped out in the computer lab.

Grandpa

Amanda — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 01:44:35 +0000

At 9:00 p.m. EST, it will be 365 days since my Grandpa passed away. Grandma called me between an hour and ninety minutes later to tell me. I was home alone and had been expecting the call after having been to visit him twice recently. The last time I got to tell my Grandpa anything was just before 6:00 p.m. as I was parking my car to head to cataloging. I spoke to Grandma and told her to tell him that I love him.

When I got off the phone, I sobbed and cried aloud with my forehead pressed to the floor. I nearly broke my glasses in the process. He was 73 years old. I had nightmares for nearly a month.

So today I have tried very hard to not be consumed by these thoughts. A year adds padding and distance between the immediacy of the pain. It gives me time to rationalize and pray that he’s finally free from the restrictions of a body broken and bound by Parkinson’s. He must be happy somewhere else. Yet, here I type and it hurts as I miss him. He’s my Grandpa and in this life I’ll never hold his hand again, watch him shake his head, chew tobacco, cross his legs as he settles in to watch the news or wrestling or Hee Haw (when I was a kid). He had striking pale blue eyes, very little hair, and large hands that even at the end were rough from a life of hard work.

In my memory he’s not the fragile, shaking picture of disease, but he was the way he was when I was a child. Working on the tractor, slaughtering the hog, helping birth the stillborn calf, wearing his dirty old baseball cap and flannel coat. He spoke little but he surely loved his bird, Petey, and those flowers he cultivated.

“Grandpa” is all I could say, as I skipped on repeat, sobbing at his service and then as I kissed his casket one last time. Grandpa. Grandpa. Be well.

Dreamlike

Amanda — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 01:30:04 +0000

Tuesday
Yesterday I taught my second patron-facing class on Trello. The students were demanding and found mysterious ways to look at the site in ways that I would never use it. Some things I am still weak on are: 1) how to keep students who are friends from just chatting with each other 2) keep people from diving right in and start tinkering instead of following along. I end up with a class where half the students have no idea what is going on because they were not paying attention. This behavior begins immediately so I’m not sure how to improve the situation. As for my notes, I will try to link to them as soon as Scribd gets back to me on the error message.

I then sent follow-up emails with all the Adult Technology students to ask them for feedback on their classes. The rest of my day was miscellaneous with emails.

Wednesday
We were hosting a special session this morning which required livestreaming and tweeting. I was fortunate enough to not be directly involved, but I was going around checking up on the status of the various aspects. I also wrote up two posts and prepped for my turn at the weekly book talk sessions. My selection of books always falls flat with the audience, but we are two different age groups with very different genre interests.

As I was cleaning up from the book talk, a patron pulled me aside to interview me about our digital signage set up. I hope she gets it worked out so we can assist her! I explained our system’s components and then outlined a cheaper but less effective method that should work in PowerPoint. Afterwards, I updated our social media and made myself laugh as I could not think of anyway to add the lego picture without posting it to my own account and then resharing it on the library’s account. :-)

Then I took notes from the Power to the Patron webinar while I did some web work. For the rest of the day, I focused on a web project which I will try to document tomorrow. Then I was off to teach a coworker about how to use Contactology. The entire day has felt a bit like a dream because of trying to bury my sadness at the one year anniversary of my grandpa’s death.

Busy but Energetic

Amanda — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 04:30:12 +0000

Today was a day where things had piled up over the weekend. I ran from task to task all day, literally up and down the stairs a few times, while trying to complete everything. At the end of the day, I finished all my tasks.

Created new 21 Things button.
Designed 3 new digital signs.
Talked to Contactology’s customer support to investigate an issue.
Answered emails.
Gave support to the computer lab person + went through our help desk ticket system.
Finished writing a hand out for the new initiative for our beta testers. Later found out that the email server never sent out my warning email so I received a bunch of blank looks when I dropped the sheet off on their desks.
Sat in on a meeting for a summer program proposal.
A patron called me for help with a translation issue (thank you, Google Translate).
Planned my Trello class for tomorrow.
Set up our library’s Pinterest account.

I am also checking into my next professional milestone step. It involves writing a proposal… A fun bonus is that the article I wrote up for my alumni program about marrying my library school sweetheart is now up.

How to return to Stock and then update Samsung Epic 4G

Amanda — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 17:59:35 +0000

The rollout for my Samsung Epic 4G (also known as Samsung Galaxy S) came out a few months ago. Sprint harassed me about it every day but my phone would crash during the updating process. Finally the announcement of OneNote for Android got me excited enough to bother with updating my phone from Froyo to Gingerbread. This post is more for my own purposes, but the resources may help you as well if you are having trouble. The process took around 12 hours since I had to recharge my phone twice and I bricked it once (brick = broken/frozen).

Note: When you work on your phone, you are taking full responsibility for your actions. Your carrier might refuse to honor the warranty.

To reset your phone to complete stock so it is open to updating. Leave only the “auto-reboot” option checked on the left side of Odin.
To update to Gingerbread. Sprint’s over-the-air update kept freezing on me, so I had to manually upgrade my phone for it to work.

Discoveries:

Google does NOT keep a list of what free apps you had previously installed so make a list of them somewhere.
If you want to associate Google Talk with a specific email account, make sure to add that as your first Google account.
In order to access my paid apps, I had to add my old email account as well. Then in the Android Marketplace menu settings, I just had to keep switching back and forth between accounts.

More Meetings Than Sticks Could Be Shaken At

Amanda — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 17:51:25 +0000

Wednesday

Answered emails.
Updated the Nook Colors’ settings.
Worked on converting video footage (useless since the sound failed to record).
Met with a department to discuss her department’s section of the website. We decided they would create a mood board on Pinterest to gather ideas for the visual style they are going for.
Checked out some UX stuff on the main floor.
Discussed the Book Groups stuff.
Surprise 90 minute shift in the computer labs.
Still working on sorting out the notes and website stuff from the previous two days.

Thursday

Answered emails.
Worked on the website.
Met with the Book Group to rethink their whole web strategy. We discovered that you cannot reorder select items in Google Forms. I sent them with precise marching orders on what to do next.
Met with a department head about Contactology. I accidently deleted two of my templates.

Friday

Embedded a Twitter widget into a special node on the website for the Children Library’s Tweet Up event.
Fixed a digital sign (at least the third time this week! >_>).
Fixed the website breaking in IE7.
Created a Google Form for feedback for our new service which we are recruiting patrons to test this week. Then wrote emails to the department heads explaining what was up.
Rebuilt my lost Contactology templates and then made some more. A revision needs to be done in the header, but this was a start!

Busy Days

Amanda — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 04:20:47 +0000

Monday
We have hired another helper in the computer lab, so I started my week training the new worker. When she held things stable, I dashed off to place the latest 21 Things button on the website, fixed a digital sign, and fixed a problem on the website. A node reference which should not have existed reappeared and started acting up. When I was free, I made six new digital signs. I rounded out the day with emails, social media, and started processing a video. The email was the important part since I set down and hashed out the future plans of one section of the website. It will be a major change with me doing most of the heavy lifting, but it is essential the department contributes as well. I tried to be as clear as possible as I outlined what was expected, what the workflow would be, and the end results.

Tuesday
Today was less productive. The video I had left processing yesterday was gone due to my computer being turned off. I then spent the rest of the morning tracking down issues involving our latest project. This means coordinating with every department including establishing firmer relationships with people who can be overlooked in the overall scheme of things. I carry information with me from place to place figuring out the holes and piecing together the larger picture of the project. An issue that was holding up was finally resolved.

Later in the afternoon, I went to a group meeting with the key players on this project. The overall scale of this project on my hands is beginning to take shape in my mind. It is a bit overwhelming when I have three website projects I am also working on, but it is an exciting time. Tomorrow I will begin creating the documentation to move to the next phase. Perhaps I will even record another video tutorial (as an aside, just checked out a video that one of our staff members did on my phone — it looks fantastic)!

I then closed out the day in the computer lab where I figured out how to create a mailing list database in Microsoft Access and then use that list to create labels in Microsoft Word. I am not sure the patron fully grasped the coolness factor…

WordPress Class & Personal
While answering a student’s question, I was inspired to look into some navigation posts on Smashing Magazine. Eventually this led me to reading up on some UX items. Finally, I was struck with some talking points on how to move forward with the visual design and emotional appeal of my library’s website. I can’t wait to start talking this out with someone!