Category Archives: Uncategorized
Welcome visitors from BlogHer!
Greetings! I don’t normally do weekend updates, so look for regular postings resuming tomorrow. And thanks for coming by!
Comics, Sneakers, Zombies, More: Morning Buzz, January 2, 2012
Teaching students to use the library via a comic book. Excellently done! Nice job Wilton Library!
If you’re interested in those “Deal of the Day” type offerings, there’s a new aggregator at http://www.adealaday.com.
I haven’t had much time to browse Foot Locker’s Sneakerpedia, but it does look interesting. (I may not be the target audience; my
favorite brand of sneaker is “On sale and in my size.”)
Bing has apparently dropped support for the Link command.
Want to know what the weather is like as we kick off 2012? http://weatherzombie.com. Heh. Good morning, Internet…
Google, Astronomy, Tools, More: Morning Buzz, December 26, 2011
Nice one from Search Engine Roundtable: a Christmas logo roundup.
Hadn’t heard of this tool before: cc:to me. E-mail yourself content from anywhere, with functionality available as a bookmarklet. Free, but paid accounts are “coming soon”.
The Google Books lawsuit…. it’s baaaaack….
Wow: touring Mars with very detailed images.
New(ish) Web site ranks Colorado schools.
Presidents: the Poughkeepsie Journal reports that the Pare Lorentz Center at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library has created an online database of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s daily schedule.
Tip for geneaologists: how to geolocate your pictures of headstones and memorials on Google Maps.
An interesting collection from University of Nebraska-Lincoln: a database of bird songs collected on organic farm land.
Astronomy archives: the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada has launched an online archive of David Levy’s log books.
A new option for cloud-based video editing: WeVideo. Good morning, Internet…
Online Hopi Petroglyph Archive Launched
Hopi Petroglyph Site
CyArk, the World Monuments Fund, and the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office have gotten together with University of Redlands associate professor Dr. Wesley Bernardini to launch the Hopi Petroglyph Sites Digital Preservation Project Website. (Say that three times fast.) This site contains multimedia, a virtual tour, and educational plans related to Tutuveni, which means newspaper rock in Hopi. Tutuveni contains 5,000 petroglyphs of Hopi clan symbols in its 150 sandstone boulders. You can access the site at http://archive.cyark.org/hopi-petroglyph-sites-intro.
The site starts off with a slideshow but you can access a menu of available content on the main page. The multimedia page contains drawings, photographs, videos, and even 3D models of the Tutuveni site. Whenever I tried to look at a high-resolution version of a photograph or a drawing, I found I had to be a registered user. (Registration is free but this will slow you up.) It appears that the 3D model viewer uses Java; I had trouble getting it to work with Chromium. (To be fair that might just be me and my cranky computer.) I recommend looking at the introductory videos; they’re short but interesting.
Speaking of site registration, you’ll need to have an account to download one of the three lesson plans, including one for Hopi Clan Symbols (grades K-6), History of Tutuveni and Hopi Clan Symbols (grades 7-12), and “Respecting Our Past,” an overview of deterioration and vandalism at petroglyph sites along with preservation efforts (grades 7-12.)
I think my favorite part of this site was the virtual tour, which offered 360-degree panoramas (including up and down views in addition to “spin” views) of the Tutuveni site. Unfortunately despite the zoom capabilities of the virtual tour, it was occasionally easier to read the graffiti on the boulders at Tutuveni than the petroglyphs, but as I explored different parts of the site (there were LOTS of different panoramas) I found some easily-viewable boulders and petroglyphs. The views were stunning.
The virtual tour is denoted as “self-guided,” and I do admit that I wished there was more structure to take me through each of the major boulder groups, but between the introductory video, the lesson plans, and the panorama, you can see (and learn) a lot.
Morning Buzz, August 17, 2011
New Yorkers will soon have access to amusement park ride safety reports.
The University of Toledo has a new digital archive to showcase its collection of Hungarian books.
Wow, Stanford is offering three computer classes for free.
A new digital atlas is available to trace population movement during Ireland famines. “Two new digitized atlases show the levels of emigration during the Great Famine, right up until the rise of the Celtic Tiger in 2002, as well as an analysis of Ireland’s population change.”
The Australian Dress Register sounds fascinating! “The Australian Dress Register … documents significant and well provenanced men’s, women’s and children’s clothes and accessories. The register offers museums, private collectors and owners across the country, a resource to share information about dress with the wider community.”
A new search engine focuses only on Nigeria.
After browsing this wiki of over 3400 types of tomatoes, I’m craving some rye bread, mayo, and pepper. Good morning, Internet…
Afternoon Buzz, July 31, 2011
Environmental law violators in British Columbia are now in an online database. “The free database includes a wide variety of compliance and enforcement actions taken by ministry staff and enforcement officers. It includes orders, administrative sanctions, tickets and court convictions covering hunting and fishing, open burning, mud bogging, dam safety, and pesticide and pollution violations.” (Mud bogging?)
Australian National University to launch revamped digital collection. “The Digital Collections will freely share ANU research with the rest of the world by making public over 400 theses, almost 4,000 research papers and 2,000 images.”
A new archive of Oregon historic newspapers has been launched. 180,000 pages cover 1846 to 1922.
Hardware nut? CircuitBee “is like Scribd for soldering> Very nice!
The state of Colorado is releasing a database of Colorado forest products. “The database lists businesses that use wood material derived from Colorado’s forests; many specialize in utilizing beetle-killed wood, which provides a market to help address forest health in areas impacted by bark beetles.”
Just read about this AAA guide to driving laws by state. Lots to see here!
UConn is digitizing a collection of rare Puerto Rican documents. “Library officials said Tuesday the 5,000 fragile documents they are scanning date as far back as 1844 and detail court disputes over slaves, land and livestock.”
A rumor: Vogue magazine is prepping a online digital archive.
Speaking of fashion: a visual search engine helps you put together an outfit from a picture you see online. I’ll be sure to use this if I see a jeans and t-shirt outfit I just must have… Good afternoon, Internet…
Evening Buzz, July 14, 2011
Justia has launched free daily opinion summaries from the United States Supreme Court, all Federal Appellate Courts and all state supreme courts. “In addition to the daily offerings by jurisdiction, subscribers can sign up for summaries categorized by practice area that are delivered weekly. Practice areas and topics include Constitutional Law, Intellectual Property, Employment Law, Criminal Law, Immigration Law, and many more — over 60 total categories. Each summary includes a link to the full text of the court’s opinion allowing users to immediately click through and read the case. All summaries are written by licensed attorneys.”
The U.S. Geological Survey has announced a massive release of historical topographical maps. “For more than 130 years, the USGS topographic mapping program has accurately portrayed the complex geography of our Nation. The historical topographic map collection contains all editions and all scales of USGS topographic quadrangles. Files are high resolution (600 DPI) scanned images of all maps from the USGS legacy collection.” This is over 200,000 maps spanning 1884-2006.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has launched the Production Art Database. This sounds like a lot of fun. “The database contains records for more than 5,300 items…including motion picture costume and production design drawings, animation art, storyboards and paintings. Nearly half of the records include images, making this an invaluable online resource for researchers interested in motion picture design.” The database contains information from items as early as 1923 and as recent as 2010. The URL for the story from which I’m quoting is http://www.shootonline.com/go/index.php?name=Release&op=view&id=rs-web2-463444-1309292420-2 ; the direct URL for the database is http://collections.oscars.org/prodart/.
The University of Arizona has released The Jack Sheaffer Photograph Digital Collection, a collection of over 10,000 photographs that covers southern Arizona from 1955-1975.
“Sheaffer photographed tragic accidents, civil rights and anti-war marches, politicians, athletic events, celebrity visits and local beauty pageants, and the collection is continually growing.” Announcement: http://uanews.org/node/40497.
