Random Notes

Possible uses for LibGuides that we won't have time/scope for:

• Virtual Browsery (Nicole asked Hum already, so she may follow up in Summer)
• General staff use for processing documentation, etc.
• Would be great to have book covers in RSS new books list

Random notes by Angie so they're in one place:

• Have people add the Post to LibGuides bookmark.  Really easy to add links this way.
• Cut and paste works really well, including screen shots, using the rich text/dynamic boxes.
  • But when I tried to edit this page, the html got weird and I had problems getting fonts back to size, etc.  Maybe it's best to do this if it won't be edited for awhile?
• Polls could be really useful in course pages, maybe even while teaching to get instant responses.
• I want to be able to associate my page with Engineering AND Science, but it seems like I can only choose one or the other.
• What should we require for the user profile?  I don't like putting in office numbers since that's misleading in many cases, and most people don't want drop by traffic.  Or maybe I'm jumping to conclusions for everyone.   We should also determine *if* a picture is used, what type of picture is acceptable.  
  • what to call the profile box.  I called mine "ask us" for more name recognition?
• I would recommend we tell people NOT to add pages to another person's page unless they are specifically told to. I hope this wouldn't happen, but just in case.... I was able to add a page to Maggie's companies and Remlee's Test page.
• How will link checking happen?  How does it happen now?  Is there a crawler that checks for broken links?
• I wanted to link from my 2.009 page to all of Maggie's Companies pages.  But when I include a tab to her Companies home page, I don't see all of tabs associated with Companies. Is there a way to link to them all without me having to add all the pages?

Peter's notes
RSS feed feature is very easy to use. Default number of items to display is 5. Depending on width of the box used this can be pretty vertically long. (I tried putting a feed on a side box and it doesn't look so good. I tried making the default 100 to see what would happen. It topped out at 29. Default is to display titles with a popup showing part of first sentence if you mouse over. Can also set so that part of the first sentence displays beneath the title. Includes option to take the person to the web site of the RSS and to subscribe to the feed.

Notes by Nicole and Marion:  (Incorporate some of these into guidelines?)

 1. Private = anyone who knows the URL can see it

     Unpublished = must sign in to see it

2. click on "change status" and you can make a "friendly URL" - yea!

3. rich text box you can create a table with the built in tools without knowing HTML, BUT, it's a little clunky
not sure why it let me make a table that's bigger than the surrounding box
(ask LibGuides)

4. books from the catalog box:a work-around for having images that DON't link to Amazon
- go to web site with images, such as Barnes and Noble
- right click on the image and copy the image location URL
- in the libguides input form box, paste that URL (instead of using Amazon's)
- voila! the image is now non-clickable and you can make the title go to Barton by filling in the Barton URL

5. if you need more room between the title of a box and its content, hit edit text and put in a blank return or line breaks.

6. if you know HTML, you can use it in all the boxes (switch to the plaintext editor)

7. embedd video box:get code from techtv.mit.edu
on video page, click "share", then look for tabs... click "copy & paste"
use the first choice for "most blogs and web sites"
copy the whole batch of code in the box
paste that into the "embed video" thing in LibGuides
when the user plays it, it opens in a full size window

(Marion could set up a LibGuides page that contains all our tutorials with the code pasted from TechTV and then others could just link to them).

8. upcoming events box:they go in chrono order
don't use the 2nd description box because it goes behind a very inconspicuous "i" icon.... best to use the main description

9. documents and files box:works well for a list of PDFs or Word docs for people to download!

10. interactive poll:shows nice stats
prevents you from voting more than once in the same browsercan put a link under each choice

• News Alert on libguides.mit.edu: Who's responsible for keeping it up to date?
  • Angie: "The Alert feature be tied into the News-blog spotlight responsibilities?  So they can change the alerts when they update the spotlights?  It makes sense to me to have spotlight items like this coordinated.....
  • Maggie: "Actually, I'd say we should just let it go.   It is really hard to keep things up to date and find new content."
  • Remlee: If we end up using the home page much, it makes sense for the news-blog folks to do it.  If we don't use the home page much, then I say, turn off the feature.
• Pick up to 10 featured guides for homepage
  • Angie: "I don't know how I feel about the "featured guides".  We seem to put a lot of thought and time into keeping the news blog and spotlight and home page current and fresh and new.  This is just another thing to remember to update and change.  Is it needed at all???  Can't we just keep with the news blog and home page as the places to highlight new stuff?"
  • Maggie: "I think not."
  • Remlee:  Let's not use it for now, but think about it later.
• Ask Task Force about home page (libguides.mit.edu)
  • Angie: "Maybe we can have this Research Guides link from the Help Yourself page?  Like where all the other pages are now?  I don't think there's much we can do with the libguides home page.  At least until we see what it looks like when populated.  It's probably fine as is for now?"
  • Maggie: "I think leave as is and keep it as simple as possible.  It might be good to link from Help Yourself for those people who previously used the subject guide links, etc. so they can continue to use their old path."
  • Remlee: use as little as possible, and link to our new index of research guides whenever possible.
• Clean out test pages & polish pages, clean out pictures: Group is working on.
• Come up with text for ILB tools page
  • Angie: "I would NOT call the box Interlibrary Borrowing.   Maybe call it "Can't find what you need?" and include AskUs in the box?   So the box text would be "Need help finding information?  Use AskUs (link) for help from library staff.  If MIT doesn't own the item you need, use Interlibrary Borrowing (link) to request it from another library."    Maybe just ILB doesn't make sense for a box?" 
  • Maggie: "I agree with Angie's suggestions about ILB."
  • Remlee: Now, I'm rethinking our need to have an ILB box at all.  I think we should just can it.