I wrote about different ways to add the ezproxy stem to url almost 2 years ago but the bookmarklet method has always being the most popular method used by libraries to allow members access to articles via the library's subscription even when off campus.

Like many academic librarians, I do various types of presentations, orientations and classes to students. Some students might think we librarians are out of touch that we librarian just use our library catalogues and subscribed databases and know little of Google/Wikipedia etc. As such I always try to mention some "real-world" scenarios to signal that I am well aware of the strong google/wikipedia tendencies of well pretty much everybody.

I was reading Bohyun Kim's guest blog at ACRLOG which talked about how users generally don't want to come for library instruction classes but want to learn tools like LibX that speed up searches, and she asked me what I thought of it. I replied that I felt she was spot-on, having experienced the same but said it was a bit depressing.

Librarianship is a difficult road. I find myself often torn between idealism and cynicism, caught between passion and frustration. Talking to other librarians, I see the same in them. Libraries really have so much potential to make a difference and yet it seems obstacles in our path often seem insurmountable.

As mentioned in my last post, I recently presented at the online Library 2.011 conference. Talking a little about how we scan the net for mentions of my library , the results of such scans and how, when we actually respond and reactions of users. Proactive scanning Twitter and web.

We all know that library conferences are expensive. Though I fully enjoyed my experience at ALA Annual earlier this year, for someone like me in Singapore, it is hard to expect to attend many such conferences overseas because of the distance.

While many people were slightly disappointed with iPhone 4S, the one feature that was considered cool and perhaps the main selling point is Siri , the intelligent assistant that among other tasks reads your email, manages your schedule, calls/texts your contacts etc. Still, will people find it strange to speak commands out-loud in public? Is Siri smart enough most of the time or will it be frustratingly wrong most of the time?

Steve Jobs first pitched for the iPhone at MacWorld 9 Jan 2007. Here is the original transcript and below is the video of the master at work. There Steve claimed to be reinventing the phone. How would he reinvent the library catalogue? "This is a day I've been looking forward to for almost 140 years. Every once in a while, a revolutionary product comes along that changes everything.

We live in a world where it seems we have countless ways to communicate with our users. Recently, I have added a new one to my toolkit - WebEx a popular web conferencing software. At our institution we also have other tools/services options such as Camatasia Relay, Ink2Go, Adobe Breeze,Live sessions can be recorded as  "webcasts", while the free tools like Skype, Hangouts in Google+ gives us even more options.

I have written plenty of posts on why you want to proactively scan Twitter & other online spaces for mentions of your library so you know what people are saying about your library and help if needed. But today I am going to focus on just Twitter. For Twitter I have written plenty on the options available whether desk-top,webbased clients, social media search engines etc for scanning.

I don't have much artistic or design skills so I like playing with tools that help mask this lack of skill. The following are some tools that allows even someone like me to create more flashy presentations/visualizations/mashups without much skill or effort. Some of the tools below could be used at presentations, others could be a unusual visualization that you show on LCD monitors and other digital signages.