Thing #9 Taking and Editing Photos

I love taking photos, but rarely take the time to 'jazz' them up so this exercise is a fun one for me! I decided to use LINE Camera.
Professionally, I can see the use of an ipad camera plus an app such as LINE for quick promotional photos of book displays, events, etc... to post on a library's Facebook page while wandering the stacks!

This is what I created in 5 minutes at my desk- a 'Meet the Staff Member' post. I included a selfie, and picture of what you will find at my desk... My complaint is that the text wrapped/cut off words and does not look so great... But, the color options, rounding of corners, etc.. are endless!

Thing #8 Social Media Management Tools

For this exercise, I explored the social media management tool 'Friendcaster'. This app is advertised as a easy to use app for your Facebook page, meant to make using Facebook easier. Indeed, this is a very simplified way to view your Facebook news feed. I didn't particularly care for it as all the pictures were smaller and the view is pretty much stark white plus text. The app is easy to navigate, has options for posting updates/photos for your Facebook, a newspaper icon for the news feed, and a link to your 'friends' if you want to check up on someone specific. For me, it is too simple, too easy. I guess I prefer the regular Facebook app, and even with that find that the live internet version is often different in how items are posted on the news feed. What I like best about using social media is looking at pictures or videos posted by friends, or following links to stories others recommend. I don't need a special app for this. I am not sure how Friendcaster would be of use professionally unless there was a way to filter the items that appear on the news feed to very specific groups or friends. Interesting to try, but this one will be deleted!

Thing #7 Content Saving & Sharing

Pinterest! Oh how I love Pinterest. I have many boards and pins, and pinners to follow. I recently read a funny quote that "Pinterest-ing is the new Googling". I find that to be true when I am looking for recipes, craft ideas, inspiration for family photography and gift ideas. I store many recipes here, and ideas for future projects to do with my kids.
What I like about the Boards is that you get to see a visual cue to what the Pin contains- either a picture of the finished product or a set of several pictures showing the steps involved in making whatever it is. Sometimes that visual reminder is enough to get you to click on that link again to see why you saved it in the first place. Healthy muffins is much more exciting when accompanied by a mouthwatering picture!
I often neglect searching by category, and instead type in some sort of keyword search. Many hours can be wasted away jumping from Pin to Pin, Board to Board- fantasizing about having the time to cook/bake/create all of the ideas collected in my Pinterest account!
I have not used Pinterest for work, but am aware of others who use it to collect ideas for storytime, library programming, etc... It is a multiple purpose tool. Out of curiosity I used the link on 23 Things to checkout how the Owatonna Public Library uses Pinterest. My first surprise was how many boards there are! What a great way to push Staff Picks or other topical reading lists!

Thing #6 Creating & Editing Documents

I installed the app Quickoffice which allows you to create and edit Microsoft Office documents, spreadsheets and presentations, then saves everything via your Google account. I think this will be useful in order to access work from either a mobile device or computer workstation.
Perhaps the most useful part of this app is the pdf file for getting started. It told me everything I need to know about creating or moving files and folders, deleting or emailing files, and much more.
The biggest stumbling block I can envision with using Quickoffice is the fact that all my work documents are stored on the server at my employer. We do not use Google Docs, and therefore I would need to remember to upload files, and later download and re-save newer versions. This could get complicated!
However, for personal use I have started to use Google + for photo sharing, documents, spreadsheets... It seems to be an easy transition to Google Drive.

Thing #5 Notetaking

I decided to test out Dragon- a dictation app. It seems simple enough- speak and Dragon will type whatever it is you say. This could have many practical uses- list making, letter writing, brainstorming sessions, etc...
I quickly realized that you truly have to tell Dragon each and every punctuation mark in order to make your text make sense at all... It is like speaking another language. After a short trial I decided that I would make better use of a more intuitive app and did a test run of Remember the Milk instead.
With Remember the Milk, I liked the easy to use Weekly display, simple text format, ability to have a title to each task and then expand with more notes on that task. For example- an entry for Dinner Party could easily include my grocery list. The app also includes different ways to create personal, work and study lists to further differentiate your to do list. I was unable to figure out how to set up notifications for email or text message which I think would be helpful. This app may take a little more time to figure out the bells and whistles, but it could be a helpful tool for both work and home! An internet search for help/tips on RTM led me here: http://blog.rememberthemilk.com/2011/05/introducing-remember-the-milk-for-ipad/
Lots of useful tips!

Thing #4 Keeping Up

Keeping Up

 

There are many ways one could waste time online- Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, multiple news and entertainment/gossip sites... the list goes on and on! I was pretty curious to see how the use of Flipbook could streamline my time spent online.

I installed the app, created several 'magazines' and tried to discover how it pulled info from Facebook. I ended up spending even more time exploring the info found via Flipbook than I would on a normal session of trolling my usual sites. There is just too much information!! I must be a creature of habit and prefer to access my favorite things separately when I have the time. Otherwise, I am tempted to read everything that comes in.

I guess RSS is just not for me... or I need to discover another avenue to narrow the types of articles that come in. Simply clicking on sports- baseball- brought in too many articles when all I really care about is American League Baseball, Central Division, MN Twins!! Go Twinkies.

One final complaint is the content drawn from Facebook was only related to posts of articles/videos on other websites. I use facebook mainly to see cute pictures of my friend's kids/vacations/pets and to read their status updates. Only occassionally do I click on the odd interesting article link.

Overall, Flipbook has an interesting concept- I see myself using it when I want to browse various topic, but it does not narrow or streamline anything for me.

 

 

Thing #3 Utilities

For Thing #3 I tried out StandApp, an app that promotes good health by providing an alarm reminder to stand up and take a break from your desk to do easy exercises. I set the app for a reminder every 60 minutes and soon learned that each hour of my work day really does fly by... soon enough the reminder to get up and move appeared followed by 5 minutes of exercise.

While this was a good reminder to get up and move I did feel silly doing some of the stretches for the full 5 minutes. I work in an open area of cubes- no closing the office door to do my stretching! The stretches and other exercises were simple, but not challenging. You will not work up a sweat doing these- perfect for the office environment. I can see myself continuing to use this app on days that my energy levels are dragging. I felt that I was better able to focus on my work after taking the time away from my computer screen to do these exercises. I may not have time to do this every day, and the option to set the reminder for every 120 minutes may be a better use of my time throughout the day. 20 minutes of exercise at my desk vs. 40 minutes would be better for my productivity!

Thank you StandApp for helping me find a way to 'get the wiggles' out at work and allow me to settle down again to re-focus my attention to my work!This is a great healthy alternative to checking personal email or facebook on your mobile device for the umpteenth time just to break up your workday! Or, a walk to the vending machine for that matter...