Widgets, tools, and doodads for library webmasters

Darlene FichterData LibrarianUniversity of Saskatchewan

Frank CervoneDirector – Library, Information, and Media Studies

Chicago State University

Photo by: aaardvaark (Creative Commons license)

They have got WAAAAYYYY to much stuff to talk about!

Well, I hear that they’re supposed to be amusing

But I doubt they have our sense of balance!

Firefox tools

• SafeCache• SafeHistory• FoxMarks• FEBE

SafeCache

• Protects your privacy• Defends against cache-based tracking techniques • Embedded content is cached

– Segments the cache according to the domain of the originating page.

• Enable/disable in the Privacy pane of the Options menu.

• Learn more about Protecting Browser State using Same Origin policy (paper)

www.safecache.com

SafeHistory

• Protects your privacy by defending against visited-link-based tracking techniques.

• It allows offsite visited links to be marked only if the browser's history database contains a record of the link being followed from the current site.

• Enable/disable SafeHistory in the Privacy pane of the Options menu

www.safehistory.com

FoxMarks

• Automatically synchronizes bookmarks• Access your bookmarks anytime at

my.foxmarks.com. • Works in the background to keep your

bookmarks up-to-date on all your computers

www.foxmarks.com

mysteryuser

FEBE

• Firefox Environment Backup Extension• Quickly and easily backup your Firefox

extensions• Easily synchronize your office and home

browsers • May specify user defined items

– Backup virtually any data on your computer

customsoftwareconsult.com/extensions/febe/febe.html

Other webtools for collaboration

• Meebo chat widget• LinkBunch• DocSyncer• Twirl• polldaddy

Meebo Chat Widget

www.meebome.com

Let’s stretch it

Add it to your catalog. Add it to your null results page. More info: David Lee King’s Blog Post

LinkBunch

• Lets you put multiple links into one small link• Firefox extension creates a bunch from all

your open tabs• Twitter bot in the works

– Isn’t finished yet

linkbun.ch

DocSyncer

• Automatically finds and syncs your document files to Google Docs – This means everything

• “Users are even reporting that launching a document directly from their desktop using DocSyncer is FASTER than launching the document natively in Microsoft Office!”– Yeah…right

www.docsyncer.com

twirl

• Desktop client for twitter

www.twhirl.org

What is twitter?

polldaddy: Get interactive

polldaddy.com

Webtools for web development

• VisCheck• Feng GUI• Browsershots• Flickr photo badge• Photoshop Express• Addthis• Google countdown• Babelfish/Google translate

VisCheck

• A computer simulation of the entire process of human vision

• Way of showing what things look like to someone who is color blind

• Online service– Image files– Web pages

• Downloadable – Windows and Mac

www.vischeck.com/vischeck

Tritanope

Protanope

Deuteranope

Full color

Full spectrum

Red/green deficiency

Blue/yellow deficiency

Feng GUI

www.feng-gui.com

• Automatic alternative to eye-tracking• Creates heatmaps based on an algorithm that

predicts what a real human would be most likely to look at

www.fenggui.com

© 2006-2008 Feng-GUI - Feng Shui for graphic user interfaces.™

google.com

flickr.com

useit.com

Browsershots

• Creates screenshots in different browsers• Open source, online service • How it works:

– Submit your web address– Added to the job queue– Distributed computers open the website in their

browser– They create screenshots and upload them to the

browsershots server

browsershots.org

Flickr Photo badge

http://flickr.com/badge.gne

This is also a great example of progressive tutorial.

Photoshop Express

Tutorial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LT9Sb-iYFYGeoff Baum – CNET News

www.photoshop.com/express

Forget location: Think web site distribution

http://addthis.com

Pick a button – Grab your code

Bookmark button statistics

• Top Bookmarks (Past Week/Month/Year)

• Top Bookmark Services Used

Google countdown

short url: http://urltea.com/32m0

Altavista Babelfish site translator

www.altavista.com/help/free/free_searchbox_transl

Google translate my page

Short url: http://urltea.com/32lx

Nifty utilities

• Process Tamer• File Hamster• Syncback Freeware• LinkExtractor• reCaptcha• Anonymouse• Prism

ProcessTamer

• Monitors CPU usage of processes• Reduces the priority of apps that hog the CPU• Windows only

www.majorgeeks.com/Process_Tamer_d4651.html

File Hamster

www.mogware.com/FileHamster

• Real-time backup and archiving of your files while you work

• Monitors files or directories– Automatically creates incremental backups – Store notes about the changes that have been

made

Syncback Freeware

• Backup all files anytime with a single click• Scheduler to automate backups• Versioning• Synchronization• Incremental backups • Machine to machine via ftp

– Encryption– Compression

www.2brightsparks.com/downloads.html

LinkExtractor

www.webmaster-toolkit.com/link-extractor.shtml

Moving large files

100 MB, 7 days

500 MB, 7 days100 MB, 7 days

100 MB, no time limit

1 GBPeer to Peer

reCaptcha

recaptcha.net

Anonymouse

• Want to private• Check if resources are accessible outside your IP

range or not

http://anonymouse.org/

Prism

• An application that lets users split web applications out of their browser and run them directly on their desktop

• Web platform integrated into the desktop experience

• Developers don’t have to target it separately • Windows today

– Mac and Linux available soon

labs.mozilla.com/2007/10/prism

More Widgets & Gadgets• Widgetbox

– http://www.widgetbox.com/

• Google Gadgets– http://www.google.com/ig/directory?synd=open

• Previous Cool Tools Presentations– http://library2.usask.ca/~fichter/cool_tools/

All work and no play

lolinator.com

Thanks!

Darlene FichterData LibrarianUniversity of SaskatchewanDarlene.Fichter@usask.ca

Frank CervoneDirector – Library, Information, and Media Studies

Chicago State University