Assignment 3: Option 1

I chose to do Option 1 for Assignment 3. For this option we had to interview a librarian who is in charge of their library's CMS. I spoke briefly (via email) with the library director of Wallkill Public Library, Mary Lou Carolan who directed me to the library assistant, Lisa Palmer, who is in charge of maintaining that library's CMS. Wallkill Public Library's website was done through Piper Mountain Webs Library Website Solutions which has a built in CMS.
Below are the questions and answers from my interview with Lisa.

1. How and where did you hear about Content Management Systems (CMS)?

Lisa: I heard about CMS through my director who knew that other libraries in RCLS (Ramapo Catskill Library System) were using them.

2. What were your motivations to adopt the Piper Mountain Webs Library Website Solutions with their built in CMS as opposed to WordPress or Joomla?

Lisa: We liked Piper Mountain because it seemed easy to use and assistance was always available.

3. What were the decision making criteria? Which was most important to you?

Lisa: We wanted two things for our website, basically - a standard, recognizable template, but one that was flexible enough to allow us to change it up and keep it fresh. So details like the rotater at the top of the homepage were an attraction, as was the fact that the calendar was right out there for everyone to see immediately. We thought Piper Mountain did a good job of condensing a lot of different information into a relatively small space without making the page look disjointed or crammed.

4. What system did you have previously? What are the important benefits or advantages of Piper Mountain Webs compared to the system you had previously?

Lisa: Previous to Piper, we were using Dreamweaver. I had taken a couple of intro courses on it, but still I found it incredibly clunky and cumbersome. I think, though, that if I was more of a techie I might have liked it better. I just had neither the skill level nor the hours in my work day to devote to becoming better versed in it. So everything was a major chore - especially when it came to swapping out art and graphics, etc. Piper is much easier and there's always someone there to help if you get into a bind.

5. How was the learning curve?

Lisa: There's not much of a learning curve, at all - if you've ever worked with a template like Constant Contact or other online marketing tools, it's very similar to that. Just a template you switch text and images in and out of. Easy.

6. Do you find the site easy to maintain? What are some features you think need improvement (if any)?

Lisa: The site is easy to maintain. One of my few beefs about it (and I think they're working to make this more efficient) is the calendar is pretty time-consuming. Even if you have an item you can duplicate - like an event that happens each week - you still have to open up an entry and add a different date to it (which sounds trivial, but I've used much easier calendar programs). There are other features that could be similarly streamlined - such as our Newest Materials page, which entails manually entering the author and title of each and every item you want mentioned.

7. Do you feel that the system is worth the cost? ($675 start up fee + $600 yearly fee)

Lisa: The system is definitely worth the cost in my opinion. I think it has a distinctive and attractive look to it and, as I mentioned, the assistance that's available is a huge help.



Although Wallkill  Public Library opted to go for a more expensive website with a built in CMS as opposed to a straight CMS, their choice worked for what they were looking to do. The Library Director, Mary Lou Carolan has a business background and is a firm believe that libraries need to do whatever they can to market themselves (she led a workshop at our system headquarters called "Get Off Your Ass...and Out into the Community" which is where I first met her). She explained that she really liked the look of Piper Mountain website compared to something that could be created on WordPress or Joomla. The built in CMS gives control to the library to update web content easily, as needed. Lisa, as stated in her interview, is not a "techie" but she is able to maintain the website easily which is the point of a CMS.
As was mentioned above, many libraries in our system (RCLS) use CMS for their websites. I chose to conduct my interview with those at Walllkill Public Library because I was interested to know their reasonings for going with a site that would cost more and therefore take up a bigger chunk of their budget. Piper Mountain is what would work for them and their needs of wanting something flexible and "fresh". Their website was definitely one of the most visually appealing for me out of the other ones I looked at in our system.
One of their criteria is actually one of my favorite features about their site - a calendar that's right there for everyone to see immediately. If I'm going to my library's site, I want to see what is going to be happening there and when immediately. I don't want to have to click through tabs to figure out when things are occurring and I do not think that I am alone in that either. 
After Lisa mentioned Dreamweaver, I decided to check it out because I have not heard of it before. It's actually a website development tool through Adobe. From my explorations of Dreamweaver, it looks like it can be used in conjunction with WordPress to give the WordPress page a more unique look and feel to it. There are some tutorial videos available to watch to learn how to use Dreamweaver and I would be interested to know if anyone has had experience with Dreamweaver and enjoyed it. Lisa made mention that if she were more "techie" that she may have like Dreamweaver better. It would be an interesting comparison to have.
I was surprised to hear about the calendar feature, it must be a very time-consuming and frustrating process to have to put events in daily, even when they are repeated. I'm glad to hear that Piper Mountain is working to correct this very inefficient function.
As far as the cost of the system, it does seem pretty steep for the initial expense ($1275 to start), but you get what you pay for. The website is visually appealing and easy to navigate through and from my understanding easy to maintain. You can check out the website here: http://www.wallkillpubliclibrary.org/wallkill/.
Overall my talks with Mary Lou and Lisa were informative and left me with some things to think about. I think it's great that they were able to find a site and CMS that worked for their library's needs as well as their own personal needs in maintaining the information on the site. It is so important that library's consider multiple perspectives when picking a CMS. It can look fantastic but if no one on staff is capable of maintaining it, the CMS will not be serving its purpose. From my outsider's perspective, Wallkill Public Library made the right choice for them by going with Piper Mountain and the built in CMS offered by them. 

A Lesson on Time Management

So this week has gotten away from me and as I was working through my discussion posts that are due tonight the lovely site maintenance is occurred on Blazeview...due to be down until 7AM tomorrow. This has not been my week. But just a lesson in needing to manage my time better. I guess it's on to starting to type up Assignment 3 while I wait for the maintenance to end. UGH! Lesson learned!

Module 3: Cloud computing, open source software, 3D printing

Working my way through Module 3 readings...I'm having to reread quite a bit to wrap my head around some of these things, since it's all pretty new territory for me. Cloud computing and open source software are things that I've always thought about in an abstract way, never really how they actually work and are applied. I'm excited to read the article about 3D printing though.

For Assignment 3 I conducted my interview via email with the library director and library assistant of a library that is part of my system. The library director is the one who ultimately chose their CMS but the library assistant is the person in charge of maintaining and changing the site. It was an informative interview.

Joomla

Just finished playing around with my Joomla page. I hadn't realized how long the tutorials were going to be when I initially started this assignment, so it has taken me longer than I anticipated but it's been a good experience. Joomla is not the most intuitive site, and the back and forth that I had to do to edit the pages and then see how they would actually appear on the finished product was a bit annoying. Overall I feel that this was a great experience and it is something that I would like to dive into further. It'll be interesting to get experience with other sites and really be able to compare them to pick the one that works best for whatever need I try to fulfill.
Here's the link to my Joomla...enjoy! 
http://kellymlis7505.cloudaccess.net/

Joomla and Reading

Today I am spending most of my day finishing up the reading for Module 2 and answering classmates questions as well as monitoring my own discussion questions with 2 group members.
 I'm looking forward to jumping into Joomla, I watched a little bit of the beginner's Joomla tutorial yesterday and will finish the rest today. I'm excited to be creating a website and I know this experience will be extremely beneficial in the future.
Hope everyone enjoys their extended weekend (if you are so lucky), although I have to work tomorrow I'll enjoy my Monday off :)

Wiki Link

After many comparisons I settled on Wikispaces for my library's wiki page. It's free, easy to create and maintain, and it's fairly mobile friendly :)
I was lucky enough to have some instruction on creating lib guides through my library system last year, and the knowledge from the lib guides definitely helped me create this wiki. It's not much but it covers the things my library found most important to have in their wiki. The link is below, enjoy!

fallsburglibrary.wikispaces.com

Working on Wiki

As part of our first assignment for Applied Technologies we have been asked to create a Wiki for our library. My library is the Fallsburg Library located in South Fallsburg, NY which is part of the Ramapo Catskill Library System (RCLS).

Main characteristics: Fallsburg Library is a public library which serves a diverse population of about 20,000 who live within the Fallsburg Central School District. The library's budget is approximately $350,000/year. It is a member of RCLS which has 51 member libraries spanning 4 counties.

Goal of Wiki: The goal of the Fallsburg Library wiki is to provide information about library hours, location, and contact information. The goal of the wiki is also to provide another area where library events can be posted and viewed.

Requirements for Wiki:

• Must be FREE
• Must be easy to create and update
• Page history needs to be available
• Should also be mobile friendly

Using wikimatrix to choose a wiki the following suggestions were given to me:
 bitweaver, CentralDesktop, GWiki, Incentive, MindTouch, Oddmuse, PAUX, Traction TeamPage and Wikispaces

Some more research needs to be done before I can choose a wiki that best fits the library's needs and requirements.

Settling In (copied from wordpress and added to)

So I’m spending today trying to get settled in with this whirlwind 3 week grad class. I’m starting to feel a bit more comfortable with Twitter but this blogging every other day is something that is going to take some time to get used to.
I watched my first TED talks today and really enjoyed both of them (one on Wikipedia the other on Twitter). They both gave me a new found respect for both outlets. It is killing me a bit to be stuck inside in front of my computer on such a gorgeous spring day here in upstate NY…when warm weather hits we have to enjoy it while it lasts. School has to come first though.
I have to apologize for these early blogs because this is not at all something I am used to doing, I’m hoping to catch on with this soon and maybe then it won’t be so awkward.
I have switched over to blogger now that my Google account has decided to play nice again. I like the set up much better than wordpress...I'm already learning some new things!

MLIS 7505 Intro Blog (copied from wordpress)

Hi all!
This is officially my first blog ever! I probably would have been quite content living out my life without having ever blogged, but since it’s a requirement for class I guess I’ll have to do it (same with twitter and “tweeting”).
A little bit about myself: I am 27 and live in upstate NY (NOT the city, I know it’s amazing to think that there might be some non-city parts of NY). I actually live about 20 minutes from the site of Woodstock ’69 and we’re actually gearing up for Mysteryland 2014 over Memorial Day weekend which is to take place at the site to mark the first overnight camping festival allowed there since Woodstock and it also marks the first time Mysteryland will be in the US.
I work full-time in a small public library with the title of “library clerk” but I wear many hats and perform many tasks ranging from HR to tech services to marketing. Anyone who works in a small public library knows the multitude of tasks that every employee needs to perform to stay running successfully and fulfilling patron wishes. I also teach swimming lessons 2 nights/week, tutor 2 nights/week, AND work every other weekend and event days at the Woodstock ’69 site which has been turned into Bethel Woods Center for the Arts and Museum.
Although I am the most “tech-y” person at my library, I know that there are a LOT of things that I still need to learn and get more comfortable using. I am hoping to get more comfortable with some of the different types of social media out there, Facebook is pretty much the only thing I access on a daily basis while Pinterest and Twitter I’ll look at every so often. I’m also hoping to learn some more about website building because my library’s webpage is in desperate need of a facelift. This class should be fun and I am looking forward to all that it has to offer!