Wordle

Love it...want to use it all the time. Here is one I did for our learning. It is a section of the FMM contract document I have been working on today and is currently what my working world is all about. I am trying hard to get a Wordle picture on this post so I printed it then scanned it and ten tried to upload the scan but that didn't work. I knew that you cant save the Wordles anywhere other than the Wordle page. So, my attempts at doing that were a bit dismal. However, there might have been something I could do with the scan and changed it but I don't know how to do that. But here is the link to the Wordle so that you can have fun with it. Nic used it in the weekend and loved it too. All he did was write the alphabet which was a little dull for me and great for him.
www.wordle.com

Thinking about what to do next

Thinking about what to do next
Originally uploaded by sallyscape

This is a lovely photo of my darling little boy at Totaranui. He is so frantic and seldom still so, what a moment. My dad made this delicious little boat and everywhere we go people love it and take photos and want to talk about it. Wooden boats have that appeal and you feel that you are part of something special.

As an addition to this post, I forgot to say that I got this picture off my flickr page and that was the purpose of the exercise. I think it was a bit fiddly and you have to have all the right things installed and remember all your passwords but once done it has a lovely black boarder and is cute as a button.

Aaha

Right, now I know the value of RSS feeds. I went to the Radio NZ site and cut and paste the RSS feed Url into my Blogline list and then got the last 24 hours headlines. The value in this is that the headlines or additions to the website are gathered from all parts of the website and thus you don't have to surf around and try and remember what you saw last time. So for me, the value of an RSS feed is for website use as I think my blog management system suits me well at the moment. Hence, I am going to focus on website RSS feeds and podcasts and keep my blog system as it is. Good exercise though. Slowness of my computer and all the back and forward stuff is very time consuming but as long as no one wants anything this afternoon, we should be fine.

RSS feeds and learning

Well, I am doing the module on RSS feeds and feel pretty comfortable about what that is all about. However, I do have a question or a conundrum. I read about 50 blogs weekly, I have them listed in my favourites in a blog folder then within other folders under various subject headings - news, food, fashion, home and interior, nz, political etc. When I signed up to the bloglines and selected my feeds, I got a long list of sites and blogs to visit. What is the difference? Is it that things will only turn up on the list if there is an new post? Or do I need to organise my feeds into subject folders? I am wondering what the advantages are but will keep playing with it and see what comes up.

Second post of the day

Just updated this into the new Blogger which is actually not new but since I havent used this blog forever, it was out of date. the good thing about that is that I could add a blogroll widget without having to use HTML which is a great advance for the Sunday driver tech types like me.

Blogger v Wordpress - compare and contrast

This is my hidden blog that I have not posted on since October 2006. Instead of having a separate book blog I have combined book reviews in my normal blog. I am resurrecting this blog for the purposes of a learning plan I am working on through work. We could establish another blog to do this but the thought of trying to remember more names and passwords and setting up a new blog was all a bit much so I am using this old thing as my learning and sharing space. My rules about no work on home blog are temporarily suspended.

Anyway, the title of the this blog denotes the task and because I am a wee bit lazy and tend to skitter across the top of things I have done some research to find out what other people with more time on their hands have said on this topic and i will chip in with my thoughts as appropriate.

First up http://pulsed.blogspot.com/2007/07/blogger-wordpress-chart.html
Check this out and see how unbusy this person is. However, I have comments being a person who blogs on both hosts and I have set up blogs on both as well.
My primary blog host is Blogspot and there are things I like and am used to. The template changes and fun you can have with that. Instructions are straight forward and it is friendly
Wordpress has a very cool looking template but it is limited. Uploading photos on Blogspot is very bloody annoying as they always post to the top of your entry and you have to move them about but you can't cut and paste! I hate that. I often have to reload my pics because I did one too many 'backspace's. That feels very clunky and oldfashioned to me. I would like to be much more creative with my posts but I don't have so much time to experiment and you need to weigh up the writing against the techy things.

I like Wordpress' visitor stat information. You can check many more details as part of the programme but on Blogspot you have to load up a widget. I did this and chose a funky little thing called Feedjit which I have installed on my page and you can see where people have come from which also allows me to see my regular readers. It amazes me who pops in. With this you can also see a wee map of the world and zoom in on visitors. I don't think it keeps historical info so it is pretty instant and not stat driven. I did add some 'best of' widgets but got a bit bored with them.

I think your host is really a personal choice thing and a lot has to do with who your host is linked up to and where you store your Internet photos etc. Judging by others examples and discussions I am a pretty simple blogger, being a writer not a techy. It is fun to experiment with things and I have changed the look of my blog a lot over the years. I really like it as it is now.

I need to stop going on, as I think I have flanneled enough probably proving that I am a very superficial blogger. Oh yes, I love spell check on Blogspot and assume Wordpress has that, wish Twitter did. It is embarrassing.

There is also the argument about who owns Blogspot (Google) and Wordpress ...not sure but it is 'independent'. I don't care. It is about writing and connecting with people and nothing I say on my blog is of much interest. Another thing that does annoy me about blogger is that when you change your template, you lose all the widgets and other bits and bobs you have done to personalise it. I might have considered changingto Wordpress earlier but now I have a three year history I would lose my readership, such that it is.

Work uses Wordpress so I get to play with that a bit and home is blogger so it is fine. Again, it is personal choice.

Over and out