Category: Reflection

OMG … Search Engines have to be one of the best tools created for wasting time, since the late 90’s I have used many (Copernicus, Wolfram Alpha, MSN, Yahoo and Google…just to name a few).  The one thing to keep in mind constantly is verification, in particular, the need to properly verify the sources and value of the information as presented from the search results.

Looking at the tools presented in this lecture, they highlight the differences in the information submitted by each of the search engines. This week, for example, through comparison of MSN & Google (including Google Scholar) and Serendip-o-matic the same search criteria reveals that information as presented had noticeably different results.

It was also found that Serendip-o-matic showed results only from a limited database of mainly historical records while the  MSN & Google (including Google Scholar) contained results gathered across the internet. What was found to be interesting about the results is that they can be unexpected and may lead to (sway)  an alternative perception of the subject matter and subject you were researching.

Through the knowledge of different ways to use search engines and data networks and the right tools to use, research times can be reduced and the outcomes for finding verifiable information achieved.

Having finally put pen to paper (don’t judge me I’m an Analogue Kid in a Digital World) to flesh out details for my project, thoughts wander to how much of this course I’ll be able to use. So far everything I’ve read, links followed and applications accessed has opened my eyes to the possibilities of presenting something truly “digital”.

So far everything I’ve read, links followed and applications accessed has opened my eyes to the possibilities of presenting something truly “digital”.

Working through the content for this week I found  Zooniverse and the concept of crowdsourcing quite fascinating and a great research tool for future heritage and building conservation projects. Twitter is a tool I normally only use for receiving tweets relating to news that affects the building I work in, using a

Twitter is a tool I normally only use for receiving tweets relating to news that affects the building I work in, using a bot to now do the hard work has now meant that the results are more relevant.Looking at Trove Traces, another one of those great tools developed by our lecturer, I used it in my initial search for articles that may be relevant for my project.

Yes, my project finally has a plan…

Hi, my name is Rob, a part-time student studying  Heritage, Museums and Conservation for the purpose of furthering my understanding of Heritage buildings, the stories they tell and the flexibility they have for future use in our modern society.

When I’m not studying my day job is the operational management of a large Heritage listed commercial property, occupied by a Commonwealth agency and in use 24/7 and yes, it keeps me very busy.

This Unit is one of my compulsory subjects, so I’m excited to learn how we have moved from the analogue age and how we can use modern digital technology to document and preserve the tangible and intangible for future generations.

I noted in reflections for week one, my digital footprint which even after the first lesson increased noticeably, never up until commencing this course have I had to develop so many usernames and passwords…and yes I’m keeping a list.

 

I’ve just finished the week 2 readings and activities and the one thing that stood out to me the most was the guy who created 200 Trove lists about lawnmowers. My first thought was “that’s super random, who needs that?” but then I thought that it actually is really cool that there are ways for people to collect things that are really specific to them. I got lost on Trove looking for things that I’m interested in and seeing how many specific collections cater to my interests. When I was younger I collected magazine and newspaper clip outs of my favourite model, Lily Cole (no longer a model, but she continues to inspire me with what she does), so I just cant wrap my head around the fact that all of these magazine clippings of her are now on an online database.

I remember learning about Trove and hearing similar things in a previous class of yours Tim, Anthropology of Collections I think? but I will have to admit that I didn’t appreciate Trove for what it is at the time, but now after doing this unit I just think it is so great.

The Tiny Gallery is my new favourite thing, it reminds me of an online dolls house. Zooniverse.org is really cool, I can see how something like this would be so useful in the cultural heritage/ conservation sector.

I actually feel like it was easier to go back and read through the week two activities and readings now (at the end of the semester) than it was earlier on in the semester. Coming into this unit I found it hard to understand everything because of how different this unit is to everything else I’ve studied, but now I’m finding it easier to understand things I previously couldn’t wrap my head around.

Thanks,

Nour 🙂

I am probably the most incapable map-reader in the whole world (incorporating a Tom-Tom into the family probably saved my marriage!), so I was surprised by how much I enjoyed playing with maps this week.
Beginning with Google My Maps, I wanted to mark all kinds of spots. I can see how you could tell stories through plotting. It would be fun to mark-up family holidays and all kinds of stuff! Correcting the mistakes in the Australian National Heritage List so they would plot correctly became a bit of a google quest. I was able to map almost everything in the end by either replacing the ext with another detail or by removing some detail.
For example;

• Coranderrk – Change La to lane
• Koonlda Cave – Remove Cook
• Kingston and Arthurs Vale historic area – change ext to TAS

Moving on, I really like the way the Orbis map illustrates a story. It is a bit like a choose your own adventure book from the 80’s. Yes, I know many of you would be too young to remember those…

Many of the maps included in the Carto Gallery were very cool. My favourite was http://mortuarymapping.matrix.msu.edu/index.html. This site records the excavation of The Santa Clara Valley Medical Center (SCVMC) Historic Cemetery, providing a number of different filters. It includes what they have called a button map, which indicates people who were buried in hospital gowns. Burials took place in this cemetery in the early 20th century those buried in gowns were identified according to button patterns as the glass buttons survived. Very cool!

I also really enjoyed playing around with the Carto map populated with cycling accidents (not a very happy subject). Placing this data on the map really helps to make sense of information and makes it much more compelling than just looking at it in a black and white table. Using the variety of filters transformed the data in a different way

I am interested in trying to incorporate carto into the “Connections” web site that I am building. The limitation of 100 points per month could cause issues, but it is very useable. The other thing that I liked about the SCVMC Historic Cemetery site is the hand drawn burial map. Originally, I had thought that I might geolocate each burial, but it might be cleaner and more accurate just to geolocate the cemetery itself then provide a plan or map of the cemetery.

That’s all from me this session…

This week was very helpful!, now I know something I have not thought about it before.

Archiving, not only collections, but different sorts of information though an application is just great!

I believe this week’s information and websites will help me develop my Idea for my final report easier! specially DIY webarchiving, is just what I needed to search trough different sources of information and collections.

the fact that it is so specific gives you a great starting point for searching. the information is clear and in different formats. an example would be Film Noir: https://archive.org/details/Film_Noir

 

 

 

Sinuously! How many types of graphs can there be?

I consider that is good to get to know about different types or ways to make graphs to adapt to the different ways of showing information. visualizing something helps to understand things better! The colours that distinguish the different elements, time periods, etc. All settle into one graphic. It’s amazing how easy it makes you acknowledge a huge amount of information just in one visual.

But, although is good to have different types of graphics that adapt to the type of information you have or to the way one wants to display things, It could be tricky for does that do not have much experience with technology.

One has to be careful, depending on the graphs you use there are many things that can be misunderstood by other viewers.

In addition, the technology advance and new graphs come into play constantly, what will create lots of confusion if you are no up to date.

in conclusion every graphic should be enplane briefly for the viewer to understand it.

Well, this class was a bit confusing for me.  It is true that data is easier to read through graphs and other type of representation, than that would have been, for me, before knowing about this tools. Yet, I wasn’t able to understand properly how to do it and how it works. Being honest, I was completely lost for the whole class and it was hard for me to assimilate all the content and the different tools.

I was really confuse about the type of files use in each. although some of the tools like Plot.ly are easy to use and you only have to cut and paste, for me it was a nightmare.  I couldn’t get it at all, despite the fact of going home and reading everything twice.

For this class, we look upon different search tools.

I didn’t know how many ways to search though things where out there. The coolest thing is, that depending on the tool you use you get back a different result. For example:

Serendip-o-matic gives you the results just from a search within the collections, while Google gives you the results from the whole Internet. You can see the ‘past’ in Serendip-o-matic, and see the ‘now’ through Google.

What I found interesting about this class is that, you can even get results that you were not expecting to get or that you would have never imagine as options, but they are relevant to your search.

In my opinion, Knowing about different ways to search though networks is essential, not only for collections but for the increase of knowledge in general. And knowing which tool to use, will also save you time on the search for something, due that it narrows down your field of work (according to the tool you use).