Mi estas komencanto de Esperanto

Mi studas Esperanto ĉe lernu! danke al sennoma komentulo.

I first heard about Esperanto in a story whose title and even plot I've long since forgotten. I have a vague sense it might have been a futuristic science fiction novel, and I thought it might have been another word for a merged language like Spanglish.

Then some indeterminate time later I read about a homeschooling family from Ireland who had learned Esperanto. I found primers at either Wangaratta or Wodonga library and on the internet, playing with it for a little.

That anonymous commenter had directed me to videos at lernu!. Two clips were google videos (at least one of which is also at YouTube but the sound is not as good there).

Esperanto Estas:


While at google video I noticed "Wrecking Ball at the Tower of Babel" which documents a pessimistic view that constructed international languages are unlikely to become significantly useful because no international organisation has the authority to require teaching of it, no national governments would be willing to require teaching a language perceived as 'novelty' and "since language is related to identity, culture and memory, many believe that language erosion is comparable to cultural genocide" (Can anyone tell me if it is possible to link to a specific part in a video? This conclusion was expressed at 08:43).



That video suggests that learning a new language requires the elimination of the native language (citing for example Napoleon requiring schools to teach only one French language eliminating many dialects). However the Australian education system requires students to study both English and a language other than English (LOTE). {Tell me Aussies do any schools offer Esperanto?}. What if one then another then another (etc) school offered Esperanto?

Is Australia the only country that requires students to learn a second language?

23Things #22 Audiobooks

The original #22 of 23 Things was specific to PLCMC staff: create a NetLibrary account and access audiobooks from NetLibrary. Helene made an alternative suggestion for non PLCMC people: maybe explore MySpace or Facebook (I'm not in the USA).

When Missouri River Regional Library absorbed the idea for their own learning2.0 program they designated, for Thing#22: exploring Google Labs.

I started my trial of google lab's notebook before this 23Things endeavour ... I love it, although... I wonder whether I'll ever be able to post my notes to a blog rather than just publishing to a random alphanumeric googlepage.

In the spirit of exploring audiobooks: if you know where to look (within 'online databases') my local public library has Tumblebooks, but so far as I could see nothing for adults, and nothing downloadable like NetLibrary. This was a little disappointing: after exploring Garfield County Library's protopage (thanks to Helene Blowers' pointer) to find that their patrons can easily download a wide variety of audiobooks (through the Marmot Library Network)

In contemplating tags for this post it occurs to me that audiobooks - while a potentially valuable service (when they can be downloaded) - don't have the social elements of web2.0'ness. Would we want them too? Why not - I'd love to comment on, tag, and receive recommendations relating to items in my local public library's online catalog like patrons can at Ann Arbor District Library. If I had access to audiobooks I'd probably enjoy the same features in their catalogue.



So, please tell me if anyone has seen an audiobook provider with 2.0 features.

23Things #21 Podcasts Smodcasts

This Thing has given me an opportunity to contemplate how I listen.

I'm VAK, or VKA. When I think about listening I identify myself as a good listener. Yet if I need to listen to something which is not also visible I have to close my eyes. I prefer to learn things by reading or watching - it takes longer for me to process verbal/auditory material.

I believe podcasts are potentially valuable - many people find auditory input easier, quicker or more enjoyable to process than visual. They're just not for me.

For the sake of the exercise I did search Podcast.net (can search Title & Description, Keywords, Location, Host, Episodes), Podcastalley.com, and Yahoo Podcasts (easiest on the eye interface, more visual while less textual, gentler organisation) in my typical areas of interest: breastfeeding, peace and communication, library, finding nothing that I consider worth requiring the time to listen. Ah of course... with textual input I can scan for key points ... audio and even video are linear, chronological.

Also for the sake of the exercise I subscribed to Peacepod by copying the rss link to my Bloglines. It stutters - is that Bloglines or the source?

A cast of news items read in Esperanto reminded me of the language I would, in theory, like to learn. Logically podcasts could assist in language learning, but not for visual learners like me.

Perhaps other 23Thingers might have found interesting casts? Jamie mentioned the Dolphin Pod at Yahoo, I'd like to subscribe to it but there is no RSS, and Yahoo wants me to download a jukebox. Even if it is free I don't want to download it. However there is a blog which has an atom feed, so Bloglines can at least tell me when a new podcast has been posted.

Thinking about labelling this post, I decided that while I would not categorise podcasts as web2.0, the podcast directories are.

23Things #20 YouTube... or other video sites

I've discovered YouTube awhile ago, so for the spirit of this thing I have been exploring Yahoo video and Google video.

Unfortunately I cannot blog directly from Yahoo video so I've copied across an embed script for a compilation of anime romance:



Although google video provided a button to blog and validated my blogger sign in, it then (twice), after I wrote and clicked the post button, told me that I had invalid login information! I can't be bothered doing it again. (It was only an animation apparently from Pixar with blue birds that was in a popular collection)... Oh okay, I've searched it out to copy the html (genre:animation birds):



Because I was frustrated I decided to post another video from YouTube - who told me it was successful, and it might take 24 hours to turn up.

When I looked back at the exercise I note Helene asked whether we could

see any features or components of the site that might be interesting if they were applied to library websites?

I'm not sure whether Helene was asking whether YouTube or other video sites might be useful tools to mash with a library's website, or whether library websites would be enhanced by social features such as patrons being able to upload their own stuff to the library site, or comment on things. On the latter: I don't know about uploading but I've already commented elsewhere that I love the idea (carried out at Ann Arbor) of patrons being able to comment and socialise around the collection via the online catalog. On the former sure - I've noticed a library tour video somewhere, and I can imagine something like the following playlist on a staff wiki:



Darn, I previewed three times before publishing and still forgot something:

I like being able to collect my favourites (or subscribe to another user's videos) at YouTube, which can also be done with Yahoo video but not google video. I went back to check, make sure I hadn't just missed it, but I still don't see an option for that, but I did find another funny video:

23Things #19 Furl and other web2.0 tools

This post was originally published at 43 Things.

On first look at the "list of lauded Web2.0 tools":http://www.seomoz.org/web2.0/?short suggested by this Thing I couldn't see anything else I wanted to try however there are some I've tried prior to this suggestion - because I've been curious after other bloggers mentioned or demonstrated their own use of those tools.

For example:
* I've added a meebo widget to my blog, although I rarely sign in lately (because I've been too frustrated with my blog apparently being too big to transfer to the new Blogger).
* I tried and reviewed thinkfree when suggested after my reviews of googledocs and Zohowriter.
* MySpace to see what the fuss was about, but as I do not desire a large audience it serves no purpose for me.
* I've enjoyed finding funny or intriguing videos at YouTube and upon checking it today to see if I can show by link my favourites collection, I noticed I could create a video log even without uploading my own... so that's another todo!
* As the dates for nomination and decision are not indicated on the Web2.0 awards page I can't tell how out of date it is - because for sure protopage's update would have to rank it top of the start pages. I did consider PageFlakes briefly but when protopage came through with tabbed pages its movable, resizable, overlappable post-its make it far and away superior in my eyes (and I have tried both Yahoo and Google start pages).

[mind you, Firefox's tabbed browsing {yes, I know IE7 is reported to do it too now} means I can start with several tabs at once] Can you guess what I start with? (Or if you don't care and why would you?: what is/are your start page/s?)

For the sake of this Thing something new was to check out the awarded Bookmarking tools (although I don't know why del.icio.us was categorised as social tagging rather than bookmarking). While I was reluctant to try yet another place for bookmarking - Furl appears to offer more than that - by Furling a copy of an article I can retain access to it even if it is moved or deleted from where I found it. How tempting - I had moved from prolific just-in-case printing to a more philosophical if you need it you will find it whether it is what you originally saw or something new and yet now Furl tempts me to archive everything I think looks good again. Why this need (clearly I am hardly alone) to hold on to everything?

Actually as I am creating this post as a 43Things entry which offers for me to upload a related image I wondered whether Furl might have been useful in saving evidence of the effect of ZohoWriter's layer on my blog, which post (and pernicious [yup that's the word I want] layer) I've since deleted. Yes/No ... on furling a blog at a particular time does it save what that blog looked like at that time?

Soooooooooo... Furl account created and installed the toolbar Firefox must be restarted. There's little else to report until/unless (and in which case I hope to remember to blog about it): after a period of furling I do search and find within my Furl archive a page that has moved from where I originally saw it.

As I've been trying to find good sources for music for Fish (son#2) I might give Last.fm MusicStrands and/or Upto11 a glance soon. A blogger recently mentioned Pandora but I was distracted into trying for myself: unsuccessfully (as yet) so perhaps next time I'll start with Fish's thankfully more easily identified current favourites. One Llama sounded promising with the reported 3000 attributes analysed but it is still on its way.

I note that I've asked a lot of questions this midnight hour. If all those questions were answered by comments .... unlikely as my readership is ME so I hardly need to comment, but let's pretend ... no but that explains why my midnight brain reminded me of Dave Pollards' tips for blog software/server ?programmers?designers to improve commenting features

So, three hours behind intention I'm going to shutdown.

Well my 43Things entry didn't get to here, so I don't know whether the image was supposed to transfer too, so here it is from Flickr:

From blog design to being loved

After admiring Colin's (on the glade) blog's design I started clicking from myBloglines to the sources themselves to try to work out what I like most in blog designs. I like cool, clean and simple, but I also love nifty things (attractive header, tabbed pages, sidebar widgets, even personalised icons) - my challenges, should I choose to take it further than contemplation, is to find my own design and then work out how to make it happen.

Today I found Elliott Black's Top 10, and although I don't really agree with those 10, I enjoyed a comment's pointer to Veerle, and also Powazek's Thoughts.

Then things got really interesting: not only were a couple of Powazek's thoughts entertaining, but an interestingly publicly intimate one sent me to subvert with Heather Gold (who I've added to my Bloglines).

Apparently during this Intimacy rundown (whose podcast and possibly video is still to come) Michelle Tea

talked about being loved for a day by love artist Kathy Izzo and what a difference it made to her day, knowing she was loved as she worked in a book shop

I'm definitely curious.

However the destination that tripped this from a diverting skim to a reason to blog was the poem that Heather Gold read: I Love You With Technology. I'm curious what my friend Cecilia's opinion of it would be. Can't relate from personal experience but I was definitely intrigued.

Using labels or tags

After wanting the new (or beta {I like 'beta' which might also be read 'better'}) Blogger for months for its promised labels, I'm now unsure how to use them.

See, I'm not sure I've tagged effectively at del.icio.us: when I looked at the resultant tag cloud it seemed too diverse. Of course that could be because I'm not very narrowly themed, or because I use del.icio.us for too many purposes.



I remember reading about tagging methods, but if I remember one of the conclusions correctly (use numerous relevant keywords) they may have been for bookmarking even specifically Flickr and/or del.icio.us purposes. When one cannot search for words in the content more tags might help, although good descriptions might be better if they can be searched.

But when it comes to a blog, an overabundance of tags could be counterproductive.

How can I tell what will be a useful category? Sometimes my first thoughts for tags are keywords from the content, for which (now that I have a technorati widget instead of relying on Blogger's search box) I can search rather than cluttering my (admittedly as yet non-existant) label list.

43Things to Blogger not working?

43Things entry
Originally uploaded by moonflowerdragon.

Before finally being allowed to switch, I couldn't get this 43Things entry to go to either the old blogger (because they no longer support it) or the new blogger (which I had created in case I was never to be permitted to switch). And the latter did not work even though 43Things said it did:

43Things Reported Post
Originally uploaded by moonflowerdragon.
How annoying - for all that fiddling I did compiling it with the ultimate intention of it ending up here, I'll have to copy it across, double-checking the html (because 43Things allows some nifty little tricks that I doubt will be permitted here).

I'm switched .... HUZZAH

Being frustrated that Blogger didn't want to (or couldn't for some reason) switch me, and not really wanting to start anew despite setting up to try out beta with a moonflowerdragon2.0, I once again (briefly) considered Wordpress.

Colin (on the glade)'s review encouraged me to persist with Blogger. And sure enough next time I went to post, and tried again to switch... it worked. /big smile/

So here it is, I've already been fiddling with some page elements (an easier way to add widgets) and my only remaining frustration is that this template does not have a header page element. I'd be happy trying a different template but Minima, harbor and scribe (the only other ones with a left sidebar, and a header) don't appeal.

So, in the process I've lost my pretty little bighugelabs thingy that I previously had at the top of my blog.


Any ideas how I can get it there again?

23ThingsZohowriter

23Things#18 Online Office Applications

This post is also a document publicly viewable at: ZohoWriter. I would be interested in your comments here or there.

--- This review was first created at and posted from Zohowriter on the 7th January, preceding later construction and post via googledocs. Thanks to a nasty persistent layer (no, arvind right click and 'cut' did not remove it) which also persistently sits/?sat at the top of my blog I plan to delete that post. Which unfortunately will probably lose a pleasant comment from Jonathan Crow (so I have copied it below, and can't seem to create a bookmark with Zoho to link to it). ---

I tried out Writely (ok) and Google Spreadsheets (neat) before I discovered PLCMC's 23 Things. I've used Google spreadsheet to prepare a table of appropriate prices for in-between level Silkroad items. Writely didn't present any particular problems but then wasn't given a proper tryout collaboratively because the team for whom I thought it might be useful decided early on to leap into a different tool, and I moved to different projects.

I'm a little tired today, but if I can stay awake (or perhaps another time), I might try out the features Helene Blowers thought were good about Zoho , and then check whether Writely (now google docs) also offers them.

Update 12Jan07: the last table was too big for the blog column so I've copied the one I later created at thinkfree.

Features	ZohoWriter	Google docs	thinkfree
Saves online	Y	Y automatic	Y
save, email or export as .doc, .pdf, .html, .rtf, OpenOffice	not .rtf or OO	html (zipped)	?.rtf ?OO
publish as Blogger post	Y	Y (republishing replaces post)	to blog but not 'as' post - more a link also Wordpress, Type-pad, SquareSpace
sharing / collaborating	Y	Y	Y
publish publicly	Y	Y	Y
templates	Y	N	N
revert to earlier saves	Y	Y (greatly assisted by regular auto-saves)	Y
No software to install	Y	Y	updates JVM
Free	Y	Y	Y
icon layout similar to Word	Y	less so	very in Power Edit
options (insert images, special characters, tables, bookmarks/anchors) available from main page	Y	from tabs or dropdown menus	Y
right click offers relevant options	Y	Y	Y
emoticons	Y	N	N
comments	not yet	Y
table functions	basic	basic	still checking
offers symbols beyond special characters including tick (though I don't know if blog will show them answers are N, N, Y)	N	N, but will portray if copied from elsewhere (eg thinkfree)	Y
Find and Replace	?	?	Y

Layouts:

Zoho has more icons: one click formatting etc

Google's is very simple.

Conclusion: I like Zoho's layout better, and though I don't use emoticons much yet (not being into IM) I like the fact that I could. For collaboration I like being able to use comments in Google docs and can easily remove them. I created a 'layer' in Zoho but couldn't remove it. I use tables a lot and they worked a lot easier in Zoho. However I like the automatic saving procedure in Google docs. arvind told me that Zoho also auto-saves but I cannot see any of those in the history.

Copy of comment from Jonathan Crow posted to first publication of this review since deleted:

Hi,

I am wondering if you have tried ThinkFree Online. Inc. Magazine recently voted us the best bet to replace Microsoft Office

We have a full office suite that offers robust functionality including a full print interface and functions that allow you to create full MLA format documents with footers and headers. We operate in two modes, Quick Edit, for when you need to work and run, or Power Edit when you need to take the time to create a richly formatted document.

Our Power Edit mode has the highest level of functionality around. Because we started building our application in 1999 based on MS Office formats, we also take pride in the fact that we have the highest level of MS Office compatibility available. We handle documents that other applications just don't open.

We have collaboration features, version management, publishing live documents to blogs, mash-ups with Flickr, del.icio.us, Creative Commons, and let you share documents using your own email application.

I'd be interested in knowing what you think.

Thanks,
Jonathan

ThinkFree compares

Okay, the tables from ZohoWriter and Googledocs didn't really travel well when the docs were posted to this blog, however their whole documents did arrive nice and clear as blog posts.

Zohowriter also created a problem because I tried their layer which then wouldn't be deleted (or cut).

The first post (from Zohowriter) received a friendly suggestion from Jonathan Crow to try thinkfree. Unfortunately because of that layer problem I've deleted that post, and include Jonathan's comment at the end of this post.

See the full, live document by clicking Power View

Powered by ThinkFree

I guess it depends why one is blogposting the document.

If one wants to blog about the document to invite people to travel to the online-office-place to potentially collaborate or share the document, then thinkfree does that automatically. To achieve the same with Zoho or Googledocs one could either include a link within the document when created, or edit the post.

However, if one wants the document to appear seamlessly as a post then I can't see thinkfree managing that... perhaps I might be corrected.

UPDATE 12 Jan 07: As a further note, today I'm helping a friend edit a document he has been writing about desalination. It uploaded almost precisely. Images that Word shoves to the next page to ensure they show completely, have appeared in Power Edit of thinkfree at the bottom of the previous page - cut off - I wonder if they would print that way? Great though is the quality of the Word-like view: once one has adapted to the small variations from doing things the Word-way, thinkfree power edit view appears to provide a better WYSIWYG view than the others, which I believe would make it easier to work on a document on different computers than CD or jumpdrive ported Word documents.

---

Copy of comment from Jonathan Crow posted to first publication of this review since deleted:

Hi,

I am wondering if you have tried ThinkFree Online. Inc. Magazine recently voted us the best bet to replace Microsoft Office

We have a full office suite that offers robust functionality including a full print interface and functions that allow you to create full MLA format documents with footers and headers. We operate in two modes, Quick Edit, for when you need to work and run, or Power Edit when you need to take the time to create a richly formatted document.

Our Power Edit mode has the highest level of functionality around. Because we started building our application in 1999 based on MS Office formats, we also take pride in the fact that we have the highest level of MS Office compatibility available. We handle documents that other applications just don't open.

We have collaboration features, version management, publishing live documents to blogs, mash-ups with Flickr, del.icio.us, Creative Commons, and let you share documents using your own email application.

I'd be interested in knowing what you think.

Thanks,
Jonathan

Googledocs

23Things#18 Online Office Applications

This post is also a document publicly viewable at googledocs I would be interested in your comments here or there.

I tried out Writely (ok) and Google Spreadsheets (neat) before I discovered PLCMC's 23 Things. I've used Google spreadsheet to prepare a table of appropriate prices for in-between level Silkroad items. Writely didn't present any particular problems but then wasn't given a proper tryout collaboratively because the team for whom I thought it might be useful decided early on to leap into a different tool, and I moved to different projects.

I'm a little tired today, but if I can stay awake (or perhaps another time), I might try out the features Helene Blowers thought were good about Zoho , and then check whether Writely (now google docs) also offers them.

--- Update 12Jan07: This review was first created at and posted from Zohowriter on the 7th January, preceding this one. Thanks to a nasty persistent layer (no, arvind right click and 'cut' did not remove it) which also persistently sits/?sat at the top of my blog I plan to delete that post, which will unfortunately lose a pleasant comment from Jonathan Crow suggesting I try thinkfree. Which suggestion led to a later review composed at thinkfree from which I copied the table below, because the first posts from googledocs and zoho did not scale the original table.---

Features	ZohoWriter	Google docs	thinkfree
Saves online	Y	Y automatic	Y
save, email or export as .doc, .pdf, .html, .rtf, OpenOffice	not .rtf or OO	html (zipped)	?.rtf ?OO
publish as Blogger post	Y	Y (republishing replaces post)	to blog but not 'as' post - more a link also Wordpress, Type-pad, SquareSpace
sharing / collaborating	Y	Y	Y
publish publicly	Y	Y	Y
templates	Y	N	N
revert to earlier saves	Y	Y (greatly assisted by regular auto-saves)	Y
No software to install	Y	Y	updates JVM
Free	Y	Y	Y
icon layout similar to Word	Y	less so	very in Power Edit
options (insert images, special characters, tables, bookmarks/anchors) available from main page	Y	from tabs or dropdown menus	Y
right click offers relevant options	Y	Y	Y
emoticons	Y	N	N
comments	? layers	Y
table functions	basic	basic	still checking
offers symbols beyond special characters including tick (though I don't know if blog will show them answers are N, N, Y)		✗	✓
Find and Replace	?	?	Y

Layouts:

Zoho has more icons: one click formatting etc

Google's is very simple.

Conclusion: I like Zoho's layout better, and though I don't use emoticons much yet (not being into IM) I like the fact that I could. For collaboration I like being able to use comments in Google docs and can easily remove them. I created a 'layer' in Zoho but couldn't remove it. I use tables a lot and they worked a lot easier in Zoho. However I like the automatic saving procedure in Google docs.

---

Copy of comment from Jonathan Crow posted to first publication of this review since deleted:

Hi,

I am wondering if you have tried ThinkFree Online. Inc. Magazine recently voted us the best bet to replace Microsoft Office

We have a full office suite that offers robust functionality including a full print interface and functions that allow you to create full MLA format documents with footers and headers. We operate in two modes, Quick Edit, for when you need to work and run, or Power Edit when you need to take the time to create a richly formatted document.

Our Power Edit mode has the highest level of functionality around. Because we started building our application in 1999 based on MS Office formats, we also take pride in the fact that we have the highest level of MS Office compatibility available. We handle documents that other applications just don't open.

We have collaboration features, version management, publishing live documents to blogs, mash-ups with Flickr, del.icio.us, Creative Commons, and let you share documents using your own email application.

I'd be interested in knowing what you think.

Thanks,
Jonathan

23Things #17 PBWiki

Editing the PLCMC Learning 2.0 PBWiki sandbox was quite easy.