Saturday, October 25, 2003

Sandlot Science http://www.sandlotscience.com/ Intriguing exhibits and real-time demonstrations include illusions, "brain candy" (games and puzzles), science projects, and more. For older kids and grownups alike. [Neat New Stuff] 9:53:01 AM

Reporters Desktop http://www.reporter.org/desktop/ Direct forms for searching a variety of search engines, databases, dictionaries, and free news archives. Especially check out his guide to public records searching, "Who Is John Doe and Where To Get the Paper on Him." [Neat New Stuff] 9:51:53 AM

Online Exhibits of the Museum of the History of Science http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/exhibits/index.htm Current exhibits include The Geometry of War, The Technology of Photographic Imaging, and the Oxford Virtual Science Walk. [Neat New Stuff] 9:50:17 AM

Translation Wizard - Fagan Finder http://www.faganfinder.com/translate/ "a tool which connects you directly to online translation tools. Fagan Finder itself does not contain these translation tools. Instead, it includes a listing of many translation tools, each of which has different language and translation capabilities. It matches up the translation you want with a tool that can handle it." Type in a URL or copy and paste a block of text to be translated, specify from which language into which language, and voila, you'll get a fairly passable machine translation. [Neat New Stuff] 9:49:04 AM

What's New - Government Resources on the Web http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/whatsnew.html Now all links added to the University of Michigan Documents Center pages are noted on this What's New page. Another terrific annotated resource from documents librarian extraordinaire, Grace York. [Neat New Stuff] 9:45:40 AM

Puzzles: Can You Believe It? http://www.archimedes-lab.org/indexB.html "This site intends to show that geometry can also be fun because it's visual creativity. Accordingly, we have endeavoured to make an "intuitive" puzzle site with fewer formulas and more visuals, which may encourage students learning this science or just constitute a platform for reflection." [Neat New Stuff] 9:35:22 AM

Primary Sources on the Web http://www.lib.washington.edu/subject/History/RUSA/ Excellent tutorial that defines primary sources, shows how to find them on the web and evaluate them, and then cite them appropriately. [Neat New Stuff] 9:34:10 AM

Weekend Wanderings - Henry Petroski. Weekend Wanderings - Henry Petroski - With the passing of Lewis Thomas and Stephen Jay Gould, I've had to find a new favorite author for non-fiction non-managerial subjects. Given my tech/engineering bent, civil engineering professor Henry Petroski seems to be quickly rising to the top of my list of possible replacements. While his subjects come uncomfortably useful to my work thinking (as did Gould, surprisingly, from time to time), they are delivered in a too entertaining way to feel like work. The books of his that I've read include... To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design Design Paradigms: Case Histories of Error and Judgment in Engineering ...See the theme in those two titles? (S**t not only happens. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't.) Invention by Design: How Engineers Get from Thought to Thing ...Where do designs come from, anyway? The Book on the Bookshelf The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance ...The assumed natural design of everyday things. His latest, Small Things Considered: Why There Is No Perfect Design, looks like a prime candidate for next on my bookshelf. According to Publisher's Weekly's review at Amazon.com, "...his latest effort, a wide-ranging exploration of the history and design of the everyday technologies like supermarket aisles and telephone keypads that are practically invisible in their ubiquity. Petroski emphasizes that these "small things" aren't in fact the results of a smooth and simple design process, but are rather the products of a constellation of oft-conflicting constraints, frequently with unintended consequences (consider the recently redesigned, fat-handled toothbrushes that, while more ergonomic, have rendered millions of traditional toothbrush holders useless)." His themes surrounding engineering and design make one all the more appreciative of the serendipitous successes and "good enough" failures we run into every day. [Frank Patrick's Focused Performance Blog] 9:28:00 AM

Beginner's mind. Beginner's mind. "I have learned the novice can often see things that the expert overlooks. All that is necessary is not to be afraid of making mistakes or of appearing naive." - Abraham Maslow (1908-1970) American Psychologist [Seb's Open Research] Sage advice. For extra credit, try making interesting mistakes. [McGee's Musings] 9:24:36 AM

How Everyday Things Are Made. How Everyday Things Are Made. How Everyday Things are Made: Spent the morning with my kids on this site. They loved it. Good example of learning with video/audio and limited interaction ("apply it" section). I'm reminded of how we are still in the early stages of elearning...and offerings will continue to be more sophisticated. My first exposure to the Web was a text only experience. Now, in a very short period of time, the browsing experience has become interactive, media-rich, and user-friendly (in many cases). We have the background of Web progression to direct our efforts in elearning...so it's safe to say that over the next five years, we'll see an exponential improvement in the quality of elearning materials. [elearnspace blog] For those times when you really want to do a factory tour and you don't have one handy. [McGee's Musings] 8:50:14 AM

Welcome misbehaving.net. we're misbehavin'. I’m delighted to announce the debut of a new weblog on the topic of gender and technology: misbehaving.net We’ve got a really amazing group of women participating on this site: danah boyd Caterina Fake Meg Hourihan me (Liz Lawley) Dorothea Salo Halley Suitt Gina Trapani Jill Walker We all believe it’s important to begin changing the public perception of women in the context of technology, and that one of the best ways to do that is to make women’s accomplishments, writings, and contributions more public and visible. I hope you’ll add the new site to your blogroll and/or aggregator list!... [mamamusings] From the site's description: misbehaving.net is a weblog about women and technology. It's a celebration of women's contributions to computing; a place to spotlight women's contributions as well point out new opportunities and challenges for women in the computing field. Since I already have about half the group posting here in my subscription list, I suspect this will be worth the attention. The RSS feed (RSS 1.0 format) is truncated, which wouldn't be my first choice, but better than no feed at all.   [McGee's Musings] 8:49:31 AM