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22 March 2006

"Wall of Books" updated, and a new Pittsfield library full of new books and DVDs

I've put together a new "wall of books" for the Ann Arbor District Library recent acquisitions. You can see it at superpatron.com. I have three listings there - one each for "hot" books, fiction, and non-fiction. The non-fiction is a little wonky (it shows mysteries e.g.) for some reason, the catalog search is not turning up exactly what I'd expect.

The AADL put together a very clever display of new titles in all kinds of genres up on their big display at the new Pittsfield branch library - I understand it was done in Quartz Composer using that package's ability to pull in RSS feeds. More details as I find them out...I'll see if I can't at least get a video up somewhere for you to see it, if it can't be actually put online.

Pittsfield is very nice by the way - I was at the grand opening party. A lovely big kinetic sculpture for kids to play with in the middle, lots and lots of books and DVDs, glass and steel. It's a shame it's not on any bus lines. (where's that darned transit union when you need it)

Posted at 12:08 PM in Ann Arbor |

Comments

Thanks for the kind words about the screen saver, Ed.

You can read about the Screen Saver here, or you can just download it directly. Hmm. that page is getting pretty crowded. I should really get a real blog going...

I tried exporting a quicktime version, but it didn't pull the images with it, so I'm going to have to find a better way to capture video of a application window in OS X.

As for Quartz Composer, it's great for manipulating images and doing general data display, but not so great for dynamic data retrival. My next step is trying to integrate a Quartz Composition into an XCode app. The XCode app would pull and format the data and just use QC to display it.

Posted by: ejk | 22 March 2006 at 11:49 PM

P.S. Extra geek points to anyone who can identify the application which influenced the overall look. =)

Posted by: ejk | 22 March 2006 at 11:51 PM

Wow, 3 comments in row. That's bad karma, right?

Just wanted to let you know I captured some videos of the screen saver in mp4 format.

Movie #1 - Welcome Screen (mp4)
Movie #2 - Book Display (mp4)

Posted by: ejk | 23 March 2006 at 03:06 PM

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What they're saying about Superpatron

  • So you've got Ed exploring the possibility space, and John working to enlarge that space, and together they've created a virtuous cycle of innovation. Now this is obviously an extreme example. You are not going to find a superpatron of Ed's caliber and a superlibrarian of John's caliber in every town. But I think the dynamic at work there can apply more broadly. And if it does, it will matter that these patrons and librarians are situated in a local context. (Jon Udell, Remixing the Library, GRL2020)
  • Der Supernutzer beschreibt 10 Möglichkeiten, der Bibliothek zu helfen....Den wichtigsten Punkt hat er vergessen, ihn aber selbst erfüllt. Sozusagen als Präambel könnte man also anführen:

    “Übe konstruktive Kritik an der Bibliothek. Ohne Resonanz können die Leute da drin nicht wissen, was Du willst.” Infobib.de

  • How come only some books in the Google Book Search have “find in a library” links next to them? Diglet asks, and gets an answer, sort of a lame one if you ask me. update: Kevin mentioned in the comments that it would be great to see this for all books in Google Books. I went to bed thinking “Oh yeah, I should look into that….” and while I was sleeping, Superpatron, aka Ed Vielmetti solved the crime, er problem, and created a Greasemonkey script (a plug-in that you can run with Firefox) that does this for Ann Arbor and can be modified for any library. (Jessamyn West)
  • Curse you Superpatron! t's way past my bedtime, but the Ann Arbor Superpatron has been planting ideas in my head again… (Dave Pattern)
  • Superpatron is a blog run by a patron. The author posts entries about events and articles relevant to the library community, but does it with a patron point of view. (North Texas Regional Library System)
  • The blogosphere's resident "awesomest patron ever," Edward Vielmetti, appears in an article in School Library Journal about how he wrote a script tweaking (ahem, improving) Google Book Search. Vielmetti's blog, Superpatron, is one I read daily and highly recommend to anyone in libraries looking to get a very smart user's perspective. (Librarian In Black)
  • When I wrote him back, I called him the “AADL Super Patron,” which is very coincidental, since he has been planning to create a blog with almost the same name. Today, Superpatron is live and I’m sure it will quickly be filled with Ed’s terrific ideas about making libraries more responsive to patrons’ needs. So hurry up and subscribe already, ok? (Meredith Farkas)
  • The Superpatron (faster than a speeding reference librarian…) posts a presentation on the use of del.icio.us for research. Steven Cohen, Library Stuff
  • I've talked about Edward Vielmetti here before, but I never had the right name for him. Now I do. He's Superpatron! (Jenny Levine)
  • Last fall, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I gave a talk entitled Superpatrons and Superlibrarians. Joining me for this week’s podcast are the two guys who inspired that talk. The superpatron is Ed Vielmetti, an old Internet hand who likes to mash up the services proviced by the Ann Arbor District Library. That’s possible because superlibrarian John Blyberg, who works at the AADL, has reconfigured his library’s online catalog system, adding RSS feeds and a full-blown API he calls PatREST. (Jon Udell)
  • Little did I know that when I pointed to Ed Vielmetti’s blog, I was not only coining a phrase, but providing the name for Ed’s brilliant new blog. Ed is that (unfortunately still) rare creature that not only groks the net in fullness, but also has use for his public library. (Eli Neiburger)
  • Die Ann Arbor District Library hat einen Nutzer, der sie liebt. Und nicht nur das, er schreibt darüber. Oliver Obst

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