Cool Tool # 8 - Pearl Trees

Posted by Andy

It's been a few months since I posted a 'cool tool' and this one certainly falls under the cool logo, although how effective it is as a tool I can't decide - regardless of that, please don't be put off.

Pearl Trees are a way of creating multi-level visual book marks of your interests or resources. Each pearl tree has pearls hanging from it, so it's basically a replacement for your folders and favourites.

The pearl trees are very easy to make and within a matter of minutes you can have a large number of pearls hanging from various trees, especially if you install their tidy little toolbar extension.

On the downside, sharing and navigating can be a little unwieldy, although I'm sure that they will iron this out, then again it is a little pout of most comfort areas, so maybe we need to be patient with such new tools.

I've embedded a pearl tree I've made for our IRISS project in the library, to support students. I'd suggest you have a look at the embedded image, but perhaps you have a look at the pearl tree on a larger screen by following the Web address below.

http://www.pearltrees.com/scharrlib/7794445/

http://www.pearltrees.com

Cool Tool #7 Many Eyes

Posted by Andy

Many Eyes is a free online data visualisation tool made by IBM and allows users to import their textual data and turn it in to one of many different visual diagrams.

You need to register with the website first, and after a small learning curve you can create, share and embed visualisations onto your blog or website.

Below is one that I used to create a diagram breaking down the various subject themes from David McCandless' brilliant book - Information is Beautiful.

This is not a static diagram, you can select various parts of diagram within our blog -very cool.

What IBM says about the tool:

Many Eyes is a bet on the power of human visual intelligence to find patterns. Our goal is to "democratize" visualization and to enable a new social kind of data analysis. Jump right to our visualizations now, take a tour, or read on for a leisurely explanation of the project.

All of us in CUE's Visual Communication Lab are passionate about the potential of data visualization to spark insight. It is that magical moment we live for: an unwieldy, unyielding data set is transformed into an image on the screen, and suddenly the user can perceive an unexpected pattern. As visualization designers we have witnessed and experienced many of those wondrous sparks. But in recent years, we have become acutely aware that the visualizations and the sparks they generate, take on new value in a social setting. Visualization is a catalyst for discussion and collective insight about data.

We all deal with data that we'd like to understand better. It may be as straightforward as a sales spreadsheet or fantasy football stats chart, or as vague as a cluttered email inbox. But a remarkable amount of it has social meaning beyond ourselves. When we share it and discuss it, we understand it in new ways.

Cool Tool #6 Wordle

Image and posted by Andy

*Click on the image to make it larger.

Taken from the Wordle website:
"Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes.
The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends. "

The image above was created by importing all of the tags from our ScHARR Library Delicious bookmarks and putting them into Wordle -Hey Presto!

Cool Tool #5 Dropbox

Posted by Andy

Dropbox has been around for some time and I've been meaning to set it up on my PC for much of that time. The main reason for not using it was that I wasn't too sure that it actually offered any thing more than from what I'd been using for the past few years with the likes of Mediafire, Divshare and Rapidshare to name but a few. Oh how I was wrong...

In the days of mobile and home working, it's essential that you have the ability to move and share files easily. Not so long ago we would have been moving our tiny word files about the country on floppy discs, then burning CDs, which initially was very expensive and eventually using USB sticks. All of these are open to a few common 'human' flaws, that we can leave them on the train, lose them in our homes and offices, or even have too many that we cannot remember what is on each one. Even with encrypted memory sticks, we still run the risk of losing them from our key rings, or even forgetting our password. Saying that, there is still a strong need to use these, especially when moving sensitive data, how many stories have we read in the media about sensitive files getting lost? There's also the issue of memory sticks corrupting. I remember last semester when one of our Masters students lost his dissertation and other files when his stick corrupted, luckily he had a version two weeks younger on his home PC.

How Dropbox works differently is that it installs a tiny program on your PC and creates a folder, in which you drag any files you want to share or transfer. Then you simply install the program on any PC you wish to access the files, easy-peasy. In fact I was that impressed that I dragged two mp3 files, about 18 mb into my Dropbox folder at home and turned my PC off a minute or two later. When I arrived at work the next day, the two files were sitting in my folder at work and were totally playable.

In terms of situations where you may benefit from using Dropbox, I would suggest PowerPoint presentations, large documents, non sensitive data, in fact anything you're working on or wish to share across PCs.
Remember to apply common sense when using these tools when applied to sensitive data.

If you want to learn more, watch their video and read about the features below.

Dropbox Features

File Sync

Dropbox allows you to sync your files online and across your computers automatically.

• 2GB of online storage for free, with up to 100GB available to paying customers.
• Sync files of any size or type.
• Sync Windows, Mac and Linux computers.
• Automatically syncs when new files or changes are detected.
• Work on files in your Dropbox even if you're offline. Your changes sync once your computer has an Internet connection again.
• Dropbox transfers will correctly resume where they left off if the connection drops.
• Efficient sync - only the pieces of a file that changed (not the whole file) are synced. This saves you time.
• Doesn't hog your Internet connection. You can manually set bandwidth limits.

File Sharing

Sharing files is simple and can be done with only a few clicks.

• Shared folders allow several people to collaborate on a set of files.
• You can see other people's changes instantly.
• A "Public" folder that lets you link directly to files in your Dropbox.
• Control who is able to access shared folders (including ability to kick people out and remove the shared files from their computers).
• Automatically create shareable online photo galleries from folders of photos in your Dropbox.

Online Backup

Dropbox backs up your files online without you having to think about it.

• Automatic backup of your files.
• Undelete files and folders.
• Restore previous versions of your files.
• 30 days of undo history, with unlimited undo available as a paid option.

Web Access

A copy of your files are stored on Dropbox's secure servers. This lets you access them from any computer or mobile device.

• Manipulate files as you would on your desktop - add, edit, delete, rename etc.
• Search your entire Dropbox for files.
• A "Recent Events" feed that shows you a summary of activity in your Dropbox.
• Create shared folders and invite people to them.
• Recover previous versions of any file or undelete deleted files.
• View photo galleries created automatically from photos in your Dropbox.

Security & Privacy

Dropbox takes the security and privacy of your files very seriously.

• Shared folders are viewable only by people you invite.
• All transmission of file data and metadata occurs over an encrypted channel (SSL).
• All files stored on Dropbox servers are encrypted (AES-256) and are inaccessible without your account password.
• Dropbox website and client software have been hardened against attacks from hackers.
• Dropbox employees are not able to view any user's files.
• Online access to your files requires your username and password.
• Public files are only viewable by people who have a link to the file(s). Public folders are not browsable or searchable.

Mobile Device Access

The free Dropbox iPhone app lets you:

• Access your Dropbox on the go.
• View your files on your iPhone or iPod Touch.
• Download files for offline viewing.
• Take photos and videos and sync them to your Dropbox.
• Share links to files in your Dropbox.
• View interactive photo galleries.
• Sync downloaded files so they're up-to-date.

A mobile-optimized version of the website is available for owners of Blackberry phones and other Internet-capable mobile devices.

Find out about the system requirements to run Dropbox.

Cool Tool #4 Readability

Posted by Andy

Readability is a simple tool that makes reading on the Web more enjoyable by removing the clutter around what you're reading.
Using the tool is incredibly easy, all you need to do is drag the Readability button to your web browser tool bar.

I've tried it on several websites and it works really well, I can see it being the perfect weapon when reading heaps of text on screen, and a great alternative to printing something that you may not want to keep.

Below is a video showing you how to use Readability.

Readability - Installation Video for Internet Explorer from Arc90 on Vimeo.

If you're not sold on the idea - just look at the before and after I tried using a Department of Health news page.

Click on the images to make them larger.

Before

After

Cool Tool#3 Bubbl.Us

Posted by Andy

Bubbl.Us is a very easy to use mind mapping tool, it's so straightforward that you don't need to register an account to create a map.
Below is a useful video tutorial showing you everything you need to know to get up and running with Bubbl.

After just a few minutes myself and my colleague Ruth had created a very complex mind map, which we were able to print. Obviously the real bonus of Bubbl is that you can create them anywhere and allow colleagues to add their own content in addition to be able to email them. In a nutshell it is so effective but simple, what more could you want?

As for what you can do...

• Create colorful mind maps online
• Share and work with friends
• Embed your mind map in your blog or website
• Email and print your mind map
• Save your mind map as an image

Cool Tools #2 - The Journal Finder

Posted by Andy

So in the second of our Cool Tools part of the show we thought we'd bring to the party Research Gate's newest weapon - The Journal Finder.

For those of you unaware what Research Gate is, it is a scientific network that connects researchers. It also allows you to find research partners, collaborate with scientists and explore journal articles.

According to Research Gate there are more than 20,000 Journals in print and as we all know it is sometimes it is hard to find the best fit for your paper. Their Journal Finder will help you discover which journals are most relevant to your research.

Here's how it works: Copy and Paste your article's abstract into their semantic search algorithm, and it will identify all of the relevant journals.

In addition, we will share all publication restrictions with you, as well as more information (e.g. impact factor) about the journal.

Cool Tools #1 - Creately

Posted by Andy

We usually have a recommended website every month, but given the fact I was going to post two in a month it would make it that little less valued, no single website should share the award. So I've decided to start giving them their own little tag line of 'Cool Tools'. These are anything from Web 2.0 tools to support your research, teaching, collaboration and learning, to websites that search scholarly articles in a new way. Considering there are so many great new tools out there, it seems a shame to restrict them to just one a month when we stumble on them, so from now own they'll have the tag cooltool along with the usual keywords, which you'll be able to search of find in the tags on the right hand side of this blog.

So enough of the waffle, here's the first site to get the Cool Tool treatment. It's an innovative little website that allows users to draw diagrams and designs online. This is anything from online flowcharts and computer networks to Web mockups and sitemaps. Creately works on the idea that it is "easy, collaborative and smart."

The main features of Creately are that it is an easy and intuitive online diagramming tool which is Web-based with smart user interface and quick start templates, with the bonus of accessing your charts anywhere. Like most decent Web 2.0 tools you can:

Draw Diagrams & Designs right in your browser.
No Software Downloads. No Installs.
Collaborate on online diagrams.
Create, Share and Publish diagrams online securely.
Large email attachments are history
Intelligent objects speed up designs
Automatic validation checks and smart connectors
Data powered diagrams
Capture data in your diagrams. No more back and forth between multiple tools.

If you want to know more - view their short five minute video below