-
1
Social Bookmarking & Del.icio.us:
A Personal and Professional Productivity Tool
Patricia F. Anderson
Health Sciences Libraries University of Michigan
February 22, 2007
© 2007 Regents of the
University of Michigan.
All rights reserved.
Del.icio.us
Useful for …
• Folk who use multiple computers in various locations
• Discovery of items similar to your selections
• Collecting search strategies & information for
bibliographies
• Course-integrated instruction
• Sharing resources with peers, managers, students &
others
• Web site development
Content in Del.icio.us
• Database built by general public, contains what others
liked
• Focused: better for popular topics and items
• Currently tends to focus on items of interest to technophiles
and young adults, but growing and diversifying
• What you add changes the profile
Like Del.icio.us … but for Scientists
• Connotea
• CiteULike
Connotea
-
2
Connotea CiteULike
Searching in Del.icio.us
• Three options
Searching in Del.icio.us
• Example:
Searching in Del.icio.us
• Let’s try it.
•http://del.icio.us/
Browsing Tags in Del.icio.us
• Tags are freeform and self-selected
• Check a variety of spellings, phrasings, capitalization, and
punctuation for the same concept
• Avian flu = avian.flu = avian_flu = avian-flu = avianflu =
Avian.flu = Avian.Flu = “avian flu” = …
• Avian influenza
• Bird flu = birdflu
• Bird influenza
• Pandemic influenza
• Pandemic flu
• H5N1 / h5n1
• MORE: tamiflu, pandemic, flu, epidemic, influenza
• Watch for popular terms
http://del.icio.us/
-
3
Browsing Tags in Del.icio.us Browsing Tags in Del.icio.us
Browsing Tags in Del.icio.us Browsing Tags in Del.icio.us
• DEMO
•http://del.icio.us/tag/
Getting Started
• Create your account
• Upload your bookmarks
• Export bookmarks (“hotsync”)
• Save links
• Tag
• Annotate
• Settings
Create Your Account
http://del.icio.us/tag/
-
4
Create Your Account
• Each account must be associated with a unique e-mail address
(I think).
• If creating an account to be shared across an office, consider
creating an e-mail list to serve as the contact e-mail address.
Create Your Account
• Consider the purpose of the account when naming it; segregate
home / personal and office collections.
• If you will be collecting information that is private consider
choosing a username that will not be associated with you
personally.
Create Your Account
• Let’s do it!
• Choose a fictional “name”?
• If you have a non-UM e-mail address, consider using that as
the contact.
• Use a different password than your Kerberos password.
• You will need to open your e-mail in another window to
activate the account.
Upload Bookmarks
• Easy: Select file, accept default options
• Public or Private - your choice
Export Bookmarks
• Like hotsyncing your browser
How to Save a Link
• With the post button
• With the browser buttons
• Required elements: title / URL
• Optional standard elements: tags / annotations
• Extra optional element: Privacy checkbox
-
5
How to Save a Link
• With the post button (eg. PDFs)
How to Save a Link
• With the post button (eg. PDFs)
How to Save a Link
• With the browser buttons
• TIP: Use the tab to fill in a tag with the highlighted tag, or
click on the choice to save typing.
How to Save a Link
• Extra optional element: Privacy checkbox
How to Tag
• Tagging rules
• Separate tags with a space
• Join words with punctuation (lower-case preferred) (some
simply delete spaces between words)
• Use capitalization appropriately to improved readability or to
distinguish between tags and bundles
How to Annotate
• Annotations: Personal vs. Communal
• Citations
• Quotations
• Date Viewed
• Size limits on what can be included
-
6
Tag & Annotate Examples Tag & Annotate Examples
Tag & Annotate Examples Editing Saved Links
Personalized Settings
• Privacy options
• Tag Bundles
• Networking
Personalized Settings: Privacy
• Private links (checkbox)
• Private network (block someone who sends you inappropriate
links)
-
7
Personalized Settings: Tag Bundles
• SAVE!
Who Saved What?
Personalized Settings: Networks
Using Networks for Discovery
Things To Do With Del.icio.us
• Working with students
• Del.icio.us in class environments (Google jockeys)
• Working with peers and administrators
• Have an assistant gather information for you
Del.icio.us vs. Ctools for URL Collections
• Del.icio.us• Available to public (+/-)
• Annotations and tags provide richer information than the
Ctools Dropbox
• Easier to share/add/delete links than Ctools
• Students develop skills and collections for life after
Michigan
• Feeds the public good
• Ctools• Can secure access to a select group (+/-)
• Integrates with other course materials
• UM Institutional and community standard
-
8
Collect Links for Building Websites
Collect Information to Answer a Question
• Remember privacy issues: Does your collection reveal
identity?
Collect Information and Strategies for Your Manager
Have an Assistant Collect Links for You
Create Information and Teaching Guides
• Library guides …
Linking to Complex Concepts
• Use the plus sign (+) to combine concepts
-
9
Example Library Guide
• Notice the annotations?
Saving Search Strategies
• Saving search strategies for a class (Google Jockey concept)
…
Tagging Tips
• Too few terms can make retrieval difficult
• Too many terms can also make retrieval difficult
Tagging Tips
• Include both broad and narrow terms
• Design terms with repeated concepts to go from broad to
narrow, general to specific.
Tagging Tips
• Use punctuation for spaces (lower case)
• Think of unique concepts as two term combinations, rather than
a new term.
• Standardization helps, but requires maintenance.
Tagging Tips
• Tagging shortcuts: examples
• Items for a particular audience:
• 4doctors, 4kids, 4patients, etc
• Items from frequently read journals or authors:
• in:jada, in:nyt, in:chronicle, in:agd
• Items for people in your delicious network:
• for:dentlib, for:tmjchat
-
10
Saving Items Tagged for You Saving Items Tagged for You
Tag Clouds Tag Bundles
Questions?
• Contact: Patricia Anderson at [email protected]