Power Point and Web Design

Over the years, I have had to make many Power Point presentations for work and school. While studying web design in LSC 555 (Information Systems for Libraries), I realized that a well-organized Power Point presentation and a well-organized website share a lot of common features.

Consistency, clarity and a logical flow are key to both forms of design. Like a Power Point presentation, each page of a website should look as if it belongs with the others--it should have a similar design (color scheme, font etc). Clarity is also key--the pages/slides should not be too cluttered and should clearly deal with a defined set of information and not stray too far off topic. It should also be organized in such a way that makes sense (content in outline form, or in columns...whatever makes the most sense for the information at hand). Logical flow is also an important component to both Power Point presentations and websites. The information should be presented in a way that the user (or viewer) can easily follow the logic of the designer and learn something from the organization.

Tags

I was familiar with the concept of article indexing long before I started library school. I've been using some form of "blogging tool" since about 2001. In 2001, the software and options available were fairly basic. I remember wishing that there was some way to search your blog for past posts, or give what I thought of as subjects to posts so they were easily searchable. It got really frustrating to remember writing something, and the only way to find it again was to try to remember when it was written.

At some point along the way, these various tools (I've been on LiveJournal, Blogspot and Typepad) began offering the option to "label" "tag" each post. I first noticed this in 2005, while reading some more professional blogs--they all seemed to have these subject clouds. I had no idea what they were until I clicked on one of the words and up popped all the posts labeled, or "tagged" with those words. From then on, I found tagging on blogs a very useful tool and have tried to use them thoughtfully and consistently.

When in my first library science class (The Organization of Information), and got to the indexing unit, I realized that I'd already been indexing my own blog content for years and had discovered some of the issues surrounding indexing on my own. This made me understand and appreciate the topic (particularly as it relates to controlled vocabularies) much better than I otherwise would have.

Work and School

A belated welcome to my blog! I was absent for a little while because I was juggling a lot of responsibility. I'm a very lucky MLS student in that I have secured a professional job while still a student. This has been a mixed blessing, however, because juggling a professional job and graduate school can be very difficult and time consuming.

The purpose of this, the first of many posts, is to discuss the importance of gaining real-world experience as part of the MLS. I have been working for a library on Capitol Hill in addition to a Congressional Committee. The work in the library has allowed me to see and learn first-hand how libraries operate and how concepts such as controlled vocabularies and other standardization of things like dates can be applied to information. In my work at the library, I help in the creation of a database of knowledge about current and former Members of Congress. In entering their dates of service, (ie January 4, 1995 to December 15, 2000) we saw that the database would only use the start date as a way to express which Congress the Member served in, even though in the example given, the Member served in three Congresses--the 104th, 105th and 106th. We then realized that we had to enter the dates of service in two-year chunks so that the system would recognize each Congress and be able to generate complete lists of which members served in which Congress.

This is the sort of concept discussed in the Organization of Information, but using the concepts in a real-world environment, it made me realize how important it is and allowed me to apply the concepts on my own, making them more concrete and memorable. For this and many other reasons, I would highly recommend that all MLS students get a job or internship in a library during their time in school.