Ross Thomson Halton District School Board OLA SuperConference 2012

Welcome! Feel free to leave! Ask questions anytime! The back story Pros & cons: Blogs vs. HTML Considerations before you begin Tour of my library blog site Step-by-step demo of how-to create your blog site

E.C. Drury High School Library Website 1.0 [2001 – Straight HTML] Website 2.0 [ HTML/First Class] Website 3.0 [2010 – Blogger]

Making changes: Open editor Open file Make changes Save file Upload file Test live Close editor Simple WYSIWYG Editor (Claris Home Page 3.0)

Making changes: Open client Open file Make changes Close file Test live Close client Simple Document Editor (First Class Client)

Time consuming Labour intensive Requires specialized knowledge Requires ongoing training / awareness Product more static than dynamic Change / edit hassle Difficult to generate Web 2.0 content Difficult to gather feedback

Easy to add / edit content Changes reflected immediately online Easy, seamless integration of multimedia SEO friendly (faster crawling & indexing) Offer easy integration of web 2.0 features (feedback, RSS) Automatic formatting for mobile platforms Analysis available (traffic / page views)

Familiarity & experience Ease of use Integration with other Google apps used (eg: Picasa Web) [Research & choose whats best for you]

Blog-based ECDHS Library Web Site:ECDHS Library Web Site Text Still Pictures Slideshows Embedded Video External Links Internal Links

1. Go to Blogger.com 2. Get a Google account / sign in 3. Start designing your home page 4. Add static pages 5. Add content 6. Add / edit content as required 7. Repeat Step 6

Board rules for school websites? Does content need to be hosted on a Board server? Can you link externally to the blog site? Can you redirect your current URL to the blog site? Check policies before you invest time!

A start-from scratch, do-it-yourself demo!

Ross Thomson ecdhslibrary.blogspot.com