IGoogle and Google Calendar

iGoogle is an awesome interface for all the Google apps and features. I have access to my documents, calendars, rss feeds, as well as my gmail, that I linked to my buffalo account, all in one convenient place.

Google Calendar is by far my favorite Google app.  It allows to create one time events and events that repeat (such as classes).  You are also able to create different calendars such as work, school, etc.  This is nice because you can toggle between the different calendars and just helps with organization.

The best feature is how you are able to share calendars.  You can adjust your settings so that possibly other colleagues or family members can see when you are available or busy.  There is also a meeting scheduling wizard that will find common free time between all parties and create the event in the appropriate time slot.

Web-based Apps: Google Docs

I was actually introduced to Google Docs by a colleague in another class earlier this semester. I absolutely fell in love with everything Google from that point on. I'm pretty convinced they are going to attempt to take over the world at some point in the near future.

The sharing and collaboration aspect of Google Docs is pretty amazing. Especially how you can each sign on to a document at the same time and edit work.  The google chat is also a great feature while collaborating over a document. All in all, G docs is just pretty awesome all around and I'm glad I was exposed to it.

Library Success Wiki

I believe this wiki is extremely beneficial to librarians who are looking to stay current on trends in the field.  It covers everything from how to manage a library to how to select materials. Having a collaborative website such as this is extremely beneficial to the professional because it really encourages life-long learning. Librarians are able to contribute what they feel is useful to the professional and others are able to benefit from their discoveries.

Technorati

I really liked Technorati's Top 100 blog function.  Especially how it is constantly ranking the different blogs and how the rankings change from week to week.  I also like how they have the Top 100 for different categories as well such as Politics, Technology, and Gadgets.  It seems as though they also use Tags so they you can find blogs that are similar to the ones that you may specifically enjoy.

Tagging and Social Bookmarking

I feel this is a very nice resource to be aware of.  The tagging enables common websites to be linked together which would be useful while doing research.  Articles that shared common tags and topics would be linked together so that they would be much easier to find.

Sharing bookmarks with colleagues would also be a good way to be made aware of good articles that you may have missed but another colleague had bookmarked themselves.

Finding Feeds

Technorati was definitely the easiest of the search tools to use.  The website is designed well and I was able to navigate and find feeds much quicker than the others.  I especially liked the Top 100 blogs feature that was even further broken down by categories such as politics, world politics, technology, and gadgets to name a few.  I wasn't a fan of topix.net and syndic8.com mainly because I felt the interface was designed poorly.

RSS and Newsreaders

I really like RSS and Newsreaders because it gathers a lot of the information I'd like to read in one easily accessible place.  Also, Google Reader has the unread articles function so I know when I am all caught up on the articles I may have missed.

Professionally, there are many feeds that are related to a variety of disciplines.  They will often keep you up to date on the latest discoveries, trends, and innovations within a field.  Libraries would be able to use these feeds for the same function and to stay on top of what is going on in the discipline.