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January 30, 2006

SubEthaEdit: text editing gets even more collaborative

I had the opportunity to try out SubEthaEdit with Rochelle the other day. I've been meaning to take a look ever since I hearing Darlene Fichter mention it at Internet Librarian.

If you've got a Mac, you need to check this out (it's a Mac-only download). Writely is another and perhaps more familiar collaborative web-based word processor, but SubEthaEdit is like Writely on steroids. Not only is it collaborative, but it's completely synchronous. Combine that with some audio iChatting and you've got yourself quite a setup.

Click to see a larger image:

subethaedit_screen.jpg

Though originally intended for developers working collaboratively on html documents, it's functionality and applications extend way beyond that. You can see real-time typing as well as each participant's cursor and place in the document. Each participant has an assigned colour, so you can track what they're doing and saying. Levels of access can be controlled (read; read/write) and you can easily boot those caught misbehavin' out of your documents. SubEthaEdit works with a local Bonjour network, or via the internet with people around the world. Oh yeah, and it's free for non-commercial use.

It is, quite simply, awesome.

Posted by Sherri at 2:49 PM

::schwagbag:: goes to work(ing.com)

Admittedly, the title of this post is a bit of a double entendre, and, regretfully, I haven't been able to maintain this blog with the same frequency as I had prior to moving to Toronto and starting a new job. I hope to be able to get back to it, but more about that in a later post : )

I had posted what i thought was going to be my final addition to the 'expat files' a while back. However, a freelance journalist contacted me shortly thereafter for an interview about what I wrote in The final installment of the Expat Files: Tips, advice and some lessons learned. The piece has just been published in Working.com, a sub site of the National Post:

Different country, different rules: A transfer to the United States is rarely simple by Alexandra Lopez-Pacheco

This story focuses on cross-border hardships experienced by Canadians who have moved to the United States for work - and ohmagosh, did I really say 'flabbergasted?' There is one minor clarification that I'd like to make:

" . . . the Kennedys ended up having to go through many of the same frustrations as Ms. Vokey, who handled her own transfer."

I didn't have to handle my initial move to the US on my own, and various people/groups helped get the paperwork ready my TN visa. What I did say was that anything beyond an H-1B Visa (i.e. anything having to do with permanent residency/green card) would be my sole responsibility, including lawyers fees, application fees, etc.

That's not to say there aren't great opportunities to be had south of the border! I'll be speaking with LIS students here at Faculty of Information Studies in conjunction with the University of Toronto Student Chapter of the American Library Association next month about opportunities for Canadian librarians looking south (and boy, does 'south' ever sound appealing right about now!) for career opportunities.

Posted by Sherri at 9:54 AM

January 23, 2006

Canadian election blog coverage and mashups

As any Canadian readers out there will know, today is election day - please do get out and vote! There are a couple of really great websites and mashups out there that can either help you track the election or get more information if you're still undecided:

For better or for worse, it's pretty much a certainty that we're going to wake up to a very different Canadian political landscape tomorrow morning . . . I for one am off to pick up the popcorn : )

Posted by Sherri at 9:45 AM

January 3, 2006

Bye bye .Mac :: new AIM/iChat contact info

I had a .Mac account for a couple of years, and when it expired this past June, I didn't renew it. It's quite expensive when you consider that these costs are in addition to an ISP and include many 'features' that are readily and cheaply/freely available elsewhere. I read D'Arcy Norman's thoughts with interest, and agreed that it wasn't worth the expense. Living without .Mac sync has been a little challenging, but I'll live.

One of the consequences of severing ties, though, is that my AIM/iChat handle has been associated with my .Mac identity. The alias continued to work after the account was disabled, and I didn't change anything at the time. However, I've now created a new handle for iChat/AIM:

IIsherrivokeyII (first and last two characters are uppercase 'i')

It's a bit convoluted, but someone has taken practically every iteration on my/their name.

I'll continue logging in to both accounts for a while, but will eventually retire the old account.

Posted by Sherri at 1:20 PM

How are your webpages performing in Safari?

Now that Microsoft has officially ended support for IE for Mac OS (and has suggested Mac users use another browser), web developers may want to direct a renewed push toward ensuring compatibility with a variety of browsers. If you'd like to travel down memory lane and have yourself a good laugh, check out this hilarious old (dated January 2000) flash movie hyping IE for Mac from Microsoft. Zipieeeeeeeeeee!

Many people run into problems when it comes to testing websites on Safari (a Mac-only browser). If your workplace doesn't have Macs, it can be pretty difficult to determine what your website looks to someone using Safari. I use my own iBook at work, and it is the only Mac machine on the premises (or my immediate workplace, anyway). It has earned its keep ;-)

However, there are a couple of tools at your disposal if you don't have a Mac. I was excited to read about safaritest, a mac browser compatibility tester, but then tried to use it and discovered that it didn't work. There has been some speculation that server load has been extraordinarily high, so keep an eye on this one in the future. In the meantime, I tried browsershots. It's also a compatibility tool, but in addition to Safari 2.0, includes Epiphany 1.4.8, Firefox 1.0.4 (tested on Linux Debian - bonus!), Galeon 1.3.20, Konqueror 3.3 (same rendering used as for Safari), Mozilla 1.7.8, MSIE 6.0, and Opera 8.50 (Opera, the original tabbed browser, is hot hot hot now that it's free free free!). I tried the FIS website and got the following output.

I'm sure there are other great options out there - share if you have any tips!

Posted by Sherri at 11:21 AM