Week 4: #9 Finding Feeds

I enjoyed browsing the additional newsfeed tools and looking for feeds of interest, but didn't find much else that I wanted to link to my Bloglines account.

I was tempted by those relating to comic strips and humor, entertainment, home repair and garden, but quickly reached a point where topics duplicated or I thought I had more than I could handle as it is. In the future I will probably be tempted by those relating to science fiction, plastic models, Star Trek, comic books, DVD releases, music, and half a dozen other topics, but for now, at this stage in my exploring, I think I have enough.

But thanks to this exercise I now know that feeds even exist, and as I web surf more favorites from work or home and stumble on sites of interest that offer such I can add them.

Week 4: #8 RSS Feeds-Danger! Danger!

Well I've completed the exercises. I've created a Bloglines account and added 11 feeds including iHCPL's Flickr feed.
In the process of surfing for feeds I started wondering again if my computer has problems, since videos I tried to watch on various web sites suffered pauses and buffering stops-and-starts.
I've come to expect this on computers though. Seems a lot of videos and audio spots on the web give me this kind of delivery. They either pause and drag while trying to watch say, movie trailers and TV show clips, or the viewing screen that pops up is too darn small and fairly useless for seeing much of the visual action.

Anyway, I've had a little too much fun searching for RSS feeds that I'm interested in. It's been somewhat of an effort determining what topics I want, and figuring out whether they're available as RSS or not though.

I say "Danger, Danger" because they have the potential to waste enormous amounts of my work time if I'm not very careful and maintain good work habits. I linked half a dozen newspaper comic strips, and about as many entertainment news feeds. I'll never be at a loss as to what to do on my break ever again.

I've known these kinds of web options were available and avoided seeking them out for just these reasons. I was afraid it would be like suddenly receiving a dozen new magazine and newspaper subscriptions at home. Here's hoping I can control it all and incorporate them into the allowable time I'm already spending on my breaks and lunches.

But since it's something I have to do for WORK, I guess that would be okay.
I'm learning something new, but personally dangerous! And I get training hours for it!

Week 3: #7 Edited photos

I played with Pixer to have some fun with a cute picture of one of our cats, Maggie.
I played with the color adjustment and added some lizard-green colors to re-inforce the lizard hunting theme.
Also created a version in an Impressionistic oil painting style, and a tin-type sepia version.

Good ol' Maggie!

Week 3: #6 Additional Flickr tools

I browsed a whole bunch of Flickr mashups, webapps and tools and didn't find much that I thought would be of use to me. At least not at this point in my familiarity. I found a lot of tools for things I didn't want to do with my pictures.

I'll keep playing with Flickr to see if I can get it to work for me, but it's hard to use when you've been warned not to post personal or identifying names or pictures of yourself, friends, pets, work, home, etc., so I'm having trouble finding pictures to post.

All the Flickr tools I played with behaved like a slot machine that wouldn't win. I kept selecting and clicking their buttons, and they spun and spun and random things of not much interest kept floating to the top. Usually smaller on screen than I could see comfortably too and they wouldn't enlarge.
Rats!

Week 3: Exercise 5 Discovering Flickr

Well I've discovered Flickr and I found it a mixture of fun and frustration.
Getting it to work for me was like continually driving around the block to find a house address number.
I guess my problem is a mixture of the learning curve on the program and my lack of intuitiveness about it.

Frustrating, because I really enjoy the mass collection of visuals, but it's hard getting it to do what I want; seeing the pictures I like and maybe saving them as wallpapers. Every task I attempt with it seems to take multiple passes to make work.

I posted a photo to my blog, but it wasn't from Flickr. When I tried to do upload from Flickr [a Yahoo account program] to my blog on Blogger [a Google account program] Blogger wanted me to set up a Google account.
Now I have a new laptop computer at home that I've been using to surf and pay bills online, and I know I'll benefit from the exposure to new "Gadgets and Gizmos" and website tools from iHCPL...
...but with all the bill-paying I've been setting up home I'm just so SICK of creating usernames and passwords and account numbers and verification trivia questions by the dozens.
Each one opens a floodgate of "account status" response ads too that aren't exactly SPAM, so they flood my inbox. Cripes!