Time Management

My “Perfect” System for Storing, Organizing, Reading and Annotating PDFs

January 10, 2012
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My “Perfect” System for Storing, Organizing, Reading and Annotating PDFs

I have been looking for the perfect pdf reader for a long time. You may remember that earlier this year I returned the Kindle DX after it failed to live up to my qualifications. Here is what I was looking for: ability to highlight ability to make notes ability to export those notes & highlights (I like to put them in a Google docs folder so I can search them easily at any time). small & portable, easy to read on a plane or carry around with me. preferably e-ink, but if you can recommend a super awesome program that will work on the PC I’d consider it. If you read the comments on the Kindle DX post you’ll see that many people recommended the iPad to me. I was hesitant to buy an iPad because no one could suggest an app that would do all the things I wanted/needed and while my technolust said that of course I needed an iPad I couldn’t really justify it given all the other devices I owned (Laptop, netbook, Kindle 3). Now remember the reason I wanted a “perfect pdf reader” was for all the reports and articles I was reading, some of which

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My Favorite Tools and Tips in Ten Installments: 4. Facebook

May 9, 2011
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My Favorite Tools and Tips in Ten Installments: 4. Facebook

Yes its true. Facebook. Facebook is one of my favorite things and not just for checking up on what my out-of-town friends did last weekend. I use it for professional stuff a LOT! I follow a lot of professional organizations and websites on Facebook. I listed the top six of the library ones in my post 6 Facebook Pages Every Librarian Should Follow: American Library Association – You don’t need to be a dues paying member of ALA to benefit from the stories and information relevant to all libraries they post on Facebook. Webjuction – Webjunction regularly hosts free webinars and conferences like the one coming up this week, Serving the 21st Century Patron, they also share links to other free webinars and resources. Your state and local library association - again you don’t have to pay dues to benefit from the information shared on Facebook and you can do a little online networking too. Library Journal - in addition to their stories (many of which you can read online for free) they also post links to interesting stories around the web. Library Renewal - This is a new project worth keeping an eye on. Libraries need a new electronic content access and distribution infrastructure! www.libraryrenewal.org Research, advocacy

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My Favorite Tools and Tips in Ten Installments: 3. Bit.ly

May 2, 2011
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My Favorite Tools and Tips in Ten Installments: 3. Bit.ly

This is post 3 of 10 in my 10 favorite tools series. I regularly get asked how I “do it all” so I’ve put together some of handy tools that (in addition to hard work) help me do it. I covered how I use Google tools and my tools & strategy for Twitter last week. This week its bit.ly, yes a URL shortner, but it does so much more! This is my favorite sharing tool for Twitter, it allows you to shorten and share links right from your browser.  Any time I’m reading and article or a blog post or see something I think might be of interest I can hit the bookmarklet, and it automatically grabs the title and creates a short link. It will allow you to modify the title or add text before sending. Extensions You can use bit.ly by installing the extension for your browser, there are extensions for most of the popular browsers. The extension will give you some enhancements to Twitter when you’re using Twitter on the web such as showing the number of clicks on bit.ly links. Or you can just use the bookmarklet in any browser. I actually prefer the bookmarklet to the

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My Favorite Tools in Ten Installments: 2. Twitter

April 25, 2011
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My Favorite Tools in Ten Installments: 2. Twitter

This is post 2 of 10 in my 10 favorite tools series. I regularly get asked how I “do it all” so I’ve put together some of handy tools that (in addition to hard work) help me do it.  I covered the many ways I use Google last week, this week its Twitter! Now that might seem obvious since I have over 4,000 followers, but hopefully you’ll find something useful. In the past I’ve written how I decide who to follow on Twitter, and that hasn’t changed much. Although at that time I was trying to keep the number of people I followed around 250 and I stated I “absolutely wont go over 300.” Now I’m up to almost 350, I’m trying very hard to keep it under 350.  But the rest of the information is the same I have Gmail set to filter emails from Twitter with their own label and to skip the inbox. I go through them every week or so.  I try to look at each one.  Any of the following disqualifies the account for a follow: the default avatar 10,000 followers or more businesses social media experts marketing experts no bio no real name private

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My Favorite Tools In 10 Installments: 1. Google Tools

April 18, 2011
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My Favorite Tools In 10 Installments: 1. Google Tools

I regularly get asked when I sleep, or how I “do it all”. I’m never really sure how to respond, I’m just me. I just go through my days, my routine and well do stuff. But I took a look around at some of the tools and shortcuts I use and thought I might do a little mini series. So here it is, in 10 installments! Some will be long (like this one) and some will be short. I hope you find something useful! Tool One: Google Tools It’s no secret I’m a Google fan, pretty much my whole professional life lives on Google. For that reason I use the Two Step Verification process and change my password frequently, especially after traveling or using unsecure wifi access. Call me crazy or paranoid if you like, but hey I’d be screwed if I ever lost access and you’re about to find out why. Calendar The Calendar, well actually 6 calendars if you count tasks which also shows up on the calendar and has its own color code (each calendar has its own color code). My primary or main calendar is my work calendar. This is important because I sync Outlook with my Google

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photo by Beth Tribe

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