22 Apr
This is the last of the four webinars that I produced for our clergy. This topic covers Google+, Hangouts and Drive. I hope that our clergy will find this useful in figuring out how to use these important collaboration tools.
On a personal note, scheduling four webinars for the same week was a bit aggressive. Perhaps future episodes should be spaced out a bit more.
22 Apr
My prayers have been with the people of Boston for the last week. I can’t imagine the pain of the people who were injured in the bombing. As a runner myself I have a family that waits for me at the end of races. All runners are a family. It takes a special kind of drive to get out every day and run as far as we do. It took even more drive to get up and run the day after these terrible attacks. These bombs won’t stop us from running forward. Nothing will. God be with the people of Boston and the families of the injured during this difficult time.
19 Apr
This is the third of four online training webinars that I am working on at work. We are starting this new emphasis on empowering our clergy using the Google+ Hangout system. We suffered a glitch in the webinar today where it didn’t seem to be recording the first few minutes to the archive. I noticed that it had glitched during the presentation and started it up at somewhere around the 12-14 minute mark. The archive missed the introduction as well as a description of the major browsers. The main part of the discussion was preserved.
In case you are wondering, you should use Google Chrome for everything. Period.
17 Apr
We are experimenting at work with technology webinars delivered over the Google+ Hangout system. This was the first of four that I am working on this week. It’s a very basic discussion of the history of technology, where are are now and a brief overview of social networks and hardware options. The class is designed for our clergy that want more of an overview of various technology topics. It was well received when I went on a recent training trip so I thought I would repackage it here for online viewing. You can find out more about the webinar schedule here:
http://nccumc.org/it/webinars/
.
4 Apr
I’m not sure what that middle option means but it sure seems scary…
3 Apr
I have narrowed down my Google Reader replacement choice to either Feedly or The Old Reader. I have set up accounts with both services and tried using each for a few days. Here’s what I’ve found:
Feedly has a nice looking interface that takes some time to adjust to.
Feedly was the first service that I tried to use. After being used to the Google Reader interface for several years this was quite an adjustment to make. I was looking for a concise presentation of headlines with perhaps a small snippet of the article itself. Feedly’s interface concentrates more on the presentation of the data instead. It took me awhile to get used to this interface. The mobile apps for this service mirror the website closely. I was able to use it on my smart phone, tablet, laptop and desktop computer.
The Old Reader has the closest interface to Google Reader. Mobile support isn’t that great though.
The Old Reader had the closest interface to Google Reader. The layout felt familiar and was the easiest to adjust to. The biggest problem with this service was the lack of good support for mobile devices. There is no corresponding app for smart phones or tablets. The website interface didn’t seem to work well in the mobile browser. I kept accidentally clicking the wrong links as I was using it.
At the end of the day I decided to stick with Feedly. Both sites were very easy to configure and start using. After I imported my Google Reader feed list they picked right up where Google dropped me. Even though Google Reader is still going for a few more months I’ve already switched. The key factor in my decision was mobile support. You just can’t beat a solid mobile app.
