• Backstory: Minneapolis leaves a bookmark | csmonitor.com
  (tags: libraries)
• Greenstone Digital Library Software
  (tags: cataloging library opensource)

To: The Full Council of Deans
The IT Advisory Board
The Educational Technologies Board
The Senate IT Committee
Assistant and Associate Deans
Campus IT Support Staff

Re: Campus-Wide IT Strategic Planning Coordinator

Dear Colleagues:

Please share this information with unit heads, faculty, and staff involved
in the strategic planning process, especially in areas where IT impact or
implications may be significant.

I am delighted to announce that Ken Spelke, Associate Dean for Information
Technology and Research in the Graduate School of Library and Information
Science, has accepted my offer to serve as Coordinator for Campus-wide IT
Strategic Planning, effective immediately. Ken will be spending 20% time
as a member of the CIO staff devoted to campus-level IT strategic planning,
working with the colleges and units; he will continue his duties as
Associate Dean in GSLIS at 80% time.

Ken’s 20+ years’ experience in IT strategic planning includes national
participation in Educause, membership on the Board of Directors of the
American Distance Education Consortium, and various leadership roles in the
Association for Communication Excellence. Ken also serves on the Advanced
Engineering Taskforce of the Illinois Century Network. The Office of
Campus IT Strategic Planning is located in DCL, room 2504. Ken may be
reached at spelke@uiuc.edu or 244-1179.

In providing leadership for campus IT strategic planning, Ken will work
closely with a Steering Team, comprising the Chair of the IT Advisory
Board, the UIUC Chief Information Officer, and the Dean of LAS
(representing the Council of Deans). They will interact regularly with IT
Advisory Board members from across campus; representatives from central
campus organizations; University and campus IT service providers; CITES
staff members; and faculty, staff, and students who will help vet the draft
campus IT strategic plan.

For some “first draft” information about the campus IT strategic planning
process, see http://www.cio.uiuc.edu/plan/.
Regards,

Pete Siegel
CIO

Note from Dave: Pete Siegel is leaving this summer for a CIO job at UC-Davis. I wonder if this is grooming from some sort of intermediate plan for Spelke.  I wonder what the impacts for IT in GSLIS will be in this arrangement.

It starts immediately following Altgeld’s seventh bell. This is just here so the bandos can wax nostalgic and Andrew can giggle at the name “Peter J. Griffin”. I can’t believe it’s my 8th season doing this.

University of Illinois
Summer Band
2006

Peter J. Griffin, Conductor
James F. Keene, Guest Conductor

*PROGRAM*

Thursday, June 22,2006

The Star-Spangled Banner

Chester Overture / William Schuman

Oklahoma! / Richard Rodgers ; arr. Leidzen

Handel in the Strand / Percy Grainger
James F. Keene, conductor

Overture to Candide / Leonard Bernstein

American Pageant / Thomas Knox

Victory at Sea / Rodgers/Bennett

Armed Forces Salute / Bob Lowden

The Stars and Stripes Forever / John Philip Sousa

Illinois Loyalty / T. H. Guild

Following the concert there will be a short reception at The White Horse.

• NOAA Improved Sunrise/Sunset Calculation
  (tags: solarnoon)

• Understanding MARC Bibliographic: Machine-Readable Cataloging
  (tags: marc cataloguing)
• MARC STANDARDS
  (tags: marc cataloging)
• http://www.oclc.org/bibformats/en/
  OCLC Bibliographic Formats and Standards
  (tags: cataloging OCLC)

Hello, patient readers. I am, and for a long time have been, a geek. I don’t try to hide it; I’m not ashamed of it. In truth, it’s one of my better qualities. I consider it something like having freckles (which I don’t,) or dimples (oddly, I have just one) — it’s just the way we are. Me == geeky. It’s not really something I can pride myself with.

I am prideful of the fact, in light of such social marring that comes with an accelerated level of geekdom, that I try to maintain normal social skills. No obtuse Star Wars or Trek quotes in my daily conversations.  No agoraphobic, anti-social tendencies. I love being in a group, and being the center of attention — although I know enough interpersonal communication theory to know listeners are considered better communicators than babblers. (But hey, that’s what blogs are for.) Perhaps its a misjudgement of stereotyping, but I try to be Kenny, the lovable outgoing, easy-going social geek.

I fear capacity is in danger.

You see, I’m taking an introductory cataloging class this summer for my library info science degree. I could go into (and should, before my attitudes change and my intial perceptions are lost) the nature of cataloging and why it’s a useful skill, what I hope to get out of it, etc. But I think I’m tunneling into something much deeper than that. Cataloging and classification is teaching a method of bringing order to the unordered — structure to the unstructured. Beauty in chaos. A type of harmonous, universal Zen of knowing what something really is and where it belongs, and sharing that with others.

I think you can see where this is going. It’s like I ate a magic mushroom and super-sized my geek persona. Every time I practice cataloging, every time I read about ISDC or MARC records, everytime I read the text books, I feel my cup of geekiness overfloweth. And then the cup enlarges. And it spills over some more. It’s like some kind of dark magic that is poisoning my soul– forbidden knowledge I can never unerase. It’s making me look at the world through catalog coloured glasses, and I’m afraid I’m tipping the scales too far and my chances of ever being “cool” die with each passing day.

So, fair warning, friends. It will take some time to master this cataloging skill, and then being learning the ever more daunting skill of keeping it out of normal, everyday conversation. (They say a gentlemen is someone who knows how to [practice law | play trombone | play saxophone | speak Latin ] and doesn’t.) Be kind to my internal struggles, and don’t coerse me into damaging my social skills any more than I can do on my own. Thanks.

Only he would think to leave an extra set of chopsticks in the random food-stuff office drawer so he’d have something for present Kenny to eat leftovers with.  Way to be, Past Kenny!

• Dog Training levels
  (tags: dog training levels)

If I told you it was 153 days since I’d been gambling, you’d think I had problem. If I could tell you, after a short bit of mental math, it’d been 391 days since the last Cardinals game I attended, or 391 days since my last outdoor Dave Matthews Concert, you’d be a little concerned. What does that have in common? In the last few days, I’ve done all of those. Time to reset those counters, but let me back up a bit.

I’ve been on vacation this week in St. Louis, relaxing and enjoying the mid-semester time. The weekend was hot - in the 90s, felt like 105, and of course we were outside doing yardwork. On Memorial Day, we went to Aaron’s and had a nice BBQ/dinner there. Tuesday, I joined the Cardinals Prime Seat club, their online eBay-like system for putting single game tickets from your season tickets up for sale, and I bought four tickets for Wednesday. I also scooted over to the mall to get a new Cardinals tee-shirt (with Jim Edmond’s number on it, even though he’s on the DL right now.)

The highlight of Tuesday night was the Dave Matthews Band concert at Riverport. The last few years, I’ve been buying tickets for this concert for me and Mom for her birthday. But, Tony’s been buying them for me through the fan club, since his senority is better than mine, and the seats have been fantastic. This time was no exception. The second row pavillion seats were a hair off center, but put us no more than 15 feet away from Dave. The setlist was okay, but it wasn’t necessarily something I would have picked. I’m not a big Stand Up fan, but the songs have energy live. (For the record, Bayou falls behind Watchtower or Two Step but before Ants for a closer.) I got through another non-exciting version of Satellite by singing After Her. Dave pulled out a new acoustic song on the encore about his sister. For a tour-opening show, it was surprisingly tight — no big mistakes, at least to my ear. DMB added a trumpet player that played in on most of the set, but the way the sound was mixed that close to the stage muted the piano and trumpet. All in all, a great night. The amazing part was how we left for the show a little early, and *drove right in*. No traffic or anything — unlike any concert I’ve ever been to.

More about the rest of the week soon…