Bookmarklets for OSU Library proxy

FYI, as of an e-mail sent to me on the morning of January 27, the OSU library system is happy with these bookmarklets and may plan to offer their own version of them in the near future. Thanks, again, for your support.

This message goes out to OSU faculty, staff, and students. Doesn't it make you mad when you're off campus and you want to read a paper and the research database that holds the paper doesn't let you view it because you're not a subscriber? I hate that.

Luckily, the OSU library system provides an "off-campus sign in" that can be used to make your off-campus connection look like an on-campus one so research databases will grant you OSU caliber access. Unfortunately, sometimes it's hard to figure out how to get from the off-campus sign-in to the paper you want. So I've come up with a shortcut, and I implemented it two ways.

Drag either one of the two following bookmarklets to your "bookmarks toolbar" (that strip of bookmarks that rides just below the "location bar" in your browser).

• OSU LOCSI ("LOCSI" = "Library Off-Campus Sign-In")
• OSU LOCSI

When you're on a page you'd like special access to (e.g., the official site of an academic paper of interest to you), click on the bookmarklet and you'll be transported to that site via OSU's "off-campus sign in." You may have to use your OSU username and password to login the first time you click on the bookmarklet, but after that you should be granted OSU-level access quickly.

(feel free to rename those bookmarklets as you wish; the name "OSU LOCSI" isn't important to their function)

I hope that helps.

Blogger Labels: No more than 20, unless there are more than 20.

I think it's dumb that the "Labels for this post:" line at the bottom of this bottom of this editor only lets me enter in 20 labels, but if I go into the "Edit Posts" and check this post, I can add as many existing labels as I want one by one.

So I have posts that have more than 20 labels. When I EDIT them, I have to DELETE labels in order to SAVE, and then I have to re-add them using the "Edit Posts" manager.

It's also dumb that Blogger prompts me for label completion and then picks the first one in this list when I hit "," regardless of whether I actually entered the list. So when I type "tex," in the "Labels for this post", it changes it to "AUC TeX," because that label is higher in the list but appears to match. (yes, I can scroll down to "tex" and select it... but what if it DIDN'T EXIST? What if I wanted a new label? In that case I have to let it complete and then go back and modify what it entered WITHOUT hitting comma again and causing another auto-completion.

I wonder when web development started going so far down hill. I'm sure "certification" has something to do with it. You can promote people based on their "certification" and not on their merit... I guess. I suppose that's a subject for another post.

Tedly Quick Searches

If you're not familiar with keywords and quick searches in Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Camino, you should check out "Fifteen Firefox Quick Searches" and "Firefox and the art of keyword bookmarking." Mozilla quick searches and keywords shave hours off each of my weeks (if not days).

I've posted my quick searches, and you can save them and import them into your own Mozilla bookmarks. For instructions on how to do this, see the quick searches post from above. My quick search bookmarks are basically an improvement on the bookmarks given in that post. I've fixed some annoying things about her selections, and I've added a few more.

If you do use my bookmarks, be sure to modify the local one and change the zipcode from 43210 to your zipcode.

Scrobbling Pandora Songs to Last.fm!

UPDATE: I just found OpenPandora, which is like a PandoraJam for Windows (i.e., it is a desktop Pandora application that scrobbles to Last.fm). So, our list of cool Pandora+Last.fm apps and mashups is now...

• PandoraJam - OS X Desktop application that plays Pandora and scrobbles to Last.fm. It also includes lots of other cool features, like recording Pandora streams to a format that can be used by iTunes and the iPod.


• OpenPandora - Windows Desktop application that plays Pandora and scrobbles to Last.fm. It also includes other cool features, like integration with the Wiimote and some software applications.


• PandoraFM - Web mashup that combines Pandora and Last.fm. This mashup does more than just scrobble to Last.fm; it really combines nearly everything of Pandora with nearly everything of Last.fm. For example, you can access tags and music information from Last.fm.

I'm not sure which is my "favorite." I'm just happy that these are available. I have a feeling there are more too.

I love Pandora. I also love Last.fm. I feel bad when I listen to Pandora because my songs don't get scrobbled to Last.fm. It's like all of that good listening time is just being wasted. However, I feel like I get exposed to more NEW music through Pandora because I primarily use Last.fm to listen to my own station.

Today, I accidentally found PandoraJam, which solves this problem! It is a desktop application (like PandoraBoy) that streams from Pandora and, at the end of each Pandora song, scrobbles to Last.fm! This gives me the best of both worlds! It has other features too. For example, you can record Pandora audio so you can take it with you later on your iPod. However, the scrobbling feature (which is the only entirely free feature) is the one that really impresses me.

However, this isn't a perfect solution. For one, it doesn't help me when I'm on a Windows machine. Second, it doesn't let me do cool Last.fm things like "Love" tracks. So, I went searching, and I found PandoraFM. This is a WEB mashup that combines Last.fm and Pandora. In fact, it even scrobbles at half the length of the song after a configurable number of seconds (default is 90), which is more like what you'd expect. So it's great! Solves all my problems.

So, if you use both Last.fm and Pandora, you need to check out PandoraFM.

iUseThis: The OS X Software that I Use

Are you interested in the software that I use on my Mac? See my iUseThis profile.

You can use iusethis.com to see what people are using and find software related to other software. You can even setup your own profile and keep track of the software that you use.

MacResearch - Online Community for OS X in Science

This might have potential...

MacResearch - Online Community and Research for Mac OS X in Science

MacResearch.org is an open and independent community for scientists using Mac OS X and related hardware in their research. It is the mission of this site to cultivate a knowledgeable and vibrant community of researchers to exchange ideas and information, build a community knowledge-base, and collectively escalate the prominence of Apple technologies in the scientific research community.