Mick Jacobsen organized an informative and very well attended meeting on Drupal for Librarians at the Oak Park Public Library today. I was happy to see a few familiar faces from our Drupal BoF at DePaul earlier in the year.
Jenny Levine led off with a discussion of ALA Connect and what impressed me wasn't simply what they've been able to put together but their future plans for incorporating functionality.
Next Mick Jacobsen and Michael Buhmann from Skokie Public discussed Skokie Business Portal which at the time unfortunately was suffering from CSS indigestion.
Afterwards, Mick spent some time discussing Panels and we even managed to squeeze in a bit of time discussing Drupal in small groups.
We had a wonderful turnout of close to 20 librarians from all parts of the Chicagoland area. Knowledge and skill-level ran from seasoned veterans to people being introduced to Drupal for the first time.
I'm pleased to announce a Chicagoland Drupal4Lib BoF on Friday, 3/20 (1:30p-4p) at DePaul's Loop Campus, 1 E. Jackson (10th fl., Rm# 10028), Chicago.
GOALS OF THE CHICAGOLAND DRUPAL4LIB BoF
The Chicagoland Drupal4Lib BoF will be an opportunity for librarians to get together and discuss how they use (or would like to use) Drupal in a library context. We'll ask people to present projects they're working on and we'll field questions on problems and approaches to implementing Drupal. All levels of knowledge from expert to n00b are welcome.
Also, since we're the 'host' city for the ALA Convention in Chicago in July, we'll have an opportunity to think about what we might want to do for that.
This Chicagoland Drupal4Lib BoF is a follow-up to our successful get-togethers last year at the Metropolitan Librarian System and at the wildly sold-out Chicago Drupal BarCamp in October.
CHICAGOLAND DRUPAL4LIB BoF - QUARTERLY BASIS
We'll be doing one of these on a quarterly basis -- or at least that's the intention. The people at DePaul have kindly made their location available for March; We'll be meeting at McCormick Place as part of ALA in July; After that we'll be meeting at the downtown offices of the Metropolitan Library System (MLS).
PARTICIPATION AND SUGGESTIONS
It goes without saying that your participation and suggestions are welcome. The format is free and open enough to accommodate a ton of different ideas and needs.
In anticipation of my talk 'Drupal in Libraries' that I'll be giving to the Metropolitan Library System on Fri., 2/29 (1:30p-4:30p), I'm releasing the screencast "Creating a Library Database Page with Drupal".
The talk will be about Drupal in the context of Open Source Software and Content Management Systems as well of course as its application in a library environment. (more info and rsvp...)
The screencast goes over the points I'll be making in the second part of my talk.
Have a look and tell me what you think.
UPDATE: The slides and audio from my presentation are now available. You can access them by going here...
Okay, this one is so far off it's almost crazy to talk about, but since they just posted it, I thought I might as well put out the word -- at least for people in the Chicagoland area interested in Drupal.
Drupal of course is the popular open-source content management system. I'll be giving an introduction to it at the offices of the Metropolitan Library System in Chicago on Friday, 2/29, 1:30-4:30. (Yes, leap year day!)
I'll first go over the basics of the system -- the good, the bad, and the buggy -- in the context of open source software. Then, I'll discuss how certain features of Drupal can be used to solve typical library content needs.
You don't have to be an expert to attend this thing -- just someone interested in how modern content management systems work.
Okay, this one is so far off it's almost crazy to talk about, but since they just posted it, I thought I might as well put out the word -- at least for people in the Chicagoland area interested in Drupal.
