Mind Mapping and Mind Boggling

Well, here I am still trying to mess around with downloading the mind mapping software....and with no luck! I have absolutely no idea what the problem is and I feel kind of left out because everyone is doing all of this cool stuff and I can't even play around on the site. I can see the pictures of the maps, but can't do anything, and I mean anything at all with them. My classmates maps look great. They're colorful and informative (even one little word is major information) and icons and really eye catching design. They have all done a great job. I'm so impressed! I hope I can do something close to that cool. Alex did recommend a few different sites which I am trying, but I at least wanted to get my FATP up here, or what I think is my FATP just in case. I guess half done is better than not done at all!

So, my FATP is

Form: Website hopefully with some animation and other neat tools and applications tools that I learn, and some I already have learned.

Audience: People who share the same goal as myself, as well as those in search of alternative options for animals in need.

Topic: Forever homes for abused, neglected, abandoned, unwanted, and generally any other animal that needs a forever home.

Purpose: To inform people/the public of and promote a forever home for animals as opposed to a temporary shelter or just plain abandonment.


I hope I did this part right. What I did learn in class will be a part of this, obviously, but I am not searching for a career, just following a dream that I've had since I was a kid. Hopefully this helps to move it along.

Still Working on the Social Aspects of Class

So far, I got everything done that I'm supposed to. I think. I had a really good time playing with the widgets. I still can't get over how many of them there are. Part of the assignment was to get all the class blogs together in Netvibes. I got all the RSS feeds from the class blogs except for 2 of them, which I couldn't get to work, but I think, now that I'm thinking about it, the http is missing.....maybe. I'll try again later. Anyway, I'm now trying to keep them all together and organized like the multimedia class bookmarks are all together on diigo. This is fun stuff, once you figure out some of the basics. It's quite annoying when I'm almost done with something and then it's just gone. While I was doing the feeds for the class blogroll, that seemes to work fine for most. When I was trying to add my own earlier, it didn't work. Now the RSS logos were on the sites I was using and the message would say this link is not working of currently not....something. Now, I can't remember what it said.

When I was trying to do my work history on Linkedin.com, it's sad, but I have to dig out my resume from like 10 years ago, because I haven't updated it since then. I've always gotten jobs by recommendations and never really needed one. And, since I am still in college, for the fifth year and don't per se, have a career, I'm still like a student going from place to place. My forever home for animals is, I guess not a career choice, but it's just a dream I've always had. So, technically, it's not a job and wouldn't even be like a non profit organbization. It would be just my home and my land and lots of it. I've strayed off the subject, and I do tend to ramble often. Most of these sites are a great deal of fun...and informational. I think Netvibes and diigo are very cool. I'm still playing around with everything. You just can't learn everything there is to know in such a short amount of time. I'm still not sure if I'm doing the hyperlinking right. I thought mine came out wrong last week, because I forgot to highlight, but now I'm not sure.

Does the blog assignemtn from look the same after it is submitted as it did when I filled it out or typed it out. If so, what the heck am I doing that is incorrect.

Setting Up My Linkedin, diigo, and Netvibes

Most of the setting up of these site has been fairly easy to follow. The directions, instructions and help section have been great sources of information. I appreciate when things are understandable and not in terms that are so technical I can't get past the first sentence or two.

These sites weren't nearly as much fun as this blogging site to set up, but nevertheless, interesting. Netvibes, I think took the longest, just because of all the different widgets. I mean, I was there for a good two hours, maybe more just searching through widgets to see if I recognized anything for my daily life so to speak. I tried to set up a few of my own feeds, but had problems with that. I had similar problems lat week with not being able to see some of the buttons and things on the screen, but I still can't figure out why. I have adjusted all my settings over and over and switched back and forth from Firefox to Internet Explorer, and still, no luck. I've only been using Firefox for about a month, but I read the help sections and add on the add ons that I apparently need and I still have some invisible things. It makes it really hard to do stuff.

I was just looking at the top of this blog page and it has dashboard just like diigo. It must be a standard blogging word? or button?

Anyway, I'm still working my way through bookmarking and tagging and sharing, so I'll be back a bit later to update on how it's going.

Oh My Gosh! I Did It!!

I did it! I am so excited! What a rush. Now if I could get the rest of the technicalities out of the way, I might actually finish this on time. You know, I can see how this could become addictive. It's really a blast. Regardless of my parenoia about messing stuff up, I'm having a great time, and I don't even care if anybody reads it or not. Honestly, I talk to myself quite often, so there wouoldn't be any big change there. Okay folks, tryin the hyper link now. Keep your fingers crossed!! Once again, my favorite site is all about animals. Check it out. I hope this works!

Troubles

Well, my hyperlink doesn't seem to work and I'm not sure why. I followed the directions exactly, and I'm almost positive I typed everything in correctly. So, I'm just going to keep plugging away. The bright side, the pictures came out pretty well. I thought I was getting this figured out, but it looks like I jumped the gun. I'm still working on it. I'm unclear why I can't seem to see some of the buttons and boxes and so on from some web pages. I have adjusted my settings and swiched browsers and still can't see some parts of the web page. I wish I could remember how I got through stuff like this before. I'm giving the video another shot. Ohhh!!! I hope I did it right!! At any rate, I have to try to do the hyper link again. I still haven't figured out why it doesn't work. The test!

On to The Finish...I Hope

I'm still working on the video part and forgot all about the hyperlink, so I am going to give that a go right now. Keeeping my fingers crossed. Okay! Here I go. In case I didn't already do so (I'm pretty sure I did though) I want to point you in the direction of one of my favorite websites. I hope this works. I'm going to check it out in a minute. I've seen several mistakes I've made over the past few days, and I'm trying to keep them in mind and trying to jot them down before I forget. After I publish this, I am going to check out YouTube to see if I can find a video there that kind of goes with this very strange blog practice, oh, and animal something or other.

More Getting Started

This is one set of the twin kittens we rescued last year
This is one of the kitties.
This is our older guy Smokey and another rescue Twinkie! Can you guess which is which?

I'm having a blast testing this out. I finally smartened up and printed out the pages I need for directions. I was just trying to remember what I read, but then I would have to stop what I was doing and go back and reread because I forgot and lost track and so on. I know it's not perfect, but I think I'm finally getting the hang of it. The next thing is trying to add a video. I'm a little afraid about this one, but I'm not quite sure why. We'll see how it goes. I can't seem to track down a video that has to do with animals, which obviously this is sort of based on. Hey, I'm testing it.

Getting Started

Wow! So far this has been fairly easy. Who would have thought. Everything is already done for you except choosing the looks and the title. I can't believe something that appears to be so complicated can be so simple. I had no problems at all getting started. I was a little nervous to begin with, thinking I didn't know enough about computer applications and tools to do something such as a blog. So, at this point, everything I have read about the ease of setting up a blog is true. You know what they say, "if it sounds too good to be true it probably is". So far, this is not the case. I'm impressed.

I had a difficult time making out the editing toolbar. I was using Mozilla Firefox and adjusted the settings and still can't see the buttons. I switched to Internet Explorer, and I still can't see the buttons. If I run the mouse over I can read the options, so that's how I ended up finding the image button. The image did not end up where I wanted it. I've been trying to figure out how to move it, but to no avail.