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New world, same voice

Filed under: Did you know...?,IUSM Web news,Musings,Shameless plug,Social Media — Tags: iucomm, new job, PR, public relations, social networks — Marti on November 23, 2011 @ 4:03 pm

Greetings. I’ve started a new job here at #IU. From here on out I’m coordinator for health sciences PR, in the newly named IU Communications unit (#iucomm). I’m freshly launching into the realm of social networks, especially as they benefit health sciences at IU.

So, I’ll be exploring ways of channeling useful and interesting content, including web-generated info, into new streams. Practically speaking, I’ll no longer be managing or supporting Concrete5 at the medical school.

Instead, I’ll be inventing ways to garner more interest for IU stories, including yours if you’d like to tell them to me.

Find me here:

More soon!

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Health sciences campus under discussion

Filed under: Did you know...? — Tags: medical academia, school of medicine — Marti on November 2, 2011 @ 3:36 pm

Here’s an item of general interest to people @iumedschool: During Monday’s fall faculty meeting, Dean Brater opened discussion about creating a health sciences campus, primarily Indy-based, comprised of medicine, nursing, dentistry and professional health schools. Listen to the 10/31/11 meeting here: http://go.iu.edu/4ao. IU login required.

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New editing guide for Concrete5

Filed under: Content Management,Did you know...?,Webmaster tips — Tags: concrete5, documentation, edits, webmaster — Marti on October 25, 2011 @ 8:43 am

C5 users: if you haven’t checked it out, I urge you to bookmark the new @concrete5 “editor’s guide” that Jeramy (@jedspurg) emailed us recently.

http://www.concrete5.org/documentation/editors-guide/

It’s divided into small sections, so if you want a refresher on something like page lists or the auto nav block, you can click right to the pertinent parts of the document.

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Say no to broken links

Filed under: Webmaster tips — Tags: broken links, free tools, spellcheck, web services — Marti on October 24, 2011 @ 3:23 pm

Lately I’m on a mission to find easy and cheap ways to check #iumedschool websites for broken links and misspellings. I got started with a service called SiteImprove, which gave me a nifty free trial. The service crawls through your sites and sends weekly reports on broken links and misspelled words. It is a useful service, but it’s also pricy.

So, I’m researching for free — or very cheap — resources for IU webmasters to ensure error free websites. Stay tuned.

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Goodbye, Steve

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: apple, life, news, steve jobs — Marti on October 6, 2011 @ 12:45 pm

I too feel compelled to write about Steve Jobs today. The man was a genius who built, then rebuilt, a modern business empire. He was a visionary product man, but that doesn’t explain why so many people are so sad about his death.

Maybe we’re upset because Steve Jobs was a quintessential American, someone who grabbed life by the handles, shook it hard, and made a genuine difference to so many people: geeks of all stripes, journalists, musicians, students, businesspeople, teachers, flaks, writers, editors, travelers, movie-makers. And on and on. And now he’s gone. It just doesn’t seem fair. He was only 56.

In remembrance, I offer a terrific collection of quotes from Steve Jobs, thanks to his many admirers on Quora.

Steve Jobs: What are the best Steve Jobs quotations.

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Piwik comes close

Filed under: Data analysis — Tags: analytics, google analytics, piwik, site traffic, web traffic — Marti on September 21, 2011 @ 11:21 am

In my ongoing survey of #web analytics apps, #Piwik implements #outlink tracking best. Even so, Piwik presents outlinks as a simple list, which is only somewhat useful. Webmasters want to know which page on the site generated which outlinks. In short, we want to know which pages function as referrers.

FWIWW, I tried exploring the Piwik site for info, but that was a mundane nightmare. Site registration is funky (difficult) and posts seem to go unanswered. The Piwik site is very slow to load, too. Really slow.

So, Piwik will not replace GA for me, not in its current form. I use it in tandem with GA.

Say what you will about GA, the in-page analytic views are addicting. I use them constantly.

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New IUSM web templates

Filed under: IUSM Technology,IUSM Web news,Shameless plug — Tags: concrete5, faculty data, Linked data, navigation schemes, pilot project, super footer — Marti on September 12, 2011 @ 1:29 pm

For the past 2 weeks I’ve been working in the new #Concrete5 templates. While the basics of page editing remain the same, I’m enjoying some excellent new features. Here are my top three: the horizontal nav bar, the superfooter, and the tabbed format for faculty bio pages.

The dropdown menu (above) is a pleasant change from the flyout. And I really like having an iconic image in the menu. It’s optional, but it’s a pity NOT to add an illustrative icon to the menu.

The super footer, an optional feature, is a chunk of space that appears on every page. It can hold just about anything: feeds, calendars, images and image collections, plain text — you name it. I recommend the superfooter for phone numbers, links to people, and other frequently requested info.

Lastly, we have a flashy and flexible way of presenting faculty data. Users will have to copy and paste current page data into the new format, but it’s worth the effort.

Stay tuned. We’ll be rolling out pilot sites this week.

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Another reason to use #goiuedu

Filed under: Academic technology,Did you know...?,High tech wizardry,Linked data,review — Tags: data analysis, page tracking, UITS, URL shorteners, web services — Marti on August 24, 2011 @ 3:51 pm

The @goiuedu service is a great URL shortening application at #IU. But I just discovered that go.iu also tracks the short URL creation date AND usage data. Very nice!

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Find IU Medicine in the news

Filed under: Did you know...?,IUSM Web news,Shameless plug — Tags: communications, google, news, news media, newsroom — Marti on August 22, 2011 @ 4:04 pm

What’s hot @iumedschool? Visit the #IUSM communications center to find out what news outlets are saying online about the IU School of Medicine.

This week, local media and others are buzzing about the new Glick Eye Institute, a bone-healing compound to prevent osteoporosis, and local fifth-graders getting a taste of medical school.

Also at the IUSM communications center, get info on medical school blogs, digital signage, people using social media, and, of course, news stories breaking from the IU School of Medicine.

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