"...If you're doing a 4 year degree ... the technology you use today is going to be invariably different to the technology when you come out..."
As an educator, one of the most important things I impart to my participants on any subject are the concepts they are learning about, before moving on to the process. Sure, I can teach the process for performing a Mail Merge in Wordperfect, AmiPro, WordPro, Word, LibreOffice, OpenOffice and Symphony, but more importantly, one should understand that a word-processing application is capable of combining data from another source to produce a final document with variable information (the concept).
Similarly, I have never taught a word-processing class without discussing the importance of Styles. Styles - after all - are the most important feature a word-processor contains that enable users to easily implement and maintain a consistent look and feel throughout their document. Discussing the concept of styles is just as important as teaching the process for creating and using them. If a user understands the concept, it enables them to sit in front of a new software application and using help resources, locate the process for implementing that concept within that unfamiliar application.
This - to me - is the crux of Digital Literacy.
It should not matter which particular software application is being used. If one has a high degree of Digital Literacy, then one understands the concepts that an application holds, and therefore only needs adjust their behaviour while using that application to execute the process that will provide the desired outcome.
I often find it interesting to review how a user utilises a particular application. A classic example recently was a user who had built a sophisticated navigation tool for their fellow users that enabled them (via hyper-links) to navigate through the various documents and forms located on a shared drive to easily locate the information they required. Sound like a classic intranet? A Sharepoint or Connections infrastructure? Or even Lotus Notes? Nope. It was all done inside Microsoft Excel.
Not to say that the user had done this 'incorrectly', or that they were using the 'wrong' tool, but simply; Were they using the tool best suited for the outcome they required?
Users who are familiar with a particular process (ie: the functions available within an application) will often fall back on that application to produce some really creative outcomes. Often because they lack the Digital Literacy to understand that there may be a more appropriate tool available to them.
So the next time you do some training, a demonstration, or presentation, why not spend a few moments explaining the concept before you launch into steps 1-2-3 of a process. You will enhance your presentation immeasurably because you will be helping to increase the Digital Literacy of your audience.
Getting stated with IBM Notes 9 on Ubuntu 12.10 or 13.04 x64
Sun, May 12th 2013 9:13a Mat Newman IBM Notes 9 installs without any problems on both 12.10 and 13.04 x32 flavour. However, the x64 version has a few tricks that you need to repair before you can run the installation files. Over on Usablesoftware's blog there's a nice reference to the steps required to get IBM Notes 9 installed. With the fantastic assistance of Jason Hatch from IBM, I learned that the only thing required to get Notes 9 running on x64 was to remove some dependancies from the control file in the IBM supplied [read] Keywords: ibm
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Getting Started with IBM Notes 9 - Part 3: The Search Box
Wed, Apr 10th 2013 1:13a Mat Newman In Part 2: Introducing the Masthead, we discussed the new Masthead feature in IBM Notes 9, and briefly touched on the Search box, which has now been moved - with the IBM Social them applied - from the Toolbar to the Masthead. The Search box itself has a fantastic new feature which deserves it's own post, which is: IBM Notes 9 can now simultaneously search all Mail, Including the current Users Mail database and all archives configured for that user! YAY! The option needs to be se [read] Keywords: ibm
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Getting Started with IBM Notes 9 - Part 2: Introducing the Masthead
Mon, Apr 8th 2013 5:43p Mat Newman With the introduction of IBM Notes 9, one of the major design goals was to implement the IBM "One UI" experience with an updated interface to the Notes client. Within the FRAMEWORK utilised by the OneUI design principals, major navigation elements are located across the top of the 'page'. Feedback supplied to IBM designers also indicated that many users 'lost' the quick links to their Personal Information Management (PIM) applications (Mail, Calendar, Contacts, To-Dos, etc) with the intro [read] Keywords: ibm
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Getting Started with IBM Notes 9 - Part 1: Installation
Wed, Apr 3rd 2013 9:16p Mat Newman In this series of posts we are going to walk through all the new capabilities contained within the latest release of IBM Lotus Notes, or rather - the newly reincarnated IBM Notes 9. 17 years after the acquisition of Lotus Development Corporation, IBM has dropped the "Lotus" from the branding of the product, finally bringing Notes completely under the IBM brand umbrella and heralding a new era for the most powerful desktop application available. A raft of new features and capabilities have be [read] Keywords: admin
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How to add Birthdays and Anniversaries from your Contacts database to your Lotus Notes Calendar
Tue, Mar 19th 2013 5:08p Mat Newman Another one from Twitter: Is there any way to show Birthdays and Anniversaries from my Lotus Notes personal Contacts database in my Lotus Notes Calendar" Natively: No. But that got me thinking. Thanks to the "Show Calendars" overlay feature included in Notes a while ago, ANY Lotus Notes database which includes a Calendar view can be overlaid in your personal Calendar. Problem: The Lotus Notes personal Contacts database (names.nsf on 'local') does not contain a calendar view tha [read] Keywords: ibm
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Colour Coding an entire day in your Notes 9 calendar
Mon, Mar 18th 2013 6:02p Mat Newman One really nice feature relating to Calendar Colour Coding in IBM Notes 9 is related to All Day Events. When a user configures a category for colour-coding in their Notes 9 Calendar, and then applies it to an All Day Event, Notes 9 colour codes the background of that entire day in the calendar with an opaque variant of that colour: Figure 1: Notes 9 calendar background for a day changed with an All Day Event I really like this feature as it provides easy visual notification in a [read] Keywords: ibm
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How many ways can you customize IBM Notes 9 ... Plenty!
Mon, Feb 11th 2013 11:11p Mat Newman Pleased to share the BP104 session from IBM Connect by Margo Ezekiel, Ram Krishnamurthy and myself that shows you how many ways you can customize IBM Notes 9: The exceptional ability to customise IBM® Notes® to fit your customer or business needs continues with the new IBM Notes 9 Social Edition. Learn how to make company-wide changes and tweak Notes to suit your personal work style. Margo, Ram and Mat will show you how to fine tune your client experience and improve your productivit [read] Keywords: ibm
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