And so it begins!  I’m sitting around in a cafe in the Colorado Convention Center trying to figure out how to go to all of the meetings and sessions today while I’m buzzing with excitement to check out the city of Denver.  The first session I’m going to is definitely the one I’m most excited about, but as is often the case it takes place at the exact same time as the other session I’m most excited about, dagnabbit…

I’ll be attending the ACRL event: “Bring it on Home!  Creating Custom Search Plug-ins for Your Library”. I’m excited to learn how to do this, with any luck at the end of this session I’ll have the knowledge so that I can create a library Facebook app that lets users search the catalog from their own Facebook page.  Now that is going to where your users are rather than making them come to you!  Here’s the description:

Discover how to create search plug-ins for web browsers and the social networking site Facebook.com. Through use of real life examples and hands-on instruction, the workshop presenters will illustrate how to deliver currently existing online content and services in the form of a plug-in. Plug-ins allow the user to customize their own search experience, providing access to content and services from the library without having to navigate to the library website first. Find out how plug-ins can help increase the online presence of your library.

Speakers: Paul Beatty, Distance Learning Librarian, Regis University;  Erin McCaffrey, Digital Systems Librarian, Regis University

Now here’s the bummer.  At the same time, OCLC is offering a symposium that I’d really love to be at called “From Linking to Thinking—How We’ll Live When
Information Surrounds Us”. Here’s that description:

Does the Web itself change how we think and learn? Join OCLC‘s Roy
Tennant as he moderates a discussion between David Weinberger (author
of Everything is Miscellaneous and co-author of the Cluetrain
Manifesto) and Nova Spivack (Semantic Web pioneer and publisher of the
Twine search/sharing tool) for a discussion that will explore answers
to questions like these: How will we organize information when
everyone is connected all the time? Will the Web add intelligence to
everyday objects and our personal activities? Change is coming to the
Web, but how will the Web change us?

Check back in later, I’ll be sure to write a review of the search plugins session I attend today.