Naxos Music App – Tech Tips

One of the Library’s most popular electronic resources is our subscription to the Naxos Music Library database. This fantastic music resource contains nearly 70,000 albums and nearly 1,000,000 tracks that can be streamed to your computer for free, 24/7. But did you know that there is also a Naxos Music Library app for your smartphone that allows you to create playlists and stream music anywhere, anytime?

If you have an iPad/iPhone or an Android device, you can download and install the NML app, and then use the Library’s subscription to create a personal login and build your own NML playlists!  (The apps are easy to find in your device app store: just search for the word “Naxos,” and it should be the first thing that pops up!)

Creating a personal login requires a few steps, and it’s not the most intuitive process, but lucky for us, the folks at Naxos Music have put together a YouTube tutorial showing you all the steps needed to get your personal login all set up. Take a look:

Basically, you need to log in to our library subscription (get there from our Search a Database page) to prove to Naxos that you’re a card-carrying library member; once you’re in there you can set up your personal login for free, which the app will then recognize as valid. Everyone else (i.e., NON-library members) has to pay a personal subscription fee to access the app content. 

One of the most interesting things about Naxos is the wide variety of music available in their database. While they DO specialize in classical and jazz, there is also a fascinating mix of pop and folk music mixed into their catalogue, including the entire Nettwerk label.

To create playlists that you can access in your app, log in to the web version of Naxos (always going in via the library’s page, otherwise you won’t have access to our institutional subscription) and then choose “Playlists” and “login.” You can then browse the catalogue, find tracks that you want to play, and add them to a personal playlist.

A couple of cautions: the Naxos website has a fairly short time-out window, which means you might find you get logged out of your personal account a few times when you’re browsing around looking for music to add. The short logout window is because our subscription only allows a certain number of people to be logged in at the same time, and because it’s a popular site, users do occasionally get “bumped.”  

Please note as well that the app uses streaming music technology to bring you your music, which means of course that it’s using your device’s data plan to deliver the stream. If your monthly data usage is a concern, you should probably only use the app only when hooked up to a Wi-Fi network.

Happy streaming!

-Sophie

Public Domain eBooks: now right at your doorstep!

Exciting news! We have a new addition to our eBooks offering at Winnipeg Public Libraries! We now are providing access to over 20,000+ free eBooks – that don’t count against your download limit, that are always available, and that you can never have fines on! Meet our new Public Domain Collection – books that were either published as Creative Commons books or have entered the public domain because their copyright has expired.

This collection is provided by Project Gutenberg, and is separate and distinct from the regular eBook collection. This means: 

• these books will not appear in regular searches from our catalogue – you must follow the link from our eLM site to a separate collection
• you do NOT need to sign in to download titles
• eBooks checked out in this way do not count against your checkout limit
• these titles have no licence limits, so are always available for download – perfect if you just want to read something right now!
• these titles do NOT expire like regular library books – perfect for if you are going on long holidays!
• you will still need Adobe Digital Editions or a mobile device with the OverDrive Media Console app installed in order to open eBooks 

As it is a free collection, you should be aware of the following:

• formatting may not be as ‘pretty’ as you are used to in purchased eBooks. It doesn’t mean your display is broken or there is something wrong with the file. Generally, this is most evident with Tables of Contents and images – the book text is usually fine.
• Most of the resources in the collection predate 1917, due to the way copyright law works in theUS. However, this means that there is a vast wealth of the classics in the collection – you can find books by Plato, Oscar Wilde, Charlotte Bronte, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Charles Dickens, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and many many more.
• Searching and browsing in the interface is different from using our regular catalogue. 

For a great start to the books offered, check out the Top 100 downloads from Project Gutenberg – this page is updated daily with the previous day’s hot titles. Currently, thanks to the Disney release of John Carter, the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs are high on the list!

Finding/ Using the Collection 

This new collection is available from the left hand sidebar of the eLM site, with an image of books and the caption Additional eBooks. Always Available.

This will take you to the Public Domain section of the site, where you can browse by subject or search for specific titles.

Click on Download in order to access the eBook. You will still need a program in order to read the eBook. We strongly recommend Adobe Digital Editions.  You will be given the opportunity to either save or open their file. From this stage forward, getting the eBook to an eReader or other device is the same as with library books – you just skip the checkout step. If you have more questions about your device, a complete list of resources for each device is available at: http://www.overdrive.com/resources/drc/

You can also use the OverDrive app in order to get eBooks on mobile devices such as iPads, iPhones, Android phones, and some newer eReaders such as the Kobo Vox! The interface is a little different. In order to find the collection, go to Browse. ‘Browse Public Domain eBook Titles’ now appears at the bottom of the list.

Clicking on this link will bring you to an outside page with a different look and feel. Here, you can search or browse the books in much the same way as the website version.

When you find a book you want, simply click on download.  Again, the app will not ask for any credential or library information – this is a link to a permanent download of the file, with no checkout or return required.

 An icon with the file will open. You can now open the file and enjoy your book instantly and forever!

-Brianne

BlackBerry PlayBook & OverDrive

There’s good news if you recently bought a BlackBerry Playbook tablet and were hoping to use it as an eReader!  

With the recent release of OS 2.0 for the PlayBook (an operating system upgrade, details here: ca.blackberry.com/playbook-tablet/), the library’s OverDrive Media Console (OMC) app is now available for download on PlayBook devices, which means you can now use your PlayBook to download and read free eBooks from the Library. 

Until just recently, the PlayBook tablet was not compatible with OverDrive downloads, as the OMC app was never released for the original PlayBookoperating system. Now, once you’ve completed the operating system upgrade, you should be able to download and install the OMC app on your device. The PlayBook version of the OMC app works exactly like the iPad and Android tablet apps, allowing you to browse a mobile-friendly version of the Library’s eLibraries Manitoba site and download eBooks and audiobooks directly to your tablet over a Wifi connection.  

You can find out more about the free OMC app at appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/80929/?lang=en or search for “OverDrive” in the AppWorld store on your PlayBook device. A successful upgrade to OS 2.0 is required before the app will work on the device.

We see this as VERY good news, as the PlayBook has been a popular purchase over the past few months. The PlayBook’s size makes it an attractive choice as an eReader, and we’re ever so happy that our patrons will soon be downloading our Library books to this handy little tablet.

Of course, once you’ve downloaded and installed the OMC app on your tablet, you should check out our newly renovated eLM Help page  for all kinds of great advice on how to make the most out of your eLibraries experience. The new OverDrive Help feature lets you search for popular articles, device-specific instructions and even common error messages, allowing for quick and easy troubleshooting on a wide variety of devices.

Happy eReading!

Did Santa bring you an ereader?

If you were lucky enough to receive an ereader or tablet for Christmas, check out the following links to help you get started with borrowing Library ebooks.

FAQs for new ereader owners.
http://wpl.winnipeg.ca/library/onlineresources/ebookfaqs.asp

Step-by-step guide for mobile devices (tablets and smartphones).
http://wpl.winnipeg.ca/library/pdfs/elm-mobiledevices.pdf

Step-by-step guide for ereaders such as Sony Reader and Kobo.
http://wpl.winnipeg.ca/library/pdfs/elm-ereaders.pdf

Getting the Library’s PDF eBooks on your Android tablet

…and yes, this is just for Android (sorry iPad users, for once, it’s you that’s excluded!)

Tested on the Samsung Galaxy tablet, Kobo Vox and Samsung GalaxyS Phone:

A recent question at one of our public eBooks Show & Tell courses has got us into deep-thoughts and research mode.  Our patron wanted to know: if gadgets like the iPad and Android tabs have beautiful screens which can display pdf documents georgeously, why can’t they be used to download and display Adobe PDF ebooks, which are best for images?

PDFs vs. ePUBs: A PDF eBook is basically a photo image of the printed book (margins, page numbers, images remain in place) whereas an ePUB has resizable text and margins. PDFs are great if the design & layout of the page is important to the reading experience (Children’s picture books that mix image and text on the page are a good example). EPUBs, on the other hand, are better for novel reading, because you can resize the fonts and margins to suit your comfort level (PDFs can be resized, but only by zooming in, which usually then requires you to scroll up and down to see all the text – not too comfortable).

The standard answer is: because they can’t.  The Overdrive eBooks app (available for iPad, Android, Blackberry and Windows) is only set up to download two file types: MP3 audio and ePUB ebooks (What’s an ePUB? What’s a PDF? What’s the diff? See sidebar for more).   We’re not sure what the reasoning is behind the limitation (either it was set up that way because the app was initially designed for iPhones and PDFs just aren’t readable (too tiny) on a phone screen, or the file size of the PDFs is larger, or something) but in the end, because the app belongs to the Overdrive corporation, we have no control over the options.

Of course, we’re not satisfied with that answer any more than you are.  After a bit of digging, we’ve found that the LONG answer—at least for Android tab users—is that it totally IS possible.  You just need to get a different app. 

It’s not that we don’t recommend using the Overdrive app (we use it and love it!).  And if you use an iPad, we can’t help you, because we still haven’t found anything that will allow you to load or transfer our DRM-protected PDF files to an iPad(although we’re happy to hear if you’ve found one!).  But if you’re an Android (phone or tablet) user, we’ve found that the FREE Aldiko Book Reader app is an alternative that works just like the Overdrive app (meaning that it communicates with the eLibraries catalogue and lets you download direct to your device), except that it ALSO allows PDF downloads.  If you’re willing to put in the time to get it set up and aren’t worried about troubleshooting things yourself, it’s worth a try!

Instructions for getting Aldiko set up on your Android Tablet:

1. Download and install the Aldiko app using the Android Market (FYI: on the Kobo Vox, you need to side-load the app because it’s not listed in the Kobo market. Luckily, you can download and install it from http://slideme.org/application/aldiko).   
2. Once you’ve got the app installed, open Aldiko and set it up with an Adobe ID (create one for free at adobe.com if you haven’t got one already).  To get to the Adobe ID screen, go to settings > Adobe DRM > add your info. 
3. Next, click on the little “home” icon to open the main page, open “My Catalogs”, click the “+” symbol and add eLM with the exact URL http://elm.lib.overdrive.com/10/482/en/default.htm (it has to be that exact URL or else you’ll be directed to the mobile version of the site and won’t be able to search for or download PDF files).
4. Click on the link that you’ve just created; eLibraries should open. Search for something fun to download (if you’ve got a title in mind, go find it; if you just want to test it, open the advanced search page, choose Adobe PDF in the format box and then limit to available titles, search and browse the results). 
5. When you’ve found something to download, add it to your cart, login with your card to proceed to checkout, then choose your lending period and confirm the checkout.  Next, click download to start the file transfer.  The file should automatically start to load into Aldiko.
6. When it’s finished loading, open and enjoy!

Note:  This method only works if you’ve got eLibraries MB set up as one of your Aldiko “catalogues.”  If it’s not set up, the eLibraries site will try to open the book in the Overdrive app instead, and you’ll get an error message saying that the device doesn’t support PDF downloads. 

When the library book expires, you should be able to go back to the library catalogue, check it out again (assuming there aren’t holds) and download it again to keep reading, just like in the Overdrive app.

Happy eReading!

-Sophie

Finding Your Roots: New Genealogy titles

Fall is quickly approaching, along with a new season of library programs including some on genealogical topics. This is a good time to mention a few recently-arrived library titles for genealogists — whether experienced researchers or those just beginning their family tree. 

The Winnipeg Public Library offers popular online resources for genealogists, like the Ancestry Plus database (available at the Henderson, St Boniface, and Millennium Libraries) as well as the Winnipeg Free Press online archives (available only at the Millennium Library). The Internet and digitization technology have been a great help for genealogists, making an ever increasing amount of genealogical information accessible to researchers all around the world. Social networking also allows the work of genealogists to be more accessible than ever to help others in their research. 

But we are still far from the day (if ever) when we’ll be able to rely solely on the digital world for genealogical research, and genealogists still need to navigate through archives of printed material. Given that the number of resources available on the Web keeps expanding and changing, a book is still a useful tool to help someone find what is out there and how best to use it.

For those just starting out who need books covering the basics, here are a couple of suggestions:

 There is (of course) the 2011 edition of Genealogy online for dummies, with information on how to plan your research and how to use online and printed resources. 

Another great title available both in print and e-book format is George Morgan’s How to do everything genealogy which covers how to find pertinent information in online and printed records like census, immigration, military and vital statistics records for Canada, Britain, United States, and European countries. It outlines how to evaluate and organize your findings and create your family tree and provides instructions for people new to using the Internet for genealogical research as well as how to order government documents like birth, death and marriage certificates.

                   

For people interested in more Canadian-centric genealogy books, A Call to the Colours: tracing your Canadian military ancestors by Kenneth G. Cox and  Destination Canada: a genealogical guide to immigration records by Dave Obee are two new great additions to the library collections.

                

The genealogist’s Google Toolbox: a genealogist’s guide to the most powerful free online research tools available! by Lisa Louise Cooke is, as indicated, about teaching genealogists how to get the most out of all of the popular search engine’s features (like Google Image and Google Earth for example).

Genealogy online by Elizabeth Crowe covers and explain how to use ancestry-related networks, websites and online services available on the Web. It also suggests online software that can be used for genealogical projects.

If anyone has other suggestions for genealogists, available at the library or not, please share them!

Louis-Philippe

Ebooks for Kids!

 Children’s books are the cornerstone of literacy.  From a very early age, children are introduced to books that allow them to dream about faraway lands and colorful characters through vibrant illustrations and powerful words.

 To this very day, Madeline, Corduroy, and The Very Hungry Caterpillar rank at the top of my all-time-favourites list, right along with A Thousand Splendid Suns and Eat Pray Love.  Perhaps it’s the childhood memory of reading with my mother, or the fact that these books sparked my love of reading.  Children’s books are more popular than ever, but they are now at the point of format transformation.

 The eBook phenomenon is upon us, and although it has taken a while to really hit the children’s book market, more and more titles are being released every day.  As color eReaders and tablets rapidly enter the market, publishers are beginning to see the picture book eReading experience a much more viable one.  After all, what would Brown Bear, Brown Bear be without its radiant illustrations? 

 At Winnipeg Public Library, our catalog of children’s eBooks is rapidly expanding.  Just over the past few months, we’ve added The Berenstain Bears, Thomas the Tank Engine, Curious George, and many more titles to our OverDrive database.  And better yet, these titles are available 24/7, and many can be downloaded onto any computer , iPod®, iPhone®, iPad™, Android™, Sony® Reader, and hundreds of other mobile devices.  Talk about the perfect road-trip solution!   

 How do we know that these eBooks are growing in popularity?  Over the past 6 months, the circulation of children’s eBooks at OverDrive libraries has soared 474%, making it one of the fastest growing genres. While some might attribute this to the general boom in eBook circulation across all genres, statistics show otherwise.  Two of the most popular genres, Mystery and Romance, increased 329% and 297% respectively, much less than children’s fiction.

 There is no question that children’s eBooks are here to stay. What is uncertain is how parents and educators will embrace and implement this new technology into entertaining and educating the newest generation of kids.  In his blog post The Future of Children’s eBooks, GeekDad discusses the opportunities that children’s eBooks offer for interactive learning.  The best eBooks will allow children to control the narrative, nurture exploration, and support 21st century skills.  Time, innovation, and good old fashioned imagination will take children’s eBooks to the next level — and I can’t wait to see where we end up!

Lindsay

Freegal Music: Ready For Download

Have you tried the library’s new music download service yet?

Freegal Music is the WPL’s newest online resource.  It includes the entire Sony Music catalogue of over 450,000 songs as well as Sony’s 200-300 weekly new releases, and recently added the IODA (Independent Online Distribution Alliance) catalogue, which lists over 12,000 additional music labels (700 of them Canadian) and almost 3 million songs. It’s PC and Mac friendly, and all songs are Digital Rights Management (DRM)-free MP3 files.

So how does Freegal work? Simply head over to  our database login page with your library card to verify that you’re a WPL member, then click on the link provided to access the Freegal site.  You can browse by artist or search for specific song titles,  albums or genres, and when you find songs that you’d like to acquire,  click on the download link to add them to your personal library.  You can then listen to them on your computer (Mac or PC) or add it to any MP3 player. That’s it…there’s no special software required and no digital rights management (DRM) issues to deal with.  You can also add these files to your iTunes library and sync it to your iPod or iPhone (same as for any other MP3 file). There is a limit of three downloads per week for each valid WPL card; the system records what you’ve borrowed with a handy little counter at the top of the screen, with everyone’s counter resetting at midnight on Sunday.  Check our Freegal info page for more details.

So, have you tried it yet?  What do you think?  We’d love to know!

Best book sites

Besides my favourite public library on the ‘interwebs’, there are several excellent book-related websites I’d like to share with readers. Some will be familiar while others may be newish and worth a visit when you have time and a hot cup of coffee (or other beverage) beside you.

Goodreads.com: This is a great way to keep track of what I’m reading, what I’ve read, and what I would like to read in a perfect world. With quick access to the best databases, you assemble a virtual personal library, along with your ratings and mini-reviews. On the site you can also find friends with similar reading habits, take literary quizzes, and find ‘best of’ lists that may perk your interest. Part of the deal is getting automated emails of what your goodreads friends are reading, so you can stay in the loop. I personally like seeing all the cover graphics of the books I read in one spot. And you can always check which books you liked best and why, and mull over which mystery thriller or memoir you’ll tackle next from your ‘to-be-read’ list. And, when a dark, foreboding cloud of doubt moves in on the mental horizon, you can prove to others, or just yourself, that you didn’t waste absolutely all of your time on Facebook!

Bookcrossing.com: This is a fun, rewarding way to ‘pay it forward’ and make extra room on your bookshelf at the same time. “If you love your books, let them go,” the New York Times quips. I’ve tried this service and would like to do it again. This site organizes the dream: wouldn’t it be great if we shared the books we’ve enjoyed with total strangers, who then keep passing them on? All you do is register a book you’ve finished with the site, attach a sticker with a unique ID, and drop it off at a bus stop or park bench. Any public spot really. You then can track it through the site, and be prepared to be amazed at where and with who your book ends up! I’d suggest using worthwhile books. Stop the spread of second-rate pulp!

Abebooks.com:  If you are sleuthing for hard-to-find used books, textbooks and rare, expensive books, then this is the place for you! Where other online bookstores stop, this one starts. Did you know that a first edition of E.M. Forster’s ‘A Passage to India’ recently sold for $9,766 US? Yikes. A bit expensive for my wallet. But don’t let that you scare you. If you’re a collector, maybe browse the virtual stacks of their subject page.

Project Gutenberg: You’ve likely heard of this storehouse of 33,000 free ebooks for your PC, iPad, Kindle, Sony Reader, or Android device. They’re all digitized and ready to go. Nothing really recent here, since the copyright has to be expired. But if your idea of ‘bestseller’ includes Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, and Robert Louis Stevenson, then you’ve come to the right place. For Canadiana, check out Project Gutenberg Canada.

Of course, there are the major bookstores:  amazon.com or amazon.ca, chapters.indigo.ca, and, for local flavour, mcnallyrobinsonbooksellers.com. Each has their particular strengths. I tend to use Chapters for fiction and Amazon for non-fiction, but that could be just me.

“Authors only begin books. Readers make them complete.” – Stephen Weeks

Lyle

The ebook revolution is here

Some naysayers signal an upcoming apocalypse because people don’t seem to be reading books anymore… which would be sad, except for the fact that we may be undergoing a revolution towards reading ebooks instead. Unless you were lost on a desert island or tragically caught in a coma, it would be hard to have missed the publicity. Electronic readers such as the Kindle, iPad, Sony Reader, and the Kobo eReader have held the industry spotlight this past year. Time magazine reports that in 2010, at least in the U.S., ebooks outsold hardcovers, and are gaining on the leader, the paperback!

It would be foolish to think it’s any different here in Canada. At the Winnipeg Public Library, ebook and digital audiobook checkouts doubled from 2009 to 2010. Check out the growing list of titles we offer at elm.lib.overdrive.com. (Now optimized for iPad use!)

The future seems to be touch computing, but it’s taken a while. I confess I was nerdy enough to be an early adopter of one of the first ebook readers. Back in ’98 I bought a monochrome, low-resolution Rocket ebook reader and loved it, for a while. There just wasn’t enough selection in ebooks back then. And it was kind of klunky. Fortunately, I was lucky enough to sell it on eBay.

Now with my own iPad, I’m enjoying the resurgence of ebooks — along with a lot of other people. (It’s great to have company.) Although I too enjoy the feel of ‘real’ books, and will continue to read tree-based tomes, ebooks are becoming my favourite medium for reading. Right now I have several on the go (including a great read, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak), but I don’t need to strain my arms carrying all of them when I go somewhere. They’re all tucked away, byte by byte, in a few ”apps” on my iPad. My favourites are the Kindle and Kobo apps for iPad.

Other ebook benefits include: 1) you can change the font and text size at any time to suit your fancy; 2) you can read white text on black with the lights out in bed, so as not to disturb your spouse!; 3) you can add electronic notes in the margins or highlight favourite texts with ease; 4) you can check a built-in dictionary when new words arise; 5) making a bookmark by turning down an e-page seems a lot less harmful than folding a ‘real’ page in a pristine paper book; and, wait for it… 6) ebooks are cheaper, although to me they still seem a tad high given how much easier they are to make.

And did I mention that you can carry a library of books (plus magazines and newspapers), read and unread, easily under your arm in a compact, lightweight device?

It won’t be long before ebooks comprise the majority of book industry sales. For those who haven’t tried an ereader yet, I would recommend you borrow a friend’s or relative’s and give it a spin. You can also test drive a library ebook on your desktop, laptop, or smartphone and get ready for the revolution.

Just make sure you’ve charged the batteries before hitting the couch or walking out the door.

- Lyle