Final Project: Up and Running

In light of the realization that I still hadn’t published my supplementary Google Earth supporting website and that Professor Ross mentioned in class that he needs us to publish everything so he can review it, I have published my website in its close to final form. As the final product is now due Monday April 15th, my website will be up and operational until the final due date and I will continue to make edits until that time, so keep visiting the site as small changes will be continuously made. The dropbox function for Wix which I used last week to attach my Google Earth map worked excellent. After a trial run, I am pretty happy with how things turned out, however, while exploring my site I kept running in to bits of information I need to add or things that need to be changed which I had previously missed, so I’ll need to do a little bit of work to get my website, particularly my Google Earth map in final form. If you would like to visit my supplementary site, follow the hyperlink provided. There you will find my Google Earth map. As we are all now in the late stages of this project, I would appreciate any feedback, comments, or concerns anyone might have about the website. Enjoy!

A Review of Vanessa Szparko’s Final Project

In terms of Vanessa’s final project, unfortunately I was not able to access her Wix page at vszparko.wix.com/szparkohistory. This being said, my review today will be primarily focussed on Vanessa’s in-class presentation. Firstly, I think Vanessa has done an excellent job of explaining her process of sources and data acquisition and has been fairly knowledgeable on every source she has presented to the class. Vanessa has been quite fortunate to have access to so much material on her family history but it appears to have been well synthesized and the examples of the pages on her website proves that Vanessa made a good choice in choosing Wix as a host for her materials. I thought it was also a nice touch for Vanessa to have used contemporary photos as well as it provides a more linear, easy to understand record of her family history. On this point, I may hold a bias as I as well chose to include a substantial number of contemporary photos. I found Vanessa’s choice of Wix interesting for the type of project she is doing. Vanessa expressed that she found Wix to be a good, easy to use, but still functional platform for her project. From what I recall from her presentation, I think it did work for her quite well, especially for her desire to present the content of her website in a customizable fashion. In terms of the photos Vanessa has used, I think Wix was the right choice, especially over Omeka. As an Omeka user myself, I found some of the information that space on the site is set aside for quite frustrating and time consuming to fill out, especially with photos that I myself took (I, of course, understand the need for proper citation for other sources). With the exception of government issued documents, for which information would be very interesting to see, I think that the types of sources Vanessa is using, for example, family photographs and the like, are well suited to a more casual platform such as Wix. Additionally, I would assume that Vanessa will not encounter the same copyright fears that others might encounter as most of her sources are family sources and dated government documents. This makes the need for a site with detailed information segments unnecessary. All in all, I think Vanessa did a good job explaining tool acquisition. Though she perhaps could have touched on it a little more in her presentation, I can tell from Vanessa’s blog posts that she invested a significant amount of time and effort into her project and clearly this project worked well with Vanessa’s self directed learning abilities. Another aspect of her presentation which Vanessa did not touch upon much (probably because it is so self explanatory) is where her project fits within digital humanities as a broader subject. Obviously, the project is intended to be a family resource, but I am curious as to whether enough information is provided as to facilitate scholarship. Had I thought of it when Professor Ross suggested I ask a question or two, I would have inquired about this.

Final Project Update

Since my last blog post a lot has happened in terms of my final project. Firstly, i have begun experimenting with Google Earth. I was very impressed with how easy it was to use this software to visualize a particular landscape. Using the polygon feature, I was able to map out St. Patrick’s Ward in translucent green and add some place markers. Additionally, I visited Jenny Marvin who helped me digitize a selection of maps ranging from 1855 to 1989. Furthermore, I am contemplating cropping some of these maps and creating layers of maps over my Google Earth map of the Ward allowing website visitors to gain a truly visual sense of change, especially considering that in the 1855 map, the Ward does not yet exist. I have also visited the Wellington Museum website and have found some excellent photographic resources to use for my website. Some of them are covered by copyright, so I will have to request photos and wait to hear back on their status. I have also contacted the Guelph Civic Museum and will begin searching their collections as soon as I have the time. In terms of research, my efforts have been a bit scattered as I am covering such a vast topic and I am beginning to worry about website content. In terms of web tools, I have set up an account with Omeka which looks to be a good fit for a historical based website. Omeka has an ample array of plug-ins, however, I may need to link visitors to my Google Earth map on my University of Guelph host site. I took a look at Anje’s suggestions for my project and found them to be helpful. I will definitely incorporate a bibliography as well as links where I can. A walking tour should be fairly feasible for me, however, printable versions already exist and, as such, I question how much I would really be adding to the works of others in doing so.

There is a lot of work to be done, but I will continue my work and keep you all updated on what I am up to.