Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Northwest History Goes Mobile

Did you know that Blogger has a mobile setting? It will automatically detect when someone reaches your blog via a mobile device and format your blog accordingly. Details here.

This discovery is a spin off of my spending that day at the Museums and Mobile virtual conference. It was my first virtual conference and it was very well-done. Much of the conversation was about apps--native versus web apps, iOS versus Android, developing them in-house versus hiring someone to develop your institution's virtual presence.

A lot of the technical models on display were big solutions for big museums. Form some committees, hire a developer or a firm, choose an OS, get the right voice talent (I kid you not), secure copyright, etc. Tens of thousands of dollars and year later, you have something spectacular. But I couldn't see where I or my students fit into the models. At one point I tweeted something like "Where is the Blogger for mobile?"

A quick Google search later and I found that Blogger had anticipated my need. One click and I was done. You can view this site in its mobile version here. I am excited about the possibilities. Perhaps we can use Blogger to create a mobile tour of a historic district? (You can now geotag posts as well, so it seems possible.) Use Blogger to generate the HTML to appear in the place marks on a Google Map or Google Earth?

2 comments:

D. Babb said...

Thanks, Larry! I've been looking for this option in Blogger but didn't find it until I read your post.

http://ploughlibrary.blogspot.com/?m=1

Larry Cebula said...

It is pretty obscure, isn't it? Apparently it has been available since last year.