Omeka.net

The Omeka team is reaching for the clouds with the impending arrival of Omeka.net, a hosted web service that will bring standards-based online collections and exhibitions to the internet cloud. Be first in line for an invitation to try the free Omeka.net Alpha, including a special bundle of plugins, themes, and storage, when it launches in April.

Omeka.net is a project of the Center for History and New Media, George Mason University. Omeka.net is an outgrowth of the Omeka project. Omeka launched in 2008 as a free, flexible, and open source web-publishing platform for the display of library, museum, archives, and scholarly collections and exhibitions. Omeka is designed with non-IT specialists in mind, allowing users to focus on content and interpretation rather than programming. It brings Web 2.0 technologies and approaches to academic and cultural websites to foster user interaction and participation. It makes top-shelf design easy with a simple and flexible templating system. Its robust open-source developer and user communities underwrite Omeka’s stability and sustainability.

Omeka.net will expand Omeka’s current offerings with a completely web-based service. No server or programming experience required. Similar to services offered by WordPress, the popular open-source blogging software, with the launch of Omeka.net users will be able to sign up for a free hosted Omeka site. Just create a username and password, and your online collection or exhibition is up and running.

This new hosted web service will further the Omeka project’s mission to make collections-based online publishing more accessible to small cultural heritage institutions, individual scholars, enthusiasts, educators, and students.

Read more about the Omeka project

Repositories and the cloud – useful links via JISC

Links prepared for the JISC and Eduserv  meeting to discuss repositories and the cloud on Tuesday 23rd of February. Full details are on the event website and Andy Powell has written a great blog post introducing the event and asking for people’s views. See, also, repositories in the cloud report for a recap of the event.

Repository specific links:

• The JISC Fedorazon project looked at setting up a repository on Amazon’s cloud offering
• The ePrints team are investigating the use of the cloud 
• Information about DuraSpace’s DuraCloud project

General cloud information:

• The national institute of Science and Technology produced a good definition of cloud computing
• There’s a JISC CETIS activity group looking at cloud computing in institutions which has produced some really useful documents
• The Tower and the Cloud, an Educause ebook about cloud computing is a detailed overview of the cloud and Higer Education
• Cornell University has a useful overview on outsourcing and cloud computing for universities
• Berkeley published an interesting, academic view of the cloud

JISC links:

• Cloud computing in the JISC strategy
• Technical review of cloud computing for research
• Using cloud computing for research
• Review of the environmental impacts of the cloud
• James Farnhill collects links to resources about cloud computing that he’s found useful on his delicious account

Repositories and the Cloud Report

JISC/Eduserve event Repositories and the Cloud – twitter stream from the event. Videos and slides of the presentations have been posted. Also, check out Gareth Johnston @ U o L Library Blog. He  posts a good recap of the event.

code{4}lib

Interested in library use and developments in cloud computing, metadata, application development, and mobile application design for libraries, then code{4}lib is for you. Here are links to Code{4}Lib2010 notes thanks to BeanWorks!

Day 1 Morning

Day 1 Afternoon

Day 2 Morning

Day 2 Aternoon

Day 3