I've been thinking for a while about trying to develop a module on "Working with dates and times in Python" that would cover several scenarios and several of the sundry ways of dealing with them. If you think of it, I'd be curious to know what kinds of date/time arithmetic, comparisons, and manipulations librarians might want.
It might not be useful, per se, but examples from acquisition and circulation might be useful. Scenario 1: Tracking an item's acquisition and history might involve, date item identified and entered for acquisition, date ordered, date received, date cataloged, date added to 'New items', date removed from 'New items' and added to general circualation, date withrdawn from collection, date disposed. Someone might want to know statistics about several of those time intervals, also about seasonal trends in acquisition, etc. Scenario 2: Tracking an item's, or a title's, circulation history. Popular items often have high demand when first acquired, e.g., the latest best-selling thriller, that then tapers off. Looking at how many copies are in circulation over time, how many requests are on those titles, might be useful. Take historical data for, say, the last three Michael Connelly novels, then use that to help inform acquisition of the upcoming release. Do those sound useful or applicable? Are there other uses that the librarians would be interested in seeing? If someone could provide suitably anonymized data for something like that, or any other date/time related task, I'd be happy to try to make an example or two of date and time manipulation that would be suitable. -- bennet On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 10:59 PM, David Riordan <[email protected]> wrote: > Hey Bill (et al), > > One of the biggest things we learned at the SWC we hosted at The New York > Public Library a few weeks ago with Greg, Cam, Jason, and Tim was that > librarians really respond well to examples tailored to their focus areas > (when the task is hard, the example isn't relatable, and there aren't any > stakes, it's tough to keep focus). Cam Macdonnell, who's become SWC's > libraries expert, has a really great blog post summarizing the 3 library > events he's done and has some really key lessons learned. > > Anyhow for MozFest; we're thinking of trying to figure out what the right > way to create content that's relevant to librarians will be. Starting with > Software Carpentry's existing material (which we know works damn well) and > looking beyond, trying to figure out what the landscape looks like for > relevant and pedagogically sound "Learn to code for libraries" material. > > All of which is to say, should be pretty exciting. > > Best, > Dave > > David Riordan | NYPL Labs | @NYPL_Labs > [email protected] | m 203.521.1222 | @riordan > > > On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 7:38 PM, Kaitlin Thaney > <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> Thanks, Bill! >> >> Dave Riordan (NYPL), Jeffrey Lancaster (Columbia) and a few others are >> working on a library session for the sprint. Looping them in above. Care to >> link them with Cynthia? >> >> Thanks! >> K >> >> sent on the move. apologies for typos. >> >> >> > On 21 Aug 2014, at 18:42, Bill Mills <[email protected]> wrote: >> > >> > Hi all, >> > >> > Are any SWC people coming to MozFest? Cynthia Ng from the public >> > library circuit in Vancouver wrote the following proposal, but would like >> > at >> > least one SWC person to help facilitate as a co-presenter. Cynthia is >> > interested in starting a discussion to figure out how to adapt the SWC >> > curriculum and model to best suit librarians looking to jump in to the >> > skillset SWC offers. >> > >> > MozFest or no, I know there's been some movement in this space >> > especially in the Toronto area - can anyone help patch Cynthia in to >> > lessons >> > learned there, and future plans for SWC in librarianship? There's a lot of >> > interest in the Vancouver area in this, but we'd like to attack this goal >> > with the wider community as we get started. Thanks in advance! >> > >> > Bill Mills >> > Community Manager, >> > Mozilla Science Lab >> > >> > * Title of session: >> > GLAM Software Carpentry: Building a Practical Curriculum >> > (I am really bad with titles) >> > >> > * Session length: >> > Thinking 90 minutes, but not sure if that too much/too little time. >> > >> > * What will your session or activity allow people to make, learn or do? >> > Software carpentry has been very popular with scientists, and now >> > interest is building to expand software carpentry for people who work >> > in galleries, libraries, archives, museums, and similar organizations. >> > >> > We want to get feedback on how the current curriculum might fit for >> > this audience. Facilitors will ask participants to discuss and answer >> > some questions, such as: What topics are relevant? What topics might >> > be missing? If so, are there existing resources out there already >> > teaching these topics? What practical work tasks do you envision this >> > curriculum helping with? >> > >> > By the end of the session, we hope to have a proposed outline for a >> > software carpentry curriculum targeted for GLAM folks. >> > >> > Having a laptop or tablet will be helpful so that participants can >> > view and browse the current software carpentry curriculum. >> > >> > * How do you see that working? >> > After a brief introduction to review the goals of the session and >> > where to find relevant information, participants will be broken up >> > into groups to brainstorm answers to the questions presented, writing >> > them down, then reporting back. >> > >> > Based on the feedback, facilitators can move topics around on a board >> > (or wall) to work out the proposed curriculum. >> > >> > * How will you deal with varying numbers of participants in your >> > session? >> > People can be broken up into smaller or larger, more or less groups >> > depending on the number of participants. With a very small number (5 >> > or less), everyone can stay as a single group. >> > >> > With a large number, there may be many groups, but reporting back can >> > be cut down by only reporting ideas that have not been reported by >> > other groups. >> > >> > * What do you see as outcomes after the festival? How will you and >> > your participants take the learning and activities forward? >> > Participants will have the opportunity to help shape the curriculum >> > that is currently in development. >> > >> > Facilitators will get more feedback and ideas on how best to develop >> > the curriculum, possible resources for any proposed new topics, and a >> > possible outline for the currculum. >> > >> > * Theme: >> > Open Science and the web >> > >> > >> > _______________________________________________ >> > Discuss mailing list >> > [email protected] >> > >> > http://lists.software-carpentry.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss_lists.software-carpentry.org > > > > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.software-carpentry.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss_lists.software-carpentry.org _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.software-carpentry.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss_lists.software-carpentry.org
