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Whenever I’m around people using computers to do things I think are cool, I notice lots of unfamiliar applications and workflows. I’m wondering if a productive conversation for some of us to have would be to talk through our favorite software, hardware, and tools for the humanities things we use technology to accomplish the things we accomplish. Something along the lines of The Setup, but all together, in a room, where we can demonstrate things and recommend things to each other.

I’m thinking questions we could answer could include:

• What is your favorite text editor/word processor, and why?
• What is your screenshot workflow?
• What databases, archives, catalogs, or collections are essential to your work?
• What is your academic writing workflow?
• What do you carry with you when you travel for research or conferences?
• What technologies do you use in the classroom?
• How do you read/manage/save things you read online?
• What are some free/open source alternatives to well-known expensive packages?
• What’s in your browser’s bookmarks bar?
• What are your backup practices?

I’m mostly interested in bringing the practical matters of our work activities into the conversation. Sometimes learning a handful of new tools for personal use can transform the way we approach our work, but even if I learn about something that saves me 2-3 minutes or a modicum of frustration on a daily basis, I will be grateful.

We will be meeting in the lower level of Bird Library for Friday’s THATCamp–breakfast will be served by 9am in room 004.

For those traveling from outside of Syracuse University, limited free and metered parking (meters need feeding every 2 hours) is available on nearby streets (particularly on Walnut north of the library). Pay parking is available in the Booth Garage at the corner of Waverly and Comstock Avenues, in the University Ave Garage at the corners of University Avenue and East Adams and Harrison Streets, or in the Sheraton Hotel parking garage at the corner of University and Waverly Avenues. Please visit Syracuse University’s Parking and Transit Services’ Visitor and Guest Parking and Parking Directions web pages for more information.

I propose a session to talk about the playful aspects of electronic literature and web writing. We’ll see some example projects, explore some tools, and mess with digital text in a variety of ways, thinking about pedagogical and creative uses of text on the web and the tools we have to create, unmake, and distribute them.

Guiding principles:

the web is not read-only

text + interactivity = fun

you don’t need to know how to write a computer program to write a computer program

e-literature = “works with important literary aspects that take advantage of the capabilities and contexts provided by the stand-alone or networked computer.”

For some background information and a sneak peek at the tools we’ll be using, check out:
reallysystem.org/cny2017