Day: June 30, 2009

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LOC Hits iTunes U

Blog. Twitter. YouTube.  iTunes.  Yeah, we speak Web 2.0.

You nation’s Library has millions of stories to tell, so we’re trying to tell them as many places and to as many people as possible–whether on our own website or elsewhere.  And now you can add another biggie to the list: iTunes U.

via Hey U, Tune In: The Library Is Now on iTunes U « Library of Congress Blog.

Importantly, everything available on the LOC iTunes U area is also on the regular old web at www.loc.gov, so we are not required to sign-up for an iTunes account to get at Library of Congress material. Putting stuff into iTunes U is just another point of access. Some major universities would do well to follow this example instead of locking their materials into Apples silo.

BTW, since iTunes U is now directly available on the iPhone/iTouch you can d/l a lot of cool stuff from anywhere.

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FreeCourtDockets Offers, well, Free Court Dockets

FreeCourtDockets is a new, free service which allows anyone to retrieve federal civil, criminal, and bankruptcy court dockets, as well as dockets from the US Supreme Court, Court of Claims, and Court of International Trade. The site is the product of Courtport LLC.

No PACER account is required to view the dockets, but if you wish to view the filings for a case, a PACER account is needed. FreeCourtDockets provides direct links to the filings in PACER.

via WisBlawg – From the UW Law Library: New Source for Free Federal Court Dockets – No PACER Required.

Good review of this new free service. In this case it looks like “free” means “no charge but we are going to bombard you with ads to try and generate some revenue”. I’d be a bit happier if the site was a bit more forthcoming about who is behind and where the data is coming from, but I’ve always been a fan of a good “About” page.

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Serna Free XML Editor

Serna Free XML editor is an easy-to-use WYSIWYG XML application intended for students, open-source project developers, and other non-commercial users. Indeed, Serna Free is the most powerful among free XML editors for WYSIWYG authoring.

via Serna Free XML Editor, Best Free XML Editor, Free WYSIWYG XML Application for Students, Open-Source Projects, and Personal Use | Syntext.

Comes with an assortment of DTDs built-in and will publish to HTML and PDF. At first glance seems useful, but as with XML editors generally, if you are not familiar with the structure of the document you want to create it can be tough going.