Category Archives: Technology

New Powerhouse Museum WordPress plugin launched

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Seb Chan and the team at Powerhouse Museum in Sydney certainly likes to make sure they stay one step ahead of everyone else in the museums sector, and they’ve proved it once again with the launch of a custom WordPress plugin that interfaces with their collections information through the API (which, of course, they have had up and running for ages).

Here’s a little test.

  • Length of toy train track, made by Mettoy
    85/2577-325 Length of toy train track, tin plate, made by Mettoy, England, 1934-1954
  • Photograph of Avro cadet trainer plane A6-17
    88/289-147 Photographic glass plate negative, Avro Cadet trainer aircraft A6-17 on float, Clyde Engineering Pty Ltd, Australia, 1941
  • Malietoa supporters trained by Lieutenant Gaunt, Apia, Samoa, 1899
    85/1284-1481 Photographic negative, Malietoa supporters trained by Lieutenant Gaunt marching through the streets of Apia, gelatin / glass, photographer unknown, published by Kerry and Co., Apia, Upolu, Samoa, March 1899
  • Bicycle training rollers used by Ron Cazey
    2007/53/2 Bicycle training rollers, metal / rubber, maker unknown, used by Ron Cazey, Ashfield, New South Wales, Australia, 1930s
  • Optical projector array from Fleetwork Trainer
    98/113/2 Optical Projector Array, Fleetwork Trainer component, metal / alloy / electronic components, commissioned by the Communications School, HMAS Cerberus, Victoria, Australia, made by Research Engineers Ltd, London, England, 1966
  • Womens raincoat designed by Pierre Cardin
    86/574 Raincoat, womens, plastic / nylon / taffeta, designed by Pierre Cardin, Paris, France, worn by Wiska Listwan, Australia, 1975- 1980
  • Tin plate toy carriage from train set
    85/2587-26 Toy carriage, from train set, tin plate, made by Meccano, England, c. 1937
  • Concept drawings for the 4th Generation 'Millennium' train
    2006/52/7 Drawings (3), concept sketches and renderings for the 4th generation 'Millennium' train, paper, made by TDI (Transport Design International) and Design Resource Australia, Crows Nest, New South Wales, Australia, 1995-1997
  • A Korean rain gauge
    92/156 Rain gauge, cast iron, designed by Jang Yeong-sil 1442, made in Korea, 1990
  • Audio tapes of talks by Mr Paul Trainor 1986.
    2005/187/24 Audio tapes with cases (2), talk by Paul Trainor recorded in 1986, audio tape / plastic, made in Japan, used in Australia, 1986
  • 'Rainforest' vase by Ola Hoeglund and Marie Simberg- Hoeglund
    2000/97/1 Vase, 'Rainforest', crystal glass, made by Ola Hoeglund and Marie Simberg- Hoeglund, Nelson, New Zealand, 2000
  • Length of toy train track, made by Mettoy
    85/2577-323 Length of toy train track, tin plate, made by Mettoy, England, 1934-1954
  • Bottle of 'Pattinsons Brain and Nerve Tonic'
    2002/53/5 Proprietary pharmaceutical, 'Pattinsons Brain & Nerve Tonic', in glass bottle, Washington H Soul Pattinson & Co Ltd, Sydney & Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, [1955-1975]
  • Packet of 'Fink's Compound Syrup of Hypophosphites Nerve & Brain Tonic'
    2002/53/6 Packaging for proprietary pharmaceutical, 'Fink's Compound Syrup of Hypophosphites Nerve & Brain Tonic', cardboard, manufacturer and place of manufacture unknown, [1955-1975]
  • Photograph albums containing graduating classes from AusAID training centre
    2008/198/12 Photograph albums (2), containing photographs of course attendees and functions, plastic / paper, photographers unknown, used by the AusAID Centre for Pacific Development and Training, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1974-1995
  • Rain Clouds
    P3548-291 Photographic negative, rain clouds, glass / gelatin, photographed by James Short and Henry Chamberlain Russell, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Sydney Observatory, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1891-1900
  • Length of toy train track, made by Mettoy
    85/2577-326 Length of toy train track, tin plate, made by Mettoy, England, 1934-1954
  • Two rain gauge measuring cylinders.
    85/1913 Rain gauges (2), measuring cylinders, glass, made by Angelo Tornaghi, used at Sydney Observatory, New South Wales, Australia, 1861-1900
  • Model of a brig, made & presented by the boys on the training ship "Sobraon".
    H1697 Model of a brig made & presented by the boys on the training ship "Sobraon" (SB).
  • Toy train 'Spirit of Progress'
    85/2589-77 Toy steam locomotive, 'Gold Chief' Victorian Railways' 'Spirit of Progress', 4-6-2, electrically-operated, 0-gauge, metal, made by Maurlyn Manufacturing Pty Ltd, Redfern, NSW, 1951-1957

More automatic tagging tools discovered and tested

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I’ve just discovered two more services – Alchemy and Zemanta – and also a couple of extra WordPress plugins to use these and automatically suggest and add tags.  One simply uses the Alchemy API, but by far the most advanced I’ve uncovered yet is Simple Tags which pulls in tags from Local Tags (I think that’s a list of tags already used), Yahoo, OpenCalais, Alchemy, Zemanta, and Tag the Net.  So here’s a bit more text to test them out, focussed on geographic terms …

Hatfield has been in the papers again this week.  It’s where I went to secondary school.  I used to cycle 6 miles each way, each day, including the climb up Bell Bar (near Potters Bar) which was about half way from Cuffley.

OpenCalais tagging service and WordPress plugins

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I’ve just installed two WordPress Plugins to test out automated tagging systems. I’m also really interested in automated geotagging, but not sure if that’s available. For example, if I say that this post is about London, does it add lat long tags? Could these be used to create a map?

These are the two plugins:

The autotagger suggested the following for this post (before I entered this sentence of course):

World Wide Web
PHP programming language
Computing
Blog software
Content management systems
WordPress
Information
Geographic information systems
Web 2.0
Geotagging
Tag
London,Greater London,United Kingdom
London
automated tagging systems
I had already added: OpenCalais, tags, tagger, automatic

Yourls self hosted shorturl service

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Just discovered a self-hosted php/mysql url shortening tool – Yourls – which is giving me some ideas about a shorturl/permalink service for the museums sector, prompted when Flickr wouldn’t let me either post the full link to an image on the Imperial War Museum collections database, nor let me post a bit.ly or tinyurl shorturl.

Anyway, this is just a test to see how it works, and the WordPress widget to automatically post to Twitter (a bit crazy testing it with a domain the length of catchingtherain.com of course!).

Imperial War Museum panorama

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Another experimental panorama, this time at the Imperial War Museum. Most of the main attractions are set as highlights, but Microsoft Silverlight is very frustrating in that it doesn’t allow users to hover over something in the scene and find out more. In fact it’s not very good at displaying information at all – I’d have thought it would at least show captions from the titles and descriptions that you set!

Wait a little while and it should automatically go through the highlights, or just click on the thumbnails to the right (again, there must be something not quite right with a piece of software if you have to give people guidance on how to do the basics!)

I’d suggest opening full screen for maximum impact, or see the original on photosyth.net