Collaborate Ultra – Digital Learning Applications and Media

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Diag====| HTTP [https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/feed/?tag=dlam-feed] ⌉ array(6) { ["headers"]=> object(WpOrg\Requests\Utility\CaseInsensitiveDictionary)#2401 (1) { ["data":protected]=> array(12) { ["content-type"]=> string(34) "application/rss+xml; charset=UTF-8" ["date"]=> string(29) "Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:35:35 GMT" ["server"]=> string(6) "Apache" ["x-powered-by"]=> string(10) "PHP/8.3.31" ["expires"]=> string(29) "Thu, 19 Nov 1981 08:52:00 GMT" ["cache-control"]=> string(35) "no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate" ["pragma"]=> string(8) "no-cache" ["link"]=> string(194) "<https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-json/>; rel="https://api.w.org/", <https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-json/wp/v2/tags/8>; rel="alternate"; title="JSON"; type="application/json"" ["set-cookie"]=> array(3) { [0]=> string(62) "PHPSESSID=aj6tk46at7of9s7ssa69p46t96; path=/; secure; HttpOnly" [1]=> string(139) "spo_2048_fa=1f6a19a4a61ea1542b1e6b34a077e786; expires=Mon, 15 Jun 2026 15:05:35 GMT; Max-Age=1800; path=/sliceoflearning/; Secure; HttpOnly" [2]=> string(125) "RCKBMHKB=027ff8be59-56fd-48CvPN_EmOtirxUW85WVosNK3uMB49buEvon3HEXjH2fSKynsURyOWQs37eYv_Xi7YApk; path=/; SameSite=None; Secure" } ["last-modified"]=> string(29) "Mon, 05 Sep 2022 13:49:32 GMT" ["etag"]=> string(34) ""3f92756d9ecbe74d271c36001f3864b1"" ["vary"]=> string(15) "Accept-Encoding" } } ["body"]=> string(31884) "<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" > <channel> <title>dlam-feed – A Slice of Learning</title> <atom:link href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/feed/?tag=dlam-feed" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning</link> <description></description> <lastBuildDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2020 15:04:52 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en-GB</language> <sy:updatePeriod> hourly </sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency> 1 </sy:updateFrequency> <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5</generator> <cc:license >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</cc:license><dc:rights >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</dc:rights> <item> <title>More about Blogs.ed and Plugins</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[James Slack]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Wed, 23 Sep 2020 15:22:18 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[Uncategorised]]></category> <category><![CDATA[dlam-feed]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/?p=176</guid> <description><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutesProcesses and Plugins I admit, I may be cheating a little here. As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>Processes and Plugins</h1> I admit, I may be cheating a little here. As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own WordPress Multisite at your institution, as ever, if you want to discuss this feel free to get in touch. Firstly let’s talk about how we go about selecting Plugins. We start to look when multiple users all ask for the same of similar plugin/function or if we encounter and issue that needs a plugin to be resolved. Thankfully we have an inhouse development team that can be called on if we cannot find something which is a blessing but they support multiple platforms so we do need to have good reason. If we do find a plugin or multiple plugins then we start to investigate whether they actually resolve our issue and if they add any issues or have unexpected behaviour, so far this seems to make basic sense. We have, however, developed a process to audit plugins to ascertain whether they are well supported, well reviewed and also if they contain privacy invasive cookies using the following criteria: <table width="99%"> <tbody> <tr> <td>Plugin / theme name:</td> <td>Yes / no</td> <td>Comments</td> <td>Date requested</td> <td>Date installed</td> </tr> <tr> <td>What does it do?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>How much does it cost? <ul> <li>Cost of adoption</li> <li>Cost of training</li> <li>Cost of usage</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Author background</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Is the documentation good?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Who will use the add-on? <ul> <li>admins / authors</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Feedback / reviews <ul> <li>Is it used by many, reviews / comments</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Technical status: <ul> <li>Is it up to date, compatible with our version of wordpress?</li> <li>Is it well written?</li> <li>Does it backup/restore?</li> <li>Is it secure?</li> <li>Is data shared outside of wordpress?</li> <li>Type of cookies set</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Accessibility: <ul> <li>Check any spellcheck functionality on free data entry boxes/forms that is either automatically run by the system or that requires users interaction</li> <li>Describe any data validation that is automatically run by the system to ensure users enter data in the correct formats. Check error messages are in sufficient colour contrast, accessible font, clear location, not pop ups.</li> <li>Check whether the template scales correctly using different resolutions and whether there are any resolutions that are not recommended, tested using ctrl + and Windows Magnifier</li> <li>Check the colours and colour contrasts and font types and styles used i.e. are italics and continuous capitals avoided?</li> <li>Check functionality that would allow users to customise their views (i.e. font size, colours, contrast ratios). This is by altering browser settings.</li> <li>Check whether all content is accessible through a keyboard interface and whether it requires specific timings for keystrokes. I.e. is it possible to navigate around the template and complete any forms etc without ever using a mouse.</li> <li>Check there is an indication or warning of links which will open a new tab or window and check that these warnings are accessible</li> <li>Check that the template conveys no information in only colour or sound.</li> <li>Check there is no flashing or scrolling text? If so does the text flash 3 or more times per second and can it be paused? If there is flashing or scrolling text please provide more details.</li> <li>Check that Zoomtext is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that JAWS is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that TextHelp Read and Write Gold is compatible with the template in terms of spellcheck, hover highlight and highlight and read without plug ins.</li> <li>Check that tooltips are clear and enabled by default on the template.</li> </ul> · Check that there are text alternatives for any non-text content. <ul> <li>Check that for any audio/visual items are there captions available and theses have been checked for accuracy.</li> <li>Check there are no time limits prescribed for the viewing/inputting of content to the template</li> <li>Check what specialist help is linked to on the template and that this includes a method of contacting someone for assistance?</li> <li>Check that if the template is accessed via a mobile or tablet device the user system does not require to use any requires any specific timings/specific keystrokes to complete tasks</li> <li>Check the template works with mobiles/tablets to offer any text to speech functionality of the results for those with visual impairments?</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> You can also read more about this process in this blog post by Callum, one of the original service managers who has since moved to greener pastures (about 5 metres away when we were in the office) – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/dlam/2019/04/08/cookie-audit-findings/">Cookie Audit Process Blog</a> Lastly, here is a comprehensive list of all of the plugins that we currently use, all of these have been vetted through our process so should provide a good starting point. <h3>Plugins</h3> <table width="1132"> <tbody> <tr> <td width="270">Plugin</td> <td width="225">Developer</td> <td width="511">Description</td> <td width="126">Network Activated?</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Add Existing Users</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Allows you to bulk add existing users to a site, including the facility to set their role.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="http://addmultipleusers.happynuclear.com/">Add Multiple Users</a></td> <td>HappyNuclear</td> <td width="511">This plugin allows you to add multiple user accounts to your WordPress blog using a range of tools.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="https://akismet.com/">Akismet Anti-Spam</a></td> <td>Automattic</td> <td width="511">Used by millions, Akismet is quite possibly the best way in the world to protect your blog from spam. Your site is fully configured and being protected, even while you sleep.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Batch Create</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Create hundred or thousands of blogs and users automatically by simply uploading a csv text file – subdomain and user creation automation has never been so easy.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>BeeHive Pro</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Basicall Google Analytics, users can use their own ID or apply for access to the University managed one</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Broken Link Checker</td> <td>ManageWP</td> <td width="511">Checks your blog for broken links and missing images and notifies you on the dashboard if any are found.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Classic Editor</td> <td>WordPress Contributers</td> <td width="511">Enabled at network level to remove block editor default</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>CommentPress Core</td> <td><a href="http://www.futureofthebook.org/"> Institute for the Future of the Book</a></td> <td width="511">CommentPress allows readers to comment in the margins of a text. You can use it to annotate, gloss, workshop, debate and more!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cookies for Comment</td> <td><a href="http://ocaoimh.ie/"> Donncha O Caoimh</a></td> <td width="511">Sets a cookie that must exist for a comment to be allowed through</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cryout Series Slider</td> <td><a href="http://www.cryoutcreations.eu/">Cryout Creations</a></td> <td width="511">accessibility ready free image slider for WordPress.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Disable Comments</td> <td><a href="http://www.rayofsolaris.net/">Samir Shah</a></td> <td width="511">Allows administrators to globally disable comments on their site. Comments can be disabled according to post type.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="https://gitlab.is.ed.ac.uk/is-dlam/academic-blogging-project/ed-solr">EdSolr</a></td> <td>UoE</td> <td width="511">Integrates Apache Solr with a WordPress Multisite Installation.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Email Subscribers & Newsletters</td> <td><a href="https://www.icegram.com/"> Icegram</a></td> <td width="511">Add subscription forms on website, send HTML newsletters, and automatically notify subscribers about new blog posts once they are published.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Enlighter – Customizable Syntax Highlighter</td> <td><a href="https://andidittrich.com/">Andi Dittrich</a></td> <td width="511">Syntax Highlighter</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>FeedWordPress</td> <td><a href="https://feedwordpress.radgeek.com/contact/"> C. Johnson</a></td> <td width="511">simple and flexible Atom/RSS syndication for WordPress</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Flickr Album Gallery</td> <td>FARAZFRANK</td> <td>Flickr Album Gallery is on JS API plugin to display all public Flickr albums on your WordPress website.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Force Regenerate Thumbnails</td> <td><a href="http://www.pedroelsner.com/">Pedro Elsner</a></td> <td width="511">Delete and REALLY force the regenerate thumbnail.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="http://www.arnebrachhold.de/redir/sitemap-home/">Google XML Sitemaps</a></td> <td><a href="http://www.arnebrachhold.de/"> Arne Brachhold</a></td> <td width="511">This plugin improves SEO using sitemaps for best indexation by search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and others.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Image Attribution Tagger</td> <td><a href="http://red8interactive.com/">Red8 Interactive</a></td> <td width="511">A plugin that adds image credits to licensed images</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>MimeTypes Link Icons</td> <td><a href="https://github.com/eagerterrier/MimeTypes-Link-Icons"> Toby Cox, Juliette Reinders Folmer</a></td> <td width="511">This will add file type icons next to links automatically.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Multisite Plugin Manager</td> <td><a href="http://uglyrobot.com/"> Aaron Edwards</a></td> <td width="511">The essential plugin for every multisite install! Manage plugin access permissions across your entire multisite network.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Multisite Privacy</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Adds more levels of privacy and allows you to control them across all sites – or allow users to override them.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>NS Cloner – Site Copier</td> <td><a href="https://neversettle.it/">Never Settle</a></td> <td width="511">Allows us to create sites from a template</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>NS Cloner Pro</td> <td><a href="https://neversettle.it/">Never Settle</a></td> <td width="511">add-ons to the NS Cloner Core</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Open Attribute</td> <td><a href="http://openattribute.com/">OpenAttribute</a></td> <td width="511"></td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>PDF & Print</td> <td><a href="https://bestwebsoft.com/">BestWebSoft</a></td> <td width="511">Generate PDF files and print WordPress posts/pages. Customize document header/footer styles and appearance.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Reading Time WP</td> <td><a href="https://jasonyingling.me/">Jason Yingling</a></td> <td width="511">Add an estimated reading time to your posts.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Remove Email Verification</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Removes need to send a verification email when adding users to site or blogs</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>TinyMCE Comment Field – WPSIWYG</td> <td><a href="http://www.eracer.de/">Stefan Helmer</a></td> <td width="511">This plugin turns the comment field from a primitive into a WYSIWYG editor, using the internal TinyMCE library bundled with WordPress.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Titan Framework</td> <td><a href="http://gambit.ph/"> Benjamin Intal, Gambit</a></td> <td width="511">Titan Framework allows theme and plugin developers to create a admin pages, options, meta boxes, and theme customizer options with just a few simple lines of code.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>True Multisite Indexer</td> <td><a href="https://rudrastyh.com/">Misha Rudrastyh</a></td> <td width="511">Indexes all posts across your network and brings them into one spot – a very powerful tool that you use as a base to display posts in different ways or to manage your network.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Ultimate Category Excluder</td> <td><a href="http://infolific.com/technology/"> Marios Alexandrou</a></td> <td width="511">Easily exclude categories from your front page, feeds, archives, and search results.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WordPress Importer</td> <td><a href="https://wordpress.org/"> wordpressdotorg</a></td> <td width="511">Import posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories, tags and more from a WordPress export file.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WordPress.com Theme Updates</td> <td><a href="http://automattic.com/"> Automattic</a></td> <td width="511">Update themes downloaded from WordPress.com seamlessly with the rest of your WordPress updates.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP Accessibility</td> <td><a href="http://www.joedolson.com/"> Joe Dolson</a></td> <td width="511">Helps improve accessibility in your WordPress site, like removing title attributes.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP Crontrol</td> <td><a href="https://github.com/johnbillion/wp-crontrol/graphs/contributors"> John Blackbourn & contributors</a></td> <td width="511">WP Crontrol lets you view and control what’s happening in the WP-Cron system.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP QuickLaTeX</td> <td><a href="http://www.holoborodko.com/pavel/">Pavel Holoborodko</a></td> <td width="511">Access to complete LaTeX distribution. Publish formulae & graphics using native LaTeX syntax directly in the text. Inline formulas, displayed equations auto-numbering, labeling and referencing, AMS-LaTeX, TikZ, custom LaTeX preamble. No LaTeX installation required. Easily customizable using UI dialog. Actively developed and maintained. Visit QuickLaTeX homepage for more info.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP to Twitter</td> <td><a href="http://www.joedolson.com/">Joseph C Dolson</a></td> <td width="511">Posts a Tweet when you update your WordPress blog or post a link, using your URL shortener. Rich options to customise and promote your Tweets.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WPMUDEV Dashboard</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Brings the powers of WPMU DEV directly to you. It will revolutionize how you use WordPress. Activate now!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <h3>Themes</h3> <div> <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 48pt;" border="0" width="64" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <colgroup> <col style="width: 48pt;" width="64" /> </colgroup> <tbody> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt; width: 48pt;" width="64" height="19">Theme Name</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Apostrophe 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">AwesomePress</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Baskerville</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Bhari</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Blask</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cyanotype</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Davis</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fluida</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fukasawa</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Garfunkel</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Hitchcock</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Isola</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Lovecraft</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Make</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Period</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Radcliffe</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Sorbet</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">SPLOTpoint</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Tiny Framework</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Fifteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Nineteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Seventeen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Sixteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Twenty</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Writee</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </div> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>Service Inheritance</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/#comments</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[James Slack]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Fri, 14 Aug 2020 16:06:04 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[Uncategorised]]></category> <category><![CDATA[dlam-feed]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/?p=165</guid> <description><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutesHow to Inherit a Service A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>How to Inherit a Service</h1> A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I can drop my old service” “No”. Thankfully I have loved taking over this service, by this service I do actually mean *this* service. I now manage the Academic Blogging service, blogs.ed.ac.uk which is what you are reading this post on. I have blogged in the past but sporadically at best. Managing the service is completely different, managing any service is difficult but managing a service which is designed to be open and allow people to do what they want (to an extent) comes with it’s own interesting challenges, more of that in another post. Today however I wanted to talk more specifically about inheriting a service. It’s something that I hadn’t really thought about before but it struck me that this is the first ‘living’ service that I have taken over. I have a relatively short period of experience of managing learning technology services, roughly 6 years at this point. In that time I have managed two large services but both of these were in their infancy when I got hold. I was able to largely decide what these service should look like, what they would look like and what the policies around them would be. Obviously there is an amount of team work and involvement of other teams in this process but as a service manager the impetus usually came from me. Taking on a new service that has existed before, however, is something completely different. I often enjoy using bad analogies that I tend to stretch to far, so allow me to do this yet again: Inheriting services is like getting an armchair that belonged to someone else (ish). It’s arranged in a different way, it faces the door, it doesn’t go back far enough, it feels a bit to firm and there are Revels tucked into the side of the cushion. Who would put Revels down there, why would they choose Revels of all the things available? <h2>Service Personality</h2> The problem/issue/opportunity is, someone or a group of somebodies have decided how this should work and put it all in place. Now you come in and you’re not sure if you always agree. Most of the time you will but you just need to understand the ‘why’ after seeing the ‘what’ and ‘how’. Most services have a ‘vision’ of sorts attached, usually within the original Project Brief or the Service Level Description (SLD) that sets out the ‘shape’ of the service. This works great in isolation but what often happens is that this clearly defined ‘shape’ then gets released and it tends to need to alter shape to fits its environment in some way. (I DID say I enjoy bad analogies). <h2>Opportunities for Change</h2> I’ve always very strongly believed that getting a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ is possibly one of the most useful things to do when you have a great idea or process. Having someone outside of the ‘organisation’ take a look is often the best way to pick up on things, firstly it forces you to explain why you made a decision and also allows you to be questioned. If you can’t convince someone as to why something works that way then you might want to re-evaluate or compromise with the other view point. I love the following quote, which I believe is attributed to Grace Hopper – “The most dangerous phrase in the language is, ‘We’ve always done it this way’ ” (If you don’t know who Grace Hopper is, please pause and look her up. I will wait) <h2>Inheritance runs both ways</h2> This is the part that surprised me the most when I realised that this was the first service that was secondhand/pre-loved/pre-existing/had a life before me. I started this long monologue talking about how I had inherited something but it seems obvious that the service had also imbibed something from it’s creators and previous owners. There were certain priorities or choices that were made by previous people upon the service, impressions in the surface that had left their mark. I agree with the vast majority of these but some I want to change, based on my priorities or choices that I think make it fit it’s environment in a better way, or a way that appears better to me. Obviously all of this is measured alongside the needs of the current community, I wouldn’t make big changes that negatively impacted people using the service but I may make decisions that change the ‘flavour’ in some ways. <h2>Making it yours or making you part of it</h2> After you have been looking after the service for a short while you will likely find a list of things that don’t really feel right to you. It’s likely that these decisions were made some time ago and might not reflect the needs of the user community anymore. I would say it is important to mention here that we aren’t criticising the previous owners, just using this change as an opportunity to review and also add you own input to the service. Once you have found these areas then try to seek the justification if possible, there could be a very good reason as to why something works like this and not like *this*. If there isn’t a good justification or if that doesn’t really hold anymore then start building your case for making a change and what that change will be. Next you get to take these changes to the service team, working group or user community. If these don’t exist then this is a good chance to make them as having some external input, if only at certain times will greatly improve the service as a whole. Also be sure to check that these changes are actually wanted/needed/will have a positive impact, change for the sake of change is a winding road. Always remember RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed) This is the part that I enjoy the most about managing services, there is a human part even if what *it* is an application running on virtual machines somewhere (I imagine in a basement, because, it has to be). I get to take all of the work that went before and add my layer on top and alter it ever so slightly, like a funky new flavour in your Rainbow Cake – I REALLY DID say that I like bad analogies. <div id="attachment_166" style="width: 696px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-166" class="size-full wp-image-166" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-content/uploads/sites/2048/2020/08/7478835056_c91640ed8c_b.jpg" alt=""Layers from top - Rainbow Birthday Cake" by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0" width="686" height="1024" />“Layers from top – Rainbow Birthday Cake” by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0</div> Takeaways from service inheritance If you are a current service owner <ul> <li>For you managing a service, try to document what decisions were taken and why they were taken, this makes it a lot quicker for someone to get a feel for how the service exists now. Adding the justification really makes a big difference when someone new steps in</li> <li>Even if the service isn’t being taken over by someone else it can be very helpful to get fresh eyes on a service, or to include more people when making the decisions. Working groups or user involvement are very good for this.</li> <li>Try to update original documentation as the service shifts over time, most institutions seem to push for this at intervals but it helps to remember how services can change over time.</li> <li>Include retrospective look backs at the service at regular intervals, perhaps each year. Having a look at the changes that were added, how they were received and whether they helped add something useful to the service is a very rewarding process</li> </ul> If you are taking over an existing service <ul> <li>Getting an overview or introduction to the service is incredibly useful but do bear in mind that it is unlikely that you will be able to understand the entire service after one meeting</li> <li>If possible try to take the previous service owner hostage so that you can refer to them if they didn’t document things</li> <li>Once you have a good understanding of the service highlight the areas that you have issues with. Areas that you don’t understand why something was done in a particular way or why a certain policy exists. Try to find to root cause for these, if they make sense and fit the service you can leave them for now. If that doesn’t fit the service or the user’s need then earmark those areas for change.</li> <li>Add your personal touch, come up with suggestions in these specific areas that you have highlighted and taken them to existing working groups or service team. 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As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>Processes and Plugins</h1> I admit, I may be cheating a little here. As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own WordPress Multisite at your institution, as ever, if you want to discuss this feel free to get in touch. Firstly let’s talk about how we go about selecting Plugins. We start to look when multiple users all ask for the same of similar plugin/function or if we encounter and issue that needs a plugin to be resolved. Thankfully we have an inhouse development team that can be called on if we cannot find something which is a blessing but they support multiple platforms so we do need to have good reason. If we do find a plugin or multiple plugins then we start to investigate whether they actually resolve our issue and if they add any issues or have unexpected behaviour, so far this seems to make basic sense. We have, however, developed a process to audit plugins to ascertain whether they are well supported, well reviewed and also if they contain privacy invasive cookies using the following criteria: <table width="99%"> <tbody> <tr> <td>Plugin / theme name:</td> <td>Yes / no</td> <td>Comments</td> <td>Date requested</td> <td>Date installed</td> </tr> <tr> <td>What does it do?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>How much does it cost? <ul> <li>Cost of adoption</li> <li>Cost of training</li> <li>Cost of usage</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Author background</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Is the documentation good?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Who will use the add-on? <ul> <li>admins / authors</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Feedback / reviews <ul> <li>Is it used by many, reviews / comments</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Technical status: <ul> <li>Is it up to date, compatible with our version of wordpress?</li> <li>Is it well written?</li> <li>Does it backup/restore?</li> <li>Is it secure?</li> <li>Is data shared outside of wordpress?</li> <li>Type of cookies set</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Accessibility: <ul> <li>Check any spellcheck functionality on free data entry boxes/forms that is either automatically run by the system or that requires users interaction</li> <li>Describe any data validation that is automatically run by the system to ensure users enter data in the correct formats. Check error messages are in sufficient colour contrast, accessible font, clear location, not pop ups.</li> <li>Check whether the template scales correctly using different resolutions and whether there are any resolutions that are not recommended, tested using ctrl + and Windows Magnifier</li> <li>Check the colours and colour contrasts and font types and styles used i.e. are italics and continuous capitals avoided?</li> <li>Check functionality that would allow users to customise their views (i.e. font size, colours, contrast ratios). This is by altering browser settings.</li> <li>Check whether all content is accessible through a keyboard interface and whether it requires specific timings for keystrokes. I.e. is it possible to navigate around the template and complete any forms etc without ever using a mouse.</li> <li>Check there is an indication or warning of links which will open a new tab or window and check that these warnings are accessible</li> <li>Check that the template conveys no information in only colour or sound.</li> <li>Check there is no flashing or scrolling text? If so does the text flash 3 or more times per second and can it be paused? If there is flashing or scrolling text please provide more details.</li> <li>Check that Zoomtext is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that JAWS is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that TextHelp Read and Write Gold is compatible with the template in terms of spellcheck, hover highlight and highlight and read without plug ins.</li> <li>Check that tooltips are clear and enabled by default on the template.</li> </ul> · Check that there are text alternatives for any non-text content. <ul> <li>Check that for any audio/visual items are there captions available and theses have been checked for accuracy.</li> <li>Check there are no time limits prescribed for the viewing/inputting of content to the template</li> <li>Check what specialist help is linked to on the template and that this includes a method of contacting someone for assistance?</li> <li>Check that if the template is accessed via a mobile or tablet device the user system does not require to use any requires any specific timings/specific keystrokes to complete tasks</li> <li>Check the template works with mobiles/tablets to offer any text to speech functionality of the results for those with visual impairments?</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> You can also read more about this process in this blog post by Callum, one of the original service managers who has since moved to greener pastures (about 5 metres away when we were in the office) – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/dlam/2019/04/08/cookie-audit-findings/">Cookie Audit Process Blog</a> Lastly, here is a comprehensive list of all of the plugins that we currently use, all of these have been vetted through our process so should provide a good starting point. <h3>Plugins</h3> <table width="1132"> <tbody> <tr> <td width="270">Plugin</td> <td width="225">Developer</td> <td width="511">Description</td> <td width="126">Network Activated?</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Add Existing Users</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Allows you to bulk add existing users to a site, including the facility to set their role.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="http://addmultipleusers.happynuclear.com/">Add Multiple Users</a></td> <td>HappyNuclear</td> <td width="511">This plugin allows you to add multiple user accounts to your WordPress blog using a range of tools.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="https://akismet.com/">Akismet Anti-Spam</a></td> <td>Automattic</td> <td width="511">Used by millions, Akismet is quite possibly the best way in the world to protect your blog from spam. Your site is fully configured and being protected, even while you sleep.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Batch Create</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Create hundred or thousands of blogs and users automatically by simply uploading a csv text file – subdomain and user creation automation has never been so easy.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>BeeHive Pro</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Basicall Google Analytics, users can use their own ID or apply for access to the University managed one</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Broken Link Checker</td> <td>ManageWP</td> <td width="511">Checks your blog for broken links and missing images and notifies you on the dashboard if any are found.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Classic Editor</td> <td>WordPress Contributers</td> <td width="511">Enabled at network level to remove block editor default</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>CommentPress Core</td> <td><a href="http://www.futureofthebook.org/"> Institute for the Future of the Book</a></td> <td width="511">CommentPress allows readers to comment in the margins of a text. You can use it to annotate, gloss, workshop, debate and more!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cookies for Comment</td> <td><a href="http://ocaoimh.ie/"> Donncha O Caoimh</a></td> <td width="511">Sets a cookie that must exist for a comment to be allowed through</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cryout Series Slider</td> <td><a href="http://www.cryoutcreations.eu/">Cryout Creations</a></td> <td width="511">accessibility ready free image slider for WordPress.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Disable Comments</td> <td><a href="http://www.rayofsolaris.net/">Samir Shah</a></td> <td width="511">Allows administrators to globally disable comments on their site. Comments can be disabled according to post type.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="https://gitlab.is.ed.ac.uk/is-dlam/academic-blogging-project/ed-solr">EdSolr</a></td> <td>UoE</td> <td width="511">Integrates Apache Solr with a WordPress Multisite Installation.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Email Subscribers & Newsletters</td> <td><a href="https://www.icegram.com/"> Icegram</a></td> <td width="511">Add subscription forms on website, send HTML newsletters, and automatically notify subscribers about new blog posts once they are published.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Enlighter – Customizable Syntax Highlighter</td> <td><a href="https://andidittrich.com/">Andi Dittrich</a></td> <td width="511">Syntax Highlighter</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>FeedWordPress</td> <td><a href="https://feedwordpress.radgeek.com/contact/"> C. Johnson</a></td> <td width="511">simple and flexible Atom/RSS syndication for WordPress</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Flickr Album Gallery</td> <td>FARAZFRANK</td> <td>Flickr Album Gallery is on JS API plugin to display all public Flickr albums on your WordPress website.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Force Regenerate Thumbnails</td> <td><a href="http://www.pedroelsner.com/">Pedro Elsner</a></td> <td width="511">Delete and REALLY force the regenerate thumbnail.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="http://www.arnebrachhold.de/redir/sitemap-home/">Google XML Sitemaps</a></td> <td><a href="http://www.arnebrachhold.de/"> Arne Brachhold</a></td> <td width="511">This plugin improves SEO using sitemaps for best indexation by search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and others.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Image Attribution Tagger</td> <td><a href="http://red8interactive.com/">Red8 Interactive</a></td> <td width="511">A plugin that adds image credits to licensed images</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>MimeTypes Link Icons</td> <td><a href="https://github.com/eagerterrier/MimeTypes-Link-Icons"> Toby Cox, Juliette Reinders Folmer</a></td> <td width="511">This will add file type icons next to links automatically.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Multisite Plugin Manager</td> <td><a href="http://uglyrobot.com/"> Aaron Edwards</a></td> <td width="511">The essential plugin for every multisite install! Manage plugin access permissions across your entire multisite network.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Multisite Privacy</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Adds more levels of privacy and allows you to control them across all sites – or allow users to override them.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>NS Cloner – Site Copier</td> <td><a href="https://neversettle.it/">Never Settle</a></td> <td width="511">Allows us to create sites from a template</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>NS Cloner Pro</td> <td><a href="https://neversettle.it/">Never Settle</a></td> <td width="511">add-ons to the NS Cloner Core</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Open Attribute</td> <td><a href="http://openattribute.com/">OpenAttribute</a></td> <td width="511"></td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>PDF & Print</td> <td><a href="https://bestwebsoft.com/">BestWebSoft</a></td> <td width="511">Generate PDF files and print WordPress posts/pages. Customize document header/footer styles and appearance.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Reading Time WP</td> <td><a href="https://jasonyingling.me/">Jason Yingling</a></td> <td width="511">Add an estimated reading time to your posts.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Remove Email Verification</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Removes need to send a verification email when adding users to site or blogs</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>TinyMCE Comment Field – WPSIWYG</td> <td><a href="http://www.eracer.de/">Stefan Helmer</a></td> <td width="511">This plugin turns the comment field from a primitive into a WYSIWYG editor, using the internal TinyMCE library bundled with WordPress.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Titan Framework</td> <td><a href="http://gambit.ph/"> Benjamin Intal, Gambit</a></td> <td width="511">Titan Framework allows theme and plugin developers to create a admin pages, options, meta boxes, and theme customizer options with just a few simple lines of code.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>True Multisite Indexer</td> <td><a href="https://rudrastyh.com/">Misha Rudrastyh</a></td> <td width="511">Indexes all posts across your network and brings them into one spot – a very powerful tool that you use as a base to display posts in different ways or to manage your network.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Ultimate Category Excluder</td> <td><a href="http://infolific.com/technology/"> Marios Alexandrou</a></td> <td width="511">Easily exclude categories from your front page, feeds, archives, and search results.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WordPress Importer</td> <td><a href="https://wordpress.org/"> wordpressdotorg</a></td> <td width="511">Import posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories, tags and more from a WordPress export file.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WordPress.com Theme Updates</td> <td><a href="http://automattic.com/"> Automattic</a></td> <td width="511">Update themes downloaded from WordPress.com seamlessly with the rest of your WordPress updates.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP Accessibility</td> <td><a href="http://www.joedolson.com/"> Joe Dolson</a></td> <td width="511">Helps improve accessibility in your WordPress site, like removing title attributes.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP Crontrol</td> <td><a href="https://github.com/johnbillion/wp-crontrol/graphs/contributors"> John Blackbourn & contributors</a></td> <td width="511">WP Crontrol lets you view and control what’s happening in the WP-Cron system.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP QuickLaTeX</td> <td><a href="http://www.holoborodko.com/pavel/">Pavel Holoborodko</a></td> <td width="511">Access to complete LaTeX distribution. Publish formulae & graphics using native LaTeX syntax directly in the text. Inline formulas, displayed equations auto-numbering, labeling and referencing, AMS-LaTeX, TikZ, custom LaTeX preamble. No LaTeX installation required. Easily customizable using UI dialog. Actively developed and maintained. Visit QuickLaTeX homepage for more info.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WP to Twitter</td> <td><a href="http://www.joedolson.com/">Joseph C Dolson</a></td> <td width="511">Posts a Tweet when you update your WordPress blog or post a link, using your URL shortener. Rich options to customise and promote your Tweets.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>WPMUDEV Dashboard</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Brings the powers of WPMU DEV directly to you. It will revolutionize how you use WordPress. Activate now!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <h3>Themes</h3> <div> <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 48pt;" border="0" width="64" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <colgroup> <col style="width: 48pt;" width="64" /> </colgroup> <tbody> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt; width: 48pt;" width="64" height="19">Theme Name</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Apostrophe 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">AwesomePress</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Baskerville</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Bhari</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Blask</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cyanotype</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Davis</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fluida</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fukasawa</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Garfunkel</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Hitchcock</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Isola</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Lovecraft</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Make</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Period</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Radcliffe</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Sorbet</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">SPLOTpoint</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Tiny Framework</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Fifteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Nineteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Seventeen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Sixteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Twenty</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Writee</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </div> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>Service Inheritance</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/#comments</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[James Slack]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Fri, 14 Aug 2020 16:06:04 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[Uncategorised]]></category> <category><![CDATA[dlam-feed]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/?p=165</guid> <description><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutesHow to Inherit a Service A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>How to Inherit a Service</h1> A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I can drop my old service” “No”. Thankfully I have loved taking over this service, by this service I do actually mean *this* service. I now manage the Academic Blogging service, blogs.ed.ac.uk which is what you are reading this post on. I have blogged in the past but sporadically at best. Managing the service is completely different, managing any service is difficult but managing a service which is designed to be open and allow people to do what they want (to an extent) comes with it’s own interesting challenges, more of that in another post. Today however I wanted to talk more specifically about inheriting a service. It’s something that I hadn’t really thought about before but it struck me that this is the first ‘living’ service that I have taken over. I have a relatively short period of experience of managing learning technology services, roughly 6 years at this point. In that time I have managed two large services but both of these were in their infancy when I got hold. I was able to largely decide what these service should look like, what they would look like and what the policies around them would be. Obviously there is an amount of team work and involvement of other teams in this process but as a service manager the impetus usually came from me. Taking on a new service that has existed before, however, is something completely different. I often enjoy using bad analogies that I tend to stretch to far, so allow me to do this yet again: Inheriting services is like getting an armchair that belonged to someone else (ish). It’s arranged in a different way, it faces the door, it doesn’t go back far enough, it feels a bit to firm and there are Revels tucked into the side of the cushion. Who would put Revels down there, why would they choose Revels of all the things available? <h2>Service Personality</h2> The problem/issue/opportunity is, someone or a group of somebodies have decided how this should work and put it all in place. Now you come in and you’re not sure if you always agree. Most of the time you will but you just need to understand the ‘why’ after seeing the ‘what’ and ‘how’. Most services have a ‘vision’ of sorts attached, usually within the original Project Brief or the Service Level Description (SLD) that sets out the ‘shape’ of the service. This works great in isolation but what often happens is that this clearly defined ‘shape’ then gets released and it tends to need to alter shape to fits its environment in some way. (I DID say I enjoy bad analogies). <h2>Opportunities for Change</h2> I’ve always very strongly believed that getting a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ is possibly one of the most useful things to do when you have a great idea or process. Having someone outside of the ‘organisation’ take a look is often the best way to pick up on things, firstly it forces you to explain why you made a decision and also allows you to be questioned. If you can’t convince someone as to why something works that way then you might want to re-evaluate or compromise with the other view point. I love the following quote, which I believe is attributed to Grace Hopper – “The most dangerous phrase in the language is, ‘We’ve always done it this way’ ” (If you don’t know who Grace Hopper is, please pause and look her up. I will wait) <h2>Inheritance runs both ways</h2> This is the part that surprised me the most when I realised that this was the first service that was secondhand/pre-loved/pre-existing/had a life before me. I started this long monologue talking about how I had inherited something but it seems obvious that the service had also imbibed something from it’s creators and previous owners. There were certain priorities or choices that were made by previous people upon the service, impressions in the surface that had left their mark. I agree with the vast majority of these but some I want to change, based on my priorities or choices that I think make it fit it’s environment in a better way, or a way that appears better to me. Obviously all of this is measured alongside the needs of the current community, I wouldn’t make big changes that negatively impacted people using the service but I may make decisions that change the ‘flavour’ in some ways. <h2>Making it yours or making you part of it</h2> After you have been looking after the service for a short while you will likely find a list of things that don’t really feel right to you. It’s likely that these decisions were made some time ago and might not reflect the needs of the user community anymore. I would say it is important to mention here that we aren’t criticising the previous owners, just using this change as an opportunity to review and also add you own input to the service. Once you have found these areas then try to seek the justification if possible, there could be a very good reason as to why something works like this and not like *this*. If there isn’t a good justification or if that doesn’t really hold anymore then start building your case for making a change and what that change will be. Next you get to take these changes to the service team, working group or user community. If these don’t exist then this is a good chance to make them as having some external input, if only at certain times will greatly improve the service as a whole. Also be sure to check that these changes are actually wanted/needed/will have a positive impact, change for the sake of change is a winding road. Always remember RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed) This is the part that I enjoy the most about managing services, there is a human part even if what *it* is an application running on virtual machines somewhere (I imagine in a basement, because, it has to be). I get to take all of the work that went before and add my layer on top and alter it ever so slightly, like a funky new flavour in your Rainbow Cake – I REALLY DID say that I like bad analogies. <div id="attachment_166" style="width: 696px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-166" class="size-full wp-image-166" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-content/uploads/sites/2048/2020/08/7478835056_c91640ed8c_b.jpg" alt=""Layers from top - Rainbow Birthday Cake" by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0" width="686" height="1024" />“Layers from top – Rainbow Birthday Cake” by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0</div> Takeaways from service inheritance If you are a current service owner <ul> <li>For you managing a service, try to document what decisions were taken and why they were taken, this makes it a lot quicker for someone to get a feel for how the service exists now. Adding the justification really makes a big difference when someone new steps in</li> <li>Even if the service isn’t being taken over by someone else it can be very helpful to get fresh eyes on a service, or to include more people when making the decisions. Working groups or user involvement are very good for this.</li> <li>Try to update original documentation as the service shifts over time, most institutions seem to push for this at intervals but it helps to remember how services can change over time.</li> <li>Include retrospective look backs at the service at regular intervals, perhaps each year. Having a look at the changes that were added, how they were received and whether they helped add something useful to the service is a very rewarding process</li> </ul> If you are taking over an existing service <ul> <li>Getting an overview or introduction to the service is incredibly useful but do bear in mind that it is unlikely that you will be able to understand the entire service after one meeting</li> <li>If possible try to take the previous service owner hostage so that you can refer to them if they didn’t document things</li> <li>Once you have a good understanding of the service highlight the areas that you have issues with. Areas that you don’t understand why something was done in a particular way or why a certain policy exists. Try to find to root cause for these, if they make sense and fit the service you can leave them for now. If that doesn’t fit the service or the user’s need then earmark those areas for change.</li> <li>Add your personal touch, come up with suggestions in these specific areas that you have highlighted and taken them to existing working groups or service team. If they don’t exist then consider creating them.</li> </ul> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>1</slash:comments> </item> </channel> </rss> " ["raw"]=> string(32870) "HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: application/rss+xml; charset=UTF-8 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: close Date: Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:35:35 GMT Server: Apache X-Powered-By: PHP/8.3.31 Expires: Thu, 19 Nov 1981 08:52:00 GMT Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate Pragma: no-cache Link: <https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-json/>; rel="https://api.w.org/", <https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-json/wp/v2/tags/8>; rel="alternate"; title="JSON"; type="application/json" Set-Cookie: PHPSESSID=aj6tk46at7of9s7ssa69p46t96; path=/; secure; HttpOnly Set-Cookie: spo_2048_fa=1f6a19a4a61ea1542b1e6b34a077e786; expires=Mon, 15 Jun 2026 15:05:35 GMT; Max-Age=1800; path=/sliceoflearning/; Secure; HttpOnly Last-Modified: Mon, 05 Sep 2022 13:49:32 GMT ETag: "3f92756d9ecbe74d271c36001f3864b1" Vary: Accept-Encoding Set-Cookie: RCKBMHKB=027ff8be59-56fd-48CvPN_EmOtirxUW85WVosNK3uMB49buEvon3HEXjH2fSKynsURyOWQs37eYv_Xi7YApk; path=/; SameSite=None; Secure <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" > <channel> <title>dlam-feed – A Slice of Learning</title> <atom:link href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/feed/?tag=dlam-feed" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning</link> <description></description> <lastBuildDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2020 15:04:52 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en-GB</language> <sy:updatePeriod> hourly </sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency> 1 </sy:updateFrequency> <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5</generator> <cc:license >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</cc:license><dc:rights >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</dc:rights> <item> <title>More about Blogs.ed and Plugins</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[James Slack]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Wed, 23 Sep 2020 15:22:18 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[Uncategorised]]></category> <category><![CDATA[dlam-feed]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/?p=176</guid> <description><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutesProcesses and Plugins I admit, I may be cheating a little here. As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>Processes and Plugins</h1> I admit, I may be cheating a little here. As part of HeyPresstoConf20 I really wanted to be able to talk about our Plugins and Processes but couldn’t fit into the Tweet limit so I’m putting it all here. This should be helpful if you are planning on building your own WordPress Multisite at your institution, as ever, if you want to discuss this feel free to get in touch. Firstly let’s talk about how we go about selecting Plugins. We start to look when multiple users all ask for the same of similar plugin/function or if we encounter and issue that needs a plugin to be resolved. Thankfully we have an inhouse development team that can be called on if we cannot find something which is a blessing but they support multiple platforms so we do need to have good reason. If we do find a plugin or multiple plugins then we start to investigate whether they actually resolve our issue and if they add any issues or have unexpected behaviour, so far this seems to make basic sense. We have, however, developed a process to audit plugins to ascertain whether they are well supported, well reviewed and also if they contain privacy invasive cookies using the following criteria: <table width="99%"> <tbody> <tr> <td>Plugin / theme name:</td> <td>Yes / no</td> <td>Comments</td> <td>Date requested</td> <td>Date installed</td> </tr> <tr> <td>What does it do?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>How much does it cost? <ul> <li>Cost of adoption</li> <li>Cost of training</li> <li>Cost of usage</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Author background</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Is the documentation good?</td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Who will use the add-on? <ul> <li>admins / authors</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Feedback / reviews <ul> <li>Is it used by many, reviews / comments</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Technical status: <ul> <li>Is it up to date, compatible with our version of wordpress?</li> <li>Is it well written?</li> <li>Does it backup/restore?</li> <li>Is it secure?</li> <li>Is data shared outside of wordpress?</li> <li>Type of cookies set</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> <tr> <td>Accessibility: <ul> <li>Check any spellcheck functionality on free data entry boxes/forms that is either automatically run by the system or that requires users interaction</li> <li>Describe any data validation that is automatically run by the system to ensure users enter data in the correct formats. Check error messages are in sufficient colour contrast, accessible font, clear location, not pop ups.</li> <li>Check whether the template scales correctly using different resolutions and whether there are any resolutions that are not recommended, tested using ctrl + and Windows Magnifier</li> <li>Check the colours and colour contrasts and font types and styles used i.e. are italics and continuous capitals avoided?</li> <li>Check functionality that would allow users to customise their views (i.e. font size, colours, contrast ratios). This is by altering browser settings.</li> <li>Check whether all content is accessible through a keyboard interface and whether it requires specific timings for keystrokes. I.e. is it possible to navigate around the template and complete any forms etc without ever using a mouse.</li> <li>Check there is an indication or warning of links which will open a new tab or window and check that these warnings are accessible</li> <li>Check that the template conveys no information in only colour or sound.</li> <li>Check there is no flashing or scrolling text? If so does the text flash 3 or more times per second and can it be paused? If there is flashing or scrolling text please provide more details.</li> <li>Check that Zoomtext is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that JAWS is compatible with the template without plug ins</li> <li>Check that TextHelp Read and Write Gold is compatible with the template in terms of spellcheck, hover highlight and highlight and read without plug ins.</li> <li>Check that tooltips are clear and enabled by default on the template.</li> </ul> · Check that there are text alternatives for any non-text content. <ul> <li>Check that for any audio/visual items are there captions available and theses have been checked for accuracy.</li> <li>Check there are no time limits prescribed for the viewing/inputting of content to the template</li> <li>Check what specialist help is linked to on the template and that this includes a method of contacting someone for assistance?</li> <li>Check that if the template is accessed via a mobile or tablet device the user system does not require to use any requires any specific timings/specific keystrokes to complete tasks</li> <li>Check the template works with mobiles/tablets to offer any text to speech functionality of the results for those with visual impairments?</li> </ul> </td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> <td></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> You can also read more about this process in this blog post by Callum, one of the original service managers who has since moved to greener pastures (about 5 metres away when we were in the office) – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/dlam/2019/04/08/cookie-audit-findings/">Cookie Audit Process Blog</a> Lastly, here is a comprehensive list of all of the plugins that we currently use, all of these have been vetted through our process so should provide a good starting point. <h3>Plugins</h3> <table width="1132"> <tbody> <tr> <td width="270">Plugin</td> <td width="225">Developer</td> <td width="511">Description</td> <td width="126">Network Activated?</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Add Existing Users</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Allows you to bulk add existing users to a site, including the facility to set their role.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="http://addmultipleusers.happynuclear.com/">Add Multiple Users</a></td> <td>HappyNuclear</td> <td width="511">This plugin allows you to add multiple user accounts to your WordPress blog using a range of tools.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td><a href="https://akismet.com/">Akismet Anti-Spam</a></td> <td>Automattic</td> <td width="511">Used by millions, Akismet is quite possibly the best way in the world to protect your blog from spam. Your site is fully configured and being protected, even while you sleep.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Batch Create</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Create hundred or thousands of blogs and users automatically by simply uploading a csv text file – subdomain and user creation automation has never been so easy.</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>BeeHive Pro</td> <td>WPMUDEV</td> <td width="511">Basicall Google Analytics, users can use their own ID or apply for access to the University managed one</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Broken Link Checker</td> <td>ManageWP</td> <td width="511">Checks your blog for broken links and missing images and notifies you on the dashboard if any are found.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Classic Editor</td> <td>WordPress Contributers</td> <td width="511">Enabled at network level to remove block editor default</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>CommentPress Core</td> <td><a href="http://www.futureofthebook.org/"> Institute for the Future of the Book</a></td> <td width="511">CommentPress allows readers to comment in the margins of a text. You can use it to annotate, gloss, workshop, debate and more!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cookies for Comment</td> <td><a href="http://ocaoimh.ie/"> Donncha O Caoimh</a></td> <td width="511">Sets a cookie that must exist for a comment to be allowed through</td> <td>Y</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Cryout Series Slider</td> <td><a href="http://www.cryoutcreations.eu/">Cryout Creations</a></td> <td width="511">accessibility ready free image slider for WordPress.</td> <td>N</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Disable Comments</td> <td><a href="http://www.rayofsolaris.net/">Samir Shah</a></td> <td width="511">Allows administrators to globally disable comments on their site. 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Activate now!</td> <td>N</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <h3>Themes</h3> <div> <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 48pt;" border="0" width="64" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <colgroup> <col style="width: 48pt;" width="64" /> </colgroup> <tbody> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt; width: 48pt;" width="64" height="19">Theme Name</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Apostrophe 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">AwesomePress</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Baskerville</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Bhari</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Blask</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cover2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Cyanotype</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Davis</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fluida</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Fukasawa</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Garfunkel</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Hitchcock</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Intergalactic 2</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Isola</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Lovecraft</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Make</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Period</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Radcliffe</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Sorbet</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">SPLOTpoint</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Tiny Framework</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Fifteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Nineteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Seventeen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Sixteen</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Twenty Twenty</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 14.5pt;"> <td style="height: 14.5pt;" height="19">Writee</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </div> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/09/23/more-about-blogs-ed-and-plugins/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>Service Inheritance</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/2020/08/14/service-inheritance/#comments</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[James Slack]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Fri, 14 Aug 2020 16:06:04 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[Uncategorised]]></category> <category><![CDATA[dlam-feed]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/?p=165</guid> <description><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutesHow to Inherit a Service A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I […]]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[Reading Time: 6 minutes<h1>How to Inherit a Service</h1> A while back, before quarantine and therefore a lifetime ago, I ‘inherited’ a service. Anyone familiar with how these things go will also be somewhat familiar with how the conversation went: “We think you’ve done quiet well and we’d like you to take over this service” “Does that mean I can drop my old service” “No”. Thankfully I have loved taking over this service, by this service I do actually mean *this* service. I now manage the Academic Blogging service, blogs.ed.ac.uk which is what you are reading this post on. I have blogged in the past but sporadically at best. Managing the service is completely different, managing any service is difficult but managing a service which is designed to be open and allow people to do what they want (to an extent) comes with it’s own interesting challenges, more of that in another post. Today however I wanted to talk more specifically about inheriting a service. It’s something that I hadn’t really thought about before but it struck me that this is the first ‘living’ service that I have taken over. I have a relatively short period of experience of managing learning technology services, roughly 6 years at this point. In that time I have managed two large services but both of these were in their infancy when I got hold. I was able to largely decide what these service should look like, what they would look like and what the policies around them would be. Obviously there is an amount of team work and involvement of other teams in this process but as a service manager the impetus usually came from me. Taking on a new service that has existed before, however, is something completely different. I often enjoy using bad analogies that I tend to stretch to far, so allow me to do this yet again: Inheriting services is like getting an armchair that belonged to someone else (ish). It’s arranged in a different way, it faces the door, it doesn’t go back far enough, it feels a bit to firm and there are Revels tucked into the side of the cushion. Who would put Revels down there, why would they choose Revels of all the things available? <h2>Service Personality</h2> The problem/issue/opportunity is, someone or a group of somebodies have decided how this should work and put it all in place. Now you come in and you’re not sure if you always agree. Most of the time you will but you just need to understand the ‘why’ after seeing the ‘what’ and ‘how’. Most services have a ‘vision’ of sorts attached, usually within the original Project Brief or the Service Level Description (SLD) that sets out the ‘shape’ of the service. This works great in isolation but what often happens is that this clearly defined ‘shape’ then gets released and it tends to need to alter shape to fits its environment in some way. (I DID say I enjoy bad analogies). <h2>Opportunities for Change</h2> I’ve always very strongly believed that getting a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ is possibly one of the most useful things to do when you have a great idea or process. Having someone outside of the ‘organisation’ take a look is often the best way to pick up on things, firstly it forces you to explain why you made a decision and also allows you to be questioned. If you can’t convince someone as to why something works that way then you might want to re-evaluate or compromise with the other view point. I love the following quote, which I believe is attributed to Grace Hopper – “The most dangerous phrase in the language is, ‘We’ve always done it this way’ ” (If you don’t know who Grace Hopper is, please pause and look her up. I will wait) <h2>Inheritance runs both ways</h2> This is the part that surprised me the most when I realised that this was the first service that was secondhand/pre-loved/pre-existing/had a life before me. I started this long monologue talking about how I had inherited something but it seems obvious that the service had also imbibed something from it’s creators and previous owners. There were certain priorities or choices that were made by previous people upon the service, impressions in the surface that had left their mark. I agree with the vast majority of these but some I want to change, based on my priorities or choices that I think make it fit it’s environment in a better way, or a way that appears better to me. Obviously all of this is measured alongside the needs of the current community, I wouldn’t make big changes that negatively impacted people using the service but I may make decisions that change the ‘flavour’ in some ways. <h2>Making it yours or making you part of it</h2> After you have been looking after the service for a short while you will likely find a list of things that don’t really feel right to you. It’s likely that these decisions were made some time ago and might not reflect the needs of the user community anymore. I would say it is important to mention here that we aren’t criticising the previous owners, just using this change as an opportunity to review and also add you own input to the service. Once you have found these areas then try to seek the justification if possible, there could be a very good reason as to why something works like this and not like *this*. If there isn’t a good justification or if that doesn’t really hold anymore then start building your case for making a change and what that change will be. Next you get to take these changes to the service team, working group or user community. If these don’t exist then this is a good chance to make them as having some external input, if only at certain times will greatly improve the service as a whole. Also be sure to check that these changes are actually wanted/needed/will have a positive impact, change for the sake of change is a winding road. Always remember RACI (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed) This is the part that I enjoy the most about managing services, there is a human part even if what *it* is an application running on virtual machines somewhere (I imagine in a basement, because, it has to be). I get to take all of the work that went before and add my layer on top and alter it ever so slightly, like a funky new flavour in your Rainbow Cake – I REALLY DID say that I like bad analogies. <div id="attachment_166" style="width: 696px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-166" class="size-full wp-image-166" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/sliceoflearning/wp-content/uploads/sites/2048/2020/08/7478835056_c91640ed8c_b.jpg" alt=""Layers from top - Rainbow Birthday Cake" by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0" width="686" height="1024" />“Layers from top – Rainbow Birthday Cake” by avlxyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0</div> Takeaways from service inheritance If you are a current service owner <ul> <li>For you managing a service, try to document what decisions were taken and why they were taken, this makes it a lot quicker for someone to get a feel for how the service exists now. Adding the justification really makes a big difference when someone new steps in</li> <li>Even if the service isn’t being taken over by someone else it can be very helpful to get fresh eyes on a service, or to include more people when making the decisions. Working groups or user involvement are very good for this.</li> <li>Try to update original documentation as the service shifts over time, most institutions seem to push for this at intervals but it helps to remember how services can change over time.</li> <li>Include retrospective look backs at the service at regular intervals, perhaps each year. Having a look at the changes that were added, how they were received and whether they helped add something useful to the service is a very rewarding process</li> </ul> If you are taking over an existing service <ul> <li>Getting an overview or introduction to the service is incredibly useful but do bear in mind that it is unlikely that you will be able to understand the entire service after one meeting</li> <li>If possible try to take the previous service owner hostage so that you can refer to them if they didn’t document things</li> <li>Once you have a good understanding of the service highlight the areas that you have issues with. Areas that you don’t understand why something was done in a particular way or why a certain policy exists. Try to find to root cause for these, if they make sense and fit the service you can leave them for now. If that doesn’t fit the service or the user’s need then earmark those areas for change.</li> <li>Add your personal touch, come up with suggestions in these specific areas that you have highlighted and taken them to existing working groups or service team. 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Diag====| HTTP [https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/feed/] ⌉ array(6) { ["headers"]=> object(WpOrg\Requests\Utility\CaseInsensitiveDictionary)#2454 (1) { ["data":protected]=> array(12) { ["content-type"]=> string(34) "application/rss+xml; charset=UTF-8" ["date"]=> string(29) "Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:35:35 GMT" ["server"]=> string(6) "Apache" ["x-powered-by"]=> string(10) "PHP/8.3.31" ["expires"]=> string(29) "Thu, 19 Nov 1981 08:52:00 GMT" ["cache-control"]=> string(35) "no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate" ["pragma"]=> string(8) "no-cache" ["link"]=> string(71) "<https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-json/>; rel="https://api.w.org/"" ["set-cookie"]=> array(3) { [0]=> string(62) "PHPSESSID=tn7tv6b5085pg37pitepumfc9j; path=/; secure; HttpOnly" [1]=> string(134) "spo_201_fa=971e57e158fd4a5340f44852bfb286f0; expires=Mon, 15 Jun 2026 15:05:35 GMT; Max-Age=1800; path=/mediahopper/; Secure; HttpOnly" [2]=> string(125) "RCKBMHKB=027ff8be59-56fd-48b15YywCmPPIMyT7SOJWkdf1j9E-qgeH6oH1HSEwROD7CUdZOB1pL8ZlJy6E0q6PhsQU; path=/; SameSite=None; Secure" } ["last-modified"]=> string(29) "Thu, 14 Dec 2023 17:57:08 GMT" ["etag"]=> string(34) ""45cf9c638f115d3823aeba3d2008b07b"" ["vary"]=> string(15) "Accept-Encoding" } } ["body"]=> string(26397) "<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" > <channel> <title>Media Hopper</title> <atom:link href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper</link> <description>Articles and ramblings on Media Hopper Create & Media Hopper Replay, as well as DIY Film School and Apple Podcasts</description> <lastBuildDate>Thu, 14 Dec 2023 17:57:08 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en-GB</language> <sy:updatePeriod> hourly </sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency> 1 </sy:updateFrequency> <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5</generator> <cc:license >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</cc:license><dc:rights >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</dc:rights> <item> <title>Using Chat GPT to refine narratives</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Wed, 13 Dec 2023 12:11:21 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[AI]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=120</guid> <description><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less hilarity-inducing ‘lets spend 20 minutes phrasing this perfectly so I actually get something useful’ way. A lot of companies have been working on growing ‘large language models’ for use in AI for a while, but the one that really captured people’s attention in 2023 has been OpenAI’s ChatGPT. There are many other flavours of AI chatty-Cathy’s out there with colourful names such as Bard, Claude, Grok, LLaMA, Bothan, and Ernie Bot (one of those I made up*), but ChatGPT has become the go-to chatbot for a lot of people, with over 100 million users registered on the service. In the past 12 months, the top 2 fastest-rising search terms on Google from the UK are ‘ChatGPT’ and ‘Chat GPT’. <img decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-121" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png" alt="" width="300" height="253" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55.png 585w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /> While there are a lot of uses for ChatGPT and similar AI services, one that has some people worried about its potential impact is its use for creative purposes. The use of AI-generated images and music has raised questions about whether human artists will get shut out of the process if it’s quicker and cheaper to ask a bot to create art, and the recent SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes that took Hollywood to a grinding halt earlier this year was at least in part because of the actors and writer’s unions wanting to ensure there were protections in updated contracts to limit AI’s impact on filmmaking. While we’re likely at least a few years away from the best original screenplay Academy Award going to ChatBot_182.432.1REV3, ChatGPT can be used as a tool in a lot of ways for narrative storytelling. It certainly can write a full story for you, but it can go off in pretty wild places with some… interesting narrative choices. With the simple prompt ‘Hey ChatGPT, write me a story’, I got a 450 word tale of a character named Luna who lived in a ‘Blade Runner’-esque neon city worked as a librarian by day, and by night used her supernatural powers to turn the books on her shelves in to magical realms. She proceeds to find a kingdom in peril, talk to a wise old owl and a mischievous sprite, solve puzzles, go through enchanted forests, and save the day using the power of imagination. That’s a lot to cram in to 450 words. You can read the full story here with the password LunasMidnightOdyssey – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/lunas-midnight-odyssey/">full story</a> This is one of the problems with just giving ChatGPT free reign to do what it ‘wants’ when being creative, it doesn’t really understand scale or that just throwing every plot point it can generate in to a list doesn’t really make a story. <figure id="attachment_130" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-130" style="width: 700px" class="wp-caption aligncenter center"><img decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-130" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="468" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-768x513.jpg 768w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1140x761.jpg 1140w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c.jpg 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-130" class="wp-caption-text">Old College by Playfair, William, University of Edinburgh is available under a CC BY 3.0 Unported licence. https://images.is.ed.ac.uk/luna/servlet/s/m671gu</figcaption></figure> ChatGPT’s really power for creating narrative, at least in its current state, is in using it to refine a story, or to help work through ideas. Let’s say I’m trying create a new video for Media Hopper Create about the history of Old College, and want to write a voice over. Here’s a quick draft: <blockquote>Old College its part of The University of Edinburgh and was mostly built from the late 18th to early 19th century. Originally named ‘New College’, it is a Category A listed building located on South Bridge. The original design was by Robert Adam, with the modern design being completed by William Henry Playfair. The dome was added to the building in 1887, with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. <ul> <li>Original version</li> </ul> </blockquote> I wrote this in about 5 minutes with information culled from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_College,_University_of_Edinburgh">Wikipedia</a>, and while perfectly serviceable, it’s possibly a little perfunctory. I asked ChatGPT what it thought of my script, and it decided (unprompted) to re-write it for me to make it more ‘engaging’: <blockquote>Welcome to Old College, a majestic structure nestled within the heart of The University of Edinburgh. Originally named ‘New College,’ this architectural gem traces its roots back to the late 18th century. Designed by the renowned Robert Adam, its timeless elegance was later completed by William Henry Playfair in the 19th century. Situated on South Bridge, Old College stands as a Category A listed building, a testament to its historical and architectural significance. In 1887, a crowning touch was added to the structure in the form of a magnificent dome. Adorning the pinnacle is a gilded statue of Youth, a creation by the skilled hands of John Hutchinson. As you stand in awe of Old College, it’s not just a building; it’s a living testament to the evolution of academia and architecture. The melding of the past and present, with each stone whispering stories of the scholars who once walked its halls. Today, Old College continues to be a symbol of academic excellence and a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry of The University of Edinburgh. <ul> <li>Revision from ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This new version does feel more like a narrative than just a list of facts, and the language use is definitely more descriptive, it goes a bit overboard with the use of evocative metaphors. To try and rein it in a bit, I added this prompt: “That’s a little bit over the top with descriptive language, can you scale it back a little?”. This is the new version: <blockquote>Old College, part of The University of Edinburgh, has a rich history dating back to the late 18th century. Originally called ‘New College,’ its design, led by Robert Adam and later completed by William Henry Playfair, stands as a testament to architectural craftsmanship. Situated on South Bridge, this Category A listed building gained its distinctive dome in 1887, crowned with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. Today, Old College preserves the charm of its past, serving as a key landmark in the University’s legacy. Explore the echoes of academia within Old College’s walls, where each brick tells a story of the scholars who once roamed its corridors. This historic structure, with its timeless design, remains an enduring symbol of The University of Edinburgh’s journey through time. <ul> <li>Revision 2 by ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This time it removed some of the descriptive language of the building itself, but it replaced a metaphor of it being ‘a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry’ of the university with one about ‘each brick telling a story’. Let’s try refining it one more time – here’s the latest version with my prompt “How about you remove some of the metaphors, but give more descriptive language?”: <blockquote>Old College, integral to The University of Edinburgh, has a fascinating history rooted in the late 18th century. Originally christened ‘New College,’ it boasts an architectural legacy shaped by Robert Adam and later refined by William Henry Playfair. Nestled on South Bridge, this distinguished Category A listed building acquired its iconic dome in 1887, adorned with a gilded statue of Youth crafted by John Hutchinson. Old College serves as both witness and custodian to the University’s journey through time. Step into its storied corridors and be transported to an era when scholars traversed its halls. Each brick and beam narrates tales of academic pursuits and intellectual growth. Old College stands today, not just as a historic landmark, but as a living tribute to The University of Edinburgh’s enduring academic tradition.</blockquote> At this point it feels like ChatGPT is stuck just reiterating on a specific style of writing. This is one of the issues I hit when looking to use a chatbot for anything creative – the model it’s using to generate text has a specific style and there isn’t an easy way to break out of that. While ChatGPT is great for helping point you in the right direction, most of the time things will still need to be edited and refined manually to fit the exact purpose you need it for. How about we experiment with this further, and see how well it handles a change in tone. I added the a new prompt to change the genre, but not the content: “What if this was the Voice Over for a horror film?” <blockquote>“Deep within the shadows of The University of Edinburgh lies Old College, a structure steeped in a history that echoes with whispers of the supernatural. Once named ‘New College,’ its unsettling evolution began in the late 18th century under the design of Robert Adam, later twisted by the hands of William Henry Playfair. Perched ominously on South Bridge, this foreboding Category A listed building acquired an eerie dome in 1887, crowned by a gilded statue of Youth, a macabre creation by the twisted artist John Hutchinson. Old College, now a haunting relic, conceals not only the secrets of academia but a darker, malevolent force. As you traverse its desolate corridors, the air thickens with the chilling tales of scholars who met untimely fates within its haunted walls. Every brick, every step resonates with an otherworldly presence. Old College stands not as a symbol of knowledge, but as a portal to the supernatural, where the past lingers, and the spirits of the damned find no rest.” <ul> <li>ChatGPT’s voice over for a horror film</li> </ul> </blockquote> Ok, a lot to unpack… not only is this now borderline defamatory calling famed sculptor John Hutchinson a ‘twisted artist’ who created ‘macabre creations’, claims that Old College is where ‘the spirits of the damned find no rest’ and is literally a ‘portal to the supernatural’, but it is still using that metaphor of ‘every brick tells a story’. While overly flowery language can be a bit of a handful to prune back, this last revision shows where the creative ‘choices’ ChatGPT uses can start to turn truth in to pure fabrication. The original core of the facts from my initial script are still there (the dates, the people involved, the legacy), it uses those to create completely a fictitious narrative. The creative uses for ChatGPT are vast, but as an AI it has no concept of how it should use the information in your prompts, only what it can do. Chat bots can be a useful tool, but just remember to keep it on a short leash. *’Bothan’ is actually a lesser-known species from Star Wars: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan</a> <time datetime="2023-12-13" itemprop="dateModified">Dec 13, 2023</time> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>What is 360º Video? – The Early Days…</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Mon, 18 Feb 2019 16:24:53 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[DIY Film School]]></category> <category><![CDATA[360º]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=56</guid> <description><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks,...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks, to how it can be recorded using your mobile phone and used in education. <h2>Cinéorama</h2> The Exposition Universelle, or better known as the 1900 Paris Exposition in English, was part of France’s drive to enter the 20th century with a reignited sense of cultural and national pride after devastation of the Great War. For nearly a decade before the exhibition grounds were due to open, countries around the world were invited to bring their greatest achievements and display their cultures on an international stage, part of the event’s bigger themes of unifying people. <figure style="width: 4195px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/La_porte_monumentale%2C_Exposition_Universelle_1900.jpg" alt="" width="4195" height="2678" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Brown University Library [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Some of the highlights of the Exposition included a giant refracting telescope (60 meters long with a diameter of 1.5 meters), a display of photographs showing African American’s contributions to American society organised by sociologists and activists Booker Washington and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W.E.B._Du_Bois">W.E.B. Du Bois</a> , and in a fit of what I can only imagine was either reckless abandonment or an over-eagerness to please the visiting crowds, a Russian sparkling wine won the “Grand Prix de Champagne” beating several French vintners. The first Olympic Games outside of Greece took place during the Exposition, with the winners receiving 100 francs, a tie pin, and a commemorative pencil. One of the biggest draws of the Exposition was the introduction of two of the great innovations in the world of cinema: the first wide-scale demonstration of recorded sound synced with moving image, and 360º panoramic projections. Obviously the latter of the two had the greater impact in the history of entertainment. I mean, come on, how many people actually watch films with audio? Oh, what’s that? Most people do? Pretty much every piece of commercial film created in the last 80 years has had synchronised sound? Nobody uses 360º panoramic video projections beyond some very limited applications? Hmm. The French Cinéorama was designed and constructed specifically for the Exposition by <a href="Raoul Grimoin-Sanson">Raoul Grimoin-Sanson</a>, with the intention being to replicate a ride on a hot air balloon over Paris using ten synchronised projectors housed under the ‘basket’ of the stationary balloon model. <figure style="width: 1199px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Cineorama.jpg" alt="" width="1199" height="850" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Built on the technology that English inventor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_W._Paul">Robert Paul</a> had been working on in the late 1890’s to project moving image on a screen (which was in turn based on designs stolen from Thomas Edison’s single-viewer Kinetoscope machine), the Cinéorama would project moving images onto 10 screens, each 9×9 meters, arranged in a circle around the viewer. The film was shot using 10 cameras pointing outwards from a central point which housed the cranking mechanism that wound all of the cameras at the same time – early cinema cameras were usually hand-cranked, so this made sure that the image was captured at the same speed on each camera. This rig was then attached to a real hot air balloon as it flew 400 meters about the Tuileries Gardens, filming the ascent. <figure style="width: 600px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Cineorama_camera.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="1019" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>People would board a giant hot air balloon model in the middle of the screens, the basket of which was big enough to hold 200 people, complete with rigging and the bottom half of a balloon suspended from the ceiling. Once ‘boarded’ the spectators would look out at the screens as the projectors showed the balloon take off. Once the experience had finished, they used some cinema magic to show the balloon landing again (they played the film backwards). The Cinéorama lasted a glorious whole 3 days before the police shut it down due to safety concerns – one of the workmen had fainted from the immense heat of the arc lamps used in the projectors, and as these were housed directly beneath the viewing platform, it was considered an extreme fire hazard to the spectators. After the show was shut down in the middle of day 4, it has never been shown again. Things didn’t faire much better for the Exposition Universelle – due the unexpectedly high running costs of the Exposition as a whole, it ended costing the organisers about 600 francs (around £2,000 in 2018) more per person than the cost of admission. This was the end of this streak of Parisian international fairs. <h2>Circle-Vision 360º</h2> The rebirth of commercial 360º panoramic films came with the opening of 1955’s ‘CIRCARAMA’ cinema in Disneyland, California, showing the short film A Tour of the West, soon followed by America The Beautiful. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rmv_P_wcZG4?start=801" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> The system used in Disneyland, named ‘Circle-Vision 360°’, improved on Grimoin-Sanson’s Cinéorama system in a number of ways, with the biggest difference being that instead of having the film projectors mounted under the audience’s feet (and causing a lot of fire-risks at the same time) an odd number of screens and projectors are used – this means that each projector is placed between the screens on the opposite wall of the purpose-built circular auditorium: <figure style="width: 2320px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/3e/df/f2/ef5b770a26468d/US2942516-drawings-page-2.png" alt="" width="2320" height="3408" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Walter E Disney, Iwerks Ub (1956). US Patent No. US2942516A. Retrieved from https://patents.google.com/patent/US2942516</figcaption></figure> This clever bit of mathematics allows the bulky projector systems to be hidden behind the ring of screens, providing more a more immersive experience to the audience. The camera system used to record the footage, however, is remarkably similar Cinéorama’s – nine cameras are arranged around a central point facing outwards, with an internal mechanism keeping the cameras in sync. <figure style="width: 2364px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Circle-Vision_360_camera_%2829638534777%29_%28cropped%29.jpg" alt="" width="2364" height="1965" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">elisfkc from Orlando, FL, United States [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>The camera rig can be attached to the roof of a car or the underside of a helicopter. Given there was an intentional gap between each screen for the projectors to fit, later films used these to split-up the action between sections of the room. For example, they could show a full 360º film to start with, then fade the screens on one half of the room to show standard film footage on each screen, while maintaining the panorama on the other. This allowed for greater creative freedom, and removed the reliance of using the expensive Circle-Vision 360º cameras to capture all the footage. Over the years, 5 different Disney theme parks have used Circle-Vision 360º for their attractions, and while the original has now closed at Disneyland in California, and it’s international variants at Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris closing in the early 21st century, there are 2 theatres still operating at Epcot – ‘Reflections of China’ and ‘Oh Canada!’ At each of their respective country’s pavilions in the World Showcase. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SdUKRTeyKfU" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Interestingly, you can actually watch this version in 360º using Google Cardboard or by clicking and dragging your mouse around the frame</pre> Both of these act as quasi-tourism videos showing off the landscapes and cultural landmarks of each country …and the Canadian one also serves as a showcase for Martin Short’s comedic talents, so there’s that. This idea of pure spectacle makes sense as a use for this pretty unique form of film-making, but it does highlight two of the biggest drawbacks of 360º cinema in an auditorium setting: The first being the cost involved would make it prohibitive to film more than a few minutes worth of footage, both in terms of capturing using 9 high-quality cameras and running the multiple necessary projectors all day. The second, and possibly most difficult to overcome: trying to craft a story where the viewer needs to constantly be turning their heads. Both of the 360º cinema formats mentioned here rely on the viewer being free to stand and turn all the way around to find and follow points of interest. Indicating where a person should be looking at all times is tricky when it might be behind them. Constantly having your characters announce themselves and give time for people to move around and look in their direction could kill the tension in your drama. Thank you for coming along on our first journey in to 360º video. In our next article we’ll be diving in to the world of modern film and content creation for 360º and VR, and how this can be used in education. <time datetime="2019-02-18" itemprop="dateModified">Feb 18, 2019</time> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> </channel> </rss> " ["response"]=> array(2) { ["code"]=> int(200) ["message"]=> string(2) "OK" } ["cookies"]=> array(3) { [0]=> object(WP_Http_Cookie)#2466 (7) { ["name"]=> string(9) "PHPSESSID" ["value"]=> string(26) "tn7tv6b5085pg37pitepumfc9j" ["expires"]=> NULL ["path"]=> string(1) "/" ["domain"]=> string(14) "blogs.ed.ac.uk" ["port"]=> NULL ["host_only"]=> bool(true) } [1]=> object(WP_Http_Cookie)#2465 (7) { ["name"]=> string(10) "spo_201_fa" ["value"]=> string(32) "971e57e158fd4a5340f44852bfb286f0" ["expires"]=> int(1781535935) ["path"]=> string(13) "/mediahopper/" ["domain"]=> string(14) "blogs.ed.ac.uk" ["port"]=> NULL ["host_only"]=> bool(true) } [2]=> object(WP_Http_Cookie)#2467 (7) { ["name"]=> string(8) "RCKBMHKB" ["value"]=> string(85) "027ff8be59-56fd-48b15YywCmPPIMyT7SOJWkdf1j9E-qgeH6oH1HSEwROD7CUdZOB1pL8ZlJy6E0q6PhsQU" ["expires"]=> NULL ["path"]=> string(1) "/" ["domain"]=> string(14) "blogs.ed.ac.uk" ["port"]=> NULL ["host_only"]=> bool(true) } } ["filename"]=> NULL ["http_response"]=> object(WP_HTTP_Requests_Response)#2453 (5) { ["data"]=> NULL ["headers"]=> NULL ["status"]=> NULL ["response":protected]=> object(WpOrg\Requests\Response)#2455 (10) { ["body"]=> string(26397) "<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" > <channel> <title>Media Hopper</title> <atom:link href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper</link> <description>Articles and ramblings on Media Hopper Create & Media Hopper Replay, as well as DIY Film School and Apple Podcasts</description> <lastBuildDate>Thu, 14 Dec 2023 17:57:08 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en-GB</language> <sy:updatePeriod> hourly </sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency> 1 </sy:updateFrequency> <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5</generator> <cc:license >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</cc:license><dc:rights >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</dc:rights> <item> <title>Using Chat GPT to refine narratives</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Wed, 13 Dec 2023 12:11:21 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[AI]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=120</guid> <description><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less hilarity-inducing ‘lets spend 20 minutes phrasing this perfectly so I actually get something useful’ way. A lot of companies have been working on growing ‘large language models’ for use in AI for a while, but the one that really captured people’s attention in 2023 has been OpenAI’s ChatGPT. There are many other flavours of AI chatty-Cathy’s out there with colourful names such as Bard, Claude, Grok, LLaMA, Bothan, and Ernie Bot (one of those I made up*), but ChatGPT has become the go-to chatbot for a lot of people, with over 100 million users registered on the service. In the past 12 months, the top 2 fastest-rising search terms on Google from the UK are ‘ChatGPT’ and ‘Chat GPT’. <img decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-121" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png" alt="" width="300" height="253" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55.png 585w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /> While there are a lot of uses for ChatGPT and similar AI services, one that has some people worried about its potential impact is its use for creative purposes. The use of AI-generated images and music has raised questions about whether human artists will get shut out of the process if it’s quicker and cheaper to ask a bot to create art, and the recent SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes that took Hollywood to a grinding halt earlier this year was at least in part because of the actors and writer’s unions wanting to ensure there were protections in updated contracts to limit AI’s impact on filmmaking. While we’re likely at least a few years away from the best original screenplay Academy Award going to ChatBot_182.432.1REV3, ChatGPT can be used as a tool in a lot of ways for narrative storytelling. It certainly can write a full story for you, but it can go off in pretty wild places with some… interesting narrative choices. With the simple prompt ‘Hey ChatGPT, write me a story’, I got a 450 word tale of a character named Luna who lived in a ‘Blade Runner’-esque neon city worked as a librarian by day, and by night used her supernatural powers to turn the books on her shelves in to magical realms. She proceeds to find a kingdom in peril, talk to a wise old owl and a mischievous sprite, solve puzzles, go through enchanted forests, and save the day using the power of imagination. That’s a lot to cram in to 450 words. You can read the full story here with the password LunasMidnightOdyssey – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/lunas-midnight-odyssey/">full story</a> This is one of the problems with just giving ChatGPT free reign to do what it ‘wants’ when being creative, it doesn’t really understand scale or that just throwing every plot point it can generate in to a list doesn’t really make a story. <figure id="attachment_130" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-130" style="width: 700px" class="wp-caption aligncenter center"><img decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-130" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="468" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-768x513.jpg 768w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1140x761.jpg 1140w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c.jpg 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-130" class="wp-caption-text">Old College by Playfair, William, University of Edinburgh is available under a CC BY 3.0 Unported licence. https://images.is.ed.ac.uk/luna/servlet/s/m671gu</figcaption></figure> ChatGPT’s really power for creating narrative, at least in its current state, is in using it to refine a story, or to help work through ideas. Let’s say I’m trying create a new video for Media Hopper Create about the history of Old College, and want to write a voice over. Here’s a quick draft: <blockquote>Old College its part of The University of Edinburgh and was mostly built from the late 18th to early 19th century. Originally named ‘New College’, it is a Category A listed building located on South Bridge. The original design was by Robert Adam, with the modern design being completed by William Henry Playfair. The dome was added to the building in 1887, with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. <ul> <li>Original version</li> </ul> </blockquote> I wrote this in about 5 minutes with information culled from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_College,_University_of_Edinburgh">Wikipedia</a>, and while perfectly serviceable, it’s possibly a little perfunctory. I asked ChatGPT what it thought of my script, and it decided (unprompted) to re-write it for me to make it more ‘engaging’: <blockquote>Welcome to Old College, a majestic structure nestled within the heart of The University of Edinburgh. Originally named ‘New College,’ this architectural gem traces its roots back to the late 18th century. Designed by the renowned Robert Adam, its timeless elegance was later completed by William Henry Playfair in the 19th century. Situated on South Bridge, Old College stands as a Category A listed building, a testament to its historical and architectural significance. In 1887, a crowning touch was added to the structure in the form of a magnificent dome. Adorning the pinnacle is a gilded statue of Youth, a creation by the skilled hands of John Hutchinson. As you stand in awe of Old College, it’s not just a building; it’s a living testament to the evolution of academia and architecture. The melding of the past and present, with each stone whispering stories of the scholars who once walked its halls. Today, Old College continues to be a symbol of academic excellence and a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry of The University of Edinburgh. <ul> <li>Revision from ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This new version does feel more like a narrative than just a list of facts, and the language use is definitely more descriptive, it goes a bit overboard with the use of evocative metaphors. To try and rein it in a bit, I added this prompt: “That’s a little bit over the top with descriptive language, can you scale it back a little?”. This is the new version: <blockquote>Old College, part of The University of Edinburgh, has a rich history dating back to the late 18th century. Originally called ‘New College,’ its design, led by Robert Adam and later completed by William Henry Playfair, stands as a testament to architectural craftsmanship. Situated on South Bridge, this Category A listed building gained its distinctive dome in 1887, crowned with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. Today, Old College preserves the charm of its past, serving as a key landmark in the University’s legacy. Explore the echoes of academia within Old College’s walls, where each brick tells a story of the scholars who once roamed its corridors. This historic structure, with its timeless design, remains an enduring symbol of The University of Edinburgh’s journey through time. <ul> <li>Revision 2 by ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This time it removed some of the descriptive language of the building itself, but it replaced a metaphor of it being ‘a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry’ of the university with one about ‘each brick telling a story’. Let’s try refining it one more time – here’s the latest version with my prompt “How about you remove some of the metaphors, but give more descriptive language?”: <blockquote>Old College, integral to The University of Edinburgh, has a fascinating history rooted in the late 18th century. Originally christened ‘New College,’ it boasts an architectural legacy shaped by Robert Adam and later refined by William Henry Playfair. Nestled on South Bridge, this distinguished Category A listed building acquired its iconic dome in 1887, adorned with a gilded statue of Youth crafted by John Hutchinson. Old College serves as both witness and custodian to the University’s journey through time. Step into its storied corridors and be transported to an era when scholars traversed its halls. Each brick and beam narrates tales of academic pursuits and intellectual growth. Old College stands today, not just as a historic landmark, but as a living tribute to The University of Edinburgh’s enduring academic tradition.</blockquote> At this point it feels like ChatGPT is stuck just reiterating on a specific style of writing. This is one of the issues I hit when looking to use a chatbot for anything creative – the model it’s using to generate text has a specific style and there isn’t an easy way to break out of that. While ChatGPT is great for helping point you in the right direction, most of the time things will still need to be edited and refined manually to fit the exact purpose you need it for. How about we experiment with this further, and see how well it handles a change in tone. I added the a new prompt to change the genre, but not the content: “What if this was the Voice Over for a horror film?” <blockquote>“Deep within the shadows of The University of Edinburgh lies Old College, a structure steeped in a history that echoes with whispers of the supernatural. Once named ‘New College,’ its unsettling evolution began in the late 18th century under the design of Robert Adam, later twisted by the hands of William Henry Playfair. Perched ominously on South Bridge, this foreboding Category A listed building acquired an eerie dome in 1887, crowned by a gilded statue of Youth, a macabre creation by the twisted artist John Hutchinson. Old College, now a haunting relic, conceals not only the secrets of academia but a darker, malevolent force. As you traverse its desolate corridors, the air thickens with the chilling tales of scholars who met untimely fates within its haunted walls. Every brick, every step resonates with an otherworldly presence. Old College stands not as a symbol of knowledge, but as a portal to the supernatural, where the past lingers, and the spirits of the damned find no rest.” <ul> <li>ChatGPT’s voice over for a horror film</li> </ul> </blockquote> Ok, a lot to unpack… not only is this now borderline defamatory calling famed sculptor John Hutchinson a ‘twisted artist’ who created ‘macabre creations’, claims that Old College is where ‘the spirits of the damned find no rest’ and is literally a ‘portal to the supernatural’, but it is still using that metaphor of ‘every brick tells a story’. While overly flowery language can be a bit of a handful to prune back, this last revision shows where the creative ‘choices’ ChatGPT uses can start to turn truth in to pure fabrication. The original core of the facts from my initial script are still there (the dates, the people involved, the legacy), it uses those to create completely a fictitious narrative. The creative uses for ChatGPT are vast, but as an AI it has no concept of how it should use the information in your prompts, only what it can do. Chat bots can be a useful tool, but just remember to keep it on a short leash. *’Bothan’ is actually a lesser-known species from Star Wars: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan</a> <time datetime="2023-12-13" itemprop="dateModified">Dec 13, 2023</time> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>What is 360º Video? – The Early Days…</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Mon, 18 Feb 2019 16:24:53 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[DIY Film School]]></category> <category><![CDATA[360º]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=56</guid> <description><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks,...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks, to how it can be recorded using your mobile phone and used in education. <h2>Cinéorama</h2> The Exposition Universelle, or better known as the 1900 Paris Exposition in English, was part of France’s drive to enter the 20th century with a reignited sense of cultural and national pride after devastation of the Great War. For nearly a decade before the exhibition grounds were due to open, countries around the world were invited to bring their greatest achievements and display their cultures on an international stage, part of the event’s bigger themes of unifying people. <figure style="width: 4195px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/La_porte_monumentale%2C_Exposition_Universelle_1900.jpg" alt="" width="4195" height="2678" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Brown University Library [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Some of the highlights of the Exposition included a giant refracting telescope (60 meters long with a diameter of 1.5 meters), a display of photographs showing African American’s contributions to American society organised by sociologists and activists Booker Washington and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W.E.B._Du_Bois">W.E.B. Du Bois</a> , and in a fit of what I can only imagine was either reckless abandonment or an over-eagerness to please the visiting crowds, a Russian sparkling wine won the “Grand Prix de Champagne” beating several French vintners. The first Olympic Games outside of Greece took place during the Exposition, with the winners receiving 100 francs, a tie pin, and a commemorative pencil. One of the biggest draws of the Exposition was the introduction of two of the great innovations in the world of cinema: the first wide-scale demonstration of recorded sound synced with moving image, and 360º panoramic projections. Obviously the latter of the two had the greater impact in the history of entertainment. I mean, come on, how many people actually watch films with audio? Oh, what’s that? Most people do? Pretty much every piece of commercial film created in the last 80 years has had synchronised sound? Nobody uses 360º panoramic video projections beyond some very limited applications? Hmm. The French Cinéorama was designed and constructed specifically for the Exposition by <a href="Raoul Grimoin-Sanson">Raoul Grimoin-Sanson</a>, with the intention being to replicate a ride on a hot air balloon over Paris using ten synchronised projectors housed under the ‘basket’ of the stationary balloon model. <figure style="width: 1199px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Cineorama.jpg" alt="" width="1199" height="850" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Built on the technology that English inventor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_W._Paul">Robert Paul</a> had been working on in the late 1890’s to project moving image on a screen (which was in turn based on designs stolen from Thomas Edison’s single-viewer Kinetoscope machine), the Cinéorama would project moving images onto 10 screens, each 9×9 meters, arranged in a circle around the viewer. The film was shot using 10 cameras pointing outwards from a central point which housed the cranking mechanism that wound all of the cameras at the same time – early cinema cameras were usually hand-cranked, so this made sure that the image was captured at the same speed on each camera. This rig was then attached to a real hot air balloon as it flew 400 meters about the Tuileries Gardens, filming the ascent. <figure style="width: 600px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Cineorama_camera.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="1019" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>People would board a giant hot air balloon model in the middle of the screens, the basket of which was big enough to hold 200 people, complete with rigging and the bottom half of a balloon suspended from the ceiling. Once ‘boarded’ the spectators would look out at the screens as the projectors showed the balloon take off. Once the experience had finished, they used some cinema magic to show the balloon landing again (they played the film backwards). The Cinéorama lasted a glorious whole 3 days before the police shut it down due to safety concerns – one of the workmen had fainted from the immense heat of the arc lamps used in the projectors, and as these were housed directly beneath the viewing platform, it was considered an extreme fire hazard to the spectators. After the show was shut down in the middle of day 4, it has never been shown again. Things didn’t faire much better for the Exposition Universelle – due the unexpectedly high running costs of the Exposition as a whole, it ended costing the organisers about 600 francs (around £2,000 in 2018) more per person than the cost of admission. This was the end of this streak of Parisian international fairs. <h2>Circle-Vision 360º</h2> The rebirth of commercial 360º panoramic films came with the opening of 1955’s ‘CIRCARAMA’ cinema in Disneyland, California, showing the short film A Tour of the West, soon followed by America The Beautiful. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rmv_P_wcZG4?start=801" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> The system used in Disneyland, named ‘Circle-Vision 360°’, improved on Grimoin-Sanson’s Cinéorama system in a number of ways, with the biggest difference being that instead of having the film projectors mounted under the audience’s feet (and causing a lot of fire-risks at the same time) an odd number of screens and projectors are used – this means that each projector is placed between the screens on the opposite wall of the purpose-built circular auditorium: <figure style="width: 2320px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/3e/df/f2/ef5b770a26468d/US2942516-drawings-page-2.png" alt="" width="2320" height="3408" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Walter E Disney, Iwerks Ub (1956). US Patent No. US2942516A. Retrieved from https://patents.google.com/patent/US2942516</figcaption></figure> This clever bit of mathematics allows the bulky projector systems to be hidden behind the ring of screens, providing more a more immersive experience to the audience. The camera system used to record the footage, however, is remarkably similar Cinéorama’s – nine cameras are arranged around a central point facing outwards, with an internal mechanism keeping the cameras in sync. <figure style="width: 2364px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Circle-Vision_360_camera_%2829638534777%29_%28cropped%29.jpg" alt="" width="2364" height="1965" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">elisfkc from Orlando, FL, United States [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>The camera rig can be attached to the roof of a car or the underside of a helicopter. Given there was an intentional gap between each screen for the projectors to fit, later films used these to split-up the action between sections of the room. For example, they could show a full 360º film to start with, then fade the screens on one half of the room to show standard film footage on each screen, while maintaining the panorama on the other. This allowed for greater creative freedom, and removed the reliance of using the expensive Circle-Vision 360º cameras to capture all the footage. Over the years, 5 different Disney theme parks have used Circle-Vision 360º for their attractions, and while the original has now closed at Disneyland in California, and it’s international variants at Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris closing in the early 21st century, there are 2 theatres still operating at Epcot – ‘Reflections of China’ and ‘Oh Canada!’ At each of their respective country’s pavilions in the World Showcase. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SdUKRTeyKfU" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Interestingly, you can actually watch this version in 360º using Google Cardboard or by clicking and dragging your mouse around the frame</pre> Both of these act as quasi-tourism videos showing off the landscapes and cultural landmarks of each country …and the Canadian one also serves as a showcase for Martin Short’s comedic talents, so there’s that. This idea of pure spectacle makes sense as a use for this pretty unique form of film-making, but it does highlight two of the biggest drawbacks of 360º cinema in an auditorium setting: The first being the cost involved would make it prohibitive to film more than a few minutes worth of footage, both in terms of capturing using 9 high-quality cameras and running the multiple necessary projectors all day. The second, and possibly most difficult to overcome: trying to craft a story where the viewer needs to constantly be turning their heads. Both of the 360º cinema formats mentioned here rely on the viewer being free to stand and turn all the way around to find and follow points of interest. Indicating where a person should be looking at all times is tricky when it might be behind them. Constantly having your characters announce themselves and give time for people to move around and look in their direction could kill the tension in your drama. Thank you for coming along on our first journey in to 360º video. In our next article we’ll be diving in to the world of modern film and content creation for 360º and VR, and how this can be used in education. <time datetime="2019-02-18" itemprop="dateModified">Feb 18, 2019</time> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> </channel> </rss> " ["raw"]=> string(27255) "HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: application/rss+xml; charset=UTF-8 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: close Date: Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:35:35 GMT Server: Apache X-Powered-By: PHP/8.3.31 Expires: Thu, 19 Nov 1981 08:52:00 GMT Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate Pragma: no-cache Link: <https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-json/>; rel="https://api.w.org/" Set-Cookie: PHPSESSID=tn7tv6b5085pg37pitepumfc9j; path=/; secure; HttpOnly Set-Cookie: spo_201_fa=971e57e158fd4a5340f44852bfb286f0; expires=Mon, 15 Jun 2026 15:05:35 GMT; Max-Age=1800; path=/mediahopper/; Secure; HttpOnly Last-Modified: Thu, 14 Dec 2023 17:57:08 GMT ETag: "45cf9c638f115d3823aeba3d2008b07b" Vary: Accept-Encoding Set-Cookie: RCKBMHKB=027ff8be59-56fd-48b15YywCmPPIMyT7SOJWkdf1j9E-qgeH6oH1HSEwROD7CUdZOB1pL8ZlJy6E0q6PhsQU; path=/; SameSite=None; Secure <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/" xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/" xmlns:cc="http://creativecommons.org/ns#" > <channel> <title>Media Hopper</title> <atom:link href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper</link> <description>Articles and ramblings on Media Hopper Create & Media Hopper Replay, as well as DIY Film School and Apple Podcasts</description> <lastBuildDate>Thu, 14 Dec 2023 17:57:08 +0000</lastBuildDate> <language>en-GB</language> <sy:updatePeriod> hourly </sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency> 1 </sy:updateFrequency> <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5</generator> <cc:license >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</cc:license><dc:rights >Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0</dc:rights> <item> <title>Using Chat GPT to refine narratives</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Wed, 13 Dec 2023 12:11:21 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[AI]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=120</guid> <description><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[2023 has been the year of chatting with robots. Not in a fun-and-hijinks ‘Short Circuit’ way, but in a less hilarity-inducing ‘lets spend 20 minutes phrasing this perfectly so I actually get something useful’ way. A lot of companies have been working on growing ‘large language models’ for use in AI for a while, but the one that really captured people’s attention in 2023 has been OpenAI’s ChatGPT. There are many other flavours of AI chatty-Cathy’s out there with colourful names such as Bard, Claude, Grok, LLaMA, Bothan, and Ernie Bot (one of those I made up*), but ChatGPT has become the go-to chatbot for a lot of people, with over 100 million users registered on the service. In the past 12 months, the top 2 fastest-rising search terms on Google from the UK are ‘ChatGPT’ and ‘Chat GPT’. <img decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-121" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png" alt="" width="300" height="253" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55-300x253.png 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/Screenshot-2023-12-13-at-09.38.55.png 585w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /> While there are a lot of uses for ChatGPT and similar AI services, one that has some people worried about its potential impact is its use for creative purposes. The use of AI-generated images and music has raised questions about whether human artists will get shut out of the process if it’s quicker and cheaper to ask a bot to create art, and the recent SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes that took Hollywood to a grinding halt earlier this year was at least in part because of the actors and writer’s unions wanting to ensure there were protections in updated contracts to limit AI’s impact on filmmaking. While we’re likely at least a few years away from the best original screenplay Academy Award going to ChatBot_182.432.1REV3, ChatGPT can be used as a tool in a lot of ways for narrative storytelling. It certainly can write a full story for you, but it can go off in pretty wild places with some… interesting narrative choices. With the simple prompt ‘Hey ChatGPT, write me a story’, I got a 450 word tale of a character named Luna who lived in a ‘Blade Runner’-esque neon city worked as a librarian by day, and by night used her supernatural powers to turn the books on her shelves in to magical realms. She proceeds to find a kingdom in peril, talk to a wise old owl and a mischievous sprite, solve puzzles, go through enchanted forests, and save the day using the power of imagination. That’s a lot to cram in to 450 words. You can read the full story here with the password LunasMidnightOdyssey – <a href="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/lunas-midnight-odyssey/">full story</a> This is one of the problems with just giving ChatGPT free reign to do what it ‘wants’ when being creative, it doesn’t really understand scale or that just throwing every plot point it can generate in to a list doesn’t really make a story. <figure id="attachment_130" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-130" style="width: 700px" class="wp-caption aligncenter center"><img decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-130" src="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="468" srcset="https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-768x513.jpg 768w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c-1140x761.jpg 1140w, https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/wp-content/uploads/sites/201/2023/12/0078862c.jpg 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-130" class="wp-caption-text">Old College by Playfair, William, University of Edinburgh is available under a CC BY 3.0 Unported licence. https://images.is.ed.ac.uk/luna/servlet/s/m671gu</figcaption></figure> ChatGPT’s really power for creating narrative, at least in its current state, is in using it to refine a story, or to help work through ideas. Let’s say I’m trying create a new video for Media Hopper Create about the history of Old College, and want to write a voice over. Here’s a quick draft: <blockquote>Old College its part of The University of Edinburgh and was mostly built from the late 18th to early 19th century. Originally named ‘New College’, it is a Category A listed building located on South Bridge. The original design was by Robert Adam, with the modern design being completed by William Henry Playfair. The dome was added to the building in 1887, with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. <ul> <li>Original version</li> </ul> </blockquote> I wrote this in about 5 minutes with information culled from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_College,_University_of_Edinburgh">Wikipedia</a>, and while perfectly serviceable, it’s possibly a little perfunctory. I asked ChatGPT what it thought of my script, and it decided (unprompted) to re-write it for me to make it more ‘engaging’: <blockquote>Welcome to Old College, a majestic structure nestled within the heart of The University of Edinburgh. Originally named ‘New College,’ this architectural gem traces its roots back to the late 18th century. Designed by the renowned Robert Adam, its timeless elegance was later completed by William Henry Playfair in the 19th century. Situated on South Bridge, Old College stands as a Category A listed building, a testament to its historical and architectural significance. In 1887, a crowning touch was added to the structure in the form of a magnificent dome. Adorning the pinnacle is a gilded statue of Youth, a creation by the skilled hands of John Hutchinson. As you stand in awe of Old College, it’s not just a building; it’s a living testament to the evolution of academia and architecture. The melding of the past and present, with each stone whispering stories of the scholars who once walked its halls. Today, Old College continues to be a symbol of academic excellence and a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry of The University of Edinburgh. <ul> <li>Revision from ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This new version does feel more like a narrative than just a list of facts, and the language use is definitely more descriptive, it goes a bit overboard with the use of evocative metaphors. To try and rein it in a bit, I added this prompt: “That’s a little bit over the top with descriptive language, can you scale it back a little?”. This is the new version: <blockquote>Old College, part of The University of Edinburgh, has a rich history dating back to the late 18th century. Originally called ‘New College,’ its design, led by Robert Adam and later completed by William Henry Playfair, stands as a testament to architectural craftsmanship. Situated on South Bridge, this Category A listed building gained its distinctive dome in 1887, crowned with a gilded statue of Youth by John Hutchinson. Today, Old College preserves the charm of its past, serving as a key landmark in the University’s legacy. Explore the echoes of academia within Old College’s walls, where each brick tells a story of the scholars who once roamed its corridors. This historic structure, with its timeless design, remains an enduring symbol of The University of Edinburgh’s journey through time. <ul> <li>Revision 2 by ChatGPT</li> </ul> </blockquote> This time it removed some of the descriptive language of the building itself, but it replaced a metaphor of it being ‘a revered landmark in the vibrant tapestry’ of the university with one about ‘each brick telling a story’. Let’s try refining it one more time – here’s the latest version with my prompt “How about you remove some of the metaphors, but give more descriptive language?”: <blockquote>Old College, integral to The University of Edinburgh, has a fascinating history rooted in the late 18th century. Originally christened ‘New College,’ it boasts an architectural legacy shaped by Robert Adam and later refined by William Henry Playfair. Nestled on South Bridge, this distinguished Category A listed building acquired its iconic dome in 1887, adorned with a gilded statue of Youth crafted by John Hutchinson. Old College serves as both witness and custodian to the University’s journey through time. Step into its storied corridors and be transported to an era when scholars traversed its halls. Each brick and beam narrates tales of academic pursuits and intellectual growth. Old College stands today, not just as a historic landmark, but as a living tribute to The University of Edinburgh’s enduring academic tradition.</blockquote> At this point it feels like ChatGPT is stuck just reiterating on a specific style of writing. This is one of the issues I hit when looking to use a chatbot for anything creative – the model it’s using to generate text has a specific style and there isn’t an easy way to break out of that. While ChatGPT is great for helping point you in the right direction, most of the time things will still need to be edited and refined manually to fit the exact purpose you need it for. How about we experiment with this further, and see how well it handles a change in tone. I added the a new prompt to change the genre, but not the content: “What if this was the Voice Over for a horror film?” <blockquote>“Deep within the shadows of The University of Edinburgh lies Old College, a structure steeped in a history that echoes with whispers of the supernatural. Once named ‘New College,’ its unsettling evolution began in the late 18th century under the design of Robert Adam, later twisted by the hands of William Henry Playfair. Perched ominously on South Bridge, this foreboding Category A listed building acquired an eerie dome in 1887, crowned by a gilded statue of Youth, a macabre creation by the twisted artist John Hutchinson. Old College, now a haunting relic, conceals not only the secrets of academia but a darker, malevolent force. As you traverse its desolate corridors, the air thickens with the chilling tales of scholars who met untimely fates within its haunted walls. Every brick, every step resonates with an otherworldly presence. Old College stands not as a symbol of knowledge, but as a portal to the supernatural, where the past lingers, and the spirits of the damned find no rest.” <ul> <li>ChatGPT’s voice over for a horror film</li> </ul> </blockquote> Ok, a lot to unpack… not only is this now borderline defamatory calling famed sculptor John Hutchinson a ‘twisted artist’ who created ‘macabre creations’, claims that Old College is where ‘the spirits of the damned find no rest’ and is literally a ‘portal to the supernatural’, but it is still using that metaphor of ‘every brick tells a story’. While overly flowery language can be a bit of a handful to prune back, this last revision shows where the creative ‘choices’ ChatGPT uses can start to turn truth in to pure fabrication. The original core of the facts from my initial script are still there (the dates, the people involved, the legacy), it uses those to create completely a fictitious narrative. The creative uses for ChatGPT are vast, but as an AI it has no concept of how it should use the information in your prompts, only what it can do. Chat bots can be a useful tool, but just remember to keep it on a short leash. *’Bothan’ is actually a lesser-known species from Star Wars: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_species_(A–E)#Bothan</a> <time datetime="2023-12-13" itemprop="dateModified">Dec 13, 2023</time> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2023/12/13/using-chat-gpt-to-refine-narratives/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item> <title>What is 360º Video? – The Early Days…</title> <link>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/</link> <comments>https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/2019/02/18/what-is-360o-video-the-early-days/#respond</comments> <dc:creator><![CDATA[Liam Duffy]]></dc:creator> <pubDate>Mon, 18 Feb 2019 16:24:53 +0000</pubDate> <category><![CDATA[DIY Film School]]></category> <category><![CDATA[360º]]></category> <guid isPermaLink="false">https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/mediahopper/?p=56</guid> <description><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks,...]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[This is part of a series of posts exploring 360º videos, going from its roots in expositions and theme parks, to how it can be recorded using your mobile phone and used in education. <h2>Cinéorama</h2> The Exposition Universelle, or better known as the 1900 Paris Exposition in English, was part of France’s drive to enter the 20th century with a reignited sense of cultural and national pride after devastation of the Great War. For nearly a decade before the exhibition grounds were due to open, countries around the world were invited to bring their greatest achievements and display their cultures on an international stage, part of the event’s bigger themes of unifying people. <figure style="width: 4195px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/La_porte_monumentale%2C_Exposition_Universelle_1900.jpg" alt="" width="4195" height="2678" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Brown University Library [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Some of the highlights of the Exposition included a giant refracting telescope (60 meters long with a diameter of 1.5 meters), a display of photographs showing African American’s contributions to American society organised by sociologists and activists Booker Washington and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W.E.B._Du_Bois">W.E.B. Du Bois</a> , and in a fit of what I can only imagine was either reckless abandonment or an over-eagerness to please the visiting crowds, a Russian sparkling wine won the “Grand Prix de Champagne” beating several French vintners. The first Olympic Games outside of Greece took place during the Exposition, with the winners receiving 100 francs, a tie pin, and a commemorative pencil. One of the biggest draws of the Exposition was the introduction of two of the great innovations in the world of cinema: the first wide-scale demonstration of recorded sound synced with moving image, and 360º panoramic projections. Obviously the latter of the two had the greater impact in the history of entertainment. I mean, come on, how many people actually watch films with audio? Oh, what’s that? Most people do? Pretty much every piece of commercial film created in the last 80 years has had synchronised sound? Nobody uses 360º panoramic video projections beyond some very limited applications? Hmm. The French Cinéorama was designed and constructed specifically for the Exposition by <a href="Raoul Grimoin-Sanson">Raoul Grimoin-Sanson</a>, with the intention being to replicate a ride on a hot air balloon over Paris using ten synchronised projectors housed under the ‘basket’ of the stationary balloon model. <figure style="width: 1199px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Cineorama.jpg" alt="" width="1199" height="850" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>Built on the technology that English inventor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_W._Paul">Robert Paul</a> had been working on in the late 1890’s to project moving image on a screen (which was in turn based on designs stolen from Thomas Edison’s single-viewer Kinetoscope machine), the Cinéorama would project moving images onto 10 screens, each 9×9 meters, arranged in a circle around the viewer. The film was shot using 10 cameras pointing outwards from a central point which housed the cranking mechanism that wound all of the cameras at the same time – early cinema cameras were usually hand-cranked, so this made sure that the image was captured at the same speed on each camera. This rig was then attached to a real hot air balloon as it flew 400 meters about the Tuileries Gardens, filming the ascent. <figure style="width: 600px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Cineorama_camera.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="1019" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Louis Poyet [Public domain]</figcaption></figure>People would board a giant hot air balloon model in the middle of the screens, the basket of which was big enough to hold 200 people, complete with rigging and the bottom half of a balloon suspended from the ceiling. Once ‘boarded’ the spectators would look out at the screens as the projectors showed the balloon take off. Once the experience had finished, they used some cinema magic to show the balloon landing again (they played the film backwards). The Cinéorama lasted a glorious whole 3 days before the police shut it down due to safety concerns – one of the workmen had fainted from the immense heat of the arc lamps used in the projectors, and as these were housed directly beneath the viewing platform, it was considered an extreme fire hazard to the spectators. After the show was shut down in the middle of day 4, it has never been shown again. Things didn’t faire much better for the Exposition Universelle – due the unexpectedly high running costs of the Exposition as a whole, it ended costing the organisers about 600 francs (around £2,000 in 2018) more per person than the cost of admission. This was the end of this streak of Parisian international fairs. <h2>Circle-Vision 360º</h2> The rebirth of commercial 360º panoramic films came with the opening of 1955’s ‘CIRCARAMA’ cinema in Disneyland, California, showing the short film A Tour of the West, soon followed by America The Beautiful. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rmv_P_wcZG4?start=801" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> The system used in Disneyland, named ‘Circle-Vision 360°’, improved on Grimoin-Sanson’s Cinéorama system in a number of ways, with the biggest difference being that instead of having the film projectors mounted under the audience’s feet (and causing a lot of fire-risks at the same time) an odd number of screens and projectors are used – this means that each projector is placed between the screens on the opposite wall of the purpose-built circular auditorium: <figure style="width: 2320px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/3e/df/f2/ef5b770a26468d/US2942516-drawings-page-2.png" alt="" width="2320" height="3408" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Walter E Disney, Iwerks Ub (1956). US Patent No. US2942516A. Retrieved from https://patents.google.com/patent/US2942516</figcaption></figure> This clever bit of mathematics allows the bulky projector systems to be hidden behind the ring of screens, providing more a more immersive experience to the audience. The camera system used to record the footage, however, is remarkably similar Cinéorama’s – nine cameras are arranged around a central point facing outwards, with an internal mechanism keeping the cameras in sync. <figure style="width: 2364px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Circle-Vision_360_camera_%2829638534777%29_%28cropped%29.jpg" alt="" width="2364" height="1965" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">elisfkc from Orlando, FL, United States [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons</figcaption></figure>The camera rig can be attached to the roof of a car or the underside of a helicopter. Given there was an intentional gap between each screen for the projectors to fit, later films used these to split-up the action between sections of the room. For example, they could show a full 360º film to start with, then fade the screens on one half of the room to show standard film footage on each screen, while maintaining the panorama on the other. This allowed for greater creative freedom, and removed the reliance of using the expensive Circle-Vision 360º cameras to capture all the footage. Over the years, 5 different Disney theme parks have used Circle-Vision 360º for their attractions, and while the original has now closed at Disneyland in California, and it’s international variants at Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris closing in the early 21st century, there are 2 theatres still operating at Epcot – ‘Reflections of China’ and ‘Oh Canada!’ At each of their respective country’s pavilions in the World Showcase. <iframe loading="lazy" src="about:blank" data-bs-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SdUKRTeyKfU" width="660" height="544" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Interestingly, you can actually watch this version in 360º using Google Cardboard or by clicking and dragging your mouse around the frame</pre> Both of these act as quasi-tourism videos showing off the landscapes and cultural landmarks of each country …and the Canadian one also serves as a showcase for Martin Short’s comedic talents, so there’s that. This idea of pure spectacle makes sense as a use for this pretty unique form of film-making, but it does highlight two of the biggest drawbacks of 360º cinema in an auditorium setting: The first being the cost involved would make it prohibitive to film more than a few minutes worth of footage, both in terms of capturing using 9 high-quality cameras and running the multiple necessary projectors all day. The second, and possibly most difficult to overcome: trying to craft a story where the viewer needs to constantly be turning their heads. Both of the 360º cinema formats mentioned here rely on the viewer being free to stand and turn all the way around to find and follow points of interest. Indicating where a person should be looking at all times is tricky when it might be behind them. Constantly having your characters announce themselves and give time for people to move around and look in their direction could kill the tension in your drama. Thank you for coming along on our first journey in to 360º video. 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dbuik on What is an accessibility statement?11th June 2026
Thank you, Karen! You are very much missed over here.
Karen Howie on What is an accessibility statement?10th June 2026
This is a brilliant idea David! Nice work :) I'm still learning from you all despite not working at UoE…
Jose on Being crafty with hand-drawn stick figures and open-sourced music30th April 2026
Hi Jackie, This sounds like an exciting creative project. Designing and animating custom stick figures from scratch is not that…
Hazel Bryant‌‍ on Educated Prompting: Coding Without Writing a Single Line17th April 2026
This is fascinating, particularly the idea of "coding without writing a single line." It really highlights the potential of prompt…
Stewart Cromar on Digital Accessibility Intern27th February 2026
N.B. Closing date now extended to 23:59 on Wednesday, 4th of March.

Tag: Collaborate Ultra

Collaborate Ultra – February Release

Collaborate Ultra is the Virtual Classroom tool available at the University, you can use it via Learn or Moodle and there is also an integration through the MyEd portal. We had our first major new functionality release of 2017 on the 4th of February where we now have chat recorded within the online recording player. […]

Steph Hay 6th February 2017 0

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Tag: Collaborate Ultra

Collaborate Ultra – February Release

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