New post on my Library blog: Cite Yourself

Faux Pas?

I just finished reading a 5-page article during which the author cites his other work (even a work that is pending publication) 5 times. Is that common practice? Doesn’t that amount to an academic pat on the back?

I honestly do not know and would like to learn. Leave me a comment with the answer!

New post from my religious blog: No Nacho Libre Today

I Smell Cookies…

So I have no new Nuggets of Nacho today, I’m sorry about the pain this undoubtedly causes you. I have been preparing for this weekend’s Spanish Family Camp, and there simply hasn’t been time for me to cook up any Nuggets of Nacho. This is going to be the first conference that I have been asked to speak (I’m not counting the baby-sitting from Couples Plus). I’ll be delivering a couple 45-minute messages for Middle/High School/Early College kids who want to hear a message in English. We’ll see if they show up.

So, in order to satiate your need for Nuggets, I give you an index of all previously published Nuggets of Nacho. Catch up on all the yummy goodness from Nacho and the Bounty of God’s Word.

• Announcing: Nuggets of Nacho
• Talk of Holy Things
• Smile & Be Happy
• The Lord’s Chips
• Get Married Instead
• Good Toast
• The Blouse Rippers
• I Need A Man
• You’re Crazy
• The Nitty Gritty
• Taste The Glory
• A Better Duty and Easters
• Salvation and Stuff
• I Saw You From the Villiage

New post on my Library blog: Basics of Web Design: Book Review

The Book

Title: Basics of Web Design: HTML5 & CSS3 
Author: Terry Felke-Morris

I read this book for the class LIS 5937: Web Design for Librarians. It was a good class though tedious. Web design is about attention to detail while keeping the big picture in mind. This book shows the reader which tools are available to build professional websites out of a simple notepad.

The Review

I particularly enjoyed this book because the text was laid out in a simple, logical manner. This was a book written about the web, but also written like the web. Hence, there were a lot of bullet points, lists and tables that allowed for easy digestion of the material.

In addition, the sections were laid out brilliantly from an editing perspective. As everyone knows, new information is constantly released on this topic, and books must be revised accordingly. The sections stand alone and could easily be removed, rearranged or edited in isolation.

Finally, I found myself using this text as reference material. The index was superb, and I was able to get to all the relevant information for the project at hand with little hindrance.

I wholeheartedly recommend this text to any novice/advanced beginner who needs a little guidance/an offline reference tool for web design. Quite frankly, all of the information in the book can be found online, but sometimes the structure of a book can help beginners get their feet wet.

The Citation

New post on my Library blog: The Horror!

I Know What I’m Gonna Do This Summer

It’s not exactly the stuff of horror movies, but I didn’t get into the classes I wanted. Who knew there would be so much competition for Copyright! Here are my courses for the semester, I know they will be beneficial to my career endeavors even if they turn out to be fairly difficult and boring.


So I will be pressing on. Here’s a little factoid that will get me through this year: the last day of classes for my final term is the same as my wife’s birthday. Yay!

New post from my religious blog: Life, God, and Other Small Topics: Book Review

The Book

Socrates in the City: Conversations on “Life, God, and Other Small Topics”
Eric Metaxas

This book was placed in my hands with no prior buildup. Usually, a friend will talk up a book a few times before they hand the volume over to me. This book was literally placed in my hand with no warning and I was told to read it because it did a very good job of presenting many approaches to Apologetics.

My friend was right.

Technical Merit

It is hard to judge the technical merit of this book since it is a transcription. Socrates in the City is an informal lecture series hosted by Eric Metaxas where the brightest minds in all kinds of Apologetics get together to ask the big questions about life.

I give the work 3.5 stars because the editing is quite good. The format of the lecture is as follows: Eric Metaxas introduces the speaker, the speaker gives their lecture and there is a set time for questions and answers. Given the format and the live nature of the entire setting, the potentially weakest point is the Q&A. However, they were able to mitigate most of the difficulties with Q&A transcription and, at times, it becomes a strength.

Metaxas is a very humorous man, though some of the humor reads with a “you had to have been there” tone. This should come as no surprise for Veggie Tales fans, as he worked extensively with the program and narrated the movie dealing with Queen Esther. Still, the humor helps cut the dry, somber nature of the topics addressed.

Review

This book approaches 360 pages and covers a lot of different approaches to Apologetics, including scientific, philosophical, literary, political and historical, to name a few. Speakers range from Charles Colson to Alister McGrath to Francis Collins. The range of voices is actually quite diverse.

As was mentioned earlier, Eric Metaxas engages in witty banter with the audience that, at times, does not translate well to print. For the most part, I skipped over the introductions and got right into the main speaker’s lecture. I suggest reading the first introduction and deciding whether that humor appeals to you or not.

Takeaway

I enjoyed the lecture given by Sir John Polkinghorne entitled Belief in God in an age of science. It was thorough and debunked the dualistic thought process that believes that one must be either a good scientist or a good Christian and there is no room for middle ground. Polkinghorne lays out how these two aspirations are not mutually exclusive. He believes that by studying the universe in it’s complexity we can appreciate God’s creativity within the system he has put in place.

My next favorite piece (lecture) was Paul Vitz’s The importance of fatherhood, which directly pointed out the fact that most of the great Athiests had no strong father figure in their lives. On the other hand, most of the great defenders of Christianity had strong father figures. The term “Father Figure” is used because this figure need not be the biological father, it could be a grandfather, uncle, male neighbor or male church member who takes an interest in the child’s life.

During this lecture, Paul Vitz also describes a shift he is seeing with regard to traditional values. He states that in the middle of the 1900s we had Modernism which called into doubt some of our traditions and criticized them in the light of higher learning. Soon, Post-Modernism took it another step and simply rejected traditions offhand as passe. Now, Vitz argues that we are seeing Trans-Modernism where we realize on a qualitative level the benefit of previously unchallenged traditions. Having strong father figures happens to be one of these traditions that we should be realizing is a good thing.

In the end, I heartily recommend this book. It avoids the technical nature that an entire book on Apologetics tends to run into due to Metaxas’ humor but still tackles all the tough topics.