In building my digital project, I have to put a lot of faith in the tools I use to get things done. The tools are definitely a benefit- they save me time in building something myself and look far more professional than anything that could be made from scratch in ten weeks. However, they are not without their challenges. Learning a tool takes time, but it is a necessary step to better understand what is being done. Some require more work or time, but users can learn how to implement them with the input. Problems arise when they fail to work. Maybe a tool is getting older, maybe something is running slow, maybe the browser is acting up- there are endless possibilities. I, unfortunately, cannot diagnose all these problems, and some causes are entirely out of my control. Still, these tools were made for a purpose, and they will do their best to fulfill it. I simply need to trust that they will work, bugs and all. No product is perfect, but that does not mean they aren’t worthwhile.
Digital Scholarship Summer Fellows 2017
Musselman Library, Gettysburg College
Trust, but always be critical. But it means a lot to trust these tools, as it really means you are trusting the people who have put the work into them to make them work and maintain them. It’s certainly a huge risk, and sometimes you have that trust compromised. Unfortunately, that’s just a consequence of dealing with computers (and people).