Tools: April 2008 Archives

I don't know if you blog. But maybe you know someone who does. Other than me, that is. Or somebody who manages Web pages of some kind. Or somebody who likes to send links in email.

Part of the fun of blogging for me is sharing stuff that I like with people I know. And on the Web, "sharing" means "sending you a link." And if you've gone to the trouble of creating a list in WorldCat, it's almost freakishly easy to turn that list into a set of click-able links for your blog, Web site or email.

1. Get an account and create a list in WorldCat.
2. Go to the "Citations View" tab of the list.
3. Pick the citation style you like (I prefer MLA for this kind of list)
4. Choose to "Export selected references as:" HTML
5. And click on "Export."

At that point, you need to tell your browser where you want the HTML file to go to. Usually, I just direct it to be opened in another tab/window of the browser itself. But you can send it to a text editor or word processing program, too.

Now... Take that new HTML page of text+hyperlinks, select everything, and paste it into your blog engine, Web page or email. Depending on what software you're using, it might go in just as a copy/paste, or you may have to play with your tags a bit. It worked for me that easily in Gmail and in WordPress. Let me know how it goes elsewhere.