A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of speaking at the Digital Humanities Summer Institute at the University of Victoria. If you haven’t attended (and didn’t have your Twitter stream flooded with #DHSI2014 tweets), DHSI is a week-long Digital Humanities extravaganza, which you can read about in a previous ProfHacker post. I was participating in one of the new “Birds of a Feather” discussions, which asked two provocateurs to make short presentations and then would open up into a discussion with the audience. I loved the idea and was super-excited to participate. I had thought a lot about what I might say that would be provocative enough to spark conversation but not so provocative as to get a laptop between the eyes. There were three of these sessions, and I was slated to participate in the third one, on Thursday--the penultimate day of the conference. As the week progressed, I found myself changing my mind about what to say--so much so that my original plan went completely out the window. What I had prepared to say and what I wanted to say were no longer related.
This realization was followed by another recognition: I left my iPad at home. In an attempt at packing light, I had deliberately decided not to bring the iPad. I knew I needed my laptop for the course I was taking, and I brought my Kindle for the plane, but I only realized the full ramifications of my decision once I was in Victoria: what would I use for my talk? Usually, I’m old-school when it comes to conference presentations. I print them out and deliver them from the page rather than the screen (after lots of practice). But, this was DHSI, and I didn’t bring any paper. Or rather, the paper I brought was already full--I had printed out our course reader and thought I was being smart by double-siding! By then, I had waited too long to find myself a printer, and the stadium seating in the auditorium we were in meant I would need to look up at the audience, so having a laptop on my lap would be awkward at best. What to do?
At the eleventh hour, I realized that I could probably figure out a way to get my remarks onto my Kindle. We’ve written extensively about the Kindle elsewhere at ProfHacker: “Kindling in the Classroom,” “Just the Kindle,” “Kindle for Proofreading” and many more.
Thankfully, it was easy enough to do:
- Convert your document into a PDF
- Connect your Kindle to your computer via USB
- Click on the Kindle icon under “Devices” in your file browser
- Click on the “Documents” folder
- Drag and drop the PDF into that folder.
- Disconnect your Kindle from the computer (click the up arrow next to the Kindle icon in devices).
When you start your Kindle again, the PDF should appear. I read somewhere that the Kindle would let me increase font size for a PDF, but mine didn’t, so I had to upload a couple different versions in different font sizes to find one that would be comfortable to read from a distance.
When all was said and done, the Kindle worked out well, but I will be traveling with my iPad from now on. The larger display it affords is worth the extra weight in the carry-on. I love my Kindle, but even with the Paperwhite display and backlighting, e-ink is not the easiest to read when giving a talk, and the small screen means more frequent page turns--especially if you need to bump up the font size.
Have you had to come up with any Conference Hacks? Please share in the comments section.
[Creative Commons licensed image from Flickr user Peggy2012CREATIVELENZ]