sMac down

If there is one breakout I wish I could have attended in person it would have been the Apple sMacdown breakout ran by Dorothy Burt and Fiona Grant. They had 6 Apple Distinguished Educators (aka. ADE's) & 2 guru's share 6 tips each.

Sure not all tips will be *NEW* to everyone but it should never be assumed an "old hand" knows it all. Not that I consider myself an old hand, but having been a Mac owner for 5 years I did not know that if you held down the shift key while adjusting your volume you don't get the beeping! I love tips like that! (Thanks Lenva ;-)

The link to their Google site is here.

Drop Box - A filing cabinent in the clouds

Dropbox is a easy way to store your files and then access from any computer, including your iPhone.

First step: Download the Dropbox application from iTunes - here.

Second step: Go to their website here and create your FREE Dropbox account.

You will have 2GB of FREE storage space up in the clouds. Accessible from anywhere as long as you have an internet connection and can get to www.dropbox.com.

On your phone just click the dropbox icon and your documents are sitting there waiting for you to access them.

Social Networking that gets you up off the couch!

I have been exploring apps which you can use running, the winner for me at the moment is the Nike+GPS app. Nike released it on the 6th September 2010 - so it is very much in it's infancy and already they have put out an update to enhance the app (introducing the Facebook Cheer Me on Feature). There are quite a few apps available, I have compiled a list of the ones I am familar with below.

These are the running apps in the iTunes store that I am aware of:

• Nike+ GPS - $2.59
• Roadbud Pro - $13.99
• Runkeeper Pro - $13.99/FREE option too
• Runtastic PRO - $8.29
• Runmeter GPS Running Stopwatch - $6.49
• iMapMyRun+ - $6.49
• LogYourRun - $4.19
• Get Running - $4.19
• WalkJogRun Running - $4.19
• Kinetic - $4.19
• Strands - FREE
  
• Personal Running Trainer - FREE
• miCoach - FREE
  

For me I have chosen to use the Nike+ GPS app.



The Nike+GPS has a ton of features:

• tracks your run and maps it using the GPS built into you iPhone (no cellular data required)
• posts your run to the Nike website
• displays your route, elevation and pace for the whole of your run
  
• posts your run to social networking sites (twitter & facebook) if you want it too (this can be disabled).
  

• gives you voice feedback on your distance & pace through you headphones while out there running
• you can hit the "boost" button to hear your power song when you are having to dig deep

This article compares the Nike+ app with Runkeeper. Two of the leading running apps in the iTunes store.

For quite sometime I have been logging my runs on the DailyMile website. To date I have ran 2,163km. It is hard to desert that site when I have logged a lot of "hard yards" and it turns out I don't need to as there is a Sync feature on the DailyMile site so it will automatically update when I post my run data to Nike+. Which automatically updates from my iPhone as there is a built in Sync feature, as long as your iPhone has a wifi signal (or cellular data) it auto syncs when you finish a run. It is all too easy!

The DailyMile site is a tidy way to keep all your running data together and they go to the trouble of giving you a few extra pieces of data like how many donuts you have burnt off and how far around the world you have traveled! It turns out when you have ran 2,163km you have burnt off 699 donuts.



Links to other reviews:

• AppAdvice - posts about the new "cheer me on feature"

Other health centred apps:

• WiScale - track your body composition - FREE
  

Another App Idea

Genius Scan - when you read through the blurb that comes with this app it is more about the fact that you can scan for example a receipt for the accounts department and not worry about keeping the original receipt. Why don't you just use the camera feature on the iPhone??




The other example was taking a "Genius Scan" of a whiteboard covered in notes - hmmm.... I do that already using the camera app that comes on the phone by default.


So what benefits does Genius scan offer? Why download another app when you can be using the camera feature?

What I thought was quite ingenious regarding this app was a specific idea: instead of carrying around a stack of business cards (which you wouldn't do as you would have them in your "contacts") you GENIUS SCAN the business cards!

At the time I heard someone tweeting this idea I thought "hey, that is cool" but considering it now I'm thinking this idea is a bit redundant, hello; put the details from the business cards into the contacts! Better still use your Address Book on your computer so your can use the computer keyboard to quickly enter the details instead of mucking around with the touch screen keyboard on your iPhone.

Genius Scan is a FREE app! So I have downloaded it and will play with it and see what the pros and cons are.

I think until you have used a app for a few weeks it's a bit tricky to really know if it will be in your top 25 apps. Something tells me this is not but I'll test it out and report back.

iPad, IPod & iPhone App. List of Lists!

A lot of people have compiled lists of applications for the iPod touch, iPhone and iPad.

This blog post (which I will come and add as I discover more) is going to be my "List of Lists" of iApps that I come across.

1. 10 Useful iPhone Shortcuts - Mashable
2. Fraser Speir's iPad list (via @rbvandijk)
3. 10 Useful Apple iPad Tips and Tricks - Mashable
4. My Collection of iPad Apps - Joe Fahs
5. iPods, iPhones & iPads in Education - Jacqui Sharp
6. International Society for Technology Education - ISTE
   

Science Based Apps:

1. Virtual Frog dissection
2. Stellarium - Free
3. NASA - Free
4. Optical illusions - Free
5. BrainPOP Featured Movie - Free
6. Periodic Table - Free ( not the best app for periodic table but it is FREE)
   

Geography Based Apps:

1. Topographic maps - Memory Map - Free
   
2. Tectonic plates - Free

Art/Photograhy Apps:

1. Adobe Photoshop Express
2. Pro HDR -
   
3. Lo Mob -
4. Comic touch -
   

Movie Apps:

1. Movie Vault - Free Full Length Classic Movies Streamed To Your iPhone

Food Apps:

1. Epicurious Recipes - Free
   

Productivity Apps

1. Simplenote - Free - Syncs from iDevice to laptop and vice-versa - AWESOME APP!
   
2. Wooji Presentation Remote - control your keynote presentations
   
3. Air Mouse Pro - this makes your iPad into a massive trackpad
4. GoodReader - for reading & annotating pdf's
5. Skype - Free
   

Reference Apps:

1. StuffNZ - Free
2. Flipboard - Free - viewing range of media
3. TEDTalk videos - Free
4. Engadget - Free
   

Miscellaneous Apps:

1. Tying knots - Free
2. Vodaphone - Free - Check your balance, calling & txt rates and buy top-up credit.
3. Official All Blacks App - Free
4. Live Rugby Scores - Free
5. Strip Designer - make your own comics
6. Dragon Dictation - US store only

Miscellaneous Readings:

1. Do iPhone/iPad apps make your kids smarter? - Blog post
2. iPod/iPad user group - Wiki
   
   
   

If you have lots of time on your hands checkout the AppShopper - here.

If you know of an app that should be amongst my list please leave it in the comments :)

Google Googles - WOW!!

Google Goggles has been around for about 10 months, December 09 they launched the android app and today I downloaded it from iTunes for my iPhone. Yes it is a free app!

The app processes pictures taken with yur phone and recognizes the text within it, creating search results for things like books and business cards. It also recognizes landmarks, paintings oh and did I mention it is quite good at recognising labels on wine bottles! It is not able to recognise animals or food (YET).

Here is a quick review: brace yourself this is one cool app!






Remember this app is only in it's infancy but imagine how awesome it will be with a bit more time.

Read more here.

Ulearn 2010

This year I made the decision not to physically attend Ulearn. I have attended the last 3 Ulearn conferences and I am HUGELY appreciative of my school for being so generous to allow me to attend 3 times but I know the professional development budget is tight and needs to be spread around.

So I am using twitter to keep in contact with #Ulearn10. Videos of the keynotes are being posted here later.

The first Keynote was Lee Crockett this is his book - Understanding the Digital Generation. you can get the first three chapters for free here.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad. - I like that!


Erin Freeman is using posterous to keep a record of her "Raw Notes" while attending keynotes and breakouts and kindly shared it with her PLN (personal learning network) - thanks Erin. (@efreeman). Erin sent out a link to her Diigo which is lots of bookmarks of learning games.

Martin Levins (@emmell) has written a really nice summary on his blog which is worth a visit.

I also had this link sent to me which is a COLLABORATIVE Google doc, I'm not sure who the authors all were. It was organised by @Davein2it.

Other links that came out from my PLN twitter stream:

• The invisible gorilla
• Books online link from a breakout 1 presentation by Lorraine and Gail via @mjbuckland.
  

It wouldn't be Ulearn if you didn't come away with a blog post that has 100 pieces of software you could integrate into teaching and learning. Seriously - the first one on this list is Alice now that on it's own is going to take more than a few hours to master - but I LOVE lists like this so thank you @dakinane! Below is a slide show of his breakout:

90 tools in 90 minutes – revamped, revised and relevant90 tools in 90 minutes – revamped, revised and relevant

View more presentations from David Kinane.

Here is another list that ranks for top 100 emerging tools - thanks to @dakinane for the link


I came across a new twitter person who I think is a Computing teacher - @gradgetgurl42 this is her blog.

Wow there has been a lot of references to the infamous iPad
It seems iPads are all the rage...

I am currently writing a proposal to my senior management to justify buying one for my computing students. My approach is a little different. My students want to create their own applications for the devices and while some have iPod touches it is not the majority and obviously if they are creating the programmes then they want to test it on the device.

That is where Ange Armstrong-Lush who is presenting at Ulearn about creating apps for these devices is of great interest to me.

I am really looking forward to hearing more from @AngeNZ (Ange Armstrong-Lush) who is doing a workshop on iPod application building. Ange has a blog here with some of her pre conference material.

These are some useful links I will come back and visit:

• Gamesalad which I am already familar with but I think there is a newer version
  

• Build Web Apps for iPhone using Dashcode

I have just come across Sam Jarman (@Samjarman). His twitter bio reads: iPhone Developer | High School Student | Twitter Addict | General Geek | Science geek |Passionate about all things tech! He has 8 apps in the iTunes store, check out his list! He co-presented a pre-conference workshop on Developing iOS Applications for Learning. He very kindly sent me a copy of his presentation and a full outline on how to best get started. Thanks Sam, very appreciative of your help!

Here are a few additional links that I came across:

• Worth a read: iPad adoption rate faster than DVD - from TUAW
  
• iPad trials hit Tasmanian schools
• @rbvandijk sent this link to a list of iPad apps for secondary school students
• here at Cybrary Man's Educational Web Sites there are heaps of iPad links - must visit
• Megan Iemma (@megsamanda) has a mLearn blog with some great content, she also shared a pdf from her workshop here
• An iPod for your Classroom Toolbox - on slideshare
• Pearson (text book company) launches iPad Social studies curriculum - news article The iPad program includes three components: App with interactive learning games that introduces concepts to students through puzzles and fast-action challenges; eText on iPad where students access the social studies curriculum and take control of their learning by creating their individualized texts; and the personalized assessment with remediation App for students to review and self-test.

Some links I wanted to make a note of:

• you can create spoken text as itunes track automagically in OSX?

(broken in iTunes10 fix: http://bit.ly/bycp5X )

Google URL Shortener & QR Codes

Google now provide a URL shortening service - goo.gl.

This is nothing new! There are many different URL shorteners around eg. tiny.cc, bit.ly or ow.ly. The beauty of the Google service is that it also provides a QR code for the shortened URL.

For beginners: URL is an acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. Sometimes URL's can be really LONG so when you are wanting to share them with someone you can make it more convenient by using a URL shortening service. You copy and paste your long URL into their website and in return they will give you a modified and shorter URL to use that will still take you to the original URL's destination.

Google's URL shortener not only takes a long url and converts it to a short one for you, but it also provides a QR code for the URL address you just shortened.

QR Code..... what is that?
It is a square that looks something like this:Now it is not going to be of much use to you unless you have a QR code reader.


Some mobile phones have QR readers built into them. If you have one of the smart phones (or 4th generation iPod touch) you will be able to download a QR reader application - they are available free on iTunes.


Once you have a QR reader on a device you are set. When you come across a QR code, scan it using your QR reader and wait for all to be revealed behind the code. It may take you to a website. It may contain a message, perhaps it will reveal an image sitting on a website like Flickr... this is where you are limited by your imagination as to what lies hidden behind the code.

The QR reader for iphone allows you to then share the "mystery link" via email, SMS, Facebook, Twitter or simply take a copy.



















Now I am thinking about the authentic and genuine uses QR codes could bring to the classroom. Your comments in this area are most welcome.

1. First and perhaps the most obvious use is in the Physical Education curriculum. It could be used in orienteering type activities where the students scan the code to reveal the next set of co-ordinates. At the end of the year we run school camps and one is based locally so it could be incorporated into one of those activities.
2. ummm... how else could be used authentically in a class??

I'll come back and edit this when I think of some other ideas... Well I have not so much come back with other ideas but I would highly recommend this blog post by Joel Buckland - 30 interesting ways QR codes are being used.

This is a Google presentation - at the time I posted this link it contained 14 INTERESTING ways you could use QR codes in the classroom.

QR codes will become commonplace, Likify is one site that has come up with a unique way of using them. Basically you create your own likify page for which you get a QR code for. You then put your QR code into the public arena for people to scan, this takes them to YOUR likify page where they can "like" your page. Check out this MakeUseOf article for a clearer explanation.

Another cool app - WhatApp Messenger

WhatsApp messenger is a smartphone to smartphone messenger. It allows you to send and receive messages, pictures, audio notes, and video messages at NO COST. All features are included in the $1.29 purchase price without the need for extra in-application purchases.

* You can use it as much as you want - send a million messages in one day all for FREE. It uses you internet connection or Wi-Fi when available.

*MMS: send video, images and voice notes (3GS required to send and save video)

*No International charges - just like sending emails overseas, as long as your overseas mates have WhatsApp Messenger installed you can avoid those extra international SMS charges.

*No PIN or Password to remember - it works with your phone number, just like sending a text and integrates flawlessly with your existing phone address book

*Your Address Book is used to automatically connect with your contacts. Your contacts who already have WhatsApp Messenger will be automatically displayed under Favorites.

*Offline messages - if your turn off your internet access and not on a Wi-Fi network, WhatsApp Messenger will save your messages offline until you retrieve them

*Status feature allows you to inform your contacts what you are up to, ie in a meeting/busy.

*Extra features: share location, exchange contacts, custom wall paper, customise notification sounds, landscape mode, precise message time stamps, email chat history, broadcast messages and MMS to many contacts at once.

Switch - sound file converter

I have been using Switch for a while. It is a free piece of software which you can get from NCH software. I use it for audio file conversion to mp3.

There is a range of software that does this job, Switch is the one I have been using. I find it simple to use, an intuitive interface with no hassles.

This is what it does: Switch Audio Converter Features

• Batch converting to convert many audio files at once
• Import and convert a playlist (m3u and pls)
• Import video files and extract audio (avi, mov, mpeg)
• Extract and convert audio from DVDs
• Customizable right-click "Quick Convert" options
• Convert from multiple file formats at one time
• Access online database to add song information
• Listen to tracks prior to conversion
• Automatically normalize audio while converting
• MP3 encoder supports constant or variable bit rates
• WAV encoder supports a range of sample rates
• Use as a command line plugin for automation with software to convert or compress audio files