All posts by James Clay

app of the week, e-book, iphone

Shakespeare – iPhone App of the Week

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Shakespeare – iPhone App of the Week

This is a regular feature of the blog looking at the various iPhone Apps available. Some of the apps will be useful for those involved in learning technologies, others will be useful in improving the way in which you work, whilst a few will be just plain fun! Some will be free, others will cost a little and one or two will be what some will think is quite expensive. Though called iPhone App of the Week, most of these apps will also work on the iPod touch.

This week’s App is Shakespeare.

A cooperative project between Readdle and PlayShakespeare.com, the free Shakespeare application puts the complete works of William Shakespeare literally at your fingertips.

Free

This is a nice App that incorporates the complete works of Shakespeare.

All of his plays and sonnets in one iPhone App, accessible and searchable.

So reading books on the iPhone is not the best way of reading books according to most people I have spoken to. However I never see books on the iPhone as a direct replacement for paper books, but as an enhancement and enrichment of the printed book.

For example, imagine a learner is studying Macbeth (or the Scottish Play); more than likely they will buy a printed copy of the play to use for their studies, one they can read, refer to, annotate and make notes in. Where they will find the Shakespeare App useful is having immediate and easy access to the complete works to compare writing, characters or other plays.

Reading books on the iPhone is never going to replace the printed book, but books on the iPhone (and the iPad) is not about replacing the printed version, but providing access to books at a time and place to suit the reader.

A enhanced version Shakespeare Pro with added features is also available.

Photo source.

ipad

You can order it now…

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After much much waiting, Apple’s game changing iPad is now available to pre-order in the Apple store in the UK. Though it won’t be delivered until the 28th of May.

If you are thinking of getting an iPad, then you might want to consider pre-ordering rather than waiting for a while or waiting until the 28th, especially if you want to get one pretty much on or just after the release date.

As you might expect the iPad is currently the number one selling item in the Apple Store in the UK. If the same thing that happened in the US happens here then you may find it will have “sold out” and you will need to wait. I suspect that will certainly be the case with certain models.

So what about which model to buy?

This is quite a complex question, you need to consider how and where you will be using the iPad. If using just at home and in the office then the WiFi version will probably suffice. If you travel a lot, on the train, at conferences and events then the WiFi + 3G model may be a better bet. If you are going to be using more than just the iPad out and about, say take your laptop with you too, then you might want to consider a MiFi and just get the WiFi iPad.

One of the reasons for getting the 3G model is that it comes with GPS whereas the WiFi model doesn’t. If you are keen on using location services on your iPad, then the GPS is a must. This is probably less of an issue for myself as I do have the iPhone 3GS so that has the GPS capability that I might need. That is probably a key factor on which model is if you have an iPhone or not.

So what about size? 16GB, 32GB or 64GB?

I initially did consider getting a 16GB model as that should be enough for most activities, or so I thought. One thing that is coming out from the US is that iPad Apps are much bigger than most iPhone Apps and it is expected that they might get “bigger”. You can also watch HD movies on the iPad making use of the bigger screen and they are bigger than your average iPhone movie file. So the next consideration is 32Gb, but my first approach with any storage is think about what I might need and then double it. So 64Gb is probably the idea size for me.

I am pleased to see that the iBooks App and Bookstore will be available in the UK on the 28th and looking forward to reading a book on the iPad.

Will the iPad be the game changing device that I think it will be?

No one knows for sure, but it will have an impact regardless.

apple, ipad

How much?

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Apple have announced UK prices for the iPad and a release date!

The iPad will be released in the UK on May 28th. THis is fortunate for me as I will be presenting at the at the JISC CETIS Mobile Tech Meeting at The University of Bolton on the potential impact of the iPad in education.

So what about prices?

Well the WiFi models are

£429 for the 16GB model

£499 for the 32GB

£599 for the 64GB

As for the WiFi + 3G

£529 for the 16GB model

£599 for the 32GB

£699 for the 64GB

Apple have also said that the iBooks App will also be available in the UK allowing e-books to be downloaded and read on the iPad.

Pricing may seem expensive when you consider that the US price for the 16GB WiFI model is $499. However the US prices don’t include Sales Tax that has to be paid in many states, and the UK prices do include VAT!

So… if you take off VAT the 16GB WiFI model in the UK is $536 so about $37 (£25) more than the US model.

The WiFi + 3G 64GB model in the US costs $829, whilst the UK price (excluding VAT) is $874.

So UK prices are more expensive that the US prices, but the difference is not as bad as it first looks.

I have been asked about education pricing, well nothing has been announced, however I would expect to see no difference. The education pricing of the iPod touch is no different to the standard prices. Next year we may see a cheaper iPad when a new model is released.

Another question I was asked was about the 3G models and if they would be subsidised by the mobile phone companies. Again nothing official has been announced so at this time we don’t know what will actually happen. I suspect that later we  will see subsidised models, but certainly won’t see this on the 28th May.

The iPad is a premium product and can command a premium price. Early adopters will (and are willing) to pay “extra” to ensure that they have the iPad on day of release. We certainly saw that with the iPhone and quite a few people in the UK have paid a premium to get an iPad early. So don’t expect to see cheap iPads, well not for a while. I do expect to see subsidised models on 3G contract at some point.

So not long now till the iPad arrives in the UK and I do wonder about the impact it will have on education.

100 ways, e-book, vle

100 ways to use a VLE – #19 Reading a book

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A book, how on earth can you read a book on the VLE?

A book, a printed paper thing!

Well….

Of course we are talking about electronic books, e-books.

It doesn’t really matter whether you like or don’t like e-books as the issue isn’t about choosing one over the other, it’s about convenience and ease of use for the learner.

e-Books should really be seen not as an alternative to paper books, but as an addition an enhancement. Learners still may be given or buy a core text book, they will still have access to the library and that collection. Using e-books on the VLE is about increasing access to resources.

For any course, it is very useful for learners to have access to a reading list, a selection of useful books. Having access to those e-books via the VLE makes that reading list really useful.

Generally most VLE platforms can not be used to host commercial e-books, so most of the time you will need to link to whichever e-book platform that your institution decides to subscribe to.
We use the JISC Collections e-Books for FE collection and this uses the Ebray platform. This allows us to link to individual pages within individual books, books and collections (bookself) of books.

We would never expect learners to just use e-books and never use any other books, however having access to e-books allows learners to access a (virtual) library at a time and place to suit them.

So, yes you can read a book on the VLE!

Picture source.

e-book, google, ipad, kindle

Google to have an e-book store

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BBC News reports on Google Editions

Google is set to launch its own online e-book store in 2010.

Google Editions books will not be tied to a specific device, unlike rival e-book company Amazon.

The Amazon Kindle is linked to books from the company’s own store and similarly with Apple’s iBookstore.

The article takes account of the scanning done by Google

To date Google has scanned over 12 million books, both in-print and out-of-print, giving it a greater selection of material than either Apple or Amazon.

This action by Google reinforces my opinion about the growth of e-books and e-book readers that I outlined in this blog post.

app of the week, iphone, ipod touch

Black & White Camera – iPhone App of the Week

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Black & White Camera – iPhone App of the Week

This is a regular feature of the blog looking at the various iPhone Apps available. Some of the apps will be useful for those involved in learning technologies, others will be useful in improving the way in which you work, whilst a few will be just plain fun! Some will be free, others will cost a little and one or two will be what some will think is quite expensive. Though called iPhone App of the Week, most of these apps will also work on the iPod touch.

This week’s App is Black & White Camera.

If you love black and white photography, this is the app for you! Just take a photo or pick a picture from your photo library, you will get beautiful black and white art photos.

Features:

– Create black and white photos directly using iPhone
– Create black and white photos for pictures in photo library
– Automatically create and save to file
– Processed and saved in original size
– Fast processing & saving
– Polished UI, beautiful design

The pro version “Black & White Camera Pro” comes with flash to do fine grain brightness adjustment.

Free and £0.59 for the Pro Version.

I sometimes think the best Apps for the iPhone are the simple ones, the ones that do one thing well.

Black & White Camera is one of those Apps, you take a photograph, it converts it to Black & White and saves it as a new image to your camera roll.

Nothing more and nothing less.

It’s a free app, the pro version has a “flash” but that isn’t necessary for most photographs. If you want to use photographs from your photo library (for example on an iPod touch) then you can do that too.

Regular readers of the blog will know that I do like to use black and white images to illustrate posts. This App allows me to take a picture and use it in a blog article quickly and easily. The top image was created using this App.

video, youtube

Clean and tidy

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One of the annoyances of using YouTube in the classroom is the “untidy” YouTube interface. It has got better recently, but one annoyance remains, the comments.

For some reason many people who comment on YouTube videos seem to have to use profanities or make weird or rude comments.

As a result when you are showing a YouTube video in a classroom or at a conference, people get distracted by the comments and miss the video.

I did mention QuietTube in a post last week, I was recommended by Ellen to have a look at SafeShareTV.

Not only does SafeShareTV remove distracting and offensive elements around YouTube videos, but it also allows you to crop videos before sharing them.

A neat little idea to sending YouTube links by e-mail, or posting links in the VLE.

It helps avoid some of the distractions that the main YouTube sites offer and is in some ways better and easier than trying to embed the YouTube video.

Another way of showing your videos in the classroom is to use the channel and find the videos that way rather than using the direct URL.

As you can see you also avoid the unecessary comments and distractions, but stil not as clean as SafeShare.

podcast

e-Learning Stuff Podcast #045: Brighton Rock

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Personal responsibility, self-censorship, safeguarding, digital identity and Brighton!

James Clay, David Sugden and Col Hawksworth discuss many issues relating to digital identity and literacy in relation to the use of Web 2.0 tools and services.

With James Clay, David Sugden and Col Hawksworth.

This is the forty-fifth e-Learning Stuff Podcast, Brighton Rock

Download the podcast in mp3 format: Brighton Rock

Subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Shownotes