Yesterday I mentioned that Apple were going to allow third party applications for the iPhone. What is nice is that they are also going to allow developers using their software developers kit (SDK) to create applications for the iPod touch as well.
Apple in their press release said:
P.S.: The SDK will also allow developers to create applications for iPod touch.
Excellent, this means that developers will be able to create applications for the iPhone and the iPod touch.
Thanks Gary.
Anyone who has been following the iPhone (despite it not been available in the UK until November 9th) will know that one of the complaints about the iPhone was the lack of third party applications.
Now some clever people managed to “hack” the iPhone to allow third party applications, this was recently broken by an update from Apple.
It is now been reported that Apple have announced that they will be allowing third party application development.
Apple boss Steve Jobs has said that outside developers will now be allowed to make add-on software for the iPhone.
“We are excited about creating a vibrant third party developer community around the iPhone and enabling hundreds of new applications for our users,” said Mr Jobs.
This will be useful for those who are interested in using the iPhone for educational purposes as now educational or learning applications could be created.
I wonder also if such applications could work on the iPod touch, I am guessing no.
Not only can you download the OCR past papers, you can also now upload them to your institutional intranet or VLE.
OCR has begun the first stage of a planned release of free past papers onto the website.
In response to your feedback, we have published 1,000 free-to-download 2006 past papers, mark schemes and examiner reports. There are a few exceptions where we cannot secure copyright, but the majority of qualifications are now covered.
We have also published more than 100 of our papers from 2007, with more due online soon.
OCR’s revised policy means that, in future, many more question papers will be published on the website after each exam series.
Once published online, the papers will remain available for at least two years. Again, you can download all these papers free of charge.
Please view the past papers page for details of the documents available to download.
The JISC have announced a new funding call.
The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) invites institutions to submit funding proposals for projects to re-use learning content; that is projects to develop, run and quality assure technology enhanced courses using reused and repurposed learning materials sourced externally to their institution. Projects will be expected to construct or ‘revamp’ a module delivered largely via electronic means documenting the issues faced in developing and running the course in a case study.
As (usual) this is for HE institutions or FE College which have 400 FTE HE students.
What I like about this funding call is that they are expecting to fund between thirty and forty projects, which is quite a few. Should be interesting to see the outcomes next year.
This blog is not really new, I did blog about e-learning when I worked at the WCC, but I have reached a milestone with this blog, my 200th post (this one). The blog has also had over 4000 visits. Thanks for visiting and here’s to the next two hundred posts.
The BBC have come to a deal with The Cloud wifi service to offer BBC Online free at The Cloud’s thousands of wifi hotspots.
This means that if you are at a wireless hotspot you don’t need to pay anything to access the BBC News website for example. You can also download TV programmes (via iPlayer) as well.
I do wonder if there is potential in this kind of relationship between educational institutions and wifi hotspot providers. Could we see college websites and vles available for free at local wifi hotspots. Something I am certainly thinking about.
One thing I have noticed attending a few events recently is that the wireless networks have been unable to cope with the large number of delegates wanting to use it.
This happened at the MoLeNET Launch Conference, noted by others as well including Andy Black. I also noted it happened at other events as well.
A few years (or even just a year ago) if you attended an event with free wireless, there were probably just a few of you who used it with their laptops. Today if you attend an event, you may find that everyone (virtualy everyone) has a laptop and if not a laptop then a PDA or a phone or an entertainment device with wifi capability.
As a result the wireless networks can not cope and if you are late to the event, you will find that though your wireless laptop can see the wireless network it will be unable to be assigned an IP address by the router. With a self-assigned IP address your laptop will the be unable to route any kind of network traffic, so no connection to the internet.
Generally this happens because most wireless routers can only deal with a limited number of wireless clients. The Airport Express for example can only handle ten clients, the Airport Extreme can handle fifty.
Once the wireless router has reached the maximum number of clients, then it will no longer assign IP addresses, and any “extra” clients will not be assigned an IP address.
Now in theory what should then happen is that when one of the wireless clients is disconnected from the wireless network, it should release their IP address and the router should then be able to assign the IP address to a new client. What usually happens is that the client does not correctly release the IP address (the laptop is hibernated or turned off without shutting down properly) and therefore as far as the router is concerned, the IP address is still in use.
The solution is to reboot the wireless router, which in a conference or at an event is nigh on impossible, as most conference organisers don’t even know where the router is let alone how to reboot it (turn it off and back on again).
As more and more delegates at conferences and events use wireless devices, the more important it is for event organisers, conference centres and other places which hold events, to ensure that their wireless networks are scalable and can cope with the number of wireless clients.
The same can also be said for educational institutions which already have wireless networks or are thinking of introducing them.
Just because my wireless router can cope with my home network, doesn’t mean that I can use something similar in an institutional context.
One problem I can foresee for colleges thinking about using 3G technology is the connectivity issues that they may have using multiple 3G devices inside a building.
I noticed this device (mentioned in PCW Magazine) as a potential solution.
Oyster 3G — The home access femtocell
Oyster 3G is the home access femtocell that delivers high-quality 3G spectrum into the home. Because it uses the customer’s broadband it actually adds capacity to your macro network, improving service for everyone in the cell, indoors or out.
Though this technology in theory just makes it easier for 3G devices to connect to a 3G network, I believe you would still be charged your usual 3G data charges.
I wonder if this or a similar technology could be used to create your own institutional 3G network, so 3G devices could use the JANET connection to connect to the internet via this institutional 3G network rather than pay the data charges.
I suspect though that this would not be possible as the mobile phone operators paid a fortune for the 3G licences and therefore would not want to lose any potential revenue. However I wonder if possible partnerships could be set up? I know that this is what at-Bristol did with Orange with their local mobile phone network.
I read with interest (and disappointment) that a certain fast food company is going to offer free wireless in their restaurants. Now they use the word restaurant to describe their establishments, personally I think that breaks the Trade Descriptions Act!
The Register reports:
Proletarian fryhouse McDonald’s has announced it will offer free Wi-Fi in its 1,200 UK burger outlets by the end of the year. The move will make McDonald’s the country’s largest public hotspot provider, and pits it against Starbucks’ pay-as-you-go T-Mobile service for high street internet supremacy.
Now the thought of free wireless is always something that I love the concept of, for example: Caffe Gusto in Bristol (hasten to add only in some of their branches) has (or had) free wireless and if you popped in for a coffee you might only be in there for fifteen or twenty minutes, but enough time so you can quickly check your e-mail, do a Jaiku presence report, check a few websites and so on…
The problem with something like T-Mobile at Starbucks is that unless you have an account you can only purchase at a minimum a thirty minute slot, or even a full hour. This means you spend probably twice as much as you did on coffee to access the internet, and then you feel like you need to spend the full time in order to get your value for money.
Now the problem I have with that certain place that will offer free wireless is that I don’t like their coffee (is it too hot) and I don’t like their food (way too salty).
Please can other (nice) places start to offer free wireless, I would really appreciate it, please.
Today I ran a copyright workshop at the RSC SW VLE Forum in Taunton.
An interactive version of the workshop can be found online at the JISC Collections website.
Useful links
UK Intellectual Property – Government-backed home of UK Intellectual Property on the Internet. Resources on Copyright, Designs, Patents and Trade Marks.
CLA – The Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd. The CLA is a non profit-making company that licenses organisations for photocopying and scanning from magazines, books and journals.
NLA – Newspaper Licencing Agency. The NLA operating on behalf of the UK’s national and regional newspapers the NLA licenses organisations to take legal copies of newspaper articles;
Crown Copyright – Guidance on the use of Crown copyright protected materials.
JISC Legal – a free information service offering high quality legal information to further and higher education relating to the use of information and communications technologies.
Creative Commons provides free tools for authors, artists, and educators to mark their creative work with the freedoms they want it to carry.