All posts by James Clay

blog, blogging

A decade of blogging

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Well 17th December 1997 saw the first use of the term, weblog, from which blog, blogging and blogosphere all arise from. The BBC reports on the history of the blog:

The word was created by Jorn Barger to describe what he was doing with his pioneering Robot Wisdom web page.

The word was an abbreviation for the “logging” of interesting “web” sites that Mr Barger featured on his regularly updated journal.

A decade on and blog-watching firm Technorati reports it is tracking more than 70 million web logs.

So this is one of these 70 million and here’s to the next ten years.

A decade of blogging

ipod touch, mobile

iPod touch, impressions

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Gloucestershire College is undertaking the Glossy project as part of MoLeNET and as part of that I am evaluating and reviewing mobile devices that we may use as part of our project as well as seeing how they work so when we create (and convert) content for use on a mobile device we can ensure that it works on the majority of devices that our learners actually use.

Well I now have an iPod touch, and though I have touched one before, to actually use one for quite a bit of time, is a different kettle of fish. I am very impressed still with the device. Apple have done an excellent job.

The touch interface is very impressive and compared to the typical Table PC or Archos touch interface, the iPod touch interface is more fluid and responsive, and though I don’t like the fingerprints all over the device, the use of the finger is very intuitive.

It is these fingerprints which will probably mean that the device is not suitable for use in a classroom environment with the institution providing the devices. Learners will more thank likely look after their own iPod touch, but a class set would soon get very grimy and would need to be cleaned on a regular basis. That’s not to say this would not happen to other mobile devices, I only need to look at my phone and my iPod to see fingerprints all over them, but there is a difference when you are using your finger to poke and swipe to actually use the device.

Having said all that I can certainly see learners been able to use this interface quickly and easily, more so if webpages (ie web content) is designed for the interface.

The screen quality is excellent and images and video look excellent.

iPod touch

Syncing took a bit of time, it’s just an 8GB device, but I did put over five hundred photographs on the device as well as 4Gb of music and podcasts. This is something to consider when first using the device, it will take time to initially charge and synchronize.

The browser is probably the best I have seen on any mobile device, the way you can intelligently zoom in and out makes browsing webpages really nice and you don’t feel you are losing out with the small screen (well it’s a lot smaller than my 20″ iMac).

Overall I do like the iPod touch. it is one of the best mobile devices I have ever used and I have used a lot.

google

Google wants its own online knowledge project

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Anyone whoever searches using Google will know that Wikipedia more often then not appears in the search results.

It’s interested to read (from the BBC) that:

Google has kicked off a project to create an authoritative store of information about any and every topic.

The search giant has already started inviting people to write about the subject on which they are known to be an expert.

Google said it would not act as editor for the project but will provide the tools and infrastructure for the pages.

Many experts see the initiative as an attack on the widely used Wikipedia communal encyclopaedia.

It will be interesting to see how this will work out. I also wonder what will be the impact of such a project on the search results in Google, will Wikipedia be pushed out, in other words will the Google algorithim be changed to favour Google’s site over Wikipedia.

From a learning perspective, it certainly means that there will be another site which students can use, but whether it will be as good or as bad as Wikipedia (depending on which subject you look at) it can only be a good thing that there is going to be more (good) information available freely to learners to support their learning.

learning resources

Open Yale Courses

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Yale University (in the US) are going to allow anyone in the world to access their most popular undergraduate courses for free.

Yale University is making some of its most popular undergraduate courses freely available to anyone in the world with access to the Internet.

The project, called “Open Yale Courses,” presents unique access to the full content of a selection of college-level courses and makes them available in various formats, including downloadable and streaming video, audio only and searchable transcripts of each lecture. Syllabi, reading assignments, problem sets and other materials accompany the courses.

The production of the courses for the Internet was made possible by a grant from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. The seven courses in the sciences, arts and humanities—which were recorded live as they were presented in the classroom to Yale students—will be augmented with approximately 30 additional Yale courses over the next several years.

This means that institutions across the world will be able to see and view how Yale deliver their undergraduate programme, and unlike much of the others who have been doing this already, they are using a lot more video and audio content.

Obviously you need to attend Yale to get accreditation, but this kind of move from someone like Yale demonstrates again the importance of the institution and the teacher over the content in education.

Some lecturers are very protective about the content they use in their teaching and are unwilling to share, this kind of programme that Yale are undertaking, shows once more that it is the teaching and the support an institution provides is so much more important than the content.

And the more we share content, the more we can save time and ensure that our students (online or offline) achieve on their courses.

So here in the UK we have the Open University sharing some of their content, I wonder when we will see more Universities and more FE Colleges sharing their content? It’s not as though we don’t have a way of doing this, we do have JORUM.

Old Book

So here’s hoping Yale and others will continue to release more content for learning and e-learning online.

Photo source.

learning technologies

Free Online PDF Creation

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Though you can create PDF files on a Mac, it is not always possible on a PC unless you have dedicated software. This is where online PDF creator sites can be very useful.

They are also useful if you for example have been sent or downloaded a Microsoft Publisher file and you have a Mac, or you don’t have Publisher on your Windows PC. They can take the Publisher .pub file and print it as a PDF.

One such site is PDF Online, which can convert a range of file formats (including Microsoft Publisher and Microsoft Office) into a PDF which is then e-mailed to you.

I would suggest that if you do use such a service that you use a disposable e-mail address, or one that can be deleted later.

news

BBC, ITV and Channel 4 form on-demand service

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There is Channel 4’s 4oD service, BBC’s iPlayer, now we have plans for a new on-demand service for television.

TV

The BBC is reporting how the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 are going to work together to provide a new on-demand service for viewers.

The BBC, ITV and Channel 4 are to launch a joint on-demand service, which will bring together hundreds of hours of television programmes in one place.

The service is set to go live in 2008 and will offer viewers access to current shows and archive material.

Read more and photo source.

windows

Comic Life for Windows

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I have mentioned the beta of Comic Life for Windows quite a few times now. So it’s nice to tell you that Plasq have now released the full and final release of Comic Life for Windows.

Comic Life

Comic Life is one of my favourite applications and certainly is one of the easiest ways of making comics for use for print and online.

A 1000 seat educational licence for Comic Life is only £511.77 which is quite good value if you ask me. A 25 seat licence is only £101.95.

I will probably get a licence for my institution for staff use at least and for student use if required.

learning technologies

“it’s too flawed to be anything other than a novelty”

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The Guardian has reviewed the Sony VAIO UX1XN and found that though a wonderment of design, it is somewhat fiddly to use.

But delightful though this notebook is to look at and hold, it’s too flawed to be anything other than a novelty.

UX1XN

The review also mentions issues with the keyboard and the tablet input, which I both agree with.

… there’s the first disappointment – the keyboard. You wouldn’t want to do much more than tap out an email on it, as the size of the keys make it no good for touch-typing. Double-thumb input is feasible, but the tiny keys make it hard to be accurate.

and

The touchscreen is a nightmare. Fiddly to calibrate, it failed to retain its settings and eventually refused even to acknowledge that it was in fact a touchscreen. So I resorted to the pointing device.

I still think it is useful and not as flawed as the review makes out, and the more I use it, the more uses I find for it.

kindle, news

Amazon sells out of its new digital book reader

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Despite a lot of scepticism and negative coverage about Amazon’s new digital book reader, the device has sold out according to the BBC.

Amazon’s Kindle e-book reader has sold out despite scepticism about whether the device will prove popular. A notice on the Kindle pages on the Amazon web store said “heavy customer demand” for the device meant it would be out of stock until 3 December. Since its launch on 19 November the device has been widely examined but opinions about it are mixed.

Looks like people are interested in this digital book reader. Is this the device for e-books what the iPod was for digital music? We will have to wait and see.

iphone, news

T-Mobile to open up iPhone sales

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BBC reports that T-Mobile to open up iPhone sales.

T-Mobile is to start allowing German customers to buy Apple’s iPhone without a contract to its network, as it moves to comply with a court injunction. 

However this is in Germany only and the iPhone will be twice as expensive as the contract version.

Legislation in the UK allows for locked phones, but you could import iPhones from Germany and then avoid the two year contract making it available for testing and usability.