By allowing students to bring in their own devices for learning–rather than insisting that they learn both content and device in school–there is an important opportunity to connect with not just their personal lives, but their natural way of doing things.
Equity
While there are students who badly want technology and can’t afford even the $50, that doesn’t seem to be a strong argument against BYOD adoption, especially in light of what it costs—in time and money—to purchase, train, integrate, and maintain—state-funded, district-purchased, school-assigned devices. This is where schools, local organizations, and communities can step in.
Money and Learning
In the United States there can be a tendency to throw money at problems that are not fully understood. As a nation, America lags behind internationally, the “learning market” being one of the few markets proving evasive in lieu of continued effort, struggle, and spending.
Google has their own site to help you learn how to use Google Apps, Learn Google Apps.
The site has tips on switching from other systems, tutorials, articles, tips and tricks, videos, examples of using Google Apps and much more. You can also learn by each app individually.
There’s even an weekly episode of the “Apps Show” where you can learn about new tips and features.
HTTP/2 standard has been finalized, paving the way for a faster Web
HTTP/2 will enable faster page loads, it is binary instead of textual (more efficient and less error-prone), it is fully multiplexed (to improve network performance), uses header compression and ‘Server Push’ (to reduce overhead).
If you are a web developer you can already test HTTP/2 in Firefox and Chrome with a few downloadable test servers. More information on that can be found here.
Adobe Photoshop: ‘Democratizing’ Photo Editing For 25 Years
“Dreamscape,” courtesy of Jimmy Williams, shows how Photoshop can be used to create fantastical landscapes. But the program’s inventors note that photo manipulation predated Photoshop.
Chromebook:
Diigo’s Awesome Screenshot tool. Awesome Screenshot is a simple one step installation
TechSmith’s Snagit. Awesome Screenshot will only capture things that are displayed in your web browser. Snagit download the Snagit Chrome app and the Snagit browser extension. . Both tools allow you to draw and type on top of your screenshot images. Macbook and Windows laptops:
Mac keyboard combination of “Command+shift+4” “Command+shift+3” will capture everything on your screen.
Windows computer Snipping tool
Jing to take screenshots on my Mac and on my Windows laptop.
Skitch If you have an Evernote account, you can save Skitch images in your Evernote account.
iPad and iPhone:
Taking a screenshot on an iPad or iPhone is a simple matter of holding down your “home” button (the big round one) and power button at the same time. The image will save directly to your device’s camera roll. When I need to draw, highlight, or type on an image in my camera roll I turn to Skitch again.
Android phones and tablets:
As long as your device is operating on Android 4.0 or later you can take a screenshot by holding down your home button and power/sleep button at the same time. The screenshot should save to your camera roll unless you’ve designated another place for it to save. Once on your camera roll you can use the image in other apps for drawing, cropping, annotating, and sharing. Some Android devices, depending on manufacturer, include a built-in screenshot image editor. Pixlr and Skitch. Skitch on Android offers all of the same features that are outlined above. Pixlr is a more robust tool that allows you to apply image filters in addition to drawing and typing on your images.
Please consider other IMS blog entries on the topics:
Android Wear (java)
Pebble (C)
Samsung Tizen (HTML5)
Apple Watch WatchKit (Swift, Objective-C support is buggy)
WatchKit is the least mature
limitations: no keyboard, no mouse, no touch screen, battery life, limited usable screen real estate, CPU performance
opportunities: hands-free, speech for text input, sensors (gyro, camera, accelerometer), gesture-based input, BLE (bluetoothSmart)
GOod wearable Design: Recognizes immediacy, leverages context of the wearer
challenging to develop good experiences for these devices.
802.11 will eat short battery life, in addition to bluetooth. Samsung Gear S will get notification even from afar, but usually smartwatch notification is paired only in immediate proximity of the bluetoothed device.
Addon –
industrial uses of wearable: tag and quickmessages, not occupying hands.
keyboard is with swipe gestures.
Frank Schloendorn, Fiberlink, speaker
build in security is limited. Jailbroken / rooted devices are at higher risk> Open to hacking, still in infancy. No real MDM (Mobile Device Management) type solutions available
Do you currently own smartwatch
no management solutions exist today. OS: Tizen, Android, PebbleOS, Apple Watch OS etc
Cameras and other sensors cant be managed, monitored (spy scenario)
Is wearable an independent device or an extension of a smartphone
Best practices:
manage the connected device, not the wearable
be aware of what data can “leak” to a wearable device
if necessary, take more extreme measures (block bluetooth, ban devices)
new security options for mobile devices linked to wearables. bypass lock screen with presence of wearable, content sensitive security.
if you’re looking for a more affordable and easier to use Web development system than Dreamweaver, I may have just the thing for you:Xara Web Designer 9.
What Microsoft is getting right with tablets–seamless synching between devices, more computing power, and accessories–and why Apple should go there too.
“The iPad is nearly 5 years old. That product, ever since, has continued to ride a thin dividing line between iPhones and Macs: mobile, and computers.
…Will there be both a 12-inch iPad and a 12-inch MacBook Air in 2015? If so, how will they co-exist? Could they be meant for different customers?
…the iPad needs a change. It needs something to ignite interest. It needs a few new ideas.
Microsoft — with its hardware, and with its upcoming Windows 10 operating system — is actually blazing a bold trail. One that Apple may actually be able to learn from.”
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