Month: December 2004

I work hard to counter my Mac bias. I try to understand that not everyone sees the world as I do. If students end up being involved, it is important they have useful tools. It is simply not my fault that Mac tools are built in and easy to use.

So what if you wanted to approximate iPhoto? My recommendation would be a free product from Google (I am not certain how this came to be the case) – Picasa. Actually, Picasa and Blogger are both new services available through Google and a special feature of Picasa is the ability to upload images to Blogger.

Comparative review of iPhoto and Picasa
Picasa allows you to import and organize your images.

Picasa allows you to do some simply editing (red eye, enhance, crop).

This is a 3.5 out of 4 star program. iPhoto has some additional tools for “publishing” images that I think are useful.

Time to do a post on podcasting. I must admit I am not certain of the origin of this term. I am guessing it has something to do with the iPod, but clearly podcasting does not require an iPod. I assume the term refers to methods for offering audio (mostly spoken comments in my experience) over the Internet. (wikipedia definition)

Here is a text description of how the podcast was created. 1) record with camcorder, 2) bring into iMovie, 3) split audio track from video and delete video (I actually then used Quicktime Pro to extract the audio), 4) save out as Quicktime. 5) drag Quicktime into iTunes, and 6) convert to MP3 (note that my audio comments on this conversion are misleading – the audio is first converted to MP3 using a menu option and then burned to CD also making certain the MP3 option is used). I am not certain this was all worth it and stopping with the Quicktime audio file would have been fine with me. I understand that some offer MP3 content because it can be collected via RSS feeds and perhaps downloaded to an iPod for mobile access. I tend to use my iPod for music and an occasional audiobook rather than collections from audio authors.

Click on the forward arrow to play.

David Warlick blog post on podcasting. This is the post I reference in my own podcast. His post ends with some great links if you are interested in pod casting.

Andy Carvin post on podcasting. Please review most recent posts on this site for Andy’s comments on Tsunami Relief Efforts.

BBC article on Pod casting

Unless an emergency presents itself, I always save work on my server for break times. So often something goes wrong and I spend hours or days attempting to recover. Break time gives me a little cushion in case something goes wrong. Today, I upgraded WordPress – the software that runs this blog. Everything went smoothly and you are now reading this through a supposedly improved system.

If you want to operate your own blog on your own server, WordPress is the way to go.

Tired of finding directions using MapQuest? Try Map24!

Map24 contains a java applet that allows the user to apply several tools – measure distance, move about. If you are like me and must rely on specific directions to get from point A to point B, this tool is worth a look.

Techlearning has just annouced the winners of its portraits of learning contest. Take the time to view the samples of student work.

You do not always need a high-end graphics products to accomplish common graphics tasks. Consider using the tools available in PowerPoint or Keynote.

I walked out of my office today and noticed the sign in front of the campus church across the street. It seemed perfect for my last post before Christmas.

A simple message for a complex time.

Peace!