Antivirus extensions on a Chromebook?

Posted on August 26, 2021 by admin

I have been assuming that antivirus software need not be added to Chromebooks because of the way a Chromebook “sandboxes” activities limiting what a virus could accomplish. I was surprised to have the following YouTube public service video come up in my Twitter feed. I have since received a more “adult” message from the University of North Dakota recommending the same software.

The antivirus described is Cortex XDR Agent

So, I have been trying to determine my assumptions about Chromebooks may have been misguided. The video does not really provide enough information for me to determine exactly what the vulnerability might be and if it is to the institutions using Chromebooks or to the individual user.

Online searches for viruses and Chromebooks verify my impressions to a point (ChromebookHQ, Malwarebytes – some potential concerns involving extensions, BestAntiVirus – similar concern to Malwarebytes).

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Google search

Posted on August 24, 2021 by admin

How Google prioritizes search results has always been a mystery with the lack of clarity defended as necessary corporate secrecy. I liked the original notion of page rank because as an academic I understand the logic of citation frequency as a metric of importance. Here is a recent effort by Google to explain the signals it uses to rank search results. What is missing and of great importance is how these signals are weighted.

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Comment Spam

Posted on August 17, 2021 by admin

I have started to receive a lot of comment spam. You don’t see the spam because I have comments setup to require moderation. It has taken me some time to determine why the spam just started. I have been using the free Akismet plugin to block spam and it worked great. However, Akismet decided this blog was a commercial venture because of the ads and decided I had to pay for their commercial service. I use ads more out of curiosity than anything else and the cost for one month of the Akismet service would cost more than this site generates in ad revenue in a year. I have turned off comments as a solution.

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Pearson – future of education?

Posted on August 17, 2021 by admin

I sometimes check a stock market page to see if my retirement funds are increasing or decreasing. The page offers the basic data on the markets, but also news of the day that may be influencing the markets and specific stocks. I encountered the following story on Pearson.

I know that Pearson has a presence at the University of North Dakota. The company had approached the Psychology department which already had a substantial presence online about partnering with the department. The department would make use of its existing developments as part of an offering through Pearson and the company would funnel more participants through the program. The department said no because it already had all of the participants it felt comfortable handling and the finances made no sense given the program was already fully operational.

Textbooks – there is an app (actually quite a few) for that

The news stories I encountered were not about the online courses, but the new CEO’s innovative approach to college textbooks. Using a Pearson app (see options above), students could access textbooks by the month. As I read the article, the students would pay $15 for “all you can eat” or $10 per book (minimum of 4 months). The titles had to be offered by Pearson. The company also offers related resources (e.g., note-taking).

Here is a related post offering a broader perspective on the Pearson approach and general comments on the remaining larger companies focused on the higher ed market.

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Layering question stems in Insert Learning

Posted on August 10, 2021 by admin

Insert Learning is the service I recommend for educators interested in layering elements (comments, links, questions, discussion prompts) on online web pages to create learning resources. I have generated a couple of video tutorials you are welcome to explore. In an effort to improve the efficiency of educators adding questions to online content, Insert Learning has added question stems that can be simply selected and edited if necessary.

The following two images show the Insert Learning Toolset and an inserted question. The red boxes indicate the selection of the question tool (left) and within the blank inserted question dropdown menu icon that reveals the question stems (second image).

Insert Learning describes these stems as “text-independent” and “non-googleable”. I agree with these descriptions, but I think question stems are more useful if more specific. I understand the effort of Insert Learning to suggest educators consider the value of question stems, but either Insert Learning needs to go further in suggesting useful stems or educators should look elsewhere to become familiar with the use of stems and to find examples. Just Google question stems.

Here are the types of stems I recommend:

Do you agree or disagree with ………..? Support your answer.

Give an example of ……….

What is the difference between …… and ……

How does …. effect ….?

How does …. tie in with what we learned before?

These stems are not “text-independent”, but I would suggest they are more useful in facilitating productive cognitive activity.

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Try Wt.Social

Posted on August 4, 2021 by admin

Many are quick to criticize the limitations and the evils of social media, but continue to add their content to the same “services” they criticize. The reason tends to be that this is where the folks they want to interact with are. This problem is called the network effect. It becomes a circular problem – you don’t join a network because your friends aren’t there and your friends don’t join because you aren’t there. Make the first move.

Make the commitment to spend some time on a different service even if it means cross-posting comments. My suggestion for an alternative to Facebook would be wt.social. WT.Social was started by Jimmy Wales the developer of wikipedia. It is based on friends and what are called subwikis. Think of a subwiki as a topic or interest group. You follow people and participate in subwikis. This produces a feed that resembles your newsfeed in Facebook. Bring a few friends.

Wt.social is supported by contributions rather than ads. If you like the experience, commit a few dollars to keep it going.

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