If you missed our Cool Tools Day in October, well, I’m sorry. Here’s what we talked about (also available as a PDF). Just to show there’s no hard feelings.

Bronwyn’s “iTunes & Audio Podcasts”
Visit iTunes website for free available podcasts including:

  • TechNews TodayThis Week in Tech (TWIT)
  • MacBOOK weekly
  • This week in Google
  • Search Engine – net neutrality and copyright
  • Spark from CBC radio – lifestyle and tech

Alex’s “Pure Text“
For Windows users:

  • Application stevemiller.net/puretext
  • Keyboard shortcuts that allow you to maintain font and formatting when copying & pasting text

For Mac users:

  • Visit alternativeto.net (similar to the process of using Firefox add-ons)
  • Browse site for applications you want to use
  • Select application and then click on “Visit Website”
  • Download application to your browser

Franklin’s “Data Visualization: Many Eyes“

  • Website: http://manyeyes.alphaworks.ibm.com/manyeyes/
  • Good place to find data sets
  • Good place to share data sets (warning: no way to keep data sets private so careful about uploading data sensitive documents)
  • Can do tricks with mapping
  • Provides options for visualizing data (example: using tag clouds, word trees, bubble chart, etc.)
  • Alternative website: visualizing.org (It is free, but new – so it is still being built)

Will’s “UBC Blogs & UBC Wiki”
UBC Blogs:

  • Digital Learning Commons
  • All you need is your CWL to make a blog or website
  • Social media aspect to blogs are groups, forums, profiles, friends, etc.
  • About 6000 people are using the service now
  • Built using WordPress
  • Supports custom CSS in themes
  • Consider it a content management platform (rather than a blog platform)

UBC Wiki:

  • Functions on Media Wiki software
  • It is not private, anyone can edit
  • Based on philosophical ownership, not structural
  • Your CWL should last “forever”

Jonathan’s “WilsonWeb”

  • Audio capability for reading/hearing articles off of WilsonWeb interface
  • Can download audio files as well as text
  • Can listen to audio while following along with the html text (words are highlight as they are read)

Trevor’s “OneNote“

  • Virtual notebook
  • Can organize into binders – notebooks – pages
  • Can type anywhere on screen/page (not line-based)
  • Can keep all different kinds of documents/files in one page (so that you have all related documents in one place)
  • Can link from it
  • Takes good snapshots of pages & will include url of html pages (only difficult doing this with pdfs)
  • Can keyword search through ALL One Note documents at once
  • Autosaves along the way (no save button)
  • Create shared notebooks
  • Can draw on page
  • Saves time in filing
  • visitmix website – works with silverlight

Schuyler’s “Search Shortcuts in Google Chrome”

  • Edit search engines
  • Can set up keyword shortcuts for different sites
  • Add to google toolbar add to chrome search
  • Example: type “gs” for google scholar
  • Might be able to do sim in FireFox
  • Another tool is Yubnub
  • Can set Yubnub into Chrome search bar and execute yubnub commands directly into your search

Schuyler’s “Dropbox & GoodReader“

  • Backup option
  • Stored in the cloud
  • Can stop using usb keys (all you need is access to the internet)
  • Can invite collaborators to your folders
  • For iphones, load GoodReader to navigate into your Dropbox account

Frankin’s “Portable apps“

  • Website: Portableapps.com
  • Legitimate site
  • Can store on usb key without having to download applications onto the computer’s hard drive
  • Good way of getting around restrictions of downloading