As the term comes to a close and you slide into the break for a bit of a breather, consider checking out these tech tools. I know you probably don’t have time now to look at these, although if you’re looking for a good excuse to do something besides grade papers… If you don’t want to take the time now, bookmark this webpage, and take a look at these when you need a break from your visiting in-laws. (Yes, I know you love them, but that doesn’t mean that you have to spend the entire week with them.)

Here they are (the tools, not your in-laws), in no real order.

Dropbox.com. Not using Dropbox.com yet? Still carrying around a flashdrive or emailing files to yourself? If it were foolproof, I’d say keep doing it. But flashdrives fail or get lost. People forget to email that changed file back to themselves, having to call home when they get to work, hoping someone you live with is still there. And for those who live alone, hoping that someone has broken into your house and willing to answer your phone.

Instead, install Dropbox on your work computer and your home computer. Dropbox will add a folder called “My Dropbox” to both computers. Anything you put in that folder on one computer will synchronize with the other folder. Automatically. Edit a file at home. Save it. And it will be there waiting for you when you get to work. [Internet connection required.] (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

Shortmarks. My partner tells me that this is the best technology I’ve brought into our house since the PDA I got her as a replacement for her five-pound DayTimer several years ago. And you know that a lot of technology has flowed through our home in that time.

With Shortmarks, you enter a bit of text in your browser’s address bar, and Shortmarks directs you to that website. They start you off with a bunch but make it easy to add your own. For example, qty in my browser’s address bar takes me to the quarterly. Entry takes me to the entry code page. But it gets even better than that. For sites that allow you to do searches, you can search that site before even going to the site. For example, when I type z unbroken into my browser’s address bar and hit enter, I’m immediately directed to Amazon’s page that displays all results for the term “unbroken”. (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

Speaking of Unbroken I highly recommend it. By the author of Seabiscuit, Unbroken is a page-turner, or a screen-tapper for those of with e-readers. I believe it has a chance to with a Pulitzer for general nonfiction.

Sandglaz. Ready to get organized? I’ve finally found a task management system that replaces all of my little paper notes. Click to add a new task. Add a note or a due date to it if you’d like. Have one list for work stuff with a few different areas cordoned off for different kinds of tasks. Add a new list and share it with others to help keep track of what’s been done and what’s left to do. Bookmark the site on your Android or IOS phone and add stuff on the go. But not while driving. (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

Join.me. It’s an easy way to share your desktop with others. I use it during conference calls that I’m coordinating. I run Join.me, and it generates a link. I send that link out to the people who are part of the meeting. They click on the link, and they can see my desktop in their browser. To talk to each other, we can either join the conference call using Join.me’s built-in conference call number (free, but long distance for everyone), or by some other means.

It’s also handy when consulting with students and you want to show them something – a document, spreadsheet, webpage, really anything on your computer. Send them the link, and have them call your office phone. (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

YouCanBook.Me. Using Google Calendar, this service shows students when you’re free and lets them book themselves into your calendar. It will even send them a reminder. They also get a cancellation link. If they click that, it will remove them from your calendar. Use gsyncit ($20) to synchronize Google Calendar with Outlook. (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

If you’d rather give students access to only certain times in your available calendar, check out appointment slots in Google Calendar.[Update 12/15/2012: Effective January 2013, appointment slots will be discontinued. Existing appointments will be fine, however.]  (Click here for an earlier blog post.)

If you want even more stuff to try, flip back through these blog posts for the last year or two. I’m certain you’ll come across something interesting to try!

The ECAR survey folks always have interesting information to present. Free and online. Hope to see you there! For those who can’t attend, but are interested, I’ll be tweeting live during the event. Follow me on Twitter by clicking the ‘t’ icon on the far right side of your browser’s window.

From the EDUCAUSE website:

Reserve your seat now—virtual seating is limited.

“About EDUCAUSE Live!

“Interact with today’s leaders in higher education IT while learning about emerging trends with Diana Oblinger and Marc Hoit as they alternately interview a special guest during this free online seminar series.

“Find Adobe Connect technical requirements; past seminar archives; instructions for attending web seminars using an iPhone, iPad, or android; and suggestions for making web seminars a collaborative event on your campus on the EDUCAUSE Live! website.”

Quick tech tip: Change the default color of comment boxes in MS Word 2010.

In any MS Word document, select the “Review” tab, click on “Track Changes” then select “Change Tracking Options.

Next to “Comments” click the dropdown menu and select the color you’d like.

Any document you open now will use that comment color.

Bonus tip: Use the keyboard shortcut to insert comments more quickly. Highlight the text you want to comment on, then press CTRL-ALT-M. After a little practice, the key combination will feel natural to you.

Dropbox.com provides you with 2GB free space out of the box. If other people who are invited by you join, Dropbox will increase your allotted space by either 500MB (edu accounts) or 250MB (everyone else) up to an additional 16GB for a total of 18GB. I was recently asked how exactly one gets that additional space.

1. Share a folder with someone who doesn’t have a Dropbox.com account yet. If they join Dropbox.com as a result of your invitation, more MBs for you.

   Or

2. Send your friends, family, and colleagues a link. Go to the Dropbox.com referrals page. Here you have a few options. Log into your web-based email service and get all your contacts so you can pick and choose who to send the link to. Or you can just enter the email addresses of your invitees directly. Or you can push your invitation out to Facebook or Twitter. Or, at the very bottom of the page, copy the link directly. Anyone who signs up via that link gets you extra space – and gets themselves extra space.

   

I bet you don’t schedule many appointments between 9pm and 8am. Yeah, me neither. Google Calendar now gives you the option to hide those hours, or whatever early/late hours you choose.

To activate the option, go to your Google Calendar, and click on the cog icon in the top right corner. Select “Labs”.

Click “enable” next to the “Hide morning and night” tool.

Click the “Save” button near the top of the page, and you’re done.

Go back to your calendar.

On the far left, where the times are listed, some of the times will be shaded. Click and hold the little bar at the bottom to select the morning times you’d like to hide.

Google Calendar will now look like this.

Then scroll down and repeat for the evening times. Done.

Any time you’d like to see those hours, just click on the shaded area in the time column. Click again to hide the hours.

What if you schedule something during those hidden times? Google Calendar will show you.

Thanks to the Lifehacker blog for the heads-up on this new tool!

My friends over at the Teaching High School Psychology blog, just posted about the 60 Minutes segment on the flavorists which they describe as “a nice piece on the flavor industry and their attempt to create ‘addictive flavors’ to woo consumers.”

If you use Chrome and want to show 60 Minutes episodes during class, go over to the Chrome web app store, and download the free 60 Minutes app. When you open a new tab in your Chrome browser, you’ll see the 60 Minutes icon.

Clicking the 60 Minutes icon calls up the most recent episode. The segments for the episode are on the left. Use the menu at the bottom of the screen to select previous segments.

Previous segments are divided into categories you see at the top of the screen in the screenshot below.

Click on the segment you want, and it will automatically start playing. Here I’ve selected the segment suggested by my colleagues. On the far right side, click the film icon to read about the segment. Click the + button right below it to view additional footage.

Enjoy!

UPDATE: TodaysMeet shut down on June 16, 2018. 

I just finished reading a Scientific American blog on how people watch television. The author reports that “TV networks have taken to dividing their audience into two new segments.” There are those who watch TV like people have always watched TV. And then there are those who watch with a web-enabled device in their hands. I’m not sure there’s much difference between those two groups in that both groups want to share the experience. If we have people in the home to watch with, we’ll do that. If our family and friends are scattered to the four winds, we’ll turn to the internet to connect with them – or to connect with strangers who love the show as much as we do. At root, we’re social creatures. Why wait until tomorrow morning at the water cooler to share our thoughts about the show when we can do it right now, in real time?

People are no different when you take them from in front of the TV and drop them into a classroom. If the class is even remotely engaging, students are going to want to say something to somebody. Some instructors encourage dialogue, others don’t, and don’t for a variety of reasons. Large class sizes certainly make dialogue more difficult, for example.

Some instructors encourage their students to use Twitter with a course-specific hashtag to ‘talk’ with each other during class. Earlier this year I wrote about backchan.nl as a way to create a walled-off space for you and your students. Here’s an even easier-to-use alternative. (Shout out to Steve J. of the Teaching High School Psychology blog!)

TodaysMeet is an impromptu meeting space. No logins required. Enter a name for your room. The URL will be http://todaysmeet.com/[whatever you name your room]. Decide how long you’d like the room to be available. Click “Create your Room.” Give your students the URL.

When a student enters, she or he enters a name, and clicks the “Join” button.

The student types comments in the “Message” box, and clicks “Say”. Comments from all students appear in the “Listen” area. Anyone who is in the room can see what everyone else has written.

At the end of class, you can save all of the comments as a PDF. Use it, if appropriate, as assessment data or to assign class participation credit. Respond to student comments or questions during the next class session or take them to your class discussion board or email list if you use one.

Want students to work in groups? Great! Have them huddle up to respond to some question, and then have someone enter something on the group’s behalf.

I’m often asked, “If students are looking at their devices, how do you know they’re doing something class-related?” I don’t, any more than I know that if they’re writing on paper, they’re taking notes and not working on their math homework. Or if they’re looking at me, they’re thinking about the course material, and not the great weekend they had or are planning.

Qwerty? 123456? Ashley? Bailey? SplashData has released the list of the top 25 passwords culled from lists produced by hackers. Is yours on the list? Password security is the best thing you can do to protect yourself.

I use LastPass to store all my passwords – one password to rule them all. It runs in my browser and on my Xoom and Android phone. If I remember that password, I have access to them all. It will also generate passwords for me if I’d like.

Don’t want to use a password manager? Be sure to create strong passwords that you will remember for the different websites you visit. Some people suggest using your favorite lyrics and mixing things up a bit. But don’t choose something popular. Hackers know enough to try those. Glen Campbell was recently honored at the CMA Awards, so let’s take a look at how some of his lyrics might look as passwords

Develop a system that is unique to you, and use it.

A little comic interlude.

From failblog.

[Update 6/20/2013: Sandglaz converted all of the grids to infinity grids.  This added a whole new complexity to Sandglaz that I don’t need, so I’m no longer using Sandglaz.)

I feel like I’m continually on a search for a good task management solution. I use FollowUp.cc to send reminders to myself via email. That works, but I’d really like something that works like paper. Sandglaz (sandglass, presumably) is the closest thing to that I’ve seen.

Here’s an example of what a to-do list looks like. (When you create a new account with Sandglaz, they’ll give you a grid of tasks that serves as a tutorial. Excellent idea!)

The section headers are the defaults, but you can change them to anything you’d like by clicking on them. To add another to-do item just click anywhere in that section. Click in the white space next to the checkbox, and start typing. See the little dots to the left of the check box? Click and hold to drag it. Drag it to change the order of tasks in that cell, drag it to another cell, or drag it to a completely different grid.

Mousing over an item gives you a down arrow on the right. Click it to add a description and a due date if you’d like. Click the “Delete Task” link to delete the task.

If you just want to acknowledge that you completed a task, click the task’s checkbox, and the task will receive a strike-through.

When you’re ready to delete all of your completed tasks, click “Delete Completed” at the top of the grid.

Want more than 4 cells in a grid? Click “Settings”.

That opens this window. Rename your grid, change the size, or delete it.

Sharing.

As with most tools in the cloud, you can share your grids with someone else. Click “Sharing” and invite whoever you’d like.

Advanced tools for the paid-for version.

[Updated 2/14/2012] Sandglaz is still in beta as of this writing, so the advanced tools are currently free, but they will likely only be available to paying users.

In the paid-for version, you can create an “infinity grid” that allows you to set milestones.

You can also use hashtags to create, well, tags. Here I’ve added “#psych100” to a task. That automatically makes “#psych100” clickable.

When I click it, all of my tasks are filtered to only show those tasks with that hashtag. The filtering tag is now displayed at the top of the grid. To stop filtering, click the tag button.

You can also you the @ symbol to identify particular people. It works just like the hashtag.

Click it to filter by that tag. When you’re done filtering, click the tag button to toggle off filtering.

Conclusion.

Play around with this tool to find the best way to configure Sandglaz so it works how you work. Keep an eye on their blog for announcements of new features.