geek.teacher » Geek

Δ My favorite features of iOS5

Dan — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 22:19:14 +0000

I’ve had the good fortune to play with the latest release of iOS for the past few days, and I have only good things to report back. Even if you’re keeping your current device and not anticipating a new iPhone this week, iOS5 makes your current iPhone a better phone. Here’s the things that I’m really liking so far:

Better battery life. My iPhone 3GS is definitely feeling it’s almost two and a half years of life in the battery department. Unlike when I first got it, I need to charge it every single day without fail, and it’s frequently been near death by the time I get home from work. Since I switched to iOS5, I’ve had a little more juice at the end of the day.

iCloud. Everything on my phone backs up over the air and just works? Yes please. I had constant problems trying to get over the air calendar syncing to work with my Google Calendar, but everything works fast and flawlessly over iCloud. If I need to restore my phone, I don’t need to be at my home computer any more, since it all backs up to the cloud. Apps that store things in iCloud are starting to drop now. GoodReader updated today, and Apple’s apps are updating tomorrow. Expect an avalanche of updates over the next couple weeks.
Wireless syncing. If you’re still storing stuff on your computer, you can now have the iDevice in question sync over wifi. This feature will be hugely useful for classroom teachers with small classroom sets of devices (2-5 devices, say).
Twitter integration. Easy sharing to Twitter from any app. Of course I’m going to like that.

Notification Center. I always hated how notifications took over my screen in iOS. Now they don’t, they sit nicely and wait for me to act on them.
iMessages. Thanks to my school building and my wife’s hospital both being built as bomb shelters, we get terrible cell phone reception at work. Now we send texts through Apple, so they work over WiFi. Bonus: No need for me to upgrade my texting plan any time soon.

I’m chomping at the bit to add these features to the improved hardware of the iPhone 4S, now only days away!

Δ Watch this: Plot Device

Dan — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 14:34:06 +0000

Δ Watch this: Rocketeer cartoon

Dan — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 22:11:19 +0000

The Rocketeer 20th anniversary from John Banana on Vimeo.

The original comics and movie this is based on are both great. The director of the movie directed the Captain America movie coming out next month. I’m hopeful for a good movie.

Δ Watch this: Everything is a Remix Part 3

Dan — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 21:00:50 +0000

Everything is a Remix Part 3 from Kirby Ferguson on Vimeo.

This series has been one piece of the puzzle ruminating in my head on that promised blogpost about teaching and remixing.

ShowMe App for iPad

Dan — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 13:51:12 +0000

ShowMe is currently free, and while I didn’t have a lot of time to play with it while it was in beta, I can assure that (a) this app is the real deal and (b) it’s absolutely going on any iPads I get for next school year. The app makes it super-easy to create tutorials/screencasts directly on your iPad. There’s tons of creation potential in this one for students of ay age.

Dress for Success

Dan — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 20:46:00 +0000

Lytro’s Camera Lets You Shoot First and Focus Later

Dan — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 17:37:59 +0000

Holy moly.

The company’s technology allows a picture’s focus to be adjusted after it is taken. While viewing a picture taken with a Lytro camera on a computer screen, you can, for example, click to bring people in the foreground into sharp relief, or switch the focus to the mountains behind them.

via Lytro’s Camera Lets You Shoot First and Focus Later – NYTimes.com.

The Anosognosic’s Dilemma: Something’s Wrong but You’ll Never Know What It Is

Dan — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 13:08:44 +0000

Interesting 5 part series by Errol Morris that starts off talking about how people are very bad about knowing what they don’t know, and moves on to psychological conditions related to loss of limbs or paralysis. The part about Woodrow Wilson is downright chilling, but my favorite line is this one from part 4:

It may well be our brains are wired up to be slightly more optimistic than they should be.

iTunes Apps for Teachers

Dan — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 22:42:45 +0000

Apple has added an official Apps for Teachers category to iTunes. Some excellent apps listed, particularly in the “Curricular Support” subcategory.

Δ Watch this: Thru Jerusalem

Dan — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 23:20:41 +0000

Guy goes to Jerusalem, asks musicians to play some music, mixes into awesome video.

I have a lot of thoughts about mixing and how it related to education that I’ve been wanting to write for some time, but haven’t quite pulled together yet. I think that will probably happen after school gets out.