Hello again to regular visitors and welcome to new ones. Lots of developments on the e-learning front nowadays - the latest pages at the 'April' link below.

Andrew Hill April 2004

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E-learning news

For those who want the latest updates in the world of ILT and e-learning a monthly summary of what I'm up to is now available

January
February
April

Village life!

A few weeks ago I wrote this:

I'm amazed that more hasn't been done at government level to push BT to move faster. There again, maybe I'm not amazed. If it were a deprived city centre and I was a single father with 17 ethnic minority children then it might have been a different story.

Shortly afterwards I had an announcement from Tiscali that broadband had reached this tiny hamlet. I really didn't believe it but filled in all the forms and must have been their first respondent. Expecting still to find that the small print about 'subject to lines being tested' would lead to a 'sorry but . . .' type of letter, I was absolutely delighted to receive a package containing free modem, software, odd things to put in sockets etc. It all worked beautifully so, at last, jobs like editing this lot take a few minutes instead of hours with a current speed of 589.8kbps!

£500

will still buy you a decent PC these days. But it's getting more difficult to find good brands with a decent warranty at this figure. This is because many companies now sell a flat panel with their most basic offerings and charge more than the erstwhile monitor. The all-important on-site warranty is often now not included in published prices - notably Dell's on-line headline prices which lurch from a highly attractive figure to something not very competitive at all. (But do read the articles about HCI in my more detailed e-learning news if you work in an FE college).

Out of the the bedroom . . .

. . . and into the lounge. At last PCs are beginning to do the things people really want them to do and to look attractive. Although not yet widely available the new Shuttle case, or a variant of it, resembles more a hi-fi unit than and should prove popular. I want one.

Bye bye floppy

At last. Goodness knows how it's lasted so long - probably all the budget conscious IT Managers reluctant to replace old equipment. But finally, the quirky 3.5" is dying. You tend to have to specify it now as an addition for a new machine. At about £15 that's still worth doing and cheaper than the USB external thing (but you'll need one of those for most new laptops). Remember - you've an awful lot of stuff on those old floppies and make it your belated New Year's Resolution to transfer it all to another medium and put them all in a box in the loft to show your grandchildren.

Hello USB drives

Although not yet the memory storage device of choice nationwide, the little memory devices that just plug in to the USB slot are easy to use, safe and store up to 2GB (1400 full floppies). Even the now standard CD-R drives can plop 500 floppies' worth onto a CD. Has to be easier and more sensible than carting around umpteen boxes of the old floppies which are seldom labelled with the up-to-date contents!

The broader picture

Web designers are going to face a few problems soon as the new widescreen format for flat panels and, same thing but different, laptop screens, becomes the norm as it has done for tvs.

e-what??

e-learning - that's what. Yes, our Civil Servant friends have been at it again and this is the latest eduspeak. Obviously bored with ILT (Information and Learning Technology) and charged by their political masters to come up with something New, e-learning will be coming to a course near you anytime now. In simple terms it's all about making learning more interesting, relevant and accessible through the use of electronic technology. Bit like I'm trying to do on this site and through my College courses. Which is just as well, because I am now a National e-Learning Co-ordinator for the Eastern Region (of England, that is!!). More about this, if you have trouble sleeping here.

Office 2003?

I can't imagine anyone wanting to spend several hundred pound on a product with 2003 in its title in 2004 and certainly can't see any good reason to upgrade your XP version. Indeed, there's a lot to be said for getting the tasks done for free with OpenOffice.org now in version 1.1 It's fully compatible with Office so you can still work with Word and Excel files if you wish.

And you don't get the annoying Drawing thing either - instead there's a remarkably good Drawing program in OpenOffice.

Pictures

Now that you can get a decent digital camera for under £150 you'll be buying one soon for the kids or partner if not yourself. Unless you're lucky, though, there'll be some pretty naff software bundled with it. Well, who in their right minds will give you anything more than strictly necessary? Look for Adobe's Photoshop Elements or Serif's PhotoPlus 8 which are both reasonably priced, competent and easy to use. Microsoft have, however, given us their own effort but few people realise they have it within the XP operating system. It's called Microsoft Photo Editor and looks like the rather sad Imaging thing that used to be offered. Inside the menus, however, are a number of tools which can be made to work effectively with your photos and can cope with most day-to-day tasks. It is a bit tedious, though, and not easy to get the hang of. Their Works offering, once the also-ran, includes Word in all its glory these days and a decent array of tools, including a simple but effective picture editor of its own and is well worth the tenner or so that is usually required to bundle it with a new machine. If you're looking for a good, albeit awkward, image editor then download Irfanview 3.80. It's free and the whole programme fits on a floppy. get the add-ins for the best range of effects.

Long life?

Until recently there was always a pretty damn good reason for wanting to replace a machine every couple of years, at least. The speed improvements were really worthwhile and larger hard drives and the better graphics cards, particularly, were almost essential for the latest things you wanted to do with the machines. Now, though, I wonder. The typical average spend on a PC has been about £1200 for the more challenging user and that now buys a widescreen, neat small format case, all the goodies that you're likley to need and people are starting to think about replacing bits and pieces rather than the whole thing. Now that the kids have got your old PC and the office provide one too the clamour for you to change is lessening considerably. So, unless 2004/5 brings some remarkable changes that I don't foresee, I reckon that a good buy now will see you well ahead - a bit like your other gadgets with more a 5-10 year life span. This could have interesting repercussions but I haven't figured them out yet!

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