dougbelshaw.com/blog

Welcome back!
#uppingyourgame: an educator's guide to productivity is now up to v0.4!
(I'm looking for people to translate it into other languages when finished - if you're interested get in touch!)

I stumbled across Wixi today. It’s a combination of desktop operating system, file-sharing application and personal file repository. It reminds me of EyeOS with which I experimented a year or more ago. It’s currently supposed to be in invitation-only beta, but you can sign-up using this page and get unlimited storage!

Once you’ve created your account and logged-in, you can create folders and upload your media to the site. This can then be tagged and set as ‘private’ or ‘public’. If you set, say, some video as ‘public’, it can be streamed (but not downloaded) by visitors to your Wixi profile page. You, however, as the owner of the content, can both stream and download it no matter where you are. Wixi does not require any special software to run, other than a web browser (currently only Firefox and Internet Explorer).

Although I experienced a few minor and not-too-irritating bugs whilst uploading, I’ve found it a great (free!) service so far. I’m stumped, however, as to how they’re going to deal with potential copyright infringement law suits. A quick search for ‘DVD rip’ brought up a whole host of films uploaded by other users that I was able to add to my Wixi page and stream (full-screen!) almost immediately:

Wixi is definitely one to keep your eye on, especially as you are able to embed widgets to share your content in blogs, wikis, etc. I’m certainly not recommending this one for educational uses. I think this one’s for personal use only…

Give it a spin, and add me as a friend – I’m on there as dajbelshaw.

Posted: March 31st, 2008
Categories: Technology
Tags: beta, Browsers, Clients, copyright, EyeOS, file-sharing, films, Firefox, Internet Explorer, media, Mozilla Firefox, MP3s, software, streaming, web browser, web desktop, Wixi, WWW
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I have to confess that, at first, I couldn’t see the point of Twitter. Since then, however, I’ve become somewhat of a convert, getting in touch with many people I wouldn’t have otherwise.

Lately, however, Ive had cause to re-evaluate my use of the service. I’ve been prompted to write this post by three things, the most recent of which was one of Doug Noon’s comments on my last post:

I’ve avoided Twitter because I don’t want to be *that* connected. I know that it might be “useful” on some level, but so would joining clubs, taking classes, reading great books, working for non-profit civic organizations, and spending time with family. Everyone should set their own priorities, and define some limits.

The second was an incoming link to one of my posts over at teaching.mrbelshaw.co.uk about the potential of using Twitter in the classroom. They didn’t like the idea, although the way they tried to link together ‘facts’ to build an argument was woeful:

Nearly one million people use Twitter. That is almost negligible for a US website but guess how many people work in IT in California? Nearly a million. So how many “normal” people do you think use Twitter?

Erm, I don’t think they’re one and the same group of people. But anyway, they continue:

When was the last time anyone normal (i.e. not people who get paid to look at these things) did anything (that did not  involved a dancing seal or laughing baby) as a result of Twitter or Digg or Second Life – or even to a slightly lesser extent Facebook or FriendFeed or MySpace?

They may have a point about preaching to the choir here. But I suppose this post is to do with business and the (monetary) value of getting involved social networking and Web 2.0 as a whole. Perhaps more damning is my all-time favourite blogger, Kathy Sierra (much missed after the debacle last year) who showed us the dangers of The Asymptotic Twitter Curve:

The idea behind Kathy’s worries about the use of Twitter stems from a book by the wonderfully unpronounceable Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi entitled Flow. It’s a book I’ve been threatening to read for around 5 years now! The state of ‘flow’ is, unsurprisingly, a highly productive state in which an individual is ‘in the zone’. Kathy argues that this is almost impossible when you’ve got constant interruptions and distractions. Twitter’s certainly one for putting you off the task in hand.

So what I’ve begun to do, following the example of someone I read recently (but have now forgotten where) is to have two modes of working. The first is best described as outwards-facing, the second inwards-facing. When I’m in the former mode, I’m available on Skype, Twitterific automatically refreshes my friends’ tweets every 3 minutes, and I’m available on Google Talk via GMail. I’m using all four of my virtual desktops via OSX Leopard’s ‘Spaces’ feature and I’m moving around flitting from this to that. Effectively, I’m in ‘networked’ mode.

On the other hand, when I’m in the latter, inwards-facing mode, I’m working minimalistically: I’m invisible on Skype, Google Talk is closed, Twitterific is closed down, and I’m working with – at most – 2/3 tabs in Firefox. Almost everything I do is created and stored online these days, so usually it will be Google Docs and a couple of other websites for reference. I find this, coupled with the right kind of music, to be much more conducive to a state of flow than the ‘networked’ method of working.

What do you think? Is Twitter a bad thing? How do you use it?

Posted: March 28th, 2008
Categories: Productivity
Tags: Digg, Doug Noon, Facebook, flow, Kathy Sierra, MySpace, networking, Second Life, Social network service, Twitter, Web 2.0, website
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I started reading educational blogs in late 2004/early 2005. Back then, there were only a few educators blogging – the likes of Will Richardson, Vicki Davis, Wesley Fryer. Oh, and the inimitable Stephen Downes. There was (and still is) a dearth of UK-based educational bloggers.

One thing they had in common, however, was a revolutionary message: that education must adapt to the 21st century or suffer the consequences. There were fantastic conversations to follow across these blogs. This is one of the reasons I started teaching.mrbelshaw.co.uk in late 2005 – to become part of this ‘conversation’.

Now, in early 2008, things have changed. Whilst it’s great that there’s more educators than ever blogging, tweeting, etc. the focus has shifted. Those that were formerly in the classroom and relating the changing world and tools available to everyday educational experience are no longer in those positions; educators who have no desire to transform education are blogging. The edublogosphere has changed from being about ‘the conversation’ to being part of ‘the network’. It all smacks a little too much of ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ and, to be honest, viral marketing of Web 2.0 apps.

At the end of the day, the map is not the territory. My wife, for example, memorized the map of Newcastle-upon-Tyne when we got married and she moved up there. In many respects she could navigate herself around the city better than I could – someone who had lived close-by for 15 years or more. She could name the most popular places for pizza, show visitors the major attractions. But she didn’t know the city in the way a local would. She knew the what, but not the why.

The same goes, to a great extent, with the edublogosphere. Three years ago educators were looking to using new technologies to move towards a new model of education. Nowadays it seems to be all about bragging how you’ve used (web) application X before anyone else has. The edublogosphere seems to be overrun by educators who know the what but not the why. They’re impressed by those who can ‘leverage the power of the network’. This means, in practice, seeing how many people following you on Twitter respond to a shout out for information/hello’s whilst you move out of the classroom and into a consultancy role.

I guess from the above you can tell I’m not in favour of the new direction the edublogosphere’s headed. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still people keeping it real and not jumping on the latest bandwagon. But they’re becoming increasingly hard to find. Technology and the teaching methods that gave a vibrancy to the early edublogosphere have been distorted in order to be shoehorned into a corporate vision of schools I, for one, find repugnant.

So how should we fix it? Well I’m not saying that I’m not also to blame. I know that I am. These days I use technology to make my life easier rather than to push boundaries. Perhaps we need a commitment to collaboratively develop new pedagogies rather than remark on how ‘cool’ it would be to use any given tool? I can’t believe that it’s 2008 and we’re still using a method of education more than a little reminiscent of the Industrial Revolution…

Posted: March 28th, 2008
Categories: Education
Tags: blog, Doug Noon, Education2, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Stephen Downes, United Kingdom, Vicki Davis, Web 2.0, Weblogs, Wesley Fryer, Will Richardson
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In an average week I probably receive 2-3 emails asking me to review websites, products or software. One random person this week even asked if they could guest blog solely so they could advance their career! Most of these go straight in GMail’s trash folder, but one I received earlier this week was different.

I received an email from Andrew Chater, Bafta award-winning producer of seminal documentaries and History-related programmes. He’s recently launched timelines.tv, which, he believes:

…is a new and exciting on-line history resource provided free for the user…. It offers a wealth of quality TV documentary, arranged on interactive historical timelines that put you in control of your journey through the past. The content covers all aspects of British history from 1066 to the present day, arranged on three parallel timelines: social, political and national/imperial.

I have to say that I’m rather impressed by it. Not only does it help visitors gain a handle on chronology, but introduces themes to enable them to get a grip on how concepts such as ‘leadership’ have changed through time.

Perhaps the best way to use this resource is in a 1:1 laptop situation. In fact, it would be ideal with each learner having an Asus eee each! (are you getting sick of me talking about these little marvels yet?)

The size of the digital video is probably (just) big enough for viewing on an Interactive Whiteboard/projector, but I think the bitesize nature of them means that setting the watching of them for homework along with an activity is a real possibility.

I’m really looking forward to more sites like this springing up. Very well done, Andrew – and kudos for making it free to all!

Posted: March 27th, 2008
Categories: Education
Tags: Education2, emails, History, learning, programmes, teaching, timelines, websites
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This is my first blog post using the powerful combination of my new (replacement) Asus eee and the Scribefire plugin for Firefox.

The purpose of this post is to demonstrate how I have setup my eee for better productivity (i.e. made it more powerful whilst retaining ease-of-use). I think you’ll agree that my setup at least looks good:

There’s two programs/scripts I used to get to the above. I was made aware of these by the excellent Eeeuser.com wiki, which should definitely be your first port of call! In particular, the following are very useful:

• pimpmyeee (a script that turns on and turns off features – includes themes, icons, ‘Advanced Mode’, etc.)
• TweakEEE (a program that is installed to the Settings tab and allows you to modify the Easy Mode user interface)

By using these two programs/scripts I now have the advantage of being able to use the fantastic Easy Mode whilst having the power and flexibility of accessing the Start Menu. This means I can install and access programs such as Frostwire and the GIMP quickly and easily using Synaptic Package Manager:

How have YOU modified your eee? Are you pleased with the results?

Technorati Tags: Asus, eee, theme, Scribefire, Firefox, howto, modifications, Linux

Posted: March 27th, 2008
Categories: Productivity, Technology
Tags: Asus, eee, Firefox, howto, Linux, modifications, Scribefire, theme
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In Part 1 of this DVD-ripping guide for educators we learned how to use a program called Handbrake to rip a DVD to digital video. In this part, Part 2, we’re going to look at how to divide the outputted video into ‘chunks’, ready for use in lessons.

The program we are going to use to do this is called Avidemux, which is free, Open-Source, and available for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux.

 

Step 1

(click to enlarge)

Once you have installed Avidemux, open the program. It should look something like the screenshot above.

Step 2

(click to enlarge)

We need to choose MP4 under the Format menu.

Once this has been done, click on the folder icon at the top left-hand corner to locate the file with which you want to work.

Step 3

Locate the file you encoded in Part 1 of this guide and then press Open. An error similar to the one above may appear. Apart from the program author’s terrible grammar and spelling, don’t worry about it and simply press Yes.

Step 4

Using the controls at the bottom of Avidemux, select the part of the digital video you want to take as a clip.

Play and Stop the video

Forward and Back one frame

Forward and Back one keyframe (i.e. takes you to the point where the scene changes)

Set Start and End of section to include in clip

The easiest and quickest way of finding the section you want to include in your clip is to use the Slider to get to roughly where the section is. Then use the Keyframe buttons to fine-tune this a bit more. Then for frame-perfect positioning, use the forward and back Individual frame buttons. Click the A button to set the start of the section for your clip and the B button to set the end of the section for your clip.

Step 5

Once you have found the section you want to include in your clip, press the disk button next to the folder icon. It should say Save Video if you put your cursor over it. You will then be prompted where to save the clip. Choose the location and filename then press Save. You should see something similar to the screenshot below:

The process should not take very long as it is not actually encoding the video, merely taking a section out of an existing one and copying it to a new file.

Step 6

Go to the location you chose to save your clip and open it in a program such as Quicktime (free of charge with iTunes) or VLC. Repeat the above steps for as many clips as you want to take from your original ripped video.

Comments? Questions? Add them below!

Posted: March 25th, 2008
Categories: Education
Tags:
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Last Sunday I managed to track down an Asus eee. There’s been a lot of hype about these little laptops with their 7″ screens. I was all prepared to starting writing a review of how useful mine’s been when… it’s stopped working.

Well, that’s not strictly true. It still works. It’s just that the left mouse button, which is on a kind of rocker switch beneath the trackpad, has stopped working. If I plug in a USB mouse it works fine – but that’s not the point, is it?

So it will be going back tomorrow. It would seem I’m not the only one with this problem. Something to do with leaving it running and overheating. Me? Using a laptop too much? Shurely not…

• Forum discussion of left mouse button malfunction
• Asus customer support numbers

Update: After 45 minutes in Toys ‘R’ Us (yes, that’s where I bought it from – nowhere else had any in stock!) I got a replacement. The only one they had left was the display model. I took it as it’s in good condition and actually the 701 model. This means that it’s easier to overclock and upgrade! Oh, and I also managed to wangle a £10 gift voucher.

Posted: March 24th, 2008
Categories: Technology
Tags: Asus, eee, forum, mouse button, overheating, problem
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One of the edtech questions I’m most often asked both on and off-line is a variation of How can I get a video into digital format to show on my projector/Interactive Whiteboard?

A while back (about 4 years now) I produced a guide on MrBelshaw.co.uk using a program called FairUse Wizard. That program’s still around, but it’s not what I recommend anymore. This first part of the DVD-ripping guide concentrates on converting a DVD into digital format.

You’ll need to download a free copy of the wonderful Handbrake. At the time of writing, version 0.9.2 was for OSX Leopard only and Windows users only, with version 0.9.1 for those on OSX Tiger.

Step 1

(click to enlarge)

Install Handbrake, insert the DVD you want to rip and open the program. You should see something similar to the screenshot above.

Step 2

(click to enlarge)

Click on the Source button and locate your DVD drive.

(click to enlarge)

Handbrake will scan your DVD the titles included. It will assume that the longest title is the main feature that you want to rip.

Step 3

(click to enlarge)

You should now see something similar to the screenshot above. As you can see, I’m using the eminently-useful-for-teaching-History film Schindler’s List as an example. You can click on the Browse… button to choose where you want the eventual ‘ripped’ file to go.

Step 4

In times gone by we would have used DivX or Xvid to compress our video. Nowadays, however, I recommend using H.264 – so make sure your settings look like those shown above.

Step 5

(click to enlarge)

Handbrake compresses the DVD video using something called a codec (we’re using one called H.264). It’s similar to the process used when you compress an image to put on the Internet. Effectively, it’s doing that for each frame of the film. We need to specify how large we want the images to be and how much to compress them. This will determine the quality and filesize of the outputted ‘ripped’ video. We’re therefore interested in the options in the bottom right-hand corner, as shown in the screenshot above.

Option 1:

If you want your outputted video to look as close to the original as possible and don’t care about filesize, choose 62% on the Constant Quality slider and under Picture Settings choose the Anamorphic option.

Option 2:

If you can’t afford around 1.3GB of space for your film but are still interested in it looking good, choose 1000 kbps under Average bitrate.

(click to enlarge)

Once you’ve done this, click the Picture Settings button, make sure the Keep aspect ratio box is ticked, and choose 576 as the width for your outputted video.

Option 3:

If you’d like to burn your ouputted video to CD for safe-keeping, then enter 700 MB in the Target size box. The quality will still be acceptable (especially for Interactive Whiteboards) but not DVD-quality.

Step 6

(click to enlarge)

Now that the video options have been configured, click on the Audio & Subtitles tab. Usually the options should be configured as in the screenshot above – English soundtrack at 128Kbps. Obviously if you are ripping a foreign language film you will need to choose the non-English soundtrack and English subtitles!

Step 7

Now that we have configured both the audio and video and chosen where to save the outputted file, we can click on Start.

Alternatively, as each encoding session can take a couple of hours, it might be an idea to click on Add to Queue and then set several off at once to run overnight.

Step 8

You should see something similar to the above during the time Handbrake is working. Once the encoding has finished you will see the following satisfying message:

The file should be wherever you decided to save it when you clicked the Browse… button in Step 3.

You should now be able to play the file in Quicktime (which comes with iTunes). A better option, however, would be to download the free and Open-Source program VLC (which can play everything under the Sun!)

(click to enlarge)

(click to enlarge)

Comments? Quuestions? Reply below!

Posted: March 24th, 2008
Categories: Education
Tags:
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I’m delighted to announce that (eventually!) EdTechRoundup Podcast Episode 3 is now available for your listening pleasure. It’s around 33 minutes long and is centered around a conversation about the merits of blogs vs. wikis I had with Kristian Still.

The quality music inbetween sections is taken from the first few seconds of Justice’s One Minute To Midnight.

Posted: March 23rd, 2008
Categories: Technology
Tags: audio, blogs, Doug Belshaw, edte.ch, EdTechRoundup, educational technology, Justice, Kristian Still, MP3, podcast, wikis
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I was at Villa Park, Birmingham, today to watch Aston Villa vs. Sunderland at the kind invitation of Ali Hall, a friend from church. The match ended 0-1: Sunderland’s first away win of the season, gaining some much-needed points to stay clear of the drop.

Below are some pictures of the day. Click on them to be taken to the larger versions on Flickr.

Sunderland are now on 30 points with 7 games left:

We’re not free from relegation worries by any means, but at least we’ve got a win under our belts and are not in the bottom 3! The final 7 games for Sunderland are:

• 29 March – Sunderland vs. West Ham
• 5 April – Fulham vs. Sunderland (a 6-pointer!)
• 12 April - Sunderland vs. Manchester City
• 20 April – Newcastle vs. Sunderland (local derby)
• 26 April - Sunderland vs. Middlesbrough (another local derby)
• 3 May – Bolton vs. Sunderland (another 6-pointer!)
• 11 May – Sunderland vs. Arsenal

Not the easiest of run-ins, then, but I’m sure we can snag 6 points or so…

Posted: March 22nd, 2008
Categories: Everything Else
Tags: Flickr, football, league, match, photos, Sunderland
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