For those of you who use Facebook, which apparently is everyone... There is a tool available now to synchronize your Facebook contacts to Outlook. This would make those contacts available throughout your digital life as Outlook syncs to your phone, Live Contacts, etc.
Checkout the video on Channel 10 here : http://www.on10.net/Blogs/laura/sync-your-facebook-contacts-with-outlook-and-windows-mobile/
If you are a student using Windows Live @ EDU, the Outlook Connector would bring all these technologies together in to one seamless solution.
Backstage at MED : Outsync : Outlook - Facebook Sync Released!
One of the things I love most about the fall season is NCAA football. I recall as if it was only yesterday waking up to the sounds of the Marching Illini practicing out our dorm window. This time of year, Saturdays at our house start with my Zune letting the fight songs roar from a wireless speaker.
It was this loyalty to my alma mater that peaked my interest when I learned that the Zune team is now offering branding. "Branding" is the ability to have a design printed right on the device. Up until now if you wanted devices with your own design you had to purchase "skins" which were basically something you stuck to the outside of a device in order to give it more aesthetic appeal. The Zune branding is printed on the device by the manufacturer. Think about a fine paint job on a tricked out sports car as opposed to decals someone tried to apply themselves.
This opens a lot of interesting marketing opportunities for both schools and universities to create imaginative devices. Imagine if you rewarded season ticket holders with a custom Zune filled with video clips from last season and a courteous thank you from the head coach! What if you welcomed all incoming freshman with a branded Zune preloaded with orientation video! How about high school students with their mascot blazing the back of an mp3 player as they listen to podcasts recorded by their teachers and wireless trade flashcards.
Yes, I said preloaded. The Zune team is also able to work with customers to pre-load content. This takes your branding from just being proud of a device to a full audio/photo/video experience!
I bring this up in the context of Education because that is my area. The Zune team is willing to work with any customer on this and the size of the order is "negotiable". Below I have posted 6 different images direct from the Zune team with examples of how these devices would look. I can honestly say if I could get one of these from my old stomping ground, I would order one as an alumni immediately.
If this would be of interest to your school, I would be happy to help.
A recent whitepaper linked from the UK Higher Education Blog delves in to this topic and explains the options with detail. This is a very important discussion in my opinion and it encompassed over half of our LabMan 2007 closing keynote presentation last summer. Although we got tons of compliments afterwards, I also heard it went right over a few heads. I'll attempt to simplify.
The UK Higher Education Blog : Thin Client, Rich Client or hybrid?
One of the slides in our deck was particularly interesting to me (see image below). It reads left to right and demonstrates the evolution of a workstation as it moves away from the static presentation of:
and towards:
This is one of the ways that software as a service and Web 2.0 could be delivered today within schools using existing solutions. Imagine if every student had a dedicated virtual workstation on campus. What would the effects be on cost and safety? What would be the impact for resources who are not able to reach campus due to geographic distance or family obligations? I encourage you to think about the possibilities that virtualization can bring to student computing "outside the box".
Click the slide to open at higher res.
Here is a link to set aside. HP has published an online gallery of photo projects. You simply choose a template, upload a photo, and it will allow you to print it as a PDF file which you can then Email, share, print, etc. Templates include calendars, cards, and interesting photo art. This would be an easy tool for a classroom project dealing with digital media.
Graffiti-cool yearly photo calendar
Just as there were step-by-step technical guides for Vista, a new set of guides has been posted for Windows Server 2008. If it was possible to wear out a favorites button, my link to the Vista guides would be showing some serious signs of over-use. There are some outstanding topics here. Between conference calls today I will be testing SSTP!
Creating and Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services Templates Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services in an Extranet Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Step-By-Step Guide
Deploying SSTP Remote Access Step by Step Guide
Server Core Installation Option of Windows Server Longhorn Step-By-Step Guide
Step-by-Step Guide for Configuring a Two-Node File Server Failover Cluster in Windows Server Longhorn
Step-by-Step Guide for Configuring a Two-Node Print Server Failover Cluster in Windows Server Longhorn
Using Identity Federation with Active Directory Rights Management Services Step-by-Step Guide
What's New in Failover Clusters
What's New in Terminal Services for Windows Server 2008
Windows Server Active Directory Rights Management Services Step-by-Step Guide
Windows Server Code Name Longhorn Beta 3 Active Directory Certificate Services Step-By-Step Guide
Windows Server Longhorn Beta 3 Release TS Gateway Server Step-By-Step Setup Guide
Windows Server Longhorn Beta 3 Release TS Licensing Step-By-Step Setup Guide
Windows Server Longhorn Beta 3 Terminal Services RemoteApp Step-By-Step Guide
Windows Server Longhorn Beta 3 Windows Deployment Services Step-by-Step Guide
Download details: Windows Server 2008 Step-by-Step Guides
You would think in 20 years my habits would improve. I still carry valuable data in my backpack where it is at risk of getting torn, lost, or just buried under piles of extra stuff that I carry around to feel prepared but never actually end up using. When I was in grade school, my valuable data included homework, notes from home, permission slips, order forms, etc. In college I carted around Zip Disks because I felt they were more robust than floppies and some of them would store over 100MB!
In the professional world my data has evolved in to digital assets such as slides, spreadsheets, and whitepapers. These things have changed in form from crumpled up papers large diskettes to USB thumb drives but they still risk being lost or destroyed. Especially thumb drives. Mine has survived lost&found, the washing machine, and due to its size it sometimes takes a few minutes for me to scour my backpack if it happen to slip out of its pocket and fall to the bottom.
Students who understand how to leverage Web 2.0 really have it made when it comes to transporting files. There are great online services who are competing for their attention. Last week I published a brief list of new Live services and how they could benefit Education. Two that I left out were Windows Live @ EDU and SkyDrive. These are solutions that include massive amounts of online storage. Live @ EDU currently allocates 5 GB for student mailboxes which you could obviously use for Emailing files to yourself to later access from a browser. SkyDrive is more directly an online storage solution. It is still in beta and currently only provides 500MB of storage. This is large enough for most documents but hopefully the available storage will be increased when the service moves out of testing (to something massive, I hope).
If you can drag and drop, you can protect and store files on your own hard drive "in the cloud" meaning it is hosted by Microsoft. You simply open the website, sign in using a username and password, and then upload your files. You decide whether others should have access, either by inviting them to sign in or by opening a folder for public access to anyone anonymously.
These services are very simple to use. They probably have a greater learning curve for most of today's adults than they would for young people who are already well acclimated with modern web based services and tools. So hopefully crumpled papers, Zip Disks, and yes even my trusty USB thumb drive will soon be considered artifacts of a world before we could store things in "the cloud".
Yesterday a press release snuck out with several announcements regarding virtualization. For full detail, link to Kevin's post and then to the press announcement after the jump.
Kevinsul's Management Blog : Announcing the 'Windows Installer Utility for MSFT Application Virtualization' (and why you should care)
This is a major opportunity for Education because we live in an environment where many machines go relatively unmanaged. So if you want to push out an application, there is an unknown probability that it could negatively impact something else on their machine since you have no way of collecting an inventory of all those workstations and then testing application to application compatibility issues. Application virtualization resolves that issue by creating a virtual bubble for that application to live in, but still uses local machine resources.
In the past, for this technology to function it required a back end server to deliver the application and determine to who and how long it should be available. This announcement makes public the ability to deliver the virtualized application independently using Windows Installer, which means if that machine is going off-campus for a long period of time or may never come back at all, you can still provision to it safely.
This is an outstanding opportunity for students to get their hands on Office Ultimate, which includes OneNote! -http://www.theultimatesteal.com/
Beginning Sept. 12, Microsoft will launch a special Web-based promotion exclusively for students called The Ultimate Steal. Students who are actively enrolled at eligible educational institutions will be able to acquire Office Ultimate 2007 via the Web at the low student price of US$59.95. Calling this promotion "The Ultimate Steal" is spot on when you consider that this is a savings of over 90 percent of the retail price of Office Ultimate 2007. The retail price is what students might think they would have to pay, when much lower pricing such as this has been available to students for many years.
Student Promotion Provides Steal of a Deal for Office Ultimate 2007: Q&A: Alan Yates, Microsoft general manager of Worldwide Education, highlights how Microsoft is providing college students with easier access to tools for academic success.
Interesting information from one of my colleague's blog posts -
The Microsoft Research Assessment Toolkit was conceived to provide higher education faculty members with user-friendly, focused resources to assist in developing and conducting rigorous educational assessment. The Toolkit includes a variety of items to facilitate the planning and implementation process, including: An overview of assessment and assessment planning guide. User self-assessment tool to help faculty determine their level of assessment experience. The components of the kit are coded to allow users to find tools and strategies appropriate for their needs. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) that explain assessment issues with minimal use of jargon. Case studies of effective assessment that provide a snapshot of faculty in various computational science or STEM disciplines. A guide to selecting assessment tools. Annotated resources primarily focused on computational science and STEM disciplines and organized by topical categories. Web links to various assessment-related sites or organizations. Development of the Toolkit will be an ongoing effort; Toolkit materials are available online at http://research.microsoft.com/erp/AssessmentToolkit.
The Microsoft Research Assessment Toolkit was conceived to provide higher education faculty members with user-friendly, focused resources to assist in developing and conducting rigorous educational assessment. The Toolkit includes a variety of items to facilitate the planning and implementation process, including:
Development of the Toolkit will be an ongoing effort; Toolkit materials are available online at http://research.microsoft.com/erp/AssessmentToolkit.
Dan on eScience & Technical Computing @ Microsoft : MSR Learning Assessment Toolkit
HP has launched a series of press announcements over the last few weeks that include their new Blackbird gaming PC, their new HDX "Dragon" laptop, a new line of MediaSmart TVs, information about their MediaSmart servers (Windows Home Server), and they have stolen my heart by positioning a very aesthetically pleasing laptop over at my local Best Buy...
Terrible photos I took from my phone don't do this hardware justice. In person this is the most attractive laptop I have ever found, PC or otherwise.
42" LCD with built in wireless and Media Connect? I'm in. I could hang this on the wall and stream Diggnation or Totally Rad Show without having to run any wires other than power. What's more, it supports DivX, H.264, and DVR-MS!!! I almost passed out when I saw the "Recorded TV" button on the remote. This will literally pull recorded shows off a Media Center without an extender!
3 models above represent a new line of gear with focus on winning back consumers who are starting to question whether PCs can still be cool. Although the server is not exactly something I would set on the mantle, it is one of the most useful pieces of tech I hope to buy this year. The laptop has an ejectable remote control, TV tuner, and HDMI out. The desktop is built to attract PC gamers who are looking for high performance in a stealthy chassis.
There are many bloggers/journalists actively discussing Windows Live publishing out several new free tools this month. So what? Well these tools will be available through WSUS which many schools already have in place, so deployment is very low-cost. There is also a big "so what" across what the applications have to offer.
These tools are interesting to education, especially in labs where a teaching exercise may include collaboration, digital media, how to check Email, and/or blogging. This may also be of interest for pre-loading student 1-1 laptops with free tools including Live Family Safety for parents to apply filters and create a safer browsing environment, in addition to the Vista parental controls.
So what would you get? I've taken a recent post from the Microsoft Update team and retro-fit their bullets below.
Windows Live Messenger - Instant messaging client which includes integration with Xbox Live, Yahoo, PC-to-PC webcam calls, sending Text Messages, and File Sharing. Windows Live Photo Gallery - Tool for editing photos and organizing and sharing photos and videos. This program expands and improves on features available in Windows Photo Gallery (part of Windows Vista), and works on either Windows XP or Windows Vista. Windows Live Mail - Free tool for checking Hotmail and other Email accounts, as well as Newsgroups and RSS. Windows Live Writer - The tool I use nearly every day for posting to this site. You can automatically import the style from your blog so the environment where you write looks/feels as it will appear online. It is also great at managing your drafts, old posts, and has an online gallery of plug-ins for integrating with other applications. Works great with popular blog platforms including Live Spaces which students can use at no cost. Windows Live Family Safety - Adapts your computer so parents have even more control than what's offered in the Vista parental controls, and adds parental control to XP. With Family Safety you can set rules on what web sites your kids are allowed to access, who they can chat with in Live Messenger, and who they can add as friends to their blog in Live Spaces. Windows Live Sign-in Assistant - Installs in the background so you can take advantage of single sign-on across all the tools without always being prompted for a username and password. Windows Live Toolbar - Installs a toolbar within Internet Explorer to add search functionality for websites and your desktop, search online maps and directions, weather, photos, and helps alert you to online phishing scams as you browse. Works with IE6, XP, and with Vista.
Windows Live Messenger - Instant messaging client which includes integration with Xbox Live, Yahoo, PC-to-PC webcam calls, sending Text Messages, and File Sharing.
Windows Live Photo Gallery - Tool for editing photos and organizing and sharing photos and videos. This program expands and improves on features available in Windows Photo Gallery (part of Windows Vista), and works on either Windows XP or Windows Vista.
Windows Live Mail - Free tool for checking Hotmail and other Email accounts, as well as Newsgroups and RSS.
Windows Live Writer - The tool I use nearly every day for posting to this site. You can automatically import the style from your blog so the environment where you write looks/feels as it will appear online. It is also great at managing your drafts, old posts, and has an online gallery of plug-ins for integrating with other applications. Works great with popular blog platforms including Live Spaces which students can use at no cost.
Windows Live Family Safety - Adapts your computer so parents have even more control than what's offered in the Vista parental controls, and adds parental control to XP. With Family Safety you can set rules on what web sites your kids are allowed to access, who they can chat with in Live Messenger, and who they can add as friends to their blog in Live Spaces.
Windows Live Sign-in Assistant - Installs in the background so you can take advantage of single sign-on across all the tools without always being prompted for a username and password.
Windows Live Toolbar - Installs a toolbar within Internet Explorer to add search functionality for websites and your desktop, search online maps and directions, weather, photos, and helps alert you to online phishing scams as you browse. Works with IE6, XP, and with Vista.
There are more where this came from. Check ideas.live.com for other interesting tools. Did you know you could share your desktop with someone for remote collaboration or support, for free? Did you know students can store their files online for free? There are a plethora of tools available and more coming that together can empower classrooms even though they are offered at no cost and support a very low cost of deployment.
The Office team has released a lot of new content to help students/teachers to kick off the school year. This includes a slew of templates and content for office applications as well as training and tools that "Educationalize" the Office platform.
Inside Office Online blog : School bells are ringing
For more information, see the Office for Education website - http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/suites/FX102294021033.aspx
PS - Blake, here you go buddy!
Scott McLeod has posted a great resource over on http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/
The tutorials on the web site highlight many of the Excel skills that are helpful when working with building- and district-level data. The tutorials are targeted at data managers, principals, guidance counselors, teachers, and other school personnel who have the responsibility for collecting, analyzing, and reporting K-12 performance data (which is just about everyone these days!). You will see that the tutorials are much like the ones created by Atomic Learning (they trained us!) but are focused on data-driven decision-making needs of educators rather than being generic. Below are the four sets of tutorials we recommend for every teacher and administrator. If every educator knew how to do these four things, schools’ capacity to do some basic monitoring of student progress would be greatly enhanced. They take just over half an hour to watch once, and of course they can be viewed as many times as necessary to accomplish mastery.
The tutorials on the web site highlight many of the Excel skills that are helpful when working with building- and district-level data. The tutorials are targeted at data managers, principals, guidance counselors, teachers, and other school personnel who have the responsibility for collecting, analyzing, and reporting K-12 performance data (which is just about everyone these days!). You will see that the tutorials are much like the ones created by Atomic Learning (they trained us!) but are focused on data-driven decision-making needs of educators rather than being generic.
Below are the four sets of tutorials we recommend for every teacher and administrator. If every educator knew how to do these four things, schools’ capacity to do some basic monitoring of student progress would be greatly enhanced. They take just over half an hour to watch once, and of course they can be viewed as many times as necessary to accomplish mastery.
(see original post) - School data tutorials