August 2010 Archives

Have you ever emailed files to yourself or do you carry a memory stick with you that has files you think you will need today? No need to do that anymore because there's Dropbox. So what is this Dropbox, you ask? It is by far one of my favorite apps for iPad and iPhone.

Think of it as a folder that is located on every single computer, ipad, phone, etc you happen to own. And whatever you put into that folder is accessible with all of your computers, iPad and phones. I have a Dropbox folder on my computer and Dropbox app on my iPad. Whatever I put into my Dropbox folder on my computer can be accessed with my iPad. It is simple as that. Trust me, once you use it you won't look back.

Check out this short video that shows what Dropbox is and what does it do.

SETUP YOUR DROPBOX ACCOUNT NOW

Download Dropbox for iPad
Download Dropbox for Windows, Mac, Linux.

The ultimate Wikipedia app for the iPad is what you need to know about this app. The cool thing about this app is the interaction you can have with each item. Those familiar with Wikipedia (hopefully that includes everyone) will love being able to search, and search, and search inside this app. Rather than read about it, just download it and search for something and you'll be hooked!

Download Wikipanion for iPad

First on the list of must free apps for the iPad is Evernote for the iPad. Evernote is a cloud based document storage tool that allows the capturing, organizing, storing and sharing of multiple file types including photos, videos, pdfs, text files, and audio memos, just to name a few. Items you store in Evernote can be sorted by tags, keywords and folder names and accessible on your iPad, iPhone/iPod Touch, Android, desktop computer (OSX and Win) and in the cloud to be accessible anywhere there's an internet connection. Find yourself offline? Upload and store any files and the next time you connect to the internet you're files will be synced. And on the iPad, this app just looks really cool with the grab and pinch, and slide touch functions.

Download app for iPad

As a student this has been a great app for when I'm doing research for papers and projects using my iPhone and iPad as a combo. On my iPhone I love being able to take photos of textbook pages from books I'm reading on the go or journal articles I pick up and save them into an Evernote file. I surf around on my iPad looking at news, reading journal articles, viewing videos, etc. and anything I find, I can copy and paste into Evernote. The best part is opening up my laptop at the end of the day when I'm home and having all this material from phone and iPod on my desktop application. Not to mention, I can share folders with others so we all can contribute to a folder of information and see what the other person has found. It rocks, it really does! And it's free!!

Welcome to a site dedicated to learning more about Apple's iPad and the contribution it could have in higher education and instructional technology practices. This site will be used to post information about the ins and out of the iPad, review software (both educational and fun), discuss challenges and pitfalls as well as successes in the higher education sphere. We'll post articles and news from other universities using the iPad as well as provide a space to hear from instructors, students and technology staff about their personal experiences with Apps and in the classroom with students.

To begin, check out this YouTube video about the Apple iPad from the designers at Apple and how the iPad came to be. This will be a fun experience so we hope you'll continue to read and contribute your experiences-- let's enjoy the ride!