Learning the World

On this edition of the ITS Coffee Break, Ken Newquist and guest host Jason Alley (filling in for Courtney Bentley) talk about the HighEdWebDev conference, innovative ways that schools are using GIS on campus and announce a new brownbag about understanding the Interent. In Tech News they fill people in on an update to the popular Quicksilver fast application launcher for Mac OS Xand contemplate a CSI-spawned murder in Second Life while in Help News they offer suggestions for getting more out of search in Firefox and streamlining your Del.icio.us bookmarking experience.

• Download the MP3 directly
• Subscribe to the Soapbox podcast rss feed using an aggregator (you only need to do this once; subsequent shows should download automatically)
• Subscribe to the Soapbox feed via iTunes

The Drupal 6.0 beta 2 release is out. Among 6’s new features are support for OpenID, triggers for site events, theming improvements, a brand new menu system, and overhauled book and forum modules.

I haven’t tried installing it yet, either at work or home, so I’m not sure what these changes mean practically. I’m hoping we’ll see some sort of native support for secondary menus within Drupal (e.g. click on a primary navigation link, and it spawns 5 sublinks). I’ve had to hack together a solution on two of my three Drupal sites, and I’m not particularly happy with either of them.

The forum module was always clunky, at least when I tried to implement it, so I’m looking forward to trying that out as well.

Lafayette’s network upgrade rolls through campus and host Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley try out the second of three new microphones in this edition of the ITS Coffee Break. In Tech News, they discuss new apps for Apple’s iPhone, how to collaborate with Google Docs and Sheets and speculate on Microsoft’s plans to offer DRM-free downloads through its Zune Music Store. Finally, in Help News they review ITS’ web site update project and take a look at the upcoming Web and Video Conferencing lecture being held in November.  Get the podcast.

Mark Pearson from Earlham College explains why he’s breaking the Golden Rule of never upgrading during the semester to take Moodle from  1.8.2 to  1.8.3. In a word: performance. His 1.8.2 install is running slow (a complaint that a few others have had as well) the new version includes some streamlined SQL designed to deal with that issue.  He’s also planning on adding hacks that allow folks to do mass downloads of course files via ZIP and disable the “preview” default for Resources.

The new version of Mac OS X really is going to ship this month. While I’m excited about new features like Spaces (known as virtual desktops for our Linux friends), QuickView (which lets you look at almost any file without opening the associated application) and Stacks (piles of documents that rapidly expand when you mouse over them) I think I’ll wait a while to upgrade. The 10.5.1 release seems like a good milestone to shoot for.

Moodle 1.8.3 is out, which means my life is about to get a lot busier as I install it on Lafayette’s development server and start testing it for bugs.

The ITS Coffee Break goes stereo as it tests out one of three new microphones recently purchased for podcasting. In Tech News, hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley talk about ways to spruce up your Facebook profile, discuss Berkeley’s decision to upload 200 course lectures to YouTube, and speculate on Google’s purchase of the microblogging platform Jaiku. In Help News, two new “Integrating Teaching with Technology” presentations are announced, as well as an ITS brown bag about getting started with Linux. Listen in iTunes or download it from Soapbox. Listen in iTunes or download it from Soapbox.

CommandN is my favorite video podcast, featuring a great mix of tech and web tips, news and suggestions. Not a week goes by where I don’t learn something from this show, and that’s something I can say of every podcast I listen to. It’s well worth the time it takes to watch it, and its the perfect show to start your geeky morning routine.

The NITLE Moodle Users Meeting is spending two days talking Moodle in Denver, CO. Call it a liberal arts Moodle Meet. Or an eduGeekfest. Or a mini Moodle Moot. In any case, it’s a bunch of folks from liberal arts colleges talking about the trials and tribulations of using the Moodle learning management system.

So far it’s been a good gathering; on Friday it started off with a discussion of Moodle and pedagogy, then went on to update everyone on the state of the NITLE Moodle community. I spent Friday afternoon first attending a discussion of eReserves within Moodle, and then gave a presentation on “Marketing a Moodle Transition” with my colleague Courtney Bentley (which went over very, very well). On Saturday morning I’m learned about the University of Pudget Sound’s experiments with digital audio recording and playback within Moodle, and then attended the Moodle collaboration breakout session on modules.

The October 10th edition of the Coffee Break leads off with news of Lafayette’s implementation of Shibolleth and the recent Podcamp Philly event held at Drexel University. In Tech News, hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley discuss the new Firefox Campus Edition, the Chronicle of Higher Education’s new Tech Therapy podcast, and one professor’s attempt to rate the trustworthyness of Wikipedia’s contributors. In Help News they review file compatibility issues with Microsoft Office 2007, announce upcoming Outlook and NetStorage workshops, and offer a tip for quickly saving photos using Safari.

Getting the Podcast

There are several ways to get the podcast:

• Download the MP3 directly
• Subscribe to the Soapbox podcast rss feed using an aggregator (you only need to do this once; subsequent shows should download automatically)
• Subscribe to the Soapbox feed via iTunes