Wednesday, December 31, 2008

7 Things You Don’t Really Need to Know About Me

Today I was tagged in a Twitter meme entitled "7 Things You Don't Really Need to Know About Me". I have been on the Web for so long, and never have hesitated to share, but here are some things that you might have missed!

1. I had perfect attendance in high school.
2. I was my high school mascot.
3. I watch Days of Our Lives every day (and that is not a cardboard cut-out!)
4. I have ridden motorcycles since I was 7 years old.
5. I maintain the Unofficial American Graffiti home page.
6. I maintain the Dave DeBusschere Sports Card site.
7. We live in a geodesic dome and our son's middle name is Buckminster.

I am passing this on to the following:
1.Meg Ormiston
2.Jim Wenzloff
3.Leslie Fisher
4.Lisa Thumann
5.Leigh Zeitz

Thursday, December 18, 2008

iPhone apps that sync


When the App Store opened for the iPod Touch and the iPhone, I first found myself drawn to the applications that took advantage of the great graphics, the well-crafted touchscreen, and the built-in accelerometer which enhances the use of some very cool apps!

However, as time progressed, I began to look at applications that would increase my productivity and also have a desktop component. I like a desktop component for both the ease of lots of data entry and for peace of mind, since the data is backed up on both the handheld and desktop devices.

One piece of software that I received as a demo, SplashShopper, created by SplashData, I have found easy-to-use and very useful!

SplashShopper is just what it sounds like-- it is a shopping list application, and comes with pre-populated shopping lists for all types of things, including books, gifts, groceries, movies, etc. However, it is very easy to re-create these lists to meet your specific needs and even create your own list.

The lists, especially the grocery list, can get very detailed. However, I did not care about some of the fields, so I just entered the item, the broad category, and the aisle fields when entering my grocery store's items. I used the desktop component for entering all 174 items.

I love having my grocery list with me all of the time, arranged by store aisle, and only seeing the items I need! The iPhone makes use of this application so easy, since the touch screen is so responsive one can push the cart and use the electronic shopping list at the same time! (And, if you still like the paper list, you can email a text version of the shopping list to yourself before you go to the store!)

Kathy

Monday, December 08, 2008

Cool little photo scanner

Many years ago I had a stand-alone photo scanner, back in the days when flatbed scanners were really expensive. It worked (most of the time)! I find archiving old photos on a flatbed to be very time-consuming. Just recently, I ran across the Pandigital Photolink One-Touch Scanner. As you can see from the photo comparison, the scanner is very small- it is 6"x 2" x 1.5". It only can scan up to a 4" wide image, but it is perfect for the 4"x"6 photo size.

Pandigital Photo Scanner


Here's how it works. It comes with an SD card, but has a 5-in-1 card reader (Compact Flash-Type 1, MemoryStick, MS Pro, MS Pro Duo and DUO (with adapters), MMC, SD and all the little SD versions with an adapter, and xD (H-type and M-type) on the back side.

You just plug in the AC adapter, and scan your images through the scanner, one at a time, and they are saved on the card in an 1800x1200 resolution at 300dpi. It is speedy to scan multiple photos, and, although this is not a high resolution, the colors are true, and those old photos from the pre-digital camera age of the 60's, 70's and 80's look just great!

You can hook the scanner up to a desktop and it acts as a card reader, too, and you can easily move the photos off the memory card and onto the desktop for burning to your archival CD, posting to flickr or Facebook, or making your PhotoStory.

Here is an old photo I scanned and did not retouch. (This is from 1966, before I hit those awkward teenage years!) I intentionally chose one with a lot of reds to show that they did not bleed, as sometimes happens with that color. (Okay, this was also before I had any fashion sense, too, based on the colors I was wearing!)

Saturday, December 06, 2008

The Networked Student

Created in the style of the Common Craft videos (with permission) here is a well-done video about the networked student, Web 2.0 tools, and the networked teacher. Thanks to Wendy Drexler and her son for creating this!