Podcasting

I found the best podcast on all things you need to know to podcast. The young men in the video explain the settings that you need to change in Audacity to make the best podcast. They talk about microphones and how to turn your file into an actual podcast. The only part of the video that I didn't like was when they spoke with a radio/podcast expert who has all of the expensive, professional equipment only necessary for experts like him. I fastforwarded through that part to save my sanity. The rest of the video was useful, and I found the young men very personable. Here is my podcasting page with documents and videos to help anyone learn how to create a podcast. It is cheap and easy, so I highly recommend this to everyone!

TrailFire

I'm not sure if the beta version of this software needs some work or if my laptop is ready to kick the bucket?! I have created a Trail for others to follow. You can find it at:(http://www.trailfire.com/twcross/trails/11366). Each page has a small "i" icon on it that when clicked will show a comment on the page that then allows you to click an arrow to the next page and comment in the trail. You can create multiple trails. Trails are public by default, but you can make them private and make them available by invite only. I wasn't very creative with my trail, but some of the ones that I saw on the site looked pretty cool with graphics in the comments. It is taking forever for my laptop to show the icon for the comment or my computer tells me that the program is not responding. I could really get into using TrailFire if I could get it to work in a timely manner on my laptop. I'm going to test it on my desktop to try to figure out if it is my laptop or the program with the technical issues.

WV Technology Conference 2006 - Charleston Civic Center

I had a great time presenting at the WV Tech Conference. What nice people attended the sessions! I loved how attendees chimed in with information that they had about free software being discussed. I knew it was worth the time that it took me to come up with a final presentation title, "Free Digital Bling to Amaze, Astound and Impress Your Students!" I hope that attendees participate in the Free Software Wiki that we started for the conference presentation. I also hope that the participants who inquired about repeat future presentations contact me. I had so much fun doing the presentation that I can't wait to do it again! At least I already know that I will be presenting at the WV Community College Association and WV Association for Developmental Education 2006 Annual Joint Conference in October.

BubbleShare

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Audio is supposed to be available to accompany the images, but I could not get the recording tool to work. I don't know if it was my mic, computer or BubbleShare. I like that I can turn my images into a photocast for iPods even if I don't know very many people with iPods yet. I like the GUI for this site. It couldn't be any easier. BubbleShare would REALLY rock if I could get the audio to work.

Using Producer for PowerPoint

Two blog posts in one evening! Part of the reason that I have taken so long to post is that I have been working with the audio file that I created from a Strategic Plan Update oral presentation that our college president did for me to record. I created a PowerPoint to go with the audio and then used MS Producer, which is a free download, to create a presentation. If I had a video, I could have inserted it instead of just a picture. Of course the page would have taken even longer to load then, so it is probably just as well. You should view it with Internet Explorer, as I don't think it plays in all browsers. Come on Microsoft! Play nice with others!

Flickr & Cocoa Beach

I know I haven't posted for a while. It isn't that I haven't been looking, finding and using new software. It is just that I have been soooo busy doing those things that I have neglected posting. I thought I would add more photos on the page to make up for my lack of postings and maybe I will be forgiven. The image sharing software of the day is from flickr.com. I hope you enjoy the images. They are of my daughters' first trip to the ocean.

Flash Slideshow

Playing with Podcasts

After a couple of days, I have found software, recorded an oral presentation, edited the presentation, saved it in multiple digital formats, and created .rss and .xml files to turn it into a podcast. As a result, I have now created my first official podcast. I'm pretty proud of it. I had wanted to do one with my voice, but I wanted a more professional sounding voice, so I asked our college president to speak. It turns out that she has a lovely, recordable voice. It was only a matter of removing dead airspace and some "ummmms" and "ahhhhhs" before saving the file as .mp3 and .wav files. I used Audacity freeware to do the recording and edits. I used a KOSS CS-100 headset with microphone ($10-$15). I tried to use Podifier freeware to create the .rss file that I needed to turn the audio into an actual podcast that would be received in podcast aggregators/receivers, but I had some trouble with the script that it created. In the end it was easier to look at someone else's script and just put my links and info into the script to create the file. I also looked at podcast aggregators/receivers and tried a few before I found the one that I liked best, ZiePod. You can find my webpage about podcasting with links to the software that I used at http://www.wvup.edu/dl/Podcasts/index.htm.

Not So Scary Disney & Slide.com

In my never ending search for finding and trying cool freeware, I have had to resort to creating a blog. Ok, how much geekier can I get? So...I created this blog just to try out the slideshow software from www.slide.com.

I think it turned out to be pretty cool! The program is relatively easy to use. When you are finished creating the slideshow, you are given the code to add it to your blog page. Directions are given for various blog sites. It took me three tries to get a slideshow created, but I finally did it. I don't know if the software is in beta or what, but I seemed to have a lot of technical difficulties. My successful attempt didn't include as many pictures as the first two attempts, and I didn't try to rename any of the images either. I may go back later and try to add photos and change image names to see if I can do it successfully without getting kicked out of the site.