Wednesday, September 1, 2010

What is Web 2.0? Presentation

As part of a presentation, I am giving I present to you:
"What is Web 2.0?"

New Google Document updates allows for users to collaborate easier!

According to the Google Docs Blog:
You can now see the text that other editors are highlighting as they select it. So if someone is about to delete something on your screen or drag text somewhere else, you’ll see them highlight that text before anything changes.

How not to do PowerPoint!

Monday, August 16, 2010

Get more Dropbox space!

One of my favorite tools is Dropbox. They give you 2 GB for free to sync whatever files you need. To squeeze out a little more space from them, you can always recommend it to your friends and have them signup using your referral code. You can also complete Dropbox's training session for another 250 MB. Just click on "Getting Started" on the Dropbox website to get started.


via Lifehacker

Monday, August 9, 2010

Bragto U: Embedding PowerPoints in a Web Page

Bragto University
Class: DOCS 110 Embedding PowerPoints in a Web Page

Objective:  To embed an existing PowerPoint presentation in a website for student access.

Prerequsites:

  1. You may want to check out Bragto U: Uploading to Google Docs to be able to upload your existing presentation.


Materials:

  • Google Docs Account


Procedure:

Maybe you have a presentation that you would like students to preview before they get to class, or they need to review before the big test.  The easiest way maybe to just post the actual file online in its .ppt glory.  But what about kids who don't have PowerPoint?  I know there is the stand alone PowerPoint viewer and OpenOffice.org Impress, but this solution give students a reason to visit a webpage.  It is a bit of Pavlovian training to get them to visit your homepage.

I found a free online butterfly PowerPoint. (My son is loving the butterflies outside our house.)  I uploaded it to Google Docs. Next step is to get the code to embed it in a webpage.

Go to the right side of the screen to "Sharing" then click on the last option "Publish/Embed".



Click on "Publish Document" which will give you new options.  If you ever wanted to stop publishing, you can.

Select the options for the size of your player, and various usability options.  The webpage will spit out the embed code to be placed on your site.  In my cases it is:
<iframe src="https://docs.google.com/present/embed?id=dgmqdx5x_57kgt87hc&size=m" frameborder="0" width="555" height="451"></iframe>

You need to enter this into the HTML code of your webpage.  If you just enter it into you WYSIWIG editor, you will get exactly what you see above, just code.  It needs to be in the HTML for the browser to process it.

The finish product will look like this.:

Thursday, August 5, 2010

See-ya Google Wave.

"I feel a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced." --Obi Wan Kenobi, Episode 4 A New Hope




After a whole two months of availability, Google has shut down its ambitious Wave project.  I was really looking forward to using the program this year in my class.  I am holding out hope that Google will reinstate the program, but I am not going to hold my breath.  Maybe this is a means of provoking adoption?



What is Google Wave?  Read it here.





Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Bragto U: Uploading to Google Docs

Bragto University
Class: DOCS 101 Uploading to Google Docs

Objective:  On your hard drive, you have thousands of documents.  You have spent thousand of hours on those documents.  Now the push is for "cloud computing", and you would like to foray into that new world.  But what about those documents you have created.  What about them?  You can upload them to Google Docs!

Prerequsites:

  1. None!


Materials:

  • Google Docs Account


Procedure:

Google Docs will gladly accept any file you want to upload... but to edit it online, it will only accept certain files.


There are quite a few options of what Google will let you edit.  But to edit the file online, the uploaded file needs to be either a document, spreadsheet or presentation.  If you upload with the option of "Convert ... to corresponding formats." unchecked, Google Docs will upload it but will require you to download it to edit it.[gallery link="file" columns="2"]

Next select the file or files that you would like to upload.  Click upload.  You have the option of selecting the destination of your uploaded documents to put them into a specific folder.  You also can set the privacy of said document on the bottom, by default it is set to "private".


Complete!