Free Software Directory 3 comments

The Free Software Foundation’s new Free Software Directory, was officially re-launched earlier this week.

More than 6500 programs are listed in the newly updated directory, all of them free for any computer user to download, run and share. According to the Free Software Foundation, each entry is individually checked and tested so users will know that any program they come across in the directory will be truly free software, according to the group’s formal definition, with free documentation and without proprietary software requirements.

Programs that run on proprietary operating systems like Mac OS X and Windows are listed as well, but only if they run fully on GNU/Linux.

The new directory has been rebuilt using MediaWiki–the same software that powers Wikipedia. A set of extensions called Semantic MediaWiki add advanced search and presentation capabilities.

A great resource for anyone looking for open source alternatives to the paid-for proprietary offerings. Additionally, promo codes for advanced technology add to the savings.

New look and new features for Communities of Practice website 1 comment

As of today, new features and a new look for the IDeA Communities of Practice (CoP) platform. This is the first major new release for over 12 months, and brings a number of usability enhancements to the platform, which is provided as a free resource to staff working on local government throughout the UK.

New features include:

• a more compact and cleaner design for the Welcome page which now includes: (i) service and general information announcements, (ii)details of  most active communities and (iii) details of new communities, (iii) details of featured/special communities.
• a “tag cloud” for quickly finding content and communities by keyword.
• the MyHome page has been changed from green to blue to ensure consistency with any personalised content pages (My Profile My Blogs, My Alerts, My Messages, My Contacts etc.)
• finding an existing Community of Practice has been made simpler by the addition of an A-Z index and tag cloud to the ‘Communities’ webpage.
• the Help facilities have been improved to ensure users can make the most of all the various features on the website.
• a new on-line process for setting-up communities enabling faster turnaround.
• the addition of ‘themes’ for Forum threads and Library files, enabling a blended approach between taxonomy and tags for organising content
• the Forum section now allows for ‘sticky’ discussion threads, where a topic can be marked to remain at or near the top of the list of topics.
• a facility for closing threads, for example where a discussion must be time-limited.

This release is the first of 3 major upgrades being planned between now and early 2009.  Watch this space for further announcements, or better still, go the the CoP platform and start connecting, collaborating and innovating!

Background

The community of practice platform was launched in December 2007 as part of an initiative to encourage collaboration and more effective knowledge sharing between local councils. The anticipated benefits which are now being realise are better/more efficient public services and greater opportunities for innovation and co-production.  It currently supports over 18,000 users and more than 550 separate online communities, working on a range of initiatives from climate change to preventing violent extremism.  The platform supports a range of social networking and social media tools.

[Steve Dale is the business analyst and technical lead for the IDeA CoP Platform]

Top 100 Social Media Tools 39 comments

Not sure if this is something to be proud of, or ashamed about, but I’m using (or have used) about 70% of the applications in the list. The encouraging thing is to note how many of these applications are free to use. Others might have applicable promo code discounts.

The list has been compiled from a cohort of learning professionals who shared their Top 10 Tools for Learning both for their own personal learning/productivity and for creating learning solutions for others.

If you want to influence the list and rankings, then head off to the Centre for Learning and Performance Technologies.

TOP 10

Key to availability: D=download; H=hosted; C=insert code onto page

TOP 11-20

22-91

92-133

Social Networking with Sharepoint Server 2007 – a limited solution to a wider business requirement 3 comments

The most comprehensive summary I’ve read so far on Microsoft’s foray into social networking via their Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007 (MOSS 2007) product. The article is an extract from a forthcoming white paper written by three Microsoft gurus – Eric Charran, Dino Dato-on and Greg Lang.

The article seems a bit too preoccupied with the profiles, active directory and people search facilities at the expense of how they’ve implemented tools such as RSS, wikis and blogs. However, it does seem to be a vast improvement over the facilities offered on Sharepoint 2003. Given the usual complexity that Microsoft seem to automatically build into the deployment of any of their products, it looks like it could meet the  social networking requirements of most organisations, provided that networking and collaboration is limited to within the organisation’s firewall. My guess is that it would be hugely expensive to deploy as a social networking solution across and between organisations,  e.g. for connecting councils in local government or for collaboration between agencies and learning providers in the education sector. Sector-wide social networking solutions for business still seem to be limited platforms such as GovX or I&DeA, and products such as Blogtronix and CommunityServer. Still, given the huge investment that many organisations have already made in Microsoft’s Office products, I anticipate a huge take-up for MOSS 2007. I just hope they’ll also recognise its limitations for (social) networking outside the firewall.

Enterprise Social Software Platforms – is Blogtronix the real deal? No comments yet

I read with interest that my old employer – Reuters – has chosen Blogtronix as the social media platform for their recently launched Green Market Social Community. I’ve been pondering which platform would best suit the social media network I’m planning for the Information Authority, which will be supporting data providers across the Further Education system. Knowing how rigorous Reuters are in their procurement process, I’d be foolish not to include Blogtronix in the short list.

Google Gears up for off-line browser apps 3 comments

As a closet fan of all that is ‘Google’, I was wondering when I should make the final step in my transition from Bloglines to Google Reader. I’ve been using both for some time now, which is bit of a pain when I have to add and categorise a new feed since I end up replicating the process twice. However, I think the recent announcement about Google Gears is the tipping point I needed. So, sadly, it’s goodbye to Bloglines, but loyalty only goes so far.

Basically, Gears is a browser add-on that enables web-based applications to run locally whilst off-line. The product is in Beta at the moment, and only supports the Google Reader (RSS feed aggregator). However, we can expect to see support for Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Mail, Google Blogger, and in fact any of their applications where there is value to be gained by working off-line and on-line.

Looks like another killer app to me!

RSS in Plain English No comments yet

This is a neat little video explaining RSS is plain English. Note – it requires Flash Player 8.

Launch of Directgov for kids No comments yet

Directgov, has launched a new Flash animated site for children aged
5-11. DirectgovKids
welcomes our future generation of civil servants (else why else would they be visiting Directgov?) into a self-contained little world full of virtual buildings to explore, each representing a part of
government – so introducing, says the blurb, "important ideas about
citizenship, democracy, and political participation".

Children’s Minister Beverley Hughes proclaimed "This is the first time children in the UK have been communicated with
directly by Government through an online site". 

The site is quite well constructed, with lots of animated games to play, though I don’t think the makers of Sim City have got anything to worry about just yet. I thought they could perhaps have introduced a bit more realism into the relationships between communities and government by introducing some elements from Doom3, but perhaps that’s part of a later release.

To pick up on an editorial from Public Sector Forums…" after all, which five-year-old wouldn’t tear themselves away from Hungry Hippos or their PlayStation 2 for a heated debate on ‘Sustainable Schools’? In the words of Eric Morecambe…"there’s no answer to that"!

Free photo editing from Picnik No comments yet

I’ve covered this before in a previous post, but if ayone is seeking a cheap (as in free) but powerful photo editing application, take a look at Picnik. They’ve just released version 11, which has a whole host of new features.

Ning – Social media platform No comments yet