#glow #glowplus #EDUScotICT

Glow and Best OS/Office version/Browser versions

I have been doing some research into the best configuration for workstations which are used to access Glow. A key component of Glow is O365 which is a continually evolving service. This is on the face of it a good thing but also has implications for the best workstation configuration to ensure that access to the cloud services work and also that the integration between cloud and Workstation is as good as possible. Of course it is possible that users may be using O365 and other Glow services using a workstation which may not support the most ideal configuration. I have seen users experience some issues with when invoking the full office applications in Office 2010 – particularly in relation the users authentication and document synchronisation.

As a general principle keeping the workstation up to date will ensure the best user experience.

The following links are useful in trying to ensure that the best possible configuration can be achieved – this in turn should lead to the best possible user experience.

If you are a home user you will have the opportunity maintain the workstation software at will – in some cases upgrades can be freely downloaded – others will be pay for!

Note that you need to be a logged in as a Glow user to view some of these links

https://glowscotland.sharepoint.com/sites/glowkey/technicalchecks/_layouts/15/start.aspx#/
https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/Office-Online-browser-support-ad1303e0-a318-47aa-b409-d3a5eb44e452?CorrelationId=935f4f21-6d15-4e34-9f9c-77e2448e71c5

https://support.office.com/en-CA/article/Office-365-system-requirements-719254c0-2671-4648-9c84-c6a3d4f3be45

TERENA – Lecture Recording Competition #Glowplus #EDUScotICT

Earlier this year I was involved in facilicating participation in the TERENA Lecture Recording competition which took place at their annual conference. The conference took place in Reykjavik, Iceland. The purpose of the competition was to allow different lecture recording tools to be showcased and compared.

A number of people ( 16 ) were invited to present a short lecture in a lecture theatre in sequence. A video camera captures the lecturer, a microphone captures the lecture audio and a video feed was provided of the lecturer’s power point presentation – all of this was organised by the event organiser. The signals were split and each lecture recording solution combined them to provide the finished product.

Cisco has a lecture recording solution which consists of a number of its products working together as follows.

Capture
Using a Cisco C60 video CODEC which takes the three inputs provided and combines them for transmission and recording on a Telepresence Content Server (TCS).

Transform
Cisco MXE – Media Exerience Engine which converts the video into a number of formats which can be configured in advance.

Share
Cisco Show & Share – a video portal where the finished product can be viewed via a computer web browser or hand held device.

The recording solution is cloud based – in this case the back end equipment which include the Telepresence Content Server (TCS), MXE and Show and Share Server are all based at a Cisco Lab in Cisco’s campus at San Jose, California.

So the video stream needs to traverse the Internet to get from the CODEC at the lecture theatre to the TCS at San Jose. The event lasted just over an hour with 16 short lectures being delivered on a variety of topics.

The recording is started by an operator at the lecture theatre connecting the codec to the TCS in San Jose ( this is a one button press operation). After the last lecture is finished the call is dropped and the recorded video is passed to the MXE for transcoding, then on to the Show and Share Server for publication and viewing. This process takes approximately the same time as the duration of the recording. A second task is automatically done by the MXE – this is called Pulse Analytics – which scans the audio track to create a voice print for each speaker and then to create a key word index of the spoken words this adds a further period of processing time. In all it takes 2 times the duration of the recording before it will appear on the Show and Share server.

At this point it is worth having a look at the end product.
(Note that there is no need to do any video editing to get to this point. But you will see in this version some spalsh screens which I added to introduce each speaker and their topic – I did this using iMovie on my laptop. The colour coded time line on the video and the keyword index are all created automatically.)

Now take a look at the end product by following this link – takes a moment to load – be patient 😉

Click here to view the video on the Show and Share Portal.

Notice that you can click on a speaker name in the speaker list to jump to a particular speaker and then click on the key word index to jump to occurrences of that word in the recording of this speaker lecture. If you select a particular speaker first you can see that the key work index shows the key words used by that lecturer.

Can you imagine how a tool like this could be used in Education!!!! Lecturers/Teachers can record their lessons so pupils/students can view them again – or even view them before attending class!! See my post on the Flipped Classroom.

Mobile makes a difference – always available #glew #EDUScotICT #glow #glowplus

I recall an occasion when my dad was involved in a road traffic crash. He was alone in the car but fortunately had his recently obtained mobile phone with him. He called me and I was able to travel to where he was and assist him to as we waited for the recovery vehicle to arrive. My dads approach to mobile telephony was moulded by his experience up to that time, consequently he would only switch on the mobile when he needed to use it. The suggestion that he should leave it switched on was a foreign concept to him. He was more concerned about not running down its battery…..

Of course he had a telephone at home which was switched on all the time and that was acceptable. If he was at home and I needed to contact him I could do this by calling the land-line. But if he weas out and about – even with his mobile – it is more than likely the case that it would be switched off. This made his phone a one way device!!!! From him to others but the reverse was not really feasible.

Today’s young people seem to become equipped with a mobile phone/device at a very early age and they are very comfortable with the idea that they are contactable at any time – day or night!!!! In fact I observe that people in general seem to react to a mobile phone communication – SMS or voice call with a irritating priority. How annoying it is when someone’s mobile phone rings when you are in mid conversation and they interrupt the conversation to take the call or respond to the SMS……. Gone are the days when you might walk up to a person already in conversation with another and politely wait for them to end the conversation before engaging with the new one. Seems all you need to do is SMS or make a mobile call to get their immediate attention. 😉

I don’t mean to over generalise on this matter but I do think that the introduction of mobile phones and their now almost universal availability, has had a marked affect on people in general. Particularly, the young generation. How often have you been on a train and been surrounded by people who have their heads bowed writing the next SMS reply, or playing a game, of interacting with friends on facebook etc.

It seems to me that we do need to accept that “mobile” is now firmly embedded in or culture and we do need to recognise this in all aspects of life. I can recall the time when I would interact with my friends only on a face to face basis – where as now relationships and associated commuications seem to be continuous and less dependant on physical proximity.

Schools have a habit of asking children to either not bring their mobile phones to school or to switch them off when in the classroom. I feel that this is a matter that does need to be re-thought. We should make use of this medium for the benefit of every child’s education. We should certainly consider that mobile phones are definitely now a defacto medium for communication for many/most people and embrace this as an acceptable way to reach learners (and teachers) more efficiently. Is there a need to include phone etiquette basic social skill we want children to learn from an early age?

Lets also remember that the days where phone were a medium for only voice communications are truly in the past! That time is history – we need to recognise that we can communicate and interact with people using voice, text, and graphic and even video using these devices that have now been firmly adopted by todays society.

I expect there will be people like my dad around for some time to some but lets face it, todays youth are now setting their own standards for communication in light of their adoption of mobile communications. We can’t expect to get their attention if we continue supress this technology in our schools. Just a thought!!