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iPad-enabled students get performance boost, says ACU study

From special-needs classrooms to textbook publishers to free lesson movements, anxious IT administrators to Irish principals to K-12 thought leaders: education loves the iPad. Apple has even taken up the learning banner in an iPad TV ad. For all the enthusiasm (and budget resources) focused on the “magical and revolutionary” tablet, however, there’s not much rigorous research yet on how, or if, the iPad is helping students learn more effectively.

One group that’s trying to quantify these benefits is the ACU Connected mobile learning program at Abilene Christian University, which has been working for more than three years to identify the specific advantages of student mobility with a new generation of devices. This week, ACU will announce some of its study results for the iPad while welcoming seven new research fellows studying the impact of digital mobility on education.

The research results, previewed exclusively for TUAW, are uniformly positive. In one study, students who annotated text on their iPads scored 25% higher on questions regarding information transfer than their paper-based peers. In a separate project covering iPad usage patterns, two researchers studying ACU’s first all-digital class discovered that the iPad promotes “learning moments” and helps students make more efficient use of their time. Grad students working in an online program reported a 95% satisfaction rate for online iPad-based coursework. As far as the ACU studies are concerned, the iPad in education is a success story.

Of course, no two learners are exactly alike, and the iPad isn’t ideal for every education challenge; nevertheless, the ACU teams have found a lot of upside so far. We’ll be checking in with them this week for a full interview about the research programs and the opportunities for educational transformation around mobile computing.

iPad-enabled students get performance boost, says ACU study originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sun, 18 Sep 2011 22:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Thunderbolt display daisy-chaining spec cleared up

Apple has posted a support article to clear up potential confusion about the capabilities of its new Thunderbolt-enabled Cinema Display. First of all, it should go without saying that only Macs with a Thunderbolt port will be able to utilize the display to its fullest capability. Fortunately, virtually all new Mac models released in 2011 feature the new I/O port.

Not all Macs’ Thunderbolt ports are created equal, however. While most Macs will be able to drive two Thunderbolt displays from a single port, the MacBook Air is only capable of driving a single display. Additionally, the 13-inch MacBook Pro’s display will automatically go black if it’s driving two Thunderbolt displays; Apple notes this is “expected behavior.” The 15 and 17-inch MacBook Pros and iMacs should be capable of driving two displays in addition to their own internal LCDs. The Mac mini can drive two Thunderbolt displays plus a display connected via its HDMI port, but only if the mini has an AMD graphics card.

Apple’s notes one other caveat about the Thunderbolt display: older Mini DisplayPort displays won’t light up if they’re hooked directly into the Thunderbolt port on the newer LCD. Macworld’s testing found that Mini DisplayPort LCDs can be added to a Thunderbolt chain and work as normal by hooking them into another Thunderbolt peripheral. It’s unclear why simply hooking the older monitors directly into the newer ones doesn’t work. For best performance Apple recommends hooking the Thunderbolt display directly into the Mac’s port, then hooking Thunderbolt storage devices into the display’s relevant port.

Macworld’s first look at the new Thunderbolt Display makes it sound like an impressive piece of work; not only is it a huge and vibrant screen, it’s also a very powerful hub thanks to the inclusion of three USB ports, Firewire 800, Thunderbolt, and Gigabit Ethernet. That’s so many connectivity options that many users may find they’re able to funnel everything into their Macs via the Thunderbolt connection to the display.

Thunderbolt display daisy-chaining spec cleared up originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sun, 18 Sep 2011 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Talkcast tonight, 10pm ET: Anticipation Edition

Sunday night means football, the Emmys, and of course the TUAW Talkcast. It’s been a busy week of waiting: for OS X 10.7.2, for iOS 5, for some definitive expectations on the next iPhone update… but the good news is, if you were holding your breath to see how Microsoft plans to challenge the iPad’s tablet hegemony, it’s time to exhale. We’ll talk Metro, next-gen iPhones, the fate of the iPod classic, and whatever else seems interesting — so bring your questions and comments along for the ride!

To participate, you can use the browser-only Talkshoe client, the embedded Facebook app, or download the classic TalkShoe Pro Java client; however, for +5 Interactivity, you should call in. For the web UI, just click the Talkshoe Web button on our profile page at 4 HI/7 PDT/10 pm EDT Sunday. To call in on regular phone or VoIP lines (viva free weekend minutes!): dial (724) 444-7444 and enter our talkcast ID, 45077 — during the call, you can request to talk by keying in *8.

If you’ve got a headset or microphone handy on your Mac, you can connect via the free Blink or X-Lite SIP clients, basic instructions are here. Talk to you tonight!

Talkcast tonight, 10pm ET: Anticipation Edition originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sun, 18 Sep 2011 20:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You’re the Pundit: Does the classic iPod have a future?

When it comes to forecasting the next big thing, we turn to our secret weapon: the TUAW braintrust. We put the question to you and let you have your go at it. Today’s topic is the iPod. Are the non-touch units examples of dead devices walking?

The iPod classic and shuffle lines have had a big “expiration date” stamped on them for quite some time. Maybe it’s time for Apple to hold the funeral for these formerly ground-breaking devices.

The classic, with its large capacity hard drive and touch wheel, and the shuffle, with its tiny form factor and limited interface, have each served a niche market for quite a while. Does the shrinking demand for these items and the greater capacity and lower cost for the touch and nano mean an end to the ten-year-old classic collection?

You tell us. Place your vote in this poll and then join in the comments with all your predictions.

View Poll

You’re the Pundit: Does the classic iPod have a future? originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sun, 18 Sep 2011 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Greenpois0n to Jailbreak iPhone 5 and iPad 2 [5 New Userland Exploits Found]

P0sixninja and iOPK from the Chronic Dev Team announced, at MyGreatFest, that they have found record breaking 5 new exploits to jailbreak iPad 2 and the upcoming iPhone 5. During his talk about…

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Best Resources In iOS Development – September 19th, 2011

Welcome to the site, and to another edition of the best resouces in iOS development.  Featuring the iPad and iPhone developer resources from this site in the last week in order of popularity.

If you listen to the tech sites, it looks like the iOS 5 GM seed should be coming very soon, and if they’re right this means an early October release of the iPhone 5.   So exciting times should bee soon ahead!

This week’s resources include an assortment of open source libraries, examples, and tutorials along with news of some new free services for iOS developers.

Here are the resources:

1. Tutorial: Develop An Angry Birds Like Game With Cocos2D And Box2D Step-By-Step – A great tutorial detailing how to create a working physics shooter style game similar to hit iOS games such as Angry Birds.

2. Tutorial: Easy Asynchronus UITableViewCell’s With Blocks And GCD – A very quick to implement tip to make your UITableViewCell’s asynchronous with sample code.

3. Example: iOS App Demonstrating Basic Usage Of The OpenCV Library – An app store app that has been open sourced that utilizes the OpenCV library.

4. Open Source: Boilerplate for iOS Apps Released With A Multitude Of Useful Code – A new project to create a useful resource for iOS developers that is inspired by the popular HTML5 boilerplate.

5. Tool: Debug Web Pages Viewed In The iOS Browser Remotely With Firebug Like Ease – An extremely useful tool that allows you to interactively debug web pages on your desktop while viewing them on your iOS device.

6. Tutorial: Get Ogre3D Running On iPhone And Build An Xcode 4 Ogre3D Template – A step-by-step guide on getting the Ogre3D graphics engine running on iPhone – and how to adapt the Mac template for building on the iOS platform.

7. Open Source: Library Allowing For Automatic Synchronization Between Portrait And Landscape Views – A project that allows you to create separate portrait and landscape views, and easily synchronize the two views without needing to write any adjustment code.

8. News: TestFlight Adds New Free Services To Make App Testing Easier – TestFlight has added a multitude of services free of charge to make testing easier such as in app updates, crash reporting, and in app questions.

Thanks for reading, please bookmark and share this post!

©2011 iPhone, iOS 4, iPad SDK Development Tutorial and Programming Tips. All Rights Reserved.

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Example: iOS App Demonstrating Basic Usage Of The OpenCV Library

I’ve mentioned in the extremely useful OpenCV library, and tutorials on usage and install.  Getting started with OpenCV can be difficult, but can be key if you’re looking to do any sort of image processing on the iOS platform.

I’ve come across an application that actually already is in the app store and provides a good example for those looking to use the Open Computer Vision library.  The app uses the edging algorithm along with some tweeks to make things more efficient and provide real time edge detection on the iPhone.

The application is Edgy and you find the application on iTunes here:
Edgy on iTunes

You can find the source code on the Google Code page here:
http://code.google.com/p/edgy-camera-ios/

The app has been added to the open source iOS apps listing.  Looks like this could be of great help if you are looking to get started with OpenCV.

©2011 iPhone, iOS 4, iPad SDK Development Tutorial and Programming Tips. All Rights Reserved.

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Open Source: Boilerplate for iOS Apps Released With A Multitude Of Useful Code

I’ve mentioned some great multi-purpose open source libraries lately such as the massive Cooliris toolkit, and the up and coming Three20 replacement library Nimbus.

And I’ve come across a new project that looks like it could become something every bit as useful as those great libraries.

This project is somewhat different in that it is not a library or a framework, but rather the potential starting point for an iOS app including many popular open source iOS libraries such as JSONKit, and ASIHttpRequest along with adaptable code snippets.  Including functionality for as asynchronous downloading, swipeable table view cells, map annotation and more.

The project is the iOS boiler plate and you can find it on Github here:
https://github.com/gimenete/iOS-boilerplate

You can read more details on what is currently included on the homepage here:
iOS Boilerplate

It looks like the project is off to a great start.

©2011 iPhone, iOS 4, iPad SDK Development Tutorial and Programming Tips. All Rights Reserved.

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Quick Tip: Convolution Reverb – McDSP’s Revolver Part 3

So far we have looked at the equipment used, how to set it up and getting the space recorded. In part three we will now look at converting your expertly recorded audio into an Impulse Response. As an Impulse Response, you can import it into McDSP’s Revolver plugin, thereby recreating the sound of the recorded space on any audio!

Step 1: Prep the Session

Previously, if like the example you were using a limited audio interface and dependant on what software you are using, you will need to reset your outputs and maybe drop your two mono audiofiles that you have recorded onto a stereo audio track.

Now we need to choose the ‘Sweep Analyzer Stereo’ from the Audiosuite menu.

Step 2: Let’s Analyze

Now it is simply a case of telling the Sweep Analyzer what the ORIGINAL signal was, and then what the RECORDED signal was. Essentially it will create a digital algorithm, which will (when loaded into Revolver) tell Revolver the characteristics of the space and how it should process any incoming sound. The difference between this and a standard digital reverb, is that we are creating the reverb algorithm used.

The process is a simple one:

  1. Select Sweep on the analyzer, then select the original sweep audio region and choose analyze on the analyzer
  2. Select Response on the analyzer, then select the stereo recorded audio region and choose analyze on the analyzer

Step 3: IMPORTANT! Save Your Newly Created Impulse Response

All you need do know is save your newly created Impulse Response however you deem appropriate.

I have imaginatively called mine ‘Carpark’.

Step 4: Now Let’s Try Out Our New Reverb

You may remember in part one of this three part series that I offered a snare drum recorded in the space as an example of how the carpark sounded. Now we can compare the the original snare drum that I recorded in the space, with the dry snare sample with our created Impulse Response on it, and determine how similar they are. First of all I will import the original snare sample and create a stereo aux track to place the Revolver plug in on.

Below you can find the two audio files to compare. Note the signal to noise ratio of the original snare versus the artificial, and ignoring that, the similarity of the two reverbs.

Download audio file (snare1.mp3)

Snare Sample recorded in the space.

Download audio file (snareconv.mp3)

Snare Sample through the Impulse Response we created.

In Closing

Convolution Processing is a complex process and can be used for many things from band production to film post-production to forensics. If you take a few minutes and do a search through google you will find an abundance of information about it and about how you can implement Impulse Responses and create them, from simple methods through to vastly complex capturing (this tutorial falls somewhere in the middle). Good luck and remember that space is something that we as humans often take for granted, capture it.


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Android Quick Look: BluetoothAdapter

The Android SDK ships with powerful Bluetooth APIs capable of managing the local Bluetooth adapter, scanning for nearby Bluetooth devices, transferring data between bluetooth devices, and more. This Bluetooth quick look will show you the most fundamental steps necessary to begin programming Bluetooth applications on the Android SDK. Step 1: Import the Bluetooth Package The […]

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Square bringing Chrono Trigger, others to iOS (and Android)

The Tokyo Game Show is currently going on in Japan, and here’s some news from there that us old school gamers will appreciate: Square Enix is planning on bringing my absolute favorite console RPG ever, Chrono Trigger, over to iOS. Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of information on when it’ll be out or what’s changed from the original (there was a DS version released a few years ago), but I’ll wait — Chrono Trigger is good enough to play through yet again no matter what’s different.

There are a few other titles also coming to the iPhone and iPad — Final Fantasy Legends is on its way over, as is Dragon Quest Monsters. It’s unclear exactly what Legends is — it appears to be a new entry in the mobile realm for the Final Fantasy franchise, and nothing to do with the great old GameBoy game Final Fantasy Legend. Dragon Quest Monsters is of course the spin-off series from Enix’s Dragon Quest series, so it’ll be nice to have that on Apple’s platform as well.

And there’s even more — a card battle game called Diffusion Million Arthur (your guess is as good as ours on that one), a board game called Itadaki Street, and even a card battling game in conjuction with Epic Games (!) called Demon’s Source are all due out at some point. Hopefully all of those will eventually land on the iOS store here in North America. That Epic/Square Enix collab especially sounds really interesting.

Square bringing Chrono Trigger, others to iOS (and Android) originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 17 Sep 2011 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Valve offering original Portal for free until September 20

If you haven’t played Portal yet, now is your chance. Valve is offering the Mac and PC versions of the 2007 physics-based puzzle game that took the world by storm for free on Steam until September 20.

Valve is giving the game away in honor of its Learn with Portals program. The educational program hopes to leverage the way video games are increasingly playing a role in education by using Portal and Portal 2 to teach physics and critical thinking skills to students. According to Valve:

One of the biggest challenges in teaching science, technology, engineering, and math is capturing the students’ imaginations long enough for them to see all of the possibilities that lie ahead.

Using interactive tools like the Portal series to draw them in makes physics, math, logic, spatial reasoning, probability, and problem-solving interesting, cool, and fun which gets us one step closer to our goal-engaged, thoughtful kids!

Education or not, the game is addictive and fun as can be. Be sure to grab it before the 20th while it’s still free!

Hat tip to Lex Friedman.

Valve offering original Portal for free until September 20 originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 17 Sep 2011 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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