Note taking app + more = TagSpaces

We all tend to forget. It’s part of human nature. But can we forget when we have all the technical possibilities of today? Both students and teachers have to keep in mind many things to remember. Is there a technological way to help us remember?

Yes there is! It’s open source and available for various platforms. It’s TagSpaces. One can use it just to write a simple note to remember. TagSpaces is rather unknown but powerful and feature rich app. It's not just a note taking app, but it's much more - it's a complete data management application that you can use to manage and organise the files on your computer. As the name suggests, you can tag all kind of files for quick finding. 

If you want an introduction just click here. If you want to download it, than go here. More information can be found here. If you want to use it on your mobile phone, than go here.

TagSpaces can open all kind of files be it image or PDF. It can also take quick notes. A nice GUI (graphical user interface ie you can clearly see what it does) tops all the features.

Playing all sorts of music or video files

A teacher or a student, can make use of audio and video files nowadays in class. It's not the first time that one has a video that one downloads from the internet or get it from another kind of resource, but it won't play on his computer! This happens with video files but especially with music, where one encounters several music formats.

Is there a free and open source player which plays practically all types of audio and video files? Yes there is! Just try Smplayer. It is available for windows and linux platforms. If one is looking for help to do the first steps, than one should visit this page. If you want to see how many formats of files are supported, than one should visit this page. The FAQ (Frequently asked questions) section is here. The forum, (the place where people ask all sorts of questions), is here.  Enjoy!

Gimp - The Image Manipulation Program

Photo taking is becoming a habit for many people since it is readily available on mobile phones. Most people like photos as we are living in the “selfie era”. Teachers and students too are part and parcel of today's society.

Now when it comes to class, both teachers and students would like to change some aspects of the photo. They need an open source program which is not difficult to learn yet it makes it possible to manipulate photos according to their educational needs.

A picture says a million words somebody said one day.  They are a wonderful tool in the classroom. An example would be that of a conversation starter or else to help students write in a different way ie a series of photos from different angles of the same object would help them to avoid repeating the same ideas or sentences. A photo of a strange animal or plant would obviously break down any misunderstanding and would help the teacher immensely. A photo can help the students understand people of far away countries together with their lives, culture and experiences.

Teachers do understand that most resources did not originate from educational spheres so it's understandable the need to tune them in to educational needs. Hence image manipulation comes in very handy.

We present gimp, the program which has been going on for these last 20 years!!! If you need tutorials, documentation and to download it, one finds everything in one page. Just click on the link below.

http://www.gimp.org/

Gourmet Recipe Manager: a Recipe-Organiser

Today it's the turn of those students studying Home Economics' special section: Preparing Food. At times one has some ingredients and wants to know if it's possible to prepare some kind of food. Or how about knowing what to buy before preparing a particular kind of food? Or how about calculating the nutritional value of food?

Others have already collected some recipes, could they be incorporated into one program? Or could one classify his/her recipes in a different way? Those who are living in the fast lane would like to find the essential recipe with the least amount of time, is it possible?

Well, all this is possible because of Gourmet Recipe Manager which is a recipe-organizer available for Windows, Mac and Linux. Practically it allows you to collect, search, organize, and browse your recipes. Want to have a try? Well go here to download. If you would like some information about the program, than go here. Do you have more questions? Well go here. 

 

Free Interior Design Program

Students would like to design their own room. Maybe they have ideas about their school. They don't want to become architects but they have a special love for design. Well, we are providing another free and open source software in order to fulfill their dreams.

Sweet Home 3D is a free interior design application that helps you draw the plan of your house, arrange furniture on it and visit the results in 3D. It should fulfill their dreams. It's another asset for teachers teaching design and technology. If you wish to download it, click here. For videos and other help click here. For some quick photos about results that could be obtained by using Sweet Home 3D, just click here.

Tux Math

It has been the experience of many teachers that when they distribute math papers most students' face turn white. Why is it so hard to use numbers? Well, we have a partial solution by presenting math in a different way. TuxMath is where mathematics meets the arcade.

In this shooting game, asteroids threaten friendly penguin Tux. His ammunition? Mental arithmetic! The flying moon rocks are actually space division, multiplication and subtraction, and by finding the answer, you destroy them, and saving the penguin igloos from the devastating impact.

TuxMath is an open source, free game whose difficulty is appropriate for students from elementary to high school. It offers dozens of missions that require calculations that get more and more complicated, ending up with some really tricky stuff, like the division of negative numbers.

TuxMath also offers a second, more advanced mode, where the asteroids are fractions you destroy by finding their common denominator. TuxMath is fun and well-designed and bridges the gap between educational and fun. Who said that fractions have to be boring?!

Tuxmath is available for windows, mac and linux PCs. One can download it from here. Tutorials are found here.

Stellarium

It's incredible the number of open source products which could be used in class. One of them is Stellarium. Students need to view and access sources themselves. In this case stellarium proves to be a very good product. Students may view stars at the comfort of their homes.

In technical words it's a planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope. It is being used in planetarium projectors. Just set your coordinates and go.

You may download it from here. If you want to use it on your android mobile phone, download it from the google store. Mac/Windows users download it from here.