techcenterblog » students

Cool web tools

abrown — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 00:29:00 +0000

Billshrink helps you to pick a cellphone carrier and plan.

Watchmycell monitors your cellphone usage and alerts you before you exceed your monthly minutes.

Mymilemarker helps you to chart your fuel economy. You may enter data from your cell phone.

Dimetracker assists you to track your spending and, as does mymilemarker, provides a way to do so via cellphone.

Howjsay is a pronunciation dictionary. Type in your word and click submit and it will speak the word for you, albeit with a distinct British accent.

Gate2Home provides multilingual onscreen virtual keyboard emulation, allowing you to type in a language you specify on any computer.

SpokenText allows you to record PDF, Word, plain text, PowerPoint files, RSS news feeds, emails and web pages, and converts them to speech automatically. You can download your recording as an iPod book or mp3 file. Readthewords provides similar service. There are other such sites but these two seem to have better speech engines. I’d recommend submitting your own writing, as hearing your own writing helps you to catch your mistakes.

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Periodic Table of the Elements

abrown — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 09:37:00 +0000

This interactive Periodic Table of the Elements linked to Wikipedia is done in all XHTML so as to be scalable. Try adjusting your window size to see it adjust accordingly. Here is a non-scalable but equally well executed Table done in Flash and another flashcard type site for testing your memory of where on the table the elements fall. This multimedia table includes videos and demonstrations.

update: Here’s more, ptable, webelements (click symbol for description of elements), and this one from the now infamous britishpetroleum lists products that’s made using each element.

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Obama and Clinton debate

abrown — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 18:33:00 +0000

The New York times has made the 2/22/08 democratic debate between Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama available as an interactive speech to text webtool. Making this tool available is helpful to voters looking to analyze the debate. FactCheck.org provides more useful analysis of the statements made by both candidates. The text to speech tool is interesting in and of itself. A similar application is MIT’s Lecture Browser which allows you to search and locate any of MIT’s online lectures that contain a search term. You may then drill down to the exact moment that your search term is referenced. You can follow each video lecture while a cursor iterates through the text of the lecture. The remarkable thing is that the text-file is generated electronically. Remarkable given the quantity of jargon and the range of accents and inflections with which to contend. The lecture browser doesn’t appear to to be supported in Firefox.

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Interactive human anatomy model

abrown — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 20:25:00 +0000

Argosy’s VisibleBody is a comprehensive human anatomy visualization tool. It includes 3D models of over 1,700 anatomical structures, including all major organs and systems of the human body. Features include, fully interactive 3D human anatomy model, detailed models of all body systems, dynamic search capability, easy to use 3D controls. The Visible Body is only available on the Internet Explorer Platform.

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Track Congressional bills and votes

abrown — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 20:07:00 +0000

OpenCongress makes it easy to track what’s happening with your government.

Now you can build a personal profile on OpenCongress of the bills and legislators that you’re tracking, network with other users, comment and vote on bills, and much more. To get started, create your own “My OpenCongress” profile, it’s free and only takes a minute.

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New language learning site

abrown — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:38:00 +0000

Livemocha is a sort of mashup between a social networking and language learning site. Mocha describes itself as providing community, lessons, and motivation. Best of all it hooks up native language learners with interested accolytes. Total immersion is the best and most fun way to learn. This looks like a pretty convenient approximation. Languages include English, French, Hindi, German, Spanish and Mandarin Chinese.

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Learn to make a business plan

abrown — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 04:08:00 +0000

Planware publishes a free Excel based business planner, Free-Plan. The free planner works exactly like the (US) 29.00 paid version does except that it produces a two years instead of 5 years projection. This seems useful to someone who wants to make a business plan or learn how to make one, as it is based on templates and comes with formidable help files.

CNET wrote about Free-Plan:

“Writing a good business plan is the first step to success. But what if you don’t know where to start? Never fear; Biz-Plan can help. This Word template provides the outline of a business plan along with an excellent help file (in CHM and PDF format) containing detailed instructions and important hints. The template itself has helpful comments in each section. Colors and fonts greatly facilitate text editing, as does the automatically updated table of contents. Best of all, Biz-Plan is free; you just have to register by e-mail. Whether you follow it to the letter or draw on it for ideas, Biz-Plan is a great resource for getting a business off the ground.”

Watch a two-minute video tutorial on how to register PC only Free-Plan, here. You’ll need to provide an email address to receive the registration code. Securing a disposable email account for this purpose doesn’t seem in keeping with the spirit of the offer?

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Investment Calculator

abrown — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 21:07:00 +0000

Sharebuilder publishes a research instrument that calculates how a stock would perform had you invested a certain amount on a specific day. Click calculator to begin second guessing yourself.

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Declaration of Independence, & Constitution

abrown — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 21:24:00 +0000

If you’re wondering what the fuss has been over the last eight years and what this “voting” thing is all about, you might want to begin at the beginning by listening to voiceover artist, Debra Jean Dean’s readings of the The Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution. Free MP3s of the recordings are available for download under a Creative Commons license. I’m hoping for the Magna Carta next.

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Sourlands Mountain Preserve

abrown — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 01:35:00 +0000

Sourlands Mountain Preserve is a highly recommended bit of mother nature in the heart of Jersey that feels sorta back country but isn’t too far away from civilization and cell connection. Activities include bouldering, hiking, horseback riding, biking and bird-watching. Click ridge trail for detailed description of one of the most picturesque beginner trails in NJ. Click for photo gallery.

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