IT Ideas

If you have Chrome devices managed on your Google Apps domain you can manage chrome and the chrome webstore. In settings, chrome, user settings there is an option to deploy apps to chrome devices and also point users to 'for yourdomain' entry in the webstore. They will see this assuming they are signed into chrome with there domain account. So these settings result in this in the webstore: Apps that you don't already have will appear in the For yourdomain section. This makes it easy to users to find apps that you suggest. Seems to work well.

I was asked today about instant uploads. This is basically means you take a photo or a video on your smartphone and a few moments later (depending on connect speed) it appears in your photos in Google+. Works really well. To do this you need the Google+ app installed on your phone. Once you have this you can go into the apps settings and configure how you want instant uploads to work. I have it set to automatically upload photos and videos if I'm on WiFi. You can do it on 3/4G but it obviously uses a lot of data - so this depends on your tariff. Classroom uses You might have a group doing a presentation of performance and want to upload the video. Perhaps a good bit of work and you want to upload the photo. Assuming you are of a fast connection, you can show the class the video/photo a few moments later on your computer. They will appear in 'Photos' in Google+ and be put into instant upload. You can then organise the photos/videos into albums. These albums/photos you...

Google Keep has been launched a few days ago. If you missed this, it is a note taking application. Works in a web browser and Android via the Keep app you can find on Google Play. The online apps can be found at  https://drive.google.com/keep/  . No Chrome app yet - imagine there will be one soon. Its very easy to use - you can make text notes, add images, record voice notes (via the Android app) and create lists.  Screenshot of the online app below. I'd reckon it quite a good note taking app to use in lessons  as it is quick and easy to use. It does not have some of the advanced features of Evernote or Onenote - but this makes it much more accessible for most people. The video (from Google) if you are interested:  

This has been posted around on G+ lately - but its here if you have missed it. If you put something in a cell (two works better than one - better chance of getting the right things) - select both cells, hold Ctrl down and click on the little blue square in the bottom right of the bottom cell - drag down and you will make a list of related things. So capitals, types of wine, rivers or whatever you want.

This is a brief guide to the table function in Google Docs. On one level it is no different than using the table function in Word, however, it does allow you to do some quite nice things when you know how it works. The table function is probably the easiest way of making quite complex layout really quickly. I've tried to illustrate this is a brief video.

Just a video for the folk at wheatleypark.org who want to build a site but are not quite sure where to start. I know many of you have a made great sites - but this is a guide if you are not sure where to start and just want to have a go. Couple of things to remember - student sites should be linked to students.wheatleypark.org and staff ones to the staff site. I can do this for you. I can also give you a nice yoursitename@wheatleypark.org address on request. Best to watch the vid full screen in 1080p.

I use my Google Calendar for organisation all the time now. One cool feature I'm not sure that too many people at school know about is the ability to receive email and SMS text notifications. Below is a brief guide to this - really easy to setup.