Back-to-School posts

Maybe so, if you believe the predictions of some analysts at Wedge Partners. They proclaim in their neverending analyst-y wisdom that in the next few weeks, Apple will again refresh its lines of iMacs and MacBooks, including a slimmer iMac and an only slightly updated MacBook. Why would Apple announce such a thing, especially so soon after the recent June revamp? Windows 7 is apparently the answer -- Apple wants to distract from Microsoft's big release, according to the analysts

Personally, it all sounds kind of hokey to us -- Apple's already got their back-to-school lineup all set, and while there probably is room for one more update before the holiday season, it's hard to believe they're going to announce some extremely minor updates in a desperate grab against Windows 7.

And not even the analysts will guess at a netbook or tablet release -- they say neither one of those is coming up for an announcement any time soon. You have to think that if Apple is doing one more update before the holidays, it really will come up in the next few weeks, so by the time Halloween candy starts dropping in pillowcases, we should know for sure.

[via PC World]

Whether you're on your way back to college, or you're the parent or friend of a college-bound Apple fan, there are a lot of great items on the market this summer that are both functional and fashionable.

Back in the prehistoric 1970's when I was a civil engineering student at the University of Colorado Boulder campus, I made the mistake of rooming one year with two high school buddies. One of them, Chuck, was a real stoner and was impossible to wake up (even a stereo with the volume turned up to 11 didn't work). His 2009 counterpart would hopefully wake up on time every morning with an iHome iP9SR iPhone alarm clock (US$99 MSRP).
It's an iPhone charger with shielding to prevent that annoying buzz from GSM transmissions. It's an alarm clock that can play tunes from your iTunes library, AM/FM radio, or just blast out an annoying noise to wake you up. It also has some pretty nice speakers for listening to your music while charging your iPhone prior to your next class.

It's been a long summer, and students everywhere are starting to head back to universities and colleges around the country. It's not easy to get back into a daily grind of classes, assignments and activities but a new application called iStudiez Pro [iTunes Link] is here to help!

Created by Andriy Kachalo and Michael Balashoff, iStudiez Pro is designed to help you take charge of your own schedule by always keeping you on top of where you need to be and what needs to get done. With an intuitive interface, the application promises to make sure "you never miss another course, lecture, and lab, track tasks and deadlines, plan homework, arrange assignments and much more."

Some notable features include:

• Smart day view that automatically displays summary of currently classes and tasks
• Detailed schedule planner to break down classes and assignments
• A view to suit everyone including expanded month and week views, with colored labels for each course
  
• Specific icons for different types of classes
• Supports iPhone features like touch gestures and device rotation
• Integrated address book keeps your contacts and professor's information close at hand
  

The application, available for both iPhone and iPod touch, is selling for $2.99 on the App Store. If you're looking to snag a copy of this app for free, the developers are currently offering a deal that if you see the demo version of iStudiez Pro being used in an Apple store and take a picture, they'll send you a free promo code!

Here's a couple images of iStudiez Pro in action:

Over the last few years, the market has made historic my remembrances of going to the bookstore and paying whatever was marked on the shelf while often vainly trying to find used titles of popular books.

Things have changed: Bigwords.com and its little friend the Bigwords.com app [iTunes Link] are welcome additions to the quest of buying books and still having enough left over for food.

The Bigwords.com app tries to find the cheapest way to buy textbooks. Whether it's one book, or a long reading list, you will save money using this app. You can also make money by using it to sell unwanted books, but being a teacher, I have a problem with that, having never re-sold or thrown away a textbook. Of course,that's just me.

A good way to explain Bigwords is to take you through the process. The Bigwords.com app lets you set a bunch of preferences, each one reducing your options a bit. You can choose books that are new only, new or used, high quality new or used, set shipping preferences, consider eBooks or rentals (along with rental terms) and whether you require a guaranteed buyback from the vendor.

You further customize it by telling it if you are a member of B&N.com, Booksamillion, ECampus.com, whether you have used Half.com, and whether you are an Amazon Prime member. Amazon Prime is a service where for a yearly fee, most everything you buy comes with free 2nd-day shipping. The answers to all of these questions help determine your final price.

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings.

This is the third and final installment in the "Back to School: Writing Tools" series (parts I and II are here). To round out our roundup, we'll take a look at some (possibly) unexpected solutions, as well as some utilities which can aid any writer. Read on for some final thoughts on the current array of Mac writing tools for students, teachers, professors ... and the rest of us, too.

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings.

Continuing the Back-to-School "sub-mini-series" on writing tools, this second post covers some great tools for compiling all of your thoughts, ideas and research into cohesive, structured documents. If you've never explored this category of applications, you might be surprised what the available options can do to improve your writing efficiency and lower the general anxiety involved with writing 10-page reports or lengthy creative writing assignments. I'll highlight a few cool ways to get those notes and floating thoughts from your notepad and your brain onto papers with large A's on them. Read on ...

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings in September.

This is the last installment in a mini-series highlighting some research and writing software of interest to students, especially those in college. We've covered research tools, as well as note taking and information organization tools. Now, let's take a look at some great tools for writing. Whether you're hammering out a research paper or penning a story for Advanced Lit., there are plenty of applications available to make life easier, if not a little bit more fun.

We're going to look at three basic categories: general word processors, structured writing tools, and utilities. Covering such a broad range of applications ended up getting a bit lengthy, so I'll be breaking it up into three posts; a sub-mini-series, if you will. This first post will offer you, our discerning readers, a few word-processing applications for your consideration. Read on ... and who knows, you might discover something new.

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings.

With students heading back to school around the country today, many are heading back with an iPhone (possibly a iPhone 3G, no doubt). In this post, I'm going to suggest a few iPhone applications that you can use to stay on task, and, of course, "make the grade." Most of these applications are free, considering that most students are low on money (especially college students).

Assignments (iTunes Link)
Assignments is an application that, as the name implies, allows you to keep track of your assignments and classes. This is perfect for both teachers and students that need to keep track of assignments in each class. Not only can you add an assignment with a due date/time and importance, but you can also add recordings. Being able to make a voice recording of your assignment is a quick way to make a reminder, etc.

The "Overview" tab allows you to see anything upcoming or due. You can sort by "All" or "Due Soon." You can also search through your assignments. In the "Assignments" tab, you can view all assignments sorted by class. The "Notes" section allows you to quickly jot a note, add a title, and add a date/time.

Overall, this application performs smoothly and works well when adding/deleting assignments and classes. You can view screenshots of Assignments.app in our gallery. Assignments sells for $5.99 (US) at the iTunes App Store.

VoiceNotes (iTunes Link)
VoiceNotes is a plain and simple way to quickly record a quick note, or even a lecture (just make sure you have enough space on your iPhone). Tapping on "Quick Voice Note" will start recording immediately, but is limited as to the length of the recording. If you tap on the + button at the top, you will be given more recording length.

VoiceNotes allows you to sync notes back to your computer using some additional software provided by the developer. Overall, this is a solid app and can definitely be used for the quick "remember to bring these books to class tomorrow" voice notes.

You can download VoiceNotes for free from the iTunes App Store.

To Do (iTunes Link)
One of our fellow TUAW-ers developed this application, and we can't get over its ease of use and flexibility in creating a simple to-do list. With To Do, you can quickly and easily add a to-do, set priority (and order), and even add a note.

To Do will even allow you to see how many tasks have yet to be completed, right from the home screen. With To Do, you will never forget about that writing assignment for English class. Best of all, this application is on a college student's budget: It's absolutely free!

Camera.app (Built-in)
Never underestimate the power of the built-in camera on your iPhone. If you find that your instructor erases the board way too fast, or if you need to capture a photo of the current slide on the screen, then just get out your iPhone. 1 ... 2 ... 3 ... clicks and you're done! A picture saved in memory, and you didn't even have to write anything. You can also combine Camera with Evernote (iTunes link) to create more structured notes or geocoding around your photos -- great for architecture students or for budding meteorologists.


Did we miss something? Do you have another application that you like/use, but didn't on the list? The party doesn't stop with the post, it continues in the comments below. Be sure to share your favorite iPhone applications to help students "make the grade."

If you're looking for a creative application to collect and organize notes, ideas and more, check out Curio. Curio provides a free-form interface for collecting pages which can contain notes, images, links to files, mind maps, sketches -- just about anything you'd need to get ideas and notes out of your head and into your computer.

Zengobi, the makers of Curio, are celebrating the "Back to School" season with TUAW and offering 20% off the academic price of the software. The Pro version retails at $149USD, but it's only $69USD in the academic store. With the discount, students can pick up a great app for about $55USD. Enter TUAWBTS at the academic store to take advantage of the offer, and hurry, it's only good for today (August 27th).

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings in September.

Going back to school isn't all about the students; the educators are often just as excited or stressed out as the kids about the beginning of a new school year. What can make life easier on the poor teacher? Great Mac software! Read on for information on a grab bag of Mac and web apps to help out your favorite educator.

Rounding out the last of our back to school giveaways, we'd like to give you a shot at wasting time. School can't be all about studying and learning, can it? Of course, if you happen to be in school for game design this could actually be homework... Plus, if you don't win, there's always Jared and SimStapler. The point: we want you to have fun.

Big thanks to Freeverse for the prize package, which includes your choice of a Freeverse iPhone game (Wingnuts Moto Racer and Sudoku iPhone are currently available), plus the following games: Hordes of Orcs, Kill Monty, Neon Tango and Big Brain Games. That should give your Xbox 360 a break.

To enter, tell us your favorite non-videogame game from your childhood (like chess, Parcheesi, Risk, etc.). The other rules (same as always) are below.

• Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
• To enter, leave a comment telling us your favorite game (not a video game) from childhood.
• The comment must be left before August 24, 11:59PM Eastern Time.
• You may enter once.
• One winner will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prizes: One iPhone game (up to $10), Hordes of Orcs ($24.95), Kill Monty ($19.95), Neon Tango ($24.95), Big Brain Games ($29.95)
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings in September.

It's time once again to head back to school. Some are entering high school, while others are going to college for the first time. If you're taking your Mac with you, you need to learn some security basics. In this post, I will show you how to secure your operating system and hardware.

Operating System (Software)
Mac OS X makes a great operating system for students and businesses because of its inherent security. However, any computer without a strong password or other means of security is an accident waiting to happen.

The first thing you need to do is set a login password. To do this, go into Accounts in the System Preferences pane. Once there you will be able to set your password for logging in. While in Accounts, you might want to disable automatic login. This forces your computer to ask for a password upon startup and makes it harder for someone to walk up to your computer and use it (or steal it and use it).

Turning off Sharing services is another way to protect someone from remotely connecting to your Mac. Go to System Preferences > Sharing. Once there, un-check all sharing services that you don't use. Disabling File Sharing, Remote Login, Screen Sharing, and other services such as these can save your Mac from being "hijacked." If you must have these services turned on, then make sure you have a secure password set.

Hardware
Securing Mac OS X isn't the only thing you need to do. If you live in a dorm, or in a shared apartment, then you may want to consider securing your hardware. No matter what security measures you put into place, they can always be circumvented by someone just stealing the machine.

Most Macs have a standard security port to connect a lock. This is a great way to protect notebooks as well as desktops and even printers and other peripherals. The locks are fairly inexpensive (around $40 US) and can save your expensive hardware from being stolen. You can find them at most big-box computer retailers and even online from companies like Kensington.

More on security...
If you want more information on Security and your Mac/iPhone, then visit TUAW's Security category. You can also get more TUAW Back to School goodness by visiting our Back to School page.

Despite the notion that one day optical media will seem "quaint," in the current world we deal with a lot of physical discs. So why not label those discs with something a little better than a permanent marker? The Dymo DiscPainter is a rather large but impressive printer for one thing only: optical media. Pop in a disc with the appropriate coating, set up the print job and boom: a nicely-printed disc for all that soon-to-be-obsolete media you're carting around.

We've got our shiny review unit ready to send to the lucky commenter who is randomly selected via the comments. Maybe not great for the dorm room, as the Dymo is pretty big, but you could always use it to prop open your dorm door. To enter, simply tell us what was the last CD or DVD you burned (keep 'em clean folks!). Be sure to check out Steve's review of the DiscPainter. And stay tuned the rest of this week as we've got more goodies to come!

• Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment telling us what was the last disc you burned.
• The comment must be left before August 21, 11:59PM Eastern Time.
• You may enter only once.
• One winner will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prize: Dymo DiscPainter ($250)
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

We've covered the personal database app, Bento, a few times in the past, and Brett mentions it in his "Collecting and Organizing Information" post, but our friends at venerable FileMaker want to give you a chance to try it yourself. So we're giving away three boxed copies of Bento today! Use it to store your school data, search and organize that data and link to documents elsewhere. It integrates with Address Book and iCal, for you savvy folks.

To enter, just tell us what you'd pack in a real, physical bento (yes, food, but what kind of food?). Leave your comment and you're entered, with the usual restrictions applying (see below). Good luck!

• Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
• To enter, leave a comment telling us what you would put in a bento.
• The comment must be left before August 20, 11:59PM Eastern Time.
• You may enter only once.
• Three (3) winners will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prize: One copy of Bento from FileMaker ($49)
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.