I was wondering what software and equipment a friend was using on a regular basis and thought that I would share my personal learning environment (PLE) here. I don’t require much stuff but feel I have everything covered with my use of the below.
The hardware
At the office we do not have a say about the computer at our desk – it is a Windows XP box and Samsung 2243 WM monitor which is currently turned on it’s side so that I can read lengthy webpages.
Being a digital media team we do have shared access to a range of kit to enable full digital media creation and support including macs, video, camera and audio kit. Most of which I never use so I won’t go into any detail save the fact I sometimes use the Nikon D50.
Personally, I own a Apple Macbook which my other half detests for its trackpad and my use of ‘spaces’ which moves things around on-screen depending on which corner the cursor is placed. I have a magic mouse which is terribly suited to my hand so never gets used and a Apple remote. The laptop is plugged into a pair of unforgiving Mackie MR5 speakers, which have made me realise that 192kbps MP3 recordings are too low quality!
I use my Xbox 360 mainly for watching DVDs and occasional spurts of online gaming.
I have a borrowed Apple iphone first generation which has hardly any apps on it and none of which are worth mentioning.
Software
I use quite a bit of software but only on rare occasions. I pretty much live in Mozilla Firefox, thanks to cloud based services and extensions for web development such as firebug and the web developer toolbar. When coding I use Coda (or 1% of its functionality anyway). I use Tweetdeck for twitter and skype for synchronous chat. For client work I use Google Documents and ExpressionEngine for content management.
Web services
Dropbox sits in the background and is used for all of my file management so I use it pretty much solidly – though it is banned at work so I pretty much curse about this fact at least once a day when I cannot find files or have to duplicate them. I find so many useful items via Google reader that I need delicious to keep track of it all and it works seamlessly across my work and personal computers too.
5 Websites that I always check for
- I am a fan of f1 fanatic which doe’s a great job at making me love the detail of the sport more and more
- Subtraction, an inspiration in many ways
- Techcrunch for tech news, though really I only check for Paul Carr
- 5by5 podcasts, the site that got me listening to podcasts – great while cooking
- Alistapart for people who make websites BUT many of the topics resonate with e-learning
Then about 100+ daily RSS updates covering web design and e-learning