Cool Tool For Professionals

I was thinking of a cool tool that I can share with everyone. It is hard to find the right one to discuss and share cause I use a lot of them. The one that I will share with you is a cool tool that I have been using for a while is and it is Huddle. This tool is using Cloud Technology and is free to the public. It has allowed me to share and collaborate through my research with other colleagues in education, work and personal ventures, where collaboration is needed.

Here are some examples from Huddle on the uses of this tool;

Use Huddle for:

• Personal projects : Secure online file storage, view/edit Word .doc and Excel .xls documents online without buying the software, manage events, sports teams and co-ordinate friends/family.
• At work : Project management, team collaboration, document sharing.

Solutions for:

• Marketing : Store product artwork centrally. Share large files with your team, agencies and suppliers while controlling level of access. By-pass email system and avoid FTP servers.
• PR: Branded client extranet. Store all press materials. Post photography and share large files. Track changes to press releases. Provide coverage and reports.
• IT: Connect remote development teams. Central document repository. Separate workspaces for different projects. Use API to connect with code and testing tools.
• Consultants: Professional branded client extranet. Manage multiple projects securely from one interface. Store all documents online. Access anywhere.
• Professional services: Secure file repository with built-in workflows. Client extranet. Track changes, audit trail and automatic version control. Review and edit documents online.
• Publishing : Create/edit copy collaboratively. Review and comment online. Connect freelancers. Upload and store images centrally.
• Start-ups: Free alternative to your own fileservers. Central document storage accessible anywhere. No software needed to view/edit docs. All your data securely backed up.
• Company boards : Secure space for storing all board communications. Everyone has visibility. Track minutes, comments, changes and views. RSS and email alerts.
• Academic : Access from Facebook. Work on project documents together regardless of location. No word/excel software needed. Automatically store previous versions.
• Government : Policy discussion and collaboration. Connect teams inside and outside your department. Secure file storage. Document revisions, audit trails and approvals online.
• Media production : Pitch ideas. Store docs centrally. Control budgets. Script versioning. Shoot schedules. Audio samples. Offline edits. 

(www.huddle.com)

This tool gives the capability to share, edit and markup by selected people or a group of people you give access to. You are able to track the approvals by others and see what they say during the process. You can also select approval times by date to give everyone a deadline to complete. There are many features in Huddle that can help teams of all sorts and from around the world. The best thing is that this tool can be integrated with popular collaboration sites, an example is Linked In for professionals.

Socio - Technical Plan Outline

Introduction - 10-20 year vision

In the next 10-20 years we will see a wide implementation of RFID chips in humans. This type of technology has been used as far back as 1998 from the first reported implant by Kevin Warwick. It is being used today through tracking freight cargo traveling around the world by air and sea.

Scope

This plan is to help advance this technology where the chip can be widely used. The uses can be by medical, manufacturing, personal and corporate environments. This technology will give the employer and employee the capability of storing information that can be retrieved through a partnership which is secured.

 
Purpose and Goals

As a partner in the implant technology, the users are able to update their own information. A partner can use the number on the RFID to access a secure site that will give personal information which is needed in many situations in life. This technology will allow importing of information of personal data which can reduce the cost of filling out information by hand and the time taken to complete.

Supporting Forces - what will help to realize it?

RFID is already accepted for use in tracking shipments in and from other distribution areas by Fed-Ex and UPS. The medical industry has accepted the use of this technology to help in severe incidents where patients are not able to speak or communicate. Stephen Hawkins is a prime example of how this type of technology can be used to help advance the illnesses. Implanting a chip in this way can and will be helpful in people with limited mobility’s.

Challenging Forces (risk) - what may hinder or block it?

There are challenging forces that impeded the wide spread of implementation of this technology. It is said that the early implants used in tracking animals caused cancerous tumors after a period of time. There is also an ethical and privacy issue that is causing problems in this area. People are afraid that this technology will give quick access to personal information through the scanners available to the partners. There are other concerns that testing of the implants in human subjects can cause companies developing the implants and equipment to falsify results.

Methodology (approach)

To approach the possible issues and challenging forces associated with the implants. This study will use the typical Delphi method and the modified NGT process. The panel will have access to all information to be able to release research statistics and gather information from the study to help refine the process and R&D on the study.

Analytical Plan - how will we recognize success?

To recognize success in this plan the study will need and preliminary success ratio before it can be called a success. What will be used is;

Subject types

1.      Diversified Denominations

2.      Blood Types (A,B, AB, O- Positive and Negative)

3.      Physical Abilities

4.      Age

5.      Sexuality

Ratios

0-50 percent - Failure

51 – 100 percent – Success

Anticipated Results - what will success look like in 10-20 years?

What we will see with the success of the study is; low cost in clerical, secure access to homes, business. The ability for manufacturing industries to track materials, allow employees to wave a hand to start work. Help in medical industry to save the patient’s life where communication is hindered.

Conclusion - Summary with observations

In conclusion, my plan will be able to help in all areas of life. The wide spread of this technology will be able to cut cost and make it easy for companies to obtain correct information and allow for medical enhancements to save lives. 

Advancing Medicine with Technology

Eve Vertes look to the future of Medicine!
"Cancer and Alzheimer active researcher since the age of 17"

Direct link to the video: http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/12




I am featuring this video on my blog for two reasons. One is the medical discoveries are done through innovative young people. Eve talks about how she studied metal deposits in fruit flies and the effects on the neurological system. Eve also discusses the means of cancer and how it gets transported through the body. The cancer cells usually attach to lymph in the body which grow into tumors. There have been rare occasions where the muscle tissue has cancer attached . This is caused by the metabolically structure and design the muscle is composed of.

The second reason that I chose this video is due to a paper I have read on Medical Nanobots repairing cells and damaged tissues in the body by Dick Pelletier. If we could integrate these two innovative ideas and place them into practice. We would be able to minimize Alzheimer as discussed by Eve by allowing the nanobots to enter into the bloodstream and allow them to detect bad tissue and repair. I also see where this could be helpful if built to destroy cancerous cells traveling through the blood stream as they will. 

There is still some theoretical issues that will need to be worked out. Before we are able to move forward in this endeavor we need to ask questions. How will the nanobot know if it is a bad cell or not? Will the nanobot live forever or quit after a period of time (Ethical discussion)? What will the success rate of repair once released? How long will it take to repair? These are just a few on top of my head that can be looked into. 


I think these discoveries will bring Medical and Technological research together to provide better health for all people in the world. 

Horizon 2010 Report

The Horizon Report 2010 was a very interesting read. They focus on the education and the way people are learning or will learn in the future is interesting. We are now in this age and it has exploded with other universities moving to the online version of classes. The online classes gives the students and educators the ability to learn and teach at their school of choice. Reading through this report takes me back to my Masters and professors that taught my classes. We had different diversities and from many regions of the world; from our military service members serving over seas to  people that live all over the United States and all over the world.

Things come to mind on the trends that the horizon report discusses. The way people learn while working in a demanding environment. People want to keep up to date on new technology or methodology being implemented. Learning in this type of environment it has come to the reports attention that the "faster approach is the most perceived approach". I would have to disagree with faster is better, due that if you have more of a formal approach a student is able to comprehend the educators teachings. This gives the students a solid base to comprehend after they leave the classroom. Foundation is the key and the challenge is to ensure productive response and learning in a real world setting classroom.

The challenges are in mobile computing and open content for schools. Everything is becoming digital and the digital age is growing as we move to smart phones, wireless lap pads(i Pad) and nook (Book Reading). Utilizing and integrating these technologies into our educational systems will help students learn while in a demanding environment of work, home and schooling. The utilization of smart phones to access school sites for educators and students like checking or grading assignments will be big asset to schools. The challenge that comes to this area is developing universal web apps that devices are able to access on the go.

Open content is another way for educators to develop a universal learning environment. They can develop against existing code that can enhance the way students learn. One example of this is the Moodle software for online learning schools. This is a web portal where educators and students can access information and collaborate on studies virtually. They can upload and down load content on demand. Using this on a computer is easy but for it to accessed through a mobile device the administrator will need to install the plug-in for use for mobile devices. This was a brief research effort and needs to be looked into further for compatibility and functionality. The site for this Moodle plug-in can be found MLE-Moodle (Moodle for mobile phones) for further research.