Java security warnings make it impossible to use Nanogong? Here's the solution.

Nanogong is one of the best things to happen to Moodle. The Nanogong plugin allows you to make voice recordings on your Moodle site. You can easily post recordings in Moodle forums or as a simple label activity.

But Nanogong didn't come without its own set of problems. Although Nanogong seemed to work fine on my Moodle 2.5 site, In the past I did get constant java security warnings  (Java 1.7.0_25 on my PC) - rendering it almost impossible for me to work with it.

The Beauty (Nanogong recorder for Moodle)
and the (Java) Beast

The irritating problem with java security warnings popping up everytime is a real deal-breaker when it comes to promoting the use of Nanogong. However, Nanogong is too good a plugin to not use on any Moodle site just because of some irritating and pesky pop up security warnings! So Nanogong is worth saving!
Here's the procedure to save the (your) day. Warning! Use at your own risk.

Fun with PoodLL and Moodle 2.5+ (Part 1) - recording audio and video

This post is about POODLL. Well sort of, because my post is obviously incomplete. I've copied inside this blog post, the contents of the POODLL filter settings of my Moodle 2.5 site. Why did I do this? Well it's simple. I finally managed to get POODLL working on my site, and I wanted to preserve the filter settings so that I can refer to them in future. You never know. When I get more time to blog about how I installed POODLL on my site, I will fill in more details.

Difference between a Book and Lesson

Hi.

Today I received a SpeakPipe message from a surfer named Yakeen who asked me this question.
You can listed to my reply here. Later I discovered an interesting Prezzi and I just thought I'd share the useful information, complete with Venn diagram, with all of you.

Moodle Book Module vs Lesson Module vs SCORM on Prezi

Happy Moodling!
Frankie Kam

Now you see it, now you don't - making the SpeakPipe icon selectively appear or disappear on your Moodle 1.9/2.x site.

Mashup: a creative combination or mixing of content from different sources. 

SpeakPipe is a cool Web application that allows the readers of your blog, website, Moodle site to send voice messages instead of text feedback.  If you are new to SpeakPipe, Madras Geek has written an excellent article on it here. Dorian Love also has an excellent post here on SpeakPipe.

I think that I have created a mashup of sorts by combining SpeakPipe embed code with Moodle pages. More so because I now know how to make the SpeakPipe icon appear or disappear based on the type of Moodle resource that is currently accessed by the user, or by the URL of a Moodle webpage.

Thanks to Howard Miller, I was introduced to the powerful yet humble me() function.After several hours of testing and Googling stuff, I finally got it working. Here's the code snippet of my Moodle theme's header.html file:

Pipes of Peace for your website or blog - SpeakPipe-enable it today to enjoy voice recording feedback from surfers!

My blog is now SpeakPipe enabled!

For Moodle we are now spoilt for choice when it comes to voice recordings. We have Nanogong, Flash AudioRecorder, MP3 Quickie and now, PipeSpeak, the newest kid on the block.

Thanks to this excellent post on SpeakPipe by Dorian Love, my blog can now receive voice recordings from anyone! To find out how you can use this clever piece of technology, read on!

Add the cool MP3 Quickie Neon audio player with upload and download to your website

MP3 Quickie Neon!

Like what you see? You can demo it live here.

Features:

• limited recoding of 20 seconds
• uncluttered GUI with open/close sections
• record MP3 audio of crystal-clear quality
• playlist of server-saved MP3 files
• upload of multiple MP3 audio files
• download of MP3 audio files
• tested under Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox
• easy to setup and to install
• uses php, Java and Javascript
  

Disclaimer:

Java applet and original GUI coding by Vimas Technology Enhanced GUI (this one!) by Frankie Kam Boon Seng. If you are using this MP3 Quickie on your site, please retain the linkback logo and URL to Vimas Technology as the software is neither freeware nor open source. If you wish to overcome the 20 second recording limitation of the MP3 applet, you may purchase the full version applet from Vimas.

The MP3 Quickie is limited to 20 seconds because it harnesses Vimas Technology’s demonstration version of its Java applet. To get past the 20 second limit, you or your institution will have to come up with $400USD, plus another $300 if you don’t want to display the mandatory Vimas logo.

I do not work for Vimas Technology, but I liked the challenge of improving the GUI of their demonstration version. This is the result of my work. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions or queries.

I'd be more than happy to hear from you!

Until my next post, happy Moodling!
Frankie Kam

Audioboo - a cool Web 2.0 audio recorder to record and playback audio

Thanks to this post by the prolific Moodlefairy, Mary Cooch, I've learnt about Audioboo today. It's a cool Web 2.0 free recording service with a nice interface.

Screen 1: Audioboo's Homepage

Nadav Kavalerchik's Spelling Bee block for your Moodle 1.9.x site

Here's one from the deep recesses of Moodle.org - a very good Spelling Bee block to challenge your English linguistic and spelling prowess.

Nadav Kavalerchik is a brilliant Isreali chap with a penchat for churning out Moodle custom code like the  Spelling Bee. If ever there were a Nobel Prize for Moodle Open Source coding, this Moodler would be a serious contender (amongst others) for the title. He has written a brilliant piece of code that is the Spelling Bee block.  Created in November 2009 and updated in July 2011.

How it works is simple. Students are presented with an English word they should hear (audio using flash) students can choose one of the three difficulty levels for words.

Screen 1: Easy Level

They are then asked to type in the word they heard and check the spelling. Pressing the "new word" button retrieves a new word from the dictionary. The block's code is based on a http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ igoogle free service. Unless your IBM's Watson, I doubt if you could score high in Nadav Kavalerchik's Spelling Bee block for Moodle.

MP3 Quickie Version 1.6 now allows you to download your saved MP3 files from the server to your client computer!

Hi there. I've just finished Version 1.6 of MP3 Quickie.

Now the recorder allows you to download your MP3 file directly off a selection drop-down box. In this version, only single downloads are allowed. So if you have 10 MP3 recordings on the server, you'll have to select each one in turn and download each one by one. Still, this is a vast improvement over Version 1.5.

Here's a screenshot:

MP3 Quickie - a new MP3 voice recorder for Moodle 1.9 and Moodle 2.x to record 20-second "quickies"

I would like to introduce a new MP3 voice recorder for Moodle 1.9 and 2.x. Here it is, sitting pretty on my Moodle coursepage in a Moodle HTML block:

Figure 1. MP3 Quickie Version 1.0

The interface design is "original", but the main underlying code is not. More on that later in this post.

You can try the live demo here:
http://scm.moodleace.com/course/view.php?id=44
Username: student
Password: moodle