Alien Skin releases Image Doctor 2

mary | 30 November, 2007 16:36

Alien Skin Software today announced the release of Image Doctor 2, the new version of its yet easy-to-use software for photo restoration, retouching, and repair. Image Doctor 2’s five plug-in filters offer users a complete toolset for photo restoration, compressed JPEG image repair, smart object removal, blemish concealment, and skin softening in one package. The five filters in Image Doctor 2 — Dust and Scratch Remover, JPEG Repair, Blemish Concealer, Skin Softener, and Smart Fill — together provide a comprehensive sets of photo enhancement tools.

Other Alien Skin academic pricing:

Eye Candy

Exposure 2

Blow Up

Snap Art

SmartDraw launches SmartDraw 2008

mary | 29 November, 2007 16:15

SmartDraw 2008, launched in September, is the first program that automates the task of creating business graphics such as flowcharts, org charts, floor plans and more. The new version is packed with exciting, helpful features that continue to draw admiration from both first-time users and long-time fans.

"Not only has SmartDraw 2008 saved us thousands in graphic design fees, but it has totally transformed our company," said Jeff Gordon, CEO of Amplio Consulting. "It's the best investment we've ever made."

Popular new features include LiveMaps, which captures live map data from the internet, allowing users to incorporate roads, regions, zip codes, and satellite images into their drawings; as well as Image Charts, which use images and pictures instead of standard bars, lines and circles…just like USA Today.

Users also love the new Express Charting feature, which allows users to create real charts and graphs of every kind, without having to make a spreadsheet first. Users simply pick a chart and type the data directly into the bars, or drag the bars to represent the right values.

"SmartDraw 2008 delivers communications, clarity, and the ease of looking good fast," said Dave Bartek, IBM. "I recommend it all the time…I am an evangelist for it!"

More than two million people have downloaded and used SmartDraw 2008 to create graphics such as flowcharts, org charts, family trees, floor plans, forms, timelines and more. Unlike other graphics programs that provide you with a blank screen and expect you to draw, such as Visio^®, with SmartDraw 2008 you start with a template that is specifically designed to create the type of illustration that you need. You enter your information and SmartDraw 2008 does the rest: building the graphic automatically using built-in rules and professional design themes to guarantee polished, presentation-quality results in just a few minutes. It draws for you!

"I've been a Visio user for years, but given the time and support constraints on my team, I needed software that was easier to learn," said Darren Tidwell, Network Administrator. "I wanted a tool that would help me solve my problems without wasting time or money. SmartDraw 2008 does this."

Red Condor Recognizes IT Professionals During Launch of new Website and National Ad Campaign

mary | 28 November, 2007 10:19

Rohnert Park, Calif., Nov. 14, 2007 – Red Condor has announced a new outreach campaign for its resilient, “no touch” email security products and services. The company will begin a new national television ad campaign Thanksgiving weekend on the Sci-Fi Channel. The “Live Spam Free” campaign uses a theme that empathizes with the plight of IT professionals – the “brave spam fighters” – and links to a special website at www.livespamfree.org.

“We’re using humor to engage, entertain and, most important, enlighten people about the hard work that’s being done to fight the war against spam and other malicious email,” said Ron Longo, president and CEO of Red Condor. “With more than 90 percent of all email traffic today believed to be spam, we’re working around the clock to stay ahead of new types of malicious email. This campaign points out that with Red Condor, IT Professionals can get back to their ‘real jobs’ and leave the job of fighting spam to us.”

The site at www.livespamfree.org features a free, online spam-blasting game, “documentary” footage inside the world’s only De-Spamification facility, and Live Spam Free wrist bands for participants. The footage includes Red Condor’s 30-second TV spot, to air nationally on the Sci-Fi Channel, which features a glimpse inside the private life of a spam fighter’s family.

Red Condor distinguishes itself in the crowded Internet security marketplace as a provider of the most resilient email protection that combines the cost-efficiencies and other user advantages of a network appliance with the vast computing resources of its hosted service. Clients can also be protected entirely by hosted service, providing flexibility and a scalable technology that keeps unwanted email outside the client’s firewall. Its “no touch” spam filtering requires no adjustment at the client site so IT managers can focus their time and energies on other network issues.

Red Condor backs its customers with multiple data centers and its 24x7 customer care center staffed by dedicated, spam-fighting email experts.

More academic pricing from Red Condor:

HOSTED MAG Anti-Spam/Anti-Virus 1yr 125

Message Assurance Gateway 2700 Appliance w/ 1 year Svc Pack and Hardware Warranty (Academic Pricing)

Message Assurance Gateway 2700 Appliance w/ 3 year Svc Pack and Hardware Warranty (Academic Pricing)

Message Assurance Gateway 3000 Appliance w/ 1 year Svc Pack and Hardware Warranty (Academic Pricing)

Message Assurance Gateway 3000 Appliance w/ 3 year Svc Pack and Hardware Warranty (Academic Pricing)

Message Assurance Gateway 4000 Appliance w/ 1 year Svc Pack and Hardware Warranty (Academic Pricing)

LCSI releases version 1.6 of its award-winning MicroWorlds software

mary | 27 November, 2007 13:07

Logo Computer Systems Inc. (LCSI) has released version 1.6 of the award-winning MicroWorlds EX and MicroWorlds EX Robotics software.

Mac users will benefit from a Universal Binary version of MicroWorlds EX and a MicroWorlds EX Robotics that has a new look to its interface. Additional features include a customizable tool bar, a modified Help System, new samples and tutorials and support for iSight image capture. On the Windows side, MicroWorlds EX is now Microsoft Vista compatible and has a modified Help System.

The Windows version of MicroWorlds EX Robotics includes Vista compatibility, the modified Help System and support for the Super Cricket robot.

"We're happy to offer these improved versions of MicroWorlds. LCSI continues to work closely with its customers to ensure that our products have features and benefits that improve their quality and functionality and result in a better learning experience for students, " said Michael A. Quinn, President of LCSI.

An extremely versatile program, MicroWorlds can be used to generate anything from science simulations to mathematical explorations to interactive multimedia stories. It provides students with the tools they need to design, construct, animate, analyze, integrate, visualize and explore different concepts.

Available on both Mac OSX and Windows platforms, MicroWorlds EX and MicroWorlds EX Robotics provide full teacher support that includes tutorials that show how to create curriculum-linked projects, an on-screen techniques panel containing simple step-by-step instructions for hundreds of techniques, and samples that demonstrate the range of exploration possibilities.

Other LCSI products:

MicroWorlds JR

My Make Believe Castle

My Make Believe Treasure Isle

Listening First Stereo Headphones from Califone International, Inc., as a 2007 Teacher’s Pick

mary | 26 November, 2007 16:19

Scholastic’s Instructor magazine has chosen the Listening First Stereo Headphones from Califone, as a 2007 Teacher’s Pick. Each product chosen as a Teacher’s Pick was carefully evaluated by the magazine’s teacher-testers throughout the year.

Instructor magazine leads the way with “teacher-leaders” — educators who hold positions on purchasing committees, research and make product recommendations and are often in charge of allocating school funds. As one of the leading and most trusted teaching magazine in the field, Instructor magazine reaches more than 900,000 educators each issue.

Ideal for primary grades and special needs students, the Listening First Stereo Headphones offer developmentally appropriate equipment in vibrant, engaging colors and themes. The headphones are made with rugged ABS plastic in three color choices — blue, red and yellow. In addition, the Listening First Stereo Headphones also are available in animal themes — bear, panda or tiger. Providing clear sound at levels safe for a child’s eardrums, the headphones are high-quality additions to any classroom learning center, children’s library reading corner or language lab.

Through the successful Our America: Tuned In Today… But Tuned Out Tomorrow? campaign, the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) recommends three guidelines to help students use audio technology responsibly: lower the volume, limit listening time and upgrade to ambient-noise-reducing headphones. “With an increasing number of younger students listening to personal media players in schools,” shared Califone Vice President, Marketing, Tim Ridgway, “It is important to educate them at an early age about appropriate listening levels.” Supporting ASHA and its campaign, Califone designed the Listening First Stereo Headphones to have appropriately sized, ambient-noise-reducing earcups to help ensure safe use as students acquire listening, literacy and language skills.

The Listening First Stereo Headphones come with the unique 1-year Califone warranty, which includes coverage for school, library and government use, typically not available for products purchased from consumer electronics stores.

Tom Snyder Introduces Science Seekers Series

mary | 21 November, 2007 13:45

Tom Snyder Productions, a leading publisher of educational software and a Scholastic company, has released a new, improved version of its software series, Science Seekers®. The program, produced in collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History and supported by a grant from NASA, engages students in learning and applying core science content to solve realistic problems.

With this collection of three peer-assisted learning programs, real scientists guide students who gather and analyze data, working in teams to complete exciting missions. This instructional format—where students watch engaging video footage to learn about their mission, collaborate in teams to evaluate information then draw from new understanding to complete their mission— enables students to develop a deep understanding that will serve as a foundation for applying science in the real world.

Science Seekers is enhanced with new features such as a built-in word list for contextual vocabulary instruction and title-specific mission booklets that encourage collaboration between students and support content-area reading. Other new features of Science Seekers include text-captions for hearing impaired and ELL students and support for interactive whiteboards, projectors and Macintosh or Windows platforms.

"With Science Seekers we have an opportunity to address some of the greatest barriers to understanding science," said Rick Abrams, General Manager at Tom Snyder Productions. "By adding supports in content-area reading, building background knowledge, and scientific vocabulary—all in an incredibly engaging format—we’re helping students experience scientific discussion and collaboration in a meaningful way.”

The updated, standards-aligned Science Seekers titles are The Changing Earth, Ecosystems in Balance, and Safe Groundwater. In addition to focusing on a specific curriculum topic, each title comes with a comprehensive Teacher’s Guide, assessment materials and answer keys.

GCN Lab Test: Web-content-filtering appliances can keep your employees away from unwanted sites

mary | 20 November, 2007 16:43

By Greg Crowe

A network administrator is sometimes faced with the onerous task of monitoring Web activity and blocking sites the organization deems inappropriate. This can be made even more difficult if the administrator is working with an already-strained budget.

Fortunately, Web-content-filtering systems are common, and they are often integrated with other network security functions, such as firewalls, antivirus programs and even intrusion- detection/prevention programs. This can save an administrator not only money but also precious rack space.

Web-content filters use two basic methods. The first, URL-based filtering, is a sure way of blocking specific sites because it categorizes the URL of the page. This type of filter has its drawbacks. It only works if the database of URLs is constantly updated as new domains and Web sites are created. It won’t work on sites that aren’t in the database yet. Also, because the database must be maintained, most providers charge a nominal subscription fee. On the positive side, this method is fast because it takes relatively little processing time to compare a URL string with those in the database.

The second method — content filtering or dynamic filtering — scans the Web page in question for words or word patterns and blocks pages that meet certain criteria. This is a powerful method that works on any Web site regardless of how new it might be, but it has two major drawbacks. First, to scan every page, the appliance must download it. If you have a lot of users, Web browsing can be slow unless you also have a very powerful filtering appliance. Also, if the filter is set to be too aggressive, it will create more false positives than you may consider acceptable.

An ideal filtering solution would use a combination of these methods, primarily relying on the database and only scanning for content when necessary.

We received a variety of security appliances with Web filtering capabilities from six companies: ContentWatch, eSoft, IronPort Systems, Mi5 Networks, St. Bernard and WatchGuard Technologies. The appliances ran the gamut of user capacity and offered a variety of additional features.

All of the appliances were rackmountable and, with one exception, took up 1U of space. Each had, as a bare minimum, two 10/100/1,000 megabits/sec data ports and a serial console port.

To test the Web filtering capabilities of each device, we connected them in turn to our test network. Appliances could be set up in a variety of configurations within the network, but we set them up in-line between the router and the rest of the network. This is almost always the configuration recommended by the manufacturer because it is largely foolproof. Setting them up in sniffer mode, connected to the network alongside everything else, is usually not a good idea. Every client’s browser has to be set to use the device as a Web proxy, which can, therefore, be disabled locally. You can prevent this by setting the router/firewall to block all Web traffic from sources other than the Web filter appliance, but setting it up in-line is definitely the preferred method.

We set each appliance’s policy to block some of the more common categories of verboten Web sites, such as those featuring adult content or nudity, gambling, games, and illegal drugs. Although each interface was slightly different, we were able to set each one to block the same categories.

We then listed Web sites we felt would be especially challenging, such as those that straddle typical category definitions and others that contain little-used domain extensions, such as .info, .biz and the relatively new .mobi.

We also put in several URLs that could easily result in false positives, such as government drug-use information and university-sponsored sexual-health sites. And we tried to play several online games, including popular ones such as “Lord of the Rings” and more obscure ones such as a German site that offers casual board games.

Although some came close, none of the filters performed perfectly. Some were fooled by certain domain extensions, and all of them failed to block a page with prohibited material within an otherwise acceptable domain — for instance, the Gambling tab on the official Las Vegas Web site. Any appliance could be adjusted to near-perfect operation for an organization willing to devote enough time and effort, but we were interested in how the devices’ out-of-the-box category definitions fared.

ContentProtect CP100 Security Appliance Only (Academic Pricing)

ContentProtect CP300 Security Appliance Only (Academic Pricing)

ContentProtect CP350 Security Appliance Only (Academic Pricing)

ContentProtect Educational Edition 1 Year Subscription (K-12/Higher Ed)

ContentProtect Educational Suite 1 Year Subscription (K-12/Higher Ed)

Net Nanny 5.6 (Academic Pricing)

Learning to think, thinking to learn - Award winning Heartsoft software helps students meet curriculum objectives

mary | 19 November, 2007 10:22

Heartsoft's comprehensive critical thinking skills curriculum which actually helps boost student test scores! Research shows that sharpening higher order thinking skills produces better test results. Based on the work of the Foundation for Critical Thinking, each Thinkology volume contains both software and written curriculum materials: Each software volume contains two animatedshort stories to introduce the concept, and twenty computer lessons to put the concept into practice; Each 125 page Teacher's Guide includes curriculum integration guidance and suggestions, and over 40 classroom activities including a full cross-curriculum set of lessons which integrate specific critical thinking skills into your math, language arts, and science curriculum.

Thinkology Series (School Version)

Thinkology Volume 1: Clarity (School Version)

Thinkology Volume 2: Accuracy (School Version)

Thinkology Volume 3: Logic (School Version)

IQChinese: A new version v3.0 of IQChinese Go courseware is released!

mary | 16 November, 2007 16:37

IQChinese Go v3.0 has been released with better quality and new functions. It is now compatible with MAC OS X as well as Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista. Moreover, it can be loaded to the computer’s hard drive with online update feature. Teachers and students don’t need to carry the original CD with them when they run the courseware. This is definitely more convenient and feasible for schools to apply this popular, unique methodology for their Chinese program.

For a full list of IQChinese Go products, visit our IQChinese page.

Rocketbook releases Beowulf DVD Study Guide

mary | 15 November, 2007 17:00

“Hwæt! We gardena in geardagum, þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon, hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.” Say what? Welcome to Old English, the language of the first masterpiece of English literature; the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf, believed to have been composed sometime between the 8th-10th centuries. Comprised of 3,182 lines, Beowulf is the subject of this Rocketbook DVD study guide, a kind of visual Cliffs Notes that breaks the poem down into bite-sized section, featuring a summary, analysis, and pop quiz for each set of lines. The screen is divided into shifting panels depicting an onscreen host, relevant artwork, and major points underscored with creative use of text. Although student-friendly, the production is not superficial in its treatment of the epic story of the great warrior Beowulf, who travels from Geatland (Sweden) to Heorot – hall of the Danish King Hrothgar – where the monster Grendel is nightly feasting on the residents (Grendel is also the first instance in English literature of the lonely misunderstood adolescent male – see John Gardner’s wonderful novel Grendel). In telling Beowulf’s story (his legendary battles with Grendel, Grendel’s mom, an much later, a fatal bout with a wily dragon), the host explains important concepts (such as the workings of “wyrd” or fate), while also drawing attention to the mixture of Christian (Grendel is thought to be a descendant of Cain) and pagan symbolism throughout the poem. While no substitute for reading Beowulf (and frankly, I think students today should have to translate the whole bloody thing, just like I did in college), this smart overview makes for a fine study aid. DVD extras include character profiles and an art gallery.

Visit our Rocketbook product page for a full list of titles!

Rocketbook Beowulf a DVD Study Guide

Rocketbook Frankenstein a DVD Study Guide

Rocketbook Beowulf a DVD Study Guide

Rocketbook Othello a DVD Study Guide

Rocketbook Macbeth a DVD Study Guide

Rocketbook Romeo & Juliet a DVD Study Guide