Algorithmic Essay-Grading: Teacher?s Savior Or Bane Of Learning?

roboA contest is underway at data-crunching competition site Kaggle that challenges people to create "an automated scoring algorithm for student-written essays." This is just the latest chapter in a generations-long conflict over the nature of teaching, and to that end it's also just one of many inevitable steps along the line. Automated grading is already prevalent in simpler tasks like multiple-choice and math testing, but computers have yet to seriously put a dent in the most time-consuming of grading tasks: essays. Millions of students write dozens of essays every year, and teachers will often take home hundreds to read at a time. In addition to loading the teachers with frequently undocumented work hours, it's simply difficult to grade consistently and fairly. Are robo-readers the answer? Mark Shermis at the University of Akron thinks it's at least worth a shot.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/pvB0bjc1gRM/

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You Can Buy a Kindle Fire for $140 Today (!) [Dealzmodo]

The Kindle Fire is arguably the best Android tablet you can get—and at 200 bucks, already a killer deal. Now you can buy a (refurbished) Fire for 140. If you want an Android tablet, you should probably do this. More »


Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/3nZvYUpy3y4/you-can-buy-a-kindle-fire-for-140-today-

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Alternative PC Tablets Like the iPad

Over the past two decades, alternative PC tablets like the iPad have been developed by computer entrepreneurs like the late Steve Jobs to make people?s lives easier in many ways, as well as more entertaining. The iPad was first released in 2010 and within a year, it had sold more units than all other tablets put together. Already it has been updated once, and the iPad 3 may be released within the next month or so – although even now [...]

Source: http://tabletbuzzblog.com/alternative-pc-tablets-like-ipad/

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HTML5 MP3 player lets you listen to your music library inside your browser

html5 browser mp3 audio player
While this slick little HTML5 audio player might not pack all of the features of your favorite desktop media application, it's still a very cool demonstration of what a Web app can do with access to local resources -- like MP3 and OGG files.

Just fire up http://antimatter15.github.com/player/player.html in your HTML5-compatible browser and browse to the topmost folder in your music library. The app will quickly build an index of all your tunes and let you start listening right inside your Web browser. Click on the filter library text, and you can enter a search string -- results load as you type.

There's a volume control, shuffle mode, play/pause control, and you can click and drag to skip forward or rewind during playback. As OMG! Ubuntu points out, you can even save the app to your hard drive and run it offline, which is pretty darn cool.

Not all browsers are equal when it comes to HTML5 implementation, of course. We found that Chrome worked the best, and Firefox was OK. It's also worth noting that this music player comes from the same developer that created one of our favorite restartless Firefox 4 add-ons, drag2up.

HTML5 MP3 player lets you listen to your music library inside your browser originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 30 Mar 2011 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/30/html5-mp3-player-lets-you-listen-to-your-music-library-inside-yo/

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iPhone 4 Owners Who Refused a Free Bumper Can Now Claim $15 [IPhone]

Box OneCloud learns from Dropbox and iCloud, allows simpler document editing on-the-go (video)

Image
If you're an avid Box user, what we're about to say is apt to have a great, positive impact on your life. For everyone else -- well, chances are you aren't about to swap out of whatever cloud ecosystem you're already entrenched in. In an effort to create a somewhat unique take on iCloud and Dropbox, Box has introduced OneCloud for iOS, a self-proclaimed "enterprise mobile framework to bring together your mobile content and the mission-critical apps designed to work with it." For now, it'll support over 30 iOS programs, four of which add "round-trip" integration; in other words, OneCloud will enable you to open a document in QuickOffice, edit it, and save it back without ever having to manually switch programs. To its credit, this is about as close as one could come to being genuinely productive on a device that tends to have productivity a bit lower on the priority rungs, but the video after the break still shows just how clunky the whole operation is. For our money, an ultralight laptop still makes more sense for business professionals on the go, but it's certainly not a bad backup to have around for making tweaks in a pinch.

Continue reading Box OneCloud learns from Dropbox and iCloud, allows simpler document editing on-the-go (video)

Box OneCloud learns from Dropbox and iCloud, allows simpler document editing on-the-go (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Mar 2012 10:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/7n7YYI-9oA4/

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KidSafe Case for iPhone 4/4S from TRTL BOT

Kids seems to be drawn to our gadgets and always want to play with them, and some parents are brave enough to let them.   And there are a lot of apps, educational and/or entertaining, for kids.  Even though the game is safe for your kid, there’s nothing to stop your child from exiting that [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2012/03/26/kidsafe-case-for-iphone-44s-from-trtl-bot/

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AVG launches LiveKive cloud sync and backup tool

avg livekive dropbox
A while back, we told you about AVG's new LiveKive service, a new cloud synchronization and backup tool which appears to have been named after a vat in which mash is made during the brewing process. But enough about AVG's odd choice of monikers -- LiveKive has launched and is now ready to accept your files into the AVG cloud.

LiveKive takes aim at services like Dropbox and SugarSync, though at the moment it's lagging behind in terms of features. As it stands, LiveKive is only compatible with Windows and OS X. There are no mobile clients yet, though with AVG's strong presence on Android we wouldn't be surprised to see an app arrive in the near future.

The company is offering a heck of a deal right now, however. If you sign up for a paid account during the launch phase, you can score unlimited storage for $80 for a whole year. You can't even score 50GB per year at that price from Dropbox, so if cost and space are more important to you than cross-platform availability, LiveKive might be worth checking out.

If you're not interested in ponying up any cash at the moment, you can still get a 5GB account free of charge. Just head on over, and create a LiveKive account.

AVG launches LiveKive cloud sync and backup tool originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 10:42:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/04/07/avg-launches-livekive-cloud-sync-and-backup-tool/

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Microsoft releases sexy Bing app for iPad

It's still a bit odd seeing Microsoft deliver apps for Apple's mobile platform. And it's even stranger still to see one as sexy as the new Bing app for iPad, which brings a slick, immersive search experience to Apple's tablet.

Just as a regular search on bing.com will, the Bing app for iPad tailors the results it displays based on what you're searching for. There are loads of custom views, covering everything from movies and maps to weather and shopping. The app also offers a heads-up display of currently trending searches, complete with related images, which is an iPad-exclusive feature.

Navigation is a breeze thanks to multitouch controls, allowing users to flick or swipe through results. And while the development team refers to the app as "touch and decide," Bing Voice Search is also built in -- making it easy to start a query without using the iPad's on-screen keyboard.

The Bing app for iPad is available for download now from the App Store.

Microsoft releases sexy Bing app for iPad originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/04/07/microsoft-releases-sexy-bing-app-for-ipad/

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Could The Birdy Be The Word In Simple Expense Tracking?

Screen shot 2012-03-28 at 3.50.14 PMWhen I was growing up, my dad had this yellow legal pad that sat right by the door. When he walked in at night, he wrote down numbers and codes. JCF - $12 JSM - $42 CCCl - $37 I didn't understand at the time, but the numbers were daily expenses (rounded up to the nearest dollar), and the codes were tags for which member of the family he was spending on, and the type of spending he was doing. Try as he might to teach me the way of the budget code, I just can't get in the habit. But you know what I'm in the habit of doing every day (no matter how grudgingly)? Email. And that's exactly what expense-tracking webapp The Birdy is banking on.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/Q63BX5gQr2U/

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