Welcome to the Student Innovator Blog

Welcome to the Student Innovator Blog

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The Student Innovators is a group of students passionate about using technology to help learning. They will be trying out apps and web tools alongside their studies and give feedback on the Student Innovator blog. They work together as a team to share their experiences so you know before you download which app is best. You are welcome to read their reviews and leave comments.

Tuesday 24 February 2015

Infolio by Hayley

Name of App:  Infolio

Cost: Free

Device/s used: iPad

What was good about this tool?
Infolio was very useful in the way that instead of flicking from app to app which could disrupt what you're looking at you could have all your apps running at the same time on one screen. Infolio is very easy to use. You can also annotate documents and web pages which i found very useful when writing my assignments.

What was bad about this tool?
 It is only available on iPad and not iPhone or android.



My Script Smart Notes by Rory

Name of App:  My Script Smart Notes 

Cost: Free

Device/s used: Ipad 

What was good about this tool?
This App was good as at the start there was a tutorial on how to work the App, so straight away you were clear about what you needed to do to work the App, rather than having to figure it out for yourself like many other Apps similar to smart notes. 
It is also good as you can write directly onto your iPad with the app meaning you don't have to type. So if you need to make quick notes on something smart notes is perfect. 

What was bad about this tool?
At first the app was fairly difficult to use, but once you use the tutorial it becomes fairly easy to use. It was also fairly difficult to find on the app store and it is only available on iPad and not iPhone. 


Monday 23 February 2015

Inkflow by Connie

Name of App: Inkflow Visual Notebook

Cost: Free

Device/s used: iPod

What was good about this tool?
It is a note taking app trying to simulate pen and paper. It is quick and easy to use. You can also add pictures and text. It can help to annotate diagrams, pictures and text. Also once you have drawn something you can cut and paste it to another place and resize it. It is a free app and performs basic functions of note taking. Notes can be exported through email and also through PDF and JPEG format. If you want to be able to draw in colour and some other features, an upgrade is available for £5.99.

What was bad about this tool?
In comparison to a previously reviewed app, Notability, its not as good and does not perform the same amount of functions such as different colours and size of 'pen'. 



Saturday 14 February 2015

Pushbullet Review - By Mustafa Mahmoud

Pushbullet Review



There are some apps out there that are considered necessities. In my opinion, this is one of those apps. Pushbullet is an app that, in its own words “saves you time by moving your notifications, links, and files wherever you go”. In my experience, pushbullet does exactly that.

 It requires very little setup (only two main steps (and it walks you through it)) and after that, it just works in the background. The way it works is that the file or notification gets sent from your phone to the servers and then to your laptop (or other device), meaning that both devices don’t even need to be connected to the same internet connection (like most pairing services require).








 The list of different things it can do is phenomenal. You can send files between devices (even from a long distance away), you can also send files to friends (you add them through e-mail), you can subscribe to certain websites to certain websites to receive notifications when new posts arrive, and what I believe to be the most useful – receiving notifications across all devices, whether it’s a laptop, computer, tablet, and phone, be it iOS or android. In fact the list of supported devices and OS’ is probably as long as you can get. Pushbullet works on android, iOS, Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari (as extensions), and also has native Windows and Mac apps. It doesn’t stop there though, the API has been opened allowing for (un)official Windows Phone, Blackberry, and even Ubuntu apps!

 The website and apps allows you to see previous ‘pushes’ (notifications and what you’ve pushed to other devices) and configure your settings. Notifications are pushed automatically to your selected devices (even which notifications you want pushed can be customised) and with many of them, you can actually interact with them from the other device. This means that if you get a message on your phone, you can reply to it from your laptop! Manually pushing files is simple too. All you have to do is select the file, choose ‘share with Pushbullet’ and then select the device(s) you want to share it to. The system is excellent, easy, and near instantaneous. I cannot stop singing its praises, in fact I use Pushbullet to send screenshots to my laptop when writing these reviews! To top it all off, the app is free, contains no ads, and receives regular support and updates that quashes bugs and adds new features. 

 If you don’t have it already, I urge you to download Pushbullet and give it a try. Chances are, you won’t uninstall it.

You can download Pushbullet from here:









And the rest can be downloaded from here


By Mustafa Mahmoud

Monday 2 February 2015

Mindjet Tasks by Liam

Name of App: Mindjet Tasks
Cost: Free
Device/s used: Apple iPhone
What was good about this tool?
You can start mindmaps easily on the go with this app. I can customise the branches using a range of colours and shapes which you can change easily. You can also easily change the name of your mindmaps and email them to others too! In your mindmaps you can also use photos from your camera roll.
What was bad about this tool?
 I have not found anything "bad" about this app yet.




Evernote Peek- by Connie


Name of App: Evernote Peek

Cost: Free

Device/s used: iPad

What was good about this tool?
Evernote Peek is basically a revision tool that links to your notes on Evernote. Evernote Peek comes with some pre made revision pieces from a quiz on Sushi to French words. Once you have exported your own notes and turned them into questions and answers its relatively simple to test yourself. The filling system is relatively similar to that of the original Evernote with separate Notebooks for each subject or subject area.

What was bad about this tool?
Generating the questions and answers from your own notes is quite time consuming and unfortunately I would find it more practical to do it on peices of card. Also when testing yourself the motion needed to move on to the next question or reveal the answer can be unresponsive which can get rather frustrating.