Day 10 - Vintage software installation options on the Surface Pro
Teaching and Learning with a Windows 8 Tablet3/21/2013
Welcome to Day 10 of working with a Microsoft Surface Pro Windows 8 tablet for educators.
Yesterday I talked about the new on-screen keyboard options available on the Surface Pro. Today, I have been installing new software.
I will be reporting on some of the software I have selected for installation in future blog posts. Since I am investigating the educational uses of the Surface Pro I have carefully selected programs that I consider to be beneficial for everyday teachers.
We are in a transition period as new devices are offering new options for delivering software. The “app store” model is becoming a popular choice but there are downsides to this approach as well. The one-size fits all app store model does not work for many organizations. Dealing with separate userids, linking credit cards to accounts, and managing new "subscription" models can be a nightmare for large organizations to manage so new policies need to be agreed to and adopted.
Businesses and schools often want their own control of userids, applications, and most importantly, data. So, for the foreseeable future additional methods for installing programs and storing data will be needed beyond the cloud. We will be living in a hybrid world, hanging onto what works now, but also moving to the cloud when it makes sense.
The selected software I installed today is Mixcraft, a music creation program. Teachers routinely work with multimedia and having access to a music creation program opens a new world of possibilities.
We purchased this program “in the box” and it came on a CD. Yes, they still sell software in boxes with CD’s.
I needed to install the chosen Mixcraft program on the Surface Pro and had the purchased CD that was needed for the installation. One problem, the Surface Pro does not have a CD or DVD player. I could have copied the files to a USB stick, or downloaded a copy from the vendors website, but I wanted to install from the CD and avoid those extra steps. Time to kick it old school.
Why install from CD? Because if I downloaded the software from the vendor site I would only get the base install. Many of the music loops that can be used with the Mixcraft program would need to be downloaded on an as needed bases after the install.
Since the Surface Pro comes with a USB 3.0 port I grabbed an external CD player, plugged it in, and was off to the races. The software CD included all of the music library loops and all were installed by default. No messing around with additional loop downloads. Another case of the versatility of the Surface Pro that once again gives me an appreciation for the backward compatibility when I needed it.
Schools have hundreds of software programs that have been purchased on CD’s and DVD’s over the years and it is good to know that many are compatible with Windows 7 and can be used with Windows 8. Yes, we are hanging onto the past but I am amazed at how many of the so-called new “apps” are nothing more that modern versions of the free Adobe Flash-based websites not so long ago. Everything old is new again, just in a different wrapper.
I appreciate having a full-size USB 3.0 port on the Surface Pro that offers so many possibilities for expanding the capabilities of this tablet. Having a USB port on the Surface Pro bailed me out again today.
Choice is good.
Until next time...
Keep on Learning,
Keep on Learning,
Tom Grissom, PhD
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar