TOP 10 TOOLS 2008 & 2009
Carol Cooper-Taylor

Director of Cooper-Taylor Training. (e)Learning/(e)Teaching Consultant, Speaker, Author, Blogger, (e)Teacher. Passionate about interactive (e)Learning/(e)Teaching.

Carol's Top 10 Tools as at 10 May 2009

1. Camtasia – Still the best screen capture tool around.  

2. DimDim – I am trying DimDim this year to compare with Elluminate. Elluminate is a fantastic product but probably not economically viable for small users.

3. FireFox – Still my browser of choice, used every day, have used other browsers but still prefer this one.

4. iGoogle – Ever growing collection of tools that you can slice and dice to your iGoogle page any way you want.

5. Joomla!  – I use this with a number of clients’ websites. It is easy to install and maintain, and clients can do as much as they want with it.

6. Moodle – I teach my own online courses using this. Very stable and easy to use.

7. Mozy – Easy online backup of your hard disc. Unlimited amount of space. Just set and forget. No more lost files.

8. Skype – Excellent for keeping in contact with colleagues and learners

9. Snagit – Makes very professional looking screen dumps for inclusion in handouts

10. Wordpress – Have used this for my own blog since the beginning of 2008. Have not regretted the decision to move from blogger.

Carol's Top 10 Tools as at 14 August 2008

1. Firefox – There is not a day goes by that I don’t use this. I have used other browsers but this is my favourite of the moment. I like the tab feature, the ability to open the browser with the tabs open from you closed it, and the ability to have plug-ins. A browser is my window on the world.
2. Google Reader - RSS Feeds are my way of getting different lenses of information. Google Reader took over from Bloglines for me recently as I like the ability to have lots of stuff on one web service – using iGoogle.
3. iGoogle
4. PowerPoint – still used whenever I teach
5. Elluminate – the only service of its kind I have used in earnest
6.  Wordpress – took over from Blogger for me as a blog tool of choice, love all the plugin
7. Joomla! – will I ever html a site again, love all the plug-ins
8. Moodle – my LMS of choice, open source is growing on me
9. Fix My Moive – great service for cleaning up video taken with your phone
10. Camtasia – great for capturing stuff movies of screen actions. Am actively looking for a good open source solutions