In response to the LTI App Bounty challenge issued yesterday by several LMS companies, here is my wish-list for software that has a simple function, does not yet exist, but should:
- A mashup of the Creative Commons search tool, Zotero, and simple image editing that would allow one to search for a CC-licensed/PD image, snag it and its source, and watermark the image with the citation, with as few clicks as possible.
- Variant on the above: instead of a watermark, a thin margin strip added to the image with citation and possibly a tiny QR (the only justified use I can imagine of QR codes today).
- Further variant: similar tool, but the target would be the Digital Public Library of America.
- A (more clever) variant of browser form-entry saving that you could use for commenting on student work: you set up prompts for comments on work, and when you start typing in a comment, the browser add-on would display (and allow you to pick) comments that you have already written.
- A variant on the above: the add-on would build, export, and import libraries of comments and prompts.
- Another variant: exporting the data in a .csv file (or other spreadsheet format). Or, given the LTI challenge noted above, something with an LTI hook.
- A server utility that could feed a page’s text in small bites to a cell-phone user (i.e., someone who does not have a smartphone but can receive SMS).
- A utility to gate a cell phone’s SMS messages into an LMS or similar (i.e., let someone contribute to a gated discussion from an LMS, not just let messages go outbound).
- An essential-systems cloning device — not a complete unit (you don’t need legs or hair for this) but enough to participate in an instructor-permission role online.
Okay, the last one is a joke, but the rest are serious. We need these, coding friends.