Personal security apps are becoming popular for smartphone users, as people become more nervous about walking home or to their car at night, especially on college campuses. Recently, five University of Michigan students created a free app called Companion that helps combat the issue of late-night safety. According to the website, “Companion lets you reach out to family, friends, or your public safety department to have them keep an eye on you as you travel late at night.”

Increased Security with Friends

Companion has you enter a destination on a map and then select a person (or multiple people if you like) from your Contacts list to be your virtual companions until you get to your destination. Your companions are sent a text notifying them that you are asking them to join you, and includes a link to a map so they can track your journey. Your companions don’t need to have the app to participate.

If you get nervous, Companion offers two quick options for getting help, without having to type a message. Simply tap “I Feel Nervous” to let your companions know you need 8help. If you feel threatened you can tap “Call Police” to dial 911 immediately. Both these options offer quick access to help without having to stop and type anything. If you don’t get to your destination, an “emergency” button with “Are you OK?” will appear on your screen. You will have 15 seconds to respond “yes”. If you don’t, your companions will immediately be notified, and the app will sound an alert with a siren.

Security across Demographic Groups

While the app was designed for college campuses, men and women from all demographics are using Companion. Parents of teenagers like the added level of security, especially with new drivers, and people with elderly parents like it because it helps make sure they don’t get lost.

Overall Review

Companion is a great tool that can fill a need for a lot of people. It’s straightforward, easy to use, and it’s free. It’s available for both iOs and Android smartphones. While I like it a lot, I see two issues that users need to be aware of. First, it can really drain your phone’s battery. Both the iTunes and Google Play pages have a disclaimer stating, “Continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life”, so you’ll want to check you settings when you’re not actually using it. Second, while the ratings on the App Store were very positive, some users on Google Play reported problems getting the app to work properly on some devices. However, Companion has made every effort to fix problems, and responds quickly to provide support to those reviewers who experience issues with the app.

Remember, while the Companion app is a great tool, personal security is a complex issue, and no one tool can provide all the answers. Common sense and being aware of your surroundings are also very important, as is knowing who to contact if you feel unsafe. On campus the UAMS police offer a variety of options to help people stay secure. The Emergency-Police telephones are easily identified by the steady or flashing blue light and provide a direct line to the UAMS Police dispatchers 24 hours per day. In addition, signs posted throughout the campus have a number you can call if you want a police escort to your vehicle. You can learn more about campus safely policies and procedures at http://inside.uams.edu/2015/06/uams-police-remind-campus-of-safety-policies-3/.

Today, an increasing number of people in the world get their new through their mobile devices, and they rely on news aggregators, websites that gather news stories from multiple sources, to make viewing easier. News aggregators have been around for a while, with sites like Reddit, BuzzFeed, Flipboard, theSkimm, and Feedly, to name just a few. Some focus on breaking-news updates, others offer options for customization, while still others provide content from a particular publisher, like New York Times Now.

Trinity Mirror, a publishing company based in the United Kingdom, has introduced a new aggregator app called Perspecs. Perspecs is unique in that it offers readers three perspectives on the same story. The app offers a mix of U.K. and international news on subjects ranging from politics to health to technology. According to the website, story categorization varies based on the topic. For example, political stories will first offer a neutral piece with background information, then provide articles from both the left and the right perspectives. A review of a new movie or gadget provides a neutral informational piece, then offer both a positive and a negative reviews.

Perspecs is free and is available for both iOS and Android devices. The app updates Monday through Friday, and you have the option of reviewing the five previous days’ editions.

Sticking to a regular news source often results in only seeing one side of the story. Perspecs offers you the opportunity to see multiple perspectives, making you a more informed reader. Give Perspecs a try and see if it opens your view of the world around you.

I love to write. I do it all the time. My problem is that I write like I talk, which means that my writing is sometimes hard to understand. I’m not a sequential thinker and my ideas jump all over the place. This can make the things I write difficult to read. Since I view writing as a form of communication, what I write should be easy to understand. If it isn’t, then I’m not much of a communicator. What I need is an editor, someone who will check what I write for understanding. I don’t have an editor, but I do have Hemingway, the free online editor that helps me analyze my writing style.

Writing Style and the Reader

Hemingway is like a spellchecker for writing style. It helps make sure that your reader will focus on what you are saying, not how you are saying it., Hemingway creators Adam and Ben Long believe that in writing, less is more. So their software identifies where your writing is too dense to be easily understood. By removing extra words or splitting a long sentence into two you can make your writing more readable.

The Hemingway editor uses yellow and red highlighter colors to identify sentences that are hard or very hard to read. Phrases that have simpler alternatives are highlighted in pink. Adverbs are highlighted in blue, and uses of passive voice are highlighted in green. By paying attention to the highlighted text, you can remove extra words, find simpler alternatives, and get rid of passive voice that makes your writing heavier and less readable.

Readability

The main goal of the Hemingway editor is to make your writing more enjoyable for your reader, known as readability. Hemingway will evaluate your writing and assign it a grade level. Grade level doesn’t refer to who you are writing for. In this instance, it means the lowest year of education necessary to understand your writing. Having a high reading level isn’t always a good thing. You need a sixth grade education to be able to read an average newspaper. In fact, having a very high grade level is likely to mean that your writing is confusing and filled with terminology. This isn’t good writing, even for a textbook.

Hemingway is a great tool for doing a preliminary edit of your writing style. It won’t take the place of a good editor, and it can’t help you with the more robust work involved in writing a complex paper or narrative, but it’s a great place to start. It is easy to use, doesn’t require registration or an account, and it’s free (my favorite price). Hemingway is now my go-to site with my first drafts.

The way we read and take notes is highly personalized. Everyone has their own method for learning new information from text, and there is a different tool for every style of note-taking. Note-taking and annotation tools can be expensive and free note-taking and annotation tools often limit the user to highlighting and adding short comments.  Rarely do they have the features necessary for deep, critical reading. However, I recently discovered a new free tool called LiquidText that can take your reading and note-taking to a deeper level.

What is LiquidText?

LiquidText is a free PDF and document annotation tool for iPad that allows you to read text in a flexible environment. Import your content from Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, email or directly from a webpage, and then highlight, make notes, and comment as you read. LiquidText works with PDF, Word, and PowerPoint documents and with webpages.

LiquidText has an impressive array of features. You can create excerpts, add notes, and then organize them in the workspace next to your document. The workspace allows you to pull out, organize, and map your ideas while staying connected to the text. The workspace is flexible, allowing you to determine how your ideas will be connected and organized. The following video by LiquidText demonstrates its many features.

You can connect your ideas across multiple pages, and comment on multiple pages at once. When you are finished, you can share your annotated files with others through Dropbox, iCloud, or email.

How is LiquidText Different?

One thing that differentiates LiquidText from other annotation programs is its large workspace next to the document. In this workspace you can drag out important passages from the text and connect them to your comments and notes. Connected passages can be linked, moved, and organized however you wish, but they still remain connected to the original text. You can apply your comments to multiple sections and connect comments into groups. Because the app was developed for touchscreen technology, you can “scrunch” and “pinch” pages to see text from multiple pages in a single view. Now you can see all your highlights and comments on a single page, making it easy to locate information within your document.

Another useful feature is that you can collaborate with others and share your annotated documents. Save your documents, with all of your notes, comments, and connections as PDF files, and upload them to Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, or share them through email. Sharing information can lead to deeper, more meaningful review sessions and improve academic performance.

LiquidText is a well-designed app that is intuitive, easy to use, and provides enough flexibility to meet the needs of individual note-takers. It offers more features than any other free app, and helps make your notes more meaningful and reflective. The process for linking notes and comments makes sense, and is easy to undo if you make a mistake. In fact, I like just about everything about this app. The only drawback I find is that it is only available for the iPad, and at this time there isn’t an android version being tested. If you are an iPad user, I highly recommend this app. You certainly can’t beat the price.

Note taking is usually a personal effort, with each person acting as a dedicated recorder. But notes tend to reflect how a particular student understands the content. It can make it difficult for the student to see alternate perspectives, or identify gaps in their understanding. Collaborative note taking, using websites like MeetingWords, can help students take more comprehensive notes, and offers opportunities for peer support and interaction while learning new material.

About MeetingWords

MeetingWords is a free online notepad and chat room that allows people to work and communicate in real time. It is simple to use and doesn’t require you to sign up or register. You use it when you need it, and then discard it when you are done.

Getting started is easy. Simply go to MeetingWords, click on Create a public pad, and begin typing. Once you are started, you can click on Share pad to get a link you can post publicly or send to select invitees. Take a look at the video below to see how the process works.

With MeetingWords, up to 32 people can edit and view your document at the same time. All edits and chat are made in real time, so everyone sees the latest version. All inputs are saved as they are generated, so multiple authors can work at the same time without overwriting another’s changes. Each contributor has a different highlight color, so it’s easy to identify who is making edits.

There are a lot of good reasons to use MeetingWords. It’s easy to set up and use, no registration is required, and it offers opportunities for large group collaboration in real time. You can bookmark your document for repeated use and download it into a savable format when you are finished.

There are a couple of disadvantages with MeetingWords, but for me they aren’t a deal breaker. First, MeetingWords isn’t available as an app for mobile devices, you can only use it through through the website, so you are restricted to using it on laptops, notebooks, and desktops. Second, it is designed for short-term collaboration, so if your document isn’t accessed for seven days it will get deleted. However, since the document is downloadable, I don’t consider this much of a problem.

Using MeetingWords

MeetingWords is a great tool for taking collaborative notes during class lectures, presentations, and videos. It facilitates multiple perspectives about the content, and the chat feature offers students the opportunity for peer support and discussion. Students can ask one another questions and even arrange to meet later for informal review sessions.

MeetingWords is a quality alternative for those times when you don’t have access to or don’t want to use Google Docs. Since it doesn’t require registration or login, it’s a great tool for quick collaboration and informal dialogue during class sessions.