Codetek’s VirtualDesktop
by Mitchell Levine
Education technological environments aren’t like corporate ones. In the corporate IT world, there’s no need for “legacy” hardware; in fact, the description is a euphemism for “disposable.” Every year, in the corporate sector, tech buyers get millions of dollars to purchase state-of-the-art, cutting edge technology to meet their end-users’ needs. In the education world, buyers get dollars to attempt to meet millions of end-users’ needs as best they can.
So productivity tools, like Codetek Studio’s VirtualDesktop are a far more serious necessity in schools than either business or home environments. Now, imagine how far you could stretch your hardware resources if you could subdivide that 27” monitor into over a hundred separate virtual monitors, each of which can run different applications. Unlike trying to use multiple windows, VirtualDesktop integrates and manages the desktops for the user with a helpful onscreen GUI, which automatically tracks each individual desktop and application. Just a few of the features would include: ‘Focus follows mouse’ for automatically focusing a window that the mouse hovers over; windows that can be dragged and dropped across virtual desktops; and completely configurable hotkey support for rapid switching between desktops.
Grade school teachers utilizing desktops for, computing skills development, language arts and reading tutorials, and Internet access for their entire classes, and remedial math and phonics for select students, can set up virtual desktops for each of these applications in the morning. Suddenly, a vast amount of time which would ordinarily be wasted getting each of the aforementioned groups and individuals situated with their specific programs is freed up for additional instruction. Classes with differing curricula that need to share a computer system, between, say, AP history students and graphic design, for example, suddenly find themselves with a lot less friction. Want your class to get the most out of your DVD multimedia encyclopedia? Try setting up multiple desktops, so they can access different applications in MS Office, so they can catalogue, index, and share the information they find with other classes online with a web publishing utility like Thinkwave Educator.
Limitations on what schools can spend on hardware will probably always be a part of education’s bureaucratic reality. But if you can’t afford to buy 100 monitors, a small investment in VirtualDesktop could be the next best thing. For more information, or to download a free trial, log on to the manufacturer’s site at www.codetek.com.#
