J David Macor

Hooray for Part 3 of my Back to School Series! Don’t forget to get your fill of Windows apps in Part 1 and Mac apps in Part 2! Anyhow, as a college student, you will need to arm yourself with a vast suite of applications to get yourself through each and every day. You will need to make presentations, take notes, write papers, organize groups, study, manage your calendar, and much more. If you start adding up the costs of the software available for these types of tasks, you may soon find yourself out of at least $500. So what is a poor student to do?

Fortunately, the Web 2.0 community has given us an array of apps that can satisfy these needs; and all of them are free or at the very least offer you a free, watered down version… I have organized the apps into categories that reflect their general nature (office suite, calendars, note takers, etc.). In each of the categories, you will see a whole slew of options and I will put a wee star next to my personal favorite. But feel free to give them all a shot!

Office Suites

These powerful apps can replace word processors, spreadsheets and presentation software. Some of them are individual replacements, others incorporate 2 or more of those types of apps and include nifty integration and file management.

• Google Docs & Spreadsheets* – As the name implies, you get a document and spreadsheet creator. Plus, it features a file organizer and the ability to collaborate with your classmates.
• Ajax 13 – From spreadsheets to documents and from presentations to graphic editors, this suite has it all; and as the name implies, it does it in ajax style.
• Zoho Office Suite – Zoho’s product offers a tremendous amount of features that rival their desktop software counterparts.
• gOFFICE – This thing even looks like MS Office. And they have slowly, but surely, added interesting and useful features, such as templates and PDF outputs.
• ThinkFree – Truly an online office suite, ThinkFree can make documents, spreadsheets and presentations to go with collaborative features.
• Write With – An elegant and simple document editor. It allows collaborators to edit, chat and see their changes live, as they are working on it.
• EditGrid – EditGrid is a web app dedicated to spreadsheets; that’s it.
• Num Sum – Yet another simple, but good spreadsheet editor. Plus, its name reminds me of chinese food; and like chinese food, it isn’t great, but it will get the job done. Even if it is a bit greasy.
• Edit Grid – A great spreadsheet editor with charting tools and templates for community sharing
• SlideAware – A dedicated presentation maker. You can share and embed and track all of your presentations as well.

Calendars/To-Do Lists

These two types of apps are perfect complements. Use the calendar to schedule your classes and study groups, then use the to-do lists to remind you to do that crappy algebra homework.

• 30 Boxes – This is a great calendar app that is super easy to use. In fact, one testimonial says, “its so easy my mom can do it.”
• HipCal – This was another great calendar service, but seeing as it has been recently purchased by Plaxo, I am a bit worried that it will become that program that is bundled with AIM that you can’t deactivate.
• Spongecell – Fantastic calendar app that looks good too. Seriously, it can handle everything that you will need.
• Google Calendar* – One of the first I ever used, this nifty app will scan your gmail for scheduled events and allow you to set an appointment right there.
• CalendarHub – Yet another calendar app, it pretty much does what the others do; schedule, groups, share, network, reminders. Pretty much everything.
• Remember the Milk – Not only is this a well thought out, fancy ajax way to manage your tasks, but it integrates right into Google Calendar!
• HiTask* – A simple web-based task management application that lets you share tasks with classmates. And it is purty…
• Nozbe – “…GTD at its essence…It gets to the heart of the matter…projects, contexts and next actions…” I couldn’t put it better myself.

Note Taking

What good is taking notes on paper? You can’t search for keywords in them, you can’t share them without tearing them out, and you can’t work on them with other classmates. Online note taking lets you do all of those things and more.

• NoteCentric – a web based note taking application. Notecentric keeps your notes organized and readily available online.
• NoteMesh* – What’s cool about this app is that you can upload your notes, so you and your classmates can share and combine them (like a Wiki) and then you can all agree on the best version.
• Nottr – This web app also lets you share your notes, but it displays them in a blog like way. The best thing is that you can syndicate your notes using RSS.
• Zoho Notebook – Zoho makes quality web apps and their notebook is no exception; you get all the file uploading and collaborating goodness that you need.
• skrbl – Here we have what is basically a sharable write board. The beauty is that you don’t even need to sign up; just start one and begin the note taking.

Flow Charts

Also known as mind mapping, these things are great for planning your next school project or paper. They are kinda like outlines, but more detailed and visually appealing.

• Kayuda – This app offers mind mapping in its simplest form. And while it may not create pretty looking charts, it still gets the job done.
• Flowchart.com – Lets you create good looking flowcharts for whatever purpose you may need. Has an MSOffice like interface.
• Mindmeister* – Think flowchart on a massive dose of web 2.0 steroids. It even has a generous amount of that flickr-like pink color.
• Mindomo – Another web based mind mapping tool. You can get their basic account for free.
• comapping – Make mind maps together with your friends and colleagues; apparently a hit with the education market (thanks Omar).

Group Organization

This is the height of collaboration. You can share images, documents, links, and basically whatever else you can think of. There is no better way to manage a school project.

• Backpack – This app is recognized as the gold standard for project management. It features everything from calendars to chatting to file histories. You can’t go wrong here.
• Stikipad – So this web app is different from the other project managers in that it uses a Wiki interface. It still gets the job done!
• Zoho Projects – I used this one to write a group paper and it was a lifesaver when it came to managing deadlines and sharing research.
• Goplan* – Does everything that the other web apps do and it does it in style. Seriously, design weighs heavily on my preferences…

Studying

Yup. The web can help you study too! Whether you need to look up information on the War of 1812 or you can’t figure out that math problem, there is a solution out there on the net.

• Wikipedia – This is a no brainer. The famous (or infamous) encyclopedia has an entry for anything that you need to know about.
• SparkNotes – What do you do when you have one night to read War and Peace? Check out this site for character and plot summaries!
• Yahoo! Answers* – If you are struggling with answering any sort of question (academic or personal), just post it here and you shall receive your answer.
• CollegeCram – This beauty of a web app will let you make flash cards, worksheets, quizzes and all sorts of other studying paraphernalia.
• BuddySchool – When all else fails, just get yourself a tutor here! Or become one, if you are one of those smart types…