Friday, June 13, 2008

Learnit Lists Updated With Audio!

Learnit Lists, which I'd originally reviewed (and praised) as a good way to get a daily dose of foreign language vocabulary words. They even commented on my review. Well, Learnit has been updated with some extra features which increase its value, but it doesn't do it all seamlessly.



First of all, I had to remove the old gadget and install the new one, when it really should've just updated itself automatically. I was hounded by a notification that my original version was old, but never really explained how I was to get the new version. You can get the new version here.



Past that, the biggest new feature is the listen and speak mode. Working off of a credits system, you can listen to the proper pronunciation of a word for one credit, and you can earn credits by recording words in your own native language. This is a novel way to expand the system's vocabulary very quickly, and the extra interactivity is pretty awesome.



My main complaint is the gadget's screen size. I had complained before that the original version took up way too much space on my iGoogle page, and in their response to my review, Learnit said they would look into the matter. Well, in this new version, the gadget itself takes up less room indeed, but the actual frame that carries it seems EVEN BIGGER. It's still easily the biggest gadget on my already cramped page, and with a layout and design that doesn't really match any other, it sticks out like a sore thumb. I once again call for a more compact, elegant solution that incorporates the other features as well.



Overall, it's still a good gadget, and with this latest version in beta, more features are forthcoming. Far from perfect, it's still recommended (and recommended over the older version).

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1 comment:

New Bohemian said...

Hello,

Thanks again for your honest feedback. It's really important to hear - and helps us prioritise.

There was a problem with the message about the new version - it should have been set to show just once, however something went wrong. Thanks for alerting us. The programmer is looking into this now.

We are going to produce some custom learnit widgets - which can be in any size a normal advert would be - and can be any colour or image, with a simple scroll through your daily words. So we could produce a 125x125 for example. If you're interested, contact me on info at learnitlists.com & we'll put one together for you.

Many thanks!
Nicola