Unit-3 English In Digital World PDF

Unit-3 English In Digital World Introduction- Internet has been around for quite sometime. However, it is only in the recent years that its popularity has increased to a great extent. The Internet is an information communications channel that enables broadcast and exchange of...

Unit-3 English In Digital World Introduction- Internet has been around for quite sometime. However, it is only in the recent years that its popularity has increased to a great extent. The Internet is an information communications channel that enables broadcast and exchange of electronic information amongst individuals and institutions. The usage varies from a simple e-mail to a complex video conferencing facility. The Internet provides several services viz. searching for information (search engines, directories), communication (through e-mail, chat, newsgroups, Internet- Resources and Services 134 mailing list etc.), file transfer protocol (FTP), telnet or remote login, conferencing, media broadcasting, etc. World Wide Web is currently the service that most people use to access Internet services. A variety of tools have been developed over the years to make effective use of these services. In this unit you will get familiarised with some of the popular Internet tools. Internet Search Tools: - There are millions of servers available all over the world hosting private and public websites with their web pages offering information and services. The information available on the Internet can be in the form of HTML pages, attached files in various formats (Word processor, PDF, video, audio etc.), databases attached to websites, dynamic page elements viz. animation, online forms etc. There are so many information items available on the net which makes it difficult to locate the exact required information. As you all know by now that there is no central authority in charge of the Internet. Anyone can create or withdraw websites as and when required. Because of the dynamic nature of the web, it is difficult to keep track of all the information that are available in the web. If you are aware of availability of specific information on the net, all it takes is to provide the exact site address (URL) in the browser to go to that site. But if you have no idea as to where to look for a specific information, what do you do in such a situation? You then need to take help of different types of search tools that are available on the net. The search tools can be categorised into following three types: Search engines Subject directories Deep web or invisible web. Let us discuss these three categories in details in the following sections. Search Engines: - A search engine is a program that searches through keywords or a search term. Search engines use automated software to create indexes of web pages. Search engines comprise the following three basic elements: Spiders: These are programs (also known as web crawlers, web robots, web wanderers) that navigate the web from link to link identifying and reading pages and retrieving all documents that are referenced. Index: It is a database containing a copy of each web page gathered by the spider. After spiders find pages, they pass them on to another computer program for indexing. The indexing program identifies the text, links and other content in the page, and stores them in the search engine database files. Search and retrieval mechanism: It is a program that enables users to put queries to the index and returns results in some schematic order. The search engine database can be searched through keyword or through other advanced search approaches. The required pages will be retrieved if the search term matches the content stored in the index of a search engine. Internet Tools 135 Search engines can be further categorised into two types: primary and meta search engines. Primary search engine uses a spider to collect its own searchable index whereas, meta search engine searches multiple search engines simultaneously. There are numerous search engines available. Some of the popular ones are– Google, Yahoo, Infoseek, Looksmart, Teoma, Lycos, Hotbot, etc. For metasearch engines you can have a look into ixquick (http://www.ixquick.com), Fazzle (http://www.fazzle.com), ProFusion (http://www.profusion.com), Query Server Deep Web or Invisible Web: - These are pages that cannot be found by search engines and are rarely available in subject directories. They comprise information that is stored in databases as well as multimedia and other files. Search engine spiders cannot index these databases due to a number of reasons: i) Spiders cannot go inside database tables and extract the data. ii) Spiders are incapable of gathering non-textual data such as multimedia files, graphical files and documents in proprietary formats such as PDF files. iii) Sites requiring registration or passwords and login id are excluded by spiders as they require ‘typing in’ which is not possible for spiders. Deep web sites or database-driven websites hosts dynamically changing content such as the latest news, job postings, flight and train related information etc. The information content is normally stored in a database such as phonebook listing, list of professionals such as lawyers, doctors etc., dictionary definitions, geographical information, etc. in a deep web or hidden website. There are websites that specialise in collecting indexing databases available in the web. Some of examples of such sites that collect searchable databases on the web are: Complete Planet (http://aip.completeplanet.com), Direct Search (http://www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm) Invisible web.net (http://www.invisible-web.net) Profusion (http://www.profusion.com/index.htm) Search.com (http://www.search.com). (http://www.queryserver.com), MetaCrawler (http://www.metacrawler.com). Now let us see how to use search engines to retrieve information. For this we will use the Google search engine. Each record is displayed with a few lines of information picked up from the retrieved pages so as to help a user to find its relevance. On clicking any of these links, the required page will be transferred from the concerned server and displayed on your screen. Search engines usually give us a list of best matches to least likely matches in descending order. Most search engines allow you to enter very specific, even complicated search queries. Usually a single keyword or a couple of words will be sufficient to search for the relevant information. The terms ‘and’ ‘or’ and ‘not’ can be used to narrow down or broaden your search e.g., “library education and USA and UK”, here, ‘AND’ is used for narrowing a search. Similarly, ‘OR’ can be used to broaden it and ‘NOT’ to refine the search. iii) Field search: Field specific searching is possible by defining the field to search e.g. Title: global warming, URL: warming. Plus and Minus signs: place the plus sign (+) in front of all words you wish to retrieve and minus signs (-) for those which you want to eliminate. Remote Access and File Transfer Tools: - Telnet and FTP are two commonly used Internet tools. Telnet enables remote access to other computers whereas FTP allows uploading/downloading of files both personal as well as general files. Telnet Telnet is a program that allows you to log on to the computers on the Internet and use online databases, library catalogues, chat services, etc. To Telnet to a computer you must know its address. This may comprise words, for example, spacelink.msfc.nasa.gov or numbers (IP address: 140.147.254.3). Some services require logging into a specific port on the remote computer. For this you will be required to type the port number after the Internet address for example, downwind.sprl.umich.edu:3000. Telnet is based on client/server model. The client program running on your machine initiates the connection with a server program running on a remote machine. Telnet lets you log on to another computer from your computer using Internet. For this you will require valid user id and password to access the remote computer. However, there are many Internet hosts providing public resources which are accessible through special guest account. To use telnet you have to run a telnet client program. If you access the Internet using a shell account, your telnet client will be the Unix telnet program. In case of a PC, you have to run a windows client. The windows operating system has its own telnet client. In windows you can start the telnet program by following these steps: i) Go to start and click run. ii) In the ‘Run window type telnet and then the IP address of the computer you want to access then click OK. Fig. 8.3: Run Window To get access to the system you will have to provide the user id and password. In the following example the IGNOU LibSys server is accessed through telnet. Accessing IGNOU Libsys Server through Telnet By entering user id and Password for the Libsys Library System you can enter Libsys interface and work in the remote computer as if you have been working on the server itself. Internet Tools. Telnet Access to IGNOU’s Libsys Server The alternate way is to go to the DOS prompt and enter the telnet command. Telnet sessions are text based and do not have any graphics. With the growing popularity of web, telnet is now less frequently used as a means to access to information on the Internet. File Transfer Protocol (FTP) FTP is an Internet service that allows transfer of file from one computer to another. A file can be a software program, a game, a text document, a spreadsheet, a graphic, animation, a sound or a video file. There are two methods of FTP. In the first method one has to log on to the remote host machine having a valid account with user id and password. The second method is known as anonymous FTP, where one has to sign in as a guest or as an anonymous user. Like telnet, FTP is also based on a client/ server architecture. Many FTP client software programs are available which make file transfer faster and accurate. You can download a free trial version of WS-FTP from Ip switch Home Page. After installation when you start the programme, the following screen will be displayed Ip switch WS_FTP Home Page Internet-Resources and Services 140 To connect to the remote server click connection wizard. The connection wizard will require entry of site name, server address, user name and password of the remote server. Click finish to connect to the remote server. Once you are connected you will see a screen similar to the one given below. Ip switch WS_FTP Home Page after Connection with the Remote Host The left frame shows the files of your own computer and the right frame lists the ones available on the remote host. To download a file from remote host, select it and click the arrow pointing towards the left frame. This will download the file from the remote host. To upload a file similar process is to be followed but in the opposite direction. The latest web browsers now available, have inbuilt FTP capability which makes downloading of files a very simple operation requiring no additional FTP software or knowledge of FTP commands. Communication Tools: - E-Mail - Electronic mail or e-mail in short has made a dramatic change in the personal and business communication all over the world in the last few years. It is one of the most popular and widely used Internet services. Electronic mail is a service that can be made available either through local area network or through Internet. E-mail allows computer users to exchange messages, locally and worldwide. The messages may be sent to a single person or to a group of persons at the same time in a matter of seconds. The messages may be in the form of text only i.e., ASCII files or it may be binary files in different formats e.g. Word, PowerPoint, Excel sent as attachments. Basic e-mail functions include: Reading mails (collected in inbox) Composing new messages Replying to the messages received Forwarding messages to other e-mail addresses Saving draft messages Attachment of file Deleting and re-filing messages in some other storage area. Conferencing Tools: - Internet facilitates real time communication through number of conferencing tools. Conferencing can be in various forms viz., audio/video conferencing, web based chats, bulletin board systems, shared white boards, etc. We will discuss each of these categories in the following paragraphs. Video conferencing via the net has enormous potential for enhancing communication in all spheres of life – business, governance, education etc. Video conferencing involves broadcasting and receiving of video signals over the Internet in real-time. Conferencing can be in one-to-one, one-to-many (multicast) and many-to-many (multipoint) modes. For video conferencing the basic-requirements are: a video camera (webcam is good enough), microphone, speakers or headphones, sound and video cards with associated software and networking components. Networking can occur over fast Ethernet, TCP/IP (the Internet), cable network or via ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network). Video-conferencing, however, requires high speed connection for acceptable quality of video output. This is a hindrance to its wide acceptance as a mode of communication for the general public. In audio conferencing, voice is digitised and sent through the Internet to the final destination. For this you require a headset with earphones, a microphone and conferencing software. Internet can also be used to make telephone calls around the world at a cost of local connection. This can serve as an audio conferencing tool to make computer to computer and at times computer to telephone calls. NetMeeting Interface Source: http://www.microsoft.com/Windows/NetMeeting 6 Internet Tools 145 Web based conferencing software such as NetMeeting, CU-SeeMe etc. enables geographically dispersed group of people to communicate in real time using video, audio and collaborative screen sharing tools simultaneously. NetMeeting offers a complete Internet conferencing solution and comes inbuilt with the Windows Operating System (Windows 2000 and above versions). Following tools are available in the NetMeeting software: Video and Audio Conferencing NetMeeting’s audio and video conferencing features let you communicate with anyone on the Internet. Chat Chat lets you conduct real-time conversations via text, with as many people as you like. Internet Directory The Microsoft Internet Directory is a Website provided and maintained by Microsoft to locate people to call on the Internet. File Transfer File transfer lets you send one or more files in the background during a NetMeeting conference. Program Sharing NetMeeting’s Program Sharing feature allows you to share multiple programs during a conference with flexibility, and also enables you to retain greater control over the way they’re used. Security NetMeeting uses three types of security measures to protect your privacy. Remote Desktop Sharing Remote Desktop Sharing lets you operate a computer from a remote location. Advanced Calling This feature gives you the flexibility to send a mail message to a NetMeeting user or initiate a NetMeeting call directly from your mail address book. Whiteboard The whiteboard lets you collaborate in real time with others via graphic information. 7 Internet-Resources and Services 146 Conferencing without audio and video application is also possible on the web with document management, multimedia conferencing or screen sharing tools. Document sharing packages enables sharing of word processing or spreadsheet files and work on them jointly sitting at remote locations. Multimedia conferencing and screen sharing tools enables users to control as well as synchronise presentations available in text, graphic, image, audio and video formats in real time. Web chats and instant messaging are the other real time communication tools that are very popular and widely used. Chat windows or rooms allow participants to share what they type. These are primarily text only systems, but some systems also have additional facility of incorporating audio and snapshots. Interactive Relay Chat (IRC) is the original chat feature that is supported by most of the browsers. Chat rooms require global chat protocol to conduct online chat sessions. These can generally support fifty to thousand users in a session. A variation of the web chat is the instant messaging (IM) in which a user can communicate with another user who is currently logged in by typing messages. While chat rooms are ideal for discussing a topic among a group of participants, the instant messaging is more suitable for one to one private conversation with friends and family members. To send and receive instant messages, a user needs a connection to the Internet and instant messaging software. ICQ is a popular IM tool available at http://www.icq.com. Yahoo, MSN and AOL’s Instant Messenger are also quite popular. The instant messaging software enables a user to set up a list of contacts who also use the same program. Once this list is set up, one can see each contact as they come online. A chat session can be started with them quickly and easily. Most conversations are typed text messages that are sent back and forth, though more advanced users can exchange voice, video, files and more. 8.6 OTHER TOOLS Virtual Environment Internet  supports a wide range of synchronous activity through virtual environments. These are basically imaginary settings in which one can interact with others. The first such type of virtual environment developed was the MultiUser Dungeon (MUD). A MUD is an elaborate computer mediated imaginary environment which often involves individuals assuming a character and getting involved in virtual role play. A significant feature of most of the MUDS software is that users can create things that stay on after they leave and others can interact in their absence. This allows the world to be built gradually and collectively. There are a large number of MUDs available on the net. Other variations of the MUDs are: MOO (MUD Object Oriented) MUSE (Multi-user Simulated Environment) MUSH (Multi- User Shared Hallucination) MUCK (Multi-User Chat Kingdom)8 Internet Tools 147 Streaming Media The use of streaming media to deliver audio and video over the web is growing popular and is very useful in online learning environment. Streaming audio or video refers to the process in which the user receives files in small information packets and plays the media piece by piece. The process is almost invisible except for the initial buffering that takes place. The advantage of streaming is that the user need not wait for the entire file to be downloaded before playing. Streaming media can be delivered live or it can be archived for later use. Streaming media requires special software/ plug-in to be installed in your system. Application players required for this purpose are: Real player (http:// www.real.com), Windows Media Player (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ windowsmedia), and QuickTime (http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download). The quality level of the streaming audio and video are determined by the internet connection bandwidth, computer’s processor speed and the RAM of the system. Internet congestion may also hamper the smooth delivery of media files. What is online communication? Online communication refers to the ways in which individuals as well as computers can communicate with each other over a computer network, such as the Internet. These ways include:  chat rooms  e-mail  filling out online forms  forums  instant messaging (IM)  posting comments on websites, such as blogs  social networking sites  VoIP Advantages and Disadvantages of Internet Communication Technology has changed the way we communicate in so many ways. It has also changed the way people conduct business, and the manner we conduct our personal and social lives. We can easily text, talk and email through a link to anyone all over the world. In fact, it is now possible to visit any part of the world virtually. The education sector has also improved significantly because it is now possible to acquire a degree from any institution all over the world if you have a computer and internet connection. On the other hand, internet communication has created numerous problems that appear to increase as the technology advances. The list of advantages and disadvantages of internet communication can be endless, it all depends on the track you choose to it. For example, you must be cautious on how and who you give your personal information. You should also question the sources of your information to determine whether it is the truth or not. So what are the advantages and disadvantages of internet communication? Advantages of Internet Communication: 1. Speed and time Through internet communication, time and money are saved. This is because it is much cheaper and quicker to transfer information around. It also becomes faster and efficient to contact a business partner or a relative. We can now communicate with anyone around the world through emails and text messages instantly. The internet has also provided face-to-face communication, thanks to Skype, social media sites, video conferencing, and many other ways offered by communication companies. 2. Job creation One major advantage of internet communication is the creation of new and exciting jobs. System analysts, computer programmers, web designers, hardware and software developers and many other new opportunities created by information communication technology (ICT). 3. Globalization The internet has indeed brought people closer, and also helped in economic growth. It has also brought down geographical and language boundaries. The universe has become a global village due to information technology, permitting countries such as such as Japan and Ireland who are separated by language and distance, share information and ideas with one another. 4. Cost effective It is so cheap to send an email to another country than making a phone call. The internet has also helped to systematize business practices helping businesses to cut cost. 5. Improve education sector The internet has made it possible for numerous computer programs to be shared with different generations in different parts of the world. Important information such health, business and environment facts are easily available to any person with an internet connection. 6. More business opportunities Information communication technology (ICT) has made it easier for businesses to be automated allowing customers to contact them 24/7. This means that a company can be opened anywhere, anytime, allowing clients to make purchases from different countries. This makes business easier and more convenient. For example, the use of ezTalks has helped many businesses work together instant and simultaneously. Companies using ezTalks are able to share and access large files without delays, get updates in real time, and ensure every staff participation no matter where they are or at what time. 7. Eliminates the cultural gap The internet has helped to bridge the gap. People from different nations can easily communicate with each other, allowing the exchange of ideas and views. Disadvantages of Internet Communication： 1. Unemployment Even though the internet has improved many sectors, it has resulted in job unemployment through outsourcing, downsizing, and redundancies. For example, a factory can replace skilled personnel with robots which can work faster and for longer hours. 2. Privacy Although the internet has made communication easier, quicker and convenient, privacy problems have emerged. From email hacking to phone signal interceptions, more and more people are now troubled about their private information. 3. Lack of job security Since technology keeps on changing, job security has become a problem. This means that IT experts need to be continuously learning to keep up with the changes if they want to retain their jobs. 4. Overruling cultures While the internet has made the universe a global village, some cultures have consumed others. For instance, teenagers in western countries have influenced most teenagers in other parts of the world on how they dress, act and behave. Netiquettes - Etiquettes Of Social Media Netiquette is a set of unofficial rules for good behavior and politeness followed by users of online and digital technologies such as the Internet, email, and chatrooms. Netiquette is derived from the word "etiquette," which refers to the general rules or conventions of correct and polite behaviour in social settings and situations. It is thus the practice of exercising polite and considerate behaviour in online contexts, such as Internet discussion boards and personal email. Five Social Media Etiquette Rules Marketers Should Always Follow: - Social media is an integral part of everyone’s world these days. Brands have huge audiences to tap into on the various social platforms. Unfortunately, too many brands are misusing social media for their own benefit. As a brand, are you making this mistake? These 5 social media etiquette rules can help you change your approach for the better. You’ll see better results when you follow these rules because your audience will appreciate each of them. 1. Don’t just respond, initiate. Yes, it’s important to be responsive when social users talk about you. You want to be present and engaging with those people. Tools like Respond by Buffer can help you with this. If you have the responsiveness covered, are you taking the time to include initiating conversations? You have options for how you can do this easily and efficiently. The benefits of this outreach can be great for your business because few brands do this. Twitter chats To start, Twitter chats are a highly effective way to initiate conversations, either as the host or a participant. If you’re new to Twitter chats, they are live conversations where people tweet about a pre-assigned topic, using a branded hashtag in every tweet. People follow along by monitoring the established hashtag. As an example, Express Writers hosts a chat with their #ContentWritingChat hashtag. They promote the topic the day before, and people join in at the assigned time: Tuesdays at 11am EST. During the chat, Express Writers sends out questions about the topic, and people respond with their opinions. How can you benefit from initiating your own Twitter chat? Well, you build influence and a loyal following to start. You also build relationships with the influencers you bring in as special guests. In the long run, Twitter chats help you bring in more committed customers who trust you because of your engagement on Twitter. How can you benefit simply from participating in Twitter chats? You don’t and shouldn’t just answer the questions during the chat. More importantly, you should start 1-to-1 conversations with other participants. Respond to their answers or start a side conversation about something else. These side chats during the main  one can be great for getting your brand out there to people who may not already know who you are. Social media monitoring- Twitter chats are great for starting conversations in a set environment, but it’s not the only way to initiate conversations with your target audience. You should also be monitoring specific keywords surrounding your brand and business offerings. Without being too creepy, you want to monitor whenever someone posts a specific keyword that matters to your business, such as “need financial services” if you offer such a service. If you’re wondering how you can do this, you have options:  Hootsuite gives you social monitoring options with their platform. You can set up feeds based on the keywords you select. These feeds can be combined with any other feed types to make it easy to both initiate and respond in one place.  Mention also has a social monitoring service. This one is a bit more advanced than Hootsuite. Their product can help with both initiation and responsiveness by allowing you to monitor your brand and selected topics.  Synthesio is probably as advanced as you can get for social media engagement services. It gives you thorough data about how people are engaging with you and what you can do to initiate based on complete analyses about your industry, competitors, and customers. When you’re actively looking for opportunities to initiate conversations with prospects, you’re taking your brand ahead of your competitors. You’re getting your name out there and building trust with others. Social media is about conversations, so your best results will come from participating in them. 2. Do your research before using hashtags and other platform features: - One of the mistakes brands make on social media involves hashtag misuse. When you’re ready to publish a tweet, you want to optimize it for reach. Too often, you may choose the wrong or least-effective hashtags. That’s why research is key. When you want to use the best hashtags for reaching the right audience, use a research tool to help you understand which one(s) will work best. There are two options that come to mind right away: Rite Tag is a paid program that gives you hashtag suggestions within Twitter, Facebook, and most other social platforms. For $49 a year, you get access to these hashtag suggestions, trend alerts for new popular hashtags for your topic, and  more key features. It’s a handy tool if you want to know what’s effective at the very moment you’re posting content. Hashtagify is a free alternative to Keyhole. You can research hashtags in an encyclopedia or pay for the pro plan to get suggestions based on your Twitter account activity. The website offers many ways to research hashtags to find the right one(s) for your content and purposes. Hashtags are tricky when you are either new to social media or overwhelmed by it. To fully understand the best practices, you need to keep in mind:  Hashtags have different meanings and popularity per platform. What is popular on Twitter might be nonexistent on Instagram.  Don’t make your hashtags too long. The only exception is on Instagram, but with a 140-character limitation, Twitter is not the place for long hashtags. Keep them 1-3 words long, and be as specific as you can.  You don’t want to include more hashtags than your main text. This is true for all platforms. Even though Instagram is a great place for more than 10 hashtags per post, you still want to include a description that doesn’t get lost in the crowd.  Whatever you do, don’t send out tweets that #look #like #this. Make sure you’re only using the pound sign for the keywords that matter. Another research issue is when brands start using new platform features without a clear understanding of how to do so, who the typical audience is, and what the audience wants to see. Live-streaming is a great example of this. With live video appearing on Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat in the form of “stories,” it can get confusing as to what brands are supposed to do with the feature. You might think that you can take the same approach on all three platforms, but that isn’t best practice. In fact, you need to re-evaluate whether you should build your own live-streaming strategy for each platform. Facebook’s audience is different from Instagram and Snapchat. People on Instagram expect to see different content than they would on Snapchat or Facebook. It’s important that you research and understand these differences. These are a few resources for using live-streaming effectively on social media:  How to Choose the Best Live Video Platform via Social Media Examiner  How to Optimize Video for Different Social Media Channels via Hootsuite The key in all of this is the importance of doing proper research before acting. If you’re making assumptions or ignoring best practices, you’re playing a guessing  game that won’t give you the best results you could get. You may still see engagement, but optimizing your content will give you even better results. 3. Create customized content for each platform: - You want to save as much time as possible on social media, and there are tools out there that make cross-posting easy. However, remember this: Not all platforms are the same, and this includes content appearance. For example, we can go back to the last point about research. The hashtags on one platform might mean something completely different on another. Most platforms accept hashtags, even LinkedIn now, but are they effective everywhere? Facebook is not an ideal place for hashtags, so you don’t want your tweet content to appear there. You also want to keep in mind:  Each platform has its own character limitations. Twitter only accepts 140 characters, but Instagram and LinkedIn give you much more room to use. Facebook also allows longer posts, but on that platform, shorter is more effective. Keep in mind that if you share a longer post, such as from Instagram, onto Twitter, it’ll get cut off and look messy.  Each platform allows for different kinds of multimedia. Facebook allows for live video, recorded video, links, photos, and much more in your posts. On the other hand, Instagram only allows short videos and photos. Links are not recommended there. If you share a post on Facebook with a link and try to cross- post to Instagram, it won’t look good. Instead of cross-posting your content in the same exact format on all your platforms, consider a different approach: cross-promoting. The difference is that you’ll still be sharing the same content but just formatting it differently for each platform. It’ll optimize your content so that you see better engagement and overall results. 4. Don’t be a robot: - Social media is all about being, well, social. It’s about engaging in conversations with other users and your audience. If you automate everything you do on social media, you miss out on the main point of social media. Instead of relying too much on automation, consider engaging as often as possible. You can start by offering real-time customer service, which is now expected rather than ideal. Your audience is reaching out to you online, but if you’re not answering, you’re hurting your brand reputation. Even if you build a bot for customer service, you still need to be there to give people a human being to assist them. Chatbots aren’t ideal. In fact, Rob Siefker, Senior Director of Zappos’ customer loyalty team, insists that artificial customer service will hurt the experience rather than help. Chatbots don’t have that essential human element in their programming, and customers want that. Engagement, in general, is key to making the most of social media. You want to see a return on your investment, and engagement is how you’ll get it. On Twitter, use direct replies to have 1-on-1 conversations with other users. On Facebook, ask questions and use images to increase engagement. Those are just two of the many ways you can build relationships with your audience. The important part to remember is: You don’t need to stop automating and scheduling content, but you do need to reserve plenty of time and resources for engaging with your audience in real-time. 5. Use direct messages for the right reasons: - Direct messages are often misused, and many brands think this feature isn’t worthwhile. They are often used for automated sales pitches and generic welcome messages, but what about using them for the right reasons? Use them for customer service. Facebook, Twitter, and other social media services allow for private messaging between brands and users. It’s an opportunity for businesses to interact with their audience in a safe environment without character limits and public exposure. Direct messaging can also make shopping easier. It not only allows for customer service inquiries but also what is often coined “conversational commerce” where your customers get quick and easy access to your business and its offerings. For example, Facebook bots make it easy for people to shop right from Facebook Messenger with one action. As long as you’re using direct messaging for the right reasons, it still has potential for your business. Use it to continue public interactions in a private setting, and take advantage of its sales potential. Problems And Opportunities in Handling Digital Resources: - The opportunities associated with digital learning are immense. Perhaps the most significant benefit of digital learning tools is the ability to personalize learning. Years ago, a teacher could only dream about having the ability to design a curriculum that would be ideally suited to the skills, deficits, and preferences of every single student in the class. Rather, teachers had to be content with teaching to the average—which often meant teaching to no one in particular and leaving many students to struggle with the material. But digital edtech tools make it possible for teachers to target instructional materials to each student. LMS systems can help with organization, data analytics can help with diagnosing student performance in a fine-grained way, and the wealth of digital resources means that teachers no longer need to re-invent the wheel for each activity. Teachers have long understood that collaborative learning increases not only student engagement but also improves learning outcomes. Digital tools such as Coggle serve as platforms that make it simple for students to brainstorm, research, organize, and present what they have learned. At the same time, digital tools are not without their challenges. The sad truth is that the research shows that edtech sometimes does not deliver on its promises. One problem is that the life cycle of digital tools is so short that it is nearly impossible for the research to keep up. The second problem is that there is a lot of money to be made in edtech, which means that the field is crowded with purveyors who may not be well-intentioned. Even when their motives are exemplary, they often overemphasize the tech aspect of edtech to the detriment of the “ed” part and devote far more resources to the technical details of their products than to its pedagogical rigor. Further, the proliferation of edtech has made it difficult for teachers to vet materials—something that was not even part of their job description when their only instructional materials were textbooks that, while perhaps dull, had at least been expertly vetted. The only thing that matches the promise of digital learning tools is their peril— educators and other stakeholders will need to tread carefully to ensure that their students have the best possible educational environment. Tools to check grammar, - importance of academic integrity. Grammar is the essence of language! With people adopting newer slangs to communicate and get closer to the rest of the world, the correct usage of grammar is being affected to an extent where researchers struggle to write effective academic content. Since, academic writing forms the basis of knowledge dissemination, it is imperative for researchers to formulate grammatically correct academic writing. To make this process easier, quicker, and error-free, there are several AI-based online grammar checker tools available. While there are over hundreds of such tools available online, it is crucial for researchers to use best grammar checker tools for testing scientific English. Importance of Using Best Grammar Checker Tools Most academic writing is objective, accurate, and structured. They also use a formal tone. Hence, using an online grammar checker tool to assess your grammar and spelling for submission to an academic journal, makes it easy to meet specific requirements for final publication. Therefore, there is a growing need for inspection tools that help enforce requirements such as appropriate language and improved grammar for each field of study, as well as academic journal style guides and word count limits. Furthermore, online grammar checker tools must provide accurate help with academic English writing, technical terminology, scientific expression, and publication readiness. Six of the Best Grammar Checker Tools for Researchers: - Recently, several online grammar checker tools have been launched to address advanced features for enhancing your manuscript. Here we will discuss 6 best language enhancement tools for academic and technical writing for authors: 1. Trinka AI Trinka AI is the world’s first grammar and language enhancement tool tailored for writing academic and technical papers. It was created with the intention of improving manuscripts for academic English usage and technical vocabulary and making them publication-ready. In addition, it stands out by working with authors and ensuring holistic language improvement beyond grammar and spelling checks. It adheres to academic style guides while suggesting corrections in your manuscript. Furthermore, it has custom-built features such as maintain academic tone, providing unbiased language, concept clarity, sentence structure, alternative word choice. It provides detailed explanations as to why is a correction suggested. Furthermore, it helps researchers in reducing word count by suggesting alternatives without changing the context of the matter. More importantly, it allows you to choose between the US and the UK style to make it easily accessible for researchers all over the world. Developed by a team of linguists, engineers, and data scientists its acts as a writing assistant to support all kinds of people in all kinds of communication, from academics to everyday conversations. 2. Grammarly Grammarly is a popular online grammar checking tool that can be used with Google Chrome, Firefox, and Microsoft Edge browsers. This is used to check grammar and spelling errors. There is an indicator in the lower right corner of the writing area, on clicking the indicator, it displays the number of errors and suggestions. One downside of Grammarly is that you have to switch to a text editor for proofing. Also, Grammarly can be upgraded to the paid version, Grammarly Premium, which is a service that detects plagiarism and provides citation suggestions. The free version of Grammarly gives you access to only basic features. 3. Ginger Ginger is another handy spelling and grammar checking online tool to improve your writing skills. It can be used on-board in the browser and provides a great user experience. Furthermore, it displays a small icon in the lower right corner of the WordPress post editor, compose area, including Gmail, Facebook, and more. It highlights detected errors as you type. This helps in tracking them easily. However, Ginger has several drawbacks, one of which is the need to switch from WordPress to a text editor. The hassle of having to start the Ginger editor separately by clicking on the icon for better proofing is time-consuming. 4. Hemingway Hemingway is available as a web-based text editor, so it doesn’t work directly within the WordPress post editor. However, you can use a free web-based editor to check your articles for readability, grammar, and spelling errors.  You can think of Hemingway as a style checker, not just a grammar checker. This is because it is a tool that helps you improve readability by displaying your text’s readability score and suggesting improvements. Hemingway is available through a paid desktop application for Windows and Mac and can be published directly from WordPress. 5. ProWriting Aid ProWriting Aid is a premium writing editor and grammar checker designed specifically for science bloggers, content writers, etc. This tool allows users to find and to correct grammatical and linguistic errors in an automated way. Currently, this tool work on both Windows and Mac, and is also compatible with writing software such as Google Docs and Scrivener. As mentioned earlier, ProWriting Aid can be used for a variety of writing purposes, but it is the field of fiction writing that it really shines in. 6. Typely Typely is a completely free spell checking tool that requires no sign-up. An online tool that is easy to use and provides the ability to effectively perform grammar and spell check to help you write in a professional way. It provides a report generation function. Additionally, it provides a service for simple language check through a functional design. Exclusive Strengths of 6 Best Online Grammar Checker Tools: - 1. Trinka AI – As the world’s first AI-based grammar and language improvement tool, it is the most suitable tool for writing thesis and academic writing. 2. Grammarly – You can check grammar and spelling errors when writing a post by installing it in your browser. 3. Ginger – A simple way to check grammar and spelling. 4. Hemingway – Not just a grammar checker, but a style checker. A tool that can improve readability, especially for novelists. 5. Pro Writing Aid – Useful for all types of writers, entrepreneurs, and bloggers. It’s a helpful tool for fictional writers and novelists. 6. Typely – A simple grammar and spell check tool that is completely free to use.