Our very own David Rose (whom you met yesterday) has been hard at work researching and vetting (read: playing with) mobile apps for integration into our courses. You know, that whole “harnessing technology” thing we like to talk about. The first fruits of his efforts are available in an updated ME102: Mechanics I, and the improvements are rolling out to the iTunes U version of this course as well.

For this intro engineering course, we’re roping in Autodesk^® ForceEffect™ by Autodesk, Inc., available free in both Android and iOS flavors.

According to the app links, Autodesk ForceEffect is “a mobile engineering app for simulating design concepts…helping you to quickly and easily simulate design options during the concept phase to determine the viability of a design.“ That is, you can construct objects, apply forces, calculate vectors, and do other assorted engineering stuff.

The app and a couple problems we put together are listed in ME102 as an “optional” resource type, (see the pic), but you’ll see them when working through Unit 1, too.

And there’s more where this came from! In the coming weeks and months, we’ll add more apps (free and paid, covering Android and iOS platforms) to our courses as optional components.

Have you been using any great apps to supplement or support your online studies? Let David know!