If you have recently been studying a course on OpenLearn you might have noticed the link to "Knowledge Maps" at the top left. This takes you to a page with resources for a special version of the Compendium software adapted for OpenLearn. The Compendium-OpenLearn software is explained more fully at http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/view.php?name=KM. I've been becoming increasingly interested in these sorts of mind mapping programs in the last few months and have found that it has many uses not just for your studies but can be used when you are trying to visualise ideas, or work out structures that help solve problems.

After the relative ease of getting a local Moodle installation going on Kubuntu, is it possible to shrink this whole situation so we can get a few Moodle powered OpenLearn courses onto the Asus EEE PC and then take them with us wherever we go? It could be very handy to those who would like to learn but don't want to take a full sized laptop with them or even to those who are on the other side of education, the people who write the courses and would like the convenience of being able to work on them while out and about.

You might find your self in the situation where you have a bit of time to spare, but sadly with an unreliable, absent or just very expensive internet connection. This might happen if you are travelling, maybe on a long distance flight, or staying somewhere without internet facilities. Well now you could be using that time to pick up some new knowledge, maybe taking a course on a subject that has always interested you, or learning new skills to enhance your career. I'm not talking about one of those cheap CD-ROMs you see in computer shops promising to teach you vast amounts of knowledge, but are often disappointing, instead I'm talking about genuine Open University materials that can be loaded onto your computer absolutely free and used interactively when your are offline.