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Ultimate Drill Book
Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2017 6:34 pm
by bis4brass
My staff and I, while watching our band struggle to put together their dot books, were talking about the possibility of using something like ultimate drill book. Expensive but maybe worth it.
This is of course only available with Pyware.
I wonder if there is another similar option that is compatible with Envision, or if any compatibility is planned in the future?
Re: Ultimate Drill Book
Posted: Fri Aug 04, 2017 12:06 am
by William
Hi bis4brass,
Ultimate Drill Book does something fairly unique so unfortunately I don't think there are any alternatives to exactly what they do. We would love to be included in their work so if you pass an email on to them requesting as such I'm sure it would go a long way.
That being said, we do work with DrillBook Next, which is a wonderful mobile app that allows you to download the drill to your phone and view it on the fly.
As far as physical dot books are concerned, I am very curious about the current state of the system. Do you know of a lot of groups who still use physical dot books and printed charts? Or is the big trend to move everything to mobile? I'd really like your insight.
Have a great day!
Re: Ultimate Drill Book
Posted: Fri Aug 04, 2017 12:55 pm
by bis4brass
I was tempted to try going with Drill Book Next instead of physical dot books this season. We may still pilot it with a few kids.
The positives are that kids will never forget their phone, while dot books aren't always a priority. It is quicker and doesn't not require the set up time with the handwritten dot books (which is why UDB appeals). Of course there is the fact that students can see animation right there, and a picture.
Now, the drawbacks: Not every student owns a smart phone. Connectivity may be an issue. What if we can't get wifi and students A, B, and C are out of data? You are limited to the information default on the app. I want my students to put step size on their sheet. I would love, love, love if this were an option to put on the printed dot sheets in envision. And they need to write down counts for choreography, direction of dress, horn moves...where does that go in the app? I also think it's quicker to flip through a physical dot book than a 3x5 note book than to navigate the app on a touch screen. Also, not all students can be trusted to stay on task on only use the phone for it's intended purpose, although that's less of a concern.
I'm pretty sure most groups will continue to use physical dot books until the apps are improved and have more flexibility, but that's just my feeling. I don't see a huge trend to move to all digital. That being said, I may leave my printed charts on the ground when I go up in the scaffolding this year and use my iPad and Apple Pencil with PDFs.
Keep up the good work. This program gets better and better. Quite intuitive, especially compared to the alternative. I have a nice little list of features I'd like to see, and I'll post that eventually. Honestly, the best part of Envision is the access to you that users have in this forum. I hope that feature is here to stay.
Ryan
Re: Ultimate Drill Book
Posted: Thu Aug 10, 2017 12:22 am
by William
Thank you bis4brass, that is exactly the kind of answer that I was looking for. Thoughtful and concise. We are interested in the whole end-to-end drill writing to teaching experience. We believe that we have opportunities to grow in the printout/dot sheet end of the process so this answer will help guide that development.