The following links take you to sites that provide software that is commonly used in CCU and other distance learning courses.  You will especially want to be sure that your system has Adobe Acrobat Reader and Flash Player installed.

Adobe

http://www.adobe.com

Adobe Acrobat Reader for PDF Files

Flash Player for Flash Content

Real Media

http://www.real.com/

Real Player for some MP3 and video content

Apple

http://www.apple.com

Quicktime – media player for video and audio

iTunes – for listening to and podcasting some course content

Microsoft Office

CCU has a site license for Microsoft Office products that allows students to pay a minimal charge for an install disk, or to borrow one from the CCU library for free and install it on their computers.  Users can choose either Office 2003 or 2007 and also have access to Windows XP or Vista as part of this license.  The Office install is available for either PC or Mac versions.  This is a low cost way to get a high quality office suite installed on your system.

For further information contact the IT Helpdesk for licensing and installation support.

Open Office

http://www.openoffice.org

Should you choose to not use the CCU Microsoft site license, you will need some way of creating papers and assignments, and then submitting them.  Open office provides an open-source alternative that is compatible (mostly) with the products in Microsoft Office.

Mozilla Firefox

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

This web browser is a free download, is compatible with Moodle, is much less intrusive than Internet Explorer, and provides a wide variety of plug ins for user preferences.

Google Earth

http://earth.google.com/

You do have to have enough system power to run Google Earth, but if you do, install it.  For courses like Bible Lands and Lifeways it lets you see the layout of the land from multiple perspectives.  In Bible courses you can find locations described in Acts or the Gospels, or the prophets.  You can also use it to follow the action in history courses.  You can create your own push-pin locations (like your house).  It’s a great tool for visualizing the lay of the land.

AVG Antivirus Software (Free)

http://www.avg.com/

While the AVG software is free for home computers (not business), it is not “cheap” software.  It provides extremely powerful protection for your system, without a high financial outlay.

Online Bible (Free)

http://www.onlinebible.com/

Don’t let the name fool you.  This is a fully searchable electronic Bible that you install on your computer and can use whether on the internet or not.  Make sure that you first install the Starters Pack.  Then you can select from a wide variety of other resources to add to your research tools.  Dan Dyke is the Online Bible guru on campus, if you have major questions about installing or using it.  The Introduction to Biblical Language Tools course utilizes this software to introduce students to exegetical word study skills.