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Geek Speed Dating for Google Apps Marketplace

Welcome! You're here to find the app of your dreams.

There are many apps to choose from in the Marketplace. To add apps to your domain, you must be an administrator or be able to talk your administrator into adding them for you. You can find the steps for adding an app to your domain here.

We're going to explore available apps today. You'll share your app with others and you'll get new ideas too. Grab a notecard on your way in. The card will have a black number on it or a red letter. You'll use this notecard both in preparation for the dating rounds and the dating rounds themselves. Listen carefully.

Get Ready for your dates!

First, go to the Marketplace and seek out an app...the one you think you'll use the most or someone in your schools will use. Click here for the Google Apps Marketplace. Use the filters available at the side or do a search for education apps (add other search terms like "free" if you wish). If your number or letter is smaller or at the beginning of the alphabet start at the top of the list; if your number or letter is larger or at the end of the alphabet, start at the end of the list (keep clicking "Next" at the bottom of the list and the pages will expand. Just like a regular search, you'll get a general number of hits at the top right corner of the screen). If your letter or number is somewhere in the middle, start there in the list.

Explore. Make notes. Read reviews. Make some decisions. You'll have approximately 10 minutes to settle on one app you'd like to share and ultimately go back and explore further at a later time. Feel free to use resources outside of the Marketplace to make sure the app is as it's described. My friend, Rachel, likes to enter a search using quote marks and the work "sucks" to make sure a product doesn't. If I wanted to know more about the app called User Renamer I'd visit my favorite search engine and enter "user renamer sucks" in the search bar. Of course, I'm hopeful I don't get any hits because this app looks extremely useful.

On the side of your card with the number or letter on it record the name of the app, the price, and any other relevant information you want to tell your dates. Don't forget the obvious and not-so-obvious ways you and others can use this app so you can share that too. Your dates might have further ideas about how this app can be used.

Now for the fun part...

This idea was an origination of Mark Wagner from CUE. I've revised it a little.

If you're holding a red card. Stay put.

If you're holding a black card, you'll move when the timer goes off (every 2 minutes).

Be ready to explain your app and ways you, your staff and students might use it. You'll have 2 minutes to explain your app and 2 minutes to listen to your date.

At two minutes, thank your date and either move or hang tight and expect a new date. Make notes about the app you just heard about on your notecard. You'll see about nine different people and hear (hopefully) about nine different apps. Decide which ones are right for you and be ready to share them with others you meet and greet.