Barnes & Noble(NYSE:BKS) has announced an August release for their new NOOKstudy software package. Following in their recent tradition of following up Amazon’s original moves with some further refinement, it appears we’re looking at a few old favorites with a couple new twists. The Kindle DX has proven to be slightly less than ready for big-time school exposure so far, which leaves the field open to the nook and its related software for the time being.
As anybody might expect, looking at software for students, there will be highlighting, annotation, and in-text note-taking for follow-ups. In addition, annotations and notes in general will be tagged for easy searching and full-text searching will be, obviously, much faster than the existing search feature native to the nook device. There also appears to be some browser integration to allow for fast look-up of formulas and definitions as you read. Users will be able to open two texts at once for simultaneous reading/reference on the same screen, a tabbed browser will allow multiple documents to be open for use at any given time, and students will likely find the ability to organize documents based on class and topic quite helpful.
This all comes at the same time as an announcement of integration of the Barnes & Noble eBook Store with the ever-popular Blackboard educational software, which will allow students to download any available texts directly from a list of what is required for their classes. Basically, B&N is hoping to take the college scene by storm and they seem to have a good idea of how to go about it.
Yes, well, I have the DX and the complete lack of any form of word processing on the unit is questionable as a decision.