Portable teachMe

Since you get to spend most of your daily time in front of the computer, it’s a good idea to make most out of it. For instance, small desktop utilities help with different types of tasks, including learning. In this regard, Portable teachMe helps you create custom dictionaries, or use the built-in presets to learn new words through cool desktop flashcards.

As the name clearly states, this is the edition of teachMe which skips you the effort of going through a setup process. This is particularly handy if you use different computers too often, but you also want to learn at least the basics of a subject of interest. Registry entries remain intact during the whole operation, but .NET Framework needs to be installed for the program to function.

Three flashcards show up on the desktop on launch, but you can take the time to go through configurations to either set up a new dictionary, or edit existing ones. It comes with a built-in database editor in which you can load existing definitions from CSV files if you don’t want to spend the time to manually add each entry with its own definition.

Customization is an important options here, so there’s no particular type of subject you get to learn, but rather anything of interest through this method. Desktop flashcards show the initial word at first, and reveal the definition after a given amount of time, just to see if you managed to learn a thing or two.

Time options are found in the general configuration panel, including rotation of words to save some time. You can rate words directly inside desktop flashcards. Word priority also plays an important role, and the higher the value, the more often a word shows up in queue.

All this time the application quietly sits in the tray area. Hotkeys can be configured for more comfort, and you can even specify the number of flashcards to use, with a maximum of five. A turbo mode is toggled at the press of a button, doing the same thing, but a lot faster.

Portable teachMe is a practical little utility which helps you learn different definitions of interest while working on other projects. It neatly blends with your desktop, while the automatic time to refresh words and reveal definitions minimizes your effort, thus helping concentrate.