UNOIT

UNOIT by developer Diethard Seiferth is the best flashcard app I’ve ever come across. It’s fully customisable, giving you full control over flashcard lesson creations.

Mission Accomplished

If you are like me and have downloaded flashcard apps in the past, you’ll have noticed that the apps usually have set questions. This is fine of course for people who want a set amount of questions to learn, who then delete the app when all questions have been learnt. However, what about people who want to create flashcard lessons? Well, this is where UNOIT really shines as you can create your very own lessons.

I’m learning the Thai language at the moment, so want to practise remembering specific words that I find difficult to recall. No problem with UNOIT as I can tailor flashcards for specific vocabulary that I have trouble remembering.

You can create unlimited learning lessons and batch them into specific lesson categories.

A really neat feature of this app is that the flashcards are shown a set number of times, so you don’t have old flashcards popping up that you’ve already learnt. Internal algorithms determine if a card is to be shown and is aware of whether a flashcard is known or not.

Another feature is the ability to add locations on a map at a point where you wish a flashcard to pop up. Let’s say you were travelling around Europe for example and wanted basic vocabulary to get by; no problem as you can set a specific lesson group to pop up when you arrive at a location to remind you of the basic vocabulary to get around with.

When a question pops up it allows you time to think of the answer. You then press the question mark button and inform UNOIT if you knew the right answer or not by ticking on the check mark or cross buttons. This way it learns what you are actually remembering and tailors how many times the flashcard needs to pop up to make it stick in your mind.

There are encouraging remarks that pop up such as ‘Great!’ and ‘Wow!’ or even ‘Excellent!’ and a short soundbite when you are close to remembering the flashcard 100%. There is even a fun prize giving ceremony on a podium when you’ve remembered the complete lesson. I like these added quirks as it makes the app fun to use.

Of course, you then have the option of messaging or emailing friends about your achievement. This way, if you are working as a team on increasing knowledge, for example on revising for a science quiz if you were a student, you could give each other encouragement by showing that you’ve taken action.

The app is was very quick to download as it is very compact size at only 6.5 MB. This is mainly because you add the flashcard content and is not a batch of pre-made flashcards that you don’t want. You are in control as to the content and what shape you want the the lesson structure to take.

This app is what I’d call an ‘ever-green app’ in that it doesn’t date. If you create a flashcard lesson and learn the answers off by heart, simply create new fresh lessons. You can create lessons for memorisation for yourself or for friends or even your employees if you have a small business.

A really neat thing about UNOIT is that when you initially open up the app there are question cards that actually teach you how to use the app. When you want to delete a lesson group, simply click on ‘Edit’ in the lesson category screen and then delete it, ready for fresh lesson creations to take their place.

You can tweet a lesson you make up or send it via email or Dropbox.

You can import lessons in CSV format. This means that you can share lessons with friends using UNOIT. To load up a lesson from Dropbox or email they first have to be in UTF-8 Unicode format with the file extension ‘.UNOIT’ with answers separated by tabs. The instructions are present in the information tab within the app. There is also a link to the homepage and FAQs if further advice is required.

Just think, if you were, for example, a teacher, you could easily get together with other teachers in your department and share educational quizzes. There really is plenty of scope for working as a team with this app to produce a pool of information to share.

To change the font size on a question card you simply double tap the card and the font will automatically change size and single tap it to bring the font size back down. To backup a lesson you simply export the lesson from the lesson view.

Mission Accomplished

To sum up this very useful app I’d say that the main strength UNOIT has is that it’s fully customisable and you can create as many flashcard lessons as you desire. The app is a breeze to use and the time points feature is a really neat idea, enabling you to grade how well you are remembering each lesson. This app really wins hands down for me when compared to other apps with fixed lessons and short shelf lives. I will certainly keep this app on my device permanently as I can think of many uses for it.

Room to improve

I certainly couldn’t find anything wrong with the app so I can only suggest enhancements to UNOIT. My suggestion as a future upgrade for the developer would be to provide a website area for users to post pre-made lessons up for other people to use and download. A kind of depository for people sharing lessons with the general public. This way people learning Spanish could share lessons, science fans could challenge others to quizzes and there would also be general knowledge quizzes to keep people entertained on a long journey readily available. Perhaps the developer could even post up some pre-made lessons on the developer website for people to have fun with. Perhaps a few off-beat lesson for people to have fun with at parties? Such as fun trivia questions etc.

Conclusion

A very useful app which lets you have full control over flashcard creation with an excellent learning time control feature. Great value for money and an app that will not age compared to other set flashcard apps. UNOIT gives you total freedom on lesson creations. The time and location features within the app makes this app unique. Fantastic app!