We’ve got to admit that we’re pretty excited about the iPod Touch as a cheap and accessible way to prototype use of the iPhone in higher ed, and we’re increasingly interested in the Touch as a solution in itself.

To coincide with its appearance at several Apple Stores today, Apple released an 85-page PDF guide that outlines many of the Touch’s basic features. While there are some glaring (and frankly nonsensical) omissions—why no Mail app? why no ability to add events directly to the calendar?—we’ve also seen some really interesting additions that don’t (yet!) appear on the iPhone.

From an educational standpoint, we’re really excited by the Touch’s support for multiple languages and multiple keyboard layouts. According to the Touch page on Apple’s site, the Touch features

• International keyboard support for English [including several input variants, ed.], UK English, French, German, Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Polish, and Portuguese
• Dictionary support for English, UK English, French, and German

This should make the Touch more at home in a wider range of university applications and suggests that it might be more nimble for data input (surely they’ll release the same notes app that works on the iPhone!?). We imagine that the software on these devices will get more uniform over time, but in the meantime, there may some interesting applications for this snappy little iPod…