This course is coming to an end and I have just submitted Assignment 2 and will submit this Learning (B)log as my Assignment 3 now.
I have enjoyed the class (although it has been a struggle to find time sometimes with a full-time job and two kids) and hoping I can contribute to the world with my newfound knowledge.
Good luck to all my class mates!
I realized here when reading the material for this module that P2P file sharing was discussed here, and since I had included that without reading ahead in my "Assignment 1" I felt a bit sheepish.
Very interesting reading about thinking about the Internet as an Information Ecology in this module.
Also, realized I really like the iLectures, and hoping there could be more of those for us online students, makes the course richer to able to sit and listen to a lecture in between reading all the material on the monitor.
Choice 3: www.cln.org
This site is purely an educational portal linking to other websites with no author producing its own material. My annotations:
- No copyright diclaimer, no info about the author or cln.org on the bottom of the pages
- No dates of published or updated
- Almost 30% of all links came up with error 404, and some information on the links which worked is outdated
-Traffic rank: 17,5495
Will not choose this one for this exercise due to the missing information, not perceived as a current or trustworthy web site for information.
Choice 2: useit.com by Jakob Nielsen
This website discusses current issues on web usability, such as web site navigation, design (font size, lay out, color of links etc), how teenagers and seniors use the web and intranet usabilty to name a few. My annotations:
- Many other websites and blogs are linking or using this as a reference.
- Well-known author
- A high site rank: 8,945
Second favorite choice, but will not choose due to usability, Joe Barker's web site is simply laid out better and is easier on the eye (the overall look of the useit.com site is something a lot of people have commented negatively on too, although it is an excellent site!).
Choice 1: Site by Joe Barker, UC Berkeley Library Resources
This educational site, mainly set up for students enrolled at UC Berkeley, discusses the latest trends in search engines, directories and evaluating web pages. It has a great glossary of Internet terms and Web jargong. My annotations:
- Clear author, clear organisation
- "Page updated" information
- All links working to pages with information from the author, not to other sites (ie not just a portal)
- Other websites and universities are linking or using this as a reference
- Traffic rank: 1257
I choose this site for the task. I find it trustworthy and several other educational websites have used it as a reference or in their bibliography. All links are current and links to useful information. It is very relevant to Module 4 in our course, that and the fact that its primary users are students, like myself, is perhaps why I find it interesting. A well designed, relevant and functional website!
I have chosen what I, as a student of this course, believe were the best three sources/web page results from my search in the previous task:
1.Finding information on the Internet- a Tutorial, http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/FindInfo.html
by Joe Barker, UC Berkeley, Library resources
"This tutorial presents the substance of the Internet Workshops offered year-round by the Teaching Library at the University of California at Berkeley. The content on this site has been updated to reflect the latest trends in search engines, directories, and evaluating web pages. The title reflects our belief that there is a lot of great material on the Web - primary sources, specialized directories and databases, statistical information, educational sites on many levels, policy, opinion of all kinds, and so much more - and we have better tools for finding this great stuff." (Excerpt taken from site)
2. Jakob Nielsen on Usability and Web design, www.useit.com
by Dr. Jakob Nielsen, Nielsen Norman Group
3. Internet Guidebooks, www.cln.org/guidebooks.html, by Community Learning Networks
"Listed on this page are guidebooks and resources which can assist teachers to learn more about the Internet. Most of the resources on this page are for novices, but there are a some that even advanced users would find helpful. These resources have a technichal focus. They will not provide teachers with pedagogical information on how to use the Internet in their classrooms." (Excerpt taken from site)
For the task I used simple cut and paste commands, but to prepare for the Resource Project I also used Zotero, a Firefox extension that helps you manage research sources, although it probably wasn't essential for this task, but I enjoyed giving it a try.
Works cited:
Barker, Joe, UC Berkeley Library Resources. Finding information on the Internet - a Tutorial. March 9, 2007. April 14, 2007. http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/FindInfo.html
Nielsen, Jakob, Nielsen Norman Group. Jakob Nielsen on Usability and Web design. April 10, 2007. April 14, 2007. www.useit.com
CLN, Community Learning Network, Internet Guidebooks. April 14, 2007. www.cln.org/guidebooks.html
Taking the same key words "advanced internet users" as in the previous task:
1. the biggest number of hits relating to these key words would be accomplished by searching for 'advanced AND internet AND users' in Google, rather than one phrase, it gives me 110,000,000 search results!. An even larger hit list(2,640,000,000) can be created by typing 'advanced OR internet OR users' (not necessarily useful though).
2. sources relating to skills-based information on these key words could be searched as: +"advanced skills" +"internet users" which brings up 11,200 results. I could also search "advanced internet users" with a filter only to retrieve .org sites perhaps, which seems to bring up some useful sites(364 results) relating to skills in advanced internet usage.
3. If I would like information coming only from American university sources I would type in "advanced internet users" site:.edu (same as searching with a filter only allowing these sites to filter through). My search results are 278 for this search. If I only wanted results from Australian university sources, I'd type +advanced +internet +users site:.edu.au, key words not in quotes to give me a bit more choices.
I used Google for this task and my first hit for "advanced internet users" was:
Advanced Internet Users Tutorial-CIESE www.k12science.org/tutorials/advanced/
Then I used Dogpile MetaSearch (searching search engines like Google, Yahoo, Msn, About.com at one go) and came up with the same first hit as Google did.
I noticed that the same first hit search result came up in both search engines. The second one, Dogpile MetaSearch, eventhough searching 4 search engines at one time, brought up less search results than Google (16,800 in Google and 62 in Dogpile). I found the search results very similar, so it is hard to say which one gave me the most promising results (the key search words are very general) but I prefer the Metasearch since it gives me a less overwhelming amount of results.
The first 5 hits of both searches:
Results 1 - 10 of about 16,800 for "advanced internet users". (0.04 seconds)
| www.k12science.org/tutorials/advance |
| Msen Advanced Internet Users Links Page www.msen.com/1997/adv_links.html |
| All Search Engines 1 - 20 of 62 (About Results) | |
I have most of the programs suggested in this task already, except for Windows Media Player for Mac OS X, so I tried to download it several times without success. I did have a hard time thinking Windows would have a good time holding hands with my Mac before the download effort, but I hope that wasn't why it didn't work. I will look into this problem later and see what happened.
Update: Finally found out that the download did not work because my StuffItExpander wasn't the latest version. Downloaded the last version 11.0 and The Player finally worked! Phew..It just goes to show how important it is to have the most updated versions of programs, even when it comes to downloading other ones!
I use most of these programs(AdobeAcrobat, Shockwave, Flash, Quicktime) daily without actually thinking about it, they are such an essential part of how I read news, get updated, use websites and send and receive media.
This task is to set up a blog and take a screen shot of it, but since I am recording my learning log in a blog, I think this will not be necessary. I am using "Blogger" which I find is very user friendly and gives me the options I need.
Top 5 tips for a new blogger:
1. Content - what will you write about? Who will read it?
2. Design/Look/Feel- how do you want to be perceived? Simple/Complex?
3. Net etiquette - use it!
4. Update - don't let it be a "dead" space, will only make people not to check back again
5. Personalize - include information about you and an email address
In this task we were to upload our web page or learning log to my student web space in Oasis using FTP. I have already downloaded my page to the web space, but uploading using FTP proved to be a tricky task. I tried several times by using different applications, but all I got was error messages. Somewhat frustrated, I asked my husband, a Computer Engineer, to help me out, and even he did not manage to upload it (and with 18 years experience of computer programming and designing microchips we were quite surprised). Looking into the discussion groups at WebCT only confirmed I wasn't the only one with this problem though. After two nights of trying, I almost resorted to writing Cynthia an "I can not do it!" email, but tried Fetch as a last resort and suddenly I was in. I uploaded a less-linked version of my page and 4 only images, since I noticed the FTP connection was dodgy here too, and was probably going to time out before I had uploaded them all. I did it though! But next step was to view the page, which I assume has the url: http://www.student.curtin.edu.au/~13769831
Since I am not at the Campus(which I assume most students in this course aren't), it looks like I can not view it on my home computer. Yay. Not. I read all the posts from other students and it looks like I have to run VPN in order for me to see it. Now the VPN doesn't cooperate, and I will take a break before I start abusing my dear computer.
I have previously (without any difficulty) uploaded pages to other FTP sites several times, so I will leave this task now, since I have to get to other tasks before I get too far behind in my course schedule.
On my web page I have use some clip art from Microsoft Clip Art gallery, which is alright since the images are fine to be used for personal or school assignments, which it is. For my test html pages about Liquorice I have used a few images which I would have had to get permission for under the current copyright law. On my blog I have included screen shots of other web pages, which all would need be cleared for permission under the law today since most of the sites are under copyright by the owners.
Since I am using these images and screen shots in a non-commercial and educational purpose and haven't posted them in a misleading or negative way, I am hoping I will not get into trouble.
I could not use the Curtin logo on top of my web page for an assignment unless I had first obtained the permission from the University first. The requests need to be written and include the purpose of the use of the logo, the proposed format of the use of the logo and the date(s) or periods when the logo will be used and sent to the "Executive Director of Corporate Communications".
5 most important rules for writing online
Web readers are scanning a web page and picking up headlines, captions, and the first words of every paragraph, rather than read it word-by-word (like they would read a paper). Find a focus on your content, and keep your pages concise, simple and avoid jargon.
1. Use the inverted pyramid structure; outline your main idea first and follow with your paragraphs which will explain and support the idea
2. Write short sentences and paragraphs - max 20 words in a sentence, and max 6 sentences in a paragraph.)
3. Make it easy to read/scan your text:
Use bold headings with keywords.
Use intendented lists and bulleted lists if appropriate
4. Omit all redundant information, and do not repeat yourself in the text.
5. Include links if the user would like to read more about a specific topic rather than include all information on your page.
I enjoyed working with the Volcano Web exercise and building a small website with the skills learnt from the lessons. Sometimes, being a well versed internet site surfer with high standards for web sites, I found it hard not having the skills to do what I wanted to do, due to my limited HTML coding knowledge (I used Textedit and code only, not a WYSIWYG). One thing in particular that I first found great was the (PRE)preformatting tags, which later turned out to be a bit of a wild card, it was almost easier to go back and work on each paragraph with tags, more control that way. When I used the (PRE) tags the text was formatted exactly as in your window, which is not exactly what you wanted when it comes to type face etc. I can see it being useful with statistics and charts though.
Useful experience for me, eventhough my website
ended up looking a little "homemade".
http://webct.curtin.edu.au/305033_a/student_pres/Group50/liqindex.html
IRC, Internet Relay chat, is a basically a large multi-user live chat facility which enables users in different parts of the world to communicate with each other in special interest forums. Not being a user of chat services, I would think IRC is more used for meeting a bunch of people online with the same interests compared to ICQ or MSN which perhaps are used more for chatting with existing friends?
I tried EZTalk IRC, and went into the only chat room that didn't seemed to be an Adult room or Married-n-Flirting (it wasn't Granny's Knitting room, but similar) and had two people ask me a question and both left before I even had time to type an answer! Youngsters of today..When I finally managed to type an answer I realized to late I had selected a member by mistake and "whispered" something to only him. Left quickly. Needless to say, I do not think I will be a frequent member of these services, too busy to even maintain my current friends.. and a bit too old too perhaps:)?
I thought this task was going to be simple, entering the ICQ site and searching for "advanced netstudies" as a nickname. Easy Peasy. Not.
What are the pros and cons of email lists versus discussion boards?
Email lists
Pros: More personal, more related to subject matter with a group that have all agreed to sign up on the particular list. More respect between members.
Cons: Knowledge is limited, you don't get the same diversified group of people sharing their knowledge. Risk of members emailing group with unimportant information thus disturbing them, a sense of abusing the closed members group.
Discussion Groups
Pros: Anyone can join, larger breadth of people from different background, all with the subject in common. Share of experiences and knowledge is larger. You can be more open about your opinions since one can be posting under a nickname.
Cons: People might be more inclined to "speak their minds" since under a nickname, could be offending to some. Can sometimes lead to a discussion away from the subject matter, distracting for people who entered to discuss the particular interest.
Are there certain kinds of communication or purposes more suited to one than the other?
Email lists: Group of 3-40 members perhaps. Department within a workplace or university or any smaller cultural society with a specific interest. Subject matters which will be of interest to the members, not regarded as "junk". Could be important announcements.
Discussion groups: Groups of people who choose themselves when to be involved in the group discussions, perhaps less time restricted material than that on a email list.
Traceroute/Ping tools
Tracing route from CentralOps.net to curtin.edu.au [134.7.179.10]...
I pinged the webct site from my computer and compared the time with the time taken to ping from the net tools site.
Wictorias-iBook-G4:~ wictoria$ ping curtin.edu.au
PING curtin.edu.au (134.7.134.47): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 134.7.134.47: icmp_seq=2 ttl=240 time=150.286 ms
It took about 150ms from my computer in Auckland compared to the 246ms from the CentralOps.net, which most probably is a computer in the US, hence the longer time it took to ping Australia.
Tracing route from my computer to curtin.edu.au:
traceroute to curtin.edu.au (134.7.134.47), 64 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1) 3.456 ms 7.494 ms 2.080 ms
2 lo2.akl-grafton-bba2.ihug.net (203.109.128.167) 52.248 ms 50.074 ms 47.483 ms
3 gi1-1.akl-grafton-bdr2.ihug.net (203.109.130.110) 54.353 ms 52.665 ms 54.853 ms
4 gi2-10.akl-grafton-bdr1.ihug.net (203.109.130.50) 53.071 ms 54.067 ms 52.745 ms
5 ip-static-202-147-45-73.asianetcom.net (202.147.45.73) 52.677 ms 50.714 ms 53.680 ms
6 ge-1-2-0-0.gw4.akl1.asianetcom.net (202.147.55.222) 52.754 ms 51.109 ms 49.422 ms
7 po4-0.cr2.syd1.asianetcom.net (202.147.55.254) 74.873 ms 72.809 ms 85.966 ms
8 po12-2.gw2.syd1.asianetcom.net (202.147.40.126) 75.607 ms 83.015 ms 88.417 ms
9 fe-2-3-0-0.gw1.per1.asianetcom.net (202.147.42.50) 137.837 ms 140.827 ms 137.160 ms
10 aarnet.ix.waia.asn.au (198.32.212.7) 147.212 ms 138.835 ms 142.133 ms
11 ge-1-0-3.bb1.a.per.aarnet.net.au (202.158.198.1) 140.112 ms 135.654 ms 217.257 ms
12 gigabitethernet0.er1.curtin.cpe.aarnet.net.au (202.158.198.178) 139.310 ms 139.943 ms 143.053 ms
13 gw1.er1.curtin.cpe.aarnet.net.au (202.158.198.186) 138.453 ms 145.965 ms 141.777 ms
14 te2-4.b309-cr.net.curtin.edu.au (134.7.250.18) 143.015 ms 141.085 ms 139.712 ms
15 te1-1.b309-sr.net.curtin.edu.au (134.7.248.65) 141.805 ms 143.119 ms 141.142 ms
16 prodweb2.curtin.edu.au (134.7.134.47) 136.277 ms 136.693 ms 138.971 ms
There are 16 ‘hops’ from my computer in New Zealand to curtin.edu.au (compared to 19 from the CentralOps in the US).
Observation: The ping (round trip time) is dependent on the distance between the computers, but the number of hops (between routers or computers) seems less dependant on distance.I have created this blog to discuss, post and ponder about topics related to my online course, NET11, which I am currently undertaking at Curtin University of Technology in Australia. I hope it will make sense to anyone entering this blog, but if not, I rest assure it will to my classmates anyway.
Feel free to post comments!
