Mercer CSC125 - Rule's Class

Win a free Dropbox account for Life!

2011-10-06T12:19:00.001-04:00

AppSumo is running a contest through October 13th - the winner gets a free 50gig Dropbox account for life.

If you've never heard of Dropbox, it is a well-done way of storing files online. You can access them through a webpage, or if you install the software on your machine you can also access them on a local folder (which is kept synced up). Folders can be shared as well.

CLICK HERE to try to win this from AppSumo.

Fall 2011 Update

2011-08-12T14:35:00.001-04:00

As I will not be teaching CSC125 at Mercer this fall, this blog will not be updated.

If you are still getting updates from this blog and would like to keep your inbox from getting clogged up with reminders of your past college [mis]adventures, you should see an unsubscribe link below.

If you'd like to keep up with that crazy ol' CS guy who really was an odd duck, here are a few avenues:

http://www.MacMusicGuy.com - music
http://www.MaconMacGuy.com - the occasional computer 7 tech article
http://TomRule.blogspot.com - watch for news about a new album I'm working on, including lo-budget vids and pix.
http://www.last.fm/music/Tom+Rule - more music!
http://www.GovAccessMusic.com - good if your are REALLY bored, or are running a government access or public access cable TV station.

Stay Sane!

Who says Math can't be pretty?

2011-05-05T09:39:00.000-04:00

Something to take a break with as Finals wind down!

These articles have several shots of art generated using Fractals.

Factal Art from the Xaos Zoomer

Chaoscope Factals

Flame Factals continue to dazzle

Flame Fractals take you through the wormhole

10 Cool Office Add-ins

2011-05-05T09:34:00.000-04:00

Ran across an article about 10 very cool add-ins you can throw into your Office install that add interesting capabilities to Office. The article has the complete links.
The Gallery Version - screenshots
The Blog article version

1: Everything - You type in a search string, and Everything displays a list of matching files and folders. The response is almost instantaneous for normal systems.

2. E-mail Follow-up - lets you set a response time when you create the email; if the recipient hasn’t responded by the allotted response time, this nifty little add-in reminds you that you’re still waiting on a response.

3. More Add-in lets you quickly and easily hide Word text by creating collapsible sections. Anyone who creates long documents comprising the same blocks of text will find this add-in useful.

4. FreeFileViewer lets you view a number of formats so you need only one viewer. Using FreeFileViewer, you can read a PDF, a Word document, an Excel spreadsheet, and more. You can even play music files.

5. ASAP Utilities - solutions are easier to find and implement. If you ever find yourself thinking, I know Excel can do this, but how?, turn to ASAP Utilities.

6. Proposal Pack Wizard - Try this Word add-in if you manage large business documents, such as proposals, contracts, quotes, grants, and bids. Using merge technology, Proposal Pack Wizard lets you quickly assemble documents.

7. VisualBee - lets you enhance an existing presentation. When you run VisualBee, it analyses the presentation’s text and structure and tries to improve what you’ve done on your own

8. iSpring Pro converts a PowerPoint presentation into an online Flash presentation

9. Pop-up Excel Calendar lets you insert and configure a datepicker control without writing code.

10. Fuzzy Duplicate Finder - helps you find all those fuzzy duplicates — those mistakes that don’t always show up as mistakes. It’ll also find typos and misspelled words in your Excel workbooks and help you handle what it finds.

No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud - Care or Not?

2011-04-10T22:21:00.000-04:00

Who couldn’t love the idea of the new Amazon Cloud Drive? You get at least 5GBs of free cloud-based storage, and its trivial to get 20GBs of free storage on Amazon Cloud Drive. Used in concert with the Amazon Cloud Player you get a fine cloud-based music player that can be used either from a Web browser or on Android tablets with the Amazon MP3 App. The new Amazon consumer cloud service also works well. It’s just too bad that you have to give up all privacy to use it.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/networking/no-privacy-on-amazon-8217s-cloud-drive/882

Do you care about this?

SHOULD you?

News from the Missed April 5 class

2011-04-05T23:22:00.000-04:00

Apologies for not giving you advance notice about class today. I live on a deadend street - and the end of the street was blocked with downed powerlines and a 75 foot downed tree. The tree was cleared out just after noon - power was not restored until after 4 pm.

It has obviously been an "interesting" day! I hope yours has been more routine than mine!

The syllabus says this:
April 7 DEADLINE: Capstone DB 2,3, myITlab Ch 3&4

April 12 Cover: WP Intro, WP1, WP2

Because we need to go over the concepts of the capstones in class together (especially the report designer and calculated fields), I'm going to change the deadline FOR THE CAPSTONES ONLY to next Tuesday night (April 12). That is going to collide a bit with the Word Processing stuff, but I don't see that as a major issue.

So the myITlab Access tests (chapters 3 & 4) are still due by Thursday night, 11:59 pm.
The last 2 Capstones are now due by next Tuesday, April 12, 11:59 pm.

Facebook Firing upheld in Court

2011-03-28T21:50:00.000-04:00

Original article here

This ties in with what I mentioned the other day about nothing online being private. 2 workers at a Mazda dealership lost their jobs - even though they had an exemplary work record -because of several comments posted on Facebook.

"Postings that employer staffed by "crooks” and “hosed customers” justified terminations
In what some are calling a first in Canada, the British Columbia Labour Relations Board has upheld the dismissal of two employees for Facebook posts about their employer."

Be careful!

Access Capstone 1, "What's a Network good for" grades

2011-03-25T10:17:00.001-04:00

Those grades have been posted. Remember to click on the grade in myITlab custom view to see any notes (there won't be a note if you earned a 4/4).

A COMMON ERROR - learn from this before diving into Capstone 2 & 3!

In the filtering (the thing you did before taking the screenshot) you should have been able to figure out what you should see BEFORE doing anything (i.e. you could manually pick out the warranty items before 1/15/2008 that had NOT been completed). From there it's a matter of figuring out exaclty how to get those results.

It's a very similar process to any puzzle-type of game (video or otherwise). You KNOW there is a solution to get past the obstacle - you just have to find it. In this case you should be able to see the destination (that there should be 5 results) - you keep playing with it until you find the solution.

THE OTHER TWO CAPSTONES HAVE SIMILAR SITUATIONS. Do not assume that your filter or query is correct just because it ran. Use your common sense and doublecheck your result!

...and please - if something doesn't make sense - ask questions!

Miscellaneous Tidbits from the Web

2011-03-24T12:23:00.000-04:00

The Nintendo 3DS - a close look at it. Fascinating that they've figured out a a way to do a 3D image WITHOUT the funky glasses.
Tablet Computing - i.e. tbhe Ipad - has been around a while. See a "tablet" from the 1800s!
Likewise, teh mouse, which dates back from long before anyone actually made one that was usable. See the early designs here.
Quibids: Here's Clark Howard's opinion: Penny auctions nothing more than an illegal game of chance

See you next week!

Alice presentation schedule

2011-03-23T09:05:00.000-04:00

Alice presentation schedule has been updated with the latest list. Go check it out!

If you haven't signed up for a date, DO IT NOW! (The last date - Apr 28 - is full)

Excel Capstone has been graded.

2011-03-18T10:19:00.000-04:00

The second excel capstone has been graded. Remember to click on the link in the gradebook to see my comments.

A common error: question #12 asked you to type "-->" into a cell, where you would get an error - and then to figure out how **I** made it work.

What you do is to precede --> with a single quote, thusly:
'-->
which forces Excel to treat anything following as text.

------
...and a word of advice:

Several people apparently didn't take notes when I walked through the capstone in class, and it was very apparent. Everything you were required to do was gone over in class or was covered in the myITlab training.....and no one asked any questions, stated that things weren't clear, or that they didn't understand.

Don't make the same mistake with Access. You have a variety of ways to contact me - use them if things don't make sense? Ask in class [hopefully there are no more surprise doctor's visits in my life this semester!] If I hear nothing then I can safely assume that all is well.

CSC125 - NO CLASS THURSDAY 3/17

2011-03-16T12:09:00.000-04:00

I'm crossposting this into myITlab, so you may get this twice. I have a family thing to take care of (involving doctors) so class WILL NOT MEET this Thursday March 17.

Here's your to-do list instead:

1)
Sign up for a day to present your Alice project by filling out this form. There area limited number of slots each day, and they go first come, first served. If you are working with a partner, ONLY ONE of you needs to fill this out.

Athletes - check your schedule to make sure there are no conflicts (if it is possible to know that this far ahead!).

Web Form Generator

Just in case, here's the direct link: http://www.formstack.com/forms/?744550-IvLDK4YJEh

2)
Start going through the Database training in myITlab - there's a deadline next week!

3)
I've added a new assignment in the Mini-Projects folder. Deadline is next Tuesday BEFORE CLASS (i.e. 9:25 AM).

Do some research online.

Find FIVE things computer networks are good for &/or allow you to do, Express this IN YOUR OWN WORDS - NO copy/pasting allowed!

Type these up in a Word doc - make sure your name is in there as well - and submit it to the dropbox by the deadline.

Post spring break note.....

2011-03-14T14:19:00.000-04:00

I had planned on recording something and posting the material online to cover the day we took off. Unfortunately a ton of other projects got in the way, so we'll just cover 2 days worth of material in class this Tuesday.

For the same reason the second Excel capstone didn't get graded - hey, it was MY spring break as well! I'm hoping to get a dent in them this evening.

Anyone else thankful for coffee in the mornings?

CSC125: Thursday March 3

2011-03-02T22:02:00.000-05:00

Class will not meet today.

I will be posting online what I would have covered in class - it will introduce databases and such. MAKE SURE you watch it with your brain engaged before we come back.

Have a relaxing Spring Break!

Internet? What's the Internet?

2011-02-08T14:47:00.000-05:00

Just a quick reminder that the internet was not always in everyone's mindspace - here's a video from 1994. When this aired the World Wide Web was only 2 years old. [How old were you?]

Friday Colloquium: All about Google (It's more than just a search engine)

2011-02-02T11:15:00.000-05:00

This should be doubly interesting because they will be using a new online presentation tool called PREZI [Click to view "Why you should move beyond slides""].

Remember that to get credit you have to sign in AND fill out the review form. I'd suggest filling it out right then and turning it in at the CSC office.

All About Google

Bob Allen, David Cameron, Laurie White, and friends

Sure Google can help you search the Internet, but there's so much more!

This talk will provide a quick overview of many Google technologies with some slightly more in-depth examples. Discover how to dynamically generate charts, graphs, and maps for WWW pages, get a permanent phone number, and search the WWW using pictures.

Come see how much Google has to offer and how easy it is to use! You'll also get a preview of Google's biggest conference of the year, Google I/O.

Friday, February 4, 2011

10:00 AM

Room 204, Computer Science Building

Refreshments Will Be Served

Useful thing schedule posted

2011-01-20T15:02:00.001-05:00

The schedule is at
http://csc125.blogspot.com/p/useful-thing-sked.html

If you haven't signed up, you need to let me know in class what slot you'd like. First come, first served!

Also, if you have a site you'd like to "reserve", email my Mercer account with the site and I'll add it to the reserved list.

Have a weekend!

good open source software (as in FREE)

2011-01-18T12:14:00.000-05:00

This article has a list plus a short description - and links! - to some software that you may find useful. Windows only in the article.

"Open source is not ideal for every situation, but you will be surprised how many times you will find an open source solution superior to its proprietary cousins."

The article (windows) @ Techrepublic

Good source for Mac open soruce software: Open Source Mac

A Bit o' computer history.......

2011-01-17T07:38:00.000-05:00

The Computer History museum opened an exhibit - the TechRepublic article is here - that shows some early computing machines.

CSC125 To-Do list

2011-01-13T12:18:00.000-05:00

Pick up a myItlab Office 2007 code
Run the "Home Diagnostic" test and make any changes it tells you to make
Install the myITlab files. (http://www.myitalb.com for both of these steps)
"Enroll" (there's a button that says this) in our class: Class Code CRSABAL-221684. Make sure the class is being taught by me and Dr. Andy Pounds.[Dr. Pounds is the Mercer myITlab admin].
Take some time to explore the "Start Here" folder in myITlab.Download the syllabus and the gradebook, take the practice Word 1 test, take a look at the gradebook and messaging systems inside myITlab.
Find out how long a US size 13 foot is (male) in inches. Keep track of where you found that info, and how you found it. We'll talk about this in class Tuesday.

BUT I DON'T HAVE OFFICE - WHAT DO I DO?

You actually have several options - you DO NOT have to go out and buy the software (but if you choose to do so, see below). You can use your laptop (Windows, Internet Explorer) to do most of the myITlab stuff (i.e. online testing) plus the Misc. Projects, and then use the ARC and CSB building computers to do the Capstones (i.e. download the instructions and create the files).

If you REALLY want to have a copy of Office 2007 for Windows - you are basically out of luck. HOWEVER! ----- you can pick up a copy of Office 2010 for Windows CHEAP through Mercer - click here. There are SOME difference between 2007 and 2010, but not tons. I didn't see any real problems from the students using 2010 version to complete 2007 projects - I was told that a few buttons were in slightly different places.

If your laptop already had Office installed when you bought it, you probably have a "lighter" [i.e. fewer parts to it] version. Make sure you have Microsoft Access. If you don't, you can use the lab machines for the Access projects.

ADVICE FOR MAC PEOPLE

Don't try to use Office for Mac to do these projects. You could get them done, but they will take longer because you will be trained on the Windows version, and then will have to translate those instructions into Mac in your head, and then actually do the project,,,,,,more brain trouble and confusion than the class is worth! The CONCEPTS transfer to the Mac side - that is, the Mac version will do everything you'll see (and then some, except Mac Office does not come with a database) - but the buttons are processes are different just because it is running on a different operating system.

START SPRING 2011

2011-01-08T14:45:00.000-05:00

START SPRING 2011

If you haven't already UNSUBSCRIBED, now would be a good time - see the unsub link at the bpottom of this message.

Of course, if you ENJOY these occasional updates from a former class, feel free to stay on the list!

...and ONE MORE THING.....!

2010-12-22T13:49:00.000-05:00

Just a final post with a few last words.....

I enjoyed teaching the class. It is always nice to have people in my classes who will ask questions! I DO get tired of hearing myself talk.

Thanks for the many comments from the 37(ish) of you who filled out the survey. Some interesting and cogent comments that have given me food for thought.

There are 2 more things you probably ought to tend to while you are reading this:
1) Unsubscribe from this email list. There should be a link at the bottom of this email that enables you to unsub - unless you really LIKE hearing from past classes!
2) unsub from the Facebook group - though I will probably kill that one off since it wasn't used much at all.

Hope you have a restful and happy Christmas!

Final Exam news

2010-12-06T10:07:00.000-05:00

Yes, we'll have one.

No, we won't be meeting for it.

It will be done online.

Open note, Open Book, Open Web.

DO NOT WORD WITH ANYONE ELSE ON IT.
Turning in someone else' work - even just a half-paragraph - will get you an automatic F on the final and a referral to honor Council for you AND the person you "borrowed" from.

Assuming I can get the thing completed in time - it's a crazy busy week, but I'll do my best - the final will be available this coming Friday (12/10). You must complete it by Tuesday night 11:59 pm.

DO NOT GO HOME TO COMPLETE IT. Somebody tries this every semester, and it always ends in technical-related-tears. Part of the final will be taken inside myITlab, and part will be a Word doc with questions you'll be answering.

Answer these questions IN YOUR OWN WORDS - no copy/pasting! Basically you'll be proving to me that you have a modicum of understanding of the answer.

Any questions? Message me inside myItlab.

Just for fun: Worldwide Telescope

2010-11-23T07:04:00.000-05:00

This is free software from Microsoft that is actually pretty cool.

http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/

Immerse yourself in a seamless beautiful environment.

WorldWide Telescope (WWT) enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope, bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world. Experience narrated guided tours from astronomers and educators featuring interesting places in the sky.

A web-based version of WorldWide Telescope is also now available. This version enables seamless, guided explorations of the universe from within a web browser on PC and Intel Mac OS X by using the power of Microsoft Silverlight 3.0.

Good tech-related vacation reading [articles]

2010-11-18T09:11:00.001-05:00

Good vacation reading:

Another firing over Facebook comments: Lawsuit pending Yet another reminder that Facebook is NOT a private forum  
iPad competitors: The top 20 to watch I like the iPad, but these are verrrrry interesting.....  
Top 10 Tech Scandals Yes, a bit o' scandalous junk reading.......  
Steampunk: A way of life for some designers Steampunk computers, anyone?

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