In today's class we didn't look at anything new. Students used the time to catch up on the exercises. I wanted to pause a little today to give people a chance get on top of things. Some students have yet to get with the program. I don't think the rest of us can wait for them much longer.
Students who had everything done checked that the random numbers weren't skewed. They modified their code to use floor instead of round.
In the next class we will look at functions
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
"Teaching Naked" video
During the week I recorded the audio for a short video I am making on "Teaching Naked". I had tried to record it at home at the weekend but the house was to noisy.
When I started recording in my office I couldn't believe just how much noise there was. I couldn't, as you might think, hear the DJ Society doing it's thing 20m away, but I could hear all sorts of ambient noise. My desk is constantly vibrating, but I don't feel or hear it. My computer hums gently. As soon as I turned on the mic I could hear all these hidden sounds.
Audicity, like a lot of audio editing programs, has a fantastic noise reduction feature. You select a sample of "silence" and it analyses the noise. You can then subtract noise with those characteristics from the recording. It only works for structured noise, like a fan, or a hum. It won't work for people passing the the hall for example, or slamming doors. It if so impressive though I suspect I could record something on a plane and it would be fine.
A buddy of mine in Portugal is going to illustrate the video for me, if he has time. If not I'll have to do it myself.
When I started recording in my office I couldn't believe just how much noise there was. I couldn't, as you might think, hear the DJ Society doing it's thing 20m away, but I could hear all sorts of ambient noise. My desk is constantly vibrating, but I don't feel or hear it. My computer hums gently. As soon as I turned on the mic I could hear all these hidden sounds.
Audicity, like a lot of audio editing programs, has a fantastic noise reduction feature. You select a sample of "silence" and it analyses the noise. You can then subtract noise with those characteristics from the recording. It only works for structured noise, like a fan, or a hum. It won't work for people passing the the hall for example, or slamming doors. It if so impressive though I suspect I could record something on a plane and it would be fine.
A buddy of mine in Portugal is going to illustrate the video for me, if he has time. If not I'll have to do it myself.
Monday, February 13, 2012
SOFT6007 DCOM1/ITS1 Class 07
We had an in-class exam. But the results won't count towards the final grade. It was just for a reality check.
SOFT6008 Class 07
Students worked away on the various exercises.
Some students need to take a look at the New Orleans example again and really understand it before attempting the various exercises involving random images. Don't forget the discussion we had about randomness. Some students have unwittingly written code that has stacked the dice or deck. Those kinds of things could have gotten you shot in the wild west, if they'd had JavaScript :-)
There is a lot of interesting variety in the code being written to complete the euro change exercise. It's really worth thinking about the logic before writing the code. I've see a lot of code that is more complex than it needs to be. There is no need for nested loops. And if you think about it, what's the maximum number of 50c coins you will display. The solutions involving mod and integer division are clever, but brave.
Beware of intelligent quotes when copying and pasting. They have different ASCII values from regular double quotes and will break your code.
Some students need to take a look at the New Orleans example again and really understand it before attempting the various exercises involving random images. Don't forget the discussion we had about randomness. Some students have unwittingly written code that has stacked the dice or deck. Those kinds of things could have gotten you shot in the wild west, if they'd had JavaScript :-)
There is a lot of interesting variety in the code being written to complete the euro change exercise. It's really worth thinking about the logic before writing the code. I've see a lot of code that is more complex than it needs to be. There is no need for nested loops. And if you think about it, what's the maximum number of 50c coins you will display. The solutions involving mod and integer division are clever, but brave.
Beware of intelligent quotes when copying and pasting. They have different ASCII values from regular double quotes and will break your code.
SOFT6007 DCOM1 no move on the cards
I looked into moving our Friday afternoon class to Tuesday evening, but there are no labs available at that time.
SOFT6007 COM1 Class 07
We had an in-class exam. But it was just for students to find out how they are doing. The results will not form part of the final grade.
Friday, February 10, 2012
SOFT6008 Plans
On Monday we will not cover any new material. Students have plenty of exercises to do and plenty code to to write.
SOFT6007
On Monday we will have an in-class exam on everything we're done so far. But there won't be any marks going for it.
SOFT6001 Class 05 DCOM1 Lab
Students made several pages and link them together. The pages included the nested list exercise and a page with an image. Most students also coded their timetables using a table
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Hogeschool van Amsterdam
I have some brochures from Hogeschool van Amsterdam for anyone interested in going there on Erasmus. Classes are taught in English.
Connected Blog to Google+
I connected my blog and my Google+ account today. Now I can write a blog post as usual and share it with the relevant people in Google+. That's handy because I was more or less putting the same information in both. I want to keep both on the go at the same time. I want to build the audience for one, but keep the audience for the old. I'll be curious to see which students prefer In G+ students see only what's relevant to them. On the blog they can see everything, unless they click on the appropriate label.
SOFT6007 Targets
By the end of this week students should have a website with a few pages linked to each other, including one page with the nested list example, and one page with an image.
If that's not happening for you, you need to let me know so we can get you sorted.
If that's not happening for you, you need to let me know so we can get you sorted.
SOFT6007 COM1 Class 05 Lab A
Students coded the nested list exercise and made some pages link to each other.
Some students used to class to catch up on things they had missed. It's important to get the fundamentals sorted before moving on.
Some students used to class to catch up on things they had missed. It's important to get the fundamentals sorted before moving on.
SOFT6007 COM1 Class 05 Lab B
Students coded the nested list exercise and made some pages link to each other.
Some students used to class to catch up on things they had missed. It's important to get the fundamentals sorted before moving on.
Some students used to class to catch up on things they had missed. It's important to get the fundamentals sorted before moving on.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
SOFT6007 ITS1 Class 05 Lab
We looked at how to link between pages.
Students coded example from previous classes.
A number of students used the time to catch up on missed classes. Students should catch up this week.
Students coded example from previous classes.
A number of students used the time to catch up on missed classes. Students should catch up this week.
SOFT6008 Class 05
We looked at alerts and promts and then loops.
I set the euro change maker exercise for students. The logic of that can be tricky and there are a few ways to do it.
I set the euro change maker exercise for students. The logic of that can be tricky and there are a few ways to do it.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
iTunesU
I was all set today to start uploading my classes to iTunes you. Two years ago I setup of a podcast server. I had imagined that the latest version of the software would be a huge improvement on the previous one, but it's still very clunky. I held off publishing classes so far this semester in anticipation of submitting them to the automated server. But if the pieces don't fall into place soon I must have to manually type the RSS feed myself. That's pointless donkey work.
If Apple plans to sell an iPad to every student and wants lecturers' content to be the draw it is going to have to take seriously the server side part of the equation. Using the server product it is hard to believe it's from the same company that makes iPods. The list of things I would fix if I was in charge is too long for me to start on.
On a positive note, Google+ is working out well for be so far. The ease with which I can publish a video is amazing (take note Apple). There hasn't been too much interaction with students on G+ yet, at least not with me. They may be interacting with each other, but I don't think so. I think the social element of education technology is often ignored. That's why I think something like G+ or FaceBook is the way to go.
If Apple plans to sell an iPad to every student and wants lecturers' content to be the draw it is going to have to take seriously the server side part of the equation. Using the server product it is hard to believe it's from the same company that makes iPods. The list of things I would fix if I was in charge is too long for me to start on.
On a positive note, Google+ is working out well for be so far. The ease with which I can publish a video is amazing (take note Apple). There hasn't been too much interaction with students on G+ yet, at least not with me. They may be interacting with each other, but I don't think so. I think the social element of education technology is often ignored. That's why I think something like G+ or FaceBook is the way to go.
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