Monday, November 17, 2014

SOFT6008 COM2.A Classes 37 & 38

Students worked on the assignment.

Attendance was poor


Friday, November 14, 2014

SOFT6008 Class 36 Extra : Some tips for the Assignment



Attendance at COM2 labs has been very poor over the past few weeks. (DWEB2 attendance has been good). Working from home is perfectly fine and I'm sure many of you have fewer distractions at home than at CIT. 

However I think it would be a good idea if you could make it to at least one lab next week, just so I can make sure that you are on the right track. Also I might be able to outline for you the shortest route from where you are to where you want to get to. Even if you have very little done, I can advise you on the best way to go. 

Here is the full list. There is generally plenty of room. But if the lab fills up I might have to ask you to leave.

Mon 10 C120
Mon 11 C128
Mon 15 IT2.1
Wed 09 IT2.1
Wed 10 IT2.1
Wed 11 C128
Wed 13 C214 (Lecture)
Wed 16 C128
Wed 17 C128
Thu 12 C134x

I am proposing that we use the 1300 class on Wednesday as a Q&A session. I have a few more JavaScript party tricks to show you, but none that will help you get the assignment done better.


Some advice:

If you are still working on things in Photoshop it's time to stop, cut your losses, and go with the pizza. 

Like I said in class during the week, I recommend that you use a single function to change the elements on the page so that it looks like it's suppose to look, and ultimately calculate and display the price. Using individual functions to modify individual elements can make things more difficult when it comes to calculating the price later on. 

Figure out how to use CSS to style required inputs, and for new HTML5 input types both the valid and invalid. It's all done in the CSS. This is a very easy set of marks to get. (see video)

If you are using code that you didn't write yourself, ask yourself if you really need it. (You really DO need credit card validation, for example). If you are using code that you didn't write from scratch all by yourself, then use comments to clearly identify the code that isn't yours. 

Make sure that when the form details are submitted that all of the data is sent to the PHP sever. The sever will send you back everything it has received. A pizza order, for example, must contain all the toppings required to make it. You don't need to send the price. 


I have put a video online that goes over some of the important points about user input validation and the HTML5 CSS validation. [I'm just waiting for it to process. By the time you read this you should be able see it on the blog and Google+.]

Thursday, November 13, 2014

SOFT6008 COM2.B Class 35

Students worked on the assignment.

Only 5 students turned up.

SOFT6007 ITM Class 36

Students worked on the assignment.

Only 5 turned up.

SOFT6007 Simpler Three Column Layout

I put a simpler three column layout example on the blog notes page today. If you already have you already have a three column layout that you are happy with, there is no need to change it. But if you haven't started it yet, this simpler version makes for a better starting point.

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

SOFT6008 CLASS 36



I went through a suggested solution for the question posed in the exam and outlined how the marks were allocated.

Afterwards (not on recording) we went through the marking scheme for  Assignment 2 and I identified what I considered to be low hanging fruit. I also explained a bit about the HTML5 invalid psuedoclass

SOFT6008 COM2.A Class 35

Students worked on the assignment

SOFT6008 DWEB2 34 & 35

Students worked on the assignment

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

SOFT6007 Digital Colour

Some more information about digital colour systems, for those who are interested.


Hue Satuuation Brightness (HSB) system



Red Green Blue (RGB) system
Cyan Magenta Yellow Black (CMYK) system

SOFT6007 ITM Classes 33 & 34

I explained the need for DOCTYPE and charset declarations.

I showed students how to do a horizontal navigation bar using a tags and display:inline-block

[If you missed this class. See class 33 for DWEB]

SOFT6007 DWEB Classes 34 & 35

Students worked on the assignment

SOFT6007 Class 33 Digital Colour



At the start of class I gave students grey colour chips to sort. Then I gave them colour chips.

We looked at the Hue Saturation Brightness (HSB), Red Green Blue (RGB) and Cyan Magenta Yellow Black (CMYK) colour systems. I spoke a little bit about Pantone too.

SOFT6007 WEB Class 34



I explained the need for DOCTYPE and charset declarations.

I showed students how to do a horizontal navigation bar using a tags and display:inline-block

Monday, November 10, 2014

SOFT6008 DWEB2 Class 33

Most students seem to be doing fine, but a few are a good bit behind. A few refuse to take my advice. 

I met with everyone once, but there were few questions otherwise. 

SOFT6008 COM2.A Classes 33 & 34

Attendance was poor. Students (who were there) seem to making progress, but for some it is a bit slow. 

I spent the class debugging and explaining

SOFT6008 Deadline Extension

The deadline for Assignment 2 is now
noon on Friday 28 November 2014.


Thursday, November 6, 2014

SOFT6008 Assessment 1 Results



I finished correcting the exam we did last week. I have sent an email with the results anonymised. This histogram of the results looks something like the bar chart above. They are very disappointing.

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

SOFT6008 COM2.B Classes 29 & 30

Students worked on the assignment

SOFT6008 Class 32


We looked at cookies

SOFT6008 COM2.A Class 31

Students worked on the assignment