HCI Week 02

All talk.no lab. Did up to (&incl) Gestalt Theory.

I misjudged the time. The travel clock I had was an hour fast since daylight savings time! But nobody seemed to mind.

SOFT6008 Class 02.4

We looked at user input validation and checksums.

We looed at code for mobile phone number validation and the Luhn credit card algorithm.

In the next lab class students will start coding the Luhn algorithm. I advised students against look up solutions online. It's best to start with a clean slate and a blank sheet of paper.

COMP8035 Class 02

I met with each student and talked through some ideas.

All the students who were there seem to be on top of things. But the main output for this module is the research Report at the end. So all efforts should be considered as stepping stones on the way to that.

COMP6021 Class 02.4 - Zombies, Semaphore & ASCII

We looked at some solutions for the traffic light zombie code and considered some advantages and disadvantages.

We looked at Braille, Semaphore, ASCII, DOS Code Pages, and extended-ASCII

Next up: Unicode

COMP6021 Class 02.3 - Negative Numbers

We played Binary Bingo, but the winner wasn't aware that he had won.

We looked at One's Complement and Two's Complement representations of integers. I explained why they were better that sign & magnitude representations. We looked at using offset binary for awkward situations.  I briefly mentioned IEEE Floating Point, but we won't be going into that. 

We began our look at representing text. I outlined the problems facing Outpost 19 after an attack by the zombie hoard, and asked students to devise an efficient communication system for the traffic lights. 

SOFT6008 Class 02.2

I asked students to continue working on the phone cost calculator.

And then the slot machine exercise.

These images might be useful

COMP6021 Binary & Hex Tutorial

This video is a great refresher if you've forgotten how binary and hex work.

COMP6021 Class 02.2 - The Sock on the Door

This was, in fact, our first class.

I introduced the module and talked a little bit about the assessment.

We look at how bits can be used to represent different numbers of things or state, depending on how many bits there are.

We looked at how bits can be used to represent positive integers, and represent integers that may be negative (sign & magnitude)

Slides:

Next up: two's compliment

SOFT6008 Class 02.1

We took our first look at the Document Object Model (DOM).

We looked at how to do rollovers. I showed students the coins toss game working and asked them to work in pairs and speculate what the code might look like.

Next up students will be expected to extend the coin game and turn it into a slot machine.

Slides:
JS02s.pdf

Examples:
Rollover
Coin Toss Game

SOFT7008 Class 02.1

The projector wasn't working so we couldn't have a lecture.

I gave students a short programming skills assessment. Some student struggled with that. Students who are not comfortable with programming might want to consider another option.

SOFT6002 HCI Week 01

I introduced myself and talked a little bit about he assessment for the module. The modules descriptor is here.

I talked about the importance of HCI and we looked at five of Neilsen's heurstics.

Slides:
HCI-W01-L1
HCI-W01-L2 Starting Heuristics

I sent the slides by e-mail and a link to the module website maintained by Paul Rothwell.

SOFT6008 Class 01.4

We looked at prompts and dialog boxes, and loops.

I asked students to implement a change visualizer.

A few students finished quickly so they took a look at the Phone Cost calculator and tried to figure out how the absence of PasreInt was making the program fail in certain circumstances.

COMP8035 Class 01.3

I asked students to find an interesting article from the list of journals listed other there --->
and to write 400 words on the topic. That's for Week 4.

I want students to become familiar with ACM and IEEE journals. They are all available via
http://library.cit.ie

COMP8035 Class 01.2

Students got to grips with delicious and set up their blogs.

SOFT6008 Class 01.3

I asked students to make a craps shooting game using images of dice and Math.random()

Some students struggled with the escaping of the ", but otherwise it went well.

Good job guys

SOFT6008 Class 01.2

I asked students to take the examples we did in the last class and mess around with them, and tweak them, in order to understand how they work.

SOFT6008 Book Recommendations

I recommend students buy one of these books.

Javascript in Easy Steps

by Mike McGrath

9781840785708

€15.55 at Easons   £8.79 at Amazon

Javascript & JQuery

by Jon Duckett

9783527760572

€39 at Easons         £37.50 at Amazon
Strangely  cheaper as a set £25 

SOFT7008 Class 01.2

There were very few students in class. So rather than repeat everything next time, I decided I would post a video on how to set up PHP so that everyone can be up to speed for next week.

As of today there is no room timetabled for tomorrow's class. If it is there by tomorrow we will meet up. Otherwise I will see you again next week.

SOFT6008 Class 01.1

I spoke a bit a but JavaScrip and where it runs.

I outlined that the first 40% of the CA will be an in class written exam (date later) and the reaming 60% is a coding assignment.


We looked at two examples of dynamically building up a page using document.write ()
Time based greeting and New Orleans Random Image

There were quite a few very good questions. That makes me happy.

Slides: js01d.pdf

I stressed the importance of coming to class and working through the exercises. That's the best way to learn to program in JavaScript. Googling for solutions is less likely to result in success.

COMP8035 Class 01.1 Introductions

The module descriptor for this module is here

I gave a handout that outlined very briefly what the assessment for this module is going to look like. I gave a handout from wired.com about Predictions for 2015. We looked at those to see if there were any ideas worth looking in to some more.

By the end of Week 02 student will post to their blogs a list of 5 relevant twitter feeds worth following for this module and a brief description of what to expect from each feed.

I asked students sign-up to use Delicious.com and to tag pages relevant to this module with CIT-COMP8035

I will maintain a page of resources for this module and add to it from time to time.

I spent the bulk of the class discussing what the Written Report will look like.