Week 10

Task 1 – Favourites Tutorial Exercise:

I went onto the website Internet Beginners Tutorial, read and completed the instructions that were present. I clicked on the Favourites icon and added the website as required.

I then clicked on Favourites to make sure that I had added it successfully which I had. The next point that was asked of me was to add the website into a folder, which I did by clicking on Add Favourite and then Create in I typed in ‘Favourites Tutorial.

I went back to have a look at my favourites to make sure the folder and website had been added properly. The next step was to rename the file I just created by going through the Organize Favourites option.

I opened it and renamed the file to ‘A Tutorial in Favourites.’ I then clicked close and opened my Favourites to check that the file rename had been successful.

Task 2 – Creation of Folders and Adding Websites Exercise:

I used the information from the tutorial to crate a favourites list with three folders with two websites favourites in each. I went onto Google and typed in Tutorial in Favourites which brought up several results. I added the Step By Step Microsoft Internet Explorer Favourites Tutorial and Tutorial: Organizing Favourites in IE6 to the ‘A Tutorial in Favourites’ folder I had created in the Task 1 exercise.

I then typed in Internet Tutorials in Google and selected these links to add into a folder these were: Internet Tutorials, Internet Beginner's Guides Tutorials refdesk.com and Finding Information on the Internet: A TUTORIAL - Table of Contents, Internet Tutorial, and Internet Tutorial [English Online]. I used the ‘Add Group Tabs to Favourites’ method as it is a lot faster process than adding each one separately.

For the last folder I typed into the Google search bar Information Technology Tutorials, I added the following websites to a folder:

Information Technology (IT) Tutorials, IT Tutorials, Computer Technical Tutorials and Information: Free Computer Tutorials, Weblinks / Information Technology / Tutorials, Weblinks / Information Technology / Tutorials / Microsoft, Network Topics - Information Technology Tutorials and Information Technology Tutorials. I then used the ‘Add Tab Group to Favourites’ again under the folder name of Information Technology Favourites.

I was not happy with the small amount of favourites I had in the ‘A Tutorial in Favourites’ so I found some more links to add in the folder which were: eLouai How to Add to Favorites in HTML and Firefox Help - Firefox Bookmarks Tutorial (The Mozilla Help Site).

After adding these two websites to the Favourites, I opened all three folders to check that all the websites I had added were all in the folders.

Task 3 and 4 - Being Digital Article Reading and Review:

I then went and read the parts of the “Being Digital” which was available on the website from the Workshop task. ‘The DNA of Information’ which spoke about Bits and Atoms in communication technology is very similar to the ideas that were told to us in the lecture where a book may have advantages over the internet but there are cases where its vice versa.

The paper text may be very easy to access and be in your hand like that whereas the internet is not made like that. But a book can easily go out of print but a text on the internet will always be available. He also predicted that media would be come digital and it would happen fast. Now there is digital video, images, messages, music and much more. On’ Prime Time Is My Time” the writer claimed that in ten years time the video cassette would go out of business, in saying this he was correct to a certain degree. They still exist but the Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) has taken over instead.

References:

Negroponte, N. Being Digital - The DNA of Information [1996]. Retrieved May 28, 2008, from Being Digital:
http://archives.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/nn/ch01c01.htm

Lecture:

This week the lecture concentrated on using technology for accessing and organising information. The questions that the class received include:
List 3 main points from the article.
Do you think the internet has its limits?
How would you define information overload?
List your technological sources of information.
What are some of the strategies you use to manage information?
Society is vulnerable when it comes to many things such as if there were no truck drivers, there would be no food and therefore the shops would be empty. If the power went out, nothing would work and if there was a problem with the internet millions of people would be affected. As most people rely on the World Wide Web. Physical matter is atom based which can be touched; it is difficult to change but can be costly to have transported. Whereas digital form is not atom based and cannot be physically touched but is cheap and fast to transfer from place to place. In the past books used to be hand written and could take days or ever months to finish, they were valuable but if they were destroyed there was no way of bringing it back unless there was another copy of it.

Tutorial:

This week’s tutorial involved our tutor showing the class how to do the first part of the task which was adding WebPages and creating folders in the Favourites section in Internet Explorer.

Readings of the Week:

Grazing the Net: Raising a Generation of Free Range Students by Jamie MacKenzie describes the valuable source that the internet has on students for their assignments, research, etc as it is such a high in nutrient place for information. When the article first appeared in 1998, this information is still very relevant today but there is still a problem of students going off topic and not doing their work and just sitting in front of a screen all day.

The BBC website I was unable to access, the video would not load up properly. I believe that this was the video that the class watched in one lecture which contained information about Wikipedia and how it isn’t an appropriate website to reference from.