Mac tip

Hi there

After accidentally clicking iDisk again I decided to find if I could rid myself of some of those pesky items. I found that right clicking the left column allows you to open finder preferences and modify the left column. This is not in the main preferences display so is was a handy little find.

cheers John

PDF Study Tip

Hi All

One big problem I have had since starting online study is the amount of paper and printer consumables I seem to burn through.

While its not practical to always avoid printing there are ways to cut down on it.

One is a function available in Adobe Acrobat. All PDFs have the ability to save comments that can be added even from the reader. I have found this is quite practical so far and it has the added advantage that the notes can be cut and paste and especially handy when writing coding solutions.

So if you use pdf notes for your study you can use this great feature.

cheers John

Getting Started with C

Hi All

Week 1 Lab Exercise – correcting errors.

/** computing the distance of a marathon in kilometres **
main {
int miles, yards
float kilometres;
yards = 26;
miles = 385
kilometres = 1.609 * (miles + yards / 1760);
printf(“%d miles, %d yards = %lf kilometres\n”, miles, yards, kilometres);

Answer:

/** computing the distance of a marathon in kilometres **/
#include
int main(void) {
int miles, yards;
float kilometres;
yards = 26;
miles = 385;
kilometres = 1.609 * ( (float) miles + (yards / 1760));
printf(“%d miles, %d yards = %.2f kilometres\n”, miles, yards, kilometres);
return 0;
}

Reflection on an error I caught going through an example in week 1 notes. The example was on casting eg total / (float) number; When I removed the cast all I got was 0.0. It was printed to screen using printf(%f,etc total;). Expected to round down but not return 0. Further reading warranted.

#include statement – the hash alerts the preprocessor. The include instructs to include a file in the executable. eg #include The entire text of stdio.h replaces the statement in the program. By comparison import in Java allows access to the separate package but does not import the lines of code. More object oriented.

Predefined C libraries – stdio and stlib are 2 common prefined libraries. stdio has functions like scanf and printf that allow input and output. Ref stdio Wikipedia Page also contains a list of standard libraries.

cheers John

Life would be boring without interuptions

George aka cow cat

Hi All

If its not the kids its the cat.

I’d never get anything done unless I was constantly interupted.

cheers John

Cool feature in Blogger

Hi All

Just a quick tip.

I cut and paste a Word document comments into the Blogger editor today. It automatically insert links in the document which were linked them to a list at the end of the document. Its great when things work right. More impressed every day with the Blogger tools.

cheers John

This site has Klout

Hi All

Found this website while researching Twitter for my Web Presence assignment. They call it Klout influence.

They also have a developer site if you want to delve deeper.

http://developer.klout.com/

cheers John

Out of Control? Thinking about the Lecture

Hi Deepti

How does this make you feel about posting information online a) about yourself b) about others?

How would I feel if something like the Star Wars kid had happened to me? According to Solove (2007 .p43) “Qian, (little fatty) however, later changed his perspective and began to take the events in stride”. I think this example shows that although the “trail” we leave throws up challenges it also like all parts of our life the importance of adapting and learning skills to cope with what is thrown at us. Personally I don’t really see people like Qian as in any way inferior and quite often have a more positive view of what they do than someone ridiculing them through the internet.

I think the lecture examples like Star Wars Boy (Leaver, 2010) are the result of a new technology waiting for our understanding of it to catch up. Examples still happen but more and more in a contrived way as it is adopted to mainstream media. (Sorry not example at this point). As we become more Internet savvy the risks of us being caught out will lessen. This can be shown by students postings on Facebook and privacy settings. This awareness is being passed on and you can only assume its not just within this course. Eventually Internet safety will be hardwired into us like crossing the road.

cheers John

Leaver, T (2010). Topic 3.1: Your Digital Shadow. Retrieved from Blackboard Course Material WEB101 http://lms.curtin.edu.au/.

Solove, D., (2007). How the Free Flow of Information Liberates and Constrains Us, in The Future of Reputation: Gossip, Rumor and Privacy on the Internet. Retrieved from http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/dsolove/Future-of-Reputation/text/futureofreputation-ch2.pdf

Twitter Feed – Great Service

Hi All

Found this great service that links my Blogger account directly to my Twitter account. You have to sign up with an email address and then add the details of both services.

cheers John

Who make it in to space first?

I pretty confident the cosmonaut in the middle will get there first. She has some sort of space elevator set up already.

Is our privacy being invaded by data matching software. I wouldn’t be to worried if this was an example. I suppose there is the word Russian that they have in common. Not sure about the link between aviation and dating sites. Now I can get back to reading about new Russian space vehicles. Or will I ?

cheers John

SBS – 6 Billion + 1 stories

Hi All

I was doing some research for my online presence today and learnt yet another way of how get peoples time and attention for zip.

SBS on opening their website offers the opportunity to win a $100- Myers voucher for completing a survey. The problem is when the survey is completed it states. “Sorry you do not qualify to enter”.

SBS Survey Link

Try the content rules link. For me it displays the SBS about page.

I don’t mind doing surveys and donate my time if its for an honest cause. But when its done in a weaselly way like this it now taints my opinion of both SBS and Myers.

cheers John