Reading Comment for Week 11 Readings (Since I was confused about not having 10 reading scores already)

Obviously I think that Wiki's are an extremely tool and asset to all people but most likely in the workplace. I think a majority of my classmates will agree with me. It seems that it would be a no brainer to have all information and data stored in one particular place without ever needing to be moved. This would cut down on the loss of data and streamline the editing process. I do however see a couple of setbacks to this. For one, anything can be edited by anyone as long as some rules are followed. Therefore, we don't actually know what the source is behind the data we are reading and if it is reliable or not. This is why most of my papers throughout my college career were not allowed to use Wikipedia as a source, as layed out by the professors. Also, there would still need to be collaboration in the workplace so that a particular piece of data is not being edited by two different people at the same time. However, even with the minor drawbacks a Wiki can be a very valuable asset.

Muddiest Point Week 10 For My Last Point of the Semester

We stated in lecture that search engines return data in a ranked order of similarity. Obviously there are algorithms that do this quickly. However, we also stated that this can be changed to return data ranked by anything such as authod, date, etc.... I guess what I'm muddy about is how the user goes about doing this in the search engine such as Google? Is there an option somewhere that lets you determine how articles are ranked and returned???

Homework #6 (WEBSITE)

Here is the link to my personal website for homework #6:

http://www.pitt.edu/~swb5

Muddiest Point, Readings, and Comment (All in 1 Post)

Muddiest Point (Week 9):

I am confused as to what the advantage is of using XML over HTML, or if there is even much of a difference? Specifying all of these separate tags, created via the user, only seem beneficial if we were going to have other machines read our file?? Other than that, it would seem much simpler to write in HTML. I hope this is not completely confusing or off base.


Readings for Week 10:

The speed and effectiveness at which search engines work is absolutely astonishing to me. I never understood how they could return so many web pages in such a short period of time before I read these articles, in particularly the piece about “crawler machines”. Actually, even after reading that it is still almost baffling how it takes but a few seconds for a search engine to scan billions of web pages. Even more so is the fact that they can eliminate duplicate pages so that the return is not polluted with the same data over and over. I wonder with the few search engines there are, and with their stranglehold on the market, have engines reached their plateau? Meaning is it even beneficial for a company or individual to try and compete with the likes of Google and Yahoo? Also, is there any room for advancement?? It seems as if they are as good as they can be, as fast as possible, I’m not sure how or why resources would be invested to improve them. However, There must be something to it with Google releasing the new Google Chrome so I guess time will tell.


For Zhen : Comment for Week 10:

I commented in the Technical Discussion board this week in Susan and Jennifer’s thread. See it here:

https://courseweb.pitt.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_9047_1%26url%3D

Muddiest Point, Readings, and Comment (All in 1 Post)

Muddiest point (Week 8):

I don’t understand why we would want or need to use the meta tag in the header. We say that the data is not displayed on the screen for people to see so why even put it in there?? I understand the machines can read it but how is that going to benefit anything?


Thoughts on Readings for week 9:

Ok, I’ll start out by saying that I am very unfamiliar to XML before and after reading these passages. I guess you can say I know more after than before but wouldn’t want to proclaim myself as a pro. From the readings I seem to gather that XML is closely related to HTML judging by the snippets of code that have been provided on the sites. It does seem however that XML would be more proactive, meaning that it knows that coders and users will make mistakes and it helps correct or flag those mistakes. I think it is also very important and a great feature that it helps documents be compatible across platforms and any other variables that may be different from system to system. That being said, it seems that XML would be the way to go for a serious developer or user, even though it seems a bit more complicated to learn and use compared to the HTML language.



For Zhen: Comment for week 9:

Zhen, I commented on Peter’s blog regarding HTML. See this here…

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=4619180577856147392&postID=5538865292843294899&page=1

Homework 5: (Koha Book Shelf)

Here is the link to my Koha shelf:

http://pitt4.kohawc.liblime.com/cgi-bin/koha/bookshelves/shelves.pl?viewshelf=7

Muddiest Point, Readings, and Comment (All in 1 Post)

Muddiest point (Week 7):

In the slides we show that the web is growing at 25% per month. That absolutely astounds me thinking about how big the “internet” can really be. Which brings me to my question/statement, Is there a limit on this thing we call the web? Is there a point that we can get to and be like, ok, that’s it we can’t grow anymore? It kind of boggles your mind if you think about it, will it ever stop?


Thoughts on Readings for week 8:

After this weeks readings and noticing our last assignment, I am pretty excited in thinking that we get to design our own web page. I learned very minimal HTML like four years ago in my freshman year here at PITT. It was really neat to me, and actually fun to do for school. As I went through the HTML cheat sheet, I want to let anyone know that reads this to keep that handy. I’m not sure what our assignment will consist of but I think without a doubt that will be your best asset to get it completed. One thing I do remember however is that it is kind of difficult to program HTML and make it look smooth and professional. The layouts need to be chosen, buttons moved, pictures and what not so keep that in mind while working with it. Another thing people may not know is that you if you go to any website and click view at the top, and then click on “view source”, you can see the HTML layout for that particular web page. A lot of times it is very confusing because most websites are so elaborate but none the less, that is the code.


For Zhen: Comment for week 8:

Zhen, I commented on Jake’s Blog regarding the Homework that is due tomorrow. See it here…

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=633484337573796975&postID=5872372284220813288&page=1