HTML Coding

I have always been intimidated by the mere idea of HTML coding. Some of my friends made websites from scratch with their ability to use HTML code, but I never thought it was something I could do myself. After learning the basics of how to code, I understand that it isn't actually that difficult, it just requires proper use of many details, all of which have to be perfectly correct in order for the code to work. That is one of the reasons why, despite programs like Expression Web, it is important to be able to understand code when building a website. If one simple bracket is missing in the code, the website won't look right. In troubleshooting this problem, not having to depend on a program to figure out where the problem is can save both time and money. Also, if the program happens to stop working, someone who doesn't know how to code themselves would be in a lot of trouble, whereas someone who knows even a little bit of HTML code could at least get by until the program was fixed. The way I think about it is that knowing how to use HTML code even though there are programs that do it more quickly is a lot knowing math even if you have a calculator. Calculators can work much more quickly than we can do math by hand, but the meaning of the answer is more clear if we have some idea what the calculator is doing, and if the calculator ever dies, it's important that we can do calculations on our own, as well. It's important not to get dependent on machines, lest we ourselves become incapable doing of simple things we should have no problem doing, and HTML coding is no exception.

Some Really Cool Powerpoints

I was really impressed with all of the powerpoint presentations my classmates gave earlier this week about their intended majors. It was clear from everyone's presentations that they had given them a lot of thought, and that they had either really learned well from Ms. Belisle or that they're just naturals at using Powerpoint. Though it's incredibly hard for me to pick only two of the presentations, my two favorites would have to be Rachel's and Katy's (altough Abigail's comes in a very close third).

The design of Rachel's presentation on the history of paper money stood out to me because it was simple, but very fitting. I loved the typewriter background that she had. Not only was it original, and not something anyone could find as a default background provided by Powerpoint, but it really fit well with the subject. The music really went along well with the presentation too, espeically since it had typrewriter sounds in it, which was a clever touch. I learned new things about paper money from her presentation, as well. I never knew that paper money was invented by the Chinese in the 7th century. That suprised me, because I never realized that paper money was such an ancient invention! I was also interested to learn that when money gets worn out, it is sent back to the Federal Bank. I had always wondered what happened with old, torn money, and now I know!

Katy's presentation about raku firings also really impressed me. She did a really good job of letting her pictures guide her presentation without having lots of extra words on the slide, which shows that she was well-prepared and knew what she was talking about. The pictures she used to show what a piece can look like after being fired using the raku technique were stunningly beautiful, and have made me think about trying a raku fire myself (my mom has a pottery studio in our basement, so I do a lot of pottery whenever I'm at home). Katy also did an excellent job explaining how raku firing is done. Although I'd heard the term before, I never actually knew what it meant to raku fire something until now. It interested me to know that the colors come from activation of the carbon in leaves or paper that are put in the fire along with the pot, especially because it's yet another way that cool things relate to chemistry (yay chemistry!).

Searching the Internet Wisely

There have been many occasions in my internet-searching life where I have googled something in hopes of finding a good, academically sound source of information and found (in the first 10 or 20 hits) only popular sites that, while interesting, were definitely not helpful. During his presentation yesterday, Chris Nolan explained the reason behind the madness. Google actually lists search results in order of their "relevance,"which includes how many times other sites link to the website in question. Basically, this means that popular websites like CNN.com are usually far above websites from universities or academic journals, which is convenient for the majority of people, but not for school. I'm so glad Mr. Nolan explained several ways that this problem can be avoided. Google offers an advanced search option, in which you can limit your search by having Google only search websites that end in ".edu" which is useful, because webpages that come up are likely to be written by university professors who are credible, and often citable sources. Also, Google offers a more scholarly search engine, aptly named GoogleScholar, which only searches for academically trustworthy sources. I've actually used it already-just last night I had to do a literature search for a biology lab paper, and using GoogleScholar (as opposed to the SciFinder Scholar database, which only one person can use at a time-so annoying!) saved me a ton of time!

One thing I found really surprising was that the anti-Martin Luther King group was able to get the martinlutherking.org domain before any other, pro-MLK groups were able to claim it. Really, the entire site shocked me, because I was definitely not prepared for such a discriminatory site. It definitely emphasizes a good point though-it's important to be wary of .org sites (as well as .gov and .com sites) because they are often incredibly biased, and definitely not something you want to be taking for absolute truth, in research or in general internet surfing.