LKL Programming course

what the wg?

2005-12-09T09:28:00.000Z

IBM DeveloperWorks is running a great short peice on the future of HTML. The amazing bit is that if you're using Safari or Firefox 1.5, the future is here:

http://rig.vlad1.com/~vladimir/canvas/cdemo1.html

http://developer.mozilla.org/samples/raycaster/RayCaster.html

the things they don't teach you in programming school

2005-11-21T17:39:00.000Z

Roedy Green explains how to maintain a programmers' job for life, and I think he's great.

and now for something completely different

2005-11-14T16:46:00.000Z

Quotes on programming. some more geek humor. I liked this one:

"God is Real, unless declared Integer" - J.Allan Toogood, FORTRAN programmer

But you have to know a thing or two about the pain of FORTRAN to understand.

CiteULike: A free online service to organise your academic papers

2005-11-02T00:58:00.000Z

I found it. I knew I will if I just look hard enough (Is that a general theorem - what ever you want on the web is out there, just need to know how to find it?). Any way. Ever since I dumped windows, my main problem was to find a replacement for EndNote. Not that EndNote is such a charm, but it did the job and I couldn't find something that would do it in my new setup. besides, I wanted something web2.0 - online, shareable, tagged. well, here it is. http://www.citeulike.org

Just what I was looking for.

2005-10-31T11:36:00.000Z

iseff: Introducing Openomy

It's time to introduce Openomy. It's far from complete and I have a lot of work left to do, but I want to get feedback as soon as possible, so let's start with the concept:

In short, Openomy is an online file system with an open API anyone can use to develop applications to meet their needs.

I think Openomy can be best described in more detail through the concepts which derived it. I'll break this up into three distinct concepts,

1. Openness and APIs,
2. Tagging, and
3. AJAX.

So, register on:
http://www.openomy.com/register

And send my your username, so we can start sharing. Mine is "yish"

Talk to her (your coworker, your Dalia, whatever)

2005-10-27T16:01:00.000Z

There's an entertaining thread on the PPIG discussion list about the importance of discussing your programming problems. The consensus is that its always good to talk about your problems. Event to a plant, and even to an English major. However, it is even better if your peer knows something about what your talking about.

Painless HTML

2005-10-27T10:37:00.000Z

This one's an html editor packaged as a Firefox extension. So, easy install, platform independent, and it works pretty well. Lets you navigate between code, structure and design views etc.

Of course, you need to be using Firefox as your browser first, but I'm sure you already are!

What me? Let w3c do it!

2005-10-27T09:51:00.000Z

One nice thing about giving programming exercises is that you don't have to check them. Let the software do it for you. Well, not really, but at least you can expect it to be debugged.

25 seconds

2005-10-27T01:03:00.000Z

that's the time it took since I posted until some stupid spammer left his greasy fingerprints on the blog. Pray, why? Do you guys really think that because you say "I like your blog" I will leave your plug for flavored nappies on my blog? Please - explain.

Warning: Programming can be bad for you

2005-10-27T00:46:00.000Z

well, not. This is a bit of a long-winded rant, and I can't say how much of it I find convincing (although parts of it are). What I like about it that its an authentic piece of hard-core geek-speak, and yet - I think - human readable.

hit me with your javascript! hit me!

2005-10-24T00:58:00.000Z

Ok, let's do some programming. We'll make a button that says "hit me!" but when you do, it shouts "ouch!". Something like this -
Unfortunatly, we can't do that on the blog - it blocks scripts. but no worries. just create an html file and open it in a plain text editor. (and don't ask me how to do that on a mac!)

An html file is a text file that starts with the tag <html> and ends with the corrosponding closing tag </html> Within that, there's usualy a "head" and a "body". So a minimal page would look like:


<html>
<head>
</head>
<body>
</body>
</html>

Try it. Create an empty text file, call it something.html, edit it in a text editor and insert the above. Now save it and open it in your browser.

It's probably not very interesting to look at. Why don't you add some text in the body? Or a title in the head, as in -

<title>groovy hedghogs </title>

Next, the button. So the guys who inveneted HTML thought: "why would there be a button, if not to do provide some input in a form?" Hence a button is a kind of input gizmo, and always part of a form. Which means, its in the context of a form tag. i.e. -


<form>
<input type="button" />
</form>

You also probably want to add a value="something" to your button.

And now - the ouch! For that, we need a bit of JavaScript. Once you get this done, you can call your frinds and tell them you coded. JavaScript is a programming language - or, as the name implies, a scripting language. All it has in common with java is 4 letters. JavaScript allows you to program interactions on web-pages (as oposed to interactions on the server, which are invoked throught the page). Here's a piece of JavaScript:

<script lang=JavaScript">
function boo() {
alert('hoo');
}
</script>

I think its pretty self explanatory. So I'll move on. What you want to do is create a script like this in your page and attach it to the event of a user clicking on your button. So, copy the code (including the script tag) to your page above the button (think why). And add the onclick event handler to your button:
<input type="button" value="blahh" onclick="boo();" />
Done.

Now check if it works, and if you still have the energy, go figure how to pass the text to display as a parameter to the function.

wtf is web2.0?

2005-10-20T08:30:00.000Z

Carry posted a great entry on terminology. One of the concepts she mentioned is Web2.0. Now, I'm not saying I have a better definition of the term, but I have my own opinion, which is basically what everyone has only they try to look smart by referring to it as if its a well known, well defined, technical term. Bull. (well, maybe except Tim O'Reilly, who probably coined the term. He's also the one who invented LAMP).

Web2.0 is not about technology. Its about people, and the interaction between them. In a broader perspective, its about division of labour. Of course, having the right technology helps, but most of it is already out there.

It started with friendster, Orkut and the like. Those got boring after a while, but the ideas caught. Then came del.icio.us and technorati, with the whole tagging thing. flickr also tagged along (>cough< sorry. couldn't help myself). The technology is trivial. The idea is radical. Its about breaking down hierarcies of knowlege and consequently distributing the ownership of knowledge. Hence folksonomy. (noticed that all my references are wikipedia? Did I say breaking down of hierarchies? Distributed ownership of knowledge?) And if knowledge is power, and it is, then we're talking about a break down of social hierarcies and distribution of socio-economic-political power. We're talking revolution, yeah. But seriously, remember the semantic web? You know why it would never work? Ontologies. Someone has to have the authority to dictate them. Well, ain't that kind of world no more, so we're tagging, and happy with that, thank you.

Oh, and of course - bolgs and RSS / ATOM syndication. Wouldn't have technorati without them. Again, the technology varies, but the idea stays the same. I call it ssammedia, which is mass media with the mass going the other way. Actual, that's probably where it started. After all, web2.0 is all about participation.

Now the big guys are picking up on it. Yahoo! with it's 360 Google buying around. I'm sure MicroSoft will have a go, I've heard they already have something, but this is really against their grain.

The thing is, the technology is simple - simple to create and simple to use. Its the change of mindset that's interesting.

But still, where does AJAX fit in? Oh, it just does the same stuff but soo coool. Interestingly, where AJAX defines one style of web2.0 applications, there's also an alternative one.

WebNotes - yumm!

2005-10-17T09:59:00.000Z

Here's a new interface to look at.
It's very web2.0
It's very AJAX
And its plain cool.

Maybe we can download the source code, and use it as a starting point for a prototype of the interactive essay?

Of course, after we have the use-case scenarios ...

wikis and html

2005-09-26T14:13:00.000Z

We talked about wikis. The first place to look for an answer on what is a wiki? is, of course, on the mother of all wikis. Speaking of Wikipedia, the next assignment is to edit the page on Interactive whiteboards. If you need any help, then you probably want the help page (linked on the wikipedia sidebar).

The LKL hosts two wikis: the Learning and Technology in the Workplace wiki and Philosophy of technology wiki.

As for editing html. Again, you can start with Wikipedia, and follow the links. There's also a good tutorial on WikiBooks. A good site is WDG's html reference. If you want a bit more funk, Wired's webmonkey is a good place to start. You might want to bookmark there html cheatsheet.

let's play tag!

2005-09-23T11:18:00.000Z

I've set up a del.icio.us tag for the course: lklprogrammingcourse. Del.icio.us is a bookmark sharing and tagging tool (see folksomony).

What does this mean, like, in humanspeak? Well, every time you or I come across a web page we find relevant, we list it on http://del.icio.us/ and attach the tag lklprogrammingcourse. Then the other of us can see it, by browsing http://del.icio.us/tag/lklprogrammingcourse or by tracking the RSS feed (oh boy, here he goes again) at http://del.icio.us/rss/tag/lklprogrammingcourse.

Ah yes, you first have to register at http://del.icio.us/. Then, the best way to use them is by copying the bookmarklets - read the about page.

Not quite, but cute?

2005-09-23T11:09:00.000Z

Not exactly a Googlewhack, but close enough for a laugh.
Gordon, Michele & I am writing a paper. In there, I plugged a sentence about "design for cognitive conflict". Gordon, who wasn't sure WTF that means,
googled it.

The only page that came up was an obscure note I once made on the PPIG mailing list. So, does this count as a whack? not sure. but maybe I should elaborate the concept, or dump it.

Here's what I wrote there:

When designing technology for performing a task, you will want it to be invisible, not get in your way of doing your thing. When designing technology for learning, you often intentionally make it provoke thinking by forcing users to solve problems. We call thins "design for cognitive conflict".

whatever.

2005-09-21T23:50:00.000Z

Yet another
free blogging service. They have a few nice features, like private posts and tags, but on the other hand, they dump ads on your pages. Should we bother? Probably best to stick with Blogger.

Look mum, a blog!

2005-09-20T13:39:00.000Z

Looks like Edublog isn't quite working for us. Carey tried to register and we gave up after 30 minutes. There support didn't seem very, er, supportive either.

Ok, so what is this blog? Well, we're playing around with a programming course at the lkl, and we thought we'de try this as our platform. Probably not very interesting if your not the teacher or the student (yes, singular) of the course. You can waste your time better elsewhere.