week 7

Lecture
In this weeks lecture we looked endnote a computer program. Endnote is a program designed to make referencing alot easy for students conduction essays, reports or any type of paper you have to complete in a particular unit for every assignment needs to provide proof of where your information has come from.

Our lecture explained that we should use the standalone program of endnote for it is the easiest form to start with for a research project. Once a student has their reference information prepared, for example and author, title, year, place published etc, they type the information into endnote in the appropriate areas and endnote puts the reference together and saves it automatically. This is how endnote works.

We use endnote because it keeps track of our references in case we want them for future reasons, because it has a variety of paper typed suitable for most referenceing needs and it has an easy search system that allows people to locate references with a particular project when saved in a specific category.

Tutorial
In todays tutorial we had to review an online referencing guide and include examples of referencing from five different types of electronic format material.

• The Web-page:

Stop climate change. [n.d.] Retrieved April, 2008, from Greenpeace: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/climate-change

• Article in an internet journal:

Tom. (2007). The legacy of Ronald Ryan's last day. [online].Retrieved April, 2008, Quadrant,51, pg 53-60. from http://0search.informit.com.au.library.ecu.edu.au/fullText;dn=20070330;res=AGISPT>

• For an Online Encyclopedia

Graffiti. (2008). In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved April, 2008, from Encyclopedia Britannica Online: http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9343951

• For an E Book

Mccall, Grant. (2002).Rapanui Cuttings from the Chilean Press. Retrieved April, 2008 from http://hdl.handle.net/1885/42305

• For an Electronic report

Mulligan, D., & Bickmore-Brand, J. (1998, July). Outreach, access and support programs for socio-economically disadvantaged people at Curtin: A feasibility study. Retrieved April, 2008, from http://eesj.curtin.edu.au/local/documents/les.doc

a screen shot showing Endnotev11 Exercises for Vista’ (showing 3 references)

a screen shot of Cite while you write Endnote Exercise

week 6

lecture

The lecture was about how Anyone can post information on the web because the information provided on the net might not be accurate, truthful or relevant so it is important to evaluate websites.

This is done by firstly finding out who published the web page and whether they are reliable. secondly finding out why the publisher published the web page and finding out what their goal or objective in publishing the web page. Thirdly finding out what is published on the web page- whether they're up to date with the information posted est.

Tutorial

The first part of today's task was to summarise the strategies provided on the website:



ICYouSee Critical Thinking page http://www.ithaca.edu/library/training/think.html

These strategies and tips were:

• Make sure you are in the right place.

This strategy is asking us the purpose of using one’s web. Because everything might not show up on the net, maybe the information you’re looking after is in a book that can be easily accessed in less time then with using other sources.

• When in doubt, doubt.

When we look up information on a website, we should evaluate the sources, because some of the information is misleading, therefore we need to consider bibliographic citations or supportive evidence

• Consider the source

By checking up on the author you will know if he or she has the proper authority and expertise to make their publication trustworthy. It is important not only to check their name but also to research it to find out if he or she is a qualified person that has other publications elsewhere.

• Know what's happening.

Determine the motive of creating the page, understanding the motive can help you judge the page.

• Look at details.
  

While we are in the website, we should look more depth of the website such as the words that are link together and the spelling, the links in the website does it works. These things should able to tell you whether the website is reliable.

• Distinguish Web pages from pages found on the Web.

Sometimes the text on a website was actually written for something else like a book, journal, or newspaper article. If the text seems written like this, the site must provide the reader with the correct original references. If however, the website does not provide this, it is best not to use the information

The second part of to days tutorial was to evaluate and compare strategies for evaluating information found on websites using the following webpages:

INCO 48: http://www.taftcollege.edu/newTC/Academic/INCO48/sec6-4.htm

This website has the same properties as the first website I evaluated except it was in more depth and had a few more topics it looked at such as copyright, censorship and compare information.

Good, the Bad and the Ugly: http://lib.nmsu.edu/instruction/eval.html

The website the good, bad and ugly had the easiest format to follow when finding information it also had easy to read dot points on Authority, Accuracy, Objectivity, Currency and Coverage.

We were then asked to Complete the "Reliving the Sixties: a Web Site Evaluation Assignment" exercise on the ICYouSee website.





http://www.ithaca.edu/library/training/think60.html. .

The website I chose to evaluate through this web site were

The Psychedelic Sixties

This site was made by the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia. From reading through some of the links from the home page I think most of the information on this page may not be all completely factual and probably not a very good source of information but i also don't believe that all the information on the site is untrue. I think that this site was put together by students and is mainly made up of stories and interviews from people who lived in that generation.

American Cultural History: 1960 - 1969

This website appeared to be very well designed on a plain background with any bright colours to distract the eye. The purpose of the website was to provide information on American culture in the 1960’s. It did have a lot of facts about the 1960’s with links to confirm the facts as well as a lot of general information. The authors name was clearly written at the bottom of the page as well as the page designer and who the article was written for. I believe the article would be good for research on American culture in the 1960’s.

week 5

Lecture
During this week's lecture we took an in depth look at search engines in general and the different types of search tools and options that are available to us.

A search engine in itself is a web-based application that looks through the Internet, creating indices which are most often based on textual information.

There are hundreds of search engines on the world wide web, but the most popular include, Google, Altavista, Yahoo and Alltheweb. Whilst search engines are extremely help full they do still have several problems. The major being that they return far too many results due to the fact that they have very weak relevance or quality filtering of these results.

This is a problem that is becoming increasingly worrying, because of the fact that the Internet is growing exponentially and this issue is not being dealt with.There are, however, several other smaller problems with web based search engines.

These include things such as not filtering broken links, misuse of the page ranking system, and building endless indices that include completely irrelevant results. Luckily for us there are some things that we can do to ensure that we receive more accurate results.

First of all we must remember to only use appropriate keywords and refrain from using commonly found words.

Secondly you must know what he is searching for. For example, if you were to search for a phrase, it would be much more effective to use ' '"(quotation marks)' at the beginning and end of all phrases. You may also use the '+' & '-' signs to add or remove certain additional topics to your original one. For example if one was to search 'jaguar' + cat, he would receive information on the animal jaguar, whilst if one was to search 'jaguar' -cat, he would only not receive any information on the word jaguar in relation to animals.

Last, but not least, most search engines have advanced options and in many cases familiarizing yourself with these can lead to much more accurate results as well.

Tutorial

During this weeks workshop we were required to complete three tasks. The first was to work through an interactive tutorial on search engines, listing four strategies that will help in structuring a good search. The next task was to complete an online quiz and take a screen shot of our end result and finally to discuss and summarise what we have learnt so far about information on the Internet and using search engines.

The four strategies that help in structuring a good search are:

1. For keyword searches, use several words.


2. Read the search tips or help information at each search engine.
   
3. Use many search engines, not just one- you will get a greater variety.


4. Select the appropriate search type, in many cases you will find relevant information in directories rather than search engines.
   

The second task was to complete an online quiz at http://siteseen.co.uk/questions/generalknowledgehard/ and post a screen shot of our end result.

The final task was to discuss and summarise what we have learn about information on the Internet and the use of search engines. In my personal opinion the Internet is a great source of information and we just simply have to learn how to sift through the useless junk to get to the use full data. It is all there, we just simply have to learn how to get to it. This is why the innovative minds of today have given us web based search engines. Whilst at times they are not as effective as we would hope, with some basic knowledge it is very easy to come to the results that you want. Whether it is using Boolean operators or simply taking advantage of the advanced search option, the tools are there for us to come to the right information. As the Internet continues to grow exponentially we can only hope that so too, do search engines and their effectiveness in presenting relevant results.

Extra Reading

Internet Search Tips and Strategies

http://www.virtualsalt.com/howlook.htm

This website takes an in-depth look into using Internet search engines and what tips and strategies can be used to maximise the effectiveness of our results. It covers everything from the different categories of information on the web all the way to the different search tool types, tips and strategies. I found this to be very help full is it is probably the most user friendly comprehensive list of searching tips and strategies. All of them are quite straight forward, but are things that many of us miss and can easily learn to end up with much better results.

Chapter Four: Search Engines

http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/history/ivh/chap4.htm

This website actually covers the history of web based search engines. It takes a look at how search engines first started, how they work and all the forms of search engines that are used electronically in today's world. This website isn't necessarily something that will help people in retrieving more accurate results but serves the purpose of informing people of their background history. I personally found all of the information interesting as most of it was very new to me and I would image that very few people actually understand or know about the history of search engines.

Search Engine Optimisation for Companies

http://www.websight.net.au/search-engine-optimisation.asp

This website is a Search Engine Optimization for small business marketing strategies to Australian and international companies.

week 4

lecture summary
this weeks lecture was about the :
•Internet vs Web
•Historical perspective of the Web
•Defining the WWW
•Web Protocols
•Web Browsers/Interface

Tutorial

my expectation
The tutorial this week taught me to recognize different web based resources to tell if they are authentic and to tell if the information given is fake.

My expectation of the following web sites before viewing themare:

the web site http://www.haggishunt.scotsman.com/ is possibly a website about a club for Scottish men called haggish hunt i think it is not authentic because why would you want to hunt sheep intestines



the website http://www.molossia.org/ is possibly a website about information on molossia. the domain name org possibly means it is a organisation that it would be more authentic then the previous web address i also think the web site could be authentic because it sounds like a realistic domain name



the web site http://www.martinlutherking.org/ is possibly a organisation about martin Luther king but i do not think this web site would not be authentic because it is a org instead of edu or ac which is more likely to be authentic



my results after reviewing the websites are:

The web site http://www.haggishunt.scotsman.com/ is not authentic because;

1. Firstly the pictures of HAGGIS are not real you can tell it is a fake animal by the photo shop editing of the supposed HAGGIS by putting platypus's head and feet with some other sort of animal.
2. The second thing wrong with this website is the web cameras, they are not active live feeds they are just still pictures.
3. The third thing i noticed was the home page is haggisclopedia, in this there is information about the haggis. It states that haggis are not aquatic animals, if they are not aquatic then why does the haggis have a platypus's head and feet?; it also states that a haggis fur is waterproof but not showerproof. If the fur is waterproof then it would clearly be showerproof
4. The fourth thing i noticed about this website was it has no author or claim of ownership meaning anybody could have made the website.

The website http://www.molossia.org/ is not authentic because;

1. Republic of Molossia is an imaginary place which does not exists
2. The history of Republic of Molossia is very little and is hard to believe.
3. If there is a place call Republic of Molossia, they should if have a government (.gov) website rather then a non profit website (.org)
4. In the front page, it said teacher click here, which mean this website is for tutorial reference
5. In the photo album, the photos are mostly model toys, especially the Rail Road

The website http://www.martinlutherking.org/

gave me a first impression of the author criticising martin Luther king because he only talked about the negative aspect of what he has done. Also their was some unfounded accusation about him e.g woman bashing, racist est. The website is an org instead of a edu which means the facts presented on the page don't have to be correct.

After I research Martin Luther King, I can tell that he is a hero because he obtained the same equal right for black as for white, through organised protest and rallies. I think the website is a poor example of how a website can mislead you to believe false information.

Readings

Week Four: Reading 1 - A Brief History of the Internet

(http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/history/ivh/frame_theorie.html)

This website was about history of the World-wide Web, it about the changing since 60’s till 1996. It basically about World-wide Web took off from Arrant to they developed World-wide Web to Internet. In time change, even when you are on the net, you can still be talking on the phone and its speed is improved better and faster quality.

Week Four: Reading 2 - History of the World-wide Web

http://www.isoc.org/internet/history/brief.shtml#Origins

This website is about the history of the Internet since the 60’s until 1994. The websites contents are Inventions and innovations of Internet, How they got from ARPANET to World Wide Web (WWW), The History of Electronic Mail and what they came from, Search Engines and history of how they search quality information and Basic Net Data.

music

week 3

Lecture summary
Today's lecture was about Using Online Libraries why they are a useful over other libraries. The lecture also explained why they are Disadvantages, the types of Online Libraries and the Limitations of Online Libraries. The lecture also gave me examples of Online Resources.
Today's lecture was also about using Databases.


The lecturer explained to me what online databases were, the types of Online Databases, the advantages and disadvantages of online Databases. She also explained to us how to use our campuses library to access Online Libraries & Databases.


Tutorial summary

We had to use the ECU library web page to locate online books and journals to research the economic impacts of global warming on a business. The online journal database i looked at was ProQuest.
This is a screenshot of the website i looked at to search for the document i wanted.

This is a screen shot of my sorting thought the documents to fine the one most relevant.

This is a screen shot of the document i found that had the most to do with Economic impact of global warming on businesses.

I then visited the MEDline plus website - http://www.medlineplus.gov/ and went going through an interactive tutorial and researching different drugs, and their effects on people. This website would be useful for students and customers needing information to help answer health questions. This is because MedlinePlus directs you to information that helps you to answer health questions. The website gives easy access to medical journal articles. MedlinePlus also has extensive information about drugs, an illustrated medical encyclopedia, interactive patient tutorials, and latest health news.

This is a screen shot of the medline website.

The ten useful functions/ search tips from the ECU library site are:

1. The Quick catalogue search it is easy to search for exactly what you are looking for.




2. Search by faculty. This allows you to obtain search result relative to the faculty you want your results from.




3. Journal Titles Search all the journal titles held by ECU are available in the database.
   
   


4. open any time of day or night




5. a list of websites selected by the ECU librarians that are in order of subject.




6. Has access to Academic Tip Sheets




7. The reserve collection service allows you to reserve material.




8. Gives you a date of when a book etc is due so you can asses whether it is possible for you to use that particular book for your needs.




9. Gives you online access to other universities.




10. Gives you access to the library’s special collections.

Readings

Reading 1 Summary- ‘Finding what you want on the web’

The website is about some one trying to stop using Google but finding it unsuccessful because the web is just to big to search without search engines to narrow down the web pages. He said that he knows how to back up dogie looking information by supporting websites and how to follow promising links from one website to another but not how to search for the websites.

This is a screenshot of the Reading review 1 website that i had to review.

Reading 2 Summary- ‘Bare Bones Lesson 7: Basic Search Tips’

This website contains information designed to get you started in the right direction with a minimum of time and effort of finding the "bare bones" on comprehensive and detailed searching of the Web by providing you with tips that help you filter out the information you dont want when searching the web.

week 2

Lecture
In my week two lecture i learnt about Microsoft and Microsoft's applications:
word
Microsoft office
excel
PowerPoint
publisher
outlook
access

I also learn about Internet explorer's and search engines
Google
Yahoo
FireFox
Safari
explore
Netscape
AOL

Tutorial
In my tutorial i learnt:

how to do print screens to take picture of the screen pages on your computer.
by first selecting the print screen you want then pressing the PrtSc button on my computer then going into paint and pressing Ctrl and V at the same time this will bring up you pic in paint where you can then save it as jpeg on my computer or thumb drive.

What i should put in my project and the order they should go e.g.
cover page, header footer, page break, page number, table of content, table of fig,line spacing.



I also learnt how to use excel i made a spreed sheet table of the hours i spend doing particular activity's e.g sleeping, eating,travelling,in lectures,tutorials,lib/study,eating,social,exercise,

I also learnt some useful shortcuts e.g.
ctrl delete = delete words in front of cursor point
ctrl backspace = delete words behind cursor point
ctrl Z = undo
ctrl Y= redo
ctrl and arrow right or left to jump words
ctrl home = go to start of doc
ctrl end =go to end of doc
ctrl shift= word by word highlight words
ctrl A= select whole doc
ctrl F= finding key

and I learnt how to save documents so they can work on vista 2007 and the 98 to 2003 computer configurations

Readings

Reading summary "using MS word for APA tasks"

This reading is all about how to use Microsoft Word 2000 for Windows XL. The paper gives you general tips about how to use the following:

document comments
show/ hide
typeface
margins and alignment
alphabetize reference lists
keeping headings with text
indents
page headers and numbers
line spacing
regular spacing
irregular spacing
dot leaders in contents list
customize the tool bar
use document comments

This paper is not useful to me because i have windows vista at home making this paper irrelevant to me.

Reading summary two "graphic file formate"

This paper is about Adobe Photoshop, a program that is designed to edit images. The paper discusses Graphic Formats which is the types of formats pictures can be used in.the paper tells us about the following formats:

Bitmap (.bmp)
Compuserve(.gif)
Joint Photographic Experts group- otherwise known as (JPEG)
The tagged image file format (.tiff)
Photoshop document (.psd)

In conclusion this week I learnt some invaluable information that will undoubtedly save me time and effort i am very glad i choose to do this course if only i know how to do this stuff in high school i would have taken an hour to do the final copy of my assignments instead of all weekend ow well :0