My Advice...

So you're taking computer skills, eh?

Well here's some advice, from me to you, on how to be successful in this class.

1)Come to class! Don't skip. You learn so many important skills in this class and you can't possibly be successful if you don't know how to do the things you learn in class.

2)Do the homework! It honestly doesn't take that much time and all the skills you practice are useful. You will be sorry. Kidding. But really do your homework.

3) Don't be afraid to ask questions. Mrs. Belisle is always willing to help you out, all you have to do is ask. Your TA is a good source to go to for questions, too.

4)Have fun!! Don't stress too much about the way things work out, because in the end they always do. Focus on learning and the grade will take care of itself.

Enjoy! :)

My Website

Please visit my website at www.cs.trinity.edu/~gkeeslin.

Making this site was not as difficult as I had always expected making a website would be. However, losing all of my work half way through the project was a pain in the butt. I used Microsoft Expression Web on the school computers since I have a mac. I am extremely proud of my webpage in general, but I think I am most proud of is my about me page and the page about St. Louis because it took a lot more effort on my part to format it so it looked good. I think my biggest technical challenge is just dealing with computers in general. I am, by nature, a very stubborn and easily frustrated person so when the programs didn't work exactly the way I wanted them to I was easily discouraged. My biggest design challenge was similar; if something wasn't working the way I wanted it to I was discouraged and frustrated. I plan on showing this website to my family and friends and I'm sure I will use this knowledge again. Maybe not for a class, but at some point in life.

HTML Coding

I think it is really important to know HTML coding because even if software can do it for you, the software can always have glitches or you could need to do a quick fix from a computer that doesn't have that software and it would be so much easier if you could just go into your coding and do a quick fix.

My Picture That Lies

For my picture that lies, I chose to do something from a touristic perspective. I have been to Europe on numerous occasions and I find it funny (not in the haha way but more in the weird/strange/bizzare way) that tourists, time after time, want to take pictures where they look as big as the monument or landmark that they are visiting. If you don't know what I mean you will see it in my picture. Clearly, my picture was manipulated, however the easiest way to do this without spending half an hour on photoshop elements is to stand far enough away from the landmark that it looks smaller than it actually is and strategically place yourself so it looks like you are leaning up against the Eiffel Tower. I picked the Eiffel Tower because I speak French and Paris is my favorite city in the world. I thought it would be funny to make a picture that so many people take (except in mine you can tell that the person is WAY too big for real life) so I looked for pictures of people leaning on walls and found this guy. The picture of the Eiffel Tower was from a tourism website and the picture of the guy was from a modeling site of somesort. The weather was a bit dreary in the picture of the Eiffel Tower so I played with hue, sautration, and brightness/contrast in order to make it look like an absolutely beautiful day in Paris. I blew up the picture of the guy and cut him out of the scene he was in, flipped him horizontally and stuck him right in there. No one wants to be in Paris on a rainy day so I figured I would spice things up a bit and the picture of the tower by itself, while awesome by itself, was a bit lonely (reasons for manipulating the pictures).

Personally, I don't think the manipulation was harmful since the picture, for all intensive purposes, could have been taken in person. Plus it really takes no political stance on anything, it's not controversial, so I really think it would be taken as more of a funny, clever joke rather than an attempt to sabatoge the Eiffel Tower (although we never really know with the French now do we?).

In the article I read, titled Altered Images, Nick Young discusses China's political popularity, or lack thereof, throughout the world. It is known that in their history, China has manipulated not only photographs but literature, news, internet information, television broadcasts and just about anything else that can be manipulated. Young states, "This is not an entirely suffocating level of thought control, since Chineses citizenss are quite ingenious at manipulating the permitted discourse to express their own concerns. But it does mean that many debates are arcane and obscure to outsiders, and that Chinese officials are inexperienced, and genereally useless, at presenting themselves to audiences that are not bound by the Party's syntax" (Young, 133). Although I am sure many pictures throughout history have been manipulated to secure reputation and other such things, I can assure you that my intentions for my "picture that lies", while the title itself sounds rather immoral, were true and genuine. Enjoy!

The Curious Case of Martians at Trinity

One night on campus, things started to get a little fishy...

High Quality Web Info

The biggest thing I got out of Chris Nolan's presentation to our class was by far the information on Google Scholar. I had no idea such a thing existed and I will most definitely be using it for projects and papers to come because of the advanced links and better quality information that google scholar offers. Something that surprised me is that other countries have to use two letter codes (i.e. .uk, .fr, etc.) because the United States Government got the rights to the three letter codes such as .com and .net first. I guess I was naive and just thought that they chose to do it that way, in part probably because .uk and .fr are the only two I am very familiar with and those both make perfect sense in my mind. I definitely think this lecture was helpful, and it was interesting to find out why google sources come up as they do when you enter a search term. I will definitely take all of this information that we learned into consideration before doing more open web research.

Photos That Lie

Of the photos that lie, I picked the one on the University of Wisconsin-Madison application for a few reasons. First of all, I think it's a problem that is easy for us, as college students to relate to. Trinity is a very diverse place so it's not really a problem that we think about a lot, but for other schools it could pose a pretty big problem. Secondly, I have a friend that goes to Wisconsin and now I get to make fun of him for this. Anyway, the picture was originally of students at a sporting event of some sort and I guess the administration felt that there was a lack of diversity represented in the picture. Therefore, instead of taking another picture that showed more diversity, they chose to photoshop in an African-American students head to make the university appear more diverse. This is harmful because it promotes an atmosphere on campus that may or may not exist. Diversity a quality that some kids look at in colleges and this picture could be misleading.

CLT

So I didn't really learn anything from our CLT trip. I don't know if it is because it was 8:30 in the morning on a Friday and I just wasn't paying close attention or the fact that the tour was less than 30 minutes and we didn't do what we were supposed to do at the end by filling out that worksheet. Either way I don't think I will ever need to use CLT. My plans don't involve media work and if I end up being a History and Political Science major like I plan to I don't see a need to do audio, visual, or video projects and therefore won't need the programs that CLT has to offer. I think they would be awesome tools for people in those fields, but for me I just don't see them being a necessary part of my education.

Network Diagram

So there's my network diagram for Trinity and I must say that it took a lot more time and effort than I expected it to. I thought that the tour we took of the Network in Halsell was really interesting, kind of over my head on many notes, but interesting none the less. It's nice to know where everything is going and coming from since I'm fairly certain that almost every student uses the Internet in some way, shape, or form everyday. I find it impressive that Tucc-Tiger is a simple looking as it is; I feel like it would have to be a way more intricate device to preform all of the duties that it does. Apparently I was wrong. Surprise, surprise! I have a lot of respect for anyone who has the brain capacity and the patience to work with computers and networks and such, especially one as large and expansive as Trintiy's network.

Top Tech Tip

Try saying that 5 times fast! So after hearing Joe Hatch speak today in class, I realized that I need to be a lot more cautious when it comes to protecting my computer. It was nice to get a better understanding of Clean Access; now I actually understand the reasons that it's there rather than just getting frustrated at it all the time. It was also very helpful to know that the Tech Support Center in Winn 103 is there to help with any problems we have, from slow performance to Clean Access problems. The information on Spyware was informative and it was nice to know the difference between the TUSecure network and the TUGuest.

Of all the information we heard today, I have to say that my Top Tech Tip would be the blog article about 12 Things Computer Users Should Fear in 2010. I've posted a link to the article at the bottom of this post. I agree that people have become less cautious about protecting themselves when it comes to their computer usage and I think that this article has a lot of good tips and warnings for every computer user.

12 Things Computer Users Should Fear in 2010

Post Scavenger Hunt

Having just finished the scavenger hunt of the on-line blogs, I can tell that this is going to be a good class. I found all of the blogs really intriguing and I look forward to getting to know y'all more throughout the semester. I left comments on both Moira and Amanda's posts, the URL's for which are posted below. Amanda, I do find it entertaining that we both commented on each others posts. I had no idea that you commented on mine until I had already commented on yours. Looks like great minds think alike afterall.

http://mallen21.blogspot.com/

http://amandampatterson.blogspot.com/

My Life In A Nutshell

My name is Grace Keesling, and I am from St. Louis, Missouri. In my spare time I like to hang out with my friends (including my totally awesome roommate who is in the 8:30 class and suite mate who is in the 2:10 class), listen to music, and both watch and play sports. I played field hockey, basketball, and water polo in high school and I play water polo for Trinity's club team. I enjoy watching football and baseball but my all-time favorite sport is hockey. My favorite NHL team is the St. Louis Blues. My computer background is very basic, for lack of a better word. I have been using Macs my whole life so I can function using Windows but only at a very basic level. So I'm hoping to gain a more detailed understanding of the Windows system and increase my computer abilities. Below is a link for my Trinity email address:

grace.keesling@trinity.edu