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Learn HTML in a Weekend

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step-by-step tutorials in HTML page design

Can you really learn HTML in a weekend? Well, Steve Callihan doesn’t make any rash claims. He only sets out in this beginner’s guide to cover the basics – leaving you to fill in the finer details with later practice. The book is written with the assumption that you have a relatively free weekend. You do some preliminary reading on Friday evening with some basics about hypertext and the basics of a web site. Saturday morning is devoted to the elements of HTML tags, how to create headings, paragraphs, and breaks. It’s organised to teach you what each code does and to give you an overview of HTML.

Learn HTMLSaturday afternoon is described as optional. It deals with some of the refinements of aligning text on the page, wrapping text round images, and dealing with font sizes, colours, and faces. If you have the stamina to keep going, Saturday evening is a ‘bonus’ session covering tables. Don’t take this timetable too seriously. Anyone who can master tables in one evening should apply immediately to the Nobel Prize Foundation.

Sunday morning is devoted to frames – perhaps a section which beginners can skip, because frames are no longer even thought to be a good idea by most web design theorists. The afternoon session on forms is likely to be far more useful, and the evening ‘bonus’ session on graphics will be even more popular. I followed this in detail, since I’ve never been strong on graphics, and it proved to be a straightforward tour through making 3D buttons with Paint Shop Pro.

The book is well illustrated, and there’s a CD with the usual array of free and shareware editors and browsers, so you have all that’s required here to make a start. It truly could be done in a weekend – but why not take a little more time and get it right.

© Roy Johnson 2000

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Steve Callihan, Learn HTML in a Weekend, Rocklin, CA: Prima Publishing, 1999, pp.425, ISBN 0761518002

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Learning XML

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overview of XML concepts and applications

Learning XML is for anyone who wants to understand what XML is and how to use it. Erik Ray shows how to employ the appropriate structure and format to demystify the process of creating XML documents. XML is relatively simple (but very rigorous) set of tags which describe the content of documents. The problem is that you still need to learn Cascading Style Sheets in order to control the appearance of text on the page. Ray covers all that, as well as the other important technologies – such as the Document Type Definition. He also shows how style sheets can be used to format documents – though in a rather abstract manner.

Learning XMLOne or two illustrations would have been useful here. He also explains the principles of Transformation, using XSLT, which allow you to convert an XML document from one form into another. He explains very persuasively why XML is superior to HTML for preparing documents for multi-purpose use. There is also an introduction to the use of XLink and XPointer, which can create bi-directional links between data. These are extremely powerful technologies which will make the next steps in XML programming an exciting prospect for those who want to pass beyond the frustrating limitations of HTML.

This is a book which is suitable for readers who already know some HTML, but who want to know what is coming next. And it’s an overview: the finer details of XML language will have to be acquired elsewhere. It is written in a persuasive and authoritative manner. This is somebody who knows what is going on in the latest phase of Web development.

© Roy Johnson 2003

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Erik T. Ray, Learning XML, Sebastopol (CA): O’Reilly, 2nd edition 2003, pp.432, ISBN: 0596004206

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Literacy in the New Media Age

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theoretical study of writing in the digital age

This is an investigation of the effect of new media on what Gunter Kress calls ‘alphabetic writing’. He is arguing that multimedia and the screen are starting to challenge the page as the natural medium of writing – and that this in turn is affecting the way we write. It’s certainly true that writing for the screen has to be more immediate and heavily chunked than writing for the page, and Kress also argues that the screen is making graphic images more important as a medium of communication.

Literacy in the New Media Age He points out quite rightly that speech and writing are two completely separate systems (which is why many people have problems with writing). The alphabet is actually a loose transcription system for translating between them. His basic argument is that all communication (including linguistics) should be seen as a subset of semiotics. There’s actually not very much about new media discussed – merely an assumption that iconic or visual communication is challenging the dominance of writing.

However, he does make the interesting observation that computers put users in charge of page layout in a way which gives new emphasis to design, as well as providing interactivity between writer and reader.

Having argued that all texts are a result of ideological relationships between author and reader, he even attempts a quasi-political analysis of punctuation. This is not really persuasive, and founders in his attempts to explain or excuse his examples of what is no more than poor writing.

But he does end on an interesting topic of reading paths. That is, the manner in which readers have to construct their own navigational routes when confronting what he calls ‘multimodal’ texts – ones with pictures and words, such as magazines and web pages, for instance.

Although he claims to have left behind an academic style so as to communicate with a wider audience, he writes in a dense and rather abstract manner. The results will be of interest to linguists, educational theorists, and semiologists – though those approaching it with an interest in new media might be a little disappointed.

© Roy Johnson 2003

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Gunther Kress, Literacy in the New Media Age, London: Routledge, 2003, pp.186, ISBN: 041525356X

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Literature and the Internet

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resources, techniques, and issues for literary studies

In the field of literary studies, people have been creating digitized texts and making concordances for quite some time now. But until the advent of the Web it was difficult to get an overview of criticism and scholarship which was easily available. In fact it’s still not easy. As the authors of this excellent guide Literature and the Internet point out, it remains common for the latest work to be made available only in the form of conventionally printed books and the dinosaur publishing methods of scholarly journals.

Literature and the Internet But at last the Internet is now making ever more material easily available to us, and it is the purpose of this guide to advise students, teachers, and scholars how to make the most of the opportunity to retrieve it. They start with a general survey of the pros and cons of the Internet for literary studies, quite rightly pointing out that despite all its obvious advantages, there are still many shortcomings:

It has large and obvious gaps, it cannot cover the literary ground as even a moderately well-stocked library can, and it cannot equal the contemporary appeal of a good bookstore.

In fact the differences between books in libraries and texts on the Net are intelligently explored, before we get down to some practical advice on usability. This centres logically enough on using search engines, and they offer an explanation of the different techniques which can be deployed, as well as alerting users to the differences in kind amongst the sources which might be located.

The centre of the book is an extensive list of resources. These are arranged as web site address – in categories ranging from libraries, journals, literary periods, literary criticism, discussion groups and email distribution lists, to individual authors – from Achebe to Zola – and their home pages.

Mercifully, these lists are annotated with useful evaluative comments, making clear distinctions between sites which are commercial, fan pages, and the results of scholarly research. It’s interesting to note how many of the award-winning sites are the work of dedicated individuals (such as Jack Lynch at Pennsylvania and Mitsuharu Matsuoka in Japan) and departments in little-known colleges in the back of nowhere. Major institutions are noticeably thin on the ground.

I felt reassured that the authors had done their homework, had visited the sites they discuss – and were not frightened of levelling criticism at some quite well known names in the literary establishment. They point out the need for more qualitative evaluation of online resources and web site reviews.

This is followed by advice on the evaluation of sites, including a series of basic questions we can ask on arrival. Is the information accurate? Is it complete? And is there any acknowledgement of the sources being used?

There is also a section for teachers, discussing how computers and the Internet can be used in literary studies, with suggestions (for instance) for hypertext assignments and web essays – though I hope their term Webliographies doesn’t catch on.

They consider the nature of electronic texts – from plain ASCII, through the Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) and HyperText Markup Language (HTML), and even as far as the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) and Extensible Markup Language (XML).

These are only touched on lightly, with their differences briefly explained, but this is a valuable topic to raise in the consciousness of students and teachers, especially in the light of controversies surrounding the form in which commercial electronic books are being issued.

The guide ends with considerations of the theoretical and political connections between literary studies in an era of digitized text – exploring some of the notions raised in recent years by Jay Bolter, George Landow, and J. Hillis Miller.

They even have some interesting comments to make on the likely impact of Information Technology on academic careers – including the vexed issue of academic publishing, which must surely be due for major convulsions in the next few years.

Many people have argued that it’s now rather pointless issuing printed resource guides which will be quickly outdated. But there is a reason for such publications. The fact is that it’s often quicker to locate information in a book, rather than searching through files or favourites using a browser.

Certainly, I’m very pleased that this book is on my desk, and I look forward to exploring its suggestions and passing on any gems to my own students – who are currently learning how to write, link, zip, and upload their first web essays.

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© Roy Johnson 2000

Stephanie Browner, Stephen Pulsford, and Richard Sears, Literature and the Internet: A Guide for Students, Teachers, and Scholars, London/New York: Garland, 2000, pp.191, ISBN: 0815334532

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Mashup Patterns

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designs and examples for the modern enterprise

Mashups originated in the music industry, where a mashup was a combination of two or more songs to create a new experience. Typically, the vocal track of one song was combined with the instrumental background of another. The result was a hybrid – but something new. For most consumers, mashups are built with data from Google Maps, Flickr, YouTube, Amazon, and eBay. These companies were pro-active in offering up their data for other people’s use. In Mashup Patterns Michael Ogrinz is more concerned with ‘enterprise’ (that is, Big Business) where there may be less enthusiasm in giving access to data. But it can be ‘gathered’ nevertheless – and he offers the polite euphemism ‘harvesting’ to avoid the more nasty-sounding term ‘screen-scraping’.

Mashup PatternsHe also sees rich potential in the congruence of mashups with Software as a Service (SaaS) – firms which offer ready-made software solutions to which business users subscribe at very little cost. This saves them the heavy investment costs of developing their own. His emphasis is on showing useful solutions to problems: this is the ‘patterns’ of his title. A pattern is a solution to a problem which can be re-used elsewhere to solve a different problem. What he doesn’t do is show the technical detail of how it’s done. For that you might wish to consult the book’s companion, J. Jeffrey Hanson’s Mashups: Strategies for the Modern Enterprise.

It’s understandably assumed that data will be taken from more than one source to create a mashup – but he gives examples where only one source is used. In both cases however, scheduling of gathering the data may be crucial, especially on time-sensitive issues such as stock market prices.

The book is rich in examples. An ‘alerter’ can be used to warn businesses of new software releases or product updates, or compare price fluctuations to identify buying opportunities. Similarly, price analysis mashups allow businesses to keep an eye on competitors and offer lower prices.

Mashups he calls ‘Infinite Monkeys’ can be used to analyse huge amounts of data, which are too big for human analysis. This is done to uncover hidden trends – such as geographic hot spots where more widgets sell, more accidents occur, or where house repossessions are on the rise.

Mashups can also analyse data in blogs, wikis, and email messages to deal with what he calls ‘reputation management’ – such as most frequently cited sources. The patterns he describes are given a ‘fragility’ rating – based on how likely the data they use is going to become unavailable (because sites do go down or even disappear).

One of the most obvious uses of mashup technology is the holiday planner. Data can be drawn from multiple sources such as airline schedules, hotel booking agencies, car hire firms, and restaurants to produce a complete package.

All these applications are grouped into chapters which consider how information can be obtained from various sources, how it can be enriched, recombined, and repurposed. The term ‘enterprise’ in his subtitle is reflected in the fact that most concrete examples involve improving sales, making a business more effective, identifying new business opportunities, and in general maximising profit.

He finishes with some real life case studies in which companies successfully used mashups to solve problems – from Associated Press to the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and Reuters. This emphasis on commerce might make the book appeal to business users as well as the content creators and software developers who are most likely to be taken up with the possibilities of mashups.

© Roy Johnson 2009

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Michael Ogrinz, Mashup Patterns: Designs and Examples for the Modern Enterprise, London: Addison-Wesley, 2009, pp.400, ISBN: 032157947X

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Mediactive

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new journalism, new publishing, new media

Mediactive is the latest stage in an argument that has been developing for some time now. In 2004 Dan Gillmor launched the notion of the ‘citizen journalist’ in his polemic We the Media. He argued that news is too important to be left entirely in the hands of professional journalists, and that bloggers (who were at that time a new phenomenon) had a corrective influence that should be encouraged. Since anyone with access to a computer and the Internet can start blogging within five minutes, it was in the power of ordinary people to create an additional and maybe an alternative voice to the established press and the broadcast media. They can also do this at virtually no cost, because the open source movement makes powerful software available to us free of charge. Since that time the sales of print newspapers have been plummeting, and bloggers have risen in importance and influence, to the extent that all major newspapers now have their own staff bloggers, having once ridiculed their very existence.

Mediactive Mediactive is Gillmor’s update to these arguments, in which he urges us all to become more active, sceptical, and open consumers of information – but also active participants in its creation. And he even provides the tools to do the job. In the past you needed to own printing presses, publishing companies, and distribution networks to make even the smallest item of information available to a wider audience. But now all that has changed. Because as he argues very persuasively (referencing Clay Shirky) – the barriers to entry are virtually zero. “You don’t need anybody’s permission, and you don’t need much money either”. In other words, individual entrepreneurs now have an entirely new opportunity to make information available to the public.

His book is in three parts: first, the arguments for becoming active in the creation of media (print, blogs, video, podcasts); second, the tools for engagement and how to use them; and third, the large socio-legal issues and conflicts in online advocacy and the realms of media literacy in education.

This is an interesting book in its own right as a physical object. Mediactive exists primarily as an on-going project, a web-based set of resources, of which this printed book is only one manifestation, which might well be called Version 1.0. Other manifestations already exist as web pages, and you can download the whole thing as a PDF file free of charge at Mediactive.com. In time, as new materials, updated evidence, modifications, and corrections are made, the version number will change – just as in the case of software at the moment.

Dan Gillmor is one of those people who believe that making books available as free downloads increases the sales of a print version. It has to be said that in this form of print on demand (POD) format these books are not very attractive. They have small page margins, the first lines of paragraphs are indented, typography is crude, and perhaps worst of all, underlining is used to show where hyperlinks exist in the online version.

It has no index, footnotes, or bibliography. All of these are available in the master copy which exists on line. It’s rather like a book that has been produced by an enthusiastic amateur using a desktop publishing kit. It’s also written in bite-sized chunks for reading on screen. What works in one medium doesn’t necessarily translate well without problems for another

However this is the Brave New World of publishing and distributing ideas, and I think we might expect a few rough edges in these emerging forms, just as I’m equally confident that production standards will rise as the form matures. If you don’t believe me, have a look at any document you produced twenty years ago.

Basically he wants us all to become more vigilant and active participants in using the new media tools at our disposal. His strongest argument in support of citizen media against traditional journalism and especially broadcast media is also its smallest and simplest elements – the hyperlink and the comment. If television news reports an event, we have no way of clicking through to check the source of the information or any alternatives there might be, and we have no way of offering corrective feedback or criticism.

Having urged participation, he then goes through the best known of the new media tools – blogs, YouTube, Flickr, and even content management systems (CMS), though like me, he drew the line at Drupal as a techie step too far.

All this creates an entirely new opportunity to the individual entrepreneur in any field of interest. That’s because the barriers to entry are virtually zero. “You don’t need anybody’s permission, and you don’t need much money either.”

He poses interesting questions and raises thought-provoking questions. For instance, the apparently simple query: “What is journalism?” If somebody documents arguments over a planning application to build a new factory in their neighbourhood on a blog – is that journalism? And if not, why not? His answer would be yes – because even though you are not paid for writing the article or employed by a newspaper, the article is performing the function of journalism by making information publicly available.

He also poses an interesting notion that is reflected in the very nature of the book itself. “When is a work complete?” Why shouldn’t a digital work live on and accrue to itself all the modifications, corrections, additions, and links to further information that become available over time? There is no reason why a book should not be like a Wikipedia entry – subject to constant updating and revision.

Of course this idea leads in turn to the question “What is a book?” – to which this production is an interesting answer. Of course we are accustomed to a book being a relatively static or fixed entity, existing in maybe at the most two or three editions. But there is no reason why we should not refer in future footnotes and references to Book Title, Version 3.1.5

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© Roy Johnson 2011

Dan Gillmor, Mediactive, Lulu.com, 2010, pp.183, ISBN: 0557789427

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Microsoft Manual of Style

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guidelines for clear technical writing

Microsoft Manual of Style was produced in-house at Microsoft as the style guide for its army of writers who produce the help files and documentation for its products. Except that it’s been re-written for the public, and it’s completely non-prescriptive. They don’t say “This is the way it should be done”. They say “Here’s how we do it at Microsoft. You may find this approach useful”. It starts with a chapter describing the principles on which its house style is built – and these could profitably be adopted by any other organisation or business. Or any individual for that matter.

Microsoft Manual of Style They are not at all particular to Microsoft, but aimed at producing seamlessly efficient communication. The principles include consistency of language, an empathetic attitude towards readers, precision, plain language, simplicity of sentence construction, a nod towards avoiding gender bias, and maintaining grammatical parallelism (which is very useful if you are writing instructions).

These issues are all illustrated by good and bad examples that show clearly the distinction to be made between for instance two apparently identical instructions::

Use this procedure to make any changes to your password.

Follow these steps to change your password.

The second has seven words instead of ten, less fuzz, and more clarity.

There’s a separate section on writing efficiently for the web. You should use the power of headings, sub-headings, bulleted lists, and well-chosen hyperlinks to maximise readability. There’s a specially valuable tip here. In each paragraph, put the conclusion first (what’s called the ‘inverted pyramid’ style) so that readers know if they wish to read on. People scan web pages rather than read them.

It’s not all about instructions and programs. The guidance assumes you might be using videos, blogs, and community-provided content such as wikis. It also keeps in mind that you might be writing for an international audience – but it points out that the guidelines for accommodating this are the same as for writing clearly and persuasively for English-speaking readers anyway. The maximum length of sentences should be twenty-five words.

For those people who will be writing about technology there’s a whole chapter on user interfaces – screens, menus, dialogue boxes, and toolbars – and how to write instructions that are clear and unambiguous. This is bang up to date, because to interact with contemporary devices you now need to include gesture (pich, swipe, zoom) as well as input via speech instructions and keyboard shortcuts.

More technical advice follows – on writing procedures (how to navigate through folders) how to describe cloud computing accurately, how to show code in support documentation, and fine details such as how to use filename extensions and when to use capitalization and bold.

There’s quite a lot on how to display numbers and when to use words (seven databases but a 24-hour day) how to show dates (February 12, 2012 – which is very non-standard) plus how to write captions and compile bibliographies.

On grammar and punctuation they understandably go for simplicity, clarity, and brevity. All the basic common sense rules are illustrated – but are then followed by some not-so-obvious but fascinating illustrations of indexing and list-ordering, including the order in which numerical entries will be listed. For instance 12-hour clock comes before 2-D charts.

There’s a huge list of acronyms with advice on when and when not to spell them out, and then the last half of the book is an alphabetical list of technical terms and commonly used words and phrases with illustrated explanations of good styling. They range from am/pm, through less and fewer, to ZIP codes and how to spell the plural of zero.

There are two indexes – one at the front and another at the back of the book – so it’s easy to find any detail you need to check. The latest fourth edition does its best to keep up to date with the ever expanding language of technology – app, cloud, and sync as well as terabyte (TB), petabyte (PB), and on up to yottabyte (YB). And it’s interesting to note that E-mail and Web site have now become email and website as these terms have now become part of everyday language.

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&copy Roy Johnson 2012

Microsoft Corporation, Microsoft Manual of Style, Microsoft Press: Redmond (WA), fourth edition, 2012, pp.438, ISBN: 0735648719

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Red button Writing guides compared

Red button Writing skills – an annotated bibliography

Red button Editing and Revising Text

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Modern Architecture: a critical history

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an illustrated history of architecture 1900-2000

This is a scholarly history of modern architecture which has gone through a number of editions and has been kept up to date with obvious enthusiasm from the author, who is an authority on the subject. Peter Frampton starts with three short chapters that give the historical background to the modern era. That is, the architectural thinking, urban planning, and the technological developments after 1750 that led to the twentieth century, when what we call modern began.

Modern ArchitectureThe narrative proper begins with the Arts and Crafts movement in England, then moves on to the Americans Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright. Both of them started their careers in Chicago, which was rebuilding itself as a city following the Great Fire of 1871. Next comes Gaudi, who I had not realized was influenced by Ruskin, Richard Wagner, and the French architectural theorist Viollet-le-Duc.

I rather like Frampton’s approach of devoting one short chapter to each style or designer, because there is just enough to assimilate without being over faced, and the succinct form encourages comprehension of the subject.

The celebrated James Rennie McIntosh went from spectacular early success to a very sad late career decline and an end in near obscurity. This is surprising, given the enduring popularity of his work. It would seem that even architecture has its shooting stars.

There are chapters on the Vienna Secession and Italian futurism, and in addition to these movements he includes studies of individual designers such as Adolf Loos, Henry van der Velde, Tony Garnier, and Auguste Perret. Some of these movements produced more designs than finished buildings, but Frampton includes their plans on the grounds that some were more influential than completed projects.

It is interesting to note that almost all the architectural visionaries he discusses were politically radical and leftist of one stripe or another. But none of them was able to reconcile the fact that their most celebrated products as artists were beautifully luxurious homes for rich bourgeois patrons.

The Bauhaus and Neue Sachlichkeit movements generated some amazingly innovative designs and buildings, until the Stock Market collapse of 1929 and the political swing to the right caused many of its stars to flee both east and west (only the latter survived). It’s quite surprising that many of their buildings look remarkably similar to those being built in major western cities today, almost one hundred years later.

Frampton sees Le Corbusier as the most important figure of mid century modern architecture, though it should be kept in mind that many of the high-rise social housing projects built under his influence (with their disastrous elevated walkways, vandalized lifts, and rubbish-strewn communal areas) have since been demolished, not long after they were first built.

A chapter on Soviet architecture does its best to show radical ideas emerging from the early years of the Proletkult, but finally has to admit that all creativity was crushed by the dead hand of Stalinism from 1930 onwards.

The latter part of the book plots the development of those people he sees as seminal influences – Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Phillip Johnson, and Buckminster Fuller. And although he includes a chapter called ‘The New Brutalism’ which largely features the work of Alison and Peter Smithson in the UK, it’s fairly clear that this is precisely the sort of work which has given architecture and publicly commissioned work a bad name in the latter part of the last century.

For this fourth edition Kenneth Frampton has added a major new chapter that explores the effects of globalization on architecture in recent years, the rise of the celebrity architect, and the way in which practices worldwide have addressed such issues as sustainability and habitat. The bibliography has also been updated and expanded, making this volume more complete and indispensable than ever.

The book has a comprehensive critical apparatus and huge bibliography, but it would also benefit from a glossary of architectural jargon. I had to look up the meaning of terms such as trabeated. atectonic, entasis, celerestory, oneric, lithic and phalantsery. Be warned: it’s not an easy read, but it’s excellent value.

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© Roy Johnson 2010

Kenneth Frampton, Modern Architecture: a critical history, London: Thames and Hudson, 4th revised edn, 2000, pp.424, ISBN: 0500203954

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Moodle Teaching Techniques

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creative effective online learning courses using Moodle

As a course management system, Moodle has more technical features than its commercial rivals, but that’s not the only reason it’s being taken up by schools, universities, and colleges. In the jargon of educationalists, it’s a ‘constructivist’ program. This means that it allows users to learn through building their own experience of learning, possibly in contact with other students. It is student-oriented, rather than teacher-led, and it promotes learning through doing rather than just passive reception. If anybody tells you it’s an easy software program to use, they’re lying. Most people will need all the help they can get, even if they are putting some ready-made course materials into Moodle’s default templates. That’s why books such as Moodle Teaching Techniques exist – to explain the principles of eLearning design at the same time as offering a guided tour of some Moodle features.

Moodle 1.9 Teaching TechniquesThe first chapter in Rice and Nash’s guide details the variety of strategies people use when learning, and it identifies the tools within Moodle which can be used to include them in an eLearning programme. This is useful at beginners and intermediate levels, when it’s not always easy to understand the difference in purpose of, say, a quiz and a lesson.

The next step – quite logically – is the creation of a structure for a course. It is now a generally accepted fact that courses need to be split into small, easily manageable units – whether these are called topics, modules, units, lessons, or chapters. The recommendation here is to use Moodle’s forum tool for creating these discrete parts. This is quite reasonable – but users will need to make clear to themselves the distinctions between student, group, forum, class, and course which flow from this decision. It is not immediately clear in Moodle what the consequences of making one choice rather than another will be.

The same is true when it comes to allocating permissions. Moodle permits a number of levels of privacy and security, and you will need to consider carefully the benefits and potential disadvantages of allowing students to see, for instance, each other’s work and teacher’s comments upon it. Fortunately, each stage of their recommendations is illustrated with screen shots showing how to effect the required configuarations.

They are quite right to assume that Chat will be an attractive feature for students – particularly youngers ones who have grown up in a world of Messenger and Facebook. But it seems odd to discuss all Chat’s possible uses before any course materials and structure have been shown. Unless you already know how to use Moodle, this book itself would need to be used in conjunction with another – such as Using Moodle or Moodle: E-Learning Course Development.

The issue of assessment is focussed exclusively on the creation of quizzes – which can be a rather complex and often counter-intuitive matter in Moodle. They show how a quiz can be timed, limited, and controlled – but they miss one important feature which could save course designers lots of time. That is the creation of categories for question banks in which the quiz questions can be saved for future re-use. These are, after all, the fundamental and re-usable learning objects which form the basis of a Moodle course.

Next they cover the use of the lesson to promote learning. The course materials should be chunked and their sequence controlled, with a series of checks on undestanding included at each stage. And if you didn’t already appreciate the fact, it’s worth knowing that Moodle records every single student activity on a course – so it’s possible to see how many attempts have been made at a quiz, how long was spent on each page, and how many correct answers have been accumulated. This allows for a lot of revision and fine tuning of the materials between each itteration of the course.

Then they cover features which will probably only be used on courses in further and higher levels of education (and training) – the use of the Wiki feature, the Glossary, the Workshop, and the Choice activity. It’s typical of Moodle’s use of confusing terminology that ‘Choice’ is what most normal people would call a Poll or a Survey.

And at the end comes a chapter which should more logically, but perhaps less inspiringly, come first – course management. You really do need to know how to set up a course so that students can find their way around, see what’s available, and keep track of their learning.

I continue to believe that the definitive guide to using Moodle as a course design and management tool is still to be written. It will be a hefty tome if it ever appears – but in the meantime, users will have to cope with these slimmer (but still expensive) volumes which offer pointers in roughly the right direction.

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© Roy Johnson 2010

William Rice and Susan Smith Nash, Moodle 1.9 Teaching Techniques, Birmingham: Pakt Publishing, 2010, pp.200, ISBN 1849510067

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Nerds 2.0.1 – A Brief History of the Internet

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Internet HistoryTV programmes of interviews with Internet personalities

Robert Cringely’s Triumph of the Nerds won legions of computer-skeptical and computer-naive viewers with its mix of minutiae and hip techniques. Going one step further into the digital maze, Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet operates as a sequel of sorts to the surprise docu-hit. Just as its precursor chronicled the rise of empires built on computer software, Nerds 2.0.1 collects interviews from key players in the development of the Internet.

Fashionably hip in its visual feel, the film begins by amassing data on the net’s crowning, collaborative irony: conceived in the Pentagon during the counterculture’s smokiest high point by members–dare it be said–of the military industrial complex, the Net developed on the axis of university research networks and Deadhead (as in the Grateful Dead) electronic bulletin boards.

Much of the rest has become history, but Internet and computer industry pundit Robert X. Cringley makes the narrative a jumping, attractive embrace of being a nerd. Interviews with Bill Gates, Mark Andreesen, and Steve Case make these three hours (three tapes slipcased in a nice box) fly by.

This video series is an excellent addition to the material available on computer history. It moves at a fast pace and provides interviews with many of the key people in the industry. It does not cover every aspect of computer history, but it does fill in some gaps that other references missed. I encourage anyone interested in computer history to add this video series to their library. Excellent footage, nicely put together.

© Roy Johnson 2002

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Robert X Cringley, Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet, VHS Video (3 tapes) ASIN: 6305128235

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