TU100, My digital Life, Block 4, Part 4, Session 2.8, A world that didn’t work, Activity 12.

 Block 4, My Friends., Open University., Part 4: Virtual Worlds., TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Feb 262012
 

What were some of the factors that contributed to the failure of Google Lively?

The fact that the requirements for Lively were similar to Second Life, but with fewer user freedoms made it less competitive. On top of this there seems to have not been much research gone into the project upon launch. The lack of immersion, freedom and creativity are probably the three biggest detractors for users in Lively. On top of this, Lively was a ‘plugin’ as opposed to a stand-alone application, which only worked in Firefox and internet explorer.

TU100, My digital Life, Block 3, Part 3, Session 2, Online communities, Activity 12.

 Block 4, My Friends., Open University., Part 2: Friends Reunited., TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Feb 082012
 

Referring back to Block 1 Part 1, state why emoticons might be used in online messages. How can they be used to help avoid causing offence?

Emoticons can be used in place of inflection in spoken words. This allows written text to convey the emotion with the text, and removes a degree of ambiguity that comes with text.

TU100, My Digital Life, Part 3, Block 5, Session 2.1, An Angry Man, Activity 12.

 Block 3, My Place., Open University., Part 5: Giving it all Away, TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Jan 242012
 

Excerpt from the Open University course TU100 material:

Free software is a matter of the users’ freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. More precisely, it means that the program’s users have the four essential freedoms:

  • The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
  • The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish (freedom 1). […]
  • The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
  • The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. […]

Looking at the bulleted list of the four freedoms above, which would require access to the source code?

Freedoms 1 and 3, studying and changing how the program works, and distributing modified versions, are require access to source the source code.

TU100, My Digital Life, Block 3, Part 4, Session 4.1, Retrieving deleted data, Activity 12, 13 and 14.

 Block 3, My Place., Open University., Part 4: Glue  No Responses »
Jan 192012
 

Activity 12

A user of a Windows computer accidentally deletes a file and wants to recover it. How could they get their data back:

  1. before emptying the Recycle Bin
  2. after emptying the Bin?

If they have not deleted the file from the recycle bin, then all they need to do is access the recycle bin and then right click the desired file selecting ‘restore file’ to have the file be sent back to it’s directory.

If the recycle bin has been emptied then the user would have to use a piece of recovery software such as ‘Recuva’ by Piriform software.

Activity 13

Give one piece of advice to a colleague who has accidentally deleted a file from their Windows computer and then emptied the Recycle Bin.

Do not install anything, save any documents, or perform a defragmentation.

Activity 14

A friend has accidentally deleted some files from their computer. They have bought an undelete utility. Should they install the application to their computer?

No they should not as the undelete utility may be installed over the files it is that they want to recover.

TU100, My digital Life, Block 3, Part 3, Session 2.2, Estimating Location, Activity 11 and 12.

 Block 3, My Place., Open University., Part 3: Location, location, location., TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Jan 122012
 

Activity 11

What is the name given to the process of translating information such as a terrestrial base station address into location coordinates?

This process is called geocoding.

Activity 12

Figure 15 shows a map of a wireless network containing a number of base stations, with circles to indicate the transmission range of each base station. A position on the map is specified using the coordinates marked along the border, and the coordinates of the base stations are given in Table 1. The figure is also labelled with four physical locations (A–D) where a particular mobile device is being used.

Figure 15 Five geocoded terrestrial base stations
Figure 15 Five geocoded terrestrial base stations
Base station ID Coordinates
M1 2, 1
M2 2, 3
M3 3.5, 4
M4 3.5, 2
M5 5.5, 3

Using the transmission range of the base stations together with their coordinates, complete the following table to show the location coordinates that would be determined by the mobile device at each of positions A–D, using the method described above.

Actual device location Base station(s) in range Computed device location
A M2 2, 3
B M3 3.5, 4
C M1 and M4 3.5, 2 (stronger signal from M4)
D M4 3.5, 2

TU100, My Digital Life, Block 2, Part 5, Session 1.3, Causes and Consequences, Activity 11 and 12.

 Block 2, My Stuff, Open University., Part 5, With the Tears wiped Off., TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Dec 292011
 

Activity 11

Given that the relationship between exercise and obesity is a negative correlation, what would a positive correlation be? Can you think of an example?

In keeping with the fitness theme, there would be a positive correlation between doing fitness and exercise, and the athletic health of a people.

Activity 12

On the evidence of Figure 15, what correlations, if any, can you see between income and obesity?

Column chart showing relationship between overweight/obesity and income

Figure 15 : Column chart showing relationship between overweight/obesity and income

 

The income bands along the bottom scale, marked Q1, Q2, etc., are called quintiles. All this means is that the income distribution of the UK population has been divided into five equal ranges, with Q1 containing the top 20% of earners and Q5 the bottom 20%.

The data in Fig 15 show opposite correlations for men and women. For men, as income decreases ( from Q1 to Q5 ) then the percentage of obesity decreases. This trend is reversed for women, which shows an increase in the percentage of obesity as income drops.

TU100, My Digital Life, Block 2, Part 4, Session 2.2, What is Information good for?, Activity 12.

 Open University., TU100: My Digital Life.  No Responses »
Dec 272011
 

Imagine you are buying a new computer. Describe the information you require in terms of your goals and constraints, your options and the relationship between the two.

Things I would like to know about a computer when buying include:

  • What operating system is installed.
  • The size and type of HDD(s).
  • The amount and type of RAM.
  • What processor is installed.
  • What other programmes are bundled with the computer.
  • The cost.
  • The make and model fo the GPU.

Generally the price can be considered a constraint, and the quality / amount of the others can be considered a goal, with an increase of price allowing a more powerful components to be bought, and a decrease affecting the quality of the components in the opposite manner. This is a linear relation between price and quality.