Out of school for 16 days

Wow...I got so caught up in the Summer Semesters, that I forgot my blog, I would like to take the time to allow people to know me, I am maintaining a 3.5 gpa, and feel like my brain is a sponge, but that is ok, I have 16 days off, until it is back to IT land, and in the mean time I will still stimulate my mind, and my soul. I believe that is the only way to live as humans in an imperfect world. Love and Blessings to all Lisa N.

Terms and Definitions for May the 5th.

1.- Hexadecimal - A base 16 number system.

2. - Word - An ordered set of characters that is treated as a unit.

3.- Octal - A base 8 number system.

4.- Pure Binary - uncoded binary.

4.- Binary-Coded Decimal (BCD) - A code in which each decimal digit is represented by a group of 4 binary bits.

5.- Excess-3 Code - A code in which the decimal digit n is represented by the 4-bit binary code n+3.

6.- Gray Code - A non weighted binary code in which sequential numbers are represented by codes that differ by one bit.

7.- Alphanumeric Code - A code used to represent the letters of the alphabet and decimal numbers. The computer keyboard.



Thanks to Introductory Computer Mathematics, Second Edition, Nigel P Cook, Prentice Hall, pages 210-222.

My blog of interest for May the 5th

iFrame attacks surge. SQL injection attacks on Microsoft Internet Information Servers last week left Web pages with malicious iFrames in them. It looks as if Panda Security is asking network managers to make sure their web pages are not infected. The number of infected Web pages spiked dramatically last week, and the vendor is offering free scans to check for malicious codes on companies Web pages. Wow!!!!

Microsoft: Web attacks take off...........oh my!!

It looks as if the criminals in computer land have changed their tactics in the last six months of the year 2007. Some of the tactics are as follows: dropping malicious email in favor of Web-based attacks, the # of Trojan-down-loader programs jump by 300%, malware items were up by 55%. Wow, is the Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) that ships with Windows reliable? You tell me........................................ This article is from the magazine NetworkWorld, so I just copied their website, sorry if if does not take you there. Thanks Pro. "D".

Class Discussion on May the 5th for IT Foundations

Well.............the semester is winding down, and I am actually sad to be leaving this class. I was taught so much by Pro. "D", and I am so very grateful, meaning I have some background in a whole lot of different areas such as: XML, html, blogs, wiki's, computer math, imaging, and all the other areas I missed in between. This week we focused on the Computer Math, and hexadecimals, octal, and converting them to binary, and decimals, and vice versa. We also talked about the ASCII code and found out in a short term means the computer keyboard. Wow!!! We also talked about the BCD, the excess-3 code, and the grey code. Those terms will be on my terms list. Once again Pro. "D", we love you and thank you for all your help, you are the best in my eyes.

My blog of interest for the week of April the 28th

How many times have you looked at your credit card statement and seen a bill for $9.87 and figured "oh well", it is only ten dollars? I know I have many of times. Maybe you might want to read what the latest research has found and how fake companies are robbing thousands of unsuspecting credit card owners and the owners just look over the small amount.

Shortcomings of Vista.............my article of interest for the week of April the 28th

Wow....a 25 items list for the new O/S Vista. The CRN Test Center made a list of these items that VARs should be aware of when using and deploying Vista. Some which include: SMB2 a new variant of the SMB protocol, which could cause compatibility with Samba or Linux, Hardware not performing adequately, and needing hardware upgrades, Third-party antivirus applications not yet compatible with Vista, Drivers that manufacturers do not have available and third-party applications not yet fully supported just to name the first five. OH MY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Class Terms for April the 28th.

1. - Decimal Number System - A base ten number system.

2. - Base - With number systems, it describes the number of digits used.

3. - Radix - another term for the base of a number system.

4. - Most Significant Digit(MSD) - The leftmost, largest weight digit in a number.

5. - Least Significant Digit(LSD) - :) The rightmost, smallest weight digit in a number.

6. - Reset and Carry - An action that occurs when a column had reached its maximum count.

7. - Binary Point - A symbol used to separate the whole from the fraction in a binary number



Thanks to: Introductory Computer Mathematics, Second Edition, Nigel P. Cook, Prentice Hall Publishers, Chapter 9, pages 200-202

Class Discussion on April the 28th.

This weeks discussion was on Number Systems and Codes. We discussed the history of the Liebniz's Language of Logic. Gottfried Wilhelm Liebniz was born in Germany in 1646. In 1676, he turned his focus to mathematics. His focus was on the binary number system. Ironically, for all of his work, he failed to make the connection between the famous 1666 essay and binary to the universal language of logic he was seeking. The discovery remained hidden until George Boole uncovered it a century later after Liebniz's death. We also discussed the Decimal Number system which has a base of ten. We also learned that the term radix means base. We talked about the reset and carry operation. Finally, we talked and learned the binary number system. We also learned how to convert the decimal number system into binary number systems and binary number systems into decimal number systems.

Thanks to my Introductory Computer Mathematics Book, Second Edition, Nigel P. Cook, published by Prentice Hall, pages 198-210

Terms for April the 21st.

1. - Analog Data - Data recorded very similar to its original structure.

2. - Analog Circuit - An electrical circuit known as an operational amplifier.

3. - Linear Circuits - the basis for neural membrane models.

4. Ohm(Kiloohms) - the unit of resistance. The larger values are measured in
kiloohms which are equal to 1000 ohm's.

5. - multimeter - a device that has the capability to turn analog into digital and digital into analog.

6. convergence - the combinations of communication and computers and the combination of the two.

Multimeter references: 1. Digital Multimeter Measurement Fundamentals.
2. Agukebt 2458A Digital Multimeter Data Sheet.


convergence reference: Citation: Robert M. Janowiak, "Computers and Communications: A Symbiotic Relationship," Computer, volume 36, no. 1, pp. 76-79, Jan., 2003

My blog of interest for the week of April the 21st.

It has only been a month since Vista released the SP1 to Windows in 5 languages, and it is now been downloaded by millions of people on their PCs. Now, Vista has announced the next stage that anyone running Vista in any of the supported languages can now download this manually. I guess Vista has its good and bad points.

Look out Wirless Carriers: Cellular South?

Look out wireless carriers, Cellular South is offsetting horrid early termination fees by crediting their account with $200.00. Cellular South believes customers should have unlimited calling, texting, emailing over the web over their wireless cell phones. I know I will be looking into this and keeping up with Cellular South.

Class Discussion on April the 21st.

I was not present for the actual class, but I know we discussed Chapter 8 out of Introduction to Computer Mathematics. The chapter consisted of analog, and digital data and devices. The class also took the online tests that went along with our textbook and printed out two copies with our names on them, I sent mine via email, and plan on giving them to my advisor on my advisement date of the 25th of April. The class also encoded and decoded binary number's and looked at the ASCII charts. I missed you guys.

Terms and Definitions for April the 14th.

1.- Assessment - the process of documentation and measurement of what one knows on a particular subject.

2.- Main Page of a Wiki - the welcome page to a wiki.

3. - Editing a Wiki - use the edit mode to enter text.

4. Media File Link - is a tool for an edit page of a wiki.

5. Internal Link - another tool for an edit page of a wiki.

6. Sub page - a separate page in our wwki from the main page.

7. WWKI - What We Know Is



Thanks to Professor D for the typed assessment of our WWKI.

Blog about Networking....................................

Since I have been in Network +, I have grumbled and griped, but I am amazed at what I am being taught, and see in all reality that when I go online, I see blogs about the 20 most useful sites for IT professionals. Wow!!!! Networking is a HUGE world.

Yahoo comes out Swinging.............go yahoo.

Microsoft threatened a hostile takeover to Yahoo. CEO Jerry Yang was not having it. Yang responded the letter written on 4/5, with a letter of his own. Yang said that Microsoft's bid of 44.6 billion dollars undervalued Yahoo not only in its current state but also its given potential. On 4/9, Yahoo announced Index-tools which is an online advertising analytics provider. Then later that same day, the company also said that they will run Google ads alongside its own search results, for exploring options for gaining revenue and market share and keeping it out of Microsoft's hands.

Class Discussion on April the 14th for IT Foundations

We made so much progress on our class WWKI, I am so very proud of the whole class which includes our teacher. This has been an amazing class for me this semester, I was introduced to this blog, which I believe I am doing very well, and we began a WWKI, Wow, AWESOME. Today we made an assessment on what we did accomplish on our class WWKI, and now we are headed towards Computer Math. I am not overwhelmed at all, even though at the beginning of the semester, my first semester, after all the new information that has been taught to me, it was taught in a way that the teacher learned with us, we are just a bunch of geeks, and I love it. I really am going to miss the class but will continue with my blog.

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class for April the 7th.

1. - PHP - ( Hypertext Processor ) is a computer scripting language used for producing dynamic web pages. The PHP License and The Free Software Foundation considers it to be free software. It is also the most popular Apache module among computers using Apache as a web server. The recent version is 5.2.0.

2. - Apache Http Server - a web server that plays a key role in the growth of the WWW. It was the first viable alternative to what is now known as the Sun Java System Web Server and has since evolved to rival with Unix as well.

3.- PERL - a general purpose programming language originally created for text manipulation. But...now it is used for System Administration, Web Development, Network Programming, and GUI development.

4. - CGI.pm module - a large and widely used Perl module for programming Common Gateway Interface(CGI) web applications. It is written and maintained by Lincoln D. Stein.

5.- ASP - (Active Server Pages) - Microsoft's first server-side script engine for dynamically generated web pages. It is included as a free compound of Window's Server 2000 and up.

6.- VBscript - (Visual Basic Scripting Edition) - an active Scripting language developed by Microsoft. It is installed as default in every Desktop release of Windows Operating Systems since WIN 98. Must be executed in a host environment.

7.- Byte Code - a term used to denote forms of instruction sets designed for efficient execution by a Software interpreter and is also suitable for further compilation into machine code. The name stems from the Java Instruction Set.

A Blog about Wiki's imagine that............

I visited this blog out of curiosity. Since the past two classes have been about our wwki's, I searched "Blogs about Mediawiki". KCKeditor is a pure extension for MediaWiki. It looks as if this might be a breakthrough. I read and I saw what was working for them and what was not working for them. All in all I think this could also help us, it surely can't hurt us.

Class Discussion on April the 7th for IT Foundations

Our class discussion today was to get our WWKI up and running. We are gaining progress, and all learning together. We have found out our WWKI is using PHP programming language, and it is not very friendly to us users. But...we are getting there. We have our individual student blogs with the links, and we have ten terms on the main page. We also talked about the remainder of the semester, and were given our Math books. It looks as if we are going into binary numbers, and hexadecimals, which is all behind the scenes. I am looking forward to seeing the remainder of this semester, I have already learned so much, I hope my brain can retain all of this technology. I love it.

The Grid..............next generation of the internet.

Wow....the next generation of the Internet. Not only do we have programming languages transforming into "meta" languages, it looks as if we have the "supercomputers" turning into "metacomputers". The grid originated from an idea that involved connecting to a supercomputer from a remotely controlled place. The word grid actually comes from the "electricity grid" which seems to that any compatible device will be able to plug in anywhere on the Grid and have some level of resources. Wow!!!!

Terms and Definitions for March the 24th

1. Spring Break - S. - surprising
P. - pretty
R. - roses
I. - involving
N. - new
G. - green grass

B. -Beautiful
R. - Relaxation
E. - everyday
A. - And
K. - Kind to self


Blame it on Carla Dianne, it was her idea, we love you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Search Wars Continue: Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft

This is an article I found in the NetworkWorld. It seems as if Google is continuing to increase the share of the United States search engines on the Internet. It is interesting to read the ratings of each of the Search Engines such as Google, which widened the gap between Microsoft's hope of purchasing Yahoo.

Blue Sky's Brand ruins ABC Group's name

I guess I looked this up out of a personal matter. I worked for this company and was layed off per say. Before Blue Sky's Brand merged with ABC Group, the company was a private runned company. I loved my job, we all were like family. Two months after the company merged with us, the fomer owner and the one under the CEO, gave their two weeks notice, and then the Layoff's began. One by one, they layed us off. Until Friday the 14th, employees's had NO idea that the layoff was happening. It is so sad to see this happen, over 400 employee's did not even get paid for the last three weeks they worked. I truly hope they get what is coming, like KARMA.

A blog of interest about Sprint..............

Wow..........I found a tech trader blog that has to do with Sprint. According to this, even though the stock is dropping and employee's are not happy, according to looking at their comments, the writer does not foresee a Buyout.

Class Discussion for March the 24th.

Today we "played" with our class project called our "WWKI" which stands for WhatWeKnowIs. This is written in CamelCase language which is keeping in tradition with Wiki languages. We got our main page started. We placed our blog addresses on the WWKI and over our Spring Break we will try to link back from our blogs to our classroom WWKI. We also went on a little field trip, we walked to the Public Library to see if our WWKI was visible to the Internet world and we were successful. See you all after Spring Break, which will resume on April the sixth.

What is going on with Sprint?

It looks as if Sprint Nextel has some drama going on with announcements and stories that went spinning around today. It looks as if two of the board members resigned, did they know something we didn't. Also, MMS users have filed a class action lawsuit against Sprint Nextel and finally the CEO Dan Hesse appeared in an advertisement soliciting Sprint's replicable new unlimited plan that the competition had up and running.

Aconyms related to Wiki's

1. CAPTCHA - this is a type of challenge request the computer establishes a human user via the computer robot. The letters are usually distorted, and a human is only the one that gives the correct answer.

2. dhtml - this is actually dynamic HTML. This is a collection of four different styles to create interactive and animated websites. The three languages are: HTML, JAVA, CSS, and DOM.

3. JavaScript - a scripting language that is mostly used for web development.

4. - DOM - Document Object Model - this is a platform and language in dependant standard object model that is mostly used for XML and HTML.

5. dynamic wiki's - it looks as if this is more like dynamic programming. It is the process of solving problems without the a lot of time and a lot less complicated.

6. - semantic wiki - this is a wiki that allows the ability to capture and identify other information about meta data and their applications.

7. - soft security - it is a wiki security that is often invisible, but prevents something from being harmed.

Let's go back to the Vista Blog...................

It seems as if PC users can now download the Windows Vista SP1 via Windows update. It looks as if it can be manually done, or around mid April it will automatically done if the personal computer is configured correctly to accept the automatic updates.

Class Discussion on March the 17th for IT Foundations

This past week we discussed our class "Wwki", WhatWeKnowIs, that we will work on together. We looked at different wiki websites to get a general idea for what our Wwki's will explore and the general focus the Wwki will follow. We were each given a different assignment, mine was to explore our Wwki site, and find out how to edit, and create pages. Also, we found out we will be making the terms we have learned this semester as the main idea of our Wwki.

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class for the week of March the 10th.

1. CamelCase - another word for this is medial capitals. CamelCase is used for the practice of writing compound words or phrases without the spaces or dashes between the words. The name originates from the uppercase "bumps" in the middle of the compound word which can be compared to the "humps" of a camel.

2. Wiki - a software where users can easily create, edit, and link to different pages together. A backronym for Wiki is: What I Know Is.

3. WikiWikiWeb - also known as "Wards Wiki's". This is the very first wiki software created and written. It was created in 1994 by a man named Ward Cunningham. The idea behind this is to allow programmers the freedom to exchange ideas with ease.

4. MediaWiki - a web-based wiki software application. This was originally written to serve the needs of the Wikipedia encyclopedia; However, today it has been integrated by individuals, educators, and companies as an initial knowledge management solution.

5. Wiki Language - This is also known as "wiki markup". Wiki Markup is a markup language that offers a simplified version to HTML. This is used to write pages in a Wiki Website.

6. Wiki Source - A Wikipedia project to build a free wiki library of source texts and the translations in many different languages.

7. TWiki - This is a wiki with structure. It is used to run collaboration platform, knowledge base and a team portal. Users are able to crate wiki applications using the TWiki mark up language along with the mark up language's expandable functions with plugins.

Class Discussion on March the 10th 2008.

We had our mid term test. We all did well which I would like to thank our teacher, for being who she is and how her teaching style has allowed me to grow in the "Internet Language". After the test we all searched the web for Wiki's. We all found numerous sites that we can begin our Wiki's next week. We talked about what a Wiki is and how to search for one that would fit our needs as a college class. We talked the term CamelCase. We also have a list of websites to visit. On my search, I found some terms like Wiki Words(mixed-cased words) which are page titles that link to a page with that certain type. I also found the word Reverse Index which is the purpose of Category Headings. It enables a user to find the references. I am sure more will be revealed in this by the end of my weekly posting.

Wiki-Wiki Teaching Blog......................wow.

I went to this blog really to find information on the term "Wiki" and I found out that Wiki - Wiki means quickly in Hawaiian language. This is a similar site to what we are doing and a wonderful start for the students of that High School. I never even touched a computer until I was thirty years old. Wow..........I really did stumble out of MS DOS into the New World of Technology and I am loving it.

The Predictions for 2008 in Wireless Technology

Wow.......the predictions for the whole year 2008. Let us see if they come true. Prediction #1: Helio will go bust: This first prediction is stating that SK Telacom and Earthlink will just crumble over the fierceness Wireless industries this year, partly due to the losses Helio lost last year. Prediction #2: Leap and MetroPCS will merge. In September, MetroPCS announced its intentions of purchasing Leap along with their debt. Even though Leap denied them once it will be interesting to see if MetroPCS is successful this year. Prediction #3: Motorola to spin-off its units. It looks as if Motorola has their units spread abroad, for a marketing strategy that just might make it work this year. Prediction #4: Sprint, Clearwire will merge their WiMAX networks. Spring and Clearwire to make its merge with their systems, this should bring about amazing results. Prediction #5: Verizon Wireless' Open Access to prove toothless. Wow! Verizon giving their customers the choice of any compatible wireless device as long as it meets Verizon's standards, wow I need to change carriers.

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class for March 3rd.

1. NIC - network card, network adapter, LAN Adapter or NIC (network interface card) is a piece of computer hardware designed to allow computers to communicate over a computer network. It is both an OSI layer 1 (physical layer) and layer 2 (data link layer) device, as it provides physical access to a networking medium and provides a low-level addressing system through the use of MAC addresses. It allows users to connect to each other either by using cables or wirelessly.

2. OSI - The Open Systems Interconnection Basic Reference Model (OSI Reference Model or OSI Model for short) is a layered, abstract description for communications and computer network protocol design. It was developed as part of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) initiative and is sometimes known as the OSI seven layer model. From top to bottom, the OSI Model consists of the Application, Presentation, Session, Transport, Network, Data Link, and Physical layers

3. TCP - The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is one of the core protocols of the Internet protocol suite. TCP provides reliable, in-order delivery of a stream of bytes, making it suitable for applications like file transfer and e-mail.

4. Copyright - Copyright – symbolized "©" – is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time. Generally, it is "the right to copy", but also gives the copyright holder the right to be credited for the work, to determine who may adapt the work to other forms, who may perform the work, who may financially benefit from it, and other, related rights. It is an intellectual property form (unlike the patent, the trademark, and the trade secret) applicable to any expressible form of an idea or information that is substantive and discrete.

5. TCP/IP - The Internet protocol suite is the set of communications protocols that implement the protocol stack on which the Internet and most commercial networks run. It has also been referred to as the TCP/IP protocol suite, which is named after two of the most important protocols in it: the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP), which were also the first two networking protocols defined. Today's IP networking represents a synthesis of two developments that began to evolve in the 1960s and 1970s, namely LANs (Local Area Networks) and the Internet, which, together with the invention of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989, have revolutionized computing.

6. Trademark - A trademark or trade mark[1] or mark is a distinctive sign or indicator of some kind which is used by an individual, business organization or other legal entity to identify uniquely the source of its products and/or services to consumers, and to distinguish its products or services from those of other entities. A trademark is a type of intellectual property, and typically comprises a name, word, phrase, logo, symbol, design, image, or a combination of these elements. There is also a range of non-conventional trademarks comprising marks which do not fall into these standard categories.

7. Packet - In information technology, a packet is a formatted block of data carried by a packet mode computer network. Computer communications links that do not support packets, such as traditional point-to-point telecommunications links, simply transmit data as a series of bytes, characters, or bits alone.

Class Discussion on March the 3rd for IT Foundations

This week in class we discussed Networking and the terms and acronyms that go with the networking world. We talked about NIC's, the OSI model, TCP, and IP. We also discussed the seven layers of the OSI model and I will go in detail about this subject. The OSI model was created by the ISO, which stands for the International Organization for Standardization. OSI stands for Open Systems Intercommunication. The OSI has seven layers and I remember the layers by an acronym: Programmers Don't Never Throw Salty Pretzels Away. Stay with me it was so confusing to me but keep in mind that this happens in milliseconds, and us as humans don't even know all the work that is going on behind the scenes of a simple email.
1. Physical Layer- this is responsible for mechanical, electrical & procedural with the physical link.
2. Data Link Layer- this actually has two different layers into one: LLC which is the Logical Link Control and the MAC which is the Media Access Control. This provides reliable, accurate data transfer over the physical link.
3. Network Layer - this is where the routers are placed and organizes the data into IP datagrams or packets.
4. Transport Layer - Provides reliable transport between end points.
5. Session Layer - the easiest one for me to remember and understand, it simply establishes, maintains, and terminates user connections.
6. Presentation Layer - Provides useful transformation of data using a common language.
7. Applications Layer - Interface to the user

Wow....Vista has a blog.

I visited this blog because we had gone over Vista during one of our classroom lectures. This blog has so much new technology and the date and times of when this new technology will be launched. Check it out, for Vista users, it is awesome and scary all at once.

My News Article for the week of March 3rd

This article did not amaze me at all, but I did find it intersting. Wow, mobile devices are now the trend of the 2000's and in my "age", the landline was the trend. I have kept up with technology. I just got a Samsung Blast phone, and don't even know how to work it yet. Yet being the key word. But this article is very interesting and true. The average person would be less reluctant to give their mobile device up than the landline.

My Movie I created for IT Foundations Class

Class Discussion on Feb 25th for IT Foundations

This weeks class discusion covered many topics: working with Vista and Graphics, how to get images onto your computer, Type of Image File Formats, Information on the image file formats, Acquiring images thorough Vista, Creating a Slide Show, and Making a Movie. The one topic that I enjoyed and learned the most from was the Creating the Slide Show. In Vista, the toolbar is at the bottom in the Photo Gallerey consisting of eight buttons: Image Display, Thumbnails, Back Button, Play slide show, Forward Button, Rotate 90 CCW, Rotate 90 CW, Delete Image. This was very easy and very fun to learn.

Reality TV turns into a film made in seven days......

I visited this blog to find out about movie making and found this to be interesting. There is a lot of hype these days with reality television. It looks as if this man worked with a group of different culture people for seven days, with their different personalities, and come up with the movie CO/MA

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class. Week of Feb 25th

The acronyms I chose this week are as follows:
1 .jpg, .jpeg - In computing, JPEG (pronounced JAY-peg; IPA: /ˈdʒeɪpɛg/) is a commonly used method of compression for photographic images. The name JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, the name of the committee that created the standard. The group was organized in 1986, issuing a standard in 1992, which was approved in 1994 as ISO 10918-1. JPEG is distinct from MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group), which produces compression schemes for video.

2. .tif, .tiff - Tagged Image File Format (abbreviated TIFF) is a file format for storing images, including photographs and line art. It is now under the control of Adobe. Originally created by the company Aldus[1] for use with what was then called "desktop publishing", the TIFF format is widely supported by image-manipulation applications, by publishing and page layout applications, by scanning, faxing, word processing, optical character recognition and other applications.[2]

3. .bmp - The BMP file format, sometimes called bitmap or DIB file format (for device-independent bitmap), is an image file format used to store bitmap digital images, especially on Microsoft Windows and OS/2 operating systems.

4. .png -Portable Network Graphics (PNG) is a bitmapped image format that employs lossless data compression. PNG was created to improve upon and replace the GIF format, as an image-file format not requiring a patent license. PNG is pronounced /ˈpɪŋ/ both P-N-G and ping.[1] The PNG initialism is optionally recursive, unofficially standing for “PNG's Not GIF”.[2]

5. .pcx - PCX is an image file format developed by the ZSoft Corporation of Marietta, Georgia, USA. It was the native file format for PC Paintbrush (PCX = "PC Paintbrush Exchange") and became one of the first widely accepted DOS imaging standards, although its use has since been succeeded by more sophisticated image formats such as GIF, JPEG, and PNG.

6. .aiff - Audio Interchange File Format (AIFF) is an audio file format standard used for storing sound data for personal computers and other electronic audio devices. The format was co-developed by Apple Computer in 1988 [1] based on Electronic Arts' Interchange File Format (IFF, widely used on Amiga systems) and is most commonly used on Apple Macintosh computer systems. AIFF is also used by Silicon Graphics Incorporated.

7. .swf - SWF (acronym of "Shockwave Flash",[1] pronounced swif) is a proprietary file format for multimedia and especially vector graphics. It was developed by Macromedia and is now, following their acquisition, coming from Adobe. Intended to be small enough for publication on the web, SWF files can contain animations or applets of varying degrees of interactivity and function. SWF is also sometimes used for creating animated display graphics and menus for DVD movies, and television commercials.

WoW.............the final puzzle piece on the blu-ray's

The format wars have came to an abrupt halt. As of Tuesday, Toshiba's withdrawl from the HD DVD players and PC drives, consumers can breathe easier and whip out their credit cards. Now there are some pro's and con's to this interesting battle.

Pro One: One format will rule them all - meaning that all movie sudios will release their movies on Blu-ray. Which means that consumers can be confident when they purchase the Blu-ray Disc Player because regardless which studio produces and distributes the films, it will be compatible with the Blu-ray player.

Pro Two: All movie collections will play in the Blu-ray Disc player - consumers can put their minds at ease because the HD DVD's will play in this player. With that being said, beware because the older models will not support the Bonus View, or the picture-in-picture, and other features. But..they will play the movie.

Con One: Slowdown of Price Drops - meaning that in 2006, Blu-ray players were introduced at $1000.00. But..acoording to Consumer Electronics Association, the average player was $500.00.
Now let us fast forward to 2007 and the average selling price has dropped to $395.00. Now let us update to 2008, the CEA expects the price to be $307.

Con Two: Fewer Deals - meaning that, will we see the Blu-ray's combined with the HD TV's? Will we see the buy one and get one free? It is true that Blu-ray's should have an investment in the promotions but the predictment on this is fewer promotions than we seen with HD DVD's.

Pro and Con: HD DVD Movies and the Hardware very cheap - meaning that since the movies and players are in the melting pot, we can expect this material at a cheaper price later in the Spring and Summer of 2008.

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class.

1. The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a general-purpose markup language.[1] It is classified as an extensible language because it allows its users to define their own elements. Its primary purpose is to facilitate the sharing of structured data across different information systems, particularly via the Internet,[2] and it is used both to encode documents and to serialize data. In the latter context, it is comparable with other text-based serialization languages such as JSON and YAML.[3]

2. SGML - The Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) is a metalanguage in which one can define markup languages for documents. SGML is a descendant of IBM's Generalized Markup Language (GML), developed in the 1960s by Charles Goldfarb, Edward Mosher and Raymond Lorie (whose surname initials were used by Goldfarb to make up the term GML[1]).

3. GML - Generalized Markup Language (GML) is a set of macros that implement intent-based markup tags for the IBM text formatter, "SCRIPT". SCRIPT is the main component of IBM's Document Composition Facility (DCF). A starter set of tags in GML is provided with the DCF product.
GML simplifies the description of a document in terms of its format, organization structure, content parts and their relationship, and other properties. GML markup (or tags) describes such parts as chapters, important sections, and less important sections (by specifying heading levels), paragraphs, lists, tables, and so forth.

4. CDF -Channel Definition Format (CDF) is an XML standard used in conjunction with Microsoft Active Channel and Smart Offline Favorites technologies. Its use is to define a website's content and structure. The standard is somewhat similar to the RSS standard introduced by Netscape several years after CDF was introduced in 1997. The standard and Active Channel were introduced with the launch of Internet Explorer 4.0, while Smart Offline Favorites was introduced with the launch of Internet Explorer 5.0.

5. CML- CML (Chemical Markup Language) is a new approach to managing molecular information using tools such as XML and Java. It was the first domain specific implementation based strictly on XML, the most robust and widely used system for precise information management in many areas. It has been developed over more than a decade by Murray-Rust, Rzepa and others and has been tested in many areas and on a variety of machines.

6. OFX -Open Financial Exchange (OFX) arising from Microsoft's OFC and Intuit's Open Exchange is a data-stream format for exchanging financial information.

7. MathML -Mathematical Markup Language (MathML) is an application of XML for describing mathematical notations and capturing both its structure and content. It aims at integrating mathematical formulae into World Wide Web documents. It is a recommendation of the W3C math working group.

Class Discussion on Feb 18th for IT Foundations

For our classroom discussion we studied the history of xml, html, sgml, and gml. I thought this lecture was very interesting. Our teacher showed us the history of the mark up languages and espcially how to do the xml. XML is Extensible Markup Language. This language specifies a document's stucture and content. It is a simplified version of SGML or a subset which could be called "SGML lite". I found out that this xml makes a document searchabe by a search engine on the internet. XML was developed by the W3C which consists of the XML Working group and the XML Special Interest Group. There are ten goals when working in XML:
1. must be easy to use over the Internet
2. must support a variety of applications
3. must be compatible with SGML
4. must be easy to write programs with that processes XML documents
5. the ideal optional feastures in XML must be kept to a minimum, the ideal would be one.
6. should be clear and easily understood by nonprogrammers
7. should be prepared quickly
8. design must be exact and concise
9. easy to create
10. terseness in XML markup is of minimum importance.

Intel IT studies the impacts:

I went to this blog out of curiousity of another class, I am in which is Network +. This blog had the conclusions of the studies that were conducted by Intel IT on the impacts of streamed client and Virtual Hosted Desktop. The study consisted of computing modules on server and Network utilization. The study concluded that Network utilization was low for Virtual Hosted Desktop, and the server utilization was lower for streaming than the Virtual Hosted Desktop(VHD). This streaming was a lot more efficient for a wider variety of applications.

Keeping up with the Blu-rays..the last piece to the puzzle.

This was an article from the Hollywood Reporter. It seems like Paramount Home Entertainment is also releasing their films on Blu-ray formats. At first, Paromount supported both: the HD DVD and the blu-ray formats, but when Universal Stuidios announced that they would also be in support of the blu-rays, Paramount also jumped on the game board, and became the sixth and final puzzle piece that blu-ray formats needed.

Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class.

Here are the seven terms that were asked in class.

1. CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) - used to describe the presentation of a document that is written in a mark-up language. It's most common application is to style web pages written in HTML and XHTML, but the language can be applied to any kind of XML document.

2. Flicker - a method for comparing images for different Internet Service Providers on your own Web Browser.

3. Facebook - a social networking site, created in 02/2004 buy Mark Zuckerburg, which was a Harvard Student. Then in 9/2006, anyone older than thirteen years of age can join this online networking. It has about 62 million members and the title of the site refers to the paper facebook application writers to customize the look and the styles of the writer's own page.

4. Media Player - a term used to describe computer software that plays back computer software multimedia files. Most media players support an array of media formats, including audio and video files.

5. Podcast - a collection of digital media files which is distributed over the Internet, often used for encryption fields, for playing back on portable media players and personal computers.

6. MetaData - are data about data. An item of metadata may describe an individual dactum, or current item or a collection of data including multiple content items.

7. Meta Tags - information that is inserted into the "head" area of a web page. The most valuable feature is the ability to control the way search engines are describing a web page.






Reference: Google Wikipedia

Visiting a Blog of Interest

I visited this blog out of curiousity. We had talked about it in class last week and I really wanted to see what the IT's of the 2000's had to say about it. It was very interesting espcially the title. If you are into IT, this would be the site for you.

Learning More and More....................................

I am in Internet Foundations II class at my college. We discussed last week about the differences in blog, blogger, blogosphere and how they interact between each other. We had to review sites to see where we could post for free and actually set one up for our class project. I chose Blogger.com. This site is very user friendly and I am enjoying doing this. We also discussed in a little detail what CSS stands for. I found out that CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets. This is used to describe the presentation of a document, mainly a web page. This is written in a mark up language such as HTML AND XHTML. I like this because this language can be used or applied to any kind of xml document, even SVG and XUL. The SVG is also used to help the readers of web pages to define different colors, fonts, and layouts. SVG stands for Scalable Vector Graphics. This also makes the Web Page less complex and provides more accessibility.

It's the Double Wammy with Blu-ray backers.

Sony’s Blu-ray format is being recommended by Best Buy. This is one of the largest U.S. consumer electronics chain. Best Buy will carry the HD DVD, but the Blu-ray format will be on display with more emphasis than the HD DVD. Not only did Best Buy back this new format, Netflix, which is one of the largest online DVD rental services, is going to phase out the HD DVDs and only carry the Blu-ray formats. Now the Blu-ray formats are already being endorsed by the following: Walt Disney, Sony Pictures, Twentieth Fox, Warner Brothers, and MGM. This has the same similarities of Betamax and VHS in the 1980’s over which was the better tape for the consumers eyes. We all remember how the VHS tape won the battle over twenty years ago. Will history repeat itself?