Friday, October 26, 2012

Week 8 Notes


Web Development With SAS by Example

  • Tags are used in mark up languages to annotate the document content.
  • Mark up tags are used to format the display of webpages
  • Extensible Hypertext MarkUp Language is recommended by the World Wide Web Consortium for its stricter and cleaner reformulation
  • Unlike HTML, XHTML documents must be lowercase, nest together properly, posses closing tags and attributes must be cited
  • XHTML must follow Document Type Definition, requiring page formats to be in style sheets and not included as part of the make up
  • This allows for a constistent look across the entire page
  • Mark up tags give browsers the information regarding how to display the webpage
  • All XHMTL are required to have the closing tag which is </html>
  • Tags can be used to separate different sections of a webpage (title, head, style, etc)
  • For HTML, case of the letters do not matter, but all open tags must have a closing tag
  • HTML are allowed to have additional attributes that are separated by an equal sign
  • For XHTML there does not need to be a closing tag, all information is held in the tag
  • Class, SRC and ALT are all found on the <img> tag already
  • Tables can hold data as well as pictures, videos and other things
  • There are two types of links, relevant and
  • Syle sheets are used to make the webpage more uniform, it is similar to using a template
  • HTML forms can collect user input
  • HTML tags are used to communicate the output of the 

  • Developing and re-imagining library web guides in a content management system
  •  
  • Content Management is the process of collecting, managing, and publishing content.
  • CMS (content management systems) do not require a lot of experience to build.  Because of this, it is possible for almost anyone to create one.
  •  The display of the system is separate from the content, allowing libraries to concern themselves with the identifying, creating, annotating, and selecting of content.
  • Content can be: resource links, internal web pages, images, files in different formats
  •  All content added to the database can be reused whenever necessary.
  •  Within a CMS there are/should be different levels of access.  Some objects are able to be accessed by the librarian that uploaded them, while others are able to be accessed by any librarian.
  •  Some libraries have a problem with staff not being able to have enough access to materials in the CMS, while others have the opposite problem.  CMS allows librarians to custom this to their benefit.
  •  Customizing (also called tagging) allows librarians to put information in different groups and catagories, which helps to make the content more meaningful for users.
  •  CMS have a mixture of complexity and simplicity that make them more beneficial than files and folder sharing systems.  CMS offers scalability without hindering editing and publishing, web development staff can more easily assign access rights, and content being used cannot be deleted by other libraries.
  •  Open Source option was considered but they did not include any all inclusive services.  The ones that did were for Linux/Unix but libraries servers ran on Windows.
  •  A series of tables were created to join subscription databases and personnel tables allowing librarians to contribute individually or collectively.
  •  Administration links pass a specific variable for “action” so that each page knows whether to display content for a specific guide, add new content, update existing content, or delete content.
  •  1 ASP file page can manage an entire CMS
    ASP files depend on URL to make calls to the CMS. ASP code then gets the information from the database and assembles it for the viewer.
  •  The MySQL database contains tables for specific types of resource objects
such as databases, e-journals, books, media, and internet links. – can often act like a digital library, most often managed by the electronic resource librarian or CMS administrators.
·         Site administrators and librarians both have access to control mechanisms.
·          Presentational controls allow information to be organized so it can be utilized in classrooms properly.
·          The research guides component combines content from different tables.
·          Library guides were broken up into secondary pages linked to the main one, and others were single scrolling pages of resources.
·          Reasons for CMS migration include ease of use and standardization.
·          There is a crucial gap among librarians understanding about web site information architecture and writing for the web medium.

* Both tutorials completed!

Muddiest Point: I did not have a muddiest point this week 

Friday, October 12, 2012

Week Six


Local area network

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


LAN – Local Area Network
Is a computer network that interconnects computers in a certain area.
LAN is different from WAN (wide area networks) because they have higher data transfer rates, smaller geographic areas and do not need phone lines!
Ethernet and Wi-Fi are the most common to build LANs.
Interconnections between computers grew from an increasing demand for computers in universities and research labs.
Ethernet was developed at Xerox in 1973 and ARCNET was developed by Datapoint in 1976
The initial purpose was to share printing and storage because both were expensive at the time.
Novell NetWare  appeared as a solution to the incompatiable physical layer and the network protocol implementations
Windows NT advanced servers took the place of NetWare in the mid 1990’s
Coaxial cable was used in the beginning of LAN cabling.
Shielded twisted pair was used in IBM’s Token Ring, untwisted was used in StarLAN
Wi-Fi is more common now.
LANs connect with other LANs through leased lines, leased services and tunneling across the internet through virtual private network.


Management of RFID in Libraries



RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identifier.
A metaphor to explain it is that “it is like a barcode but is read with an electromagnetic field rather than a laser.”
RFID’s can carry more information than a barcode because they have a chip inside them that can carry more bytes of information.
RFID is available in many different forms but varies in its frequency of its radio waves, its physical size, and cost.
The identifying portion of the RFID is mainly for inventory purposes.
RFID is practical for the library because it can be used many times. 
It is also used for security reasons like an alarm.
In the future it can be used to help organize the library more efficiently, by doing things like automatically sorting returned books so they can be reshelved.
It can allow more books to be shelved.
The ROI can be shown by how many more books are being checked out, but the cost of reshelving still needs to be considered.
Some believe greatest investment is allowing patrons to check in for themselves- cutting circulation people.
Libraries have to decide if they need to put tags on magazines, pamphlets and other things / have to decide if they want to spend the cost on it.
It is hard to tag odd shaped items.
Cost over a long period of time needs to be considered. 


Computer network


A computer network (or just network) is a group of computers connected through communication channels that allow sharing of resources and information.
Anytime more than one computer is connected through a communication medium and exchanges information, it is called a computer network.
Transportation mediums, scale, topology, protocol and organizational scope are used to classified networks.
Computer networking can be considered a sub-discipline of the following fields: electrical engineering, telecommunications, computer science, information technology and/or computer engineering


Muddiest Point-
I was unsure when we needed to use the "one to many" feature in the database project.