Websites

I never thought that I would be able to make my own website, but thanks to the help of Microsoft Expression Web, I did! Watching everyone present their websites was a really neat experience because you could tell how hard we all worked. My three favorite websites were created by Cole, Tasha, and Anna. Cole's design was truly amazing. His choice to use the really cool typewriters against the black background with red accented keys was genius! Tasha also did a great job on her website. I loved the three pictures on the front page flipping from one to the next as a gif. What a great idea! It's amazing that she was able to save up and then travel the way she did before coming to Trinity. And I'm certainly glad she added a link to the website that helps find cheaper travel. Anna's website is on my list of favorites because it was so pretty. Even though it was done on iWeb and didn't convert over too well during the presentation, she did a really nice job creating it. I love that she was able to put up so many picture albums and share them with us. Her other pages, such as favorite foods page, were so pretty to look at that even if I didn't like something on there before, I probably liked it after looking at it on that site. 

Everyone in the class did such an amazing job on their websites! Feel free to look at my Website!

Advice for New Students

The best advice I could pass to any incoming computer student is to always do your work as soon as possible. It's surprisingly easy to lose chunks of your grade for small details, so make sure to stay on top of all your work. If you have a Mac, like I do, you're going to want to get as much work done in class as possible. Mac computers have sumilar applications to the ones we use in class, but the functions are not the exact same. If you make sure all your assignments are done in time, attend class, pay attention in class and possibly even take notes, you'll do great, and really learn a lot. I was impressed at the amount of computer knowledge I gained this semester alone. Good luck and enjoy!

HTML Code

It is important for web designers to be able to know and use HTML code even though many sophisticated web-authoring softwares are available. Expression Web and Dreamweaver are both softwares that can allow for a faster website-creating process, but even these programs can have their flaws. In class the other day, our teacher provided an excellent example for when knowing HTML code is useful. She was editing the class wiki and wanted to edit the font. She tried to bold, then un-bold, but nothing seemed to change. When she went into the site's code, she recognized that the wiki was written in a font that always appeared to be bold so she was able to figure out why it wasn't working. Luckily, this scenario was only for a class wiki, but had a similar situation occurred with a corporate webpage, someone's job (or even many jobs) could have been on the line. 

Chris Nolan's Presentation

Though there is an infinite amount of information available to us on the internet, where do we even begin to go about finding what we want? And how do we know if it's the right source? These are very common and valid questions that Chris Nolan, the Trinity Librarian, adressed when in class.
Personally, I was surprised to learn that 59.80% of Americans use Google as their search engine. I am included in that statistic, but I didn't realize they controled over 1/2 the search engines. Following behind Goolgle is Yahoo (21.30%), Microsoft (9.40%), AOL (4.80%), and Ask (4.70%). The reason for Google's popularity was because they were the first ones to rank the results in order of relevance. This goes back to one of the questions at the top- how do we know if it's the right source? Google ranks its articles according to relevance.
Another interesting fact Chris Nolan tought us was Google's stand with advertisers. According to Google, Google gets all its money from companies that pay to have advertisement on the sides and top of the page, but advertisements never affect the ranking of websites. In fact, Google says that they will block websites that try to up their rankings by advertising themselves.

Powerpoint Presentations

In class we created PowerPoint presentations representing a topic dealing with our intended majors or professions. Two of my favorite presentations were Cole's presentation on Autism and Nellin's presentation on OB/GYN's. 

Cole used layering very well and very often. His design was simple and easy to follow, yet very effective. I also really liked that he tied a personal connection in when he included his cousin's condition into the presentation.

I really liked Nellin's presentation because of the reason behind creating it. Her slides were very informative but her presentation is what sold me. She told the class that she wants to become an OB/GYN because of extremely high number women who die during child birth in Africa. Her presentation I think flowed smoothly and instilled her point very well. It left a lasting impression on her audience, me, proving the productivity of her PowerPoint.

I did my presentation on Ansel Adams because I have considered photography as a profession. Here is my presentation: Ansel Adams

What to avoid in a powerpoint

If you are wanting to make a powerpoint, there are some common things you should avoid. For more in depth explanations, you should visit techsoup.org, the site where I found most of my information.  

So what should you do when making a powerpoint?

1. Keep the slides simple. DON'T  jam all your info onto the slide

2. Use visual aides. Don't make them excessive. But all talk can put your audience to sleep

3. DON'T do too much animation. Animation here or there is okay, but no more. 

4. Use transitions sparingly! Again, simple is better

5. Don't make your fonts tiny and hard to read. You want your audience to be able to follow you, right?

6. Choose a color scheme that is appropriate for your project. Don't randomly choose your favorite colors and patterns. Make it look professional. 

7. ALWAYS proofread before giving a presentation or turing it in! In order to appear professional and intelligent, simple spelling errors cannot be frequently occurring in your presentation.

8. Prior to presenting, get a friend or colleague to give you feedback on your presentation. Don't ignore their suggestions! They may have really good ideas and their thoughts may correlate with your audience's. 

Good luck!

My experience using Excel

If I've ever told someone I enjoyed using Microsoft Excel... I was lying. Truthfully, I've always done anything and everything I could to avoid using this program. I can do simple tables and apply formulas and such, I sometimes think that Excel may just be a little above my level. My father LOVES making spreadsheets and tables using excel, but I unfortunately didn't get that gene. Since I've been in class, I have in fact learned a few new useful tools when using Excel. I learned how to use the "If" function which could be very helpful in the future. If a class project or even a future job has me make a spreadsheet and display which items are above or below a price, or number, I can use the "If" formula and easily get my answers. This handy tool will save me a great deal of time that I can use to accomplish other things. 

Excel is very useful for some academic fields and businesses because they, too, can use these same tools. The beauty of using such an advanced program as Excel, allows the user to create the spreadsheet they want without using up all their time. 

Though I was once semi-against using Excel, I think I've come to terms with it and won't avoid it (as much) anymore.