Spent today talking and lecturing over chapter 3. I tried to cover the ups (<- pun) and brownouts of power supplies and the basics of power. We will be having an exam next class. I should have the exam guide posted to the downloads section shortly. Online question sets through chapter 3 are due by next class as well. Remember to read over the chapters and answer all of your questions. You will do fine on the exam. In the meantime I will work on my poor attempt at classroom humor.
Tonight we spent mostly on learning how to add navigation buttons to our flash files. I demo'd how to create a button and add the appropriate ActionScript code to create forward and backward buttons. In class we added the navigation to the stories we created last week or you can create something new, it was up to you.
For homework you are to add 2 blog entries as well as spend some time going over the "Choosing a Topic" section off the wiki. I want all this info gathered up and be ready to discuss your game ideas next class. This will give you blogging and wiki material.
Ok the Mac did manage a minor upgrade from 10.3.4 to 10.4.11 big whoop, we still can't do much with it. I however have a plan in the works when I get home to upgrade the burner and burn a copy of 10.5.6 which should allow us to do what we want with it. Anyway while the file copy process was going on there was a little lesson in terminating cat5 cables. Going to have to practice fellas since many times you get paid by the job and not by the hour. 25 minutes to terminate 2 cable ends is way too much. We will finish any chapter info next class and get ready for our exam.
Well since I saw some struggling when you guys were trying to find parts I spent a good amount of time showing you how to research the internet in order to find the drivers and info needed for the parts sheet. Everyone needs to practice this due to the fact that if you want to be techs this will be a major part of your job....finding information. We then spent the rest of the time talking about motherboard form factors and power supplies in the lab. We will pick up with the remainder of chapter 3 next class.
For those in my IT210 class this is really for you but the rest of you should find this very interesting as well. Formerly BeOS (I have a rare original boxed copy with manual) there is a new OS that is out in Alpha form. It is called Haiku. Programmers have essentially released an open source version of the old BeOS. You guys should download a copy and test it in Virtual PC or VMWare Player (available on the net or on the z: drive at school) to see if it works. I may try that out as a lab for class some time. Anyway you can check out the Haiku Project or you can just head over to Haiku-files.org and download one of their nightly builds.
Crappo...We won't be getting headsets or mics. It was going to eat up all of the rest of our budget for the classroom. Looks like it is up to you guys to get a cheap setup from Wal-Mart. My recommendations for an in store item.
HP Deluxe USB Webcam for 36.82. It has a built in mic (unsure of the quality) and got pretty good reviews.
Wal-mart doesn't tend to carry a decent headset for gaming or web work so if you want to go that route (I would) jump online and buy yourself something nice. Remember these are items that you get what you pay for, so the cheaper you go the worse the quality will be.
Hrm...Mac computers do suck don't they? I mean we had every piece of software to go on the one in the classroom but nothing would work because we didn't have OSX 10.5.x. We only had 10.4.9. What a load of crap, having to purchase an update when it is still the same OS. All Apple is doing is making people pay for service packs. Then low and behold I did have a dmg file with 10.5.6 on it, but we couldn't burn it because they put a crappy dvd/cd-rw drive in it that would read a dvd but not burn it. How much more would it have cost them to add in that feature? 20$ maybe? So we gave up and moved on to playing the networking game some more.
After the networking game more or less ran out of steam, we finished all but the last 2 pages of chapter 3. Be working on your online questions. I will have the EOC questions up soon so make sure you are caught up. we will be having a test soon. Start reading fellas, you guys need lots of study time from what I'm seeing.
Easy day today. Finished up with chapter 2 and then hit the lab to clean up some. I want online question sets thru chapter 2 done by next class. We are looking to have an exam week after next, probably on chapters 1-3, be ready.
Well I went on a rant and finally got calmed down, only to screw something as simple up as forgetting to name the instance of my button and messing up my demonstration to you guys. Sorry about the rant and the messed up demo. Please bare with me as I'm doing the best I can. Being a noob myself, makes it that much harder to give a demo and not screw something up. (The laughing didn't help either.)
We spent time learning how to use multiple layers and how to order things on the frame time line so that we could tell a story. I did eventually get my button to work so that I will post shortly. (I may even do a video for you).
As homework you are to have your wiki social profiles filled out and completed by Friday. Again I want 2 blog entries for the week on what you have learned or worked on. I checked the past 2 weeks of blogs and they are sucking wind. I'm grading easy on these but you guys need to step up to the plate and work a bit harder. (Remember we want to show we are the best in the state.) Finally we are going to add a start button to our stories. This will help introduce you to Actionscript.
Wow chapter 3 is long! I lectured on it some more and didn't get finished. I then went back and we worked on the OSI model. Then can the playing of the network game. Yeah definitely not as fun as a PS3 but still entertaining to watch you guys figure out how to message each other. We will pick up with the game on Thursday. Bring your slips of paper back with you so I don't have to print any more out. In the not too distant future I want to have an exam on chapters 1-3. I think that is enough since it would cover 140 pages. Be working on your online question sets as well.
We spent time working on SiSoft Sandra a bit more. As a homework assignment you are to use the software to generate a report (as we did last time) that includes all of the benchmark test results for your personal computer at home. This may take your pc some time so do not wait until the last minute. Send me the generated text file in an email. I will post who has the most powerful pc. For the rest of the time we installed and checked out the Futuremark products, 3DMark06 and Vantage. Both very slick tools that showed our pc's weren't very powerful.
I'm sitting here wondering what to do next. Where do I take the class, which path do I follow? I've been doing a lot of reflection on what has transpired over the last several months with the Globaloria project. So far this is my opinion:
Oh yeah I got a copy of the new MS Office 2010 Technical Preview. Looks like we will be playing with it in class tomorrow. 
Well since I saw some struggling when you guys were trying to find parts I spent a good amount of time showing you how to research the internet in order to find the drivers and info needed for the parts sheet. Everyone needs to practice this due to the fact that if you want to be techs this will be a major part of your job....finding information. We then spent the rest of the time talking about motherboard form factors and power supplies in the lab. We will pick up with the remainder of chapter 3 next class. 
For those in my IT210 class this is really for you but the rest of you should find this very interesting as well. Formerly BeOS (I have a rare original boxed copy with manual) there is a new OS that is out in Alpha form. It is called Haiku. Programmers have essentially released an open source version of the old BeOS. You guys should download a copy and test it in Virtual PC or VMWare Player (available on the net or on the z: drive at school) to see if it works. I may try that out as a lab for class some time. Anyway you can check out the 
We spent time working on SiSoft Sandra a bit more. As a homework assignment you are to use the software to generate a report (as we did last time) that includes all of the benchmark test results for your personal computer at home. This may take your pc some time so do not wait until the last minute. Send me the generated text file in an email. I will post who has the most powerful pc. For the rest of the time we installed and checked out the Futuremark products, 3DMark06 and Vantage. Both very slick tools that showed our pc's weren't very powerful. 
<rant>