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Coding is cool! (INFO 240 #10)

November 1, 2016 · Leave a Comment

I signed up for this class because I wanted to push my comfort zone. CSS has always seemed intimidating and complicated to me, so I thought it would be good to take the challenge and see if I could make sense of it. I’m surprised by how much I’m enjoying this class.

The trick for me has been to break everything down into small chunks. Typically when I look at each week’s assignment, I think, “Oh, man, I’m never going to figure this out.” Then I start in, and force myself to focus on each step individually, and suddenly it’s all falling into place. The section in this week’s lecture about organizing code was a lightbulb moment for me as well. Organizing my CSS file into sections made it easy to find things, especially when I started working the the PHP includes.

The best part is the feeling of accomplishment I get when my HTML and CSS validate, and when everything works as expected. This time, I also tried the “Validate Accessibility” option. I need to read up on what all of the icons mean, but I like that the tool is there, and I think it will definitely be something I start using. After the week 8 assignment, I’ve become more aware of accessibility issues, and I want to make sure that’s reflected in my code going forward.

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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The Old Ball Game (INFO 240 #9)

October 25, 2016 · Leave a Comment

I’m watching the World Series at the moment. It’s an odd feeling, not just because it’s an even year and the Giants aren’t in it, but because until fairly recently, I had zero interest in baseball.

Growing up on the South Side of Chicago, I rooted for the White Sox. I was thirteen when they were beaten by the Baltimore Orioles in the 1983 ALCS; heartbroken, I stopped following baseball. In high school, I was focused on school and books and music, and didn’t care much about sports. I followed the Bulls in the 1990’s, but I’d accepted the media line that baseball was boring. I knew a few fellow nerds and geeks who liked it, but they were all into the statistics, which I found confusing and intimidating.

Then I met my wife Ruth, who’s been a Giants fan since the mid-eighties. She was more excited than I was when the White Sox won the World Series in 2005, which we listened to through her MLB Audio subscription because we didn’t have cable and got poor TV reception. I’d listen politely when she’d talk about this great new Giants pitcher named Tim Lincecum, but I wasn’t interested in the game myself until one May in 2008 my then boss sent out an email asking if anyone wanted two tickets to a Giants game. I figured Ruth might be interested, especially since she hadn’t been to a Giants game since the Candlestick days, so I said yes.

It was the first baseball game–actually the first professional sporting event–I’d ever been to, and I loved it. AT&T Park is gorgeous, and while there really isn’t a bad seat, we were in the club level with a great view on a nice mild day. The Giants lost, but they were playing the White Sox, so I was happy. I enjoyed it so much that we went to another game that year, and then one in 2009. Ironically, we never made it to a game in 2010, and because of other stuff going on, I didn’t pay that much attention until the Giants made the playoffs that year. I followed the team on the radio in 2011, all the way to the bitter end, and in 2012 I decided that we needed to go ahead and get cable so we could actually watch games.

These days, when I’m not doing school work or gaming, I’m doing something baseball-related. During the season, I watch or listen to all the Giants games. In the offseason, Ruth and I spend our time discussing the moves we think the front office should make. For the past two years we’ve had season tickets to the Sacramento River Cats, the Giants AAA affiliate, and we read up on the prospects and follow the draft. We’re planning a trip down to Scottsdale for spring training. I hang out on McCovey Chronicles, a Giants fan blog that’s become an online home to me. I’ve gone from being intimidated by statistics to using them to argue for the merits of my favorite players, and I’m thrilled when one of those players retweets me. Given the chance, I will spend way too much time arguing about why the Designated Hitter is an abomination and why pitchers should hit.

I’m still not entirely over the Giants losing in the playoffs, though I’ve become enough of a fan that I can be happy that if they didn’t make it to the World Series, the Dodgers also lost. But as Mets pitcher Noah Syndergaard said when the Giants beat his team in the Wild Card game earlier this month:

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Accessibility, Inclusion, and Equality (INFO 240 #8)

October 18, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Article 19 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights states that:

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

As online interactions become an increasing part of everyday life, removing barriers to using the web for people with disabilities is an essential part of the movement towards ensuring equal access to information for all. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, nearly one in five Americans has some form of disability. Web accessibility concerns include multiple types of disabilities, including visual, auditory, physical/motor, cognitive and neurological disabilities, as well as accessibility-related issues for senior citizens.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative has published two sets of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines: WCAG 1.0 was released in 1999, and the current WCAG 2.0 was released in 2008. The governments of Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain and the UK have adopted WCAG 2.0 as the accessibility standard. In the US, federal agencies’ websites must comply with the Section 508 Rehabilitation Acts guidelines that are currently being updated to incorporate WCAG 2.0. (Rogers, 2012)

From a design standpoint, considerations of accessibility take multiple forms:

  • Visual: Sites must be designed so that they can be read by screen reading programs, and graphics must have alternate text tags describing images. Video content should have transcripts available. Users should be able to adjust text size and color contrast.
  • Auditory: Audio and video content should have closed captioning or transcripts available.
  • Physical/Motor: Sites must be navigable without a mouse using voice or other alternate input devices.
  • Neurological: Sites should avoid or allow users to bypass content that may cause seizures, such as strobing or flashing visual effects.
  • Cognitive: Navigation and instructions should be clear and written in plain language. Images should relate to the text.

The WAI provides many resources for website creators to learn about and use the WCAG 2.0 guidelines in site design. Sections include an introduction to the concept of accessibility and why it is important, as well as suggestions for designing, writing, and developing inclusive and accessible websites.

Yet while the framework and resources for making sites accessible exist, and countries are increasingly enacting legislation and guidelines in support of accessibility, there are still barriers for people with disabilities accessing information online. Accessibility must be considered as an integral part of the design process, rather than designing the site and then trying to retrofit it into accessibility guidelines after the fact. Paul T. Jaeger, Director of the Master of Library Science program at the University of Maryland, suggests that the problem is in part one of framing, arguing that “the issue lies with governments, corporations, schools, and other institutions not taking the guidelines seriously. An articulation of these barriers to access in the human terms — the impacts on individuals of the lack of equality — may produce more interest in solving the problems than have been achieved thus far.” (Jaeger, 2015)

REFERENCES

Jaeger, P. T. (2015). Disability, human rights, and social justice: The ongoing struggle for online accessibility and equality. First Monday, 20(9-7), 1. doi:10.5210/fm.v20i9.6164

Rogers, M. (2012, November 13). Government accessibility standards and WCAG 2.0 [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://www.powermapper.com/blog/government-accessibility-standards/

United Nations. (n.d) Article 19, Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/

United States Census Bureau. (2012). Americans With Disabilities: 2010. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/p70-131.pdf

World Wide Web Consortium. (n.d.). Web Accessibility Initiative. Retrieved from https://www.w3.org/WAI/

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Time Flies (INFO 240 #7)

October 11, 2016 · Leave a Comment

It’s hard to believe that we’re already at the halfway mark! For my final project, I’m thinking of doing a website for Galqar, my main Final Fantasy XIV character. The site would include his backstory, a couple of pieces of short fanfiction I’ve written about him, and an in-character “interview” with him talking about his experiences in the game. Looking at the requirements, it’s a little daunting, but hopefully by the time we get there, it’ll all seem routine. I never would have imagined that I could create a page layout that would work on multiple devices until I tried “View Responsive Layouts” and it worked!

Game 4 of the NLDS is tonight. Go Giants!

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

 

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Dragonsong (INFO 240 #6)

October 4, 2016 · Leave a Comment

In between schoolwork and stressing about the Giants this week, I’ve been playing a lot of Final Fantasy XIV. Patch 3.4 dropped recently, bringing a lot of new content and fun things to do, like crafting furniture for my new apartment.

One of the things that’s consistently amazing about the Final Fantasy series is the music. The video below is the “Dragonsong,” the main theme song of the first expansion for Final Fantasy XIV, Heavensward, composed by Nobuo Uematsu, with lyrics by Michael-Christopher Koji Fox and Kazutoyo Maehiro, and performed here by Susan Calloway. Enjoy!

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Living in the Future (INFO 240 #5)

September 27, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Last night as I was downloading Photoshop I had an “OMG we are living in the future!” moment. I remember 25 years ago when I got a Mac LC with a 12″ color CRT monitor for my college graduation present, and how I bought a copy of Adobe Pagemaker, which came on 5 or 6 3.5″ floppy disks. That computer had a whole 40 MB hard drive; I hade to upgrade the RAM from 1 MB to 4 MB so I could run Mac System 7. I actually was on the internet back in 1991, using my 1200 baud modem to access the rec.arts.tv.startrek* hierarchy on Usenet.

I have no physical media for Photoshop, which also comes with Acrobat Pro, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, and a dozen other programs. It took me around 10 minutes to download, which had me wondering if Comcast was having a moment, because it seemed slow. I decided to use my big computer, a 17″ Alienware laptop that I use for gaming. It has 16 GB of RAM and a 1 TB hard drive. Although it’s quite heavy, I can still set it on my lap and work in a comfortable chair or even in bed.

That shift in technology, is not even the one that’s had the greatest impact on my life; I’m still using computers with keyboards and monitors. For me, someone who’s always loved books and reading and has pretty much never not had a book in easy reach since I learned to read, the big change has been that I hardly ever read physical books. As books have become longer and heavier, I found it difficult to hold them, so about eight years ago I bought a Kindle. Three years ago I bought an iPad. I’m on my second iPad and iPhone now, and I use the Kindle app to read. With the sync feature I can switch between devices almost seamlessly. I can even use Audible to swap between versions of the same book.

Okay, so I don’t have my flying car yet, and regular space travel isn’t a thing, but reading on an electronic tablet? That’s definitely something I expected when I thought about living in the future.

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Team Jump Rope (INFO 240 #4)

September 20, 2016 · Leave a Comment

When I’m not doing schoolwork, reading, writing, or watching baseball (*sigh*), chances are you can find me gaming. My current favorite is Final Fantasy XIV; according to the system I’ve been playing for a total of 79 days, 23 hours, and 55 minutes.

So what am I actually doing during all of that time? Crafting and gathering, and arranging my inventory because all of the materials I gather in order to craft ensure that my storage space is almost always full. I do quests, of course, especially the ones for the main storyline; one of the reasons I’ve stuck with FFXIV for so long is because I love the storytelling and the rich and detailed lore about the world. I do a lot of open-world events, where monsters show up in an area and any of the players in a given zone can get together to defeat them.

Most of what I do, though, are instanced dungeons and raids, where I team up with anywhere from 3 to 23 other people to complete a specific set of objectives in a given time. Early on in the game, the dungeons are relatively easy, but the difficulty ramps up quickly, especially once you hit the current level cap of 60. Late-game content relies on complicated mechanics that require everyone in the party to know exactly what they’re supposed to do, and often if a player is in the wrong place, the entire party will end up dead. In the FFXIV community, these mechanics are sometimes referred to as “team jump rope”.

The dungeon I ran tonight was an example of this. The final boss is a dragon, and the party fights him on a series of platforms high in the air. During the battle, small crystals will appear on the platforms, damaging anyone standing there. Sometimes blocks of ice will spawn and immediately explode, causing nearby players to suffer slowed movement. Giant dragon heads float around the arena, damaging players who collide with them. The main dragon casts a spell that causes massive damage that takes up most of a given platform. Periodically, the dragon also casts a spell that destroys any platforms in a straight line in front of him. If a player is standing on a platform when it’s destroyed, she’ll fall to her death and can’t be resurrected by the healer. In order to succeed in this fight, all players need to constantly be aware of where the main boss, the small crystals, the ice blocks and the floating dragon heads are, while also keeping alert for the main boss’ platform-destroying attack and preparing to jump to a new platform, and making sure to play their assigned role of tank, healer, or damage-dealer to take down the boss before all of the platforms are destroyed.

Which, in a way, is kind of like coding. There are a lot of things to keep in mind, and one seemingly small mistake can cause the whole thing to fail. I was so busy trying to avoid the big attack tonight that I jumped too far from the healer, and ended up dying to one of the floating dragon heads. I also got a CSS validation error because I was so focused on my curly brackets that I left out a # when I was copy and pasting in color codes.

And in conclusion: LEEROY… JEEEEEENNNNKKKIIIINNSS! Don’t be him.

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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IKEA Web Design (INFO 240 #3)

September 12, 2016 · Leave a Comment

I wanted to take INFO 240 because I’ve always found CSS intimidating. I learned HTML back in the late ’90’s, when starry backgrounds were a thing. It may not have been pretty, but I knew how it worked. CSS seemed so complicated, like actual programming, with codes and syntax and curly brackets. It probably didn’t help that my first experience with CSS was attempting to edit someone else’s code in order to tweak a style for my LiveJournal.

Learning that HTML controls the structure of a web page, while CSS controls the design of the page, was like a light bulb going off. Suddenly, it makes sense somehow. I’ve been thinking of it as HTML being what you use to build a house, while CSS is the interior design. To carry the analogy even further, CSS is IKEA: it’s modular, which makes it easy and accessible even for people who aren’t professional interior designers. Instead of having to go to five different stores to put your living room together, you go to one place for everything.

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Three Lessons (INFO 240 #2)

September 2, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Lesson 1: Allow time for unexpected computer issues.

On Saturday night, I ran the latest Windows 10 updates before shutting down my system. When I started things up on Sunday to work on the assignment, the updates had to install, which took about half an hour. When they were complete, I discovered that not only did the updates remove several customizations I had, but they apparently mangled my sound drivers, which I discovered when I tried to plug my headphones in to listen to the lecture. After an hour of Googling and a fair amount of cursing, I finally found out how to roll back the update, but I ended up starting much later than I’d expected.

Lesson 2: Make sure to follow all the steps, and Read The Freaking Manual

The step-by-step instructions made things relatively straightforward, even though the assignment seemed dauntingly complex at first glance. I followed the instructions and was able to get what looked like an actual web page done. Excitement! Only…when I tried to validate, I got an error: “Sorry, this type of URL scheme (undefined) is not supported by this service.”

I (figuratively) banged my head against a wall trying to figure out what was wrong. I finally left a comment in the Resources post, and today Raymond replied, noting that the error message indicated that I hadn’t checked the box in the Web Developer extension to allow access to file URL’s. Just one tiny step I missed–mostly because I figured that I knew how to add extensions in Chrome, so I didn’t follow the instructions carefully enough.

Lesson 3: Don’t start an assignment when you’re already tired and cranky.

I was frustrated last night and aggravated out of proportion to the actual issue. I was also in that mode where I felt like I had to fix it RIGHT NOW, which compounded the frustration. When I read Raymond’s comment and made the fix–after sleep and food–I was able to validate and fix the errors. Oh, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

Lessons hopefully learned.

Reposted from the INFO 240 site blog.

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Introduction (INFO 240 #1)

August 26, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Hi everyone! My name is Nancy, and this is my third semester (including summer) in the MLIS program, and my first elective. I’m still trying to decide on a career pathway, but although I’ve worked in the tech industry for the past 20 years, my web design experience pretty much stalled out in the early 00’s, so I’m very excited about this class.

I live in Sacramento with my wife and our two cats. At the moment I’m a full-time student, but when I’m not studying or working I’m usually playing video games (mostly Final Fantasy XIV these days), reading and writing science fiction and fantasy, and traveling, even if it’s just a drive down the coast to the ocean. I love baseball; as you can probably guess from my photo, I’m a Giants fan, but as a Chicago native, I have some affection for the poor White Sox.

I’m looking forward to working with and getting to know you all.

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