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Before I actually answer the blog assignment I wanted to write a little about what all I learned… I was fascinated with this week’s comic book and lecture notes…

This week I we learned about virtual worlds….  Virtual worlds rage anything from video games to movies to virtual worlds in gaming (like avatars)…

I got my first video game at age 20… NO JOKE… my parents would not allow them when I was growing up… no matter how many times I saved up my money, went to the store, and cried because they simply said, “NO”.  So on my 20^th birthday I received my first gaming system, the Wii… and I was so happy… till I came to find out, I very rarely played it at all… I have had the Wii 6 months and probably only played it 4 times… so this past week I (before this lesson) I sold it back to my parents for some money…

My boyfriend, however is a HUGE Xbox 360 nut head… he plays the Call of Duty game and several others when he gets the chance (much more than 4times in 6months)… and loved hearing what I had to say about the cook facts I found in Dr. Brown’s comic book…  He told me he owned about half of the gaming systems on the list… Haha….

I never knew so much went into gaming systems… and that them as well as computers and TVs were broken down by 3, 4, 5, 6, 7th generations, all with different bits. And that the guy that developed video game consoles was not awarded until 2005 or that video games suppressed music and video sales… I never would have guessed… because people who don’t own video game consoles still watch movies and listen to music… I don’t think I have met a single person alive who doesn’t listen to music or watch movies, but tons that don’t play video games (I used to be one of them)

Ok… Back on track to the topic of the blog…. OOPS!

I have VERRY little experience as I said with video games, and I feel the only reason my parents got me the Wii was cause of my Computer Science major to be quite honest… and along with that I have very, very, VERY little experience with virtual world online gaming as well… but here’s what I think and know on the topic from my life experience and through observation…

Pros and Cons

(These are MY OPINIONS… Don’t take them personally…  PLEASE)

Cons

My dad was very old school when it came to video games and online gaming… I never had the experience to do any type of virtual world… and now I am to the point I am glad that he didn’t let me play at all… I have met several people that are SOOO addicted to WoW (and others I don’t even know the name of quite honestly) that they literally sit in front of their computer for days… don’t shower…. Don’t eat, or when they do, they have it delivered… and don’t have a social life…at all. I feel that if my parents would have allowed me to get into virtual online games; my grades would have dropped,I wouldn’t have any friends at all, I wouldn’t have my wonderful boyfriend, and they would have yelled at me a lot because I would have been a bum with a dirty room and greasy hair…

Another BIG con is that sometimes people get too into virtual worlds and confuse it with reality… as strange as it sounds it happens… I watch a lot of NCIS and BONES, and constantly they are talking about how people confuse the two when it comes to virtual worlds online… It can be dangerous when someone thinks they can save the world, just because they did it earlier online (again I don’t play virtual world online games… I don’t know if “save the world” is the right phrase to use…lol) A lot of suicides happen to young teens because of them getting virtual worlds confused with reality…

But I do feel there is a good side to virtual world gaming…

Pros

Virtual world gaming allows you to escape and use your imagination like when you were a kid…

I am a Children’s Ministry Intern at Fairview United Methodist Church and I have to go to several seminars about how kids learn… (this is relevant I promise…) I went to one a few months back and the speaker was telling us how imagination is SOOOOO important… its not only important for children but its also important for adults as well… Adults may not fall for the whole play kitchen with air thing anymore… but virtual worlds just takes that place… (Like an adult air tea party… lol) imagination helps the brain grow and exercise to be able to take in new information…. Virtual worlds allow young teens and adults to stretch their imagination

Also, virtual worlds allows you to get away from a hard day or week… and be in “another place” for a while… It allows you to be able to do things you know you can’t achieve; like flying (without an airplane) or jumping from building to building like Spiderman…  For a teenager that gets picked on at school from 7am to 3pm… for him to come home and get online to a virtual world where he is “king” and no one picks on him… is a way of boosting self esteem and helping him cope with what is going on at school in a good way… so if you think about it, yes there is a very good outcome of playing virtual world video games… as long as you don’t get “sucked” into them thinking that it is real life or let it control you with your time and get completely addicted to it…

So, therefore in my opinion… virtual worlds can be a good thing or bad thing… just depends on how you take it all in…

I really enjoyed this lesson this week…. It was REAALLY GOOD!!

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(still upset I am missing the robots due to recovering from the flu still…. Getting there though!)

I find this lesson VERY interesting…

At first… I am not gonna lie…. I didn’t like this lesson very much at all…. I read the comic book and was like…. “what?” (with a added blank stare)

But after I read the lecture notes, it clicked….

It’s hard to think about computers being this complex… I have loved technology since I can remember, and knew that what I was working with could do many things, but not till I read this did I think about it being this complex.. (if I am making any sense here at all)

What really caught my eye when I was reading was the neuron section was when Dr. Brown compared the computer’s artificial intelligence techniques to a human brain. I don’t think I have ever looked at my computer that way at all… now I have a new way of looking at it…

I also like learning about how computers differ in the way the convert common sense… how humans build it up over time with mistakes and life lessons whereas computers don’t get that chance because well, they aren’t human… lol…

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I WAS planning on making it for the lab this week, but my luck (like the rest of this term) I got sick (had stomach bug, kidney stone issues, now the flu… this term has not been the best health wise on me)… with the flu… And was sooo upset I missed out…. I read the chapter over and over again and each time I got soo jealous of what all I missed out….

But from the reading I learned and gained a little bit of an idea of what I missed from the lab… A robot is a mechanical or virtual agent…. It normally has a mechanical system and some sort of appearance with movement…  they are not natural but are created by humans.. they can sense and maneuver their surroundings… robots are also smart, programmable, and sometimes they can make their own choices…

I then learned about Cybernetic Systems….

I had to reread this section like 5 or 6 times till it clicked with what this ment… (it was like I got it, but the “huh?” was still there)

Cybernetics is kinda like the main goal for the robot to achieve then find the action to achieve it…. Or more like the process of which you take to achieve the goal… for example: you drop your pin, the goal from that is to pick it up…. So your brain tells your legs and back to bend over the pen, then your brain tells your arms to reach for the pen, then your brain say, “you have the pen now?” when it gets back the answer yes you stand up and move on from that task…. Its just a slower way of thinking about how you process every move and goal through… but that’s how robots have to do it to achieve their goals and movements as well…

As I continued to read… I got to the next section…. The Mindstorm Lego section…. I clung to my box of Kleenex and just kept reading with the jealousy burning (by this point crying to my boyfriend cause I really wanted to come sick, which I know wasn’t right)…. But I think I got the idea of what you all did… or as far as what the comic book and lecture note say…

Each part sensor did a different thing (one did light, one did touch, etc.) they kinda were the tendons, joints, etc

Then you had the 3 motors which were like in human terms the muscle…

Then you had the Brick… which was the robot’s brain and nervous system

Then you used the lego tecthnics parts to do the overall framework to form the body in a specific way to match its function.

I was then amazed to learn that robots can have the special feature of MUSCLES!*!*!*!  Or should I use the more tech savvy word Servos… you position them at the joints of the robot or where movement is more likely to begin but sometimes they can throw off the robots accuracy.

With the NXT (the lego mindstorm robots) that I am missing out on… I am learning that in order to make them work at all… the “brain” or the brick has to be programmed in order for you to be able to communicate with your robot to be able to tell it what to do…

You have to make sure though that the commands are placed so that they take place in a logical order and under certain conditions… also use repetition in your commands as well…

But that’s what I learned with the robotics… even though I was sick and missed the fun lab… L I still had fun reading the comic book, lecture notes, and visiting some of the reference websites…. J

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I feel that computer hacking is a BIG deal… this come to me in both my personal opinion and by experience…

Last year I was hacked… someone hacked into my PSTCC account and dropped me from several of my classes and did some other stuff as well… I was out of the country (I do mission work ALL THE TIME and sometime leave the state or even the country) and went online to do some schoolwork and found that my classes were missing… I was furious… So, yes to me, computer internet hacking is very very very serious…

As for virus and other internet issues… I never have had much experience with them till this year, my computer crashed due to a virus in an e-mail that I opened by mistake.. but other than that I have learned more in this class than by experience… my philosophy is always have a GOOD internet security system and NEVER EVER EVER open unknown e-mails….

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Scratch wasn’t new to me, but it is fun… I always enjoy it… Its always a fun program to use to put your thoughts into pictures and move around… I love making cartoon like actions and movies happen on my screen and watching what I feel and think come to life right in front of me…  I like to use it when I am bored and have nothing to do on a rainy day… it is a fun fun program!

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After completing the assignment this week I was very proud of myself… I have NEVER done anything like this before and had a blast doing it! It took some looking up step by step how to do things at first, but after a while I got the swing of it and caught on really fast! I would love to do more things like this in the future… it was soo FUN!!!

All you do is open a note pad and ( i had a starter prompt) then you just start putting in what you want… like <p> means paragraph… and

<title> —- to put a title

and then you would put

</title> after you put it  to finish it off…

I had NEVER done anything like this before and didnt know where to begin… mainly if i got stuck… i looked online or google’d it…. it was soo much fun!!!

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I had some issues trying to figure out the Assembly Language assignment… but, I went to my brother who is somewhat a genius and asked for help when I was studying for the test… he helped me understand It a little bit better, just wish I would have asked him when the assignment was due…OOPS!!!…

I now can see how it is all coming together…. It makes more sense to me now after seeking help… and I now know I was making it much harder than it had to be….

My brother then informed me that his company and the company he works for as a contractor does not use Assembly Language and haven’t for years… but he knew what(and how) to use it… is that normal for today’s big computer and technology companies? (not that i am worried about it at all…lol…)

I cant wait to see what more interesting fun things I will learn in this amazing class!!!

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Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811121004… I chose this one based off of how simple it appeared… I know strange reason to pick out a case, but to me… I like to start simple… (There were several reviews for this product that people had the same opinion on picking out this case)

Mother Board: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130554 …. The number one reason I chose this one was based on the layout of the mother board itself…

Optical Drive: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827118031&cm_re=optical_drive-_-27-118-031-_-Product … I chose this one for 2 reasons… one is the matching color and style with the case… and the quality of the company of SONY… it had wonderful reviews in which that is a major plus in my book..

CPU:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115070 I chose this due to speed… my Android has the speed of 2GHz… this speed of 3.4GHz with a Turbo Boost… This is FAST!!! J

CPU Cooler: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835200014&cm_re=cpu_cooler-_-35-200-014-_-Product

RAM: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6753738&Sku=C19-6149

Hard Drive: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=57012&CatId=4357 … I chose this hard drive based on my past experience with Seagate hard drives (I have several external hard drives from this company that work great!)

Power Supply: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3276567&Sku=ULT-LSP750

Video Card:  http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=19179&Sku=G458-0552

Screws and screw driver:  Screws come with the computer case… and I will/would use my own screw driver to screw things into place.

Step one: Put the CPU into the Mother Board… Lift the little wire bracket and remove CPU from casing, careful not to touch pins at the bottom… line up CPU marks with the marks on the mother board and snap it into place. Then, place the wire bracket back into place to make it more secure…

Step 2: Take the CPU cooler (ones with a thermal seal on the bottom is better and prevents overheating) Line up the non latching end to marks on the motherboard and with a bit of force snap into place and plug in power…

Step 3: Install memory. When putting into motherboard it’s important to pay attention to which are dual channel and which are not… if put in wrong one it can slow the computer to half speed… OUCH! Drop into slots and snap in..

Step 4: Put motherboard into case after putting port plate that has holes for mouse/keyboard hookups.

Step 5: Take drive case out of computer case

Step 6: Slide drive from back to front of the case and use screws to hold it into place in the front…

Step 7: Slide back into case making sure not to catch wires on anything…

Step 8: Optical drive: Take front panel off and insert optical drive, watch sides!! And then screw into place…

Step 9: Connect front panel connectors, each is labeled and connect to box connector that then goes into the mother board, then plug in the rest of the connectors.

Step 10: Then, take the power supply and slide into case and screw it into place making sure it is lined up.

Step 11: connect all cabling… Take graphics card and put into PSI slot, this only goes in 1way…

Step 12: Finish cabling

Step 13: Turn it over and boot it up!! J then install Windows and Drivers

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Soo… I totally forgot to Blog this week.. I just kinda yelped when I was eating dinner because I was reading for next week and saw the word, “blog” and almost screamed… Oops on this being a bit late… life has been crazy and I am not at all used to blogging.

So, binary numbers… I touched this a little in high school but never really hit it as hard as in this course.. I kinda freaked when i saw the review questions for the text/quiz (which i have not been doing so hot on) and was like WHOOoAAA!!!

After reading and studying the comic book and lecture notes it is one of those things that either is really easy and you get really fast or is something that you can make WAY too hard. I had kinda experienced both. I understood the concept but when it came to reversing the numbers from binary to decimal i just could not do it at all… After sitting down and doing it reeaaalllly slowly i finally got it and was not as scared as i was before…

All in all, I really liked the lesson on binary numbers!! It was soo much more challenging than high school (like college is supposed to be) and i love stuff like this!!

I wont be late again!!!

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Hello! So I was assigned to blog about me this week, and I am not going to lie, I have never done this before… but i am always open to new things… so about me…

My name is Amy Klena, i am 20years old living in a little apartment, with my kitty Daisy, in Maryville. I am a Computer Science Engineer major and hope to transfer to UT in my future, but this is my 5th term at Pellissippi and I love it soooo much!!! The teachers, students, and the very small classes are the main reasons why it’s sooo great!

I am looking VERY foward to this class and what all it offers… I love computers and have since i was a little girl, I cant get enough of technology and I know this class is going to be amazing!!

Well, that wasn’t soo hard!!! I just might get the hang of this blogging thing, and not set it at the end of my to do list anymore… haha…

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