Writing Online

I created groups in the Writing Studio for our audio project peer review session on Tuesday. When you visit our class page, click on “groups” and you should see a group names “Audio peer review.” In this group folder, upload your audio project. You can do this over the weekend or when you get to class Tuesday.

Remember that your audio file needs to be 5MB or smaller in order to upload in the Writing Studio. So, export your file from Audacity as an Mp3 and check the file size. If it’s too large, go to the “preferences” section of Audacity, choose the “file formats” tab and lower the “bit rate” under “MP3 Export Setup.” Now, export again; the file should be smaller this time. Continue to lower the bit rate and export until the file is the appropriate size. Lowering the bit rate also lowers the quality of the audio file, so only lower it as much as necessary to hit the 5MB mark you need to upload.

When working in Audacity, exporting as an Mp3 will not affect your original Audacity file. However, if you make a “quick mix” before exporting (this collapses all your separate audio tracks into one track) and save it, you are changing the Audacity file itself in a way that will make it really difficult to do further editing. The best thing to do when you are ready to start quick mixing and exporting is to open your Audacity project, choose “save as” and save it under a new name. This way, if you accidentally alter the Audacity file in a way you don’t want to during the exporting process, you can go back to the original.

Also remember that Audacity saves your project in two parts: a “.aup” file and a “data folder.” You need both of these files/folders in order to open and work with your Audacity project. So, if you are working at home and then bringing your project to class to continue working/ creating your Mp3 for sharing, make sure to bring both with you. The two files will look something like this:

Remember that if you want to get Kompozer, Gimp, or Audacity for portable use over the break, you can get the portable application from the network drives in Eddy 300, 2, and 4 today. These rooms will be closed over the break, so you must do this today if you want any of these programs on a CD or USB flash drive.

Go to one of these rooms, click “My Computer” and then on the network drive, and then on the folder “Portable Apps.” Drag the Audacity, Kompozer, or Gimp folder to your disk or USB flash drive. You can then run the program from your disk or USB drive on any computer without needing to put the program on the computer itself. This will be helpful if you will be using someone else’s computer over break and do not want to install software on it.

Hello all! I’ve updated the blog with a new page of resources for the web design and sound projects (see new page under “links” to the right). Let me know if you have any questions, especially about downloading software for use at home.

Hello all! This is just an update to remind everyone that I will be posting comments to your web site analyses in The Writing Studio by the end of the day. I’ll send an e-mail to everyone to let you know when all the comments have been posted. My comments will be in the same folder in which you uploaded your draft.

The due date for the revision is now midnight, Friday 10/12. You only need to upload an electronic copy to the Writing Studio (same folder); I do not need a hard copy.

I’ve updated the Daily Schedule and the calendar in the Writing Studio to reflect the updates.

Let me know if you have any questions about my comments after you receive them, and I’ll see you in class tomorrow.

Today many of you discovered the wonders of computer code: the computer only does what you tell it to do in the code and not what your brain is telling it to do, and then only 90% of the time! But trust me when I say that the basics are not hard once you spend a little time practicing.

On Thursday, we will split class time up evenly between learning more HTML code and discussing the upcoming web analysis and web page design projects. The web analysis assignment details are up on the blog and the design project details will be available Friday. Please bring your homepage designs back to class on Thursday as our goal will be to learn enough code for you to start laying out your page.  Also begin thinking about what web site you will analyze for your paper and what sort of web site you would like to design.

In the meantime, visit the HTML website (see the previous post) that I showed in class, and practice the tutorials to familiarize yourself with more of the code.  See you Thursday!

This timing is pretty good. My goal is to get our class follow-up posts online between 4:00 and 5:00 p.m. It is 4:47 as I begin to write this, so I may meet my goal.

We only scratched the surface of we design today, but I think we got some useful thoughts going about creation of a personal image online, usability in terms of navigation (menu bars, links, etc.), and use of screen space (as a group we seemed to prefer uncluttered pages). Keep exploring websites for design ideas: our class examples of ugly and visually pleasing sites are on the “links” in the Writing Studio and the examples of faculty websites are on our course blog. Here are two sites that I think exemplify good use of visual rhetoric:

Wilco

Wilco’s site is extremely simple in its navigation, and uses a monochromatic color palette that doesn’t overstimulate the eye. It also successfully uses white text on a black background, which is usually quite hard to read.

Ninth Letter

Ninth Letter is a literary magazine published at the University of Illinois. The website serves as a companion to the print edition, and is a good example of how a site can combine multiple media without creating cluttered pages and navigation confusion. It uses a neutral color palette for the background and other large areas of space and reserves bright color for text and links.

For homework, complete the short forum post at the Writing Studio and using pen and paper make a sketch of what you would like your homepage to look like. Remember that you are aiming for a page that exhibits sound visual rhetoric: who is your audience for your homepage? What image do you want to portray with your page? What is the purpose for your page–are you looking for a job, applying to graduate or professional school, promoting a skill or expertise?

Have a good weekend and see you next week!

5:17 p.m. Darn.

Hello patient class members!

I got home yesterday all set to update our course blog, and discovered that the Internet was down–something about a cut cable that would take several days to fix!–so I’m just now back in my office playing catch-up.

As we discussed, you can leave a comment to this post about anything that has to do with yesterday’s class–questions, comments, additional thoughts about class discussion. etc. I will create a post after each class session form now on that will briefly summarize what happened in class and clarify any homework instructions or unfinished business. If you leave a comment that adds to the class discussion (i.e., not a question about due dates or other class management business) it will count toward your participation grade. This will allow those who are quiet during class an alternative space to contribute.

So, for class tomorrow, please read the article and explore the websites that are listed on the readings page (scroll the whole way to the bottom of the page). Also, surf the web to find an example of a website you think is really ugly/poorly designed and one that you find visually pleasing/well designed. Be ready to show your examples to the class tomorrow.

As I explained in class yesterday, those of you who completed the technology manifesto forum post before Tuesday’s class have the bonus option to make the necessary small revisions that I will suggest (I’ll send comments via e-mail by Friday at 5:00 pm) and post your manifesto to your blog. You can then skip one blog post during a week of your choosing. If you did not complete the forum post before Tuesday’s class, you should still complete that assignment in order to receive partial class participation credit.

I also created a page the details the guidelines for your blogs that I explained in class yesterday (see page listing in the sidebar to the right.

Have a good evening, and see you tomorrow!

As promised, here are all the videos we talked about or viewed in class today. Take a closer look at the the text in “The Machine is Us/ing Us,” especially if you are just learning the differences between HTML (the code used to create traditional web pages) and CSS and XML (code that allows you to create sites that use templates and pull “content” into it from a database).

And, let me say that I am a true novice when it comes to using any computer code, so don’t feel like you have to know how to code anything by hand. That’s why in class I demonstrated how to cut and paste the “embed” code right from the YouTube site into a blog. The embed code for the video is a little complicated, but it essentially follows the same formula as this code for embedding an audio file in a blog post:

The part in red is the web address for the audio file. If you typed the part in red into a browser (Explorer, Firefox, etc.) it would take you directly to the audio file where I have it stored, and it would look like this:

The part in blue indicates how high and wide to make the audio player. If I set the sizes too small you wouldn’t be able to see all the control buttons. The last part of the code in blue, “autoplay=false,” tells the browser loading the blog not to play the audio automatically, but to wait for the user to click the play button. The code in green that surrounds all the other information is the actual “embed tag.” This information tells the browser what it should do with the information in the middle–that is, embed the audio file in the blog post.

See, coding can be simple and fun! Now back to those videos I promised:

This is “The Machine is Us/ing Us”

Here is the original “I’ve Got a Crush on Obama” video that we watched in class.

This is “Obama Girl” at the Democratic YouTube debate. If you are unfamiliar with this debate, it was a debate where the questions were asked by citizens who videotaped their questions and posted them on YouTube. You can read more about it here and you can watch video of the actual debate at YouTube.

Now go to our forums at the Writing Studio to post your follow up to the videos and our class discussion. (Note: I’ve spent so much time putting together this blog post that I’m going to wait till tomorrow morning to set up the forum space. So, if you are reading this Thursday evening, check the Writing Studio sometime after noon tomorrow.)