Reflecting on learning?

Do you realise what you just did? Says Yishay. You just talked like a programmer – your programming (which he says is ‘a method of solving problems by design). You just:
• Defined and object model
• Specified what you want it to do
• Defined events
• Designed functionality
• Talked in pseudo code – if this then that and so on.

Great fun!

We thought it might be useful (at the same time as knowing it is an impossible task at another level) to try and reflect on how I made this shift in thinking. It is hard to do this without sounding too grand or grandiose – so apologies in advance (just take it down a notch when you read it yishay).

Serendipity and learning
The process of learning how to between my abstract ideas and how these might be thought of in programming terms was aided by my turning up at Yishay’s without having emailed him my attempts at the assignment. That is we could not get tangled up in the technology, in the programming problems I was having. Instead I ended up thinking about what I was trying to do. This highlights for me the way in which learning demands different levels of thinking and how different technologies help or hinder or position a person to what it is that they are trying to do (mean or think). If I had remembered my flash stick would probably still be trying to make a div box (which obviously I will now have to do).

Experiencing the spatial logic of the coding
I think spending considerable time staring at source code of various websites, and trying to make the link between the visual interface and the code helped me begin to engage (all be it still in an incredibly basic way) with the ways in which coding represents the spatiality of a page, and with the ‘look’ the grammar of a page of code.

The knowledge I needed to understand and solve the problem
Looking at the source code of pages and moving iteratively between the design and the code, and just looking at different pages and the differences in code was useful in that it gave me some ways to think about how I could describe what it is I want to make – to begin to solve the problem of how to imagine and make concrete my idea. So partly with out a language of any kind that reflects the primary concerns of what programming is I could not really get there.

‘Your thinking like a programmer’
Well I wish I truly was able to think like a programmer, but maybe this is a start, and in relation to learning I think this is key. Beginning to attempt some of the practices of a programmer – through talking to Yishay (and Gordon and Chand) I have kind of wanted to talk that talk and enter that world of practices:
• In expressing my interest in the area at where I work
• Adopting, using, trying out and finding out some programming language: literally html and java, but also listening to ‘how programmers about programming’
• Reading some stuff on programming
• Staring at sites in view source
• I have in a very minor way learnt something of what that might mean. Perhaps more than that I have just understood that programming is a form of representation, that it demands a stance or viewing position on the world, that it has concerns that shape and position the ‘identity’ of the meaning maker.

So tomorrow I will buy my html ref book and go back to try the techy stuff.

‘Reducing’ the page to a series of coding tasks

Yishay decided everything would be okay and that what I needed was to just move between the code, the idea, and small tasks and that maybe I should get myself an html desktop ref book.

We talked a while then Yishay had to knead his bread (true) so he said we’ll get to the computer in a bit, ‘okay you just take a step back and take the idea and – reduce it to the most minimal thing you have to do’. (I am not sure if it is ‘reducing’ or just representing?)

So I started talking aloud writing down my notes, breaking the tasks down into stages:

1. make a page – give it a colour and a title – make it with 4 vertical areas of space and 2 horizontal areas
2. make a box in each of these spaces – each the same size – and give each a title: box 1 – name; box 2 – colour and shape; box 3 – audio; and box 4 - movement
3. link a series of 10 images to box 2, link a series audio files to box 3, link a series of video clips to box 4
4. make function or rule: when the mouse is moved over box 1 the first image in box 2 appears
5. make function or rule: after 5 seconds the 1st image is replaced by the 2nd image, and after 5 secs the 2nd image is replaced by 3rd and so on – continues to loop/cycle through the (10) images
6. make function or rule: when the 10th image appears in box 3, the 3rd box with the first sound clip appears and starts and runs through series.
7. make function or rule: when the last sound clip ends the fourth box appears and first video appears in box 4, the 3rd box and appears and starts.
8. When the last video clip ends a button appears at the bottom of the page, enabling the reader to select and play the modes in the boxes
9. (not so sure about how to think about this bit?)An area where the reader can leave comments appears

So I got from the abstract metaphorical theoretical level to the concrete and specific in the end. (Even though as Yishay said ‘Of course there are loads of bugs in that – but well, you will build it and then you can sort that out’.)

Description of my page

The page is about how different modes shape a concept differently. The first page I make focuses on a leaf (other ones that I have thought of are: machine, monster, cell, people, places).

The page is divided into two horizontal sections. The top section is all about words, and the lower section is about specific modes that change. (The words that are written attempt to describe something that is shown in the non-linguistic representations that they relate to.)

The page is also divided into four same size vertical sections/areas. Each vertical area is ‘occupied’ by a different mode: the first area on the page is filled by word, by written language; the second by image; the third by sound; and the fourth by movement.

(I will scan and upload a rough sketch of what the page structure looks like soon, plus a few sketches of the overall thing)

As the reader moves their mouse across the word written on the page the box with a series of images of leaves appears and the first image is shown for a short while (about 5 secs) then the next image (in a series of 10) is shown, and all are cycled through. Green leaves, different shaped leaves, summer leaves, winter leaves, unfurling spring leaves and so on. When the complete series of images has been shown a box in the next vertical column is revealed and a looping audio clip of sounds of leafs plays – rustling, waving, underfoot. As the sound loop gets to its ‘beginning’ the fourth box is revealed, containing a video clip of leafs moving – swirling in the wind, moving on trees, falling.

Once the video clips finish playing a button appears on screen where the user can select, mix, and match the modes and replay, turn on and off the modes –one reader chooses to turn off the word and image, and to combine the sound and video clip. Another reader watches the series of images accompanied by the series of sounds. Another reader listens only to the sounds. The reader can choose to run everything - the image, sound, movement simultaneously or select just one mode. A comments box also pops up, where the reader can write in their comments, and link to other images, etc.

Am I starting to program (well, maybe)

Over the past two weeks I had a few attempts at making a page with div boxes. First of all I had to find out what a DIV is:

“The DIV element defines a generic block-level container, allowing authors to provide style or language information to blocks of content.”

I started out trying to make my page. First I worked with a html online directory, in the face of failure I resorted to html cheat sheets, and then just viewing and copying the source of numerous web pages. I couldn’t make my page work. Just as I was about to give up last week a colleague sent me this url
for a site on patterning something we had discussed to do with something else that seemed to offer me the solution to my problem as it has the kind of features that I want - specifically the way image and word relate on the screen.

So for a week I sat and stared at the source code for the site for about 1.5 hours. I copied it over to a text file, played around with it and – well I still couldn’t make may page.

In our latest programming session (18 Nov), despite this failure (maybe even because of this failure as it kept me staring at the screen full of source code so long) I seem to have had a different kind of ‘revelation’ in my understanding of the logic and systematic character of code. (It is so strange it is as if immersing my self in the script by staring at so many sites has seeped in to my thinking.)

The session started with Yishay saying okay we’ll have a look at what you have done and my realizing I had not emailed my attempt at the page to him or brought it along with me. Never mind he says, ‘tell me what you are thinking the page is going to look like, and later we can have a look at that site and work it together’. Whereas before I had not been able to do this – now I can.

Assignment 5: ‘It’s not really programming – its scripting’

What ever it really is called, my assignment is to make an html ‘page’ with two different modes in the representation of some ‘content’: image and writing. The page will have an interactive feature (a button, or mouse movement) that works to hide the images, and show the images. This involves building a page with images in ‘div’ tags and then writing a script to make them be hidden. The page will then show the impact on ‘content’ when realised in writing or realised in writing and image.

One idea might be to go and photo graph some texts where the visual context renders them meaningful in a way that changes the written element of the text…

Before doing that I will have a go at a basic html tutorial from one of the links on the LKL programming blog.

I need ‘stuff’ to imagine with

Can you learn how to program or even think about programming if you have not got the ability to imagine what it looks like? I think yishay and me have come to the mutual conclusion that even if you can I can’t.

Writing my last assignment 4 was difficult for me, in fact I could not do it. I could not get past as yishay described it – a certain level of abstraction. In my post ‘trying to think what this essay really is’ (Nov 2nd) I got near to it at one point ‘Diane comes up and ‘turns up’ the multimodality’ – but what next – I could not as yishay wanted me to ‘describe what happens, how does Diane ‘turn it up’ what is it ‘a button’, what exactly happens, how can the button be turned’. I can usually imagine but in this instance I had no kind of ‘stuff’ to imagine with.

This is interesting for me, as it makes me think much more generally about the idea of learning and the importance of being able to imagine the finished product (whether it can then be realised is another matter). Working with a system, a grammar and language and way of thinking about interaction that is outside of my usual one highlights what being able to imagine the finished project might actually require (for me at any rate) and involve.

So our meeting today consisted of this discussion and the decision to return to sitting around the computer together working with some basic html and java. This felt great – back to the certainty of something new. The idea being that if I can better understand how the programming works – kind of build a vocabulary (both of words to communicate and think with, but also dynamic visual examples to think with and share) to imagine with that I might be better able to imagine what the essay might look like, could be.

So with this new starting point in mind, we went through the html web page that I had made in assignment 4.1 and yishay explained how to understand (interpret) the online validation software. We looked at sites around html, looked at websites and viewed their source (I find the moment where you ‘flick’ over to the source code a really interesting one – where I am suddenly trying to match one language – what is on the web page as designed – to another – the lines of source code. Like all bilingual people I wonder how yishay or other programmers see the webpage – if they can translate it into code – and vice versa – if when they see the lines of code they see the resulting webpage? For me these two things are entirely distinct and barely connectable – in this sense I guess learning is, as with any other specialist knowledge, learning how to make new sense of the everyday through the specialist literacies and practices that learning programming makes available – well that is my task – to make some connections and start to build a page.

I learnt a number of new terms that I will add to my glossary later (hoping to beable to write a book on ‘how to pretend to be a programmer’ by the end of all this:
Event handler
Commented out
Div
Styling definition
The relationship between head and body
The meaning of the expression ‘font is depreciated’

trying to think about what this essay really is

User case scenario for interactive essay

okay so programing is really useful as it is forcing me to realise what it is i need to think about - the gaping holes in how i am trying to think about this essay is in fact very helpful in making me think about how i am conceptualising the ideas theoretically - like is it possible to think of multimodality as a continuum - the ans is no, is it possible to think of pace/speed as a continuum - yes but is it useful - ans is no! what is interactivity - and how can conceptualise it. so as i try and write this the whole thing falls apart: painful but most likely useful experience.

I am going to give a presentation in the lkl seminar room, for my ‘critical friends/colleagues’ – Diane, Caroline, Yishay, Gordon, Arthur.
The title of the presentation is ‘Designing representation on screen for learning: the semiotic resources of multimodality, pace and interaction’.

I explain to the group/audience that first of all I am going to sketch out the ideas in the essay and after that I will ask them to come up and play around with some of the ideas. The first part of the talk is linear and in my control – it has no interactive element.

I start the essay by visually ‘defining’ (filling up) the three semiotic resources - multimodality, speed/pace, interactivity through a series of examples of web pages – clips of dynamic texts. These are displayed on screen. I show that these three semiotic resources can be designed quite differently depending on the pedagogic purpose and audience of a text (getting away from the rhetoric that multimodal, fast pace, and interactive is ‘best’ and moving towards the idea of what is best fit for purpose.)

The multimodal section shows how the addition of mode is a kind of ‘modal selection’: image, writing, sound, movement, as singular modes – then in two mode combinations, then three mode and so on. That is different potentials for modal combinations. Alongside this would have the possibility for different configurations on screen - the proportion or relationship between modes. This could be expressed as a kind of grid like: modes in play by mode foregrounded…

(I think this relates to Sigrid Norris’s work – analyzing multimodal interaction – 2004). So in the modal combination could have image and writing – with a kind of sliding scale of image and writing foregrounded – showing e.g.s where the proportion of text in visual vs writing changes.

so each of the semiotic resources is filled in by 3 or 4 examples - which are open simultaneously on the screen so that the audience can make links comparisons across.

then move to think of exemplars of these three kinds of resources in one text as typologies
multimodal (lots modes), fast, interactive
multimodal (few modes), fast, interactive

at this point switch to collaborative presentation production,
I invite people to come up to the interactive white board that the essay is displayed on. This second part of the essay is not linear – it is branch like in that the person up at the screen moves away from my ‘examples’ of the semiotic resources to suggest others. in which we generate typology through talking, and linking to examples on line, drawing, scanning and incorporating possibilities into the presentation - as a kind of network of possibilities


Diane comes up and ‘turns up’ the multimodality – moving away from the idea of a written text, to a dynamic text. She turns down the pace, slowing down the presentation.
[to be continued]
still need to get right down on the level of the description think about:
the way that things are arranged on the space of display
What kind of structure does it have? An essay has a linear structure, webpage is semi linear – it branches out and off, or is it like a wiki
how will the essay structure avoid people getting lost in this thing?
Will people be able to draw lines and connections?

Assignment 4.1: basic programing in java/html

see the lkl programming course blog (24/10/05) re the task: making a button that shouts when click on it. took me ages.
learnt how to set up my text editor (on mac) to make html file, put in title, make button, program button interaction. then used basic html to colour it pink, sort out look of font etc, add my email, and stuff. then checked it using mark up 'validation' software - to find that i had loads of things wrong with the file i had made...but it kind of worked. took me hours but was great fun.

Assignment 4: Do my homework again and get it better

Imagine how object I am creating fits into a story – not ‘a face to face presentation’ but a narrative of Where, How many people, What happen - more along the lines of :

I am going to give a presentation in the lkl seminar room, for my ‘critical friends/colleagues’ – Diane, Caroline, Yishay, Gordon, Arthur. The talk will be called ‘Designing representation on screen for learning: the semiotic resources of multimodality, pace and interaction’.

Meeting 4:Thinking about programing

So we talked about my problem with doing the user case scenario and how my versions on this blog under assignment 3 are too remote and abstract. We talked about the need for me to imagine myself into the context of use of the object I’m trying to make. We talked about how the language 1 use could enable me to do this, the need to name the specifics, to talk it into existence? This is interesting as it is so much about linguistic practices and identities – so in a sense I am both imaging my self through the use of language as someone presenting the interactive essay and simultaneously I am imagining the essay and – biggest leap of imagination – my self as any kind of programmer.

Talked about ‘what happens when I walk up to the object’
The need to build a narrative of its use: what does it look like - me showing and demonstrating it to the group, and the audience coming up and ‘playing with it’. Talked about the need to get right down on the level of the description – ‘Joe clicks on a button and it looks like this…blah’

The need to think about the way that things are arranged on the space of display

What is the dimensionality is it 2D or 3D
What kind of structure does it have? An essay has a linear structure, webpage is semi linear – it branches out and off, or is it like a wiki
My talk might demand a linear starting point, but then if caroline, diane and co come up and play around with the elements on screen, link to other things – how will the essay structure avoid people getting lost in this thing?
Will people be able to draw lines and connections?
Would be nice to have wiki like links out?

Talked about the structure maybe opening with each thing, multimodality, pace, interactivity being linked to examples on the www that open up via my presentation.
That this possibility of building in more links from say caroline or diane’s examples as they read and make the presentation.

In short talked about how to get it all web 2.0 ish!

Ended up with a very sketchy diagram – which may mean nothing to anyone but me.



Next step is the scenarios and attempting – through these narratives to address the above questions. Plus to carry on with the basic html.

What is programming?

A worry we both brought up today at the end of meeting 4 is – um will I actually ever get round to programming? There are (as always) several responses to this question - one of which is ‘stop being so output product focused.

Another response to this is, what does this say I really think programming is – is programming ‘only’ about writing code or is it thinking about all the stuff I am thinking about. This is an interesting one, I have heard a lot about how programmers can’t understand or aren’t interested in the social and yet the whole process is pretty much focused on understanding the regulation of social interactions it seems. So while the traditional method of programming is pretty formal in a process that attempts to map the social as a set of abstract high-level principles and then work down to the details of how some thing might work in ‘real’ life – there is also the more ‘modern’ extreme programming (XP) or agile programming which involves ‘design games’ like reading parts in a play, acting out roles around the designed object focused around embedding it in a social context and understanding it via a more iterative approach. I like the idea of this – well I like the idea of the theory that stands behind it in that it kind of makes the point that you can’t just design an artifact or an object and ‘drop it into a context’ that really programming is about designing a set of actions, practices. So programming is designing the social.

I am starting out writing some research proposals at the moment and this thinking about programming, and trying to get my head out of the clouds and to look at the detail of what this imagined interactive essay might be, is actually really helpful for me in thinking about what my colleague Gemma Moss keeps saying to me ‘You have the theory, forget about the theory, you know the theory - you have to find the empirical object – what it is you want to follow, where it can be found, what happens to it, what do people do with it, and what is the point – why should anyone else care!’.

There is however always at least a ‘third way’ – which is okay this is programming, all this process, but yes maybe I could learn some basic javascript and perhaps we could both learn a little AJAX. Yishay will post me a link to a basic tutorial on java and see if there is a good one on AJAX.

You say 'user case diagram' I say 'activity system' - Let's call the whole thing off?

When talking about user case diagrams today me and yishay both commented how similar they are to engestrom's diagrams of activity systems.

Assignment 3.3: using UML

So now I need to make a diagram
then Scan it and upload it onto flickr and link to my blog.
learnt how to scan image and link to blog - but couldn't work up a user case diagram - my scenarios are too abstract, see yishay's posts. It is interesting as i can't seem to think myself into the terminology of the diagram - like another set of linguistic practices.

Assignment 3.0: (distraction)

Yishay sent this really beautiful XML thing as a possibility for a starting point for the essay. Suggesting maybe we can download the source code, and use it as a starting point for a prototype of the interactive essay. when you click on the little XML button on the interface tool bar it shows the source code and I have just spent some time doing that - clicking between the interface and the source code and trying to relate them. I find that quite interesting that they kind of 'mean' the same thing at some level and yet at another they don't at all. That is a question which i guess my work over the past 7 years or so been mainly about - the differences in modes and the ways in which representation shapes knowledge and possibilities for communication and learner identity and kind of trying to work out what i think this means for learning and thinking. But back to the assignment

Assignment 3.2: understanding UML

Look up the links that Yishay has sent (posted on LKL blog) re UML and find out a bit more about it.
then try and use UML to make a diagram of my use case scenario.

I'm looking at site about UML and use case diagrams which trys to explain what they are, how you make one, and why they are useful.According to this:
The UML is applicable to object-oriented problem solving. Anyone interested in learning UML must be familiar with the underlying tenet of object-oriented problem solving -- it all begins with the construction of a model. A model is an abstraction of the underlying problem. The domain is the actual world from which the problem comes.
Models consist of objects that interact by sending each other messages. Think of an object as "alive." Objects have things they know (attributes) and things they can do (behaviors or operations). The values of an object's attributes determine its state.
Classes are the "blueprints" for objects. A class wraps attributes (data) and behaviors (methods or functions) into a single distinct entity. Objects are instances of classes.

Use case diagrams describe what a system does from the standpoint of an external observer. The emphasis is on what a system does rather than how.
Use case diagrams are closely connected to scenarios. A scenario is an example of what happens when someone interacts with the system. Here is a scenario for a medical clinic.
"A patient calls the clinic to make an appointment for a yearly checkup. The receptionist finds the nearest empty time slot in the appointment book and schedules the appointment for that time slot. "
A use case is a summary of scenarios for a single task or goal. An actor is who or what initiates the events involved in that task. Actors are simply roles that people or objects play. The picture below is a Make Appointment use case for the medical clinic. The actor is a Patient. The connection between actor and use case is a communication association (or communication for short).

Actors are stick figures. Use cases are ovals. Communications are lines that link actors to use cases.
A use case diagram is a collection of actors, use cases, and their communications. We've put Make Appointment as part of a diagram with four actors and four use cases. Notice that a single use case can have multiple actors.

Use case diagrams are helpful in three areas.
determining features (requirements). New use cases often generate new requirements as the system is analyzed and the design takes shape.
communicating with clients. Their notational simplicity makes use case diagrams a good way for developers to communicate with clients.
generating test cases. The collection of scenarios for a use case may suggest a suite of test cases for those scenarios.

another good link detailing the elements in a use case scenario>
This makes sense to me but i can not think my idea of the essay into a set of actors, use cases and communications (which probably means i am not clear enough at all).

Assignment 3.1:use case senarios of my interactive visual essay

Write down several use case senarios of my interactive visual essay - here the narrative descriptions are about contexts of use.

Use case senario 1: face to face presentation

A presentation given ‘face to face’ to educational practitioners (teachers, educational software designers, and researchers) interested in the design of texts for technology-mediated learning with screen based new technologies (Interactive whiteboards, computers, hand held devices etc).

The essay will explore the ways in which three semiotic elements of a text can be designed in alternative ways to investigate a scientific concept (e.g. cells or particles) for key stage 3 students in secondary school: ‘multimodality’ – in other words image, writing and other modes, pace, and interactivity.

The ‘audience’ will be able to interact with the essay by coming up and ‘turning up’ or ‘turning down’ the multimodality, the pace, or the interactivity of the text on screen. Their interactions will show how the use of specific modes fill in particular aspects of the concept, and how the relationship of modes on screen can enhance or confuse the design of knowledge, and position students differently to the production of knowledge.

The number of modes, the degree of interactivity, the speed/pace desired by different members of the audience will vary depending on the audience that they imagine for the text – which will make the point that there is not one ideal text, but that texts like technologies are always shaped by their intended use.

The aim being that the audience will be encouraged to think about the relationship between technology and pedagogy in an interactive and immediate manner.

After ‘playing’ with the text design potentials in this way the interactive essay will incorporate the comments and thoughts of the audience into a conclusion (via the post-it XML thing?). This interactive character will serve to foreground the potential of electronic (computer based or is digital the right word?) texts to re make the idea of author, to open up potentials for multi-authored and fluid texts.

Use case senario 2: online essay

A presentation online – linked to my ioe and lkl webpages and this blog – which will be read by people interested in my work I guess.

The essay will be as described above. (It might also provide an audio commentary.) The person reading the essay will look at the 3 main dimensions of multimodality, pace, and interactivity and make selctions from a continuum of each and then view (or simultaneously view) the way in which their selection shapes the text design.

Actually I am thinking here that the essay could almost be abstract – where as I was thinking that it would be focused on a science curriculum concept like cells – what if actually the essay was abstract shapes, modes, words, sounds, and the pace increased their speed, and the interactivity shaped what the person reading it could do with it? That might work – that might be a way of making a very general theoretical point about modes of representation - but not sure – yishay what do you think? I might also plan in different routes etc to show distance from node as a semiotic resource.

Anyway, regardless of what I decide re the content of the essay the form is such that the person ‘reading’ it will be positioned both as reader and maker.
The essay will be able to be expanded and added to, so that a reader can work up ideas about how the resources of image and other modes might be combined and then play with them in some kind of ‘design ideas sandbox’ and then kind of ‘post’ them – stitch them onto the essay in some way.

When the reader has finished playing around with the design they will be able to comment on the process as well. Perhaps I will have some prompt questions around the relationship between mode and meaning/learning and so on.

Building an on-going glossary

Event handler
Commented out
Div
ML
Mark up language

Wikis
A wiki (wikiwiki) enables documents to be written collectively (co-authoring) in a simple markup using a web browser. A single page in a wiki is referred to as a "wiki page", while the entire body of pages, which are usually highly interconnected via hyperlinks, is "the wiki"; in effect, a very simple, easier to use database.
A defining characteristic of wiki technology is the ease with which pages can be created and updated. Generally, there is no review before modifications are accepted. Most wikis are open to the general public without the need to register any user account. Sometimes session log-in is requested to acquire a "wiki-signature" cookie for autosigning edits. More private wiki servers require user authentication.

AJAX Asynchronise Javascript
AJAX is a web development technique for creating interactive web applications using a combination of:
HTML (or XHTML) and CSS for presenting information
The Document Object Model manipulated through JavaScript to dynamically display and interact with the information presented
The XMLHttpRequest object to exchange data asynchronously with the web server. (XML is commonly used, although any format will work, including preformatted HTML, plain text, JSON and even EBML)
Like DHTML, LAMP, or SPA, Ajax is not a technology in itself, but a term that refers to the use of a group of technologies together. In fact, derivative/composite technologies based substantially upon Ajax, such as AFLAX, are already appearing.

XML
Extendable Markup Language
The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language for creating special-purpose markup languages. It is a simplified subset of SGML, capable of describing many different kinds of data. Its primary purpose is to facilitate the sharing of data across different systems, particularly systems connected via the Internet. Languages based on XML (for example, RDF, RSS, MathML, XHTML, SVG, and cXML) are defined in a formal way, allowing programs to modify and validate documents in these languages without prior knowledge of their form.

HTML
In computing, HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is a markup language designed for the creation of web pages and other information viewable in a browser. HTML is used to structure information -- denoting certain text as headings, paragraphs, lists and so on -- and can be used to define the semantics of a document.
Originally defined by Tim Berners-Lee and further developed by the IETF with a simplified SGML syntax, HTML is now an international standard (ISO/IEC 15445:2000). Later HTML specifications are maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
Early versions of HTML were defined with looser syntactical rules which helped its adoption by those unfamiliar with web publishing. Web browsers commonly made assumptions about intent and proceeded with rendering of the page. Over time, the trend in the official standards has been to create an increasingly strict language syntax; however, browsers still continue to render pages that are far from valid HTML. The current version of the HTML specification is now XHTML 1.0, this being very similar to the earlier HTML 4.01 that it replaces. The change from HTML to XHTML applies the stricter rules of XML to HTML to make it easier to process and maintain.
UML
Web 2.0
a perceived transition of the World Wide Web from a collection of websites to a full-fledged computing platform serving web applications to end users. The proponents of this thinking expect that ultimately Web 2.0 services will replace desktop computing applications for many purposes.
The original conception of the web (in this context, labeled Web 1.0) comprised static HTML pages that were updated rarely, if at all. The success of the dot-com era depended on a more dynamic web (sometimes labeled Web 1.5) where content management systems served dynamic HTML web pages created on the fly from an ever-changing content database. In both senses, so-called eyeballing was considered intrinsic to the web experience, thus making page hits and visual aesthetics important factors..
Proponents of the Web 2.0 approach believe that web usage is increasingly oriented toward interaction and rudimentary social networks, which can serve content that exploits network effects with or without creating a visual, interactive web page. In one view, Web 2.0 sites act more as points of presence, or user-dependent web portals, than as traditional websites.

Meeting 3:Use case senarios, UML, Del.icio.us and flickr

After some discussion of the culture of wikis and my not really using this (see posting for assignment 2) - we tried to get on track with the interactive essay focus (sketched in assignment 1.1). We discussed different methodologies for software development and the ways in which 'use case senarios inform the design process. Use case scenarios can be narrative or visual scenarios that anticipate putting software in a specific context of specific activity (community - who uses them and how. So for example, would need to anticipate the different contexts of use of an application - like viewing, joint editing, follow up commetns etc. All of this reminds me of rhetorical theory of communication.

Then Yishay introduced me to another new language UML - Unified Modelling Language - which is a common 'tool' in this design process. It is not a programing language but rather it is a graphic language with a strict syntax and formal grammar for the design of programs. It can not be 'executed' - it has not 'functionality' but it is a formal way of expressing design ideas betwen designers and others - including programmers.

Use case senario diagrams that are realised in UML are like 'one level above programming'. I think this might kind of relate to halliday - social semiotic- notion of 'higher order semiotic' - a kind of social meaning (function) to be realised. There are now UML editions that are designed to be read by a computer program so taht they generate a skeleton of the code which ties them into the development process in a particular way. The UML diagram produced from the use case senario can be read by a computer and using 'reverse enginering' it can generate a UML diagram which can be used to 'rethink' the design and then returned to code.

Talked about how i could put any visual use case scenarios - diagrams etc - on the blog. Yishay suggested might be best to scan any drawings and then up load them onto flickr and link to blog. So i registered for flickr and will have a play with that.

Yishay showed me about Del.icio.us - i registered for it and will play around with it - not quite sure how to make use of it as a resource...

Assignment 3

Have a look at Del.icio.us and try and understand it - how i could use it in my work and in this blog.

Write down several use case senarios of my interactive visual essay - so my previous descriptions of the essay (assignment 1 and 1.1) are structural - here the narrative descriptions are about contexts of use.

Look up the links that Yishay has sent re UML and find out a bit more about it - try and use UML to make a diagram of my use case scenario.

Scan this diagram - Upload it onto flickr and link to my blog.

Assignment 2: Basic stuff on html and Wikis

In working with the blog I went into the template section and worked in the basic html script – half looking things up on the sites that Yishay had suggested (see the LKL blog) and half just copying the examples of how things done in the template already. I wrote a paragraph about the blog, something about me, put some links in re papers, books, and journal.

This was an interesting experience as it helped me to think about the logic and formality of html as a programming language: a stability and certainty that I really enjoyed. It reminded me of doing maths. I then was switching between the template panel and the preview of the blog – looking at the way the html was realised on the blog. It was great – I was moving between the ‘specialised’ domain of programming (I know very very basic) which is not really known to me, and the ‘everyday’ visual domain of my intention of ‘what things look like’ – like the level of a heading, where I wanted a link to start and end, bold and italics. In this iterative move between the everyday ‘visual grammar’ – that I know – and the specialised programming grammar – that I don’t really know – I could begin to understand the programming stuff a bit, to play around with it to understand it. For instance in the html of the side bar I couldn’t work out where it was I could put a block of text to appear in a certain place, so I put it in one place, viewed it, then moved it in the template, then viewed it, and in doing so I eventually managed to decipher how the html related to the spatial layout of the side bar.

This move from specialised to non specialised ‘languages’ (or maybe formal systems is a better way of putting it?) is central to the work that I am doing about representation, communication and learning. It is interesting to be experiencing this in the realm of programming. I am also re-learning to play guitar and in the process to read music – which I used to sight read but haven’t played any music for years – but again it is the iterative move between reading music (specialised formal language), playing it and recognising tunes (everyday knowledge) that is moving my learning along.

I also went in and edited the wikipedia entry for interactive whiteboards and play around with html. Basically I just added to the entry on classroom use - by entering some references. As Yishay pointed out the way that I edited the entry showed a complete lack of awareness of the point and meaning of Wikis – and the cultural practices that surround them. So that the norm would be not to add on some academic references but to make some links either external links to key people or to project www, or internal links within the wiki.

Both these short and very basic activities made me think about programming as a cultural practice – how technology is embedded in – or becomes embedded in – evolving sets of practices and communities (in a very loose sense) and the logic and formality – the grammar of programming as a semiotic is a product of – and a realisation of – this culture. Which in turn makes me think about all the stuff around identity and language – how learning a ‘language’ gives a person access to a set of cultural practices that enables them the means to ‘try on’ identities associated with that language – like all the Jim Gee Stuff on video games, literacy and identity.

Meeting 2: Clarifying goal

We discussed my assignment as it is sketched in posting assignment 1.1 and ended up with a sense of a long-term goal: to create and interactive essay to be used in a presentation about new technologies (possibly interactive whiteboards) in which there will be a kind of ‘ideas sandbox’ for playing around with ideas of designs for learning with a focus on multimodality, pace and interactivity.

We discussed Wikis and html and Yishay has more about this on the programing blog he has set up for this 'course'.

Assignment 2

Write a paragraph about the blog – what it is about – and put that up
Make some links on the blog
Look at the blog settings – compare the ‘compose’ section with the html section so that I can see what things look like.
Edit the wikipedia entry for interactive whiteboards and play around with html