Ali Cat

PDFs - they suck!

2006-04-15T10:26:00.000-07:00

So Allison and I are sitting in the computer lab trying to work on our final project, but we have run into all sorts of problems with PDFs (yes, they suck) and putting them our website.
Here are our questions:
1) How do we do this?
2) Is PDF the correct format?
3) If PDF is not the correct format, then:
a) what type of format should be using?
b) are we able to change a PDF to a different format?
c) if we are able to change a PDF to a different, format, HOW do we do that???

Thank you very much.......once again, PDFs are not our favorite thing right now....
Have a great weekend! Go spend it outside...which we are not doing.
Sincerely,
Allison and Ali

Final Project

2006-03-28T13:34:00.000-08:00

I just read this article over the weekend from last summer's issue of Art in
America (I believe). It is about the rise of a 3rd kind of a museum - a virtual museum.
This is related to our final project. We plan to do a website that takes an existing exhibition - the Biennial. And take our viewers through the exhibition on the web - basically give visitors a new way to understand, comprehend and view the exhibition.

Many people find art exhibitions to be a bit daunting, especially curatorial feats like the Biennial that really is not a typical blockbuster show. Our website would be a way to lower the learning curve by providing alternative viewing and learning tools for the visitor.

I hope that this makes sense.

CSS Style Sheets - Concerns

2006-03-07T15:48:00.000-08:00

After spending some more time with the style sheets, I realized how little I actually do now about them and am eager to learn more.

Here are a few things that I am still confused about:
- positioning on the page: How can we manipulate the HTML to create certain types of formatting?
- standard sheets: For some reason, I remember Professor Diamond stating at some point that you can copy style sheets. Do we do that by looking at the HTML? If so, could I go to a website that I like and copy its format?

....more to come later once I go through the exercise. Thanks!

I LOVE CSS style sheets

2006-02-22T14:31:00.000-08:00

All right, I was doing my homework last night for class. I must admitt that I felt quite overwhelmed by the prospect of doing this. I do a lot of work with searching the web for work, but I don't really know anything about constructing the web.
Nonetheless, I did the assignment last night. So cool!!! My website looks infinitely better, and I just made all the pages look the same - it is either that or I am so easily amused.
Here is the kicker: I am at work today, and I realized how many websites that I go to each day that must use style sheets! It is amazing!
I even saw one, low-tech website that only used tables...and, now, I understand what Professor Diamond means when he says that we will stay away from tables - Yuck!

Learned Center

2006-02-14T12:49:00.000-08:00

I found it very interesting how very early on in "How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School" that they readily defined the "Learned Center." The article defines it as "environments that pay careful attention to the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs that learners bring to the educational setting" and then goes on to define by "knowlege centers" and "assessment centers." I liked how the article differentiated between the three, but what really struck me about the article was the juxtaposition between learner and knowledge. Did anyone else pick up on that? Maybe I just got too into the article....

Creating a template?

2006-02-14T12:47:00.000-08:00

I am throwing this out into our blog universe.....can anyone tell me how they found those really cool templates I saw on so many of the pages? I keep trying to go into the template, and it doesn't work. This could very well because I am using the PC version. Nonetheless, any suggestions would be great. Thanks!

Exhibition Design vs. Website Design

2006-02-08T09:08:00.000-08:00

As I went through the last sets of reading it occurred to me that Internet webpage design is very much like design the text for an exhibition.

Couple of questions to throw out there?
1) Has anyone taken Exhibition Design?
2) If not yes to the above question, has anyone every noticed how text at exhibitions can be very hard to read....?

Exhibition Design states, with regards to textual pannels, that there should be a 90% differentiation between text coloring and background coloring....do we think that this should apply to Internet design as well?

January 25th's reading

2006-01-25T10:18:00.000-08:00

I finished this reading last night, and I found it very interesting the possibilities that it subtley suggested between technology and certain types of learning like cognitive and rote. Despite the fact that it was a very dense reading that pertained more often to general education that technology education, it was very enlightening. That said, I would have preferred to read a bit more about the specific ways, even a history, of how the internet and certain technologies make learning easier. For instance: when Encarta first came out, internet online dictionaries and encyclopedias from Grove's to Wikipedia. The web, in many ways, constantly challenges our traditional ways to learn and research....hello....Google...or even on how blogging is the new type of commentary, whether opinion or art criticism... That would have been interesting to have.

My first time....

2006-01-18T16:42:00.000-08:00

For those of you whose minds automatically went to the gutter, take it out of there. This is my first time blogging. And, what the hell, I thought that I would just throw this down on the page.

First off, welcome to my world, and I hope you feel free to read on and comment at liberty.