__ __ __ __ __ __ web's eye view (January 27, 1998) | | /| / /| | /| / /| | /| / / alan levine | |/ |/ / | |/ |/ / | |/ |/ / Maricopa Center for Learning & Instruction |__/ |__/ |__/|__/ |__/|__/ http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/eye/ ============================================================================== The freshest bag of URLs is ready for pickup at http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/eye/bag/curr.html WebSite Garage -------------- Looking for some free tools to tune up your web site? Then pull into the bays at: http://www.websitegarage.com/ where you can enter a URL and have a checkup that includes link checking, HTML syntax review, a test of how optimized your images are, and more. --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Education in the Ether ---------------------- is a recent article in Salon Magazine, a web journal noted for its sleek design. http://www.salonmagazine.com/21st/ Since the 1990s Vicky Phillips has taught thousands of students through "keyboard colleges". In this article, she shares her experiences and perspective on distance learning. --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Babelfish --------- Sometimes you find nifty things just by poking around a web site. Recently, I noticed that searches from AltaVista http://www.altavista.digital.com/ returned a hypertext link labeled "Translate". There have been a few times when a search returned a document in German, Italian, French, or Spanish, so this seemed like a great feature. The link takes you to a site (the background has "BETA" stamped on it) called "Babelfish" http://babelfish.altavista.digital.com/ Not only does the site translate the search results from AltaVista, but you can enter any URL and Babelfish will generate the same page (images and all translated into Spanish, French, German, or Portuguese to English or the other way). But wait! There's more! You can paste in any text to the form and it will translate it into any of those languages. I like this because I do get email from people that write to me in languages I do not read (I can only speak English and HTML ;-) But now rather thank writing back humbly acknowledging my lack of other languages, I can use Babelfish to translate their original email into English, read it, write a response, and use Babelfish to translate it back to the writer's language. This is neat. But before you go blindly translating back and forth, keep in mind that language translation is a complex process, and only a fool would trust it to be 100% reliable given the nuances of meaning, the missing meaning of slang, and the gap for new words wrought by technology. Here is an example. Our tutorial for creating web pages, Writing HTML, http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/ generates a truckload of email feedback, a portion of it in Spanish, because last year, a gentleman volunteered to take on the task of manually translating the content into Spanish: http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut_es/ In fact, the lesson on creating hypertext links that generate an email message has an example to sends messages to me. I use a standard reply, that says: .......................................................................... Thanks... we put *much* more stock in email feedback than just counting hits on our web server... Once you have your pages on the web, we invite you to list yourself as an "Writing HTML Alumnus" at: http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/alumni.html h a p p y w e b b i n g . . . .......................................................................... So if I copy and past this text into Babelfish, and translate it using "English to Spanish" and the translate the results BACK using "Spanish to English", I get: .......................................................................... Thanks... we put * much * more diestock in feedback of the email that hardly counting blows in our web server... Once you have your paginations in the Web, we invited to him to that she is enumerated like " student of the HTML of the writing " in: http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/alumni.html h or n p p and W and b b i n g. .......................................................................... If I do the same process with Portuguese, I get: .......................................................................... Gratefulness... we very put * * more supply in the answer sheet of the email of that counting only beaten on our web server... A time that you have its pages in the fotorreceptora leather strap, us we invite to sign up itself it as of the " one pupil of the HTML written " in: http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/alumni.html h a p p y w and b b i n g. .......................................................................... It's close but not exact. And on a related note, a gentleman in Iceland is translation the same tutorial into Icelandic, where "Writing HTML" becomes "Forritun ’ HTML": http://www.fvi.is/tut/ --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Community College Student Experiences Questionnaire --------------------------------------------------- The Community College Student Experiences Questionnaire, co-authored by Jack Friedlander, C. Robert Pace and Penny Lehman, identifies the quality of effort students put into using the facilities and opportunities provided for their learning and development in the community college. It provides a tool for assessing the process by which students access the institution's mechanisms for involvement, and provides relevant information for a variety of applications, such as: Preparing for self-study and accreditation review Assessing institutional effectiveness Evaluating general education, transfer, and vocational programs Measuring student interest, impressions and satisfaction Discussing ways to improve student involvement Encouraging dialogue between academic affairs and student affairs http://www.coe.memphis.edu/coe/CSHE/CCSEQ/CCSEQ_main.htm --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Web-Based Training Cookbook --------------------------- "Web-Based Training Cookbook, a first-of-its-kind primer, gives corporate trainers and business managers the recipe for effective use of the Web to train employees and improve their performance." Written by Brandon Hall, Ph.D. and published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 482 pages $39.99 (plus S&H) http://www.brandon-hall.com/cookbook.html --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Web Sites for Digital Photography --------------------------------- (from TidBITS, http://www.tidbits.com/) **Web Sites for Digital Photography** -- The Web offers a number of resources for immersing yourself further in the world of digital imaging and photography. The best photography site on the Web, bar none, is Zone Zero, where you can spend many pleasant hours looking at both digital and conventional exhibits. Two other sites are also worth checking out. PC-Photo Forum is an ambitious and well designed commercially supported site with detailed digital camera comparisons, reviews, and a search engine to find the best camera prices. And, only a few weeks old, the Digital Camera Resource Page goes into great detail on digital camera industry news, specific cameras, technical glitches and fixes, reviews, forums, and other good stuff. http://www.zonezero.com/ http://www.pcphotoforum.com/ http://www.dcresource.com/ Magazines offer other interesting sites: Photo District News Magazine has a hip site with great technical information and a special digital section; PhotoElectronic Imaging Magazine specializes in digital photography; and newcomer PCPhoto Magazine stands to become the de-facto popular publication for digital photography. http://www.pdn-pix.com/ http://www.peimag.com/ http://www.pcphotomag.com/ --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Beatnik ------- Beatnik brings Hi_fi audio via the web, via a technology developed by Thomas Dolby Robertson. http://www.headspace.com/beatnik/ Some web pages can generate a personalized soundtrack in real time, just by letting you do what you do. The plug in allows the web page designer to generate different sounds on mouse rollovers and clicks using Beatnik's collection of built-in sounds. Other plug-in types (such as Shockwave movies or 'mBedlets') can issue JavaScript 'statements' to Beatnik. http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/ http://www.mbed.com/ Self-contained Java applets can also control Beatnik directly. In fact, most graphical environments can act as a graphical 'front-end' for Beatnik. The demos include dynamically created music; data from Stock markets of Dow Jones, London, Tokyo, generates sounds as a "symphony". One example has a lush 3D rendered scene that looks like something from Myst-- when you roll the mouse over different objects, you generate sounds (a rock generates a bass beat, another one adds some rhythm, and the harp strings can generate different tones depending which string you "pluck") http://www.bitstream.net/psykosonik/harpfun2.html On a related front, MooTown Piano uses Shockwave and Shockwave Audio to create a toy piano that you can play and record music with: http://www.mootown.com/piano.html --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ------ --- --- ------ --- --- --- --- --- Nifty Use of Flash and Shockwave -------------------------------- This tour of a Canadian sawmill http://www.ifdn.com/sawmill/index.html uses Macromedia Shockwave to create a navigation bar and Macromedia Flash to generate the content for an interactive tour of a sawmill. Flash works very well because it generates small media files (using vector based graphics) that can be streamed.