Courses
Wayne State University
College of Lifelong Learning
Interdisciplinary Studies Program
Computers and Society courses, Winter 2001
    ( http://www.cll.wayne.edu/isp/drbowen/casw01)
Mondays, 6 - 9:40 PM in 113 Rackham
Bullet1.png (242 bytes)Computers and Society
    GST 2710, Section 988, Call Number 95241, 4 credits
Bullet1.png (242 bytes)Computers and Society
    AGS 3360, Section 983, Call Number 98319, 4 credits
Office hours: Mondays 4 - 6 PM in 113 Rackham


                         Instructor
David R. Bowen
2311 A/AB
Wayne State University
Detroit, MI 48202		 Daytime tel: (313) 577-1498
Evening tel: (248) 549-8518
FAX: (313) 577-8585
Home Page:
    http://www.cll.wayne.edu/isp/drbowen
Email: d.r.bowen@wayne.edu

CASicon.gif (1333 bytes)
Last updated: 1/29/01
Link back to course Welcome...

Third class: Agenda
Monday January 29

  1. Quiz 2
  2. Handouts
    1. Agenda
    2. Assignment schedule
    3. ASCII codes
  3. Passbacks
    1. Quiz 1
    2. Assignment 1 (if ready). Some of the handwriting on these was very hard for me to read. In such cases, I can never be sure that I have read it correctly. If your handwriting is hard to read, from now on answer the questions in Word and turn in a print-out.
  4. Reminders:
    1. Before you leave tonight, fill in the online Attendance (Signin) form on the course web site.
    2. If you miss a class, before the next class you should go to the course web site (the URL is in the upper left-hand corner of every handout) and review the Agenda for that class, then contact me if you have questions. Assignments and quiz topics are listed on the Agenda.
    3. If you need to make up a Quiz, or ask questions, or whatever, my office hours are time set aside for this. These times are Mondays and Wednesdays, 4 - 6 PM, in 113 Rackham (the classroom). If these times do not work for you, contact me to make other arrangements.
  5. Announcements:
    1. The following people have filled in the online Course Information form. If your name is NOT on this list, please fill in the form on the course web site.
      1. Susan Bjorklund (on AGS 3360 class list)
      2. Lorey Bray (on GST 2710 class list)
      3. Shonda Brown (not on either class list - are you registered?)
      4. Angelina Canty (on AGS 3360 class list)
      5. Duane Cooper (on GST 2710 class list)
      6. Angell Cyars (on GST 2710 class list)
      7. Michael Hyman (on GST 2710 class list)
      8. Satoya McCray (on GST 2710 class list)
      9. Wanda Mitchell (not on either class list - are you registered?)
      10. William Myles (on GST 2710 class list)
      11. Caprice Nathan (on GST 2710 class list)
      12. Vincent Parks (on GST 2710 class list)
      13. Sharon Patton (on GST 2710 class list)
      14. Alfonso Strong (not on either class list - are you registered?)
      15. Jackie Webster (on GST 2710 class list)
    2. The following people on the GST 2710 class list have not yet filled in the online Course Information form on the course web site. Please do this before you leave tonight; ask if you need help. If you want online grade reports available for this course, be sure to check "Yes" in that section and enter a password for the online grade reports.
      1. Rhonda Dalton (has not signed in previously)
      2. Anthony Duncan (has not signed in previously)
      3. Renee Morris (has not signed in previously)
      4. Tonya Thomas (has not signed in previously)
      5. Charlene Wise (has not signed in previously)
      6. Corey Wright (signed in last week)
    3. The on-line grade reports are available now. Go to the course web site and choose the link to "get an on-line grade report." You will need the password that you gave yourself on the course information form. I will have your password if you forget it.
    4. Everyone chose to have online grade reports available (good choice!). One person did not give a password for these reports, and giving a password is necessary. Will Vincent Parks please fill out the online course information form again, filling in all parts including a password.
    5. There are software labs that accompany Microsoft Office 2000 Professional. These will be installed on the lab computers and will become part of the lab assignment. To complete the labs at home or elsewhere outside of the lab, you will also have to install them on the computer you will use.
  6. Review of Quiz 1
    1. Good average!
    2. Grading: On homework, quizzes and exams, for multipart questions I first grade each part. Then I calculate the grade for the question as the average of the grades for each of its parts. For the overall grade, each question gets averaged equally, whether or not it has multiple parts. Questions with more parts do not count more.
    3. "Show your work for partial credit." A wrong answer with no work shown gets a very low grade.
    4. I will distinguish between describing an action (mouse action, activating a window element) and the result when you carry out the action. Example - the right-click action is to point and click the right button once. The result is that a menu of choices pops up. On quizzes, you will be expected to follow this distinction also. You could be asked to describe the action, and/or the result of the action.
    5. Trouble with path - folders
    6. RAM Vs ROM
  7. Review of binary - commas not used in binary (10000 not 10,000)
    1. Counting
    2. Powers of 2 - comparison with decimal powers of 10
    3. Adding
    4. Multiplying
    5. Converting binary to decimal
    6. Converting decimal to binary
  8. Information
    1. How much information can be stored in n bits?
      1. Lowest number that can be stored is zero
      2. Highest number that can be stored is 2n - 1
      3. Number of different values (codes) is 2n
      4. 210 ~ 103 = 1,000
    2. A byte - 8 bits. Computers usually handle data in bytes. How much information is this, or how many different codes?
    3. Text information. ASCII code. How many bits to represent the alphabet and the other common characters? How many bytes to store a page of text?
    4. Graphics information - pixels, pixels per inch. Color depth.
    5. Pixels in a 3" x 2" graphic @ 300 Pixels per Inch, 3 Bytes per Pixel, 3:1 compression
      1. Color is made up of mix red, green and blue
      2. formula (will be given on tests):
        File size in bytes = Height (in) × Width (in) × (Pixels per inch)2 × (Bytes per Pixel) /
        (Compression factor)
      3. Black and white: one bit per pixel, so 1/8 byte
      4. Greyscale: 1 byte per pixel
      5. 8-bit color: 1 byte per pixel. 256 different colors.
      6. 16-bit color (sometimes called High Color): 2 bytes per pixel. 65536 colors.
      7. 24-bit color (True Color): 3 bytes per pixel. 16,777,216 colors.
    6. Compression - compression factor
    7. Animation - each frame is a separate graphic
  9. Overview of word processing using MS Word. Word Processing is for managing text.
    1. File menu handles files as a whole. Open, save, print
    2. Text creation or entry: making new text. Done with the keyboard in the document window
    3. Edit - change text. Cut, Copy, Paste, Find, Replace
    4. Select text by dragging over it, or click at one end of slection (beginning or end) then use arrow keys with <Shift> key down to move selection or click at other end (end or beginning) with <Shift> key down
    5. Format - change the appearance of text
      1. Font - applies to individual letters
        1. Serif Vs Sans Serif
        2. Monospacing Vs Proportional
        3. True Type - print is the same as the screen
      2. Paragraph - applies to whole paragraph. Line spacing, indent, outdent
        1. "Weaker" methods are Space Bar and Tab for centering, indenting, etc.
        2. Start a new line with <Enter> key, but start a new page with Insert / Break... / Page break, or better yet by grouping text to be kept together. to do this, start a new page if break will come in the middle. Select text that is to be kept on the same page, then use Format / Paragraph... / Line and Page Breaks then select both Keep lines together and Keep with next, then click "OK."
    6. Tools - automate actions, such as Spell Check and Grammar Check, Auto Correct - can be turned on and off item by item. Aslo configure Word for the way you want it to work - Tools / Customize... and Tools / Options...
  10. Introduction to computers - More Windows basics - Windows Explorer and the hierarchical file system
    1. Open Windows (NT) Explorer (Start / Programs) and change its options to show all information
      1. Choose menu item View / Options and then the "View" tab at the top of the Options dialog
      2. Above the list box, make sure that "Show all files" is clicked
      3. Below the list box, make sure that "Display the full MS-DOS path in the title bar" is checked. This refers to the title bar on the right pane of Windows Explorer. If this is unchecked, Explorer shows only the final (lowest) folder name
      4. Make sure that "Hide MS_DOS file extensions for file types that are registered" is unchecked. Otherwise, Explorer does not show the file extension for most file names.
      5. Make sure that "Include description bar for right and left panes" is checked. Otherwise, Explorer does not show you what drives and folders you are looking at.
      6. Click OK. This puts your choices into effect.
    2. Make a new directory, C:\myname, where myname is your first name or nickname
      1. Make sure that the root folder or directory c:\ is selected - this path should appear on top of the right pane.
      2. Choose the menu item File / New, and then Folder. A new folder appears at the bottom of the right pane. Note that its name is highlighted (shown in reverse video).

        NOTE: In Windows, whenever an object or group of objects is highlighted, you can take an action on it, such as drag, delete, copy. Also be aware -- the Windows default is "typing replaces selection." This can be very convenient, but can also blow your hard work away. So BEWARE: do not leave objects selected for longer than is absolutely necessary, and be careful when something valuable is selected. If you do delete or otherwise mess up a selection, do not panic - there is usually, but not always, an "Undo" feature.
      3. Type in myname and tap <Enter>/<Return>. Notice that your typing replaces what was there. This is a standard Windows feature that you can turn off. The feature is called "Typing replaces selection" - whatever you type directly replaces whatever was selected.
    3. Use selection and Drag 'N Drop to copy and delete files
      1. Put the test diskette in the floppy drive
      2. In Explorer, click on the a: drive icon
      3. In the right pane, click on the file "copy1.txt". Notice that it is selected (highlighted)
      4. While holding down <Shift>, click on "copy5.txt". Which files are selected now?
      5. While holding down <Ctrl>, click on "globwarm.txt". How did that change the selection?
      6. Experiment with selection with no keys down, with <Shift> down, and with <Ctrl> down. Then go back to iii-v above to select all of the "copy" files and "globwarm.txt". Add "globwarm.doc" to the selection.
      7. Hold down <Ctrl> and click on "globwarm.txt"  to remove it from the selection. Experiment with removing and adding other files from the selection. End up with all of the "copy" files and "globwarm.doc" selected.
      8. Read this step all the way through before executing it. Click anywhere on the selected files, hold the mouse button down, and drag the selected files to the new directory you just made on the c: drive. Notice the "+" sign on the mouse icon as you move the files over. The "+" sign tells you that you are copying the files, leaving the original files as is, ending up with the original and new copies of the files. Without the + sign, you would be moving the files, and removing the original copies. When copying from one drive to another, "copying" is the default. (Default = option you get with no further action.) When copying from one folder to another, on the same drive, "moving" is the default. You can select the other option by holding down the <Alt> key as you act.
      9. In the new folder, select all of the "copy" files. Tap the "del" key. (Rackham: The PowerMac keyboard has two keys labeled as "Delete". One is the key at the upper right of the main keyboard group. The other is the lower left key in the group of six keys to the top right of the main keyboard group. The first of these is called "Backspace" on the normal PC keyboard. It deletes the character to the left of the insertion point. The second is called "Delete" on the normal PC keyboard and deletes the character to the right of the insertion point. In class, I will refer to these keys by their PC keyboard names.) Hit the "Delete" key. What happens to the selected files? Why should you be careful if a large amount of work is selected?
      10. In the new folder, double-click on "globwarm.doc" to open it in Word. Drag over some text to select it. Click on the selection, hold the mouse down, and drag the selection to a new location within the file. Don't like the new location? Choose the menu item Edit / Undo.
      11. Make a new selection of text. Type a single letter. What happened? (Typing replaces selection.) Choose the menu item Edit / Undo. Notice the difference between the mouse cursor and the insertion point (I-beam). Type a letter or two. Where does the typing appear -- at the mouse cursor or the insertion point? Click the mouse somewhere away from the insertion point. What happens to the insertion point? Experiment with moving the insertion point with the arrow keys.
      12. Make a new text selection. Tap <Delete>. How can you reverse this deletion?
  11. Lab 2. Read the following steps all the way through before starting.
    1. In Microsoft Office 2000 Professional, do Tutorial 1. If you are going to do this outside of this lab, make sure that you know which pages to work on before you leave class tonight. Do not print out your document until you have completed the additional steps below.
    2. At the top of your document, put a line with:
      1. Your name
      2. This Assignment (Lab 1)
      3. Your location (Rackham)
      4. The full path (drive, any folders, and filename) that you saved the file with.
    3. After this information, but before your letter, start a new page using the menu item Insert / Break... / Page break
    4. Save the file to your floppy diskette. DO NOT SAVE TO THE My Documents FOLDER.
    5. Print out a copy of your file, staple the pages together, and turn in this copy, by the start of the next class. This should include the top line with your name on it. You can print using either:
      1. The printer icon on the toolbar
      2. The menu item File / Print, then click OK on the "Print" dialog.

Assignment 3

  1. Reading as assigned on the Assignment Schedule
  2. Convert the following decimal numbers to binary
    1. 3
    2. 11
    3. 37
    4. 197
    5. 28
  3. Carry out the following binary multiplications:
    1. 11 × 10
    2. 110 × 10
    3. 1100 × 10
    4. 1101 × 11
    5. 1101 × 101
  4. A typical graphic file format for the World Wide web (*.gif) has 75 pixels per inch and a color depth of one byte per pixel. Find the file size for a 1" x 2" graphic in this format, with a compression ratio of 10 to 1.
  5. A. Translate "Computers and Society." into ASCII
    B. Translate the following into regular characters: 84 104 101 32 97 108 112 104 97 98 101 116 32 104 97 115 32 50 54 32 99 104 97 114 97 99 116 101 114 115 46
  6. In Computers, Technology, and Society, answer the following Review questions on Pg 3-47: 4, 8, 9, 10, and 15.

Quiz 3

Quiz 3 at the start of class next week will cover: