Homework via Blog 2

REFLECTION


Something ...


a) learned
Well, I learned the accurate method of determining the reliability of a resource. Although usually similar steps are taken to ensure that a source seems reliable, often there are steps missed, such a checking the date perhaps, and simplifications of steps, such as merely checking that an author seems to have credentials, or that a resource from the web is from an educational institution rather than checking both of these and considering if there would have been an editing/checking process to it's publication. I felt this was good so that I realised what I was doing wrong/was not doing, and could use this process to better determine if the resources I'd collected could be trusted (and not mislead me!).


b) found useful.
Determining reliability? Useful for determining if a text we select can be trusted, and therefore also useful in terms of gathering resources for our assignment(s). (What I mentioned previously as well) My dad also mentioned to me previously about the slide thing, that you only had to have enough data in a presentation to guide your presentation, but the information is coming from you yourself. I actually asked him though, since I was looking over his should at a presentation he was working on, and noticed the presentation was quite simplistic. This is a point which has stuck with me (although I haven't really used it before)... However, I agreed completely that this is a highly effective way of presenting, and I'm certain the class will see this as useful too.


c) found difficult.
Merely some of the sample text assessments, where it asked 'Completeness' and we could only reply with a 'assumedly'/'apparently' as we're not experts on the subject, and would not really know if anything was omitted or not. However assumedly if the source was an unbiased one, it would be complete... Otherwise the lesson was good, and having a look at the TED video was good. My father visits the website and downloads videos and we watch the talks on new innovations and so on. There was nothing particularly difficult about the lesson itself however.


How was your participation in today's class? Give yourself a score out of 5. Write your reasons for that score.
4? I did not keep quiet in class, even though I am more of the shy type, unless I'm around people I'm quite familiar with (is 4 weeks enough?). I talked with the group, gave my ideas, worked together with everyone, so I believe I acted like a good team member. However, I could have gotten more courage and volunteered to get up and present, perhaps. However, Alex volunteered. Although I gave her my booklet to bring up to the projector....

(I took some pictures of the pages we completed in the booklet for Su to see what we did that day, as she was sick)

And... since I am here...

Kirishima Ayama = 霧島綾真

= Kiri (mist)
島 = Shima (island)
綾 = Aya (figure/design/twill weave)
真 = Ma (just, right, pure, genuine)
Ayama is styled on my last name, which in Kanji is 謝, and read as Ayama in some ways. (also read Shya)


EDIT: Email by Friday? ARGH I'm so very sorry. >_< I wrote down the questions, so I didn't read the email properly. D:

So long...

1:28 PM by KirishimaAyama 0 comments
To show just how lax I've been over the past week, I have not written on any of the days. Argh. Well, this means I better get to it now, of course. ... Before next week comes along and I still haven't done it. But this is only going to be a short summary ...

Monday = CITP

Looking at sources and seeing if they are reliable, unreliable. We started off talking about what makes a document reliable. And afterwards we moved on to.. an example, I suppose you could call it, in the lecture notes booklet. At first I was wondering if I was doing the right thing there in the table which was given.

We were meant to work as a group, but I ended up just kind of working with Julie again. xD The width of the tables (as in, a physical table in this sense) made it a little hard to talk with the people opposite, I suppose, although it seemed alright later on when we were deciding a team charter. Perhaps we just needed time to warm up....

Er, after the example, we did a whole LOT of other samples, which we then had to present. Thanks to my perfectionist trait, my booklet got hauled up to be displayed from the projector.

(All the links above are images I scanned for Su, who was sick and thus, away.)

I'm not sure if I was very thorough with mine, but at least it was pretty detailed to the extent that I could make it, so I was pretty pleased with the work I did .... We had to form groups afterwards for our assignment. This is where the team charter comes in. We have to make a set of rules for us to obey, and then all sign it. As well  fill in a form that says that we have someone to interview.

It was all in all a pretty enjoyable lesson as always. Hehe. We had to make some name cards at the beginning of the lesson too, and me and Julie wrote Japanese on ours just because... well, we could. It was amusing. xD We used the leftover paper and made two cranes too...

Then I met Sebastian for a while... went to Karebear, he got a KHR ring, I gave him some stuff... we had the sponsor meeting... not much else I want to report here.

Tuesday = IIS

I... am not sure what happened here this day. IIS and I don't really directly connect. But I met up with my team for the assignment (though Sean was missing) and we tried to work on some questions and a video store. At the very least we decided on a video store, and Amy did good work making up questions, but ... I wonder how well this is going to go.

We were meant to have a surprise quiz during IIS, but once again, the tutor decided he'd just do what he liked (I know he has our best interests in mind, but I would at least like to know what I'm missing out on from the other classes...) and although we did do the roleplaying like the tutorial sheet said, we spend the latter half of the tute drawing diagrams of the system in the roleplay. Although it was potentially helpful... all the diagrams looked remarkably similar, AND the writing was bad and small so I couldn't even read it, and thusly could not focus.

I'm sorry, don't blame me.
This subject I admit is not going that well...

Wednesday = Programming Fundamentals

Also one of those subjects in which I scream and die.The lecture was alright, although I did drop my Netbook on the floor accidentally. O_O At least it's alright. I recorded what Ryan did during the lecture although not sure how much of it was processed. I guess this reflected in the lab. Although I did alright in the tutorial, always manage to do alright in that, actually, but I had a hard time during the lab, and Joel helped me out a lot (THANK YOU SO MUCH IF YOU EVER READ THIS). I think I better go back and do all the examples and that again to try and get a better grasp of programming.

We also got our assignment. This is slaughtering me. :P
I do believe something happened before I went to the tute and lab, but my memory fails me at this moment...

Thursday  = No Class

Tried to make a start on the assignment. What a miserable failure it was. I wasted a lot of time, and ended up switching to trying to complete some LinuxGym instead since I find UNIX much nicer for me. T_T

Friday = Web Systems

Great. :D This was pretty much HTML day and I was quite happy about that - it was like visiting an old friend. Ah the good old days of HTML coding in Year 10. Soo fun ('cos Dreamweaver is such a .... ok... hehe) In any case, I figured out the problem I had yesterday with Linuxgym Chapter 7. It was because you had to set the folder permissions, and anyone who had read everything properly would have realised. I'm not 100% sure how I missed it, because I did (attempt) to read everything on the front!! But I fixed it... Yay, and fixed it for Julie too... who had also not read the first page, obviously. xDD; Whoops...

OH RIGHT, yes, first off on Friday, I volunteered for Bandaged Bear Day with erm, people from my course, but I only ended up working with Bianca, Alex and Alex's boyfriend. We wandered around Central going, asking 'Would you like to support Bandaged Bear Day?' 'Would you like to buy a Bandaged Bear?' Bianca had to leave about... 10? So then I worked by myself. We were supposed to be on shift from 9-10, really, but we ended up working from about 8.45-10.45 (at least I did).

That meant that I was late for the CITP meeting we were meant to have... urgh. In any case, when Alex finally arrived at the First Years' Lounge, we organised a few things, but we still couldn't get that much done...

Saturday

==> Had a msn conference with group members of CITP assignment. James shall be flogged for not turning up!

Distracted

I'm always a little lax with this in the middle of the week.

Wednesday = Programming Fundamentals

... Do I even recall what happened that day?... Uhm, so we had our lecture. Oh, with a different lecturer! I can't say I remember his name, however, he was pretty good. He's also a subject tutor I think, since he takes one of the tutorial/workshop classes. This week we actually had to submit the work we did in our workshop to PLATE. The previous class seemed to have a lot of trouble trying to make it work. It seemed later on that we had to submit them as .jar files, since the system wasn't taking .zips. When I (finally managed to) finish(ed) mine, I .jar-ed it wrong and it didn't work. xD Thank goodness Zen helped me by telling me that I probably made the file wrong. Not that we were given any instruction on that... *sigh*

Short summaries today...

Thursday = No classes

But I still spent the whole day doing Unix/LinuxGym, though I got distracted a lot...

Friday = Web Unix Systems

Indeed.
Well, since I did the chapter that we were doing for that lesson the previous day, I was pretty much done, so I divided my time helping the others and doing the next chapters. Unix is really fun, and I reckon it'll give me a lot less nightmares than Java will...

Very short this time, but there's not much to say, really.
I'll write more next time.

Yikes

... I feel somewhat under pressure today... for reasons I will not disclose. It mostly has to do with getting ahead of myself, when I should just sit back and relax (as if) about it (alright, maybe just... not worry so much... which is a lame and inadequate answer...) - but I guess I really am a woman worrier. Or am I woman warrior? Oh Mr Phillips, I am confused. xD
(I apologise for all the ellipsis, but it reflects my current frame of mind...)

Tuesday = Introduction to Information Systems.

Lecture was pretty much about Business Information Systems. I think I might need to look up more information on this topic, although I guess it all depends on the level of detail they go into in consecutive weeks - more stress though. Ugh assignments....

Speaking of which, lecture we did follow the sheet this time, although most of us are still under the impression the tutor cannot really speak properly. Well, I have nothing against his accent... but I'm just not sure what he's wanting part of the time. Urgh. >_< Still at least we have a GROUP formulated now! Yet, we have no name... and we were supposed to send our group details to ... our lecturer? I forget so I need to find that, wherever it is! *gets a stressed feeling...*

Also in the group, there are two second years, and two first years (a boy and a girl in each), so I feel a little intimidated. Just a little.... or a lot.

Homework via Blog

Haha. Well... I might as well. This way I can look back too, and I won't lose it.

REFLECTIONS

a) What I learned ...
... useful?
About what people felt were ethical and unethical? During the Case Studies where we voted, I found it useful to see what professionals had to think, even though I had my own strong views and code of ethics.

...interesting?
The Code of Ethics for the ACS? We had such trouble trying to come up with our Codes because they were so specific, however, the Code of Ethics for the ACS is simply written and covers a large amount of aspects. Although it allows interpretation in different ways, it's still fascinating how it can be so simply worded and yet apply to so many situations. (I feel that useful and interesting really do cross over however.... Both this and the point mentioned before are both interesting and possibly will influence our professional behaviour.)


... good?
Can I be general and say everything? Everything is very relevant to what skills we will need in order to be a professional IT person, and therefore good for me and my future. There was nothing I learnt during the lesson which I would define as 'bad'.

b) One thing I found ...
... useful?
I think this appeared mostly in the form of the video. I reflected on the way I present and decided that perhaps there are things I need to work on too, as ... scornful as we may have seemed about the man's presentation. That's not to say anyone performed badly however, since I watched everyone presenting their case studies and they were all very good.

...interesting?
The Codes of Ethics everyone came up with? It showed a different interpretation of the question we were given and I realised that there were in fact many things we were overlooking in our Code of Ethics as we were focusing too much on one thing, perhaps.

... good?
Generally how we worked in groups with people we perhaps didn't know that well still. It was an enjoyable experience and I would love to work with those people again.

c) One thing I found...
... difficult?
Well, nothing was particularly difficult about the lesson other than trying to come up with the Code of Ethics when we were interpreting the question a certain way and it seemed everyone else was interpreting it in different ways. We sort of got a little hemmed in by our interpretation of the question - I should quote our presenter and say our three codes were awesome though.

... not useful?
I had no problems with the lesson, and found it all very interesting and relevant as I said before. However perhaps if different cases were given to all the groups to do the group activities, it would ... avoid certain things like 'Yeah, what the other group said before', however seeing someone else do the same presentation lets us see what WE did wrong in ours and note these for next time. ... So maybe another case study would have also been interesting and useful? - Can use what we noticed was wrong the first time and try again? (However I think students will probably not be happy with longer lesson?)

d) Questions or Comments?
... I have no questions for this workshop.
All comments are written above in my responses also. (And in the previous blog entry if interested...?)

Long day...

Monday = Communications for IT Professionals

Well, it was to the workshops this week, and I think I was looking forward to this a lot more than the 3-hour lectures (although 3 hour workshop also is a bit =A= by the time you're finished, heh). It also helped that I was relieved that I was in a Band 1 workshop of course.

The tutor introduced herself, and I remember the first reaction I had was to look at Julie next to me and exchange glances. Her surname sounded very Japanese. She did an example of how she wanted us to introduce ourselves also and ... well I guess we found out we were (somewhat) right. (Though to what degree I have no idea, of course....) I'm such a Japanophile. Or I just like Asian things, really.

We then tried to define ethics with the person next to us/the people around us.

Ethics:
"Morality and actions, What we perceive to be right or wrong, Sense of personal responsibility - consequences of actions, Personal conduct based on respect for others, Principles and values you choose to live by."

We also talked a little about Ethical Dilemmas and moved onto the case studies. I found myself pretty opinionated on this topic. I think I have a strong code of ethics... sometimes. I'm not really sure. I feel these things are wrong, but when push comes to shove, I think sometimes these things get ignored. By not having this kind of real life experience, I suppose we can't really know. However, from experience from my own projects, say in HSC Year, I'm quite a perfectionist and will try to make the system as good as I can get it - so I think I can uphold my personal code of ethics well enough.

We tried to come up with codes of ethics afterwards and although our codes were a lot different to other peoples', I felt they were rather valid. Although our group was the only group that presented with only three codes, I had six written down in actuality, however, we kept arguing that it could already be explained by another dot point and thus we were only left with three. I felt some of the other people's points seemed perhaps a little too general, however maybe we were the ones thinking too specifically? I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, however.

We had a short break then watched a segment of a Youtube video where we were supposed to look carefully and pick out what we felt was good and bad about his presentation. My whole group agreed wholeheartedly that his presentation overall was pretty bad, but probably definitely in stronger words. It was true however, overall he was uninspiring, looked confined and bored... I think it's alright to be informal in your presentations sometimes, depending on who you are presenting to, and depending on what kind of message you are trying to present (you want to create a relaxed interested interactive air, right?), so it's not necessarily a bad thing he said 'Hey, guys', but his lack of enthusiasm was the real problem.

We looked at presentations skills and worked on Case Studies then, and each of us picked a 'role' in the group for the presentation and tried to build up our points. I don't think I did too badly, though I could have gestured more, I suppose. The thing is that I'm not necessarily bad at presenting, I just don't like to volunteer myself up for it. At High School, generally I'd be with people who'd rather not have to present, so the responsibility would fall with me (Sorry if anyone is reading this....). While I can't say I was magnificent at it either, at least I do have experience with it and am willing to present if no one else is? Or at least I find myself a lot of enthusiastic now unless I'm feeling unwell ... like somewhat recently...

Afterwards I had to go meet sponsors for lunch. We went to that cafe in the UTS building that's next to the ABC (oh I forget all the numbers and everything, yikes).Luckily I didn't have to pay I guess, since I don't have a lot of money these days. We chatted with the sponsors while eating. Felt like some of it was going over the top of my head. I should look up more on stuff - but I'm not really that much into the business side of this course. Perhaps that's not a good thing to say. I acknowledge that no matter what I do, it will have something to do with business, of course, however, if possible would like to do more programming related work,  or the like, depending on how everything goes - and depending on what Masters I might decide to do later?

I still want to work at the ABC eventually. My dad works there, and I really enjoyed work experience there, but I still don't know what I could do there. Perhaps I could work on the web stuff or their TV stuff, but I don't really know if I'm in the right course for those occupations. So I need to find out more about the jobs availiable at the ABC then, I suppose.

Went with my dad to a move after everything. He got free tickets from work so we watched The Last Station. It was quite interesting. ^_^

Kill two birds with one stone

(I didn't blog on Wednesday... but never fear, the memory is still pretty fresh.)

Wednesday = Programming Fundamentals

I think writing out my notes is a good thing, especially for Prog Fun (Hehe). It may be less neat, but for some reason, I reckon it makes me understand it better. Well... I'm not really sure.

In any case, I looked over the notes the night before and went to the lecture, and then it was off to the first tutorial and lab. The tutorial I thought was fun, writing out the lines of code, and underlining methods, and classes, and objects and so on. The tutor commented that my writing was neat, and I guess it was. I haven't written anything in ages, and I think I'm making an attempt to be neat - the only thing is how long it can really last. That I know from experience. xD

The workshop was a bit harder, not to mention with the people on either side of me freaking me out with their skillz. Alright, I jest, but they completed it very quickly, whereas I worked quite slowly. I had some problems with the last section in particular, where you had to make a house from scratch. The problem was that I did not understand the code that Bluej gave me when I made the new class. Although the booklet did say we could copy the code from the moving the circle, I ... was quite stubborn. In the end, I had to copy anyway though, however to make it more unique, I tried to change the size and colour of the house. Black house + fuschia (it looked fuschia anyway) roof = odd house. I had to create some objects with the existing classes to try to see what kind of code I needed to write in, since the compiler kept telling me I made an error. The coding didn't seem exactly the same as what we did in our tutorial, nor did it match what I tried to look up in the textbook. I suppose I'll have to work this out later on and see what I can do now...?

And one of the members of the group changed classes, so it looks like we have to look for another member. I think there was someone I know from the Anime@UTS club who was not in a group, but I ... have actually forgotten his name...

Thursday = No classes. ^^;

Friday = Web Systems

I found Friday particularly fun. The lecture was pretty interesting, and I think Unix is pretty fascinating, as frustrating as it can be trying to get the Movie Player to work (but I think I overlooked some things there, so it really is my fault...). At any rate, the lecture was about file allocation methods and .... I actually wonder if I should defragment my disk, even though the lecturer mentioned newer versions don't really need defragmenting anymore. At any rate, the lecture was quick! As a friend commented, if only Prog Fund went this quickly! (Well, it's just that two hours can be a bit... taxing...)

The workshop we were working on LinuxGym. For some reason, my internet dropped out at first, so I couldn't access even Google and LinuxGym couldn't access the internet either, but then I logged off and back in and it seemed to fix itself, so I got it working. I have realised that it seems that LinuxGym doesn't work in certain situations.

But back a few steps. My friend next to me (no full names, but his name is James) was having a little trouble with LinuxGym. First of all his folders were all missing (like the ch1-fdr (?) and the rest), so he had to manually make them (actually the first exercise's question was not very clear, and didn't mention it had to be in the chapter 1 folder until we clicked 'mark'). And then on the third part of it, LinuxGym froze and he had to close it. But when he reopened it, it would not log him in.

This is what I realised. I told him to try relogging into the online er, site? (the 192.168..... etc) and then try to log into LinuxGym, and it worked. LinuxGym will not work without an internet connection, and it will not work unless you are logged into that IP address either. I think the connection from before must have timed out, just like the Juniper Network Security things for UTS Wireless. If you break off from the Wireless, you have to close the Juniper security before trying to log back in to use the Wireless or it will not work.

I feel like UTS's technology can be so temperamental.

But we finished the questions, helping each other. James did a few typos at one point, or couldn't find the right thing to type and I'd show him, and I'd make a typo and it wouldn't work and I'd consult with him. I also helped the person next to me, and some people behind me before while doing the calender thing. I'd always spelt calender as calender, but the site wanted us to store it as 'calendar' which was why we'd keep getting the question wrong. I guess this hones our observational skills. :D

All in all, although we all had some problems trying to get everything to work, it was quite fun, particularly the helping others. xD I do like to make people happy, and then I'm happy too. And helping people makes me happy too. Maybe it was my attitude the previous week that I felt so down and depressed about university. But now it seems pretty exciting, except for all the things due - that makes me quite apprehensive. >_<

I also made an error before. The IT wireless network (which the Student Centre has no idea about) is actually called UPNFIT. Which everyone calls upen-fit, but I always just call it U-P-N-F-I-T. I think that's just a habit I have of reading everything in Caps, as just the letters? Unless it's during internet conversation of course.

This afternoon (4-7) I also had a good time with the Anime@UTS club, watching several shows. We watched Mr Brain, a japanese drama which was quite.... odd and hilarious and... odd. And then watched Baka to Test to Shokanjuu and Seitokai no Ichizon which parodied some other shows. Some things I didn't get and I wonder at my anime knowledge, but then again... I do read more manga than I watch anime anyway, so I wonder if that can be excused.

Then we also watched Detroit Metal City which made me want to crawl under the table and hide there for a few hours. I don't know those people. xD It.... was not my type of show, is all I can really say...

I guess that's all for now? Unless I've forgotten something. The club as an Art/Mecha Jam tomorrow, so I'll be going for a while, then I need to get some new clothes. I'm kind of running out with uni, since although wearing the same outfit is not unusual... well wearing the shirt 4 days in a row isn't something people want to see either... But I need to work! *worry*

Concern.

Tuesday = Introduction to Information Systems

Agenda:
- Teamwork

Todays IIS was so-so, teaching us about teamwork. I'd read some of the resources posted on the UTSOnline beforehand - which made all of us groan upon reading the dreaded word belonging off the screen off my Netbook - and had thought over some of my experiences of groupwork before, seeing reasons which people would work in groups and the way some groups function.

My experience has not all been good of course. No finger pointing, but obviously there have been cases of some people not pulling their weight and not meeting deadlines (of course, they tell me this is something definitely to be expected). Given the opportunity, I think I can be a pretty good team leader, it's just that although I can be somewhat organised, have direction and so on, I'm just too lenient of a person, and if someone ends up not finishing something or there's something unclaimed, I would go and do it myself. Perhaps some of it has to do with the fact that I rather like to do some on-hand work - which is why I've always been a little apprehensive about Management positions. Do they still get the chance to actually do on-hand work rather than to instruct others on what work they should be doing? So far, I get the impression that it's not all like that, of course, from the sponsor visits, however, this still has not completely reassured me. I suppose time may tell.

In any case, although the teamwork session was not necessarily something I would not have realised in due time, I know now what to look for, since it has been pointed out to me. When you hear about it, the reaction you get is that it's not something that you don't know (at least if you are thinking rationally), but when in the actual situation, it doesn't hit you until later... This is nothing particularly surprising, and is often the case. I hope that I can see such a situation approaching before it happens and causes us a dilemma however.

Tutorial
My first tutorial was somewhat odd. The teacher is a research student currently at UTS. Although we had been distributed sheets during the lecture about what would be happening within the tutorial session, we did not follow the sheet at all and instead did a lot of chatting about information systems.

After a cursory going around of the room with each person merely reading out their name and their desired result from the subject (obviously I'd want as high as I could...), we started talking about different information systems. I'd actually been looking forward to walking around in pairs, learning more about my class, but this obviously was not to be and was somewhat a disappointment for that reason.

Although the information systems discussion may be useful in the future (the failure of an information system), there was a point I mentioned about the speed of a system, like the speed in which it responds. I'm not exactly sure what he thought I said, although he seemed to grasp the point at the time, and yet he mentioned it again barely 5 minutes later, and I just sighed.

We formated our groups for Assignment 1. But due to the fact that I really didn't know anyone, since we pretty much skipped what we were supposed to do in that class, mostly the class appeared to form groups with people in their immediate area - obviously some of them knew each other - while the others sort of wandered around until they were invited into a group still missing members. Me and two other girls were at the front, and we looked at each other and asked where we lived. In terms of area of residence, it couldn't be a bigger nightmare, to be perfectly honest. I dread to think exactly how we shall work on the assignment with all of us present, unless we do it all at UTS, and yet we cannot pick a video store to research within the CBD (was this mentioned on the sheet, I am not clear, however I was not told this and someone else told me this).

At any rate, I'm not totally sure we were communicating in that class. A class about communicating, yet I felt like I was missing the tutor's every second word and he was missing every second word of ours, judging by the things he neglected to write up on the board as it was said. (Also I could not read his short hand. AC DE is what exactly? I can only GUESS it's supposed to be Account Details, since we were going through a diagram he'd drawn of a Banking system which I felt was seriously flawed.)

I am concerned.

Wish me luck.

C|2eativity ~

Monday = Communications for IT Professionals.

Agenda:
- ACS Foundation ... talk
- Library talk on Online Resources
- Language Task

I did somewhat find the talk by the ACS Foundation quite intriguing, since halfway throughout that er... talk, I suppose it was (lecture? Not really) I realised that perhaps even though I'm in a course which is largely focused on programming and business, this doesn't mean I can't still be creative. I think what spurred this was probably when they were discussing the internships with different companies (which despite my Industry Study semester, I think I would be very interested to participate in, if possible!), and I saw the Adobe logo amongst the ones of the other participating companies.

This reminded me of the Refresh Roadshow day that happened a fortnight ago. I admit quite freely, I haven't really used my CS4 much, so I was quite stumped by half the things that were going on there, however their presentation of some of the new features of CS5 were fascinating .... and yet, this is going sadly off-topic. *coughs slightly* (What? I had a cold! xD) In any case, they had several mentions that developers and designers work together and sometimes their roles would have to overlap somewhat - although this was actually them developing tools so that they could work together without dispute (You didn't code it how I designed it! But this design is completely ludicrous and impossible!) - but any rate, this caused a sudden epiphany, so to speak, as I realised I don't just have to be a programmer, I can be a designer and a programmer!

And work for Adobe!

Kidding. (I think.) But maybe this was obvious to others, but not to me. I don't mean just designer in the sense of designing a piece of software for a purpose, yet designing it ... in the way people create programs like Photoshop, for lack of a better example. I'm not absolutely certain how to explain it - the idea is still somewhat hazy even within my mind, but I do have an aim of making things aesthetically pleasing, so perhaps this is what I have in mind.

In any case, they continued on to the Online Library Resources after that previous talk (which I covered extremely badly) and went through things which I had been shown when I went to library training during O-Week. I kind of felt I wasted my time going to the O-Week one now... Oh well.

And then came the Language Task. That kind of worried me. On the first page, it asked to put down my first language, which I think is actually Chinese. But I do much better at English than I do at Chinese (I can't write much in Chinese, I'm not kidding), so I really wouldn't say that I'm an ESL or anything. I do recall they put me in an ESL class when I was little, but I really doubted that I needed it. It was completely useless and I didn't even understand the reason I was there in the first place (sopleasedon'tthinkI'manELS pleasepleaseplease).....

In any case (-still groaning from despair over my own demise-), the task was simply a graph with statistics about smokers in Japan, China, USA and Europe and we were supposed to describe it - in simple terms. I hope I did a good job, but as always, think I probably made a grave error somewhere along that line. The last   section of it was perhaps a little weak.... I tried my best, right? -worry-

That was pretty much it. Hung around in the FEIT First Years Lounge for a while until it was 1pm and time for the BIT Information Session (hp decided to reschedule?) and we talked about camp and future sponsor visits, and so on with Des. It was quite enjoyable overall.

/End longwinded day recount and rant.

Week 1 Summarised

6:23 PM by KirishimaAyama 0 comments
01/03/2010 - 05/03/2010 + (07/08 Activities)

This is only to make a small recount of the first week. The order of my subjects is as follows:
- Communications for IT Professionals (Monday)
- Introduction to Information Systems (Tuesday)
- Programming Fundamentals/Object-Orientated Programming (Wednesday)
- Web Systems (Friday)

CITP::
To say the least, this subject doesn't exactly cover something I don't know, but I suppose it's a good idea to try and develop my communications skills further, for all that the subject appears to be like English for Uni. I admit that my oral skills could do with a polish, however. Even so, an upside of day one was being let out early. ^^

IIS::
This... was also just fairly understandable ... stuff. I suppose it's to be expected out of an introductory lecture, however, and the same can be said of (most of) the other lectures. Had to leave half an hour early, however, so I am still wondering if I missed anything. Even if the lecture was not intensely interesting, I am still paranoidly musing over the fact that I may have missed vital information. O_O (I should warn you now, I like to use emoticons in non-formal situations ... like a blog.)

PF::
Was actually quite intense. Oh gosh. I feel lucky that I did read the chapter which was taught in class the night before though, so at least I could follow from what I had already read last night. The lecture actually built on it a little, so I'm glad I was able to know a bit about the lecture topic before I came to class. I was in fact wondering if they'd be teaching more that first lesson, so I'd photographed some of the next chapter to read later, instead of bringing the huge book. Still, I didn't end up reading it. Instead I actually headed off and bought a Flash and Photoshop book. =.=; Still handy, just not for Java.

The workshop, however, was GREAT fun, apart from not being able to log in at first, neglecting to activate my IT login. The wireless is not easily accessed from the IT building, I'm afraid. And for some inane reason, the UPN-IT does not work at all either. Supposedly this is the IT Building's (I say this, but in fact the building is for FEIT and Education??) wireless? In any case, 'messing around' (ahem, learning to use) Bluej was enjoyable.

WS::
Also somewhat introductory, giving us some overview of OSs. I like the fact that I went to that UNIX Workshop, but I still have a loooong way to go. *sighs*

Sponsor Visits::
On Tuesday (Lloyds International and Woolworths Limited) and Thursday (PricewaterhouseCoopers - and I'll say this (again) - ethical hacking!). It was a little daunting, to say the least.
Sometimes I feel quite young. Though I am not really the youngest by a far stretch (I think?).
I feel so unskilled!

Weekend::
Spent quite happily with the Anime@UTS Club, going to the City and enjoying Karaoke, and Eatout, if you could afford it - I'm broke I'm afraid. I'd gotten myself somewhat sick between Thursday and Friday though, and wasn't feeling the best when I got home on Saturday afternoon at about 6pm after Karaoke. I didn't exactly get to recuperate all of Sunday though, since an old family friend/ballet friend/schoolmate/coaching friend (Oh we go very far back) asked us out to Yum Cha. It's quite amusing that they're still happy to muse and discuss HSC details even as we students have forgotten all about it. Once it's past, we no longer want to know about it, it seems. Well, I think this is reasonable, right?

About this blog

A short*, hopefully somewhat up-to-date blog to recount a little about my uni life. And to show maybe that I do somewhat have a life. :D (Eheh)

(*Short in this case, actually means long...)