Precious Advice for CS1300 students!

One precious piece or (pieces) of advice that I give to you students taking Ms. Belisle's CS1300 Computer Skills class is to never skip class, do not get behind on the class work, and keep good notes from class times for future references like exams! Good Luck!

Favorite Websites!

The website project was actually very interesting to work on and was even more exciting viewing all the other classmates' websites. One of the website presentations that stood out for me would have to be Joy Lin's. Each website you could tell how much work and effort was put in by the small details and beautiful web pages. Joy said that she used Photoshop to create her pages and she showed that her skills were put to good use. Another website presentation that I enjoyed was Abigail's. I really liked how she put all the good photographs on her web pages which fit well with her website profile. The designs matched wonderfully and the pictures were amazing. Last but not least I really liked David's website. It had a very peculiar theme behind it all but what I really liked about his website were all the YouTube videos! Overall I am very glad that I learned how to create my own website and I know this will help me in the future.

You can find my website at:
http://cs.trinity.edu/~pchun

HTML Code

Even though there are programs out there like Microsoft expression and Dreamweaver, it is important to understand how to use and read HTML code. The reason behind this is that all web pages are created through HTML code and through the code is how it appears nice and clean on the Internet. For instance if a web designer wanted to adjust certain lines or words on his/her web page, he/she would have to go through the code and fix it from there for it to turn out the proper way on the website. If you look at every web page making program, you will notice that there is a code layout tab which you can view in HTML code and make adjustments to your page directly from this tab. Understanding how to use HTML code will enable the web page creator not only to make more efficient web pages but when problems arise in the future he/she will be able to fix them by looking and adjusting the HTML code.

My Favorite PPT Presentations!

I was truly impressed with Steven Sheppard's PPT presentation. My favorite part of his presentation had to have been the intro slides where there was a good balance between music and fade in and outs of the pictures which were articulate and moving. Another reason why I liked his presentation so much was the fact that the audience knew that he simply did not just do this project because he was an English major but that he had a huge interest in the Dell Magazine subject.
Another that I was truly intrigued with has to be Alexis' accounting internship presentation. I really liked how she made her presentation so neat and perfect which I am sure she did on purpose to match with her accounting subject. And most people see accounting as a boring topic but Alexis named the points where having an accounting internship can be interesting and fun.

Chris Nolan's Presentation

Chris Nolan brought new light onto me about surfing the web and using search engines. One new thing that I learned that I know will help me on my future web searches is the advanced search option. I did not know about this option and he gave a very good example with the Mexico and photography search. I did not know that you can exclude certain words or phrases to come up in your Google searches and I know this is so helpful because it narrows down a search substantially. One thing that surprised me about what Mr. Nolan said was the topic on .gov sites. I knew that sites ending in .gov were government sponsored sites but I did not know that the government could skew information as Mr. Nolan explained. Now I believe I am a smarter web surfer and more skeptical viewer as I search the web.

PowerPoint!

After reading the articles on PowerPoint the first thing that came to my mind was, "you can do a lot with PowerPoint." The range of options with PowerPoint seems endless from different chart styles, themes, pictures, audio, video, etc. I did not know that even the font type used was so important in conveying the message or clarity for the audience to see. The main point that I feel is imperative to a good PowerPoint presentation after reading the articles is to remember that it is used as a communication device with your audience and not as a teleprompter or list to read off of. 5 guidelines that I recommend to my classmates are:
1. Less is more, the PowerPoint slides should be kept simple and clear of what you are trying to get across.
2. Never read down a list off of a slide during a presentation, your audience can read.
3. Your text should be large because one you should not have many words on a single slide and two so that people in the back can read what is on the slide.
4. PowerPoint is animation friendly, do not use all text in your slides, use pictures and charts to help send your message and it will keep your audience awake.
5. Know your material and be familiar with your slides before your presentation so that you do not come upon a slide and wonder what it is talking about.

Excel

I did not know that excel could be used in so many different aspects of our lives not only for school but for our work and personal life. I have used the old version of excel and now that we are working with the 2007 version, it seems simply "smarter" and more user friendly. I am pretty bad when it comes to spending my money and I now know how to use excel to manage my money. I am a finance major and know for sure that excel use will come up in the future for me.