Use of Skype

Skype is a newer technology that allows you to have face-to-face conversations with whomever you wish. Skype also has many platforms and devices that allow its use such as on your phone, computer, or TV. It's great for doing things such as celebrate a birthday, hold meetings, talk to far-off loved ones, work with distant colleagues, and literally anything you would normally need to do in a group. The best thing about skype (in my opinion) is that it is completely free for its basic features such as facetime and instant messaging. If you pay a minimal fee, you can do a lot more things with more people--such as calling cell phones, access WiFi, or send texts to other users. There are two different methods of payment, either pay-as-you-go or buy a subscription.

I chose to meet with a fellow classmate, Chad Ferguson. I know the assignment mainly wanted us to use people from our group projects but I figured this would suffice because I have Chad in my intro to programming class and we tend to communicate quite often. All we needed to do was create a user account, search for each other's screen name, and dial it up. They make it quite simple. It was cool how it makes it look like you are making an actual call with the icons and "call in progress" and what not.

Using this type of medium can be very helpful. This is do to the fact that not everyone lives in the same town and not everyone has time to meet at the same time. So when using skype for group projects, it is very handy. In terms of how I felt while using it, it feels kind of wierd and yet satisfying at the same time. It makes it convenient to have skype on with your group members while they are doing the same thing as you because you could just have someone talking to you in the background, collaborating on the same things, versus having awkward or frustrating moments in person. All in all, skype is a great application to have on your computer and I can see myself using this or facetime, if needed, to conduct projects with others.

Life of a Google Software Engineer

To start things out. Many programs start out small. For example: the creator of Facebook started out by simply creating a program and putting it out there for others to see. A simple idea can manifest into something much larger that in turn affects many lives.

What do google software engineers do? Well first-off, they don't shrink-wrap software. Everything they develop is put online wether it's free or not (Google Chrome). This is mainly do to the fact that their software has many updates, so online software is much more convenient.

On a large scale, google solves problems that are too large to be handled by a single computer. Google also serves too many users to answer all the queries on a single computer, which is why Google had to evolve in order to handle a larger quantity of users. This is what led Google to create their own servers, eventually leading into building their own data centers, in order to reduce cost. Their first data centers were build on rivers because of low-cost energy due to the fact that many rivers have dams creating infinite power.

MapReduce is a framework for distributing computation that follows the outline of the link problem:
1. map
2. shuffle
3. reduce
It also handles problems like server crashing.

What does an engineer work-flow look like? First, they identify the problem as a team and brainstorm. Second, communicate your idea with your team: verbally or with a design document. Third, write your code. Fourth, test your code with "unit tests" (and existing code that you affect). If your code fails, then go back to coding. Fifth, send your code to a colleague for review. And finally, get a "looks good to me" from your reviewer and then submit! Wait! Not done yet! Now it gets deployed to a canary cell (small controlled deployment used to see if anything goes wrong). Now! Deploy to production! It seems simple but there are actually many meetings involved as well as collaboration of others. All these steps are necessary for a google software engineer.

After thoughts,

I really enjoyed the presentation! I had an idea about how a google software engineer goes about his day but not to this extent. It was also great to know how google first got started, which was briefly presented by Scott. All in all, I learned a lot from Scott and it has left me with high hopes in my career.

Audio mashup. I call it -- "Kanye's Big Gigantic Gorilla" :)

What makes for an interesting interview...

            I chose to do the following audio interviews: “When we go on fires, everyone treats you different”, “I have spent a lot of years just hiding from it”, and “We saw, on the side of the road, a guy with a prosthetic leg”. And I chose to do the following animation interviews: “She was the one” and “Germans in the woods”. The key points and flow of the interviews are listed after this summary.

            All in all, all of the audio interviews were quite easily understood by me and were pretty easy to follow. The only thing I might suggest to all of the audios to do is simply add more pauses after presenting important facts of their stories so that we know when there is a break in the story. Both of the animation interviews were also quite understandable—I couldn’t tell you which one was best understood though because both were quite effective and touching stories. They both presented audio during the animations, as well. What I liked about “She was the one” the most though was that it was narrated and then a couple of points in the story, the animated character’s mouth actually followed along with the narration. What I liked most about “Germans in the woods” though, was how it was in black and white and the animations moved slowly leaving behind a shadowy essence. Both made it hard for me to choose a favorite.

            What was different about the two types of interviews was that in the animations, there were more pauses after facts which made more sense to allow the animations to follow the storyboard and not get left behind; while in the audios their were hardly any audio pauses making it sound more like reading aloud from a book. Also, the animated interviews had more transitions between scenes, which is to be expected since it’s easier with animations. What was similar between the two types was that they both used appropriate choices for their background music and used proper transitioning when presenting it as well. Other than that, they all seemed to move right along quite smoothly.

            In conclusion I have included my list of five criteria that all audio/visual interviews should have:

1.     Start off with either an attention getter (important fact) or with a song that fades out—reason being is to obviously get the listener/viewer attention right from the beginning.

2.     Transitions between facts or important scenes—reason is because it lets the listener/viewer know that the story is about to present another fact or point in the story.

3.     No “blank” space. The audio shouldn’t have more than a couple of seconds of no audio and in an animation interview, the screen should never be black—reason being is because it looks/sounds unprofessional and lacking the effort to create a good audio/visual interview.

4.     The animation should always follow the storyboard and facts—reason being is because you don’t want your viewer to be confused in what is happening.

5.     Music in audio and animation interviews should always be appropriate for the situation—reason being is because you want the viewer/listener to feel something appropriate to the interview.

  

Audio

“When we go on fires, people treat you different.”

            The drought of 2012 has caused many fires. Daniel Ross has been an inmate firefighter since 2011. He is incarcerated because of his crystal meth addiction as well as assaulting an officer.

• ·      Begins to talk about how he is treated differently because he is a volunteer firefighter. (No additional audio so far)
• ·      After talking about how he is treated differently, a calm soothing song comes on. (Song rises and gradually fades out)
• ·      No pauses after important facts were said—fast talker. (Ending song transition)

“I have spent a lot of years just hiding from it.”

            Julie Sanders talks about belonging to a white suppremist group when she was 16. 1988, found herself at the scene of a murder—that’s when she began to re-evaluate her life.

• ·      Group of kids (suppremists) liked her because she was white. (No music)(Audio pause)
• ·      She was beat up by her boyfriend when no fights were found around town. (No music)(Audio pause)
• ·      Friends killed a man because he was black; the man also had a child with him. (No music)(No audio pause)
• ·      Didn’t come out of it till she was 20 years old and had a son. She thinks about it a lot and when describing her self now, a song rises while speaking and fades. (Music—soft sort of climactic song)(Song made me think)(Ending song transition)

“We saw, on the side of the road, a guy with a prosthetic leg.”

            In 2008, 70-year-old “Boston” Bill had his leg amputated from a staff infection. Jake Bainter (7 years) was about to have his leg amputated when they met before the operation on the side of the road. Four years later, Jake and Bill recorded.

• ·      They asked each other questions. (No music)(Audio pauses after questions)
• ·      Sometimes they each would alternate lines with no pauses to make it seem more like a story.
• ·      Bill talks about miracles when an acoustic song rises over the commentary and fades out. (Acoustic music—rises and fades out)
• ·      No transitions except for ending song.

Animation

“She was the one.”

            Richie Pecorella was engaged to the love of his life, Karen Juday, living in Brooklyn when she was killed in the World Trade Center terrorist attacks.

• ·      Beginning acoustic song for 30 seconds while text appears with a black background that explains the premise of Richie’s story. (Fades to black)(Music fades out)(Storyboard begins)
• ·      Animated Richie and Karen. (Richie narrates)
• ·      He was nervous at their first meeting. (Richie narrates)(Animation reflects his emotions, stumbling, “head-over-heels”)
• ·      Talks about Karen. (Animation Richie moves its mouth with his voice)
• ·      Goes back to narrating scenes. (Not many pauses or audio transitions)(Visual transitions—scenes fade in and out of each other)
• ·      Character animates voice of Richie while animated Karen is enlarged in the background.
• ·      Voice stops, music rises, ends with faded music and an animated picture of Karen takes up the screen. (Visual transition)
• ·      Uses credits on a notepad feature outline. (Credits fade in and out)(Music fades out)
• 
  

“Germans in the woods.”

            Joseph Robertson remembers shooting a German soldier in the Battle of The Bulge (WWII).

• ·      Acoustic music in the beginning. (Fades in and out transitions)(Joe narrates the story)(Black and white storyboard)
• ·      Animated figures move slowly leading a shadowy imprint while moving. (Helps with telling a past story, history)
• ·      Animation follows narration closely.
• ·      Talks slowly, like telling a story or reading aloud from a book.
• ·      Uses snow falling in his scenes.
• ·      Talks about waking up many night crying and seeing the kid he shot and killed. (Sad calming music rises)
• ·      Screen turns black and writing appears (fading transitions to next part of text) saying Joe made this a year before his death. (Visual fade transition to credits)
• ·      Credits fade in and out with music still going in the background.
• ·      Snow is falling during the credits for added visual effects.
• ·      Music fades out in the end.

The most amazing photoshop photos you have ever seen....EVER!

I have learned through editing these images, especially this one, that you can change the overall feel and look of an image by simply changing the image's properties. Like with chevy image to your right--it started off in color, now it's in black and white. This image is my favorite of the altered images because it seems to make the most sense to me. Reason being is because this is a Classic Chevy. Sure, there are restored mint condition classics out there but by choosing the black and white version of the image, it gives the viewer the impression that this picture might have been taken many years back.

I chose this image for my second mainly because I just think it looks cool. It comes off as black and white but it isn't. I just turned up the saturation and contrast. To me, it gives the feel that this picture came straight out of an evidence folder.



EMC's Digital Footprint Calculator

EMC provides a tool available for free on the internet that calculates your digital footprint--it is call a Digital Footprint Calculator. To start things off, a digital footprint is, in a sense, data about you. This info is given or shared by you and others through interaction in the digital world. Quite simply, any data usage by you adds to your digital footprint. This application, provided by EMC, helps you calculate your digital footprint by entering in information on how often you use devices such as a digital camera, smart-phone, PC or MAC, digital cam-corder, check e-mail, TV recording, playing online video games, streaming online music or videos, etc..

When referring to my own digital footprint, not all of these devices were included. I do not own a digital camera or cam-corder device so I was able to rule that out of the equation. I do not feel the need to have either when I already own a smart-phone that can take, send, and upload digital pictures and photos. This obviously means that I use my smart-phone for multiple uses (as a smart-phone should be) i.e. sending text messages, uploading videos and pictures, checking e-mail, checking bank accounts, updating Facebook, using the ESPN application, as well as talking on the phone (which I do not do very often). I use a MACbook Pro so that was obviously included in calculating my digital footprint. Checking e-mail, setting TV recordings, playing online video games or Xbox applications, and streaming online videos and music--also were included in calculating my digital footprint. 

I learned a few things while calculating my digital footprint:

1. The level of difficulty in figuring out how much you use digital devices is minor, but difficult nonetheless. Mainly this is because some days you use digital devices more than others. Entering in "average" information only does you so much justice. Regardless, EMC's application still gives you a good idea of how large your imprint is.
2. Anything that requires data usage is included when calculating your digital footprint. I was very surprised that recording TV was also included in your footprint, but makes sense nonetheless. It also makes sense why some mobile phone providers make you pay for your data usage (but not me because I'm with US Cellular :P).
3. The amount of data each individual uses builds up over time. I noticed this when entering in my averages in my initial usage of the Digital Footprint Calculator. For example, since January of this year I have used over 243 billion bytes of information. Thats a lot of information!! Hopefully it went to good use, heh. 

All in all, this application serves its purpose. The only recommendation I would give EMC for the next updated version of their Digital Footprint Calculator is to allow users to add additional digital devices to the calculations, as well as, allow users to collaborate with each other to find out how one class could calculate their digital footprint as a whole.