Access Project

I had never used Access before doing this project. I understand why Databases are more useful than just plain spreadsheets, but for this project I could have done it a lot easier in Microsoft Excel personally. The queries and reports gave me the most problems. Getting things to filter and sort properly took a lot of trial and error. Still not entirely sure I did that part correct actually. The form worked, but seemed to add the new members to the queries section, not the original table. I think that may be because I had selected the queries group when I made the form.

If you couldn't tell already, I do not have much of a knack for Access yet, and I'm still not sure of all its' functionality so my ability to upgrade this database would be limited. I guess the ability to auto-add the join date into the database, instead of manually typing it would be one improvement. Maybe you could hide non-essential information from the employees as to prevent abuse.

Week 12: Muddy

Two muddy posts in two weeks. I didn't quite understand all the different planning systems that Systems Analysts use. That would not be a good career for me if you have to do so much planning. Call it a personality flaw, but I've never been one for well-thought out planning.

The change management idea was kind of muddy as well. I understood that changes are difficult to make, one of the reasons why IE6 is still ~20% of internet users I've read is that companies have been too lazy to upgrade their intranets to work with anything but that. I can also understand that there can be a lot of 'noise' when the commands come down from the top, through middle management to the main workforce. Most of the time at my job, the only way I hear of rule changes is through other employees warning me. Sometimes they get things wrong and it just makes the situation worse. Properly informing people is definitely important when making major changes.

Avatar

This is an Avatar created for Xbox Live. The avatar creating tool started off with a randomized person that I thought looked a lot like Jack Lemmon from Grumpy Old Men. So it had a section for accessories and one was a fedora that I thought would accent the look. Along with a suit that I figured suitable for an old man, I completed the Avatar. The program allows for a lot of variety, and there are even animations. Recently I unlocked an ability to have my avatar barbequeing. Doesn't show up in the picture I could upload to here. I don't really understand the point of avatars, but they definitely have increased in popularity. Probably with the start of that 'Make your own Southpark Character' that I saw a long time ago.

Week 11: Muddy

When starting the lectures I had no idea just how little I knew about Access. I had opened it up before but never really done anything with it, and most times when installing Office, I'd uncheck the box for installing Access. New names for rows and columns, and the tables are nothing like I've seen as a table before. This was going to be an entry into foreign territory.

I kind of understood the idea of a primary key. That is what I understand to be the unique object to which all other things are relevant to. Everything else is just describing what is in the primary key. However I am using Office 2010, and getting to the default design view that I saw in your lectures was a trial in itself. It defaults to database and didn't realize that there were 4 different types of views. Then you get to the different types of data that can go into the fields. Access obviously has a lot of features, most of which I'll probably never learn. However I did make sure to play some Access games http://www.happy2-island.com/e/access.shtml

Week 10: Clear

I never realized before the intricacies of setting up fiber optic cables. Although I have spent many nights hoping for them to reach where I live. I do a lot of downloading, usually have a couple torrents going at any certain time, and to keep my uploading ratio even close to my downloading ratio is a serious chore. My ability to upload is at about 60kb/s compared to the 1.5mb/s that I'm downloading at.

Google realizes that a lot more things could happen if everyone had better internet connections and that's why they're putting Gigabit connections in a city somewhere in america and see how it affects life there and what benefits people put it to use. http://www.google.com/appserve/fiberrfi/public/options is the place where cities, and the people that live in them can apply.

I remember finally moving from dial-up to cable back in elementary school, and the difference in my ability to find and retrieve all types of data on the internet was greatly expanded. Now I've got multiple routers in my apartment, running over a dozen computers.

Excel Project

During the Excel project, I was originally put-off by the large amount of data to work with. However Excel is unusually user-friendly for database software. It's like it has thought of everything you might need, and put it there. If only other programs were designed so well. I'm using Office 2010 but I didn't notice any large differences that would change anything.

I already knew most of Excel through previous computing classes, and my own experiences in trying to organize data. I had not used Pivot-tables ever before though, and they are an extremely useful add-on that made sorting the data by your specifications much easier. The ability to just drag things to column or row, and then set them to Average or Sum or whatever you feel is surprisingly comforting. I can rest assured I will be using that function many times in the future.

Week 9: Clear

I really liked the setup of the lectures this week. It was broken down into very understandable excel tips, and I can easily see myself returning to double-check things in these videos in the near future.

I had never heard of the pivot table thing before, and I just took a business computing class at Santa Fe College a year ago. It's a very interesting feature and I can definitely see it's inherit value in Excel. I had already had a good basis in the functions, and logic formulas, but the videos were a nice refresher, and even went further in-depth in the date things than I had previously known. Like how it counts the days from 1/1/1900.

http://www.excelgames.org/ is a website based off games you can play in excel, I've played a couple before and it's very ingenious.