Optimus2g

This is obviously a big portion of our grade (30%), but it's not like it's something that we're doing for the first time. It's based on our research papers that we've spent MONTHS working on. We should all be starting off in a good place as the result of all the hard work that we, our writing groups, and the Professor put into writing and revising them. In speaking with Prof. Tougaw, this project will be a condensation of our papers to a web document consisting of no more than 1,500 words---making it roughly a third the length of our papers. We'll be adding images & links that correspond to the various sections in our papers that would arouse any specific interests, the way we would if we were blogging, except it will be on a website.

I would imagine that some basic knowledge of HTML will come in handy, but without it I doubt that it would screw people's course projects up (just correlate it to the blogs). I've already started reducing my paper down, using the MS Word auto summarize feature, to see what it would look like if I only used it to shorten my paper. It helped a little, but not that much, when I saw how some of the things that it chose were not things that I would want to include in the final version of the web project document. Needless to say, I'm going to have to work on this a lot more to get it to where I want it, and not where MS Word wants it.

I feel confident in working on this, but would like some guidance during class in narrowing down the scope of what I have somewhat. Hopefully we can get some feedback and assistance on this when we come back, but we won't have much time when we do because the class and the semester, for that matter, are rapidly coming down to a close (would you believe that?).

While waiting for the official email from Prof. Tougaw about this final major project, which is due before the conference on May 16th, we should all start to "trim down" our research papers to their bare essentials and look up images & links (I'd aim for 5 of each right now) that would be most appropriate for visitors who would be interested in our respective topics for the course project website. In the meantime, if anyone is interested in brushing up on their HTML skills, here's a link that might come in handy (if it's even necessary). I've used this website over the years to help me hone my own HTML skills---or lack thereof. I think you'll find it handy, regardless of if we even need it for this class. But hey, who the hell am I to make such a bold statement? As the great LaVar Burton said: "But you don't have to take MY word for it!" Check it out...HTML:An Interactive Tutorial