Covering the basics

I've been neglecting my blog for days; I imagine there must be a buzzword or phrase to describe the guilty feeling of technological negligence that I've begun to experience as a result. I've been keeping up with the readings in Discovering Computers 2009, and although the chapters are well organized and informative, so far I'm finding them fairly redundant with respect to what I've already picked up over the last twenty years of working and playing with computers. I've always believed that self-guided exploration is the best way to gain technological proficiency, but I've had an impossible time convincing my parents of that... When I encourage them to play around with their computer, they demur, "But I'm afraid I'll break something!"

So yes, a lack of fear is advisable in embarking on a technological education -- and books like DC2009 can certainly help, as well, to fill in the gaps. For example, I hadn't used a spreadsheet since my first days out of college in an office job, so the section on spreadsheets was helpful in reminding me how I could use formulas and functions to calculate data. I might even be inspired to start my own budgeting spreadsheet, and I can also use this information to help my husband average his students' grades more efficiently.

I spent a summer working as a graphic designer, so the section on CAD and image editing software made me nostalgic. Again, the textbook served as a nice reminder of all of the software programs that are out there, but the best way to learn any given program is still to dive right in and experiment. Speaking of which, I could post lots of humorous and bizarre PhotoShop images that resulted from playful experimentation...

Anyway, I'm finding that the book is helping me reassure myself that I know the basics about computers. Meanwhile, it can be helpful to see computer parts and processes all laid out. Thus, this earlier blog post from my original blog (my first blog entry, on May 15) already strikes me as dated. But that's encouraging, no?

May 15, 2008 (from the now-defunct "Information Celebration Station")

I am a single-celled organism in the salty Pre-Cambrian sea

I'm setting up this blog to document my technological evolution over the course of LIS 2600, Introduction to Information Technologies, at the University of Pittsburgh. Having grown up in the eighties and nineties, I've kept pretty well abreast of the ever-evolving capabilities of computers and network systems, but thus far it's all been self-taught, and thus my technological knowledge is fairly superficial. I'll eagerly play around with web technology, peer-to-peer applications, PhotoShop, PC games, the Office suite, or whatever other programs I find, but I've never taken an actual computer class. (Even though a computer class was required at my high school, due to a scheduling conflict I fell through the cracks... Now, finally, my time has come.)

Thus, despite the fact that I already spend many hours daily staring at a computer screen (I've worked online for the last five years), I'm ready to begin this process of evolution. Onward! Excelsior! Huzzah!