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    • Toys I would like to play with

    2009 - 11.07

    Tags: , , , , , Category Miscellaneous | Comments Off

    Figured I’d talk about some relatively new technology that I would love to get my hands on. So, in alphabetical order:

    BUG Modules

    BUG modules with BUG base

    BUG modules with BUG base

    These little modular hardware components are designed with rapid prototyping in mind. So, what’s so great about them?

    • Various modules and planned modules:
      • Audio output
      • Motion detection
      • Zigbee
      • Touchscreen
      • GPS
    • Java programmed. Java is a simple object-oriented language with large functionality, cross-platform performance, and a safety net to prevent new programmers from doing stupid things (like, wipe one’s harddrive as one can do with C/C++). It also prevents having to write each component in it’s own language
    • There’s braille on the modules. While not very useful for most people, it is still a nice thing to do.
    • Modules are just inserted into slots; no having to argue with wires and solder. Like electronic legos, I suppose.
    • Education discount.

    So, why don’t I already have these?

    • Price. These things are $50-130 US a piece with the base module at a whopping $449. While I am paying for the convenience of prototyping, that’s still a lot of money considering that I (and I assume many people) would like several modules to create anything I want.
    • Sharability. I have to expect other people to shell out the money if I want to share my applications. While Bug Labs promotes users to share code on it’s site, I still would like to actually see others use it.

    littleBits

    littleBits intro from ayah bdeir on Vimeo.

    littleBits are a series of prebuilt circuitboards with components that magnetically snap together. Prevents the need to solder between boards to make connections and looks really child-friendly. Why do I want them?

    • Simple design. I don’t know a lot about hardware (despite my research interests being mostly in hardware), and these seem like a safe way for me to get my feet wet.
    • Outreach. These look like they would be a lot of fun for kids. While I know robots are interesting to many people, when I was little robots certainly weren’t for me (they didn’t come across as unusual or artistic enough for my tastes). These things look like they’d be more successful with atypical kids and super-hardware focused ones.

    And why don’t I have them?

    • Preorder without a set date. I don’t really have the time or money to tie up with a product that I don’t know when I will get it.
    • Preorder without a set dollar amount. I don’t want to order something without knowing how much it will cost.

    Nabaztag

    Nabaztag showing colored LEDs and it's ears moving.

    Nabaztag showing colored LEDs and it's ears moving.

    Created by French company Violet, Nabaztag is among the list of smart objects. This little electronic rabbit does reminders, does RSS updates, reads one version of RFID tags, and can send/receive messages from various sources. What’s the good:

    • It’s a rabbit.  I like rabbits.
    • RFID tagging of objects and linking these to digital events sounds convenient to me.
    • Programmable. It’s nice to have a pretty toy that I can modify.
    • Not having to look at my email all the time. Having a device on the other side of a room tell me I have mail sounds a lot nicer than always having to be connected.
    • It does ear tai chi.
    • Reads RSS, sets alarms, checks email, can receive texts. Generally, it just does lots of communication

    What’s the bad?

    • The services are reliant on  a database controlled by the company owner. I feel uncomfortable having data on another server and not knowing that I can be charged for services in the future.
    • Violet went bankrupt. It was then bought by Mindscape (this past October actually). So, I don’t know what will become of the Nabaztag line.

    Zii EGG

    ZiiLABS, a subsidiary of  Creative Technology, has been pushing the creation of it’s Zii processor, a stemcell-like multimedia-focused chip. Out of this is Zii EGG, a developer tool. What makes it interesting:

    • 10 point multitouch screen
    • 1080p output image
    • 32 gigs of memory
    • WiFi and Bluetooth wireless standards
    • HD camera
    • Accelerometer and GPS
    • Text-to-Speech engine

    And the not so great:

    • Android isn’t fully operational so have to rely on ZiiLABS’ Plaszma SDK.
    • Cell phone chip?! Seriously, this looks like a phone.
    • $400 price tag. Yeah, I get that it’s intended for companies, but there’s a nice individual and educational marketability.

    Unusual job suggestion

    2009 - 11.04

    Tags: , , , , , , Category Work | Comments Off

    My official title is Assistant to the Director of Mentoring and Retention. My work has varied from cleaning to keeping the Director sane to web site design to an in-class teaching assistant to mentoring to running a student group to grading. So far I haven’t had a significant amount of say in what work I will be doing.

    This semester has been hell though with grading. I am grading, by hand, the quality of the code submitted (the equivalent of a grammar check on an essay) for the second semester programming course. This latest assignment is taking 20-30 minutes to grade each student and with 66 submissions I can feel my brain melt.

    Because I’m having to use more mental and time resources than the Director expected when she signed me over to another prof, she has asked me what work I want to do my final semester. And the idea that I have in mind is very unusual.

    We have 200 and 400-level independent study credits. For several years, excluding last year, there has been a group independent study in the spring with students from both the 200 and 400 level. This is led by the Director and usually another faculty member with approximately 10 students. The purpose being to do undergraduate research as a group or groups and practice presenting findings in the spring poster session.

    I have asked to be the teacher for this course next semester.

    I know that at some point of my academic career I will be a lab/recitation teaching assistant. Between my social anxiety and attention deficit, I can honestly say that teaching will be difficult for me. So, I want practice first.  The group study seems like a good place to get my feet wet.

    1. No preset agenda.While I enjoy structure when learning, it will take some coaxing to keep me from going on a tangent.
    2. Minimal grading compared to normal TA work.
    3. Encouraging creativity and critical thinking. I’m passionate about learning; creative and critical thinking are fantastic skills for others to develop.
    4. Writing reports and researching literature are two of my strongest skills which I can teach to others.
    5. Small group size. Less people means less anxiety.

    The Director approves of this suggestion. Now, we just need to know whose approval we need for me to do something that’s never been done before by a graduate student, let alone an undergrad.

      Setting Bars

      2009 - 11.03

      Tags: , , , , Category Class, Rant, Teaching assistant, Work | Comments Off

      [What follows is pretty free form, so sorry if it's hard to follow.]

      Yesterday, I went to a talk on science education in the twenty-first century. The main points from the talk were:

      • Traditional lecture-style teaching results in 10-20% retention of knowledge.
      • Working memory can last for at most 7 distinct topics.
      • Examples, analogies, and images decrease the working memory load.
      • Explain things as cohesive units rather than as disjoint parts.
      • Even if the choice is insignificant, the ability to have a choice increases motivation.
      • Most students leave classrooms with less “expert-like” thinking than when they entered.

      … So, if it isn’t really clear, I research a lot on education in STEM areas. And, the longer I am in college, the more I am convinced that many professors have no idea where the bar should be set on how students should preform. A particular favorite is a professor who explained his curving scheme thusly:

      Of course there will be a curve! I list everyone by their uncurved score and then [moving his hands in a window/gap creating fashion up and down] go ‘hmm there.’ And divide the grades that way [with partitions].

      In all honesty, this seems to be the primary methodology for curving computer science courses, including ones where exams are already curved. And it seems detrimental to students learning. This arbitrary curving indicates that one did better than some percent of students, while giving no evidence of what material was actually learned.

      I am currently grading the second programming course in the curriculum. And I feel like banging my head against a wall while doing so. Students make mistakes on material covered in the prerequisite course. Repeatedly. After I dock points and write a comment on what error occurred.

      The professor for this course disproves of  me grading students harshly. This includes docking points for having unnecessary looping and requiring that all of their variables be more meaningful than ‘x.’

      The professor I am working under is also the professor for one of my courses. My project is notably more difficult than others (many have settled on game A.I. while I’m doing computer vision and machine learning). On more than one occasion, he has indicated that he feels it is too complex for me. I’m not sure if this is cultural or because he feels I can’t succeed or that it shows an example of higher difficulty that others should be able to do.

      From elementary through high school, in gifted education and accelerated learning courses. College is the first setting where I am always in classes that are designed for the middle. College is also, interestingly, the first time that I have tested notably worse than my peers and been told that I can’t do something.

      I find myself questioning why I am compared to everyone rather than judged on my own qualities. I have had professors grade me more harshly for being clever, and I don’t agree to this. But, if I’m choosing to do work at a different level, why should I be discouraged? And, to be fair, I think students working at a lower than mean level have a right to work at that level.

      Professors need to work on showing students why subjects are important and how to learn them. Professors are typically passionate about their subjects, they should share this passion.

      Combining Projects

      2009 - 10.25

      Tags: , , , Category CS, Class, Research | Comments Off

      As I’ve stated before, I need to create one embedded systems and one artificial intelligence project this semester.

      From both professors, I have gotten the impression that the project is intended to demonstrate that I learned something. So, rather than worry about the scale, I’ve decided to combine the two projects into a super-project.

      Not to say it won’t still be quality work. I just as soon do both together than to risk doing one project poorly.

      So, what will I be doing?

      1. Embedding a camera, RGB LED, LilyPad Arduino, a mode switch, and an xBee onto a canvas.
      2. Connecting an xBee to my netbook, Spinnel.
      3. Creating a touch and look modes.
      4. Having Spinnel react to the actions.

      The touch mode will use conductive thread embroidered into the canvas. When the user touches it, the node will activate and do a specific task.

      In look mode, the camera will take pictures.  These photos will be sent to Spinnel for processing. Using OpenCV library, a series of movements will be interpreted as a gesture and the system will activate an event based on this action.

      So, why can I combine these projects? Well, a lot of it comes down to the size of the project. In A.I. many people are doing something that could be done in a couple weeks, like programming a game-playing algorithm. Because I’ve decided on a more advanced topic, I get a lot more flexibility in how and with what tools I approach it with.

      Now, it’s just a matter of getting the time to do it.

      Why Visual Impairment?

      2009 - 10.25

      Tags: Category Disability, Diversity, Goal, Research | Comments Off

      Alright, the standard belief is that people who want equal access, rights, etc. are stereotypically people that fall into the group that are being marginalized. I am by no measure blind; my nearsightedness is easily corrected with glasses.

      I am an individual with behavioral, learning, and pain disorders that affect my interactions with society. Why not work to improve individuals like myself?

      And there’s lots of reasons why I’ve decided I want to help people with severe visual impairment first.

      First up, people that are severely visually impaired have it a hell of a lot worse than I do. One of my friends is completely blind with not even light perception (extremely rare despite this being the imagined picture of the typical blind individual); I can’t send him Vimeo videos about research he’d enjoy because it isn’t accessible  (there isn’t a textual play). Even something as basic as keep backpacks out of aisles so he won’t trip is difficult for many people to grasp.

      As one can conclude from my research, having a severe visual impairment greatly decreases the opportunities a person has. I never had to worry about whether I would be literate, attend college, and be educated enough to have a profession; I assumed that I just needed to work for it. If a child has a severe visual impairment, this isn’t the case and that depresses and disgusts me.

      Secondly, helping others with different abilities does help me and many others. I find it very difficult to use a touchscreen because of the amount of attention necessary; staring at computer screens will give me a migraine, but I have limited choice with GUIs.

      The drive for multimedia also excludes people with hearing impairments, easily fatigued individuals, and even those that simply are in a hurry.

      Thirdly, and probably most importantly, just because I’ve decided to help one marginalized groups doesn’t mean I’m going to say “tough shit” to anyone else. Despite the common belief, I am not required to make an exclusive decision. I want to include as many people as possible; this just happens to be the area that I’m starting from.

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