Interner Resources Evaluation

• Audience:

General public; children to senior citizens; knowledgeable layperson; scholars; anyone

• Coverage:

Popular topics; personal information; current affairs; government information; research; scholarly information; fun and games; and more...

• Written By:

Anyone: professional journalists; children; teenagers (high school students); members of general public; scholars and researchers; poets and writers of fiction; essayists; college students; advocates and activists; and more...

• Timeliness:

Varies wildly: may be very current coverage or very out‐of date information, or undated.

• Length:

Can vary greatly.

• Content:

Anything: general discussion; editorial opinion; graphics; photographs; advertisements; statistical analysis; detailed analysis; fact; fiction; fraud; and more...

• Slant:

Depends: May reflect the editorial bias / slant of the web page creator; may be objective or neutral; may be geared for academic or professional audiences; may be unsupported personal opinion, who knows????

Evaluation Criteria
• Authority
• Accuracy
• Objectivity
• Currency
• Coverage

I. Authority
• Is there an author? Is the page signed? Is the author qualified? An expert? Who is the sponsor? Is the sponsor of the page reputable? How reputable? Is there a link to information about the author or the sponsor? If the page includes neither a signature nor indicates a sponsor, is there any other way to determine its origin?
• Look for a header or footer showing affiliation.
• Look at the URL. http://www.moe.gov.my
• Look at the domain. .edu, .com, .ac .org, .net
• Rationale
– Anyone can publish anything on the web.
– It is often hard to determine a web page's authorship.
– Even if a page is signed, qualifications are not usually provided.
– Sponsorship is not always indicated.

II. Accuracy
-.Is the information reliable and error]free? Is there an editor or someone who verifies/checks the information?
-. Rationale
-. See number 1 above
-. Unlike traditional print resources, web resources rarely have editors or fact]checkers.
-. Currently, no web standards exist to ensure accuracy.

III. Objectivity
• Does the information show a minimum of bias? Is the page designed to sway opinion? Is there any advertising on the page?
• Rationale
– Frequently the goals of the sponsors/authors are not clearly stated.
– Often the Web serves as a virtual "Hyde Park Corner", a soapbox.

IV. Currency
• Is the page dated? If so, when was the last update? How current are the links? Have some expired or moved?
• Rationale
– Publication or revision dates are not always provided.
– If a date is provided, it may have various meanings. For example,
• It may indicate when the material was first written It may
indicate when the material was first placed on th  Web It
may indicate when the material was last revised

V. Coverage
• What topics are covered? What does this page offer that is not found elsewhere? What is its intrinsic value? How in‐depth is the material?

• Rationale

– Web coverage often differs from print coverage.
– Frequently, it's difficult to determine the extent of coverage of a topic from a web page. The page may or may not include links to other web pages or print references.
– Sometimes web information is "just for fun", a hoax, someone's personal expression that may be of interest to no one, or even outright silliness.

Web Browsing

What is web browser?

1. A web browser is a software application that enables a user to display and interact with text, images, and other information typically located on a web page at a website on the World Wide Web or a local area network.

2. Software that displays web pages

3. Software that gives a user access to the World Wide Web. Web browsers often provide a graphical interface that lets users click buttons, icons, and menu options to view and navigate Web pages.

What can you do with web browser

– Browse web pages if you know the URL
• e.g http://www.utm.my
• http:/elearning.utm.my
– Search the web using
• Search tools
– Search engines
– Subject Directories
– Name Directories
– Meta‐Searchers
– Specialized Search Tools and Searchable Databases

Search Tools : Search Engine
1. Software that enables users to search the Internet using keywords.
2. A search engine is a computer program that does the following:

• allows user to submit a query that consists of a word / phrase
• searches the database
• returns a list (hits) that may consist of web pages, images, information and other types of files which match the query
• allows user to revise and resubmit query

Example of search engines:
1. Google : www.google.com ,
2. Yahoo! Search : search.yahoo.com
3. AltaVista : http://www.altavista.com/
4. Ask.com: www.ask.com etc!

How search engine works?
• The search engines maintain databases of web sites
• use programs ("spiders" or "robots") to collect information,which is then indexed by the search engine.
• Similar services are provided by "directories," which maintain ordered lists of websites, eg Yahoo!
• Computer software program designed to help users of the Internet locate information on the World Wide Web. It collects and indexes Internet resources ( Web pages, Usenet Newsgroups, programs, images, etc. ) and provides a keyword search system allowing the user to identify and retrieve resources. There are many search engines available and each is different in their scope, search protocols, and appearance. Some common search engines are: Alta Vista, Google, Yahoo, Excite, Lycos, and HotBot...

Search Tools : Directories

• Subjects

• built by human selection ‐‐ not by computers or robot programs
• organized into subject categories, classification of pages by subjects ‐‐ subjects not standardized and vary according to the scope of each directory
• NEVER contain full‐text of the web pages they link to ‐‐ you can only search what you can see (titles, descriptions, subject categories, etc.) ‐use broad or general terms
• small and specialized to large, but smaller than most search engines ‐huge range in size
• often carefully evaluated and annotated (but not always!!)
• Subjects
  – Google Directory : directory.google.com
  – Yahoo! : dir.yahoo.com
  – Librarians' Index : www.lii.org
  – Infomine : infomine.ucr.edu
  – Academic Info : www.academicinfo.us

Search Tools: Meta‐Search
Search more than one search engine and/or subject directory at once and then compile the results in a sometimes convenient display, sometimes consolidating all the results into a uniform format and listing.
– E.g. :
• Dogpile : www.dogpile.com
• Metacrawler
• Tripleme

Other search tools

• Local Search / Maps
• Mobile Text Search
• Desktop Search
• Google Special Searches
• Audio/Video/Imej

Web Browser: Search techniques

– Use subject directories.
– Use implied and full Boolean logic, phrase searching, truncation, and field searching effectively.
• Boolean "operators" such as "AND," "OR," "AND NOT" and sometimes "NEAR." AND requires all terms appear in a record. OR retrieves records with either term. AND NOT excludes terms.
 – Identify key concepts, synonyms, and variant word forms in your search topic.
– Use phrase
• More than one KEYWORD, searched exactly as keyed (all terms required to be in documents, in the order keyed). Enclosing keywords in quotations " " forms a phrase in Google , and some other search tools.
– E.g “educational technology” / educational technology will give different results
– Use key search engines effectively including AltaVista, Google, All the Web/FAST, and HotBot etc…
– Use meta‐search engines.
– Use specialty databases when appropriate.
• Social sciences: http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/lost.html
– Apply search strategies and techniques in a scavenger hunt exercise.

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite (often called TCP/IP, although not all applications use TCP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks, of local to global scope, that are linked by a broad array of electronic, wireless and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries an extensive range of information resources and services, such as the inter-linked hypertext documents of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the infrastructure to support email.

Most traditional communications media including telephone, music, film, and television are reshaped or redefined by the Internet, giving birth to new services such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV). Newspaper, book and other print publishing are adapting to Web site technology, or are reshaped into blogging and web feeds. The Internet has enabled and accelerated new forms of human interactions through instant messaging, Internet forums, and social networking. Online shopping has boomed both for major retail outlets and small artisans and traders. Business-to-business and financial services on the Internet affect supply chains across entire industries.

A Hierarchy of Networks

• From a single computer to LAN 
• From LAN to ISP
• ISP to WWW

internet access Via:

 dial-up,
 landline (over coaxial cable, fiber optic or copper wires),
 T- lines,
 WiFi / WiMAX
 satellite
 GPRS, EDGE. ….
 cell phones
 3G…..

Internet protocol

• Every machine on the Internet has a unique identifying number, called an IP Address.
• The IP stands for Internet Protocol, which is the language that computers use to communicate over the Internet.
• A protocol is the pre-defined way that someone who wants to use a service talks with that service. The "someone" could be a person, but more often it is a computer program like a Web browser., etc.
• An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label that is assigned to devices participating in a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication between its nodes
• An IP address serves two principal functions: host or network interface identification and location addressing

Internet protocol

•  A typical IP address looks like this: 216.27.61.137
• To make it easier for us humans to remember, IP addresses are normally expressed in decimal format as a dotted decimal number like the one above.
• But computers communicate in binary form. Look at the same IP address in binary: 11011000.00011011.00111101.10001001

What is the meaning of 161.139.52.254 ?

 

TCP/IP

 TCP/IP (Internet) Applications
 World Wide Web's Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)
 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)
 File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
 Telnet (Telnet) which lets you logon to remote computers
 Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP)
 VoIP
 IPTV

Domain Name System (DNS) The Internet naming scheme which consists of a hierarchical sequence of names, from the most specific to the most general (left to right), separated by dots : example ?
 IP (Internet protocol) The Internet standard protocol that provides a common layer over dissimilar networks, used to move packets among host computers and through gateways if necessary.
 IP Address The numeric address of a computer connected to the Internet; also called Internet address.

Wireless Technology

Wireless telecommunications is the transfer of information between two or more points that are not physically connected. Distances can be short, such as a few metres for television remote control, or as far as thousands or even millions of kilometres for deep-space radio communications. It encompasses various types of fixed, mobile, and portable two-way radios, cellular telephones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and wireless networking. Other examples of wireless technology include GPS units, Garage door openers or garage doors, wireless computer mice, keyboards and Headset (audio), headphones, radio receivers, satellite television, broadcast television and cordless telephones.

Wireless communication involves:

• radio frequency communication
• microwave communication, for example long‐range line of sight via highly directional antennas or short line‐of‐antennas, shortrange communication
• infrared (IR) short‐range communication, for example from remote controls or via IRDA Applications may involve point‐to‐point communication, point‐to‐multipoint communication, broadcasting , cellular networks and other wireless networks.

Devices commonly use wireless networking
technologies:

• portable computers, desktop computers computers, hand‐held computers,
•  personal digital assistants (PDAs), 
• cellular phones, 
• pen‐based computers, 
• pagers, GPS etc

The network is literally classified into four. They are:

1.      PAN (personal area network) – covers the network of personal devices such as printer and mobile devices.

2.      LAN (local area network) – covers relatively small geographical area such as home, school and also office.

3.      WAN (wide area network) – covers large geographical area and consist of two or more LAN connected together using communication technology. Internet is the largest WAN.

4.      MAN (metropolitan area network) – network designed to service the large area such as cities. Consist of multiple LAN and the size is between LAN and WAN.

Type of Wireless Network as stated above:

• Wireless wide area networks (WWANs) 
• Wireless metropolitan area networks (WMANs) 
• Wireless local area networks (WLANs) 
• Wireless personal area networks (WPANs)

Application : Data Networking.

• Infra Red 
• wireless local area networks (WLANs)
• broadband wireless.
• Bluetooth,
• WiMax

- Infrared Data Transmission
• IrDA (Infrared Data Association) is an industry standard for wireless communication with infrared light. (Non RF)
• Many laptops sold today are equipped with an IrDAcompatible transceiver that enables communication with other devices, such as printers, modems, LANs, or other laptops. The transfer speed ranges from 2400 bps to 4Mbps.
• Requires line of sight transmission

- Bluetooth: is an industrial specification for wireless
personal area networks (PANs).

• Designed for very short range 
• <10 m connect and exchange information between devices such as mobile phones, laptops, PCs, printers, digital cameras and video game 
• consoles over a secure,
• globally unlicensed short‐range radio frequency.
• Frequency 2.4 GHz, 
• Data speed up to 3Mbps

- Wi‐Fi the underlying technology of wireless local area
networks (WLAN)

• based on the IEEE 802.11 specifications. 
• used for mobile computing devices, such as laptops, in LANs,increasingly used for more services, including Internet and VoIP phone access, gaming, and basic connectivity of consumer electronics such as televisions and DVD players, or digital cameras 
• Frequency 2.4 GHz
• Range 100‐300 feet(indoor) 300‐900 feet(outdoor

- WiMax :To extend the range of wireless network

• Speed upt to 70Mbps
• Range 30 miles
• Provides access to internet access to fixed location with larger coverage

- Broadband wireless access

• is a technology aimed at providing high‐speed wireless access over a wide area from devices such as personal computers to data networks. According to the 802.16‐2004 standard, broadband means 'having instantaneous bandwidth greater than around 1 MHz and supporting data rates greater than about 1.5 Mbit/s'.

• It is planned to be used in the next few years and is estimated to have a range of 50km (30 miles).

Cellular systems

• 0G
• 1G
• 2G
• 3G
• 4G

1G
1G is short for first‐generation wireless telephone technology. This generation of phones and networks is represented by the brick‐sized analog phones introduced in the 1980’s. Subsequent numbers refer to newer and upcoming technology.






2G
2G phones use digital networks. Going all‐digital allowed for the introduction of digital data services, such as SMS and email. 2G networks and their digital nature also made it more difficult to eavesdrop on mobile phone calls.

3G
3G networks are an in between standard. 3G is seen more as pre4G instead of a standard of its own. The advantage 3G networks have over 2G networks is speed. 3G networks are built to handle the needs of today’s wireless users. This standard of wireless networks increases the speed of internet browsing, picture and video messaging, and handheld GPS use.

4G
4G (AKA Beyond 3G) is like the other generations in that its advantage lies in promised increased speeds in data transmission. There is currently no formal definition for 4G, but there are objectives. One of these objectives is for 4G to become a fully IP‐based system, much like modern computer networks. The supposed speeds for 4G will be between 100 Mbit/s and 1 Gbit/s.