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[decodingcoding]

CSS

We are finishing up with html this week which I find quite scarier as I found that hard (even though that is the most basic of the basic). I am however, very excited to start CSS as it will mean I will be able to make my own websites and it won’t look like something from 1997.

I kind of lied when I said I found it hard. I find that there is a lot to learn with html but Ruairi’s extremely good at explaining it so it genuinely all makes sense. He had showed us a snippet of CSS and honestly, it did look quite intimidating but I am looking forward to learning it at testing it out (even for my own personal use). 

I don’t have much to say in the blog this week as we haven’t started CSS yet but I did want to give an update on it as I am very excited to start. Next week’s blog will be in more detail but for now, enjoy my image for this post!

Caoimhe Lally 

[decodingcoding]

GIFS GIFS JIFS????

In class today we delved further into the world of HTML and touched on GIFS. We all know what GIFS are in 2019 as they are deeply rooted into our meme culture and including their usage in everyday texting. GIFS were actually created over 20 years and appear to be an extremely outdated source of technology yet we use them just as frequently as we use the English language and even EMOJIS. 

They consist of a reel or graphic played over and over again in very low quality and yet as a society they are extremely popular. The point of this blog however, is to express how although they were assumed extinct 10 years ago by 2019, they are more relevant than they ever were which is just like the concept of a physical book.

Books were to be considered outdated by the technological development of the Kindle but the publishing industry (for books that is) is still a growing industry. In this regards it shows that even though we have come up with better and more efficient ideas over time, some ideas never grow old as they are ingrained into our make up and the simplicity of them is almost like a comfort in an ever changing world.

As a disclaimer, I am not comparing a GIF to a book however, I am stating that even in the world of technology with advancements every single day, we as humans still resort back to a simpler time. I really don’t think the inventor of the GIF thought that it would have such a cultural impact 20 years after its discovery. Do you?

Caoimhe Lally

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[decodingcoding]

Welcome to YouTube

I recently started a YouTube channel where I raise awareness for mental health. It was something that I had always wanted to do but I was always very afraid of what people may think. I had thought that a lot of people from my hometown would cringe at the thought of it and so I put it off for a really long time. Finally I plucked up the courage to record and edit (badly) my first video and upload it online which was honestly terrifying. I posted it and immediately turned off my laptop and phone.

The response was overwhelming, receiving messages from people I did not even know thanking me for uploading the video. This was a real confidence boost and encouraged me to keep going with the channel as it was having such a positive impact.

On Monday, I recorded my second video and uploaded it. I was just as nervous uploading this video cause it went into more depth about the topic and my own experiences but as soon as I clicked publish I felt a release. My friends were extremely supportive sharing the video across their social media platforms generating more publicity. Obviously it has not gone viral but it is a start.

It is only the beginning but I would like to make this blog my opportunity to track my progress as I feel that this course as a whole will help me a lot in growing my channel. I plan to integrate what I learn in class into my YouTube channel and hopefully what it grow throughout the year and into the future.

Please subscribe my account is called Caoimhe Lally! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrV-3JCUL7F-LEbh46xCfhg?view_as=subscriber

[decodingcoding]

The Seven Sins of Memory with Daniel Schacter

I decided to listen to this discussion as I had done my undergraduate degree in psychology and I have always been fascinated with the topic of memory and how our brains process memories both episodic memory and semantic memory. I find the whole idea of memory quite fascinating as it is such an ambiguous term and has so many different avenues on what can be learned about it. From my own personal experience, I know that I have a very prominent episodic memory as I am able to remember very specific events in my past even from a very young age. However, the fascinating thing about this is asking oneself the question, are these memories exactly how they happened or are they altered over time to what (I) think is what happened. Something else that I have always found interesting is the idea of false memory and manipulating a memory in someone’s brain that never took place. As humans we can convince ourselves that a certain event has taken place even if it has not at all.

Dr Daniel Schacter has had a long career in memory spanning over 40 years. He did his undergraduate degree in the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill and then went on to study his post grad in the University of Toronto. He then continued on there as a member of the faculty before transferring to the University of Arizona and then onto Harvard where he is a current member of faculty.

What I learned from this discussion was the difference between explicit memory and implicit memory ie conscious and subconscious memory. An interesting study that Dr Schacter discussed was the case of HM, a famous amnesiac patient in the 1960s who had damage to his hippocampus. He underwent an operation to remove his hippocampus which caused detrimental effects to his memory. As a result of this he was unable to establish any new memories post operation. However, although he could not recall memories, he was able to conduct certain tasks that he had learned. Every time he would perform the task his ability would increase and he would get better at demonstrating it even though he would have no conscious memory of performing the task.

As a result of this, researchers and psychologists began to study the term now known as priming. This occurs when someone has had the exposure to a particular stimulus  in the past, which the effects responses even though there is no conscious memory of the stimulus ever being learned. A simple experiment that was conducted by Dr Schacter and his team was presenting a group of amnesiac patients a list of words and afterwards giving them a series of tests. One of the explicit memory tests would be presenting a word that was previously in the list and asking had they seen it in that said list already. The patients would have a hard time comprehending if they had seen the word before. The implicit test would involve showing the patient  the start of a word and asking them to complete the word with the first word that would come to mind. The amnesiac would more than likely choose a word that had been present on the list previously than picking a completely irrelevant word.

https://www.bridgingthegaps.ie/2015/01/on-the-seven-sins-of-memory-with-daniel-schacter/

[decodingcoding]

Vlog to Blog

I decided to make my first blog post about my first experience during the first week of the Web Authoring module. If I’m honest, I did not know what to expect and the first day was quite intimidating as I had never heard or knew the meaning of the terms being used (although it was called basics).

I listened quite intently in the class as I feared that I would fall behind and not understand. Assuming I would daze off I shocked myself into actually paying attention and grasping what Ruairi was saying (even if it was basics). Although I had understood what was going on I was fully aware this was our first lecture of the entire course and we weren’t exactly being thrown into the deep end.

The following day instead of a lab we had another lecture were we saw how html actually worked and what all the coding terms meant. I had expected I wouldn’t understand even the simplest of web design but again, I had surprised myself by actually knowing exactly what was going on. Honestly, the only reason I picked it up straight away was because we actually used to use html unknown to ourselves when we would post on each other’s ‘walls’ back in the Bebo days before Facebook took over the world.

To conclude my first blog I’d just like to say I’m excited for the year ahead and what I will accomplish in this module and others alike.

Caoimhe Lally

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