Reflection Blog 19

.txt and .doc files are both file types that store text information. .doc files have an advantage over .txt files because .doc files can store formatting while .txt cannot. .jpg and .gif are both file types that store image information. .gif has an advantage over .jpg in that .gif files can store animations whereas .jpg files cannot.

We cannot have just one universal standard format for all of each media type because different types of programs and machines have different rules and standard that govern information interpretation.

Reflection Blog 18

One advantage of using hexadecimal and then converting it into binary rather than just using binary directly is that some people/machines prefer interpreting hexadecimal information rather than binary code. Color images might be encoded using a different number system by using symbols to represent particular colors. Adding more colors to an image increasing the amount of code needed to represent the image.

Reflection Blog 17

One might magnify or reduce an image (e.g. make it twice or half the size) by tweaking the amount of pixels used in an image.

Expanding my heuristic so that it accounts for encoding images that contain color would significantly increase the amount of information (i.e., bytes) needed to represent the image.

Reflection Blog 16

A small compression rate for one set of text might be just as good as a large compression rate for another because different sets of text are composed of different font styles, text sizes, and characters.

One major challenge for developing a good text compression heuristic is the face that there is no "best method" for developing a good text compression heuristic. There is no such thing as a "one size fits all" approach for heuristics because different sets of text are composed of different font styles, text sizes, and characters.

Reflection Blog 15

The meaning of "large" or "small" varies greatly in terms of data size depending on the type of data being stored. For instance, short emails usually take up about 2 Kilobytes (2,000 bytes) of data whereas a hard drive might contain 4 x 1,099,511,627,776 bytes of data. As you can see, there are many different ways that data can be used and the scale of this varies greatly depending on the type of data being stored.

Reflection Blog 14

What is Internet Censorship?

Internet Censorship is defined as “the control or suppression of what can be accessed, published, or viewed on the Internet.” (Wikipedia)

Why does Internet Censorship exist?

Internet Censorship exists for several different reasons including self-censorship for moral, religious, or business reasons, or out of fear of other legal consequences.

The extent of internet censorship

The extent of internet censorship varies greatly between different countries. Most democratic nations, such as the U.S., engage in only mild to moderate internet censorship. However, some countries heavily censor general information such as political news in an attempt at reducing intellectual discussion between citizens. One prime example of this is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, more commonly known as North Korea. The North Korean regime censors all information regarding international affairs with the sole purpose of propagating the false idea that their nation is the most powerful nation in the world.  Their methods have been likened to totalitarian propaganda and blatant brainwashing.

I just talked about how Internet Censorship can be used for malicious purposes. What are some beneficial things that internet censorship could possibly bring about?

Almost all advocates of internet censorship argue that the main reason the internet needs to be censored by the government is because it can possibly reduce access to illicit drugs, sex trafficking, human trafficking, and child pornography.

The problem with this, though, is that all of these things have existed since the beginnings of human civilization, way before the internet was even remotely considered a practical idea. Furthermore, the internet is not even the main procedure by which people access these things. So essentially what we’re doing is giving the government power to eliminate nothing. Soon after this, the government will pass more legislation to increase their scope of power, like they always do, which in this case will be in regards to the internet.

Reflection Blog 13

I found the "elements" tool the most interesting out of all the developer tools because the "elements" tool showed all of the various elements of code that made up a webpage.

One thing I was able to do with the developer tools was look through the code under the "elements" tab and try to figure out which part of the code referred to which component of the website.

A benefit of using these tools is that any user is able to access the source code for webpages and understand how they work. A concern or caution of developer tools is that some people who run websites may not want their users to look through the code that makes up their website.

Reflection Blog 12

Domain name differs from IP addresses in that domain names do not change whereas IP addresses do. The domain name of a website refers to the web addresses that humans are familiar with, such as "www.google.com". On the other hand, an IP address is a collection of numbers and periods used in the TCP/IP system to send and request data.

Reflection Blog 11

Redundancy is defined as "the inclusion of extra components that are not strictly necessary to functioning, in case of failure in other components." Redundancy is useful in addressing the problems that occur with sending and receiving information on the internet because it provides additional information as a backup if a network system fails to function properly.

One problem that may occur when sending multiple packets is the possibility of some packets dropping. Network redundancy is something that may alleviate this issue by providing backup if information fails to reach its recipient.

Reflection Blog 10

Information that travels across the Internet is not sent all at once. Rather, it is broken down into small blocks of data called packets. This is done to limit data loss, improve speed, and provide efficient network usage. There could possibly be an option for me to send my message to all available IP addresses if I wanted to send a message to everyone on my network.

We can obtain much information from looking at a router log. We can view messages sent, who sent the message, who received the message, and at what time the message was sent. This alters my understanding of anonymity/security on the internet because it demonstrates to me that nobody is truly anonymous on the internet since all traffic can be tracked and monitored as evidenced by the router log in the net sim.

Reflection Blog 9

The system that my group came up with was a simple protocol in ASCII. For each message, we typed out our name to indicate the sender and the coordinates of our target. We did not need to send information about who each person was targeting since we already determined who would be targeting who as part of the protocol.

One challenge that could occur while playing battleship on the internet sim is that players have the ability to cheat. The protocol that my group and I devised did not ensure a way to prevent players from changing the position of their own battleships.

Reflection Blog 8

The internet is the large network of computers that are connected to each other all over the world. Prototypes of the internet were established in the early 1960s by computer science university researchers. In modern society, wireless networks allow people to connect to the internet and use it how they please. The internet is intended for anyone who can afford access to it for various purposes. In some parts of the world, such as North Korea and China, many parts of the internet are censored and controlled.

Not everyone has access to the internet; Some people cannot afford the cost of wi-fi access, while others live in countries where the internet is censored heavily. Furthermore, some internet service provides block certain websites that they do not want their users to access. We can overcome these obstacles by advocating political change. We can ask the government to create legislation that would negate these various issues that prevent many from having full internet access.

The idea of Net Neutrality is that all access to websites should be equal and without restriction. I support Net Neutrality because I am against the idea of internet services providers censoring certain websites for their users. One could argue that net neutrality is bad because it prevents companies from steering their users towards particular brands of media. I disagree with this idea because I think that we should not let companies choose for us our interests and forms of entertainment.

Reflection Blog 7

One major challenge that arose in our efforts to create a working protocol was the issue of how we would convey to each other which pieces of text would be formatted in what manner. We thought about this problem and came up with the solution of using a string of unusual characters to signify that the following text would be formatted in a particular style.

HyperText Markup Language (HTML) uses tags such as "<b>" to indicate that the following text should be formatted in a particular style. Our approach is similar to HyperText Markup Language (HTML) in that it signifies formatting style through the use of special characters.

One significant disadvantage that ASCII has is that it is limited to basic english alphabet characters and common symbols. Other encoding standards, such as Unicode, has a much larger number of special characters including some non-western symbols.

Reflection Blog 6

My partner Mr. Ren and I encountered no problems in our efforts to create a working protocol for the sending numbers activity.

One challenge that arose as our drawings became larger and more complicated was that the process of reading the binary messages and converting them into coordinates was relatively tedious and inefficient. We might overcome this challenge simply by practicing reading binary, so we are able to convert binary messages into coordinates at a faster pace.

This activity is directly relevant to the internet because it demonstrates how information can be sent between computers using binary code.

Reflection Blog 5

My thought process for converting from decimal to binary is quite elementary: I simply count up in binary to whatever number I am trying to obtain. For larger numbers, I have relatively big binary numbers and their decimal values memorized to speed up the process. I use the same system of counting for converting from binary numbers to decimal numbers.

I might be able to use this approach to convert between other base systems by memorizing certain values within the system to speed up the process of counting up numbers. Simply counting up by itself is inefficient, thus memorizing larger values will help me to convert values faster.

Reflection Blog 4

My group's numbering system was composed of numeric values assigned to a particular shape, as follows: 

1 = Circle

2 = Triangle

3 = Square

In this numbering system, each pattern is assigned a 3-digit number comprised of the individual component's assigned values. For example, the pattern "Circle - Triangle - Square" would have a numeric value of "123" since Circle corresponds to 1, Triangle to 2, and Square to 3. One major challenge my group encountered while establishing this system was that we had difficulty describing how our system worked in words. We overcame this challenge by working together to create a set of clearly defined rules in our composition notebooks. 

One advantage to the system that my group and I established is that the 3-digit number counts upwards intuitively as patterns change in a logical manner. 

1. "Circle - Circle - Circle" = "111"

2. "Circle - Circle - Triangle" = "112"

3. "Circle - Circle - Square" = "113"

4. "Circle - Triangle - Circle" = "121"

5. "Circle - Triangle - Triangle" = "122"

6. "Circle - Triangle - Square" = "123"

7. "Circle - Square - Circle" = "131"

8. "Circle - Square - Triangle" = "132"

9. "Circle - Square - Square" = "133"

10. "Triangle - Circle - Circle" = "211"

...etc

One insight that I have gained from reading "Computation: A New Way of Science" is that computer science is much more relevant in today's society than it was a generation ago. In modern society, computations are used in almost all fields of study including engineering, science, commerce, literature, art, and music. 

Reflection Blog 3

     The protocol that my partner and I decided on for sending and receiving messages utilized the time loop that was part of the internet simulator. We decided to have the sender send messages at
the beginning of the time loop and the receiver receive messages at the end of the time loop.
     Collaboration impacted the development of my protocol because my partner and I were forced to cooperate in order to receive and send binary messages efficiently. We were presented with the challenge of establishing a system that would allow us to send and receive binary messages without error.
    No changes need to be made to our current protocol since we have tested our method several times without error or incident.

Reflection Blog 2

     The question "What did you do this week?" cannot be answered with a binary message because there are more than 2 possible answers to this question. A binnary message is a message that can only be one of two possible values. 

     We decided to send a message as a sequence of states (A and B) rather than modifying our devices to represent more states (State C, State D, State E, ...) due to the fact that sending messages as a sequence of states opens up more possible types of answers while not over complicating the system of messages. 

     Collaboration impacted the development of my protocol because my partner and I were forced to cooperate and jointly come up with a system of messaging using our device (flashlight). Working in a group presented us with several different challenges, such as the fact that my partner and I had to be open to each other's ideas without only focusing on our own. Ultimately, collaboration positively impacted my final product due to the fact that my partner and I worked together to establish the most efficient system of messaging we could come up with. 

Reflection Blog 1

     Artificial Intelligence is a possible technological innovation for the 21st century. I think that there is a need for this innovation to come about in modern society because AI will be able to process many different types of trivial tasks at a significantly faster pace relative to humans.
     The dangers of AI being used for malevolent purposes is one barrier that may hinder the realization of this innovation. However, if we prototype different versions of AI and allow its access to the general public, it will be more difficult for a group of people to use AI for malevolent purposes due to the fact that everyone would have access to this same potential.
     Many other fields besides technology, such as business, architecture, and psychology, can benefit from innovation and prototyping. Businesses can prototype models of marketing/sales while psychologists can prototype systems of therapy.