Poet Ponders the Digital

A drawing made in Tux Paint using various brushes and the Paint tool. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley November 2, 2015 Deadline December 2015 Issue Randomly clicking on letters, the young boy I was watching play an educational game “won” each level. He paid no attention to the letters themselves. His focus was on the dancing aliens at the end of each alphabet invasion. Situations like this occur in classrooms and homes every day. Technology appeals to parents, politicians and some educators as a path towards more effective teaching. We often bring technology into our schools and homes, imagining the latest gadgets and software will magically transfer skills and information to our children. This school year, I left teaching business communications to return to my doctoral specialty in education, technology and language development. As a board member of an autism-related charity, I speak to groups on how technology both helps and hinders special edu...

RFID chip pulled from new credit card (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley October 5, 2015 Deadline November 2015 Issue This summer, I had a credit card “cloned” while driving along the Interstate 76 Tollway. Because I check my credit card statements online after any trip, I noticed the fraudulent charges and cancelled the card. Credit cards remain one of the easiest targets for criminals and no easy solution seems likely. Two years ago, I had another credit card number stolen by a waiter. Local police informed me that such thefts remained the most common form of credit card fraud. In both instances, I did everything “right” and was still a victim of thieves. The waiter stealing card numbers asked to see my driver’s license before walking away from the table. He was writing down numbers, expiration dates and card verification values while standing behind a low wall. With these data, another criminal ran charges at a convenience store, listing charges as...

English: An HP LaserJet 4200 dtns printer (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley August 31, 2015 Deadline October 2015 Issue Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek hacked a Jeep in July of this year. Chrysler recalled 1.4 million vehicles to fix issues with the “Uconnect” network, which used cellular Internet connections to enable features like remote access. If you’ve wondered how OnStar and similar services, like Uconnect, unlock car doors, now you know. They use the Internet. Uber, the ride-scheduling app company, hired Miller and Valasek in August to work on security for Uber’s autonomous automobile project, since a self-driving car requires network and GPS access to function properly. Everything in an autonomous vehicle is computerized and this invites potential mischief. Uber hired hackers to identify security vulnerabilities. General Motors, Volkswagen and other car companies have been tested by hackers. The 2016 Corvette’s braking system has been hacke...

An illustration of an example IPv6 address (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley July 27, 2015 Deadline September 2015 Issue That convenient flashlight app knows where you are. So do your social media apps, your Web browser, your clock and many other apps on your phone, tablet and computer. And there’s not much you can do to hide. Many people don’t understand how their devices offer the functionality we love and worry upon hearing our devices and software track us constantly. And much of that information remains behind on our devices, or stored elsewhere beyond our control, because we agree to that in return for features, convenience and cheap (or free) apps. When you download an application or operating system, you agree to various terms and conditions. For example, to use Adobe Creative Cloud or Microsoft Office365, you agree that your computer will connect to corporate servers weekly and verify your subscription is paid. Adobe and Microsoft servers ...

Zork I cover art (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley July 6, 2015 Deadline August 2015 Issue “This is an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. There is a small mailbox here. A rubber mat saying ‘Welcome to Zork !’ lies by the door.” These familiar words, which I once read on the blue screen of a Commodore 64, now appeared on my iPhone. Considered one of the first dozen computer games ever developed, Zork has a special place in computing history. Zork launched what is known as interactive fiction or text adventures. In 1977, four programmers working in the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science created the interactive fiction story “Zork.” Some of these friends would go on to create one of the earliest video game publishers, Infocom. From 1979 through 1986, Infocom was one of the leading game publishers, marketing games for every major home computer. Purchased by Activision in 1986, the Infocom brand and its classic games live on, a...

Film camera collection. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley June 5, 2015 Deadline July 2015 Issue Every weekend a small group of filmmakers I know make at least one three-minute movie and share the short film on their YouTube channel, 3X7 Films. Inspired by the 48-Hour Film Project (48hourfilm.com), my colleagues started to joke about entering a 48-hour contest each month. Someone suggested that it might be possible to make a three-minute movie every week. Soon, 3X7 Films was launched as a Facebook group and members started to assemble teams to make movies. The 48-Hour Film Project, also known as 48HFP, launched in 2001 by Mark Ruppert. He convinced some colleagues in Washington, D.C., that they could make a movie in 48 hours. The idea became a friendly competition. Fifteen years later, 48HFP is an international phenomenon, with competitions in cities around the world. Regional winners compete in national and international festivals. On a Friday nig...

Sample of BASH through a shell in GNOME. Screenshot taken in Arch Linux (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley May 4, 2015 Deadline June 2015 Issue Personal computer and device operating systems are the personalities of the machines. The choices we make when selecting an operating system , or the choices we have made for us, determine how we interact with the digital world. Regardless of whether you prefer (or need to use) Windows, OS X , Linux or BSD , the operating systems do the same basic work. Click a mouse button, tap a touchscreen or type a letter and the operating system converts your action into something applications understand. The operating system determines how to manage software tasks and communicates with the hardware of a device to send or receive data. Operating systems accept commands or actions from users and software (input) and then display, print or otherwise communicate the results of these commands (output) to other software or the h...

Lego Digital Designer (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley April 6, 2015 Deadline May 2015 Issue Building things provides me with hours of relaxation and a sense of accomplishment. As children, we appreciate the creativity expressed by Tinker Toys, K’nex, Lincoln Logs and LEGO bricks . As we age, we discover new building kits, from detailed plastic models to advanced robotics kits. Yet, for many of us nothing beats the plastic, stud-covered bricks. Though LEGO remains the undisputed king of plastic bricks, interesting kits are available from Best-Lock and Mega Bloks. And recently, I discovered the challenges of working with Nanoblocks from Japanese toy company Kawada. Nanoblocks are one-eighth the size of standard blocks. Following standard plans, the resulting models are incredibly small. The real joy of bricks, however, isn’t in following a plan designed by someone else. Completing a Taj Mahal or Empire State Building model feels like a huge accompl...

English: Dual disk drive (Combo Floppy drive) for 5.25 and 3.5 inch with floppy disks Deutsch: Duales Diskettenlaufwerk (Combo Floppy Drive) für 5 1/4 und 3 1/2 Zoll Disketten der Firma Canon Modell MD5511-V6 mit Disketten (Kombilaufwerk), Herstellung ca. 1995 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley March 1, 2015 Deadline April 2015 Issue Sharing files and collaborating elevate computers beyond being glorified typewriters, ledger books and filing cabinets. I appreciate the convenience of using a word processor compared to typing on my old manual Smith Corona and nobody wants to trade spreadsheets for paper, but it is the portability of data that makes computing revolutionary. Beyond automating and improving the efficiency of tasks, moving data allows us to collaborate and develop better ideas. Today, we use “the cloud” to share data via the Internet. We upload files to servers operated by Google, Microsoft, Apple and several cloud-specific companies like D...

The Etsy office's community workspace area. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Visalia Direct: Virtual Valley February 2, 2015 Deadline March 2015 Issue Artisans often spend as much time trying to sell their works as creating them. Traveling throughout the Valley, and beyond, the artists I know set up booths at county fairs, craft shows, farmer’s markets and other events, trying to entice buyers interested in handmade items. A few local galleries and stores offer space to artists, and a handful of artists have spaces of their own. But, many of our creative artists need greater opportunity. For arts and crafts, the leading online marketplace remains Etsy. In less than a decade, Etsy has established itself as the place online shoppers go first, which means artisans should have a presence in the Etsy community. A few competing online marketplaces exist, such as ArtFire and Zibbet , but none rival the popularity of Etsy. Craft fairs have overhead, from booth rental feels to the ...