Welcome To The World Of Tomorrow

Unit introduction

How do websites work? How do emails reach your computer? How does the use of computer applications affect your daily life? This unit provides an introduction to the modern online world. Starting with your own experiences, you will extend your knowledge of online services and investigate the technology and software that supports them. You will learn more about a range of services including email, online data storage, collaborative software, search engines and blogging.
This unit will help you understand the main technologies and processes behind the internet and investigate how they come together to let you view websites and send information across the world. The internet and web of tomorrow will be even more powerful, more connected, more intuitive and a more important part of our lives. This will result in an internet of services, objects and infrastructure (ubiquitous computing) which will radically change our lives. For example, smart appliances will be able to talk to each other, clothes will monitor our health and retailers will access social media to gain insight into shoppers’ preferences.
You will explore a range of digital devices, such as smart phones and digital music players and consider the technology that enables these devices to share and exchange information.
This technology has created new concerns regarding security and privacy. You will investigate these concerns and consider how users should behave online to safeguard themselves and respect others.
This unit is essential if you are considering a career in the IT sector. Online systems and technology have become part of everyday work, so being able to understand and work with this technology is relevant in many roles in the industry.

This unit supports all of the optional specialist units in the Award, especially: Unit 4: Creating Digital Animation, Unit 5: Creating Digital Audio, Unit 6: Creating Digital Graphics, and Unit 7: Creating Digital Video. It also supports Unit 8: Mobile Apps Development, Unit 9: Spreadsheet Development, Unit 10: Database Development, Unit 11: Computer Networks and Unit 13: Website Development, as these technologies form an important part of our online world.

TASK

TIP:
HELP

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the different online services available to uses. Student will identify the different online services with examples of thier use and present these in a variety of different ways through the participation of set activities.  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will be able to identify the what Online Communications services that there are providing examples of sites and platforms that can be used with the pros and cons.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to identify different educational platforms and sites that can be used in the delivery of educational materials.

3. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to identify and explain business uses of online services and what benefit this provides them

4. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to discuss and evaluate the downloading services available to users of the internet, reflecting on the pro's and con's

5. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to identify the different entertainment services available to users. 
 

Online services

Communication, real-time information, commerce, government, education, virtual learning environments, business, entertainment, download services Key terms in online communication

Whats an online service? How do i know if im using one!
The easiest way to remember this is by thinking, am i connected to the internet? If the answer is yes then you are using an online service. How about sending information to another person, maybe via email, am i using an online service? The answer is yes, sending an email requires an internet connection. So how can i access online serivces?

In small groups of 3 list the devices that you would consider to be able to access online services. (5 Min's)

The devices that you have provided all have some way of accessing the internet be it mobile or other, so when you consider that these devices are able to do this what other devices could be developed to do this?

In different groups of 3 list the devices that you would consider to be able to access online services now. (5 Min's)

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
is this devices connecting to the internet!?

Now that we have briefly looked at the devices that you could use to connect to the internet we should look at how the online services can be and are used.
Each of the services that are used have a number of advantageious points to them that benefit individuals and groups in business and society. We first need to understand what these are in order to be able to review them further. So online services can be,

1. Communication
2. Real-time information
3. Commerce
4. Government
5. Education
6. Virtual learning environment
7. Business (different types of organisations)
8. Entertainment
9. Download Services

FACTIOD:
The communication platform Skype was sold to Microsoft for a reported 8.5 billion US Dollars in 2011 and is said to have over 600 million users.

Now that you have some understanding think abount the internet services and online services that you use.
Individualy create a list of the online services that you have used or know of, and provide some inforamtion to the examples of the service in what you could do. (5 min's)

Now in small teams using your lists colaborate your lists together and organise (put in order of popularity) your services, you should also give a brief justification of why you decided this.

Now that we have reviewed the areas of Communications, Real-time and Commerce using the activity sheet in the resources are (ACT1) list the Pro's and Con's of online commerce.
(20 min's)

 

Visit the UK Government site and review the services that are offered by the site.
(10 min's)

 

When we look at the Govenment services that are available we can look closer to home! If you consider your local council, these are run by individuals that are linked in some way to central govenment. The policys and legislation this is created by MPS (Members of Parliment) and Lords in parliment are enforced by your council. So all of this information can be found in a couple of areas. These being your local councils web sites and the government site.
So when we look at the serivces available we can do things like,

1. Tax - You can pay for your car road tax
2. Financial Tax- You may wish to create your own business and you need to pay tax on your profits and earnings
3. Benefits - You may not have any employment so may be able to apply for work/ jobseeker benefits
4. Benefits - You may have a child and bew able to claim child tax benefits
5. Poll Tax/Counsil Tax - You or the person you live with will have to pay for key services such as firefighters, police and road and path cleaners amongst many other services

Education

This section of the online services area should be easy for you to recall. You should refer to your past experiances in school and at college. Now that you have been studying at this institution for a number of weeks now you have without a doubt accessed a learning area online. You will have probably been prompted to use your username and password to login. In most cases you will be using Moodle.
There are others that are available to use,

In small groups (no larger than 3) create a list of the Educational online serivces you know or have used.

We know that there are more than we can list however below are a couple

1. BBC Bytesize
2. AQA
3. Sound Learning
4. TES (Times Educational Suppliment)
5. MyMaths

There are a mixture of VLE's (Virtual Learning Environment) and online websites that allow access to information and learning resources.

Business

Banking is an area where businesss can access information about thier accounts, they can also send money to others and between accounts, as well as make payments to clients, individuals and companies.
Some online business' offer services online that enable clients and customers to compare things.

Using a text editor of your choice create a simple docuent of the sites that might fall in to the catagory of comparison site.
You should look to include;
•Screenshots of the site
• What services they compare
 

We know that there are more than we can list however below are a couple

1. BBC Bytesize
2. AQA
3. Sound Learning
4. TES (Times Educational Suppliment)
5. MyMaths

There are a mixture of VLE's (Virtual Learning Environment) and online websites that allow access to information and learning resources.

Entertainment

These services enable the access to the areas that we would consider and enjoyable and pleasing to use. These services can be catagorised in a number of areas.

In a group, discuss the entertainment area and the online services that would be available
You should look to use flip chart paper to help your thought showers (mind mapping)

Download Services

These services enable you to gain access to programs, music, information and other. These are most often linked to sites like, Piratebay and other torrent sites, however, we must not forget legitimate and legal sites and services such as iTunes e.t.c

In a group, discuss the download services area
You should look to use flip chart paper to help your thought showers (mind mapping)

Downloading is widely used by players and user and also machines. When we break down the area of download services we must consider ALL the users, and not limit this to humans.
Lets look at our PC's, how do we know that they are safe to use and that there is no chance of our files and documents being deleated?
If you think a little deeper, what services do we use to protect our computers?
•Windows Defender
• Security Essentials
•Anti Virus

QUESTION!! What happens after you install these programs? are you protected for life? How do you ensure that they are up to date?
ANSWER!! We must access the programs updater to enable it to run and check for new downloads of updates, and this should be done fairly often, some systems do this automatically.

Think about how you use the internet and online services. Working independently, list all the online services you use and provide examples of how you use each service.
Swap your list with a partner and compare them. Discuss the different types of services you have both listed.

Working in small groups, discuss which services are most popular and why you think this is. Decide on which services are most important for:

businesses

schools and colleges

people wanting to communicate with friends and family.

(40 min's)

 

Online services

Communication, real-time information, commerce, government, education, virtual learning environments, business, entertainment, download services Key terms in online communication

We as users of the internet can find that we are in situations where it appears and we don’t even realise it.
Using your experience of the online world create a simple document that discusses where we might see ad’s and adverts, additional to this identify why they and also the benefits of having them on your products

When we are look ing at the use and effectiveness of the onilne services we should also consider the business uses. When we in business company's will try to promote themselves and thier products online. This is important as this method can be seen by billions of people accross the world.

So how can this be done?

Advertising online can be done in a number of ways, this can be, via search engines. This is possibly the most viewed yet not really understood.
When you look at a search engines results pages based on the criteria you put in you will see some links have a yellow ad sign next to them and in some cases the top two results will be ad's.
As seen in the image below.

The reason that this is here is because the owner of the business has paid the search engine (in this case Google) to promote thier company when a set phrase or word is entered by the user. The owner in some cases will pay google each time a person clicks on the link this is called Pay Per Click or PPC. Pay Per Click Advertising uses others websites to host a digital advert, if a visitor to the site likes the advert and clicks on it because it might have a link to another product that they may consider buying, then they are taken to that website. The owner of the website that hosted the advert that was displayed will receive a small payment. This Pay-Per-Click system is also known as an affiliate model. This model is provided by a number of companies, such as, Google AdWords’, Yahoo Search Marketing and Microsoft adCenter.

ACTIVITY:
In small groups of 3 list the devices that you would consider to be able to access online services. (5 Min's)

Other advertising that can be used online is the use of Banners and Pop-ups. Business can register with search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo! so that their websites appear high up in a list of keyword searches, this is done by the company paying for links that appear when a user does a search. This can be seen when a search is done by the top two sites having the word sponsored against it.

ACTIVITY:
In small groups of 2 list the online services sites that you have visited that have pop-up and banner adverts on them.(hint:you will not need to go to far) (5 Min's)

Banners and pop-ups are a frustration of most web users, whether they are just browsing or looking for something specific. In most situations the banners and pop-up's are annimated so that they draw attention to themselves. These are in most cases distractions from the content of the page and an iratation to the visitor to the pages. Banner and pop-up ads often appear at the top of web pages or pop up on web pages and in

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
Where do you find most examples of banners and pop-up's and why? (10 min's)

Email is an alternative option for advertising.

In small groups of 3 discuss and create notes on whether Email a serious option to advertise or not and Why?(10 min's)

Email in the most part is informative and is used to make contact with individuals to present them with information that could be focused to thier needs, requirements and or interests. This can be both benificial to businesses and to clients however there are common issues associated with this, these could be,

1. Spam filters
2. Incorrect addresses
3. None active accounts

These issues are likely to stop communication reaching individuals. We must remember that the use of this method of communication has areas that the bussiness must consider inorder for it to be effective, these are,

1. Captures the users attention, use of images and colour
2. Retains user interest, some interactivty such as a video

FACTIOD:
47 per cent of consumers expect an e-commerce page to load in two seconds or less.

Using your newly gained knowledge of ad’s and averts and how they capture attention and also how they can distract people’s attention, you are to create your own still image of an advert that you could place on a web site or video. You are able to use any of the graphical editing software’s available in class and you have the rest of the session to create this. You are able to use any existing products that are around or you can make your own up.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the different online services available to uses. Student will identify the different online services with examples of thier use and present these in a variety of different ways through the participation of set activities.  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will be able to identify the what Online Communications services that there are and how they can make use of banners and ads with the pros and cons.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to explain the use of Pay Per Click.
 

Online services

Communication, real-time information, commerce, government, education, virtual learning environments, business, entertainment, download services Key terms in online communication

We as users of the internet can find that we are in situations where it appears and we don’t even realise it.
Using your experience of the online world create a simple document that discusses where we might see ad’s and adverts, additional to this identify why they and also the benefits of having them on your products

When we are look ing at the use and effectiveness of the onilne services we should also consider the business uses. When we in business company's will try to promote themselves and thier products online. This is important as this method can be seen by billions of people accross the world.

So how can this be done?

Advertising online can be done in a number of ways, this can be, via search engines. This is possibly the most viewed yet not really understood.
When you look at a search engines results pages based on the criteria you put in you will see some links have a yellow ad sign next to them and in some cases the top two results will be ad's.
As seen in the image below.

The reason that this is here is because the owner of the business has paid the search engine (in this case Google) to promote thier company when a set phrase or word is entered by the user. The owner in some cases will pay google each time a person clicks on the link this is called Pay Per Click or PPC. Pay Per Click Advertising uses others websites to host a digital advert, if a visitor to the site likes the advert and clicks on it because it might have a link to another product that they may consider buying, then they are taken to that website. The owner of the website that hosted the advert that was displayed will receive a small payment. This Pay-Per-Click system is also known as an affiliate model. This model is provided by a number of companies, such as, Google AdWords’, Yahoo Search Marketing and Microsoft adCenter.

In small groups of 3 list the devices that you would consider to be able to access online services. (5 Min's)

Other advertising that can be used online is the use of Banners and Pop-ups. Business can register with search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo! so that their websites appear high up in a list of keyword searches, this is done by the company paying for links that appear when a user does a search. This can be seen when a search is done by the top two sites having the word sponsored against it.

In small groups of 2 list the online services sites that you have visited that have pop-up and banner adverts on them.(hint:you will not need to go to far) (5 Min's)

Banners and pop-ups are a frustration of most web users, whether they are just browsing or looking for something specific. In most situations the banners and pop-up's are annimated so that they draw attention to themselves. These are in most cases distractions from the content of the page and an iratation to the visitor to the pages. Banner and pop-up ads often appear at the top of web pages or pop up on web pages and in

Where do you find most examples of banners and pop-up's and why? (10 min's)

Email is an alternative option for advertising.

In small groups of 3 discuss and create notes on whether Email a serious option to advertise or not and Why?(10 min's)

Email in the most part is informative and is used to make contact with individuals to present them with information that could be focused to thier needs, requirements and or interests. This can be both benificial to businesses and to clients however there are common issues associated with this, these could be,

1. Spam filters
2. Incorrect addresses
3. None active accounts

These issues are likely to stop communication reaching individuals. We must remember that the use of this method of communication has areas that the bussiness must consider inorder for it to be effective, these are,

1. Captures the users attention, use of images and colour
2. Retains user interest, some interactivty such as a video

47 per cent of consumers expect an e-commerce page to load in two seconds or less.

Using your newly gained knowledge of ad’s and averts and how they capture attention and also how they can distract people’s attention, you are to create your own still image of an advert that you could place on a web site or video. You are able to use any of the graphical editing software’s available in class and you have the rest of the session to create this. You are able to use any existing products that are around or you can make your own up.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the different online services available to uses. Student will identify the different online services with examples of thier use and present these in a variety of different ways through the participation of set activities.  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will

2. By the end of the weeks page students will 

Online communication

Contemporary social media

In our society today people with common interests gather together to share their views and opinions as well as create ideas. In many situations people that share these interests form club’s for example, football clubs, hockey clubs, chess clubs and gaming clubs these are not limited to just clubs there are gatherings of groups that create a society where they read, discuss and develop ideas as well as review others that may have been created already, an example is an historical society. However, with the ever increasing use of the internet there has been an impact on the way that we communicate and share information with each other.

Online communities

Anyone that has some computer skills and knowledge can use equipment and services to create a groups or ‘societies’ online using things like blogs. The groups are often known as online communities, which allow users access to a place where people with similar interests can come together discuss and swap their views and opinions. Sometimes the communities exist in a virtual world online. This is an unreal world created by the computer. Popular examples include SecondLife, Twinity and Habbo. The World of Warcraft virtual world a wide covering online community covering a large global area the gaming virtual world supports multi-player gaming enables users to buy, sell and share virtual reality products and equipment between them as well as create loyalty and allegiances between groups.

Netetiquette

When using the online world to communicate a special behaviour or etiquette should be used and is often know as netiquette. The use of netiquette is designed to reduce, restrict and prevent abusive online behaviour. These rules are used widely across the internet online areas and if a user is found to be breaking these rules they may be removed from the online communication areas that they are in and in more severe cases reported to the police. Other individuals may also report users to the site admins of the possible breach of the netetiquette rules.

Exam Question: What do you understand by the term "Netetiquette" [2]

Create a poster to educate a teenager to the rules of Netetiquette 

Information exchanges

When using communities’ members often make available information to its members by the use of contemporary social media, this could be information to gatherings offline, special events that maybe coming up soon that have financial gains, for example discounts, or free previews. Other ways that users are able to share information other than through social media would be via the use of

Web logs or blogs, these are continually updated online journals very much like diary’s which enable authors to express their ideas, thoughts and feelings to others and the community can respond in turn to the author. In most web logs, a blog includes text, photos and sometimes video.
Microblogging sites are sites which allows users to create and exchange short text entries, these are popular, an example of this type of site is Twitter.
An area in which most are familiar are Wikis. These are sites where people provide information to visitors to the site that can extend and edit, often they are used to share information and are useful for research. However please remember that these are moderated and in some cases fact is fiction, you should always seek a secondary source of information to prove or disprove your findings.
Finally, chatrooms. This is an online communication that almost all users of the internet are familiar with, found in most communities this is sometimes referred to as chat. This can be also found on sites like Facebook.

Exam Question: Which of these is NOT an example of an Information exchange?
1. Twitter
2. Wikipedia
3. Reddit
4. BBC

DISCUSSION TIME!!!

The way that we use technology has changed how we communicate with each other. Find out what the most common forms of communication were 50 years ago, 100 years ago, and 150 years ago. How do these methods compare with modern forms of communication?
 

Create a presentation on Netetiquette, provide information to what it means and the rules to obey and how to be safe. Remember that this infomation might be used by a person that is new to using the internet e.g Your Grandparent.

When we look in to the use of online communication in most parts we think to “Real Time” however online communications can be done in the past and then reused at a later date, this can come in the form of Podcasts. Podcasts are a number of audio or video files that are downloadable from internet sites. These are usually published in episodes of events, this could be a radio shows morning schedule, an example would be that of Radio One or Heart FM. These allow fans of the show to catch up with the music, interviews, news and general chat. This process is also known a vlog when the use of videos are involved. One of the world’s most recognizable vlogs is Youtube.

Youtube was purchased by Google in 2006 for a reported £883 Million pounds.

Communication as we know happens anywhere and at any time, we just have to remember that we are doing it. So when we learn we are communicating, we are just listening or reading more than telling or responding. One of the platforms online that we use to communicate in education is via the use of Virtual Learning Environments (VLE), not to dissimilar to this very site. Within our school communities we come across a number of different VLE’s some noteworthy ones are

1. Moodle
2. Edmodo
3. Blackboard

The use of these covers a wide range of areas of assessment and communication, the ability for the submission of a digital piece of work that can enable the tutor to explain (Communicate) to the student the areas of success and the areas that require improvements. VLE’s a not limited to just the submission of work but also enabling the use of poles, survey and discussion forums around the work. VLE’s also are great for returning to the subject matter at a later time to catch-up or to test knowledge that has been covered in sessions.

Socail Media

We know that this area is one on the most frequently visited web areas on a day to day basis. As mentioned in an earlier “Factoid” approximately 2.8 billion social media accounts are active, that is increadable considering that the reported user levels of the internet are reported to be 3.01 billion.
The use of social media has enabled users across the world to interconnect and communicate between themselves through the simple creation of a user profile. Users are able to add information about themselves and add pictures and videos of things that they like or

DISCUSSION TIME:
Over the past decade the use of social media has grown to huge levels, however with this global exposure of personal information and activities is the use of social media a good thing?

There have been a number of social media sites over the years, some of the best known were, “Friendster”,”MySpace” and “Bebo”.
1. How do these sites compare with the commonly used sites like Facebook and Google+. 2 . Provide your own opinion as to whether you feel that use these sites differently now to when they first became popular.

Social Networking

The area of Social Networking can be misunderstood, most people refer to this as facebook, however this is not entirely true, Social networking is used in business circles as well.
The use of the Linked in, this is used in the business world to promote individual acomplishments and abilities. These are then verified by those that you have worked for and with. These Social networks also enable users to share information and communicate of similar finding or information to others quickly.

Create your own Linked In profile using your own private email (as any school or college email may be unaccessible once you leave) consider how this platform promotes your self and your skills and qualities. It is worth remembering that this could be a window in to employment as employers review your social presence online as a way to see if your the right candidate for them.

Instant Messaging

As we have covered previously, Instant messaging enables a real time communication between users, this could be used in the business area of finance where a stock broker sends a message to another broker to purchase a number of shares in a company, or it would be a message between you and a bank clerk to a question about the interest rates on your bank account.

This way of communicating is effective as an alternative to the telephone, however there are risks to this communication type, the written word can be interpreted in a number of ways and something that has been written to be funny may offend another, so miscommunication is an issue.
In some instances virues can be communicated via instant messaging.

Discussion time, in groups consider what are the risks of instant messaging are? Have you ever had a situation where you have found it to be misused? What protection measures could you use? What support is there?

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

The use of VoIP over the past 10 years has increase dramatically. VoIP uses digital signals of voice and video and sends these over the Internet between a number of points, this enables the users to have a conversation from anywhere in the world.
a common VoIP application used by many is Skype.

VoIP is used in a number of business as an alternative to the conventional telephone, this use of VoIP enable a cleaner conversation without any interference however if there is a power cut or network outage this will not work.
Because VoIP is digital data it can suffer from security issues, this could be the use of identity theft, viruses, spamming and phishing.

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
Where do you find most examples of banners and pop-up's and why? (10 min's)

Email in the most part is informative and is used to make contact with individuals to present them with information that could be focused to thier needs, requirements and or interests. This can be both benificial to businesses and to clients however there are common issues associated with this, these could be,

1. Spam filters
2. Incorrect addresses
3. None active accounts

These issues are likely to stop communication reaching individuals. We must remember that the use of this method of communication has areas that the bussiness must consider inorder for it to be effective, these are,

1. Captures the users attention, use of images and colour
2. Retains user interest, some interactivty such as a video

Discussion Time: in groups of 2, discuss the impact that emails have on a company if misused. What about the risks to users of email. What could you and a company do to reduce these risks?

FACTIOD:
47 per cent of consumers expect an e-commerce page to load in two seconds or less.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the different online communication available to uses. Student will identify the different online communication platforms and services with examples of them, students will be able to explain the behaviours that should be used when using these platforms and understand the risks of using them. Students will participate in discussions and activities to enable them to present thier knowledge and understanding.  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will identify and provide examples of contemporary social media.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will 

Exam Time: You will now attempt a mock of an exam that uses similar questions to that in the actual exam.




 

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the different online communication available to uses. Student will identify the different online communication platforms and services with examples of them, students will be able to explain the behaviours that should be used when using these platforms and understand the risks of using them. Students will participate in discussions and activities to enable them to present thier knowledge and understanding.  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will identify and provide examples of contemporary social media.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will 

Online communication

Contemporary social media

In our society today people with common interests gather together to share their views and opinions as well as create ideas. In many situations people that share these interests form club’s for example, football clubs, hockey clubs, chess clubs and gaming clubs these are not limited to just clubs there are gatherings of groups that create a society where they read, discuss and develop ideas as well as review others that may have been created already, an example is an historical society. However, with the ever increasing use of the internet there has been an impact on the way that we communicate and share information with each other.

Online communities

Anyone that has some computer skills and knowledge can use equipment and services to create a groups or ‘societies’ online using things like blogs. The groups are often known as online communities, which allow users access to a place where people with similar interests can come together discuss and swap their views and opinions. Sometimes the communities exist in a virtual world online. This is an unreal world created by the computer. Popular examples include SecondLife, Twinity and Habbo. The World of Warcraft virtual world a wide covering online community covering a large global area the gaming virtual world supports multi-player gaming enables users to buy, sell and share virtual reality products and equipment between them as well as create loyalty and allegiances between groups.

Netetiquette

When using the online world to communicate a special behaviour or etiquette should be used and is often know as netiquette. The use of netiquette is designed to reduce, restrict and prevent abusive online behaviour. These rules are used widely across the internet online areas and if a user is found to be breaking these rules they may be removed from the online communication areas that they are in and in more severe cases reported to the police. Other individuals may also report users to the site admins of the possible breach of the netetiquette rules.

Information exchanges

When using communities’ members often make available information to its members by the use of contemporary social media, this could be information to gatherings offline, special events that maybe coming up soon that have financial gains, for example discounts, or free previews. Other ways that users are able to share information other than through social media would be via the use of

Web logs or blogs, these are continually updated online journals very much like diary’s which enable authors to express their ideas, thoughts and feelings to others and the community can respond in turn to the author. In most web logs, a blog includes text, photos and sometimes video.
Microblogging sites are sites which allows users to create and exchange short text entries, these are popular, an example of this type of site is Twitter.
An area in which most are familiar are Wikis. These are sites where people provide information to visitors to the site that can extend and edit, often they are used to share information and are useful for research. However please remember that these are moderated and in some cases fact is fiction, you should always seek a secondary source of information to prove or disprove your findings.
Finally, chatrooms. This is an online communication that almost all users of the internet are familiar with, found in most communities this is sometimes referred to as chat. This can be also found on sites like Facebook.

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
The way that we use technology has changed how we communicate with each other. Find out what the most common forms of communication were 50 years ago, 100 years ago, and 150 years ago. How do these methods compare with modern forms of communication?
 

Create a presentation on Netetiquette, provide information to what it means and the rules to obey and how to be safe. Remember that this infomation might be used by a person that is new to using the internet e.g Your Grandparent.

When we look in to the use of online communication in most parts we think to “Real Time” however online communications can be done in the past and then reused at a later date, this can come in the form of Podcasts. Podcasts are a number of audio or video files that are downloadable from internet sites. These are usually published in episodes of events, this could be a radio shows morning schedule, an example would be that of Radio One or Heart FM. These allow fans of the show to catch up with the music, interviews, news and general chat. This process is also known a vlog when the use of videos are involved. One of the world’s most recognizable vlogs is Youtube.

Youtube was purchased by Google in 2006 for a reported £883 Million pounds.

Communication as we know happens anywhere and at any time, we just have to remember that we are doing it. So when we learn we are communicating, we are just listening or reading more than telling or responding. One of the platforms online that we use to communicate in education is via the use of Virtual Learning Environments (VLE), not to dissimilar to this very site. Within our school communities we come across a number of different VLE’s some noteworthy ones are

1. Moodle
2. Edmodo
3. Blackboard

The use of these covers a wide range of areas of assessment and communication, the ability for the submission of a digital piece of work that can enable the tutor to explain (Communicate) to the student the areas of success and the areas that require improvements. VLE’s a not limited to just the submission of work but also enabling the use of poles, survey and discussion forums around the work. VLE’s also are great for returning to the subject matter at a later time to catch-up or to test knowledge that has been covered in sessions.

Social Media

We know that this area is one on the most frequently visited web areas on a day to day basis. As mentioned in an earlier “Factoid” approximately 2.8 billion social media accounts are active, that is increadable considering that the reported user levels of the internet are reported to be 3.01 billion.
The use of social media has enabled users across the world to interconnect and communicate between themselves through the simple creation of a user profile. Users are able to add information about themselves and add pictures and videos of things that they like or have done. 

DISCUSSION TIME:
Over the past decade the use of social media has grown to huge levels, however with this global exposure of personal information and activities is the use of social media a good thing?

There have been a number of social media sites over the years, some of the best known were, “Friendster”,”MySpace” and “Bebo”.
1. How do these sites compare with the commonly used sites like Facebook and Google+. 2 . Provide your own opinion as to whether you feel that use these sites differently now to when they first became popular.

Social Networking

The area of Social Networking can be misunderstood, most people refer to this as facebook, however this is not entirely true, Social networking is used in business circles as well.
The use of the Linked in, this is used in the business world to promote individual acomplishments and abilities. These are then verified by those that you have worked for and with. These Social networks also enable users to share information and communicate of similar finding or information to others quickly.

Instant Messaging

As we have covered previously, Instant messaging enables a real time communication between users, this could be used in the business area of finance where a stock broker sends a message to another broker to purchase a number of shares in a company, or it would be a message between you and a bank clerk to a question about the interest rates on your bank account.

This way of communicating is effective as an alternative to the telephone, however there are risks to this communication type, the written word can be interpreted in a number of ways and something that has been written to be funny may offend another, so miscommunication is an issue.
In some instances virues can be communicated via instant messaging.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

The use of VoIP over the past 10 years has increase dramatically. VoIP uses digital signals of voice and video and sends these over the Internet between a number of points, this enables the users to have a conversation from anywhere in the world.
a common VoIP application used by many is Skype.

VoIP is used in a number of business as an alternative to the conventional telephone, this use of VoIP enable a cleaner conversation without any interference however if there is a power cut or network outage this will not work.
Because VoIP is digital data it can suffer from security issues, this could be the use of identity theft, viruses, spamming and phishing.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn how online communication systems like email collect and use data to improve user experiences additional to the associated risks.

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will be able to identify and provide examples of issues associated with emails for business's.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to explain benefits of using email communications.

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
Where do you find most examples of banners and pop-up's and why? (10 min's)

Email in the most part is informative and is used to make contact with individuals to present them with information that could be focused to thier needs, requirements and or interests. This can be both benificial to businesses and to clients however there are common issues associated with this, these could be,

1. Spam filters
2. Incorrect addresses
3. None active accounts

These issues are likely to stop communication reaching individuals. We must remember that the use of this method of communication has areas that the bussiness must consider inorder for it to be effective, these are,

1. Captures the users attention, use of images and colour
2. Retains user interest, some interactivty such as a video

FACTIOD:
47 per cent of consumers expect an e-commerce page to load in two seconds or less.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this weeks page, students will learn the implications of online communication. Students will examine the risks and benefits of using instant messaging and Voice over IP (VOIP).  Students will explore cloud computing and ubiquitous computer and how these appear in our every day lives.

Objectives:
1. By the end of this weeks page students will be able to identify and provide examples of issues associated with the use of online communication systesm for person and business's uses.

2. By the end of the weeks page students will be able to explain where cloud computing is used and how ubiquitous computing appears in our every day lives. 

Implications of online communication

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
Instant messages can also include basic images, the most common of which are faces which show different expressions. These are referred to emoticons. Smiley faces are represented as :) and sad faces are represented as :( .

Fahlman is credited with originating the first smiley emoticon, which he thought would help people on a message board at Carnegie Mellon to distinguish serious posts from jokes. He proposed the use of :-) and :-( for this purpose, and the symbols caught on. The original message from which these symbols originated was posted on September 19, 1982.
The message was recovered by Jeff Baird on September 10, 2002[6] and is quoted:
"
From: Scott E Fahlman


I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use

:-(
"

To give an apreciation to Scott Fahlman create a document to explain what he is credited with creating, to a person that would not known who he is, or, what he brought in to almost everybodys lives.
As we know emoticons are used everywhere and there are now more advanced emotions available for use, in your document include the modern day versions of these smileys and exaplain why you think that these are such a sucess.

Social networking

Social networking websites have developed, evolved and ultimately changed the way that we communicate with each other. The use of Social media has enabled people to communicate interactively and in real time from anywhere across the world. Groups of people can exchange and share information quickly a benifit of this is cost as the only cost is that of a broadband connection. Social networking provides a great way of staying upto date with friends and businesses.

It is well worth remembering that you must be careful in what you post on social media as this can be seen by potential employers.

Instant Messaging

Instant messaging is used widely and is a great way to exchange text messages, this is an alternative to the telephone conversations and the costs are very much cheaper. Messages are sent in real time, and the responses are received instantaneously.
We must remember that there are some disadvantages to the use of Instant Messaging (IM) these are:
When using text the emotions that are present when it is written are better expressed in person and these can be misinterprested by the recipients. Some may see it as jest/humerious others as an attack or agressive.

It is also very important that we use caution when sending an instant message as it is sent quickly, viruses can be attached to them an this can then spread very quickly.

http://pcworld.com/

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) allows users to interact in real time over the internet using voice and video messaging. Skype is one of the most widely used VOIP services used across the globe. When used across the globe via businesses programmes like Skype can enable companys to reduce thier travel costs, travel time (and therefore loss of productivity during this time) and the cost of hiring a venue.
We must remember however that with any new technology, VoIP has its limitations these are things like
Reliability, VoIP service is reliant on the quality and reliability the internet connection at the location that it is being used at.
Other issues that are linked to limitations of VOIP
If there was a power cut VOIP systems will not work as they require electricity to run. Traditional phones do not require electricity.
The voice quality can sometimes be distorted or there may be long pauses.The
Security of the system as VOIP uses the internet hackers can intercept information and steal identity's,attach viruses, and phishing are all threats.

Cloud and Cloud Computing

The term Cloud computing means the use of a computer service on other company's computers, these are commonly known a hosts. There are a number of well-known hosting companies that offer cloud computing these include, Microsoft and Google. Cloud users are able to use software access data and storage on the host computers, which will be at a remote location, the joy of this is that those with PC's and systems that are limited can still use the software, storage and data. To access these services users will use a web browser or mobile app, without ever directly accessing the servers that the information is stored on. cloud storage is related to cloud computing – it is where only the storage, access and retrieval facilities are provided by the host provider, often via the internet.

The term ‘the internet of objects’ is credited as first being used by Kevin Ashton in 1999. Find out about the context in which Ashton used the term. Is it still relevant today?

FACTIOD:
The term ‘cloud’ is often used as a metaphor for the internet. The exact origin of where the term cloud computing comes from is unclear but many believe it relates to drawings which used clouds to denote networks in diagrams of computing and communications systems.

Ubiquitous computing systems

We must first understand what Ubiquitous means! ‘existing everywhere’. Processors can be embedded in any device, including clothing, appliances, vehicles, buildings and people, to connect them to the internet so that the data generated by the processors will be readily available.

FACTOID:
When Mark Weiser coined the phrase "ubiquitous computing" in 1988 he envisioned computers embedded in walls, in tabletops, and in everyday objects.

DISCUSSION:
Let us consider following, Is the hardware getting smaller and smaller?
What is the smallest computer you own?
What is the smallest computer you know?

Using your research skills, explore the following areas;
1. Smart Dust
2. Nanotechnology

Because we now know what the term Ubiquitous means lets look in to is application.

http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net

We use computers now in most parts of our daily lives, in most cases we dont even realise that we are.

In groups of 2, create a list of the Ubiquitous computing systems you interact with in a single day.

Some of the most common elements of Ubiquitous computing are in action in the videos below.

    
An area that is also linked to ubiquitous computing is "Pervasive Computing" as per the video below.

RFID

The use of modern technology in our day to day activities are suprising, you will have used it today to enter the school, college and even work or as part of your journey.
RFID chips are a common addition to most cards used to gain entry to a location or to allow right of passage. RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification Chip, these are a small chip that talks to another device to enable the owner of the chip to undertake an action.

DISCUSSION:
Lets review in a group where these may be used in schools and colleges?

Over the past few decades this technology has been used to enable people to make the crossings over and under the Thames as trouble free as they could via the use of the Darttag. This device that was located in the frount of the car acted like a key, so when a car got close to the barrier, the sensors would receieve a responce from the RFID chip to say that this car is owned by an individual that has pre-paid for the crossing, so allow them through.

This is also the same concept for owners of gaurages, when a car with an RFID chip in it approaches the gaurage the door will open automatically without the user pressing any buttons, or getting out to open the door.


Other examples of RFID in action would be the use of cat flaps, only allowing cats with the correct chip in its collar to enter the house.

Domestic fridges have RFID chips in them to allow the fridges to monitor and track the contents and if they get low to create an order to replenish the items.

RFID chips are often used in retail stores where high value products are sold, these chips can be attached to clothing

or these can be found on the CD's and DVD cases

Problems with ubiquitous computing

Privacy issues: Probably the most important problem is that ubiquitous computing environments pose serious privacy risks. By watching everything a user does these systems have the potential to leak all our actions, preferences, and locations to others unknown to us, now or in the future.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

 Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this week's page, students will learn .  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this week's page students will be able to 

2. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

3. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

4. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

5. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

The Internet

The Internet, the digital platform that none of us can bare to be without! However it is worth remembering that the internet is not limited to the web, it includes email, data storage and wireless networking.
The evolution of the internet is said to have begun in the 1960's where small US government sites (mostly army) were linked via a network that enabled messages to be sent between them, it was created in responce to tensions between the US and the USSR commonly known as the cold war.

We must first fully understand how the internet works before we go any further. The internet comprises of a number of interconnected computers, these systems have software installed on them that enables them to view information (client) or to present information (server).
These systems are connected to make up a network called a WAN or Wide Area Network. These links go between servers and hosts to create a web of links, that enable users to request information for a website that may be stored on a server located the other side of the world.

Now that we have some understanding to the connections between servers and the clients we should look to the terms and vocabulary that are commonly used.
 

Point of Presence (PoP)

This term relates to the location or presence of the required hardware that is used to allow the users of the internet to connect too the internet. At this point ISP, or Internet Service Providers may have a number of PoP's in small geographical area to ensure good internet access.

Network Access Point(NAP)

This term relates to the networks on the internet that enable ISP's to interchange their connections with other ISP's Service Providers may have a number of PoP's in small geographical area to ensure good internet access.

Internet Protocol (IP)

This protocol is used to move packets of data across the internet. The packets is an individual unit that information and data is carried in, these packets of data have other elements to them that enable the required information to know where to return to and in what order it is to be put back together again in. It is worth remember that the data that is sent back to a user from a server can take different routes to other bits of the data sent back.
IP is part of the other function which deals with Transmission Control Protocol or TCP to organise the messages in to internet packets

Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)

This is a protocol that is used to take the information from users applications or programs to then pass it on to the IP to send it across the internet. This process is repeated at the destination but in reverse. Because of the direct link and nature of this protocol to the Internet Protocol (IP) they are combined to create TCP/IP

File Transfer Protocol (FTP)

This protocol is the stanard used to enable the transfer of files between two computer systems. This allows people like web developers to create a website on thier computers and then once happy for them to send it to the web server using FTP. These web servers then host the website for the worlds users to access.

Internet Service Provider (ISP)

Internet Service Providers are the companys that allow users to access the internet. These company's offer packages to users enabling them play games, read the news or to send emails. This then allows users to pay for the type of users that they are, heavy, mild or occasional users.

ACTIVITY:
In small groups of 3 list the devices that you would consider to be able to access online services. (5 Min's)

Internet Make-up

http://oer.nios.ac.in/

The internet is a large network that is made up of lots of networks. These networks are inter-connnected to create large networks that allow users to navigate through to reach the location of the information, or web page that they require.
Below is a simple image of the infrustucture of the internet from a small scale point of view.

https://open-stand.org

The image diplays well the connections between servers and clients in the internet system, it is worth remembering what these elements are and understanding what they do.
 

Server

Servers are used to store data and files. These machines are used direclty to serve other computers called clients. These Machines run specific software to enable the connection of other machines to it and to send information to them from it.
Withing the internet and inside small company networks servers can take a number of roles, these are

1. Email server
2. Web server
3. File server
4. Print server

Client

These are computer systems that are used to connect to servers to enable access to files, printing and email.
 

Router

This is a hardware device that is used to connect to the internet. This device takes the messages recived back from the internet and routes it to the device that requested it. Routers have other operations that look at security and check that the information or "packets" of data are not virues or trojans.
 

Connecting Backbone

This is the connection between large networks on the internet and other networks in other areas. The internet covers the globe and some countrys are islands and require the connection of a physical cable to enable this connection.
Below is a map of these connections.

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Technology/Pix/pictures/2008/02/01/SeaCableHi.jpg

How to connect to the internet?

Broadband Connection

Now that we have some understanding to the make up of the internet and the structure of the most common part of the network lets look at how we can connect to the internet.
We know and understand that we use a different devices on the internet, however at times we use them without consideration. The most common way of connecting to internet is via Broadband, this is a wired connection that in most cases requires a machine to have a Network Interface Card or NIC to connect to a modem that connects to an ISP. The advantage of this direct wired connection is that the users can experiance a mostly reliable service and at high speeds, however the disadvantages of this is that the users are limited to single physical location.

Wireless Connection

Wireless connections to the internet are where the device requesting the information is not connected physically to another element of hardware. This is common of mobile phones and some tablet computers. The benefit of using wireless connections are that the users is able to move about with the device to an number of location, and it not reliant on a static piece of hardware. The drawbacks of this is that a number of locations are outside of the wireless signal, the speeds in which the data is sent can be extreamly slow and the connections are less secure than that of wired.

Dial-up Connection

Now that we have some understanding to the make up of the internet and the structure of the most common part of the network lets look at how we can connect to the internet.
We know and understand that we use a different devices on the internet, however at times we use them without consideration. The most common way of connecting to internet is via Broadband, this is a wired connection that in most cases requires a machine to have a Network Interface Card or NIC to connect to a modem that connects to an ISP. The advantage of this direct wired connection is that the users can experiance a mostly reliable service and at high speeds, however the disadvantages of this is that the users are limited to single physical location.

ACTIVITY:

FACTIOD:

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

 Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this week's page, students will learn .  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this week's page students will be able to 

2. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

3. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

4. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

5. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

World Wide Web

http://tw.rpi.edu/

The World Wide Web as we know it is credited to a single persons visions and commitment to enable people to have access to information in an easy linked way. Sir Tim Burners-Lee an Englishman created the core elements to enable the hosting and sharing of information using a number of protocols.

HTTP – HyperText Transfer Protocol
URL – Uniform Resource Locator


The platform that Burners-Lee provided enabled people to turn computers in to webservers to share the information that was on them to others using the correct software. The webserver stores the original file and then if a user requests to see this file a copy of it is sent to the user/client.

When we look in to webpages we can see that these pages are linked together via the use of Hyperlinks, these are a kind of string that allows some one to follow the string to another page. Websites are made up of a number of these links and some of them can be to webpages that have been created by other people.

As mentioned earlier, users/clients use special software in order to request these files and webpages, these are often referred to as Browsers. These programs interpret the information that is sent to them by the webserver and present the webpages in a form that we can recognise. The information that is sent by the webserver is the webpages code, this is known as HTML or HyperText Mark-up Language. This code is created by the user/owner of the webpage and uses Tags to create the pages. Theses HTML tags always start with a bracket < and then close with a bracket > and example of this is in the box below.

There a lots of HTML tags that are used to create a webpage below is a small example of a few of them It is worth noting that most HTML tags have what are known as closing tags as per the example below

a paragraph

URLS

As discussed earlier one of the protocols that is used in the use of Surfing the Web is the use of a URL, these are used to direct a user to the correct location of a website. Lets look a little deeper, an owner of a website will use a computer to Host the website that they have created, this computer will have an address, this address is known as an IP address (this has been covered earlier, week 8) this address like your home address is unique, however the address is a IP number which could be something like 210.68.187.250 this number has no meaning and could be easily forgotten, so we use a service called a DNS or Domain Name Service that links the IP addresses to a written address like http://www.MyStudentSite.co.uk. 
An URL also has other information in it to help the client’s software known what to do and where to go, The HTTP://www.MyStudentSite.Co.Uk/Subjects/OnlineWorld1/index.html
HTTP:// part of the URL tells the browser that the Protocol will be for a webpage
www.MyStudentSite.co.uk tells the browser the Domain which is the name/address of the website
/Subjects/OnlineWorld1/index.html tells the browser the Path of a specific part of the webserver to gather information

Search Engines

Search engines are a great way to find information from across the web, the search engine acts like a form of yellow pages or Thompson Local.

http://s.hswstatic.com/gif/market-online-business-2.jpg

There are number of popular search engines that are available, these are Bing, Google, Ask however there are a number of alternatives to these popular engines, and also there are a number of engines that were popular however they fell out of favour.

ACTIVITY: create a time line of web browsers.

The search engine will take a word, sentence or phrase and look over its database of web pages and it will look for the keywords and then present the user a list of the possible matches that have been found based on the search. In order for the search engines to gather this data they have a few tools that is uses to gain these vital references. Search engines use of Crawlers to read the webpages content and create a list of common words and terms that occur on the page, these crawlers then return the information to the search engines database to be indexed like a library system. These crawlers are also known as Web spiders, Web crawlers and bots. These are all automated and have no human involvement. Other ways that websites can appear on search engines, and to be listed at the top of the page is by paying to search engine to list them on the top of the criteria when a user enters a Keyword. These are known as sponsored links.

Email – Purpose and Use

What is Email? Often referred to as Electronic mail, email is a digital letter sent to someone that may require information or may need to be aware of information that is being discussed and sent. Email systems have a number of points to which are important and essential to enable users to send the mail. When looking at the image above we can see that users have a number of inputs and buttons that can be used and are required to be used to send the message. Let’s look in to them with a little more focus.
To .. – This area is one of the required area that are used to identify whom the message is required to be sent to.
Cc .. - This area is used to enable users to add people/users to see the message, however the message may not directly affect them. An example of this would be a message sent to a child inviting them to a party but the mother of the child was Cc’d about it so that she knew that they had been invited. Cc stands for Carbon Copy.
The Send Button – This is used to send the message once the person has entered an address of the people that they wish it to go to.
The Paper Clip Button – This is used to enable the users to attach a file to the email.
Address Book – This is where the information of people’s addresses and other details are stored, this is similar to the traditional paper version of an address book.

Create an infographic that highlights and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of emails. Include the use of CC and BCC and the capabilities of Email.

High Priority – This button enables users to make the recipient/ receiver of the email aware that the contents are important, this could be something like a change of room for a lesson that is due after lunch.

Low Priority – This button enables users to make the recipient/ receiver of the email aware that the contents are of low importance, this could be something like a message wishing people a Happy Christmas.

The Flag – This is a button that allows the recipient to put a flag on an email that they have read to review or action something later.

Emails have a number of other features and tools that can be used and most are common across different email software.

When we use email we must consider a number of areas and be aware of potential disadvantages of using such a system. We know that we are able to send emails that have attachments to them, however these can spread viruses. We can send these emails to multiple people at once, this could open up more users to virus infections quickly It is faster that Post or Snail mail as it became to be known.
You can record information in to a contact book of people’s addresses so that you can respond to them when required. Lots of web company’s offer email accounts for users to create their own bespoke names, e.g. [email protected] and these can be accessed anywhere an internet connection exists. We know that emails can be intercepted and data stolen and or edited to enable users to get information for unsuspecting users. Some users in the real world send emails pretending to be someone or a company to try and get others to send personal information, this is called Phishing. Things to look for that identify spam emails are misselt words, requests for pin numbers, email address that are very strainge.
Those of us with email find that our email accounts are at times flooded with emails that have no relevance to us at all, this is called Spam.
IMAGE of Spam.

How Email works

http://www.successbydesigns.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/imap_pop.jpg

An email account uses a number of different Protocols to send and receive emails, these are;
POP3 – Post Office Protocol 3 – This protocol Pulls the email from an email server to a client’s PC when requested
IMAP – Internet Message Access Protocol – This is used for Webmail
SMTP – Simple Mail Transfer Protocol – This protocol pushes the email from the mail server to the clients pc when a new mail arrives.


The email server will store the email on the server until the client is ready and requests the email.

 

Data Exchange Packet Switching

The term packet switching refers to the process of data being broken in to parts called packets before it is sent over a network or the internet and then how it is reassembled when it gets to its destination. When we look at the packets each will have a section of the data contained within it, these are limited in their size. A packet will have the following information contained within it; Error Control Bits – This part of the packet checks to see if the packet has been assembled correctly.
Data (Payload) – The core data being sent.
Source Address – Where the data packet has comefrom.
Destination Address – Where the data packet is intended to go.
Packet Identification – This part of the packet identifies the packet type so that the system knows how to reassemble them.

The life of a packet

VOIP and Packet Switching

As we have covered in earlier sessions VOIP or Voice Over Internet Protocol is a great way to communicate over the internet. Because VIOP data is sent over the internet these data packet will need to go through packet switching, however there is a small additional step, VIOP makes use of a thing called CODEC, this term is created from the following two process that are done to the data.
COmpression - This reduces the size of the original data to smaller digital file sizes that are then in sizes to be broken in to packets that can be sent on
DECompression – This takes the packets data and decompress it back in to the form that can be presented to the user at the other end.
 

Why do we use packet switching, what are the benefits?

The use of breaking down the data in to packets means that the file if they were big would not clog up the network as parts of it can be sent a chunk at a time and then once the complete packet group arrives it will construct them back in to the correct order. Using packet switching allows for the users to have an added security element as if a packet is intercepted it only contains small parts of the data in it. There is a disadvantage to this method as if a packet is lost or corrupted during transmission the whole file will not be received correctly.

Data Exchange and Transmission Modes

We understand that almost everything that communicates will have a sender and a receiver, this is not only computers it could be phones, printers and remote controls. How these communicate are a little more detailed.

Full-Duplex - Consider a verbal conversation both people can talk at once, there are devices that can do this also, things like networks.

http://ecomputernotes.com/images/Full-Duplex-Mode.jpg

Half-Duplex – Consider a conversation or a question one device/person listens then the other reponds one they have all the information. The conversation can go both ways but cannot transmit at the same time

http://www.sqa.org.uk/e-learning/NetTechDC01BCD/images/pic012.jpg

Simplex – This is a one way conversation, this is common of TV remote controls.

http://ncsmindia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/26.jpg

Characteristics of Data Transfer

http://helpingtutorial.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/serial-communication.html

Serial – In a serial connection the information communicated across the connection is sent a bit at a time, this allows the information to be sent over large distances, however this infomation is broken in to parts to be communicated.

Parallel - In a parallel connection with a device data can be communicated simultaneously over a physical connection for example a printer cable. Because of the way that this can send information simultaneously the data is communicated faster, however a downside to this type of transmission is that the data can only travel over a small distance, the maximum recommended by most cable manufacturers is approximatly 5 meters.

Wired Transmission Methods

Let’s now look at what ways we can send information between devices using a physical method of connections.
Firstly we should review where we come in to contact with these connections!
During our day to day activities we watch TV and we use our computers. How do these devices receive their signals? Lets look closer.
Your computer connects to a network that communicates data packets around it to hopefully be received by the intended device, this information travels from your PC (when wired to the network) through an Ethernet cable also referred to as network cable. These cables are made up of a number of small cables in side of a plastic protective layer that wraps around it. Inside of these cables are 8 small strands

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Ethernet Cables

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These cables can come in two different types these are UTP and STP these terms mean that the cable has additional features that the other has not.

UTP – Unshielded Twisted Pair, these cables are all twisted inside of the cable
STP – Shielded Twisted Pair, an additional layer of protection has been added to enable the cables data to be protected from interference.

This is commonly used in home computing because of the expense as these cables are cheap to create and cheap to buy and are reliable.
However it is worth remembering that these are not able to shield from digital noise which is when a cable is close to another digital device or signal.

Coaxial

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This is commonly used in the connection of TV and aerials, they are very reliable in transferring the TV signals to the TV. This type of communication was previously used in computing before the use of Ethernet cables.

Fibre Optic

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This is by far the fastest connection that can be used to transfer information. Using light computers send this information down the cables a lightening speeds. This technology is very expensive however and very complicated to install. The cables are made from either glass or high quality plastic. Because the signals sent are light the information can be sent over long distances.These are commonly used in the connections of server on the Backbone of a network.

How its made
 How it works

Wireless Transmission Methods

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Let’s now look at what ways we can send information between devices using a wireless method of connections.
Firstly we should review where we come in to contact with these connections!
During our day to day activities we use our mobile phone and our laptops. How do these devices receive their signals? Lets look closer.
Your computer connects to a network that communicates data packets around it to hopefully be received by the intended device, this information travels from your PC (when connect the network) through an wireless connection also known as WIFI.
WiFi is also known as Wireless Fidelity.

There are a number wireless methods to send information from device to device, these are,

Infrared

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This form of wireless connection is not able to carry large amounts of information, and is limited in it range, normally this technology is used for things like remote controls for TV's, however early handheld PDA computers used this to send very small bits of data over a short distance, Like the TV remote these devices were required to be in line of sight for it to work.
 

Microwave

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This communication transmission uses shortwave to send information. It is one of the most commonly used short range communication methods, it is recognised as bluetooth.

Satalite

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This is by best for connection, using satalites that are in orbit around the world data can be sent up and down quickly over large geographical areas.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

 Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this week's page, students will learn .  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this week's page students will be able to 

2. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

3. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

4. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

5. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

Client-Side Processing

In the area of the website development and design the creator/author of the website will use what is known as Client-side processing to enable the use of some code to run on the machine viewing the website. Why is this of value?

lets look at the processing of data, it can take time to send information back and forth between cleints and servers , this can take up valuable bandwith from both sides. A good example of this is where a use is inputting information like thier email address, if the user enters this wrong it could affect the whole registration of a new user to a membership of a blog or even to log in. So checks are put in place to make sure that the email is using the correct layout, so it has and @ sign and .co.uk or any other version of a top level domain.

Could you imagine Facebook, all the new users on facebook entering the email address information wrong on the sign up page this information is sent to the server, the server then checks the information, it realises that this is wrong and sends a message back to the user. If it has to do this on a number of requests the server will slow down and could crash.

So we use client sidde processing to run these checks, this information is not sensitive, however we would NOT check the password on the client side due to security.
Areas where this processing may happen would be the loading of games and things like role over images where the image changes to another when a users mouse hovers over another image.

Server-Side Processing

Server side procesing happens once a request has been sent it, this could be an original request for a webpage, or it could be the information to login to the system, things like blog, online commerce sites and online email. The server will have a number of pages that are dynamic that can send a customised webpage back to the user based upon the login details that it has recieved. Server sider processing is brower indepentant so it will not worry what browser the user is using at the other end when it sends its responce.
Caution has to be taken when sending information to the server as this is going out over the internet where it can be intercepted.
Servers can crash when put under stress, this could be like when a new product becomes availble for online ordering and millions of users try to access the server at once.

Databases

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As they say in london you are only a matter of feet from a rat, the same is true of databases.
Databases are every where, from the use of a car park payment system recording the registration number of the cars that are in the car park at a time, to the booking of an appointment at a doctors or dentist.
Databases collect and provide information to users but how do they work? Lets look in to this a little deaper

Databases use areas called tables, these tables are set up by the owner to capture selected information that is required. This table could be set up to gather information on a person, this could have the following "fields" within the table,

• Customer_id
• Name
• Surname
• Address
• DOB (Date of Birth)

Each databases field can be set to only allow certian types of data to be input in to them, these can be;

Database Relationships

Databases have the ability to make our lives easier, they can tell us things like the current stock levels of a new release of a games or the cost of a train ticket between two locations. This data however is not stored in a single location/table, it is stored acorss a number of them.
Let us consider the following, you live in a house with your parent, therefore you all have the same address, is thie not a waste of time re-entering it over and over again, can i not just reference to it! The answer is Yes!
By using multiple tables we can store information in them that other tables can reference to. So taking our example lets look at the link between them.

Database management systems or DBS systems programs allow you to create databases. Databases use a structured query language or SQL which is a high-level language.
1.data definition language or DDL is used to define the structure of a database
2.data manipulation language or DML is used to add, delete, change and query databases where the data are held.

SQL is the language that is used to run a number of operations on a database management system.
 

DISCUSSION TIME!!!
 

FACTIOD:

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

 Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this week's page, students will learn .  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this week's page students will be able to 

2. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

3. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

4. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

5. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

Possible threats to data

Due to the very nature of data being transferred across the Internet data is at risk of attack. These attacks can come in different forms.
 

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Opportunist Threats

Opportunist threats where people use opportunities to intercept or gather data. These sorts of attacks can come when a user leaves their computer system logged on and then physically move away from the terminal for another person to then sit at the terminal and for them to look at the data that is open. This data could be changed, duplicate and removed or deleted from the users area. The user may be completely oblivious to this attack until it's too late.

Computer viruses

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computer viruses are small programs that have the ability to replicate themselves and for them to spread themselves are crossed a small or large network and even over the Internet. These systems can change personal files and key computer system files this could then result in a computer system not working correctly. Some computer viruses use e-mail to send themselves to other people that you may have communicated with. 

Malware

this sort of threat is usually found when a unsuspecting user downloads or opens a program that has been created to look like a trustable application, file, image or video that upon opening enables malicious programs to install themselves onto the system in some cases without the user ever knowing. Some of these examples include annoying features added to Internet Explorer or web browsing software, pop-ups that are selling on required materials.

phishing

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This is a common threat to users these days as more and more e-mails and telephone scams are trying to gain access to sensitive data about you so that they can then use this information in some cases fraudulently or in some cases to steal identities. Some of these experiences can be an e-mail that looks like a request from your bank to update your personal information through a link that they have provided that takes you to a webpage that looks identical to the original bank webpage, some users will not notice small differences in the appearance of the webpage as it can be very convincing. Users inputs sensitive information into these fake websites and the owners of the websites then use this information to either gain access to your accounts or for them to use it to set up credit cards and loans in your name without you knowing. A good way to ensure that you are protected against this issue would be the use of software provided by the bank to be installed on your web browser. Always look for the closed padlock symbol in the web browser as this will show that the website you are navigating to is a secure one and that you are able to check the certification of that website.

Accidental damage

there are other non-underhand threats to data and this can come in the form of accidental damage. These salts of occurrences can happen when data is destroyed due to mechanical failure such as corruption of a hard drive, or it could come in the form of natural disasters such as a computer being on the floor of a room that is susceptible to flooding. A method of ensuring that this potential loss of data is reduced would be to create a number of different backups of the data and to store these separately from the location of where the original is.

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Importance of security

As we've mentioned in the above area data is valuable data can be taken from any system that is not protected with sufficient security software or measures. No computer is 100% safe so caution should be considered when dealing with sensitive data. Companies and organisations that deal with online data has to do buildup a good reputation of being able to keep data safe and secure, the source companies will pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to ensure that all the data it holds is kept securely. However it is worth remembering the issues that some of the large companies have experienced recently with loss of security to their systems, one such example was the access by hackers to the talk talk customer database. This system was hacked by 15 and 16-year-old boys that ended up being arrested a number of days after the issue was brought to light. Other such instances would be the attack on Sony's PlayStation network where personal data was stolen including bank account details user account IDs and other sensitive personal information.

Preventative and remedial actions

so as mentioned in the previous area we need to ensure that we protect our data by using preventative measures and software. Some of these are listed below.

Physical barriers.

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A physical barrier to protect information could be the use of a set process that requires anybody that his leaving a computer system to be aware that they are to lock their machine whenever they move away from the terminal. In the case of environmental threats it would be wise to take backups of Baker on a regular basis, if the location of the system could be changed to move the system to a safer location, this could be in a first-floor room within the building rather than in the basement of a building.

Access levels.

Users are able to set the access or privileges of a user so that they are unable to gain access to information that is not relevant to them so you are therefore removing the ability for someone to steal data that is not necessary for the user to know.

Firewalls

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Files are devices that can be hardware and software that monitor all information that is coming into a network or over a network from devices this device or software stops anything that it deems to be harmful so that it can reduce the opportunity of a virus or Trojan horses gaining access to the system. This software and hardware also enables a company to restrict the access to known websites that are of potential threats to the company's systems these could be things like torrents.

Backups and recovery

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It is essential that this any company and individual create backups of all of their data onto external devices so that if a virus or the threat of corruption to the original data happens that they are in a position where they can restore this information on to another or the same system. Backups are often taken by large corporations and organisations and in some cases these can be done hourly in other situations they may be taken daily ,these backups can be held for as long as the company or organisation or person Dean appropriate. It is well worth remembering that a backup gives an opportunity for a person to rollback to certain versions of files operating systems and programs to allow them to get to a version that may not have been affected by a virus or Trojan, this then reduces the amount of data lost. So as I say to all my learners trying keep free versions of your work this then means that if you have a version that is lost you can roll back to the next version before that if that version was infected by a virus you know that you can restore to a 3rd copy which may not be as advanced as the other 2 but were unable you to have a point where you have not lost all of your work. Backups can be run by assistance that will do a number of different forms of backup, these are,

a full system backup, this is where all information on the computer hard drive is copied and backed up to another device.

Incremental backups, this is where a system will have had taken a full backup and is now checking the system for any updates to files or even the addition of new files and adding them to a version of the full backup. A good example of this is Apple's Time Machine.

Any backup taken can be stored on a number of different types of media these could be CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray or tape media, some companies and organisations may now be using cloud-based backup systems to back up their data.

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.

 Learning Aims and Objectives:
Aim: In this week's page, students will learn .  

Objectives:
1. By the end of this week's page students will be able to 

2. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

3. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

4. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

5. By the end of the week's page students will be able to 

Anonymous Assessment - Learners assess an anonymous piece of work containing deliberate mistakes against given success criteria.