EIR-----enjoy!~~

Practical 10

>> Monday, February 9, 2009

To give a summary, I found that EIR is actually a amazing CDS that allow us learn something through a easy way. There is no requirement for memorizing and writing. I think we really are having fun during the lesson. The environment is like a big family and while we are during class, it’s like we are actually talking. I like this kind of studying and it’s more effective on improving my study abilities. I hope that EIR can lead a new era for learning by having fun. ^_^. And meaningfully, I learnt how to search the internet more effectively and how to evaluate a website. These are something that I always interested in. So I feel very lucky to joint this CDS. However, it’s time to say goodbye. My best wish to all of my fellow students who are joining EIR. I hope you all can have fun here while you studying some new stuff just like I do. Bye, EIR, good luck!

Practical 7

>> Monday, February 2, 2009

TalkingCock.com

How would you react to this website?

Talkingcock.com is an amazing website which has really brought me a lot of surprises! I also heard one of the most interesting story is that the usual“kiasi” (scaredy cat/afraid of death) Singaporeans have actually managed to sustain this website for 7 years and counting. It really shocked me to what free speech reveals and that is the true side of Singaporeans.

For example , recently everyone is celebrating the chinese new year including the committe of the talkingcock. However, they got send their gong xi fa cai message in a very special way already. Here's the sample ..

Picture url :http://www.talkingcock.com/html/images/stories/yearofoxRGB.jpg

You can see from the picture, we can get a lot of very very funny and interesting info. Not only it will send the happy CNY message very successfully but it also brings people laugh. We can see the thorough heart of the talkingcock. Although I am not a Singaporean, i also can feel the power of the langruage. I hope this kind of website can last as long as possible. Since it is really just their advertisement said :

TalkingCock.com aims to provide you with stories and features that are always tongue-in-cheek, sometimes foot-in-mouth, and most of the time, finger-in-nose.

Hope you all find this website useful and interesting .

Practical 8&9

>> Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Dream holidays

Talking about dream holidays, there is always a place I really eager to go. That’s the famous and beautiful city----Hong Kong.

Hence, I found this website which helped me a lot to know better about what can do and what life is like over there.

Web page url :
http://www.hongkong-tour.cn/hongkong-canyin/hongkong-canying.htm

To be said, Hong Kong is a gourmet paradise remembered around the world gathered in this delicacy. Western food, Chinese food taste authentic; France's most popular dishes; Japanese food, Korean food, Thai food, Italian food is very common; another in Hong Kong can taste rare Mediterranean cuisine, Nepalese food, the North Vietnamese dishes, Spain vegetables, Argentina dishes, vegetables Portugal, Russia vegetables, Australia, Indian cuisine, Cuban cuisine, the United States etc, but the Islamic-style dishes very rare.

Wow. It’s just so amazing that I cannot wait to try out some delicious food over there. Not only that I can taste some local food from Hong Kong but the foreign famous ones also. Isn’t it interesting?

One more reason for visiting Hong Kong is that as there has the one and very famous ----Disneyland hotel. This is just an advertisement I read from the website.

##CONTINUE##

In order to administer your health intelligently, you might want to get away from the stress and toil of daily life! Take a break in the lap of luxury and relaxation. Come away to Hong Kong. If your choice for a healthy rest is in Hong Kong, you might want to sample the services at Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel, Hong Kong. This particular hotel along with its magnificent services offers an ambiance which is regarded as the height of elegance.

It's all about Victorian charm at Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel, Hong Kong. A blend of European grandeur and signature Disney style, this hotel offers a luxurious stay tinged with an essence of Hong Kong's traditional hospitality.

The spacious, well-fashioned rooms and suites of Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel, Hong Kong reflects the lavishness and appeal of the Victorian Era. Just cross the threshold to a bygone era as you enter the castle type hotel. You will be impressed by the world-class facilities while hosting a meeting or event at this hotel. The ideal combination of state-of-the-art technology, comfort and convenience is the main characteristic of this hotel.

Link url: http://www.asiarooms.com/hong_kong/lantau_island/hong_kong_disneyland_hotel.html?gclid=CP6j-pn9vZgCFckvpAodAgrsZw

After that, it even has the price for single bed and double bed at the bottom of the web page. Hence, I think it’s very useful and the price is really acceptable. To be totally honestly, right now I am really saving for this trip? Will it be wonderful that after playing around the Disneyland and just take a rest just beside the park.. So, therefore, i think it's good to make our childhood dream a reality. I believe some of you even have the same dream holiday with me. I hope we can go there with our loves soon..Lol.

The following will be some nice picture of Hong Kong food and the some famous view of Disneyland. HOPE you all like it. Thanks.

From this lesson. I have practiced how to evaluate the website again. For a topic like a dream holiday, my experience is that when we are searching the search engine, we cannot straight type in the keywords as "dream holiday". It will return you a lot of unrelavent topics. I think it's good to be more specifics and more details. Like you first get a pretty clear idea about what's your dream holiday, then you can do your research. In result, this way gives me more relavent topics.

Meanwhile, you can also keeping looking for more detaily like I entioned for mine: food and Disneyland. I think that will cut the waste of the time. In summary, I hope after learning and practice several times about how to evaluate the website, we all can find our own way to fit ourselves very well. ^_^

Practical__6

>> Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Database (Gateway)

This week, we have learnt how to use the database (deep search engine).

Academic Gateway

This is the database I used for this week practical.

##CONTINUE##
From the picture, it seems to be very powerful and useful. It has varieties of search functions like books and articles etc.

However, I hardly to find some very helpful information from this database engine. I think this is because of my topic is not that linked to the data which have been stored in the database engine. But I think if I got some specific questions or topics, I will still try this engine, as this engine most likely can give out some hidden information which seems to be more professional.

Meanwhile, i hope you all can find the different functions between different search engines. Do give it a try. ^_^..

Thanks for your reading~!

Practical__ 4&5

>> Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Meta Search Engine

By this week, we are supposed to learn the function of the Meta Search engine and the subject directory. These are two more powerful search engines. Indeed, what Meta search engine can do is give you the combined searching result from many different major search engines; however, it doesn’t have its own database. This can save our time very effectively that we no need to go through each search engine one by one. By using Meta search, we can get the hottest searching result from different search engine at the same time. ^_^ Meanwhile, it’s also very powerful as it provide web, images, audio, video, news and even for yellow page search requirement!!
Here is one of the Meta search engines that I use.

##CONTINUE##
So base on the picture, we can see the different search facilities and more over the favorite fetches and quick starts. These are all the powerful functions of Meta search.

And for this particular Meta search engine, it donate for ASPCA.*. Every time we search by this engine, it will donate the money to the charity system. That’s one more reason why I choose the Meta search engine. I hope you all can like this kind and useful Meta search engine.

Subject directory

For subject directory, my choice is Yahoo!

By using this method, I can often find a good starting point of my topic. And directories are also useful for finding information on a topic when you don't have a precise idea of what you need. Many large directories include a keyword search option which usually eliminates the need to work through numerous levels of topics and subtopics

However, I found when I am looking for a specific question; it might be not that accurate because of the question may not be linked in to the directories. Hence, compare to Meta search engine. I more prefer the Meta one. As no need to build our own database, so maybe tomorrow we can build our own Meta search engine. Cheers! ^_^

Practical_3

>> Saturday, November 8, 2008

Search Strategy

This week, we were being taught about how to make our search more effective, basically it’s about to create search strategy, compare & evaluate search effectiveness. So, how to use Boolean operator to minimize the time limit that can give us the most accurate answer we wanted. Here’s the key words I am using for my topic:

The impact of online gaming on youths.

Key words: impact ; online gaming ; youths ;

Step1: find the synonyms for the key words , as follows:
##CONTINUE##

Step2: use Boolean operator to connect the synonyms:

(impact OR effect* OR influence* OR consequence* ) AND (online gaming OR virtual game*) AND (youths OR teenager*)

By using this, we can get the most relevant result. By using ‘or’ and ‘and’ we have increase the accuracy for finding the most expected answer.
Meanwhile, we also used the same searching words to find on another search engine called Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com/).

However, the expected result is only a few. Therefore, we can see that Google Scholar can only give us for certain formed documents such as pdf, doc, ppt and so on. Instead of giving us specific documents, Google give us all the sources related to the answer which including web pages, blogs, forums and all this kind of discussion topics.

Hence, based on different target we want, we should be able to choose which search engine is more effective and use Boolean operator to make a best way to find our expected.

Briefly reflect on lessons learnt from this practical by answering questions below :

a) Were you impressed by Google’s search functions/features? Why?

b) How do you feel about participation in discussion forum? Is it helpful for your research? Do you feel anxious about talking to others you do not know?

c) Why must you do citation and bibliography?

a) Of course. As the first search engine and one of the biggest companies, Google has made his own way to become successful, no need to describe so much. All these companies nowadays are following the way which Google walked by. Let’s just let the pictures talk the truth.

1.Different language versions..

2.Advanced search

3.Temporary cached

4.Different functions

5.More specific links to more search engines

6.Interest linking picture

7.The speed for reacting a searching and the sea number of results

In the view of all above, that’s why I am really impressed by Google’s search functions. I hope all of you can really how to learn and enjoy by using Google. It will become our own teacher. If we come across any difficulties, we can just conquer it by finding our answer ourselves! ~~~

b) Being participated in discussion forum, I feel it’s very helpful. There are always someone who is very knowledgeable to answer your questions very carefully and specifically. However, to post on a forum is really hard. First of all, we need to create a new account, after active your account, you have to go to the linked part of your topic and post a new topic.

It’s a bit complicated for me. And it do takes time to wait for others to answer your question. Besides, there are people not here to answer your question and you have to deal with them. So, though this is another way to find answers and discuss with others, I won’t prefer it. About do you feel anxious about talking to others you do not know? Actually I am not because no one knows what I am. So I can just ignore what they say about me. By the way, a man should not feel shy and shame about asking questions right? Ok, hope you enjoy the forum..

c) It’s based on copy right. As for know, I am keeping my own blog. So it’s not hard to believer that after so many hours work, if someone just copy and paste your thing to his own space, you will get upset and very angry. Hence, due to all respect to the original writer and author, we seriously need to do citation and bibliography. All right that’s all for today…

Wish all of you a nice day!~

Practical 1&2

>> Sunday, November 2, 2008

Free S$500!!!^_^

At first, when I was told that I can buy something on ebay, I actually had no idea what to buy. I have never been on ebay before and I cannot decide what to buy. Looking at the varieties of products posted on the main page of ebay.I suddenly find maybe 500 is not enough for me. I have to admit that ebay is a great success in online shopping field for its perfect way to attract the eyes from consumers. After a quick check of the index, I decide to buy a watch. Then I used the advanced search function to help me find a watch which between SG 300 and 500. Then a list of wonderful watches comes out. The list’s url :

http://jewellery-watches.shop.ebay.com.sg/items/Wristwatches__W0QQ_sacatZ31387

Then, I slowly go through them one by one. Finally, I am focused on two watches.

##CONTINUE##

Both of them all well-made product and the price is acceptable. Besides, both the seller have announced some specifications and descriptions. I really like the variety of these two watches. However, when I read the second one’s descriptions, I kind of hardly to focus on because they are such a mess. Though I can see the hard work and the honest from the word, I really have a headache when reading such a crowded passage. Instead of putting all the information in words, the first one used numbers of block of pictures.
The example is as follows:

And I really appreciate the promises that he made to us consumers. To have a first experience online shopping, this promise of the quality of goods really builds an interface of trust between seller and buyer.

Of course the main idea of this seller is to ensure all the consumers to feel free, safe and convenience to buy stuff from him. Moreover, he doesn’t want one-time deal. From the work of his advertisement, I can see he was building a relationship that can last to long term business. That’s why I finally decide to buy this beautiful watch which will cost SG408.13 and 25 on transport.

Therefore, this is my first experience online shopping. I hope you all have enjoy everyday like I do….^_^

Here are some more work example from his product: