5-14 CIT Multimedia Encyclopaedias & WWW Searching for Information

O:\Departments\Computing\Courses\5-14\S1\Searching\Searching 2009answers.doc

Storing information For hundreds of years people have stored information on paper as text and drawings. Information is still stored this way in books, magazines and newspapers. New inventions about 100 -150 years ago allowed information to be stored in other ways such as in photographs, on film and in sound recordings on tape. About 50 years ago, a new way of storing information was discovered which has many advantages over the older ways. This way stores information in digital form. When information is in digital form it can be stored and changed using a computer. It can be stored, for example, on a memory card in a camera, on a USB drive, on a hard disc, on a CD ROM disc (or just CD ROM for short) and on a DVD disc. Information in digital form can be changed using computer software and it takes up much less space compared to information on paper.

Task 1

1. Make a list of the ways you have used a computer and software to store or change digital

information. For example, using a word processor to write a book report. Think of some other examples from home or school.

2.

Presentation Software (PowerPoint) for class talks

Graphics software (Photoshop/Paint) to create pictures or edit photographs

Spreadsheet software (Excel) to create timetables of carry out calculations

Audio Software (ITunes) to download and listen to music and films Types of Media We use the word media to describe different types, or forms, of information. The correct names for the types of media are as follows: Text: Characters in words, sentences and paragraphs Graphics: Pictures Video: Pictures that move Audio: Sound The word multimedia means ‘many different forms of information’. CD-ROM and DVD discs are good for storing multimedia.

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CD ROM and DVD CD-ROM is short for Compact Disc Read-Only Memory, a type of optical disk capable of storing large amounts of data, usually around 650 megabytes. A single CD-ROM can store the same as approximately 300,000 A4 pages of text.

CD-ROMs are stamped by the creator and, once stamped, they cannot be erased and filled with new data. To read a CD you need a CD-ROM player. All CD-ROMs conform to a standard size and format, so you can load any type of CD-ROM into any CD-ROM player.

CD-ROMs are particularly suitable for information that requires large storage capacity. This includes applications that contain colour, graphics, sound and video.

Task 2

1. Write down one feature of a CD ROM that makes it good for storing information.

A CD-ROM can store a large amount of data (650-700Mb) which would store approximately 300,000 pages of A4 text.

2. Would you be able to use a CD ROM to store information that you changed frequently, such as

documents you worked on at home and school? Explain your answer.

No, once a CD-ROM has been created the information cannot be erased or changed.

3. DVD is a format that stores more than CD ROM. Find out how much data you can store on a DVD (you might find this link useful – http://www.howstuffworks.com/dvd3.htm)

A DVD can store between 4.7Gb and 16Gb depending on whether it is single/double sided and has single/double layers.

4. Blu-ray is a recent development in optical disc storage. A Blu-ray disc is the same size as CD

and DVD discs but it can store much more data. Find out how much data you can store on a Blu-ray disc.

A Blu-ray optical disc can store 25Gb (single-layer disc) or 50Gb (dual-layer disc).

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Multimedia CD ROM Encyclopaedias A multimedia CD ROM encyclopaedia is an example of a general CD ROM. This means that there is general information about many topics. If you want in-depth information then you would need to find another source such as a specialised CDROM (or even a book!). Encarta is an example of a multimedia CD ROM encyclopaedia.

Encyclopaedia Articles Information is organised in articles. Article titles are list alphabetically and there is a convenient search feature to look for keywords in articles.

Find dialogue

box

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Navigation Encarta has a number of features to allow you to navigate (or find your way around) the CD ROM and to search for information.

The menu bar is shown above. The navigation buttons shown here are Back, Next and Home. A hyperlink in the text of an article will link you to a related article. Searching The first place you might look to find information is the index. The index lists all the articles in the encyclopaedia in alphabetical order. There are a number of ways to use the index: (a) Simply scroll through the list of entries until you find the one you want. (b) Start typing the title of the article you want to find. In the example below, the articles being

shown in the quick match list change as you type the characters ‘spac’.

Back Next

Home

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Task 3

1. Write down the advantages of storing information in digital form compared to written form.

Can you think of any disadvantages?

Advantages

Editing: information can be easily changed and updated.

Searching: it is easier to locate specific pieces of information.

Disadvantages

You need special equipment such as a computer, PDA or smart phone to view/use digital information.

2. What are the advantages of a multimedia CD ROM encyclopaedia compared to one in book form?

Searching: it is easier to find specific articles due to the search engine.

Portability: it is easier to transport a CD rather than a set of books.

Multimedia: audio, video and interactive tours can be used to make the articles more interesting for the user.

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Copying encyclopaedia content If you were doing some research using an encyclopaedia in book form you would have to take notes on the articles you found. This might involve lots of writing and could take a long time. When you have found the information you want in Encarta you can use the Copy facility. You can copy text and images from Encarta and use them in your own documents. When you choose to copy information, it is placed on the clipboard and can then be pasted into a word processed document. Copyright

Copyright is the law that says you can’t take a copy of anybody else’s work without permission. It is generally true that:

you can copy information from a CD ROM for your own personal use,

you must make sure you say where you got the information and distinguish it from your own work (i.e. don’t pretend it is yours),

you can’t use the information for any commercial venture or include it on an internet website.

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The World Wide Web The Internet is made up of millions of computers all over the world that are connected together. The two most commonly used services on the Internet are email and the World Wide Web (WWW). The WWW is a collection of websites that are stored on computers all over the world. A website is a collection of different types of information organised into web pages. Links take you from one web page to another page on the same website or a page on a different website. Your school has a website (www.morrisonsacademy.org)

Task 4

1. Who would find the school website useful? Explain your answer.

Parents, pupils, staff, former pupils, prospective parents who wish to find information about the school and school events.

2. Describe two advantages and two disadvantages of the WWW for finding information compared

to using books.

Advantages

There will be a larger range of articles since people from all over the world can create web pages.

The information is more likely to be current since web pages are constantly updated and new sites added.

Disadvantages

The information on the www may be incorrect since anyone can create a web site. The information is not always checked.

You need an Internet connection.

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Connecting to a website The most common way for a home computer user to connect to the Internet is to use the telephone network. The computer connects to the telephone network using a modem or router. An Internet Service Provider (ISP) connects a user’s computer to the Internet. Most people have are able to use broadband to connect to the Internet. The lowest broadband speed is usually 2Mbps. A typical broadband speed is 8Mbps. (Kbps = kilobits per second; Mbps = megabits per second). Web pages are laid out using a language called Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). To be able to see the information on a web page you need to use software called a web browser. Internet Explorer is an example of a web browser. After connecting to the Internet, you need to know the address of the website you want to visit. Every website has an address known as the Uniform Resource Locator (URL). For example, the URL of the BBC website is http://www.bbc.co.uk. The web browser software allows you to leave out the ‘http://’ part of the URL.

Task 5

1. Find out the names of three ISPs.

BT Internet, Orange and AOL

2. Find out the name of the school ISP.

Zen Internet

3. Connect to the Yucky Science website (www.yucky.com).

Write down three different types of information (i.e. media) used in the site.

Audio, Text, Graphics, Video and Animation

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Safety First: SMART Rules

Before we begin using the WWW, it is important that we think about safety.

"The Internet is great fun and a brilliant way to keep in contact with friends. However, it is really important that we all use the Net safely and always remember these SMART rules to stay safe online." Ant and Dec

Anyone can create a website and make the information on it available to everyone who uses the WWW. You would probably trust factual information and opinions on websites created by reputable companies, although the information and opinions might be biased. For example, a political party website or a company advertising its products. You need to take information from a number of websites and compare it rather than taking it just from one website. Unfortunately it is easy to find offensive material on websites either deliberately or accidentally. For this reason, the school stops you accessing websites that are known to contain offensive material. (Remember that a record is kept of all the websites that you visit or try to visit).

Task 6

1. Log on to the website www.kidsmart.org.uk. What are the 5 SMART rules?

Safe: be careful not to give out personal information e.g. name and telephone number to people online.

Meeting: meeting someone you have only been in touch with online can be dangerous. Only do so with your parents’ permission and if they are present.

Accepting: accepting e-mails or IM messages from people that you do not know can be dangerous.

Reliable: someone online may be lying about who they are and the information may not be reliable.

Tell: tell someone if something/someone makes you uncomfortable or you are worried.

2. Navigate to the page http://www.kidsmart.org.uk/stayingsmart/index.html Complete the interactive quiz.

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Searching on the WWW The World Wide Web is an extremely useful tool for researching. However, one of its biggest problems is the number of web pages which are available; there are now billions of them. This makes it extremely difficult to locate specific information unless we use a search engine or a web directory. Search engines work by storing information about web pages which they retrieve from the WWW itself. This information is stored in an index which is used in search queries.

Since you want a search engine to give you the most relevant results for a query, you need to do more than just enter one or two keywords. If you don’t then you are likely to end up with hundreds of thousands of websites listed, many of which will not be relevant. A web directory is not a search engine and does not display lists of web pages based on keywords; instead, it lists web sites by category and subcategory

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Searching Using Keywords

When you enter keywords in a search engine, the search engine will find all web pages it knows about where your keywords appear anywhere on a page. Clearly, the more keywords you use then the fewer web pages will be found and the more relevant the results will be (assuming of course that you have chosen sensible keywords!)

Task 7

1. Complete the table below by trying out the searches using a single keyword and then by using

multiple keywords. Write down how many hits you get for each search.

Number of hits Search for: www.google.co.uk

radio 715,000,000

control 836,000,000

1

radio control 134,000,000

roller 55,600,000

coaster 18,100,000

2

roller coaster 16,200,000

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Searching Using Phrases As you probably noticed, even using a multiple keyword search might still give you information that is not relevant to what you want. For instance, in the radio control example, using a multiple keyword search gave you results about radio and about control, as well as radio control. By putting quotation marks round your keywords ("radio control") you create a phrase search. The search engine will look for this exact phrase on a page.

Task 8

1. Complete the table below by trying out the searches using multiple keywords and then by searching using phrases. Write down how many hits you get for each search (just copy the figures for the keyword search from the previous table).

Number of “hits” Search for:

www.google.co.uk

radio control 134,000,000 1

“radio control” 12,400,000

roller coaster 16,200,000 2

“roller coaster” 8,870,000

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Boolean Searches Boolean Searches use the words AND and NOT to combine keywords in different ways. For example, assume that you would like to go to the Edinburgh Tattoo and want to find out more about it.

Search Explanation

Edinburgh AND Tattoo This will look for sites with the words Edinburgh and Tattoo. You will get hits on different types of "tattoo". This is the same as a multiple keyword search because most search engines use AND by default.

Edinburgh NOT Tattoo This will find sites about Edinburgh but not the Tattoo

Edinburgh AND Tattoo NOT Castle Finds sites with the words Edinburgh and Tattoo but not Edinburgh and Castle

The words AND, OR and NOT are Boolean operators and are used by a search engine to decide what keyword combinations to search for. You can save a bit of typing by using the following abbreviations:

+ AND – NOT

So the searches above could be rewritten as:

Edinburgh +Tattoo

Edinburgh -Tattoo

Edinburgh +Tattoo -Castle

There is no space between the + or – sign and the word that comes after. Remember that AND (or +) is added automatically by some search engines when you use multiple keywords.

Task 9

1. Using a search engine of your choice, find a show which is on during the Edinburgh Festival excluding the Edinburgh Tattoo.

Search Criteria +show +”Edinburgh festival” -“Edinburgh tattoo”

Show Moos Dies, The Persuaders (any relevant show)

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Combining Search Techniques You can combine all of the search syntax that you have studied, ie multiple keywords, phrase and Boolean, to get the most relevant results for your search. The table below shows how many results are returned from a search engine for each search syntax when asked to search for pages about computer programming for beginners but not Visual Basic. Search Engine: Google Search Criteria No of Hits

computer programming beginners –visual -basic 1,420,000

“computer programming” +beginners –“visual basic” 115,000

Task 10

1. Use Google to search for pages about cigarette smoking and lung cancer but excluding heart

disease.

Search Criteria +”cigarette smoking” +”lung cancer” -“heart disease”

2. You are going down to Glasgow next month and do not want to spend a lot of money on accommodation. Using a search engine of your choice to find a list of examples of cheap accommodation in Glasgow but no youth hostels.

Search Criteria +Glasgow +”cheap accommodation” -“youth hostels”

Accommodation The Old Mill B&B (any relevant accommodation)

3. Your family is going on holiday to France next summer. You want to go to a theme park but not to Disneyland Paris because you were there last year. Use a search engine of your choice to find a list of theme parks in France taking account of the fact that you do not want to go to Disneyland Paris.

Search Criteria +France +”theme park” -“Disneyland Paris”

Theme Park in France Futuroscope Theme Park (any relevant theme park)

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Using the WWW in Everyday Situations Some of the tasks which we regularly use the WWW for are: • Arranging days out and holidays. • Public Transport Information. • Buying goods (this is called e-commerce) In some cases, rather than using a search engine such as Google, it is better to use a website that has all the information you want. For example, if you want to find train times ,you would be better going to a website such as www.thetrainline.com. If you want to buy a book, you might be better going to Amazon’s website at www.amazon.co.uk

Task 11

The sales director of a company is going on a business trip to London next week. Find details of the first flight from Edinburgh Airport to London on Monday morning. He prefers to fly with British Airways. Flight details for Monday 9th November 2009 Flight Number BA2931

Departure Time (Edinburgh) 06:20

Arrival Time (London) 07:55

Length of Flight 1 hour 35 minutes

Task 12

You are going from Perth to the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow to see your favourite rock band. You and your friends are going to travel by train. The gig starts at 7.30 pm on Saturday and you should be home by midnight. Find out the times of suitable trains which will suit your plans. Train details for Saturday 7th November 2009 To Glasgow

Depart Perth 18:12

Arrive Glasgow 19:15

To Perth

Depart Glasgow 21:41

Arrive Perth 22:34

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Task 13

You want to give a friend the gift of the book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Write down the name of the author and the price of the book in paperback and hardcover. Prices taken from Amazon on Friday 30th October 2009

Author J.K. Rowling

Paperback Price £5.79

Hardback Price £11.69