Digital Signage Overview
Hi, my name is Tim Fahey and I am in charge of the digital signage, or the things that pop up on the cafe and main office TV. The point of this is go have announcements and ads for events on there for students to see, and hopefully it will peak someone’s interest. Anyone is free to request an ad on the TV for free, and they can do so through [email protected]. In addition to these ads, I also like to add fun elements and photos to engage people’s attention and hopefully want to participate in something, like the “Tim’s Featured Photo of the Week”. Overall, hopefully someone will notice these ads and photos on the TV, and it will contribute to the participation in our school community. The Discord Pilot The students of Technology Integration (primarily the A block section, but soon to be the remaining blocks) recently created something called a Discord server. Discord is a wonderful tool on the web, available both as a web app for chromebook users, as well as a desktop app, geared more toward those with laptops that are not made by Google. Discord, originally, was a voice/text chat primarily used by gamers for raids in video games. However, in today's fast paced world, Discord can easily be used by big companies (In fact, many companies use something at the very least like Discord). To sum it up, Discord will make communicating around the building with other tech members, far easier than methods used previously. Discord offers both desktop, and mobile device support, making it the superior tool when it comes to communication.
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by Brian Lomasney
Many people may not have experience, or may not have even heard of Linux, but in my opinion it’s a great OS with great features. One of the best features in Linux is how customizable it can be. There are themes for Ubuntu that can make it look like OS X or Windows, and there are dozens of different Linux operating systems like Arch, Mint, Deepin, and Debian to name a few. If a teacher or student is more comfortable using Windows there is a theme for Mint that makes it look like Windows 7. And since Linux and OS X are both based on Unix most Linux operating systems look close to OS X already. Another great feature of Linux is that updates aren’t mandatory. There is nothing worse than needing to do something for class and having to sit there for twenty minutes waiting for a Windows update to install. Linux rarely has mandatory updates and there are even LTS, long term support, editions of most operating systems. For instance Ubuntu 16.04 LTS will be supported for another 7-10 years, this makes it much more reliable for long term use which is why it is used on the International Space Station and in many similar places. Most Linux based operating systems are also much easier on the computers. They take up less RAM and are in general much lighter on the computer. What this means is that we can use older PCs for longer because Linux is so light that many old PCs can run it very easily. Being able to use old computers longer will save a lot of money in the long run On top of all of this Linux is free. Windows costs money and Microsoft are getting worse and worse as time goes on, and to use OS X you need an Apple computer and Apple computers are always priced higher than they are actually worth. Overall Linux is the logical choice for many people and I think that the school could make good use of it. by Tyler Jodoin
Apple and Microsoft have been at war since they started off and both are very different from each other. Microsoft is owned by Bill Gates and Apple was made by the now deceased Steve Jobs. Both are great systems that anyone could use if they just put the time into it. Even though they were created near the same time, they could not be more different. Apple went the road of a clean slick design and making appearance one of the higher priorities. Microsoft is definitely more bulky and put together while Apple products seem just to be slick and smooth. Only Apple can produce Macintosh computers while many companies make PCs. PC uses Windows while Apple uses OSX. Macs may not have programs that Windows does have while Apple may have some apps that Windows does have but Window apps seem to be the more popular of the two. Macs are super expensive while PC can be customized and managed better money wise to exactly what you want. The customer service of Apple is far superior compared to Microsoft due to more locations around where you might live. Gamers prefer PC over apple when it comes to hardcore gaming. Apple Computers seem to be better for school purposes and have better normal apps. Since Apple is a closed/private while PC is open network which can allow more hackers to target PCs over Apple products. Apple makes both the software and hardware for there products. Apple has the option to run Microsoft but the PC will never have the option to run Apple software on their computers. by Dylan Dennen
The first “cpu”( Central Processing Unit ) were in early prototype designs in the early 1950’s, there was no architecture for the cpu’s, and every cpu design was different and not compatible with the other designs, so if a program was written for one computer it would only work for that specific computer.There was also no widely accepted computer language( most people were still testing other ideas ) like binary, but most computers of the time were running on a decimal based system( they worked in base-10 instead of base-2 like today ). The first set of “family computers”(computers that can all run the same programs) was being designed by IBM in 1962, their idea was that their customer base would be more loyal and likely to say with their company if they offered computers at different price points(performance varying) that could all run the same programs.The main instruction set that they would eventually tweak to run on all of their computers was called System/360( S/360 ), This was the first popular instruction set to use binary as the language.IBM also invented RISC( Reduced Instruction Set Computing Lated know as CISC( Complex Instruction Set Computing )).This was also the time period where the concept of ram ( nothing like the ram we know today, just a concept that the main storage would be accompanied by a much smaller and much faster storage device ) was making its way into systems. In the 1970s what we recognize as a computer today started to become remotely possible, integrated circuits became economical and practical, one of the first commercially available microprocessors was the binary based Intel 4004, a little more than a year later Intel released their new microprocessor( the Intel 8008 ) that had a 8-bit based architecture with an integrated pMOS logic a re-implementation of the Transistor-Transistor Logic( TTL )based Datapoint 2200 cpu. Later Intel created the Intel 8080 which became the first widespread micro processor.IBM was striving to make large, fast computers with 1 megabyte of ram, clock speeds near 1 megahertz and 10s of megabytes of disk drives( very underwhelming today but in their time this was a very high end computer ). In the 1980s the RISC( Reduced Instruction Set Computing ) came to dominate, but not for what you would think.The RISC instruction set was becoming increasingly popular among non-desktop/notebook applications such as Printers. In 1996 a great stride in CPU technology was invented, the IBM Power 4 was the first Multi-Core Processor, it only had two cores but that was a big step in 1996 since all processors had been only a single core before it. Multi-Core CPUs can handle more information at a time. Think of it this way a Single-Core CPU has one pipeline which data is processed through, and a Dual-Core CPU has two pipelines which data is processed through Parallelization( the workload of a cpu is split evenly between all cores ( in this case 2 )) which in turn improved the performance of the CPU greatly. Hyper-Threading was Introduced by our favorite computer company Intel in 2002, Hyper-Threading doubles the number of threads each CPU core can have,a thread from the perspective of the CPU is just an ordered sequence of instructions that tells the computer what to do.Hyper-Threading increases each CPU cores throughput by allowing the core to work on two things at once(only one thread can send information out at a time but Hyper-Threading stops the CPU core from being bottlenecked( slowed down ) by too much information).The first CPU to have hyperthreading was released in february of 2002 by Intel and was from their server line of processors( the Xeon line to be specific ) and later that year in November they released the Pentium 4 processor from their desktop line which included Hyper-Threading. Below are pictures from the 1950s era CPU from IBM 700( left ) and the Intel i7-6700k( right ) which is Intel's newest desktop processor, just with these two pictures have show have far we have come in technology, from before where a CPU would be the size of a desk to today where we can fit one infinitely more powerful inside of a smartphone. by Caroline DeMasi
Recently, Apple released iOS 10--the newest and biggest update of iOS ever. While there’s been positive and negative responses to the new interface, it’s something everyone eventually will have to download and install. The update brought a whole collection of new and exciting features, such as the Bedtime tab in the Clock app and the new iMessage system. Some of these features are hidden gems, buried deep within your iPhone just waiting to be discovered and tested. iOS 10 brings a whole new shiny interface to the table. Letters are bolder, the lockscreen shows more notifications, and iMessage has a fresh coat of paint. You can’t swipe left to unlock your phone anymore. Now, you have to tap the home button and it brings up your passcode. Here are 5 useful features that come packed with iOS 10. Widgets appear when you swipe left in the lock screen. They allow you to access information from other apps, such as upcoming events in Calendar, scheduled alarms in the Clock app, Weather, News, Reminders, and more! This is very useful for quick and easy access to important dates and other information. Remember those annoying apps that you never use but come pre-installed on your phone? With the new update, Apple lets you delete some of those stock apps to free up space on your phone. This is super helpful if you need to better manage your storage, or if you are simply annoyed by having extra useless apps on your home screen. If you listen to music on your iPhone, you probably used to use the Up Next feature to skip to a better song. In the updated Music app, this seems to be a thing of the past. Fear not, this useful tool is still there! It is simply hidden; instead of tapping “Up Next”, all you have to do is swipe up and a long queue of upcoming songs will scroll into view. Control Center has been expanded to two panes with the new iOS 10 update. The first pane that appears gives you access to toggle airplane mode, wifi, bluetooth, do not disturb mode, and orientation lock, along with brightness controls, AirPlay and AirDrop, and the flashlight, clock, calculator, and camera. The second pane, which is accessed by swiping left, is the audio control center, which lets you adjust your music volume and skip forward, backward, and play/pause a song. Additionally, if you use HomeKit, Control Center will have a third pane that allows you to access this app and use its controls. iMessage has a new look, and with it, new features. When you send a link to a video or a website, a preview image and name of the website will appear. If you send a YouTube video or other video link, you can watch the video right in the iMessage app. If you turn your phone in iMessage, a drawing keyboard will appear, allowing you to draw right in the app! By tapping the icon that looks like “>”, you will be given three new icons: the camera, Digital Touch, and the app store. If you tap the App Store icon in iMessage, you will be able to find games you can play right in the app. You can also send stickers with your messages by clicking the App Store and selecting apps that support stickers. If you have an iPhone 6 or later, you can send animations within your messages by holding down the blue send arrow button. Digital Touch allows you to send animated drawings to people by using different tap combinations. There are too many other new features to note in one article, but with a bit of exploring and button pushing, you will find exciting new things to use on your phone. iOS is Apple’s biggest update ever, and it truly lives up to that description. by Tom Callaghan
Is the Chromebook the new best laptop? Chromebooks are slowly seeping into schools and becoming the new norm. The budget price for performance is unmatched by any other laptop. The battery on a Chromebook is amazing compared to many other laptops. You can buy a Chromebook with almost any size and color for less than $400. This is the perfect laptop for people that have a sluggish old computer and just want to check Facebook, email, and want to surf the internet. What is a Chromebook? A Chromebook is a lightweight laptop designed for people that spend a lot or all of their time on the internet. Chromebooks support having multiple people using the same Chromebook and are very secure. Chromebooks typically come in 11.6, 13, 14, and 15.6-inch screens. You can get a Chromebook at any technology store with many name brand companies producing them like Dell, HP, Acer, Samsung, Lenovo, and many others. What are the biggest advantages to buying a Chromebook? The biggest advantage to buying a Chromebook is the price. They range from $300-$400 but you can buy some as low as $250. The Chromebooks speed is very quick due to it having an SSD or Solid state drive. Solid state drives are combining RAM technology with hard drives, removing the spinning disks thereby making it have a lot more speed. A Chromebook’s battery is a big draw to students because it can last you the entire school day. Another draw to students is the weight of the Chromebook which varies from about 3-4 pounds. Having the massive backpacks that we all do, bringing around a lightweight laptop is a fantastic draw. What are the biggest disadvantages to buying a Chromebook? For many teachers and workers, they don’t like Chromebooks because it doesn’t have Microsoft on it. There are apps that you can get in the Chrome Store that make a connection with your home computer and use it remotely. Another thing that many people don’t like is the amount of storage on a Chromebook. Typically a Chromebook only has about 32 gigabytes of storage on a hard drive, which is equivalent to a decent flash drive. Finally, there is no compatibility with a lot of programs that you would want to use on a Chromebook and can’t. For a Windows user you can find a copy for a download of any program on the internet within seconds, but from Chrome it is impossible. So is it worth it to buy a Chromebook? Personally, I would say for a student who needs a laptop for school, yes. If you are anyone who needs more power on your computer or Microsoft then no, a Chromebook is not for you. It is lightweight, cheap, and easy to use making it perfect for even the most tech illiterate people. Overall it is a great bang-for-your-buck purchase that will last you years. by Sha Anwar
Are you thinking about upgrading to the new iPhone 7? Are you wondering if Apple’s new product is actually worth getting for yourself or a friend? Running Apple’s new iOS 10, the phone has its flaws and its benefits. There are a few new specifications that make many wonder if Apple is changing directions. Before getting into the specifics, let’s talk about the design. Like the iPhone 6, the iPhone 7 comes with a smooth aluminum body. The aluminum tends to be easily scratched but is very appealing to the eye. It has a 4.7 inch screen and only weighs a little bit less than 5 ounces. With a 12MP camera, the iPhone 7 has better photographic quality than its predecessor the iPhone 6. Video recording at 4k (at 30 frames per second) will make sure the quality of the videos you capture are precise and clean. The front camera comes with a 7mp lens and has 1080p video recording. The phone has Apple’s new A10 Fusion Chip processor that should help with multitasking and running applications faster. The phone’s battery lasts approximately 10 days when it is in no use. When the phone was in use, it lasted a solid 10-13 hours. The iPhone 7 has pretty good specifications but there are a few new features that might startle some users. Would the absence of a 3.5 mm audio jack be that much of an issue? Is the new home button going to bother many people? Well Apple removed their audio jack for a number of reasons. First of all, the world is changing every day… One day there will be more convenient ways of doing things. Removing the audio jack is almost like Apple’s way of updating and being more convenient. This was done to finally make the first waterproof iPhone. No more buying that expensive case to make your phone waterproof because the iPhone 7 comes waterproof. The home button has a major adjustment. It is no longer a button that you press. It’s now software integrated. The home button is all based on touch and is not a button. This makes the iPhone 7 even more smooth and appealing to the eye. It also makes the phone almost completely touch based. So is the iPhone 7 worth it? Yes it is definitely worth it if you don’t mind the absence of the audio jack. The iPhone 7 is almost the same as the iPhone 6. If you want an upgrade, the iPhone 7 is the right choice. Otherwise waiting for the next big iPhone is also now a bad idea for the iPhone 6 will still be pretty popular in the next few years. In my opinion, Apple released the iPhone 7 as their first waterproof slick phone with advancements that could help tell us the future of Apple products. by Jennifer O'Connell
In 2007, the Massachusetts-based design studio Nervous System began experimenting with writing computer code to program 3D printers to make fashion accessories and wall art. By 2014, they had made a blouse-style shirt and a skirt. Prior to that, they had successfully made 3D-printed jewelry and wall art. However, later in the year, they began a project that would garner them much attention and popularity in the future: a 3D printed gown. They released four videos on the elaborate construction and design of it. A month ago, they released a video of their latest project: a “petal” dress, still made of 3D printed plastics but with a program called Kinematic, which works as a way to 3D print clothes that can move with the human body which is produced by designing and programming so that it fits together like jigsaw puzzle pieces do. Their projects have been featured in the New York Times, the Guardian, Forbes, the Boston Globe, and forums at both MIT and Harvard. Nervous System designs have also been exhibited at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Museum of Modern Arts, and the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney, Australia. Though they were very early pioneers of garment design from unconventional materials, they were not the very first. In 2006, the Emmy-nominated TV series Project Runway aired their first episode, aptly titled “Innovation” featuring a dozen stressed, sleep deprived fashionistas sprinting around a Manhattan grocery store to find everyday items and foods to make outfits with in place of fabrics. This one event began a yearly returning theme of yearly no-fabric challenges for the show. This year, the theme was bringing modern style to outdated pieces of technology. This included vinyl records, Polaroid film and pictures, phone and computer cords, mouse pads, and CD's. It’s always an interest episode when you hear more hammers than sewing machines being used. From the first episode, “Innovation” kicked off not only this tradition, but a quickly growing craze for the uses of strange, recycled, re imagined, or otherwise quirky materials. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology holds a yearly “trash-ion” show, where the exhibit particularly outre garments and designed made solely out of recycled materials, things that would have otherwise been thrown away. Materials last year included iced tea cans, circuit boards, packaging materials, lamp shades, colored construction paper, paper shopping bags, photo strips, and police caution tape. A more widespread example of technology influencing fashion is in the rise in military-imitation fashions since the early 2000s. This trend was actually predicted by Project Runway season one all star Austin Scarlett in the seventh episode. Even though he predicted the return of throat-protecting garments in turtle necks and large scarves, he didn’t predict that fashion and technology could combine in literally protective gear for people who bike in an attempt to replace helmets as well as assisting devices for disabled people disguised as fashion accessories. This trend was brought to a broader audience 2016 Met Gala. The theme of the evening was bringing fashion into the age of technology, with Zac Posen’s gown for Claire Danes making waves with fiber-optic lights woven into the fabric of the dress. Literally glowing in the dark, Danes looked like a futuristic real-life Cinderella. Although there was once a more profound luxury in handmade, imported products, the so-called age of technology seems to be turning that feature into an antiquated one. by Caroline DeMasi
Recently, Apple released iOS 10--the newest and biggest update of iOS ever. While there’s been positive and negative responses to the new interface, it’s something everyone eventually will have to download and install. The update brought a whole collection of new and exciting features, such as the Bedtime tab in the Clock app and the new iMessage system. Some of these features are hidden gems, buried deep within your iPhone just waiting to be discovered and tested. iOS 10 brings a whole new shiny interface to the table. Letters are bolder, the lockscreen shows more notifications, and iMessage has a fresh coat of paint. You can’t swipe left to unlock your phone anymore. Now, you have to tap the home button and it brings up your passcode. Here are 5 useful features that come packed with iOS 10. Widgets appear when you swipe left in the lock screen. They allow you to access information from other apps, such as upcoming events in Calendar, scheduled alarms in the Clock app, Weather, News, Reminders, and more! This is very useful for quick and easy access to important dates and other information. Remember those annoying apps that you never use but come preinstalled on your phone? With the new update, Apple lets you delete some of those stock apps to free up space on your phone. This is super helpful if you need to better manage your storage, or if you are simply annoyed by having extra useless apps on your home screen. If you listen to music on your iPhone, you probably used to use the Up Next feature to skip to a better song. In the updated Music app, this seems to be a thing of the past. Fear not, this useful tool is still there! It is simply hidden; instead of tapping “Up Next”, all you have to do is swipe up and a long queue of upcoming songs will scroll into view. Control Center has been expanded to two panes with the new iOS 10 update. The first pane that appears gives you access to toggle airplane mode, wifi, bluetooth, do not disturb mode, and orientation lock, along with brightness controls, AirPlay and AirDrop, and the flashlight, clock, calculator, and camera. The second pane, which is accessed by swiping left, is the audio control center, which lets you adjust your music volume and skip forward, backward, and play/pause a song. Additionally, if you use HomeKit, Control Center will have a third pane that allows you to access this app and use its controls. iMessage has a new look, and with it, new features. When you send a link to a video or a website, a preview image and name of the website will appear. If you send a YouTube video or other video link, you can watch the video right in the iMessage app. If you turn your phone in iMessage, a drawing keyboard will appear, allowing you to draw right in the app! By tapping the icon that looks like “>”, you will be given three new icons: the camera, Digital Touch, and the app store. If you tap the App Store icon in iMessage, you will be able to find games you can play right in the app. You can also send stickers with your messages by clicking the App Store and selecting apps that support stickers. If you have an iPhone 6 or later, you can send animations within your messages by holding down the blue send arrow button. Digital Touch allows you to send animated drawings to people by using different tap combinations. There are too many other new features to note in one article, but with a bit of exploring and button pushing, you will find exciting new things to use on your phone. iOS is Apple’s biggest update ever, and it truly lives up to that description. Happy beginning of the school year!
The WHS Tech Connect Team is excited to provide Wakefield High with the best possible resources and services for the 2016-2017 school year. We just finished refreshing our website! Two exciting technology initiatives that happened over the summer are the installation of wireless projectors throughout a lot of the building and new copier\scanners. A video tutorial for hooking up to the wireless projector is in the works, but for now, enjoy the printer training video series by clicking here. We are look forward to many exciting initiatives this school year and hope you all had a nice summer! - The WHS Connect Team |
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