eContent

Harvard Visualization Engineering Class

Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences has a new course on Visualization Engineering which started yesterday, and is available online ... at the moment w/o charge1 (Schedule and Lectures / Videos) Here is the description: (added to the wiki and search engine)

• Harvard Computer Science 171: The amount and complexity of information produced in science, engineering, business, and everyday human activity is increasing at staggering rates. We must increasingly rely on computational approaches to generate abstractions that help us to gain insights into large collections of data. The field of visualization seeks to answer questions about science and humanity by developing methods that transform data into meaningful, perceptually intuitive representations. Good visualizations not only present a visual interpretation of data, but do so by improving comprehension, communication, and decision making.
  
  The goal of this course is to expose students to visualization methods and techniques that increase the understanding of complex data. The course will cover how the human visual system processes and perceives images, good design practices for visualization, tools for visualization of data from a variety of fields, and programming of interactive visualization systems. The course is targeted both towards students interested in using visualization in their own work, and students interested in building better visualization tools and systems.
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• Schedule and Lectures / Videos
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• Planned Topics:
  
      * Data and Image Models
      * Visual Perception & Cognitive Principles
      * Color Encoding
      * Visualization Software Design
      * Designing 2D Graphs
      * Maps & Google Earth
      * Higher-dimensional Data
      * Unstructured Text and Document Collections
      * Trees and Networks
      * Scientific Visualization
      * Medical Visualization
      * Scientific Photography
      * Animation
      * Interaction Techniques
      * Social Visualization
      * Visualization & The Arts

You Ought to be in Pictures (or a blogger!)

Why?

• There aren't any awards.
• The pay is rotten (non existent without adds)
• You rarely get to "talk" with your viewers

I don't know if there is a perfect answer, but I do get satisfaction from helping folks access technical learning and collaboration content, some of which I created. Here are two views of my subscriber stats for the last 30 days (not my direct blog viewers). As of today ... you ... 450 of my loyal subscribers visit this blog every day. As I don't know how often folks visit, the total number of subscribers is higher. Expand the thumbnail image for a quick view, or the attached pdf for more details!

• Subscriber Views (pdf - expand to 150%)

The World is Flat 3.0

I know that Thomas Friedman's book by the same name has been out there for some time, but if you're still trying to get folks to understand the reality of globalization, MIT World just brought online an excellent  video lecture given by Friedman himself where he reviews this concept, with updated examples:

• MIT World - The World is Flat 3.0

Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing Tips by Video

Once again, you anonymous folks out there have submitted another excellent resource to the Engineering Learning Wiki ... in this case on the mechanical engineering page. Well done!

Via the wiki I learned that Tec-Ease has been posting online free Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing Tips since 1997! You will find a wealth of information. Since last year, each tip has also had an associated video. Tips with a video are so indicated on the full archive list. Here are some recent examples:

• Parts Do Not Have Center Lines—Features Have Axes
• Read the Feature Control Frame to Determine the Origin of Measurement
• Tolerance Those Slots Right
• Use Extensions of Principle—When You Need To

Nokia N800 RSS Capability

I decided it was time to do an entire post using my bluetooth keyboard and my Nokia N800 internet tablet. Last night we had some friends over for dinner and everyone was amazed with both the clarity and size of my Nokia's screen. Obviously that is the key point ... my ease of viewing web based content as well as upgrading when new software is created for the Nokia's Linux based operating system.

One change in my web browsing habits is that I've split up my RSS feeds. My work focused feeds remain on my PC; but my leisure based feeds are now on my Nokia. It's nice to sit on my bed after a long cross-country ski with my feet up and read for fun. It's just plain comfortable! Thus attached to this posting are eleven screenshots taken on my Nokia N800.  They demonstrate how easy it is to use and read RSS feeds via the Nokia. In my case I was leaving the frozen Northland for a trip via the NY Times Travel Section.

• Screenshots
• 00: Nokia Desktop
• 01: Web Applications Menu
• 02: RSS Application Start-Up
• 03: RSS Menu - Feed
• 04: RSS Menu - Edit
• 05: RSS Menu - View (and zoom)
• 06: RSS Menu - Tools
• 07: NY Times Travel Section Feed
• 08: Toggle to NY Times "Full View"
• 09: Web Page Link / Galapagos Islands
• My Earlier Nokia N800 Review (demo screencast)

I've yet to find an application out there which allows me to edit jpg files. More than likely, I'm not looking hard enough! Oh yes, one final point  ... the RSS Feed Reader that came with my Nokia had no problems importing an OPML file. Thus, I was able to import feeds in mass via a file transferred over from my PC.
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Matlab Tutorials from Blinkdagger

Quan Quach and Daniel Sutoyo have an excellent blog named Blinkdagger. A major focus of this technology blog is providing Matlab tutorials. In addition to their excellent Matlab work, in the short time I've been subscribed to their blog, I've enjoyed their unique artwork (expand thumbnail image) and their posts on Female Engineering Syndrome (FES)! Here are those links:

• Blinkdagger Matlab Tutorials
• Female Engineering Syndrome: Original Post | A Response!
• Note: I learned about Blinkdagger via Doug's Pick of the Week

   

Google Open Source Science Initiative

Stanford Professor Larry Lessig has led the charge to insure that basic access to scientific and other kinds of research are available without charge. His book on this subject, The Future of Ideas, is available for free download. You may also wish to watch his talk given at TED which was titled How Creativity Is Being Strangled By The Law. Obviously I resonate with these concepts, and my blog is focused upon that goal. Thus, it is with great interest that I learn via Rafael Sidi's blog (Really Simple Sidi - RSS) of Google's entry into this domain:

Quoted from Wired Magazine - January 18, 2008: "Sources at Google have disclosed that the humble domain, http://research.google.com, will soon provide a home for terabytes of open-source scientific datasets. The storage will be free to scientists and access to the data will be free for all. The project, known as Palimpsest and previewed to the scientific community at the Science Foo camp at the Googleplex last August, missed its original launch date this week, but will debut soon."

This initiative will be worth monitoring ...
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Minnesotans at Play (-18F) ... Pond Hockey

Even though the temperature at 8:30 a.m. this morning is -18F (-28C) at my house ... with a windchill that is down in the -35F (-37C) range, the National Pond Hockey Championships march on (skate on?!). Take a few moments and enjoy Minnesotas at play ... and actually teams from around the United States and Canada.  This is the kind of hockey that we all played as kids (at least us Minnesota folk).

• Slide show with audio
  (or)
• Expand the attached photo

Solidworks or Matlab ... Choose Your Favorite Tool!

I discovered two new podcasts today in the "engineering design tools" arena. Lou Gallo has done an excellent job with his Solidworks Heard Podcast; but if your preferences run to MatLab, then move to Doug Hull's Pick of the Week. Both podcasts cover design features with a minimum amount of fluff.

• Matlab Pick of the Week: Podcast | Screencast Demos
• Solidworks Heard Podcast

I've added both of these podcasts to both my Google Co-op Search Engine, and the Engineering Learning Wiki (podcast and engineering tools pages).
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Can You Spot the Northstar Nerd?!

There are no prizes for winning this game, except increased knowledge!

Late yesterday afternoon I had to laugh at myself. I truly demonstrated that I was the "Northstar" Nerd. Here was the situation:

• I had just finished a hard cross-county skiing workout (see Loppets for LindYun)
• Upon finishing, I discovered that the lanyard from my thumb drive had been around my neck during my entire ski!

You may ask ... why? Well, I was listening to the Car Talk podcast via my FM modulator in my car while driving over to the park where I ski.  As the podcast was not finished when I arrived, I left the thumb drive connected to the modulator, and started my workout ... compete with disconnected lanyard around my neck!

Now how can this be educational for you? Do you time shift by listening to podcasts in your car? Although I was listening to CarTalk, lots of other knowledge based podcasts are available ... for instance Harvard Ideacast. I've attached a few photos to give you a better understanding, but link to my Drivetime podcast post to watch a tutorial, and view some of my podcast links. The cost of an FM modulator is under $25 U.S.
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