eContent

Engineering, Technology and Culture

The University of Illinois has hosted an event with the same name, Engineering, Technology and Culture. You can access webcasts of many presentations. The conference overview is described with these words:

"Although everyone benefits from the products of engineering creativity and productivity, engineering and technology are seldom studied by scholars as human activities. Thus engineers, engineering, and technology are under-represented on the intellectual landscape in a way that is inconsistent with their importance in the twenty-first century. The study of engineering and technology from a philosophical, historical, cultural, behavioral and sociological perspectives is essential to address important contemporary problems at the interface of technology and society."

Take a web link to either the 2007 or 2008 conference. You'll find some unique and intrigueing presentations to watch ... such as "Engineering Hip Hop: Crossfaders, Mixers, and Digital Turn".

I will definitely add this to my seminars page of the Engineering Learning Wiki (and the embedded Google search engine).

Virtual Machine Shop

One complaint I often hear from older engineers is how many of their younger brethren don't have hands-on experience in the "shop". If that description might apply to you, or you just could use some occasional help with a machining problem, link on over to the Virtual Machine Shop! It has some great drawings, tutorials, animations, etc. I added this content to the mechanical engineering section of the engineering learning wiki.
.

Wireless Sensors Networks+

Following up on yesterday's post (my thanks to Peter Skomoroch over at Data Wrangling Blog), I've added the following courses to the Engineering Learning Wiki and it's embedded Google Co-op search engine. The links given below take you to the correct wiki section.

• Convex Optimization - Stanford University
• Fundamentals of Physics - Yale University
• Fundamentals of Wireless Broadband Networks - RPI
• Machine Learning - U Cal Berkeley
• Thermodynamics - Cambridge University
• Wireless Sensor Networks - University of Freiburg

Remember to check out the courses page of the Engineering Learning Wiki. This page has the search engine and lists the LARGE curriculums (i.e. not just individual courses).

From Cambridge to New Haven!

I've just discovered a wealth of new engineering videos /lectures courtesy of Peter Skomoroch over at Data Wrangling Blog. Over the next few weeks I will review the courses and add some of the better content to the Engineering Learning Wiki. Here are just two examples:

• Thermodynamics from the University of Cambridge
• Physics from Yale University (Open Yale Courses)

Google Docs Screencast / Tutorial

Google is going after Microsoft's jugular ... the office suite. If you've not paid any attention to Google's entry into the software productivity suite, now is a good time to familiarize yourself with Google's efforts, particularly when you understand that Google is bringing offline tools to the table ... yes Google is starting to offer software that runs offline ... at no charge. Does anyone remember Netscape and the Microsoft's new free Internet Explorer?! History has a way of repeating itself.

Setting up yourself to use Google Docs in quite simple. Just go to http://docs.google.com/. If already have a Google account, just log in. If not, create an account. Regardless, the software suite is free and it includes word processing, spreadsheet and presentation modules. Here is my tutorial, which also demonstrates how easy it is to use Google docs for online sharing and input of information:

• Northstar Nerd Google Docs Screencast / Tutorial
  • Blog Roll Input Form - Google Docs
  • Blog Roll - Online Viewing
    (tutorial examples)

Should you ever decide to go "cold turkey" and avoid Microsoft, remember you also have these free options to interface with the rest of the world:

• Microsoft Viewer: Excel | Powerpoint | Word
• OpenOffice.Org

Stanford Online Seminars

Spring is here ... sort of (20 inches of new snow today at my cabin in Northern Minnesota). Anyhow, Stanford Online has great new online graduate level engineering seminars which will cost you nothing except your time. This terms offerings include:

• AA-297: Seminar in Guidance, Navigation, & Control
• CS-547: Human-Computer Interaction Seminar
• EE-380: Seminar on Computer Systems
• EE-402S: Topics in International Advanced Technology Research
• EE-402T: Entrepreneurship in Asian High Tech
• MATSCI-230: Material Science Colloquium
• ME-396: Design and Manufacturing Forum
• MSE-450: Lessons in Decision Making
• MSE-472: Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Seminar

Access via this url (upon linking ... scroll back to top of page). For more seminars, link to the Engineering Learning Wiki's seminars page (includes a custom built Google search engine)

Fourier Analysis for the Faint of Heart

One of my favorite engineering blogs, Blinkdagger, has started a new series of tutorials on Fourier Analysis. The information is extremely well presented ... even I understand the concept now! This is a definite addition to the Engineering Learning Wiki.
.

NanoHype

Nanotechnology is one of the techie disciplines which popular media has seized upon. Spiderman's suit in the famous comic books and movie series supposedly gives him super-human strength and powers. In sci-fi novels, like Prey ... written by Michael Crichton (Jurassic Park):

In the Nevada desert, an experiment has gone horribly wrong. A cloud of nanoparticles—micro-robots—has escaped from the laboratory. This cloud is self-sustaining and self-reproducing. It is intelligent and learns from...

This begs the question ... what is hype, and what is nano? Link to this Northwestern University site and learn more! Spend some time exploring and you'll even find information about Grey Goo! In summation, this site is worth adding to the Engineering Learning Wiki.
.

UML JAVA Tutorials / Videos

Effective use of UML can dramatically increase your software productivity. In this world of short product life cycles, you need to learn how to more effectively write software code. Although resources that explain how to create applications using UML techniques have been few and far between ... or too general in nature, thankfully that situation is beginning to change. Here is a new resource I discovered this morning. Expand the thumbnail for a better view.

• Sun UML JAVA Tutorials / Videos

And from an earlier post:

• Today's Learning Tag ... UML

I was also intrigued to see that Sun was using Wink from DebugMode. Over the past few years, this tool has been one of my resources for creating screencasts.  The feature set is nice, and the price is right (free!). I will add the Sun tutorials to my Engineering Learning Wiki Software and Engineering Tools pages.
.
 

400 Years of Open Access!

As some of us push the concept of open access to knowledge with initiatives like Creative Commons, the Internet Archive, and the Directory of Open Access Journals, we are all just a "Johnny Come Lately" compared to Gresham College in London, England.  They describe themselves in this manner:

For over 400 years Gresham Professors have given free public lectures in the City of London. The College is named after Sir Thomas Gresham, son of Sir Richard Gresham who was Lord Mayor in 1537/38 and who conceived the idea of building an Exchange modeled on the Antwerp Bourse. This was brought to fruition by Sir Thomas, on land provided by the City of London Corporation, and was given the royal appellation by Queen Elizabeth I.

Each month Gresham hosts five to ten new lectures, and makes them available online without charge. You may even download most lectures for optimized off line viewing. Topics range all over the spectrum, from "Proving Einstein right!" to "Debussy - Quartet in G minor, Op 10". Although not strictly engineering content, but given the value I have linked Gresham College on my Engineering Learning Wiki Seminar Page.

• Gresham College Lectures
  (click upon lectures tab | note European date format)