TED5110 - The basics and working with Numbers, Text, Images, Sound, Video, Interactive content

ENCODING INFORMATION

What is coding (or encoding)? The purpose and benefits of encoding and decoding - Dealing with a concrete reality, and education in the most efficient ways: Cheaper, faster, safer, better.

What are CONCRETE, REAL, & EXPLICIT / ANALOG, Intuitive REPRESENTATIONS,

Analog (initative) form: Perceived by raw stimulation to the senses (EYES, EARS, TOUCH, SMELL, TASTE) using imitative, simulated, or iconographic objects, shapes and events, as different from ABSTRACT, SYMBOLIC, & IMPLICIT / Digital (symbolic), which are encoded REPRESENTATIONS, forms created by CODING and DECODING SYMBOLS, with the assistance of the brain, or a digital computer.   Symbols include combinations of simple objects, shapes, images and events, such as SIMPLE SCRATCHES, ALPHABETIC SHAPES, LETTERS, FINGERS (digits, in Latin), and all the way to ELECTROMAGNETIC PULSES and waves moving at the speed of light and stored in thousands of billions all over the place.

Both EXPLICIT / ANALOG and IMPLICIT / DIGITAL can exist as PHYSICAL, versus VIRTUAL OBJECTS, materials and activities – Look for definition of these terms in an ON LINE DICTIONARY (http://www.yourdictionary.com/).

Which are the practical, and EDUCATIONAL advantages and disadvantages (cost, safety, speed) of each one of the possibilities to encode (EXPLICIT/ANALOG, vs. IMPLICIT/DIGITAL, or PHYSICAL vs. VIRTUAL)?

ENCODING THROUGH HISTORY:

Evolution, from iconographic (cartoon-like), to present-day (highly symbolic) written languages.

ACTIVITY: Alternate ways of encoding and decoding Text: Telegraphic-Morse, / Try it! .  Braille, American (hand) Sign Language / Try it!.

Can you WRITE YOUR LAST NAME in MORSE, BRAILLE, and in AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE?

QUESTION (Multiple Choice): What would be the largest number of different choices we could represent with the fingers in our hands, if we used them in the most efficient way possible?  a) 10   b) 100,  c) 1,024  d) 10,000 e) 54.687 - Shannon's Theorem - Why we use the binary (base-2) numeric system in computers

QUANTITY &- NUMBERS in MATH: Encoding and manipulating numbers with HAND fingers in the HINDI-ARABIC, Decimal base-10 system (http://www.animath.net/cnt10cubes.htm), - Coding and using numbers with electronic computer "fingers" (transistors & switches) in the BINARY, base-2 system ( http://www.animath.net/cnt2.html), http://animath.net/binarycalc.htm).

OTHER USEFUL INFORMATION: ARITHMETIC WITH BINARY NUMBERS - Representing, and doing BASIC ARITHMETHIC (adding) numbers like computers do . View the pebble simulations of binary addition and subtraction and binary multiplication (small numbers). Also SEE MS Windows CALCULATOR / Scientific

EXERCISES: Work on paper the additions shown in the following worksheet - Convert the given numbers to binary form (computers), and then add them in binary form.

OTHER BASES: GROUPING binary bits for easier analysis of data: in groups of 3 bits: octal-base 8 (http://www.animath.net/cnt8.html- for telecommunications; and groups of 4 bits, hexadecimal base-16 (http://www.animath.net/cnt16.html - for computer data analysis. The less common base 5 (http://www.animath.net/cnt5cubes.htm), and other, non-standard bases. Scientific formats: Integer, floating point, single and double precision ("characteristic", and "mantissa" parts). Basic operations with numbers coded in different bases.

CODING TEXT IN THE COMPUTER: Computer coding of the standard alphabetic characters ASCII (American Standard Coding for Information Interchange), ASCII Table, and Encoding the Computer (keyboard) Keys . WRITE DOWN THE FIRST 26 CHARACTERS OF THE ALPHABET IN BINARY, AND ASCII CODE. View inside a text file and verify the encrypted words.

Can you WRITE YOUR LAST NAME IN ASCII?

Common computer file formats for TEXT content:  txt, rtf, doc, html

COMPUTER "FINGERS" AND CODING - GROUPING base-2 digits (called BITS)

ITEMS	PREFIXED NAMES
1  bit     (computer finger)	bit
8 bits    ( count 0-255, or one keyboard character)	one byte
32 bits	one word
64 bits	one double-word
1000 (binary 1024 bytes) = one-thousand bytes ( )	one kilobyte KB
1,000,000 (binary 1,048,576 bytes) = one-thousand kilobytes	one megabyte MB
1,000,000,000 (binary 1,073,741,824 bytes) = one-thousand megabytes (billion)	one gigabyte GB
One thousand giga bytes (trillion)	one terabyte TB

CHALLENGE QUESTION : How many 25 MB (Megabyte) size files can be stored in a 1 GB (Gigabyte) thumb memory stick?

ENCODING VISUAL IMAGES: Primary colors and The digital canvas (RGB, CYMK). Playing with digital (binary) color information. Common computer file formats for IMAGE content:  bmp, gif, jpg, png, psd, pdf, ppt.

ACTIVITY: COMPUTER GRAPHICS PRIMER:

1.- Use a still-image processing program, such as MS Paint, to create a SIMPLE RED RECTANGLE

SAVE it as:

• BMP (Bitmap) - SIZE?
• GIF (compressed format) - SIZE?
• JPG (compressed format) - SIZE?
• TIFF - SIZE?

OBSERVE THE DIFFERENCE IN SIZES, and APPEARANCE. What makes the differences?

2.- Use MS Paint (or other similar still-image processing program) to load any of the (rectangle) images saved in the previous step.

• RESIZE (Image-Stretch Skew....) the image (Stretch> horizontal/vertical) to 50% each.
• Save ("Save as") the resized image -under a DIFFERENT NAME (e.g. 2,3, etc. TO PRESERVE THE ORIGINAL) but in the same, original JPG or GIF format
• OBSERVE ITS NEW SIZE
• REPEAT THE RESIZING for 10% horizontal and vertical stretch

OBSERVE THE DIFFERENCE IN SIZES, and APPEARANCE. What makes the differences now?

Playing with MS Paint, and Photoshop

ENCODING VOICE AND SOUNDS: Digitizing and Un digitizing Sound

Common computer file formats for SOUND / AUDIO content:  snd, wav, wma, mp3

(Using the MS Windows Sound Recorder)

ENCODING ANIMATION AND VIDEO: Digital video compression

Common computer file formats for ANIMATION (gif-animated, jsp, swf) and VIDEO (VHS, Beta, DVD, Blue Ray, wmf, Quick Time, flv) - What are "codecs", "streaming", and "interlacing"?

COMMON FORMATS FOR ENCODING text, images, sound, video FILES in the computer.

CHALLENGE QUESTIONS: How do computers know which coding is used in their files? How is this information used by the operating system (Windows, OS, UNIX) to run programs? Why does video content take longer to run?