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Learning Ruby on Rails - Day 1 - Installing RoR on Mac OSX

// April 25th, 2009 // No Comments » // Ruby on Rails

Before anyone gets any ideas. This is by no mean a definitive guide to Ruby on Rails. I am an absolute newb to Ruby on Rails and really developing web applications in general. I have working knowledge of HTML and CSS. I can stumble my way through PHP. I know next to nothing about MySQL. And this is my first ever attempt to extend my skillz (or lack there of) into application development a la playing with Ruby on Rails on my mac.

This blog post is as much for my benefit so that I can look back and see what I did. And most importantly what mistakes I made. Hopefully if you are reading this blog, you will learn from my mistakes so that you won’t have to make them.

So before I begin here is the system I am installing this on:

2.16GHz Intel Mac Book Pro running OS X Version 10.5.6

Installing Ruby on Rails.

I installed Ruby on Rails by following this excellent step by step post Building Ruby, Rails, Subversion, Mongrel, and MySQL on Mac OSX 10.5 (Leopard) which is the updated version of this guide, both of which I found on Hivelogic. The post is a bit dated but just about everything works perfectly. I did have make some minor changes to the installation to make sure I got the latest version of Ruby and Rails, but all that requires is that you find out what the latest version is a replace it in the code.

(You can find out what the latest version is by checking out the Ruby on Rails and Ruby Gems websites.)

So for example to install the latest version of Ruby Gems, everywhere I saw:

rubygems-1.3.1.tgz

I replaced it with:

rubygems-1.3.2.tgz

See easy as pie.

The only real problem I had was in installing Subversion. If you see these two error messages when trying to configure Subversion:

error: –with-openssl requires a path

error: –with-zlib requires an argument

then try removing the –with-openssl statement and add =/usr/ after –with-zlib so it looks like this:

./configure –prefix=/usr/local –with-ssl –with-zlib=/usr/

Now I don’t know what this actually does, but the installation does seem to work if you do this. Don’t blame me if something happens to your computer though… I am still learning too.

Anyway that is it for the installation. All in all it took me about 2 hours to install everything. Although I am sure that someone seasoned at this could do it much faster.

A good education needs free time

// March 22nd, 2009 // No Comments » // Analysis, Education

One of the questions that I have been wrestling with ever since I took a job as a teacher (which I must admit I am no longer doing) is how to fix our educational system. And by our I don’t mean just the one in the United States, but also the ones in places like Korea or Japan… those countries that people typically point to and say “Hey look at them. They have great educational systems.”

My response: I was a teacher in Korea. And the system here is just as f’d up as it is in the United States. If you want to compare math and science scores… ok Korea and Japan do have a significant edge on the United States, but you should see what these kids have to go through. A lot of these kids are addicted to coffee by the time they start middle school. It is not unusual for them to go to school from 7am to 10pm, Mon thru Fri and throw in another half day over the weekend. This can’t be healthy in the long run. And now I hear that people in the United States are saying that we should make our education system more like Korea and Japans? My honest opinion is that that would be a terrible mistake.

Why? Well if you are looking for solid data proving why this would be a terrible move, I don’t have any. But I do want to show you a YouTube video that I recently came across that will serve as my anecdotal evidence. This video (created by Kutiman) is a compilation of other user created music videos scattered across YouTube, blended together to create one longer video song. The result, an incredible creative audio endeavor.

But more important than the result itself was how it was created. You think that somebody went to school and was taught how to do this? You cannot be taught to be creative. Creativity comes from free time. And as Kevin Kelly suggests creating this video must have been a total waste of time and it will probably bring the artist immeasurable success.

What I am trying to suggest with this is that free time is important. The ability to waste time is important. Granted many of the things children do with that free time will be pointless (in our eyes) but we must still give them that time because one day they will create something that will bring them immeasurable success using that free time. 

Fortutious tidings for adlatitude… in jest

// February 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Miscellaneous

Google just released Latitude, a mobile social networking application that is capable of tracking your location, and I am patting myself on the back right now. I picked up adlatitude.com as a domain two years ago, and now the biggest game on the internet has essentially vindicated my choice of name.

I know that I am being self-laudatory, which most… including myself… would find to be annoying, but I feel like I deserve it. I have been running this blog for the better part of two years (I know… there is not much to show for it) and I have taken my fair amount of jostling, rib nudging, nuggies from friends who ask me if it is really worth it to write a blog that no one but myself probably reads.

Well now I have my answer… Google thinks my name is cool. Admittedly they didn’t copy my name (which would have been even cooler) but at least now I can say that me and Google think along the same lines or shall I say latitude.

A Vision of Hope… powered by new media

// January 22nd, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Inspiration, social media

Ok so this post is a day late… but things have been busy where I am, so I am going to finish off what I started.

22 Jan 2009. I woke up this morning with hope swirling within my heart and energy coursing through my veins. Today is a new day. Granted everyday is a new day, but today is different. Today the world is different.

And it all began… yesterday. Yesterday was an exciting day for people all around the world, especially Americans. For me, it was without a doubt the most important election in my lifetime.

Obama comes in riding a wave of hope, in a world where hope seems to be an ethereal wisp teasing us as we are slowly engulfed by the darkness surrounding us. In the past few months, we have seen a frightening collapse of the world financial systems. The economy is going from bad to worse. Unemployment is sitting at 7 percent, and economists are projecting double digit unemployment for the coming year. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continue to drag on. North Korea’s Kim Jung Il is as crazy as ever. And rumbling in the background is the greatest threat to have ever faced humanity… Global Warming. Greatest, not because it is any more threatening than the specter of nuclear war back in the 60s, but because in order to combat this threat, the whole world must unite.

Obama embodies America’s desire to rejoin the world and regain our place as a leader.

But what made all this possible? How did a no-name senator from Illinois, become the 44th President of the United States?

Technology. Sure Obama’s charisma, message of hope, intelligence (no offense Bush) were all factors in his election. But more so than any of those characteristics, it was Obama’s use of technology to empower his campaign and empower his supporters that allowed his message to touch so many, so quickly.

While I am on this topic, Tom Serres, CEO of Piryx and a friend of mine, had some great things to say on CNN about the Obama adminstration and the current/future use of technology by the adminstration and what that means for our country.

What Tom points out and what the whole nation has come to recognize (or at least those savvy enough to recognize it) is that the way we do politics has changed. Social media just entered the mainstream in a whole new way. Obama used social media to power his campaign by empowering his supporters.

CNN and Facebook joined teams to cover Obama’s inauguration, raising the bar on how social media will be used in the future to cover politics, campaigns, elections, and events of importance… or even social events like concerts.

Today, the world changed. It became something new. And I am excited to see how this will play out over the course of the next four years.

Dream of Changing the World: A Profile of Dean Kamen

// November 25th, 2008 // No Comments » // Inspiration

Every so often a story comes along that really touches the heart. It inspires you. It reminds you of those dreams that you had when you were a kid but have forgotten because you were too busy growing up.

This story sends me back to those times when I built worlds with Legos and imaginary robots with Tinker Toys. And for me the worlds I constructed were the worlds I wanted to live in… to be a part of. Those worlds were the better worlds, and they held all the potential that my monotonous, uninspiring, sometimes unbearable life in southeast Texas did not.

The Esquire story of Dean Kamen - best known for his invention of the Segway Scooter - is that kind of story. Kamen is a true dreamer… a real life Captain Kirk. Kamen belongs on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise proclaiming his defiance to all those who would stand in the way of exploration… charting a course into the unknown so that the rest of humanity may benefit.

Kamen is David Farragut at the Battle of Mobile Bay shouting Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! Because despite the difficulties and obstacles that face him, Kamen will not stop until he has conquered… or died.

The Esquire piece is a long article. But engaging and well worth the time it takes to read if you are like me, and you would see the world for what it could be… not what it is.

Esquire’s How Dean Kamen’s Magical Water Machine Could Save the World by John H. Richardson.

Education Trends: Manga Meets Learning

// October 19th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Education, Education Trends

Long a popular form of media in Japan and the rest of Asia, Manga has taken the United States by storm. Wired reports that in 2007, Manga had finally arrived in force and had become one of the hottest trends in the American publishing. Children and young adults in the United States alike can’t seem to get their hands on enough of it.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, Manga refers to a style of comic books that can be found in every book store / newspaper stand in Japan. Everyone from students to business men can be seen reading it.

So how does this affect education? According to a report from Matt Ford at Ars Technica, Manga will soon be used to introduce students (and others) to various topics in science and technology - everything from relativity to statistics to biotechnology.

Entitled The Manga Guide, the series of comic books will be drawn in the style of Japanese Manga and each book will focus on a single topic or field. The series is a translation done by No Starch Press and will be distributed by O’Reilly. The first Manga to be published will be entitled The Manga Guide to Statistics.

On a similar note, this reminded me of another article that I came across while I was stuck in my World of Warcraft obsession period. From a report by Iconoculture, Kaplan Publishing has partnered with TokyoPop to bring SAT/ACT prep to Manga. Psy-Comm, Von Van Hunter and other full-length graphic novels in the World of Warcraft Manga series are studded with highlighted words commonly used in the SAT/ACT tests.

Educational Technology Review: New Ways To Bring New Media into Education | 17 October 2008

// October 17th, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Education, Educational Technology, Legal and Policy Issues

The world market for e-learning and Educational Technology is estimated to hit $52 billion by 2010 (in 2007, revenues in the US alone topped the $17-billion mark). This is great news for educators, but despite the growing rapidly growing market of educational technology, it is still quite hard to find good resources for education and training in the Web 2.0 space.

In an effort to simplify the search for emerging e-learning / edtech, I have reviewed four new products that can be used inside and outside the classroom to bring new media technologies to education. In order of review they are:

• Social Media Classroom - an open e-learning platform developed by Howard Rheingold and offered free to students and teachers
• iKnow - an e-learing social networking platform developed by Cerego that focuses on language learning
• Edmodo - it is Twitter for educators… enough said
• Xtranormal - this application allows you easily create your own flash movies complete with dialogue and 3D animated characters

That was for the busy people. For a more complete look at each of these new platforms / application, continue reading below.

Social Media Classroom

Social Media Classroom is the brainchild of Howard Rheingold, a professor at UC Berkley and Stanford and the author of Smart Mobs. Social Media Classroom is built on the free Drupal CMS platform and provides teachers and learners with an integrated set of social media tools.

Each course created can use these tools as required and customize its usage for its own purposes. SMC has integrated forums, blogs, comment, wiki, chat, social bookmarking, RSS, microblogging, widgets, and video commenting.

The idea behind SMC was to create a free, easy to use, “student-centric pedagogy that engages students in actively constructing knowledge together about issues that matter to them, rather than passively absorbing it from texts, lectures, and discussions.“

Further enhancing its potential is the ability to utilize SMC in enterprise level organizations. The SMC becomes a collaboration platform where “groups, teams, nonprofit organizations, communities of practice can bring the advantages of online media to the purposes of their enterprises.“

So what is my personal take on this? I have not yet had the chance the chance to explore SMC, but I love the idea. I have been using Wordpress and Ning to enhance the classroom experience and bring the learning out of the classroom environment. One of the things that I appreciate most about Wordpress and Ning is the ability for every individual to customize their blogs (Worpress) or their profile pages (Ning). I have noticed that this feature does a lot toward encouraging students to take it and adopt these platforms for more than just classroom assignments. And I hope that SMC supports similar customization features. (If you have information on this… please let me know)

iKnow

Cerego introduced iKnow at DEMO Fall 08 as “the first intelligent social learning platform.” iKnow is built on sophisticated learning algorithms that is supposed to enable individuals to learn faster and improve memory retention. (Anyone have any data to back this up?) Because individuals learn at different paces each person’s training schedule is unique and customized according to their periods of time for studying and learning.

Even more exciting though is the community that iKnow is building around this platform. iKnow is not only a tool to help users learn but also an intelligent social network where they can share and collaborate with other users. The goal is to create a member-centric platform where members voluntarily help each other learn within these customized online systems. Ultimately, users from all over the globe will be able to remix content and share it with others within the learning community.

Reading about this I couldn’t help but remember the post that I had written on the XPrize for Education idea. There is no XPrize for Education yet, but already with iKnow it seems that we are seeing some of the ideas being bounced around there coming to life. The future is an exciting one for educators.

Edmodo

Edmodo is a tool for students to ask questions either within the classroom timeline, pose questions to the teacher directly, and submit their assignments. Edmodo is the brainchild of Jeff O’Hara and Nic Borg, two techies who work in the field of education. The simple explanation is that it is a microblogging platform (think Twitter) for education.

But it is much more than that. Edmodo contains the all the functionality of Twitter, but then adds some very useful applications on top of that, such as a calendar that teachers can use to post events and assignment due dates. But Jeff and Nic plane to expand Edmodo even further so that teachers can use it as a grading system and a way to interact with parents.

For more information on Edmodo, check out this interview with Jeff and Nic of Edmodo.

Xtranormal

Xtranormal is my favorite program on this list. Not because it is better as an educational platform… it isn’t even an education platform. But rather because it is a lot of fun. Xtranormal gives anyone the ability to create flash movies complete with 3D characters and dialogue… simply and painlessly - all you need to do is click and type. No programming required.

Now this won’t dramatically change the way we teach our students, but it can make teaching and learning a hell of a lot more fun. Want to make your student’s watch the Presidential debate? Why not have them create their own mock movie of it, rather than having them write a report.

I have not yet had a chance to use this for my classes yet, but you can be sure that I will. This would make a great project for my writing class… script writing plus animation. I wish something like this had been around when I was going through school.

Once I have given it a try, I will let you know how it works out.

Concluding Remarks

I hope you found this information useful. Check back regularly to find updates on new educational technologies. I will post them as I find them. If you have any suggestions, or if you have used any of the above, I would love to here about your experiences. Leave a comment below, or link back to this post.

Web 2.0 and Freedom of Speech: J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District

// October 7th, 2008 // Comments Off // Education, Legal and Policy Issues

Our changing technological landscape means that, as educators, we will always be presented with new difficulties and problems as students find ways to use (and abuse) these emerging technologies. These problems are unique because previous generations did not have to deal with these innovations. The importance of handling these problems appropriately is paramount, in that if we screw up, we risk further alienating our students.

Furthermore, as we try to integrate these technologies into the classroom environment, it would be good for us to understand both the abuse that is possible with it, and also the point (legally) at which a students actions go from harmless fun / teasing to something deliberately hurtful.

J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District

Earlier this month a court ruled that a school was within its rights to suspend an eighth-grade student (J.S.) for 10 days after she created a fake page on MySpace.com that depicted her principal as a pedophile and a sex addict. (
J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District)

This is an interesting case because it speaks to the rights of students to express themselves. Had I been J.S.’s age I would more than likely have used MySpace or YouTube to make fun of my teachers, but I think that making fun of someone and slander are two different things.

Although I am a proponent of freedom of speech, I think that in this case I would support the judges decision mainly because the MySpace profile was a public one and also because from what I have read of the case, it was not so much a parody as it was meant to slander the principal by painting him as a pedophile and degrading him.

Additionally, J.S. made it a public page so it was intended for anyone and everyone to see. Had it been private, I don’t think the school would have had a case.

The one problematic point of this case is that J.S. did not mention the principle by name on the MySpace page.

What legal precedents are really being debated here?

First is whether or not the principle constitutes a public figure. If the principle is considered a public figure then the burden of proof is higher for him.

A public figure is a legal term applied in the context of defamation actions (libel and slander). A public figure (such as a politician, celebrity, or business leader) cannot base a lawsuit on incorrect harmful statements unless there is proof that the writer or publisher acted with malice (knowledge or reckless disregard for the truth).

So does the principle of a school fall under this definition of a public figure? I would say that he does. Although the case did not seem to think so (or at least the judge made no mention of it), he is the face of his school and so should be considered a public figure, and thus a valid target for students or parents who want to ridicule him and his policies, as long as such ridicule is truthful.

However, ridicule does not entitle one to libel or slander. So the next question is was this a case of libel? In order for that to be established actual malice must first be proven.

The legal definition of actual malice was established in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, a Freedom of the Press / Civil Rights Case.

The actual malice standard requires that the plaintiff in a defamation or libel case prove that the publisher of the statement in question knew that the statement was false or acted in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity…. Proof of “actual malice” was required in order for punitive damages to be awarded, or for other increased penalties. Since proof of the writer’s malicious intentions is hard to provide, proof that the writer knowingly published a falsehood was generally accepted as proof of malice, under the assumption that only a malicious person would knowingly publish a falsehood.

So in this case I think that actual malice can be legitimately established. The information about the principle was obviously false, and very few would consider the label pedophile to be a harmless one. Furthermore because no punitive damages were being asked for, rather only that the school be allowed to suspend a student for disrupting the learning environment, I believe that the burden of proof is even lower in this case.

Some may cite the Draker v. Schreiber as evidence that the court made an incorrect decision in this case. But the biggest difference between these two cases is the scope of the penalty being enacted. In the Draker case, the principle was asking for punitive damages, while in this case the school was only asking to do what it already had the authority to do.

Therefore I believe that the court made the correct decision in this case.

Legal Cases

:

New York Times Co. v. Sullivan
Tinker Case

J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District

the X PRIZE: creating incentives for learning

// October 2nd, 2008 // No Comments » // Education, Inspiration

You cannot inspire others unless you yourself are inspired. So here is some inspiration for you.

The Long Now Foundation hosts a very interesting podcast called Seminars in Long Term Thinking (SALT). I was listening to their latest one, and the speaker for the show was Peter Diamandis - the founder of the X PRIZE Foundation. Although he was speaking about the advantages of using large prizes to create incentive to tackle problems in radical new ways, listening to this I think there is another message embedded in it.

For you multi-taskers, if you would like to listen to the podcast while you read, I have also embedded a copy at the bottom of this post. Enjoy.

History of the X PRIZE

On May 19, 1919 Raymond Orteig offered a $25,000 to the first person to fly non-stop from New York to London. At the time, no one believed that it could be done. But on May 27, 1927 that prize was won by Charles Lindbergh. Decades later, a young man by the name of Peter Diamandis heard this story and decided to create something radical… a vision that would send him into space.

In 1996, the first X PRIZE was formally announced. Backed by the Ansari family, the X PRIZE was…

“A prize with a goal that sat at the intersection of audacious and achievable…26 teams from 7 countries spent 100 million dollars [in total]” for a 10 million dollar prize. With the success of SpaceShipOne, we changed the paradigm that spaceflight was just for governments…and we changed government regulation in the process.“

Since the maiden flight of SpaceShipOne on October 4, 2004, there has been more than $1.5 billion dollars in public and private expenditure in support of the private spaceflight industry. This story is Peter Diamandis’ vision.

The X PRIZE Today

Now backed by Google co-founders Larry Paige, Sergey Brin and others, the scope of the X PRIZE has expanded dramatically and in some senses become even more ambitious than that original goal “to reach an altitude of 100km, and to do it again within two weeks”. Today the X PRIZE Foundation offers or will be offering prizes in 5 distinct verticals:

• Energy and Environment
• Global Development - wealth creation to combat poverty
• Exploration - space and underwater
• Education
• The Life Sciences

Listening to this, I can’t help but want to turn back the clock and start my schooling all over again. I want to take the right courses and learn the things that I need to so that I can help tackle one of these problems. And I cannot alone in this feeling. Since the Ansari X PRIZE was won, the X PRIZE Foundation have seen an extraordinary amount of interest - interest on the magnitude of “five and a half billion media impressions”. Alas since I cannot go back in time and choose a new course, I will do what I can to promote this and encourage our children to tackle these problems.

Making Incentive Prizes Work

So how does it work?

“When there is a market failure… when things are stuck… when there are entrenched bureaucracies… and when there is a stigma surrounding it - people are saying that ‘this’ cannot be done, that is when these incentive prizes like the X PRIZE work best.“

Do we face this problem in the way we educate our children today? I would say so, and there are many out there who would agree with me. So what can be done?

Making It Work For Education

As I see it the X PRIZE can be leveraged in two different ways to benefit education.

On the one side it can inspire educators and non-educators alike to invent and evolve in order to change the way we educate. The X PRIZE Foundation envisions prizes in two areas:

• Learning technologies: software and platform trials for products/services that dramatically accelerate learning and expand access.
• City competitions: mobilizing new resources and methods to improve early learning or college/work readiness.

Now I don’t know how many of you have read Ender’s Game but part of the training that the protagonist Ender Wiggens undergoes takes place through a computer game based on adaptive digital content. The game continuously assesses Ender’s skill, his interests, and his reactions to customize delivery. So why am I telling you this?

Ender’s Game was written in 1985 - the nascent stages of the personal computer industry. Orson Scott Card, the author, imagined an educational computer game like the one envisioned by the X PRIZE a decade before the X PRIZE was born. We live in a time now where his fictional visions can become a reality. We live in a time where sci-fiction can become… and does become reality. As educators we need to realize this, and we need to hold on to that vision because unless we do, we will not change the way our kids learn.

Additionally, the X PRIZE can inspire our students, just as it inspires us. Some of the competitions being presented by the X PRIZE Foundation may take decades to come to fruition. And they can serve as long term objectives for the children growing up today.

Who knows… maybe one of your students will win a billion dollars and save our planet in the process. It is our job to make sure they realize that this dream is possible.

Listen to the full podcast below. Click here to return to the top.

Download X PRIZE Founder Peter Diamandis Speaks About Highly Leveraged Incentive Driven Competitions

Educational Trends: Video Games as the Future of Learning

// October 1st, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Analysis, Education, Educational Technology, Featured, Video Games

In a little over 30 years, video games have become one of the most pervasive, profitable, and influential forms of entertainment across the world. Perhaps most illustrative of this is the existence of television channels dedicated to gaming - in particular Starcraft.

But video games have moved well beyond entertainment. From addictions, to ADD therapy, to providing comfort during economic recessions and depressions, video games are playing an increasingly active role in defining us.

With the role of video games growing in importance, is it really any surprise to think that education will have to follow suit? I don’t think so. Video games as education have existed for as long as I have been breathing. Growing up I played Number Crunchers, Math Blaster, Oregon Trail, and US Presidents to name a few. Even games that I wouldn’t have considered educational at the time contain educational value (Sim City) according to Mark Prensky. Simulations (like Sim City) were once “the province of gamers, scientists, and the military, [but today] has emerged as a huge buzzword in training.” Take for example the flight simulator. The “flight simulator was originally conceived as an entertainment device for fairs. Nevertheless, the flight simulator is [now] acknowledged as a revolution in learning and training [by the military and commercial flight schools].”

The real question is will games ever be accepted by those who need to accept it - the teachers and parents? That is a much more difficult question to answer. According to a 2007 survey conducted by Project Tomorrow we have some work to do in this area.

Among the survey findings:

• More than half of students in grades 3 through 12 believe educational gaming would help them learn.
• Only 16% of teachers, 15% of administrators and 19% of parents are on board today - although there was significantly more support for further exploration of the potential.
• And 11% of teachers say they’re already using video games in class, no matter how much you roll your eyes.

To download the full report by Project Tomorrow click the link below.

Speak Up: 2007 National Findings