Individual Assignment 6

In this assignment (IA6) I learned a lot about how relationships between relational databases versus spreadsheets. In a relational database the different information is separated into separate charts, but are still connected by one-to-many relationships or one-to-one relationship. This assignment only contained one-to-many relationships, but we also learned that many-to-many relationships should not exist and that they are bad. Finding relationships between relational spreadsheets is more difficult because the way spreadsheets are presented does not allow the user to easily connect them.

      Keys are the columns that identify unique row in a table. We need them in queries to make the process of identifying something in relation to something else easier. Queries are the requests from databases for data. We need this to be able to find information. Forms are used to read, insert, modify, and delete database data. These key concepts in relational databases could be useful to future personal and professional projects because it ensure that whatever we are trying to record is detailed and well organized.

Individual Assignment 3

Dear Grandma,

            Have you ever wondered how the hard drive in your computer works? If so, you can put your wonders to rest because I am going to tell you how it works right now! In every hard drive there are stacks of spinning discs moving very fast while a recording head is reading them. This system works similarly to a record player. However, instead of reading music the recording head reads the recorded magnetic pattern of zeroes and ones. The recording head reads these numbers through the magnetic grains in the disc. (TED-Ed, 2015)

            The speed and colors of your computer are affected by the amount of bits on it.  The more bits on your computer, the more RAM (random access memory) you have. This affects the speed of your computer because the more RAM you have the more room your computer has to store stuff. It is recommended that you have about 4GB of RAM, so if you have a computer has less than that and it is not very fast, then you should probably get a computer with more RAM on it. The colors on your computer are also affected by the amount of bits on your computer. The number of colors that you can see on your screen correlates with decimal value of bits you have. To find the decimal value you can use the equation: 2^X = Y. In this equation, X is the number of bits you have, and Y is the decimal value. So let’s say that your computer has 1 bit. Then that would mean your computer only uses 2 colors, because when you enter 1 into the equation (2¹=Y) you get 2 for Y. For true color, you need 24 bits. (Computer Clan, 2013)

References

Computer Clan. (2013, January 31). Where Are Bits, and Are They Important? (32-Bit vs 64-Bit). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptzGI9VaZmQ

TED-Ed. (2015, October 29). How do hard drives work? – Kanawat Senanan. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wteUW2sL7bc

TED-Ed. (2013, July 1). Inside your computer – Bettina Bair. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkFi90lZmXA

Individual Assignment 1

         Something that I learned that I found very interesting is all of the detail that goes into a business process. I knew previously that all businesses follow some type of routine/procedure, but I did not realize that there was a formal diagram to represent this. What I found especially fascinating about this is the process symbols used in business process diagrams. The example diagram in the textbook (Figure 2-1) might look chaotic when you do not know what these symbols mean, but once when you do learn what the different shapes and lines represent it actually makes a lot of sense.

         One of the provided ideas that interests me is the digital marketing at American Eagle because I shop there a lot. Something that stands out about American Eagle’s digital marketing is the digital marketing of their sub-brand Aerie. Since Aerie and American Eagle are both clothing stores, a lot of their advertisements revolve around images of models wearing their products. A big controversy for a lot of clothing/fashion advertisements is that images of models tend to be photo shopped. In response, Aerie has started the “Aerie Real” campaign which has lead to the sub-brand getting a more diverse group of models that they will not retouch for advertisements. By doing this, Aerie had to restructure their brand, website, and social media.