Today we talked about the law when it comes to downloading and piracy . Yes, downloading IS illegal. We may not realize this and download anyway because, well, everyone does it. If you download anything such as songs without paying for it, then technically you have no right to listen to it and what your doing is illegal. The reason for this is that when we download stuff, we are not buying the rights from the company to use it.

This brings us to our second conclusion. Without buying the rights from a company, the company doesn't make any money and for some people this means that they wont be able to earn a living.

However downloading off the Internet isn't the only thing that is illegal. There are programs like Limewire that allows you to share mp3s with people. This is still illegal because the person you are sharing it with didn't pay to listen to that song. Even if YOU paid for the song it is still illegal because it's as if your giving out free music since the person your sharing it with never paid for the right to listen to it.

Well since I was absent I learned that we had to pick out a article on computer hacking and summarize it. So the article I'm doing is called "Pull the plug on hacking" and it is by George Collins.

Basically this article wrote down some of the famous questions that people ask about hacking and it answers them. So the first question was about what you should do if you think your computer is being hacked. Well this article says that the first thing you should do is disconnect your computer from the Internet. Then you need to do a virus scan to check for any software that shouldn't be on your computer. If you install Windows XP SP2 it will give you a firewall but if you don't want to install it then you can get a free firewall called ZoneAlarm from www.Zonelabs.com.

Another question asked is how would you know if there's a program running in the background of your computer?
Well if there was a program running you can usually tell that there is a change in your computer such as your computer gets slower, you have less RAM available, etc. The way to check for sure if there is a program running in the background, is to check what processes are running.

The last question asked was My monitor has horizontal bands of dark and light lines on it. What's wrong and how do I fix it?
The best way is to read you instructions on how to degauss your monitor. If it doesn't work out then unfortunately you will have to replace your monitor. If the problem is with the video card then just see if you can install the newest drivers.
Well that's the basic summary of that article. The article can be found at this address: http://web.ebscohost.com/src/detail?vid=1&hid=17&sid=f4da0810-29f8-40e5-a044-84c95233ff22%40sessionmgr8

January.24.07
It’s good to be back!!! Well I have been absent on Friday and Monday so I’m glad I’m back. I was about to DIE just sitting at home 4 days straight doing nothing!!! So anyways I just found out that my class had a excel test on Monday. Looks like I’m going to have to do it on Monday since I don’t have computers tomorrow.

Anyways today we learned about computer ethnics. Mr. Case explained about how there are two main types which are Utilitarianism and Continism.

Utilitarianism: When a decision a person makes is good if it benefits everyone
else.
Continism: When a decision a person makes is good if the person can wish that
everyone else can make that same decision.

People tend to have different ethics when they are dealing with computers. This means that people would not do some stuff physically but when it comes to virtually they can do it. Therefore they feel like they are not dealing with people anymore so they can say or do anything without considering a persons feelings. Some of the ways that people use can even ruin a person life such as by hacking, cracking and putting viruses. These terms mean:

*hacking: destroying files
*cracking: destroy people's security system
*Virus: a software program that is able to destroy files or other programs that
are on that computer
*DOS: denial of service attack

January.16.07

Well today we learned how to insert a graph from Microsoft Excel to PowerPoint or Word without breaking the link between the graphs, data or table so that any changes you make in Microsoft Excel will also happen in PowerPoint. To do this you must:

1) Highlight your table and then start making your graph
2) Press on 'As New Sheet' before you click on finish (therefore your graph will be put on a new sheet)
3) Save the graph
4) Go to PowerPoint or word then click on Insert, Object,. Then click on the tab that says "Create From File"
5) Click on browse then select the graph that you had saved.
6) Click on the "Link to File" box.
7) Click "ok" then your graph should appear in your document

January.10.07

We started learning things about Excel such as stuff about graphs.To make graphs, you first have to create your data. After to make that information into a graph you first have to go to:

1) Insert and press on chart

2) when it comes to which type of graph you want, you probably will have
a lot of options therefore pick the type of graph that would be most
suitable for your data.

3) After you fill out all the data required like axes and make the
appropriate options, click finish.

4) You will then have a graph based on the requirements you set out for
it.

January.09.07

Today we got an excel mini project. Using what we learned before about formulas, were going to take our first term report card marks and then see what we want our final average to be for each subject. After using a formula we have to figure out what we would have to get so that the three terms would average out to the goal we put in the final average.

Well I’m just glad I finished it!!!

January.08.07

We're back!! Its school again...the holidays are over...now we have tests..... Well the only good thing about going back to school is I got to see all my friends again but along with that comes all the homework and studying!!! Anyway today in computer class we were taught some features about Excel. The features that Mr. Case showed us were:

Value: are numbers that you can do math to
Formula: is when the equation starts with =
Cells: each box on an Excel sheet
Text string: is just text that u cannot do mathematical stuff to

We also learned that you can put more then one sheet on Excel. However the most important thing we learned so far is formulas because it is very important when you want to calculate something in excel. Therefore if you mess that up then all your information will be wrong. You should also remember that when you change one number it affects everything else that depends on it.

Anyway that is all for today.