At the end of the last class, when our esteemed professor mentioned how this class may have seemed tough for some people, I breathed an audible sigh of relief. This one was intense! I had never taken apart a computer, was vaguely aware the Linux was a word, and was fairly sure that USB flash drives worked by my own sheer will.
That said, it's a class I'm glad I've taken. I liked Linux to the point that I said I would run it as my OS of choice on my perfect computer. (You try arguing with free!) I've also started lots of good conversations at work by just bringing up something mentioned in class. It's gotten me to think about and question a lot of things I would normally have never considered. How are we protecting our files at school? How do we keep kids from loading a virus that ruins everything? Is there a type of server configuration that sounds like a California NFL team?
I still don't feel completely confident with the technical, nuts-and-bolts aspects of computers, but I'm happy to say that I feel like I've improved. And going forward, I'm definitely going to keep looking at apps to run off a flash drive. Hopefully, by the time I'm looking back at this for our final project before graduation, I won't still be using Microsoft Movie Maker for the school drama club. (And, hopefully, "finding lolcats" will no longer break the top 10 list of my technical abilities.)
I've worked a little with hardware over the years, but I've always prefered to let others get inside the "dusty" machine. This was a good experience. I hadn't labeled components in a long time.
ReplyDeleteThe alternative OS was a hassle. It may be free, but I'm not sold on the download and getting it to run stuff. Also, as I read about the systems, it seems the applications aren't upward compatible which reduced the appeal of linux. But like all things computer, it is a tool.
Making software do the job I want it to do, is what I like best. I like software applications a lot better than the hardware or OS. Like you I don't feel completely hardware confident, but I have gained experience that will help me.
The exposure to some unknown variables in this class was a challenge for most of us, but I think everyone would agree that they have learned at least something new about the content we covered.
ReplyDeleteThe alternate OS assignment for me was actually a let-down when I found out the OS I had chosen didn't really work as well as I expected it to. The compatibility was an issue I couldn't get past, but it seems like you had more success than me!