Lessons Learned.

As this semester comes to a close, so will my blog. This past semester has been an enlightening experience for me when it comes to the world of blogging. During these weeks I have learned a lot of valuable information when it comes to writing a blog, though I am sure there is much more I could learn.

The first thing I learned about that I think turned out to be the most important about blog writing I learned all semester is the importance of the topic. A topic for a blog must be something that first interests the author. If the author isn't interested in the topic, then the blog is doomed to fail from the beginning. In many cases author won't want to post anything on the blog and the majority of anything that is posted on the blog will lack quality of content. As a result, any readers that may find the blog will soon move on in search of better content. The topic must of course also be something that interests other people so that the blog will have a chance of attracting readers.

The topic not only needs to be something that interests the author and readers but it must be something that can be written about week after week. This point impacted my blog in a negative way. The first couple of weeks went okay but after that coming up with new content related to programming that would also appeal to a general audience became difficult to do.

The second thing I learned is that just like anything else in life, procrastination can seriously affect the quality of work. This semester I found myself procrastinating until hours before the deadline for our class to have our blog posts online. In some cases I managed to surprise even myself with how good the post that I created in a few hours sounded, but in many cases the quality of the posts just weren't there.

During this blogging experience I did learn some positive things about writing, largely in a blog setting. One thing I learned about writing blogs is just because the "Publish" button is clicked, the writing has not been forever set in stone, never to be edited. If a something in the post needs to be clarified or added, editing is not only acceptable but in many cases a good thing.

Knowing what I know now, if I were dropped back into the first day of class I would make a few changes to both my blog itself and how I went about maintaining the blog. The first thing I would do is find a broader subject still relating to computers. I think a better topic would be one that either has a lot of information already related to it or topic which has a lot of developments in it. I would also make sure to not wait until hours before the posting deadline to start writing a post. I would instead begin writing a post, a day or two ahead of time.

History of Computers (Part 2)

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post about the history of computers from the first machine truely considered a computer through a machine called "Colossus". To read that post, click here. This post will cover the history from where I left off through the modern computer.

In 1942, development of the ENIAC (Electrical and Numerical Integrator And Calculator) began. The funding for research and development of the ENIAC was largely provided by the U.S. military. The military needed a machine that could calculate the information needed for artillery-firing tables. These tables were used to communicate to soldiers in the field how to adjust the settings on the artillery in order to be accurate under varying conditions. Development was led by John Mauchly and John Presper Eckert. The ENIAC took about a year to design, once designed it took about 18 months and $500,000 to build it. In today's money that is almost $6.5 million.

ENIAC

After the ENIAC came a period where no real developments were being made in the world of computers. That is until the 1960's came around and the mainframe computer was born. Mainframe computers used technology from the Atansoff-Berry Computer, the Colossus and the ENIAC. Mainframe computers were largely used only by large organizations due to their high cost and large amount of space they took up. At this point in history there were no personal computers in use.

After this the components to make computers began to get smaller and cheaper to manufacture. This lead to the rise of the personal computer.

Works Cited:

Abdelmoumin, Ghada A. "CSC 110 Class." Personal interview. Aug. 2012.

Bellis, Mary. "The History of the ENIAC Computer." About.com Inventors. About, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2013. <http://inventors.about.com/od/estartinventions/a/Eniac.htm>.