Alan Liu, English 165HL (Hyperliterature) Technology

Course E-Mail Alias
Access to Instructional Computing Facilities
- Instructional Computing (Phelps Hall)
- English Dept. Transcriptions Studio
UWeb
Technical Help

General philosophy regarding technology in this course: Because much of the information technology used in the Transcriptions/Literature and the Culture of Information project is new to the humanities (and is being personally configured, coded, or designed by instructors and research assistants), there are sure to be glitches, gotchas, and bugs. This is not a problem but an opportunity. This course encourages a philosophical approach to the experience of information technology. Problems should be reflected upon in the context of the overall life of contemporary information. For instance, if you are having trouble accessing a site or are experiencing delays, how might those practical problems be related to larger issues of access or time in contemporary culture? Why is the delay of a minute now so frustrating compared to the delays of days, weeks, or months that societies in the past accepted as part of the normal rhythm of human communication? "Reflecting" on technical problems is perhaps in the last analysis more a matter of attitude than of deliberate thought. In his Zen Computer, Philip Toshio Sudo suggests that as you sit down to boot up your computer you should first acknowledge it and what it means: "Before you start and after you finish working, make this one simple gesture toward your computer: Give it a nod" (fuller quote).

Course E-Mail Alias

Most basically, the course will use e-mail to allow students and the instructor to engage with each other outside class. E-mail can be both individual and collective. Once the instructor has your e-mail addresses, he will enter you in the alias so that correspondence to the alias will reach all class members (including the instructor). The alias address for this course is english165HL@humanitas.ucsb.edu

For help with e-mail or your university e-mail account, see the U-Mail web page at http://www.umail.ucsb.edu/

Access to Instructional Computing Facilities

Instructional Computing (Phelps Hall)

Students in this course may obtain access stickers for the computer labs (both PC and Mac) at Instructional Computing in Phelps Hall. Stickers will be available from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on April 5th-6h in the Phelps courtyard. Students must bring proof of class enrollment (for example a print-out of the syllabus or a Registrar's schedule confirmation.

For details on equipment and software available at Instructional Computing, see their page on Labs. Also see Instructional Computing's Software Help Guide.

A schedule of the free First Week Software Orientations at Instructional Computing (and other free workshops offered during the quarter) are available online. Especially useful for the Web-authoring assignment in this course (for those new to Web authoring) is the Instructional Computing workshop on the Dreamweaver HTML editing program held during the first week of the quarter. Students interested in graphics work may also be interested in the workshop on Photoshop.

English Dept. Transcriptions Studio (South Hall 2509)

During the quarter, a graduate-student research assistant in the English Department's Transcriptions project will hold regular help hours in the Transcriptions studio. So long as a research assistant or faculty member is present, students are also free to use the machines to work on their team project (depending on the availability of machines).

The studio is a small facility outfitted with a full complement of development tools for Web authoring, including:

HTML Editors The main Transcriptions production tool for designing and maintaining Web pages is Macromedia Dreamweaver. The program includes a site-manager with integrated FTP (for uploading files to a server)
Graphics Programs There are several copies of Adobe Photoshop and Macromedia Fireworks on the studio machines. There is also a selection of add-on "filters" (special-effects generators) for Photoshop and Fireworks, including Kai's Power Tools 3, 5 and 6 and the Eyecandy suite.
Scanner There is a legal-size flatbed scanner (with optional slide-transparency capability) that can be used to scan images into Photoshop or text into the Omnipage Pro program for OCR (optical character recognition) conversion.
Office Suite and Printers. The studio machines also include the Microsoft Office suite and a combination of laser and color-inkjet printers. These products are intended to supplement Web work; they are not for heavy-duty word-processing and printing.
Hypertext Literature Library. The studio includes a nearly complete library of the hypertext literature works published by the Eastgate Systems company. These may be used by one student at a time by logging on as "transuser" on a studio machine (which will make available the pre-installed works). For an annotated guide of some of the works in the studio hypertext library, see the Hypertext Literature catalogue

Note: Because Transcriptions Studio has a limited number of machines, faculty and graduate-student research assistants have priority. The main purpose of the studio is research and development; it can only supplement, not replace, the Instructional Computing labs designed for heavy student use.

UWeb

One assignment in the course is to build a team-authored hypertext project. To do so, students will need a UWeb account on the university's student server where they will have space to publish their project on the Web. Please go to the UWeb site for instructions and help. UWeb also offers technical support limited to assistance with publishing your pages (they do not assist in HTML editing or page design).

For help with Web authoring, HTML, and page design, see the following resource guides developed by Transcriptions:

Web-Authoring Basics (basic outline of the process required to download, revise, and upload web pages associated with Transcriptions courses)
Resources for Web-Authoring (design and how-to advice for both beginning and advanced Web authors; includes links to HTML and design style guides, help with images, and examples of good and bad design)

Technical Help

Students will be introduced to the Transcriptions studio and its tools at technical workshop during this course (TBA). There will also be individual help available from Transcriptions research assistants. See also the Transcriptions online guides to Web authoring and the help pages at UWeb.