Finals Week: Class Reflection

All in all, I enjoyed this class. I thought that it gave a pretty good general overview of the different aspects of the Internet in regards to how information is stored, retrieved, manipulated, etc. The Internet is truly an immense place and there is a seemingly endless amount of information contained within it. This class touched on many of the fundamental tools of the Internet that allow for efficient use and navigation. I enjoyed how a lot of the assignments (and the class as a whole for that matter) were left relatively open-ended. I believe that this allowed for people that aren't very familiar with information resources on the Internet to be able to learn at their own pace. On the other hand, it allowed for more experienced users such as myself to focus on the things that I wanted to expand upon, and "customize" the class a little bit. Great job Professor!

Week 15: Future of the Internet

The Internet is all around us. It is ever-changing and ever-expanding. The potential future of the Internet changes with every passing second. One of the things that I foresee happening to the Internet in the future is a complete overhaul of the structure and way we access things on the Internet. I believe that using TCP/IP as the Internet standard will cease and the new standard will become NDN (Named Data Networking). Here's what I said about NDN in a discussion post during the first few weeks of this class:

"...With Named Data Networking, a user will be able to send out a request for information called an interest packet that the router can store in what’s known as a pending interest table; basically, a holding ground for all requests. From there, the router can scour the web and the multitude of devices connected to it to find the appropriate data that the user wants. Because the data is stored in a data packet that contains a unique name, the router can intelligently locate all instances where the data may be hosted and stream that data directly to the user in bits and pieces. The idea is similar to how the peer-to-peer file sharing company BitTorrent functions in that if you wanted to download a movie, for example, you would do so by connecting directly to other users who transmit fragments of the movie to your own device. Essentially, implementing NDN as the new standard for Internet architecture would turn all devices, files, information, etc. that are connected to the Internet, into a huge indexed database that is accessible by anyone..."

In addition to that, NDN could potentially eclipse the onslaught of DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks that seem to plague the Internet lately ever since the method gained popularity in the hacking community. The research teams in charge of the NDN project are also doing some pretty cool stuff that incorporates concepts of Tor (free, open network that allows for anonymous surfing of the web). They hope to be able to provide the same level of anonymity in NDN, while still maintaining its inert low overhead. For more information on the NDN project, check out this site: http://named-data.net/ 

Week 14: Podcasting/Vodcasting

I haven't listened to many podcasts or watched many vodcasts myself, but they do have a pretty substantial following in society these days. Some of the most popular internet personalities have come to light due to their podcast or vodcast. Really, they are just an extension of a blog (but using a different medium to convey your message). A podcast can be thought of as an audible blog and a vodcast can be thought of as a video blog. You can even use an RSS feed to stay up to date on your favorites podcasts or vodcasts. In my opinion, vodcasts are now the more popular of the two; which can most likely be attributed to the immense popularity of YouTube (where you can find a vodcast on nearly anything you can think of).

Week 13: Open Access

Personally, I love the idea of open access. The main driving force (at least in my mind) behind the Internet is being able to share ideas with the entire world, collaborate, and be inspired by others. With open access, we can help spread other people's ideas so that their knowledge can touch every corner of the planet. Similar to open access is open source. I also love open source software because you can build upon the knowledge of others. Open source software has become such a huge movement that some of the most widely accepted security protocols are open source; such as OpenSSL (even though it had a pretty significant hack earlier this year).

Week 12: Mobile Computing and Apps

One of the largest examples of mobile computing in modern-day life is the smartphone. They are all around us. Whether it's an iPhone, Android phone, Windows phone, Blackberry, etc.; it's hard to go anywhere without seeing someone's face "glued" to a smartphone. I think the term smartphone tends to fool a lot of not-so-tech-savvy consumers though. They hear the word smartphone and think of it as phone with additional capabilities; when what it's truly a mobile computing device.

Smartphones are essentially just very small versions of computers. Just like any other computer, smartphones have a CPU, RAM, input devices (keyboard, touchscreen, trackball, etc.), a display, wireless capabilities, and many other features that a normal computer has. I think another term that can confuse some end-users is the term "app." An app, or application, is really just a program that accesses the computing resources of a mobile device in order to accomplish a certain task. Just like installing a program on your laptop, you install an app on your smartphone. Even though the terms are a bit different, don't let them fool you; that smartphone in your pocket is really just a tiny computer!

Week 10: Copyright

The world of copyright can be a very confusing one indeed. There are so many different pieces that make up the broad term copyright. Some of these facets include the public domain, fair use, academic/educational permissions, website permissions, etc. Another side to copyright is what types of things can be copyrighted. Can all software by copyrighted? What about this blog that I'm creating right now? In my eyes, the topic of copyright is very convoluted and controversial; the laws that govern copyrights are even more so. One thing is for sure though, it will always be in your best interest to take the time to properly cite sources in an attempt to avoid violating a copyright. Better safe than sorry...

Week 9: Cloud Computing

Oh, the mighty cloud... We hear the term "cloud" tossed around in so many different ways. It can confuse and even frighten some people. Really all it is, is using the Internet to access a virtualized version of computing resources that allow you to complete a certain task. Instead of using "local" or physical computing resources to do the work, you rely on someone else to do that portion for you and then you can access it anywhere that you have an Internet connection. Of course, it's more complex than that, but I think that's a relatively simple way of explaining it.

Personally, I still prefer local computing as compared to cloud computing. I'm a pretty tech-savvy person and have built multiple custom computers/servers. I feel that I am able to get far superior performance and reliability out of my local resources. Sure there are some cloud computing services that would allow me to rent cloud resources that have extremely high performance, but those typically cost a lot of money. Also, I love having the ability to modify the configuration of my local computing resources as needed. Subsequently, I have spent some time in my professional life designing and deploying cloud computing in order to deliver parts of our virtual infrastructure, a section of our fiber-optic network, and some application servers.