Home » Articles posted by dpennebacker
Author Archives: dpennebacker
You’re done. Kind of.
With the AP Test in our rearview mirror, thousands upon thousands of lines of code written and potentially many frustrating nights, AP Computer Science A is now complete. Congratulations.
What to do with my students the rest of the year? Well, let me explain.
We have three types of students
- Seniors leaving next Friday 5/13
- Seniors not leaving next Friday and getting out earlier than others. 5/31
- Not a senior, staying till the end. 6/10
That being said, the next few days together we’ll be a collection of students.
Mobile Design
The next few weeks, actually the remainder of the year, will focus on programming, designing and creating mobile applications. While this may seem like a daunting task (it is) we’ll try to tackle in a feasible and somewhat manageable way.
Our course of action is:
- Design the overall app
- Learn some basic Swift and Objective C
- Use XCode
- Eventually test on a real device
Allow this post to serve as resources to complete your dream app.
The first step is creating an application by prototyping the overall look of the app. You’ll be using Marvel to complete the prototype. You may work as a team, independent or even cross class if you truly wanted to attempt that. I’ve compiled a few resources:
- Marvel
- Used to actually create the prototype.
- Tuts Plus
- Interesting how-to tutorials for anything computer
- Adobe Kulor
- Help with finding color schemes
- iOS UI Elements
Talking due dates, we’ll need a working prototype by Wednesday of next week. That gives us 5 full days of in class designing to get that idea on “paper” and move to coding.
Multiple Choice Question Review
The goal for today is to review Multiple Choice Questions. Please do this anyway you feel is the best:
- With a partner
- Solo
- Asking me questions when you have them
Notice, this post will self destruct at 9pm so please make use of these questions while they are live. For even more multiple choices, view Learnerator.com or the daily session reviews that so many of you DIDN’T do!
Mobile is king
Imagine a world with no phones. A world where connectivity stopped when you left your computer. It’s not that hard. A mere 9 years ago we were iPhoneless. Some of you were 5. I wasn’t.
Anyway, mobile computer has revolutionized the way we interact and experience technology. I want to learn more. I want to know all there is to know about mobile technology. But…I need your help. Choose a group, and choose a topic. Create a presentation that adequately presents the information. You’ll present it to the class. Think of it as a TWIP but more professional. Your presentations are meant to last and entire 20-30 minutes.
Topics include:
- The history of mobile phones. Then to now.
- History of the app
- Rumors and reality. Where will our phones take us?
- How cell phones communicate
- Social media and mobile devices
- Statistics. Are we addicted to our phones?
- Who are they big players. What have they done. What do they do and how do they do it?
Game Design Benchmark
Your benchmark is divided into two parts:
Picture this
We’ll be starting our PixLab today. We have an introductory project/assignment/journey that requires you to find a partner, take some pictures and then determine which camera took it better.
Cameras are present in so many different modes of hardware. Tablets, computers, and phones are everywhere. Most people have the ability to take a photo of something on a daily basis. The idea behind a digital life is growing. Check out this site about digital footprints.
As crazy as it sounds, the concept of permanency is just that. A picture is currently saved on your HD, you share it with someone, regret the decision and then delete it. But who else has that picture? Where else has it been?
Our activity is less about digital footprints but more so about using those tools to create a positive one. So. Head to Classroom and let’s get this party started!
Binary Numbers
This week is going to stray from our normally scripted Blue Pelicaness. We are approaching our first big lab called PixLab and to help with that, we are going to work on learning binary, octal and hex. In addition, we are going to throw in the use of RGB too.
Our progression will be this:
- Introduce numbers and such
- To help us with that: I’ve got a great little PDF located here.
- Complete the ending Exercise by Wednesday. Questions 1-30 and submit them to the Google Classroom
- Next up, your TWIP will be due on Friday as always.
- The idea with this assignment is the user can enter either an RGB triplet (255, 65, 4), hexadecimal (f23ab2), or named color from the common 140 HTML colors located here.
- Once an input is received, the other 2 colors are outputted to the user. Think of it as a color converter.
- That is is it!
TWIP – Hack the bank
You are a VERY silly programmer. In fact, by silly you mean that you are hired by a bank to create a program to record bank account deposits. You’ve been asked to modify the program but your greedy hands couldn’t resist trying to modify it. You came up with this not-so-genius plan of draining bank account deposits and moving all deposits to your own Bank Account.
Here are the files you need!
Game Design
So…not to brag but I kind of wrote the book on this. Long story short, download it here. It is a LARGE file so let’s do this now and take a tour of Stencyl while we wait. A few resources for this unit:
AP Friday 10
Good luck! http://quiz.cosmicsoft.net/3y32