LIBR 240-12
Information Technology Tools and Applications
Spring 2013 Greensheet

Amonty Parsons
E-mail
Office location: email, D2L course discussion area, BB Collaborate
Office hours: by appointment

Greensheet Links
Textbooks
SLOs
Competencies
Prerequisites		 Resources
D2L Login and Tutorials
iSchool eBookstore		  

LMS

This class will use D2L (Desire2Learn). Students will be automatically enrolled into the appropriate D2L course site for this class based on MySJSU registration. The site will be available beginning January 23, 2013—the first day of spring instruction.

Course Description

In this class you will get hands-on experience with information technology tools and applications while learning to design and build websites by hand. You will learn how to:

  • work remotely with a UNIX-like web server
  • structure and present information on the Web with HTML & CSS
  • extend and transform documents with XML & XSLT
  • add client- & server-side programs to your web pages
  • use Web 2.0 technologies and produce media

No previous experience with web development is required, but you must meet our school’s hardware/software and skill requirements for incoming students:

You must understand and meet these requirements to be successful in this course.

Course Requirements

Before Class Starts

  1. Make absolutely sure you meet the Home Computing Requirements and Technology Literacy Requirements. Very, very important.
  2. Have our required text in-hand. Literally. The actual book is recommended rather than a digital copy (it's < $20 and very handy).

Motivation & Time Commitment
LIBR 240 can be very tough, even compared to your other graduate courses. It will require amounts of motivation, mindfulness, detail-orientation, problem-solving, and autonomy that have perhaps never been asked of you before in your college experience.

The difficulty of this class creates a huge demand on time for some students. Quick turnaround on assignments is required and each unit builds directly on the previous, so a high level of presence is needed for you to keep up and perform successfully.

Time expenditure resembling that of a part-time job is not uncommon in LIBR 240.

Readings, Materials, and Self-Reliance
You will be provided with and/or pointed to a sufficient amount of readings and materials to successfully complete your assignments. Many students occasionally find that they need to supplement these materials with additional help or investigation on the web.

I will be available to guide you and to help answer your questions, but you will be expected to have a high degree of self-reliance when it comes to your learning--remember that you are training to be an expert information seeker by trade.

Learning how to be self-reliant with technology is a huge part of this class.

Assignment Calendar

Wk Topic Assignment SLOs supported Due
1 Welcome Introduction   1/24
2 Working remotely Week 2 exercise #1 1/31
3 Formatting info Week 3 exercise #4 2/7
4 Presenting info pt1 Week 4 exercise #3, #4, #6 2/14
5 Presenting info pt2 Week 5 exercise #3, #4, #5, #6 2/21
6 Presenting info pt3 Week 6 exercise #3, #4, #5, #6 2/28
7 Presenting info pt4 Week 7 exercise #3, #4, #5, #6 3/7
8 Transforming docs Week 8 exercise #10 3/14
9 Programming pt1 Week 9 exercise #8 3/21
10 [Spring recess] N/A N/A N/A
11 Programming pt2 Week 11 exercise #2, #8 4/4
12 Programming pt3 Week 12 exercise #2, #8, #9 4/11
13 Using Web 2.0 tools pt1 Week 13 exercise #7 4/18
14 Using Web 2.0 tools pt2,
Developing rapidly pt1		 Week 14 exercise,
Final project pt1		 #7 4/25
15 Developing rapidly pt2 Final project pt2 All 5/2
16 Developing rapidly pt3 Final project pt3 All 5/9
17 Farewell N/A N/A N/A

Calendar is tentative; subject to change with fair notice.

Assignments must be submitted by 11:59 pm PT on the day they are due.

Grading

Assignment Points
Introduction 1 point
12 Weekly Exercises 72 points
Final Project 27 points
Total 100 points

Late assignments will receive 0 points.

Every assignment is required.

Extra credit options will not be available.

Software & Technology Requirements

Home Computing and Tech Literacy
No previous experience with web development is required, but you must meet our school’s hardware/software and skill requirements for incoming students:

You must understand and meet these requirements to be successful in this course.

Software
During the course of the semester you will be asked to install software tools that are necessary to complete our course assignments. All software that I require for this class will be free. I make a fair attempt to recommend software that is stable and compatible with all major home computing platforms (ie Linux/Mac/PC).

Things I will ask you to install on your system include:

You can install these programs now, or wait until they are required for an assignment.

I will assume that you know how to install and configure software & plugins and do not promise to help with that. The scope of this class does not cover basic computer use. (Note the tech literacy requirements above.) I will help guide you on how to use these programs to complete your assignments once you have them installed on your system.

Cloud Computing & Password Management
As part of your assignment requirements, you will use a variety of remote services in addition to our D2L course. This will involve managing a variety of user accounts... and their respective passwords. You need to have a safe and reliable method of managing this stuff--exactly what method you use is up to you.

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Course Workload Expectations

Success in this course is based on the expectation that students will spend, for each unit of credit, a minimum of forty-five hours over the length of the course (normally 3 hours per unit per week with 1 of the hours used for lecture) for instruction or preparation/studying or course related activities including but not limited to internships, labs, clinical practica. Other course structures will have equivalent workload expectations as described in the syllabus.

Instructional time may include but is not limited to:
Working on posted modules or lessons prepared by the instructor; discussion forum interactions with the instructor and/or other students; making presentations and getting feedback from the instructor; attending office hours or other synchronous sessions with the instructor.

Student time outside of class:
In any seven-day period, a student is expected to be academically engaged through submitting an academic assignment; taking an exam or an interactive tutorial, or computer-assisted instruction; building websites, blogs, databases, social media presentations; attending a study group;contributing to an academic online discussion; writing papers; reading articles; conducting research; engaging in small group work.

Course Prerequisites

LIBR 200, LIBR 202, LIBR 204. 

Student Learning Outcomes

Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to:

  1. Understand the client-server relationship and how to work with a UNIX server.
  2. Identify the difference between client- and server-side Web programming languages.
  3. Develop conceptual and practical strategies for presenting information on the Web.
  4. Create content in XHTML and HTML5 formats.
  5. Design interfaces using CSS.
  6. Present information on the Web with a consideration for usability, accessibility, and cultural issues.
  7. Work with Web 2.0 technologies such as RSS, blogs, wikis, collaborative writing tools, and digital storytelling tools.
  8. Examine some simple JavaScript programs.
  9. Incorporate interactive forms onto a Web page using a simple PHP program.
  10. Build an XML file and access it via an XSLT stylesheet.

Core Competencies (Program Learning Outcomes)

LIBR 240 supports the following core competencies:

  1. E Design, query and evaluate information retrieval systems.
  2. G Demonstrate understanding of basic principles and standards involved in organizing information, including classification, cataloging, metadata, or other systems.
  3. H Demonstrate proficiency in identifying, using, and evaluating current and emerging information and communication technologies.

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Textbooks

Required Textbooks:

  • Duckett, J. (2011). HTML and CSS: Design and build websites. John Wiley & Sons. Available through Amazon: 1118008189arrow gif indicating link outside sjsu domain

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Grading Scale

The standard SJSU School of Information Grading Scale is utilized for all iSchool courses:

97 to 100 A
94 to 96 A minus
91 to 93 B plus
88 to 90 B
85 to 87 B minus
82 to 84 C plus
79 to 81 C
76 to 78 C minus
73 to 75 D plus
70 to 72 D
67 to 69 D minus
Below 67 F

 

In order to provide consistent guidelines for assessment for graduate level work in the School, these terms are applied to letter grades:

  • C represents Adequate work; a grade of "C" counts for credit for the course;
  • B represents Good work; a grade of "B" clearly meets the standards for graduate level work;
    For core courses in the MLIS program (not MARA) — INFO 200, INFO 202, INFO 204 — the iSchool requires that students earn a B in the course. If the grade is less than B (B- or lower) after the first attempt you will be placed on administrative probation.  You must repeat the class the following semester. If -on the second attempt- you do not pass the class with a grade of B or better (not B- but B) you will be disqualified.
  • A represents Exceptional work; a grade of "A" will be assigned for outstanding work only.

Students are advised that it is their responsibility to maintain a 3.0 Grade Point Average (GPA).

University Policies

General Expectations, Rights and Responsibilities of the Student

As members of the academic community, students accept both the rights and responsibilities incumbent upon all members of the institution. Students are encouraged to familiarize themselves with SJSU's policies and practices pertaining to the procedures to follow if and when questions or concerns about a class arises. See University Policy S90-5 at http://www.sjsu.edu/senate/docs/S90-5.pdf. More detailed information on a variety of related topics is available in the SJSU catalog at http://info.sjsu.edu/web-dbgen/catalog/departments/LIS.html. In general, it is recommended that students begin by seeking clarification or discussing concerns with their instructor. If such conversation is not possible, or if it does not serve to address the issue, it is recommended that the student contact the Department Chair as a next step.

Dropping and Adding

Students are responsible for understanding the policies and procedures about add/drop, grade forgiveness, etc. Refer to the current semester's Catalog Policies section at http://info.sjsu.edu/static/catalog/policies.html. Add/drop deadlines can be found on the current academic year calendars document on the Academic Calendars webpage at http://www.sjsu.edu/provost/services/academic_calendars/. The Late Drop Policy is available at http://www.sjsu.edu/aars/policies/latedrops/policy/. Students should be aware of the current deadlines and penalties for dropping classes.

Information about the latest changes and news is available at the Advising Hub at http://www.sjsu.edu/advising/.

Consent for Recording of Class and Public Sharing of Instructor Material

University Policy S12-7, http://www.sjsu.edu/senate/docs/S12-7.pdf, requires students to obtain instructor's permission to record the course and the following items to be included in the syllabus:

  • "Common courtesy and professional behavior dictate that you notify someone when you are recording him/her. You must obtain the instructor's permission to make audio or video recordings in this class. Such permission allows the recordings to be used for your private, study purposes only. The recordings are the intellectual property of the instructor; you have not been given any rights to reproduce or distribute the material."
    • It is suggested that the syllabus include the instructor's process for granting permission, whether in writing or orally and whether for the whole semester or on a class by class basis.
    • In classes where active participation of students or guests may be on the recording, permission of those students or guests should be obtained as well.
  • "Course material developed by the instructor is the intellectual property of the instructor and cannot be shared publicly without his/her approval. You may not publicly share or upload instructor generated material for this course such as exam questions, lecture notes, or homework solutions without instructor consent."

Academic integrity

Your commitment, as a student, to learning is evidenced by your enrollment at San Jose State University. The University Academic Integrity Policy F15-7 at http://www.sjsu.edu/senate/docs/F15-7.pdf requires you to be honest in all your academic course work. Faculty members are required to report all infractions to the office of Student Conduct and Ethical Development. The Student Conduct and Ethical Development website is available at http://www.sjsu.edu/studentconduct/.

Campus Policy in Compliance with the American Disabilities Act

If you need course adaptations or accommodations because of a disability, or if you need to make special arrangements in case the building must be evacuated, please make an appointment with me as soon as possible, or see me during office hours. Presidential Directive 97-03 at http://www.sjsu.edu/president/docs/directives/PD_1997-03.pdf requires that students with disabilities requesting accommodations must register with the Accessible Education Center (AEC) at http://www.sjsu.edu/aec to establish a record of their disability.

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