Algorithmic Design and Data Structure Techniques

 

Hello Everyone,

Data structures and algorithms are essential in creating efficient and effective software. These techniques assist in organizing, optimizing performance, and solving complex problems. Here are step-by-step plans to improve data structure and algorithm skills (Gautam, 2023):

1.     Understand the Problem - Understand what is being asked.

2.     Selecting Concepts and Solutions Strategies Based on Experience - Analyze the problem description and make predictions about the concepts and approaches.

3.     Formulation of a Solution Strategy and Pseudocode - Brainstorm and write down the approach of each step.

4.     Correct Programming Implementation - Select a program that will create an efficient code by looking at memory management and other details that can make the code efficient. 

5.     Verifying Correctness and Optimizing Further - Test the code for any bugs and think about ways to optimize the program.

I believe that some algorithms and data structures are better than others because of certain situations. Needing a code that can quickly retrieve elements from a search tree or an array plays a role on how certain codes will work better than the others. It is essential to understand the pro and cons of certain designs and choose the best one that meets the requirements to solve the problem.

 

Reference

Gautam, S. (Accessed on May 30, 2023). How to Develop Algorithmic Thinking in DSA?

Lysecky, R., Vahid, F., Lysecky, S., & Givargis, T. (2015). Data structures essentials. zyBooks.

 

Java Install and Tutorial

Hello Everyone,

    In this blog post, I will talk about Java and discuss how to install Java to program. Java is an Object-Oriented Programming System (OOPs) that is aimed at implementing real-world entities in a programming language. The concepts for OOPs are the following:

·         Object – Any entity that has state and behavior

·         Class – Collection of Objects

·         Inheritance – When one object acquires all the properties and behaviors of a parent object

·         Polymorphism – If one task is performed in different ways

·         Abstraction – Hiding internal details and showing functionality

·         Encapsulation – Binding code and data together into a single unit

To learn Java programming with NetBeans and run Java applications, please see the

following steps below to install on a Windows Operation System:

1.      Visit https://www.oracle.com/java/technologies/downloads/ to download and install Java JDK 17. When opening this website, please click on the JDK 17 tab and then Windows below. Choose the x64 Installer download link to download the file and open it up to install it.

2.      Many Java development environments exist, but we will use NetBeans IDE for this example. Please go to their website here https://netbeans.apache.org/download/index.html to download Apache NetBeans 17. JDK is required to install NetBeans (Step 1), and it will not let you install it without installing it first.

3.      Create your first application with the Hello World program by using these instructions here https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/getStarted/cupojava/netbeans.html

    By following these instructions, you have created your first Java program, which should look similar to what I have here in the screenshot below:

Congratulations on installing Java and creating your very first Java program!

Feel free to ask if you have any questions.

Post #7 Tech Topic Connection

 

Hello Everyone,

            In my final blog post, I want to discuss what I have learned these past few weeks and how I can apply this to various technology topics. Learning about network security, the future of computers, using commands, programming languages, mobile applications, and using Microsoft products has helped me understand there is more going on than just using a computer for daily use. The use of these technologies topics has helped my fundamentals of technology because now I understand something as simple as what hardware in a computer does and how difficult it is to code a website with Phyton.

            With the reading and researching that was done when choosing my topics to write about, I learned how computers were used in the past, such as the ENIAC computers used in the 1940s (Vahid. Chp 1.1) and how Windows Operating System came about (Vahid. Chp 4.1). A computer's most common operating systems are Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. Windows are typically used in a business environment dependent on using Microsoft products daily and software to process data. Macs are used in environments such as editing videos, photos, and music because of the picture quality on the Macs but also how smooth the operating system process the edits. Linux tends to be used to run servers in the data center because of its stability. Linux handles more functions and does not require reboots nearly as often as Windows Server. Linux only needs to reboot when there’s a kernel update.

Computer hardware such as the processor, hard drive, RAM, and graphics card is vital in figuring out what specifications are needed depending on what the user would need it for. If the user needs to process data or work on several large spreadsheets, they would need a processor with lots of cores and 32GB of RAM. If the user is editing videos or graphics, they will need a high-end video card to help process the edits. In my class discussion, my user needed a laptop to handle Microsoft products and light edits, so I suggested a Dell Latitude 9500 2-in-1 laptop that fits their needs with a high budget.

During my first week of class, we learned several programming languages such as C++, Javascript, and Phyton. I learned how powerful Phyton could be and got to practice using it to create fonts for a website and to use it to solve math problems. To help us understand what else we can do with programming, our professor had us use block programming called Scratch (https://scratch.mit.edu/). This helped me understand how one block command can mess up everything or have to experiment with several block commands so the program can run how I wanted it to.

In blog post #3, I had to document my day and use several Microsoft applications such as Word, Excel, and Powerpoint. Learning how to format and use the different functions with Word has helped me format my paper in an APA format. For every assignment my professor asked us to turn in, he requested it to be in an APA format with a title page. In blog post #2, we had to understand database concepts and review a web or mobile application. I reviewed the Netflix application and listed the pros and cons that I ran into while using the application. I felt that Netflix needed to update its database to include more variety of content so they could reach out to more users globally.

Learning about the network and how to protect us by managing our systems and having security software helped us understand how to protect ourselves. The topics I chose about email security pertain to me at work because we deal with PHI (Personal Health Information) and other sensitive information.

 

Reference

Scratch. https://scratch.mit.edu/. Accessed 1 July 2022.

Vahid, F., Lysecky, S. (2019). Computing technology for all. https://learn.zybooks.com/zybook/TEC101:_Fundamentals_of_Information_Technology_                      &_Literacy_(TED2227A)

Williams, M. (2021). Linux vs. Windows: How to Pick the Best Server OS for Your Website. https://www.pcmag.com/how-to/linux-vs-windows-how-to-pick-the-best-server-os-for-your-website

 

Post #6 Network Security

  

Hello Everyone,

            The importance of information and system security is vital to every organization or individual. Throughout this course, I learned to identify different threats and also use commands to help see if a device or server is online or offline. With these commands, people with bad intentions can cause harm to an organization with a DoS (Denial of Service) or DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service). According to our textbook, a DoS attack is achieved by submitting vast access requests simultaneously to one target website, causing that site’s web server to be overloaded, thus preventing the legitimate request from being handled. A DDoS is when a DoS attack uses multiple computers on a target website (Vahid, 2019 Chp 8.8). To help with these attacks, an organization will implement defenses that will detect and block request from those sources before it reaches the server.

            Identifying computer security incidents is essential in protecting yourself and your organization. The two topics I have chosen are Email Spam and Phishing. Email Spam is when someone receives unsolicited messages sent in bulk by email to trick potential victims into downloading malware, sharing data, or sending money. The most recent example is the ‘Nigerian Prince’ email scam, where someone impersonates a person and asks for help transferring money with the promise of a lot of money in return for helping them. The recommendation to avoid these types of email spam is to add a third-party antispam filter to your email client. Another recommendation is reporting, blocking, and deleting suspicious emails in your inboxes.

            Phishing is an Internet scam that baits users into sharing sensitive information like a password or credit card number. Computer systems are vulnerable to this because phishing is common with emails, and emails sent to users appear to look legitimate from known organizations to have you try to log into a fake website which then the server stores the entered information (Vahid, 2019 Chp 8.5). Using your information can compromise your accounts as they will try to log into different websites to see if it is the same username and password. A recommendation to protect yourself from this is when you see an email that comes in, and you are suspicious of it, go to the website directly to check if there was suspicious activity on the account. By not clicking on the email and logging into the website directly, you can protect yourself from any phishing email. Another recommendation is to install security software on your computer because it can detect common malware in your system so your information will not be stolen. Also, it is recommended that you look at the emails carefully because phishing emails are usually sent with misspelled words or use a different email domain than the one they are posing.

 

Reference

Federal Trade Commission. (2019). How To Recognize and Avoid Phishing Scams. https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/how-recognize-and-avoid-phishing-scams

Leonhardt, M. (2019). ‘Nigerian Prince’ email scams still rake in over $700,000 a year-here’s how to protect yourself. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/18/nigerian-prince-scams-still-rake-in-over-700000-dollars-a-year.html

Vahid, F., Lysecky, S. (2019). Computing technology for all. https://learn.zybooks.com/zybook/TEC101:_Fundamentals_of_Information_Technology_                      &_Literacy_(TED2227A)

Webroot. (2022). Spam vs. Phishing. https://www.webroot.com/us/en/resources/tips-articles/spam-vs-phishing

Post #5 Computer In A Workplace

  

Hello Everyone,

    For this week's discussion, the industry I have chosen is healthcare. I chose healthcare because I have worked in this industry for about eight years, but only three years were in information technology. With my experience in the healthcare industry, I can give insight as I worked with users in the clinic and with users on the business side.

    In both of these environments, I have met with users who are not computer literate and had to teach them so that they would not compromise any patient information. In the healthcare industry, we must protect all of our patient's PHI (Protected Health Information) because HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act) will fine the hospital. Our role in IT is essential because we use technology to encrypt our data and protect PHI to ensure that patients have the confidence to go to our hospital.

    To evolve our IT systems, we are moving toward a virtual environment because it will save the company money, ensure that if a computer is lost/stolen that there is no PHI on the hard drive, and be able to access work on any device. I can see this impacting the healthcare IT industry because of how we can control the user's environment because we can see all the applications they use and retrieve any logs if something is not running correctly. We can also save the IT department money by implementing more thin clients, so we do not have to purchase laptops and pc because everything they need would be in the virtual client.

 

Reference:

Vahid, F., Lysecky, S. (2019). Computing technology for all. https://learn.zybooks.com/zybook/TEC101:_Fundamentals_of_Information_Technology_                      &_Literacy_(TED2227A)

Post #4 Traveling Through A Network

  

Hello Everyone,

I learned how to Ping and Traceroute commands for this week's discussion. The ping command is usually used to see if a website or device is down or how quickly you can access it. The traceroute command maps and helps us see the path of the packets through the network as it tries to reach the destination.

Ping Activity

Since I am running a Windows 10 computer, I first click on the start menu and type in cmd to open up the command prompt. From here, I typed in ping google.com, which these are the results.

This shows that I could communicate with google without any issues with the average speed of 31ms. Next, I wanted to ping a domain outside of the U.S. and look at the results.

I was able to ping amazon.co.uk with an average of 150ms. Next, I ping an Iceland website guidetoiceland.is which I was able to communicate with on an average of 21ms.

Traceroute Activity

My next activity was to use the traceroute command to the same domains I pinged and see if I was able to see the path of my packets through the network.

The path of my packets shows that it first went through my router, then my internet service provider, then hopped around to different servers to finally get to google. My packet request timed out several times as I suspect I may have hit a firewall to protect companies from getting hit with a DOS attack or the server is down. Next, I wanted to use the traceroute command to the two domains outside the U.S.

For my traceroute command I sent to the U.K., I was able to reach an Amazon server before it timed out. To see if the website was down, I opened it and confirmed I could navigate to the website just fine, so I assumed it hit a firewall once again. For my traceroute command I sent to Iceland, I reached a server, but with the roundtrip response of 25ms, I figured there was a chance the server was nearby or in the U.S.

Through my findings from this experience, I can use these commands in my professional life. I regularly use the ping command at work to see if a device is on campus and online. Using this command, I know how to approach my troubleshooting steps with a user or engage with the server team to see if any of our servers are having issues.

Reference

Vahid, F., Lysecky, S. (2019). Computing technology for all. https://learn.zybooks.com/zybook/TEC101:_Fundamentals_of_Information_Technology &_Literacy_(TED2227A)

Internet-class (June 1, 2015). Ping and TRACERT (traceroute) networking commands [Video]. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJV-GBZ6PeM

Post #3 Documenting A Day

  

Hello Everyone,

            In this week's assignment, I read and got to use different Microsoft products such as Word, Excel, and Powerpoint. I learned how to use Word to create a journal entry, Excel to use formulas, and Powerpoint to develop a presentation. Being hands-on and using these applications, I learned what type of scenario I would need to use these applications and how to use the applications to meet my goals.

            In my professional career, I need to use some applications depending on the situation. I use Mircosoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint when I need to share or present a topic with my team. The functions of Word are best used when you need to document and share something in writing. For example, it would be creating a knowledge article or shopping list but would not be helpful if keeping an inventory of items. The textbook explains that you can use Word to create bullet points or if you need to change the font size so it can be easily read, so when creating a shopping list, you will use bullet points to list out different products to purchase.

            Using Microsoft Excel is an excellent application to use when creating spreadsheet files and keeping track of inventory, but it would not help in writing a research paper. The advantage of Excel is that you can use formulas and graphs that can reflect the data, such formulas as SUM or AVERAGE, to calculate numbers. For example, it would be in our assignment to document our day using excel and creating math formulas to keep track of what we did in a day. In our textbook, I learned to use read and write a formula in a spreadsheet that computes the cell’s value based on other cells' values.

            Microsoft Powerpoint is perfect for presenting a presentation to an audience, such as highlighting a product to investors but not if you are using it to keep a database of products. The textbook taught me how to use themes and create animation effects to help keep the audience engaged. The advantage of using Powerpoint is using sound, pictures, and animation to help enhance your presentation, and the disadvantage would be using Powerpoint to create a shopping list.

            Learning what each application can do and what it is best used will help me succeed in my academic and professional goals. While using the different applications, I feel that Microsoft Word would be the appropriate application to document my day's information. For example, I can manipulate the words to create bullet points, change the font size, and use different fonts to help create a journal that can easily highlight my tasks throughout the day.

 

References

 

Vahid, F., Lysecky, S. (2019). Computing technology for all. https://learn.zybooks.com/zybook/TEC101:_Fundamentals_of_Information_Technology_                      &_Literacy_(TED2227A)