pancake theorem a tech/life blog

Monthly Archives for February 2011

Few students make time to study computer science 02.24.2011

I had to give up AP French to fit Computer Science I (the sole CS course I took before college) into my senior year schedule. My stepmother fought me through the whole process, telling me that dropping French would basically ruin my life (spoiler alert: it didn’t).

To be completely honest, the course I teach at MSU (and is required in nearly every college) really should be taught in high school…elementary school even. Foreign language education is important, sure, but I think becoming fluent in the universal language of technology should be higher priority.

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Adding CSS classes to WordPress custom menu items 02.22.2011

Maybe it’s the pure grain alcohol and cherry bark syrup I’m chugging, or the fumes from my dry erase markers as I clean out my desk, but I only just noticed the screen options that allow one to add CSS classes to custom menu items in WordPress 3.*.

Menucss

I have to be honest – I’m not a big fan of tucking the advanced properties away like that. I never would have noticed this if I hadn’t forgotten that my Magic Mouse is not, in fact, a tenkey and started clicking aimlessly throughout the page.

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Repurposed Computer Parts 02.18.2011

Harddrive clock

My lectures for last two weeks were all about hardware, and one thing that my students and I briefly discussed was how easy it is to hoard or unknowingly collect old, obsolete computer parts (how many floppy drives do YOU have lying around?).

Repurposing these parts, if you can’t bear to recycle them elsewhere, is actually pretty easy. I turned to Etsy for inspiration and found some really cool stuff. I especially love this hard drive clock.

If you’d rather turn your hard drive into something more useful and closer to its original purpose, I suggest throwing some cash at enclosures to transform those useless internals into desirable externals.

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em 02.17.2011

Whenever I type tags for emphasis, I always accidentally type <me> instead. That probably says a lot about how important I think know I am.

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Podium CoolPad, PodiumPad or whatever it's called 02.17.2011

I recently had to purchase a new Magsafe power adapter for my Macbook, since the other had proved itself useless after a tumultuous 3-year relationship. Not one to be able to just buy one gadgety thing at a time, I picked up a Podium CoolPad after reading all the rave reviews on the Apple Store site.

This thing is incredible. Out of the box and by itself, it looks hideous, but it’s barely visible once you put your notebook computer on it. I like how it elevates my Macbook at a nice, adjustable angle, and I can swivel it around as well. There is also room under my Macbook, now, to hide things like pens and catnip.

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