Playing an instrument is an analog experience: a tangible act based in physical reality. Because of this, when instrument simulating apps (soft synths or virtual instruments) can use the touch paradigm available on iPads, musicians can find themselves having more of an analog experience with that technology. This is useful as music creation has traditionally started via an analog process: playing a string, wind, or percussion instrument, for example. Because of touch technology, the process of playing digital instruments is now able to become more seamless.
Digital humanities and information visualization
This is a guest post from Kelly Holob, class of 2014
At Reed, I was a Classics/Religion major (’14), maybe not the sort of person you’d expect to see on a technology blog. But I worked with computers a lot — and not just because I was a T-Watcher. My field’s been developing tools like the TLG, which can search nearly the entire corpus of Greek texts, since the 1970s, and almost anyone who’s taken a class in Latin or Greek knows about Perseus, a easy-to-search collection of public domain classical texts and translations, including lexicons. There’s also Logeion, another lexical tool, which my current school, the University of Chicago, is still developing. Digital Humanities tools have been useful for exploring new ways to learn, interpret, and discover information about everyone from Plato to Plotinus for a long time. Continue reading “Digital humanities and information visualization”
The Vowel Worm
As a language learner myself, I often struggle with the unique sounds in different languages. Humans are culturally-bound language learners; this means we are able to hear and identify all human sounds when we were born, but we gradually lose this ability as we get older. For example, Japanese speakers and some Chinese speakers have difficult identifying the English “r” and “l,” while English speakers have difficulties identifying the Chinese “j,” “q,” and “x.” When I taught Chinese a few years ago, I had students arguing that there is absolutely no difference in the Chinese “j,” “q,” and “x,” and I had a hard time explaining how the sounds are produced differently.
Language has a critical period for learning: babies and children are naturally talented in language learning, but from birth to age 7, there is a systematic decline in language learning. Adults struggle more with language learning, but it doesn’t mean foreign languages cannot be learned. This means there needs to be more effort put into language learning. Luckily, technological tools can help in this process. Continue reading “The Vowel Worm”
Workshop: Data analysis + visualization
For the economics junior seminar workshop this afternoon, please find datafiles and code here.
Geocoding
Recently, I have been assisting several students with geocoding projects for their classes and thesis projects, using geocoding functionality in R. To document this work I have put together several tutorials and resources for students and faculty to use.
Continue reading “Geocoding”One stop video capture, edit and finished project on the iPad
Say you need to make a video for a class, a short rough of a performance idea for a theatre project, some dance choreography, a video capture to be used in a multimedia project you move into software on the PARC computers, a music video of your band, or even a feature length film. Why not consider using an iPad? It is quick and easy. As mentioned in my previous blog post the iPad’s processing power is approaching laptop speeds and with the iPad Air 2, they are closer than ever. Continue reading “One stop video capture, edit and finished project on the iPad”
Workshop: Stata for Econometrics
On Thursday, 1/19/15, I will be presenting a workshop for Econometrics students on how to use Stata in preparation for the first homework assignment. Come join in!
Workshop materials are here. Log in to a computer and download the zipped file – we’ll use this in our workshop.
Workshop: Analysis using Stata : Psych Edition (Paideia)
From 1pm-2pm on Friday, 1/23/2015 I’ll be leading an Introduction to Stata in ETC 211. Come join in!
Materials for the workshop are here. (PSYCH_stata_workshop)
Download the zipped file to your desktop, unzip it, and change your working directory to that file to follow along during the workshop. (Within Stata, File > Change Working Directory)
Workshop: Spatial Analysis + Mapping, Paideia 2015
I’ll be leading a one-hour intro to GIS, mapping, and geospatial analysis on Friday, 1/22, from 9-10 in ETC 205. Come join!
Materials from the workshop are here (Mapping_GIS_Paideia). Download the zipped file to your desktop and unzip it – open datafiles in either ArcGIS or qGIS (cross-platform and open source).
Workshop: Introduction to Stata, Paideia 2015
From noon-1pm on Thursday, 1/22/2015 I’ll be leading an Introduction to Stata in ETC 205. Come join us!
Materials for the workshop are here.
Download the zipped file to your desktop, unzip it, and change your working directory to that file to follow along during the workshop. (Within Stata, File > Change Working Directory)