Module 1: Telnet Option: blinkenlights

As I was browsing through other students blogs today, I came across a screen shot of something done with blinkenlights on Evelyn's page...I've been reading about this on the discussion board but thought it was, yet again, something that was beyond my understanding and therefore way beyond my reach: WRONG on all accounts!

I googled it (because Evelyn asked if anyone knew when blinken lights first began) and found this:

http://brepettis.com/blog/2008/09/29/blinkenlights/

which is an informative page about the latest blinkenlights project currently showing on a *building* (true) in Toronto. Each window of the building has been wired to be one pixel in the blinken program...totally fascinating!!!

Further down the page, it says that blinken lights first began in 2001 to mark the 20th anniversary of a group called chaos computer club in (I think) Berlin.

To top it all off, the founder of CCC died, so the group members decided to do something really special, and ended up having an exhibition in the Berlin Congress Building and in addition, remodelling the nearby (and apparently landmark) Teacher's Building...into a giant TETRIS screen!

Now *that* would have been AMAZING!!!!

Module1: Telnet Task A Progress Pictures & Reflection

These are the Bennahum's that were listed.

Unfortunately, I sent the Print e-mail option to my personal account to start with!

After realising my error, I sent it to my Curtin Student email...phew!

My computer screen (while on Telnet), reminded me of my first attempt at Uni in 1983:

a blinking cusor that kept saying 'Syntax error' over and over again because I didn't have a clue what I was doing!!!!

Luckily, this time I do :) BIG smiles - thanks everyone for your helpful message board posts...and my computer has been behaving!

It was great to participate in seeing the Internet in an 'old' way again. Technology has come a long way since the Black or Green screens of my youth when computer usage was becoming more commercialsied in the mid-late 1980s.

I know that my family have at least one old but Internet-enabled computer, my first one, which I got in the late 1990s. Although it still works, it is very slow (Pentium II but with very low working capacities). Concept 8, The Invisibility of Difference, is an important one to remember when sending information from a newer computer...older ones may have difficulty with the file size or worse, the software used to produce the email (from the newer computer) may be incompatible with the version on the receivers computer.

Module 1: Telnet Task Completed

At left is a list of commands available to me after entering a ?

One of the most frustrating things about navigating in Telnet is that you can't use your mouse...I must be very mouse-dependent!

Getting used to typing-in a command exactly as it appears was also a bit of a shock, but quick to overcome.

I think we're a bit spoilt these days with the number of things that are not case-sensitive.

Module 1:Telnet Now Enabled :)

Thanks again to the helpful tips on our message board: I have pressed the right buttons to enable Telnet Client on my Windows Vista-operated computer (or so it seems...).

I'm going to back-up my files now to an external hard-drive, and attempt the Telnet task...

Stay tuned...