Secure Email Project

My Inbox within Mozilla Thunderbird detailing Dr. Means reply to my digitally signed email

Another view of my Inbox within Mozilla Thunderbird specifying Dr. Means reply to my encrypted email

After completing the Secure Email Project, I am convinced that more people (including myself) need to take greater precautions with securing data sent across the Internet.  This particular project demonstrated one simple way to protect critical information sent via email to another recipient.  In fact, using the secure email certificate for this project inspired me to use greater caution with my email communications and to avoid sending any type of confidential information across the Internet without first properly encrypting the message.  With cybercrimes, such as information theft, on the rise across the United States, individuals and businesses must make protecting personal and confidential information the highest of priorities.


Epsilon Fears Loss of Business

Following one of the largest security breaches in U.S. history, the marketing services firm Epsilon Interactive is afraid of potentially losing valued clients.  On March 30, 2011, hackers infiltrated the company's computer database, acquiring the names and email addresses of customers to some of the largest U.S. firms, including Verizon, Citibank, and JPMorgan Chase.  Alliance Data, Epsilon's parent company, has apologized for the data breach affecting millions of their global clients' customers' personal information.  As one of the largest data-marketing firms in the United States, Alliance Data worries the security breach may affect the firm's future business.  However, Alliance Data said the breach would have a minimal effect on the company's bottom line.  On the other hand, security experts believe that the personal information obtained will increase the success rate for phishing and spam attacks by directly targeting the affected customers.  As a result, customers have received emails from those firms compromised by the breach, warning against the increased possibility of phishing messages or spam.  Meanwhile, the list of compromised firms continues to increase, with now more than 100 companies confirmed.

Works Cited

Embedded Links (in order of appearance):

http://www.cio.com/article/679180/Epsilon_Worries_it_May_Lose_Business_After_Major_Data_Breach?taxonomyId=3089

http://www.databreaches.net/?p=17374

*All screen shots are original work.

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Tutorial 3: Conversion Strategies - Choose Wisely

Change....  The mere thought of the word makes some people cringe with fear.  For others, however, the word represents rebirth, an opportunity to evolve and move forward from the mundane and familiar.  In business, choosing to implement change in the form of a new information system creates similar anxieties.  For instance, your employees may provide pushback towards the rollout of a new information system.  Although ultimately designed to improve the overall efficiency of your business, the thought of learning a new information system will intimidate some people on your staff.  Therefore, when introducing a new information system to your employees, choose your conversion strategy wisely.

Direct Conversion - Out With the Old, In With the New

When a business decides to use a direct conversion strategy, the users stop performing tasks with the old system and begin using the new system immediately on a specified date.  In fact, according to Gary Shelly and Misty Vermaat, primary authors of the textbook Discovering Computers 2010 Complete:  Living in a Digital World, a direct conversion strategy has the advantage of requiring no transaction costs (page 644).  Additionally, implementing this type of strategy is quick for businesses due to the immediate departure of one system and the instant deployment of a new one.  However, employing a direct conversion strategy can produce tremendous risk for the organization, especially if the new system fails to work properly after implementation.

Phased Conversion - Size Matters

In an organization with multiple departments, a large-scale system implementation may benefit from a phased conversion strategy.  With this approach, an organization may decide to rollout its new information system to one department at a time, thereby hedging the risks involved with a direct conversion strategy (Shelly, Vermaat, et al. 644).  For instance, a firm may first introduce a new information system to its Finance Department.  Then, after a certain amount of time, the firm would introduce the new system to another department within the organization until eventually all departments became oriented with the new information system.  This type of conversion strategy provides advantages to understaffed IT departments.  By implementing an information system one department at a time, IT staff can focus their attention to training one department at a time on the new system.  Furthermore, the IT department may address performance issues departmentally, thereby reducing the enormity of an organization-wide system implementation.

Pilot Conversion - Who Wants to Go First?

Sometimes, organizations may decide to introduce a new system implementation via a pilot conversion strategy.  Under this type of strategy, a firm introduces the new system to one location (or department) at a time, similar to a phased conversion strategy (Shelly, Vermaat, et al. 644).  However, unlike the phased conversion strategy, a firm implements a pilot conversion strategy with the purpose of testing the system in a controlled environment.  Once the system successfully achieves the firm's objectives in the test surroundings, management may decide to administer the system to other departments within the firm.  One advantage of employing this type of strategy includes determining whether the system will actually meet the firm's intended purpose prior to implementing the system across the entire organization.  Conversely, a disadvantage to using this particular conversion strategy is the element of time required, as well as the labor and development costs incurred, for management to decide whether a complete delivery of the new system to the whole organization is feasible.

Parallel Conversion - Twice the Fun

Finally, an organization can choose to use a parallel conversion strategy.  With this type of strategy, both the old and new information systems operate alongside one another for a specified time (Shelly, Vermaat, et al. 644).  After comparing the results from both systems, the firm may either immediately terminate the old system or implement the new system gradually.  Organizations typically choose this conservative strategy because the old system continues to operate, thereby preventing data loss if the new system fails to perform properly.¹  Another advantage for companies utilizing this conversion strategy is the ability to correct any problems with the system prior to terminating the old system (Shelly, Vermaat, et al. 644).  However, a primary disadvantage to incorporating this strategy involves money, particularly the costs associated with operating two systems simultaneously.  Moreover, this strategy can produce stress among users due to the extra work involved with running multiple systems (i.e. double data entry, dual reports, etc.).¹

Prior to leaving my former employer, management tasked me with implementing a new information system for our Building Department via a parallel conversion.  Developed by an outside vendor, the new system increased the amount of retrievable data while simultaneously reducing the amount of input from field inspectors.  However, several staff members immediately rejected the implementation of the new system due to their reluctance to change.  Furthermore, upper management did not ask for input from front-line staff (including myself) during the early stages of system development.  Thus, the department's failure to include the users in the development of the information system would eventually lead to resentment from field personnel.  While some members embraced the new system with an open mind, the system ultimately failed, costing the department nearly $200,000 in labor, development, and implementation costs.  As a result, after abandoning the new system, the Building Department continues to use the former antiquated information system to conduct its business operations.

Conversion from one information system environment to another is common in almost all organizations, regardless of the firm's size, shape, industry or geographic location.²  In addition, each of the conversion strategies discussed may require companies to perform hardware, operating system, and/or database management system (DBMS) alterations.²  Therefore, when implementing a new information system, companies must carefully identify the options available to find the best conversion strategy for their specific situation.²  Otherwise, management may risk jeopardizing not only the success of the project, but potentially the future of the organization as well.

Works Cited

Citations:

Shelly, Vermaat, et al.  Discovering Computers 2010 Complete:  Living in a Digital World.  USA:  Cengage, 2010.  Print.

¹http://web.sxu.edu/rogers/cs111/conversion.html
²http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-11476980/strategies-converting-one-environment.html

Images:

*All images were acquired from Microsoft via their website:  http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/?CTT=97 at the following URLs (listed in order of appearance):

¹http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=computer%20technicians#ai:MP900422405|
²http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=high-rises#ai:MP910216972|
³http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=raised+hands#ai:MC900438842|
⁴http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=running#ai:MP900430687|
⁵http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=shaking+hands&origin=FX101741979#ai:MP900443110|


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Database Project - Microsoft Access

Working with Microsoft Access on this particular project was both challenging and rewarding.  Although I have used Access once in the past, I have not used the program for at least three years.  Thus, my skills working with the program on this project were less than desirable.  Nevertheless, Access provided me with a powerful arsenal of resources to create a very informative database.  In fact, the ability to retrieve information from an enormous spreadsheet containing potentially thousands of rows of data by creating queries still amazes me.

By the completion of this project, I learned how to create a table in Access from data contained in an Excel spreadsheet.

The Members table created as part of the Table Activity portion of the Database Project.

From this table in Access, I created a simple query that displayed individual gym memberships terminated within the past six months.  In addition, I learned to sort the data retrieved from the query in descending order by each member's date of termination.  Furthermore, I sorted members with the same date of termination in ascending alphabetical order by last name.

A portion of the 6mo Departed Individual Members query created as part of the Query Activity portion of the Database Project.  Note the records are sorted in descending order by LeftDate while the members with the same LeftDate are sorted in ascending order by LastName.

Next, I created an attractive form within Access for users to view a current gym member's information or insert a new member record without having to work with hundreds of rows of data in a table.  Additionally, I locked each gym member's identification number within the form's property sheet values.  By locking each member's specific ID number, users cannot inadvertently alter this critical element within the database, thus ensuring the accuracy of records within the database.

The New Members Form created as part of the Form Activity portion of the Database Project.  With the ID field locked, I am unable to change the contents in the ID text box.

Finally, I created a report from my initial query detailing the information of members who departed within the past six months.  The report displayed the name, full mailing address, and gender of each departed member, grouped by city of residence and sorted in descending order by each member's date of termination.

The Recently Departed Individual Members report created as part of the Report Activity portion of the Database Project.  Note the records are grouped by City and sorted in descending order by LeftDate.

While this project provided some insight into the capabilities of Microsoft Access, I would like to have learned more about creating functions to ensure more accuracy of the database.  For instance, if a user creates a new gym membership for a customer, management could guarantee accuracy of the data by creating a function to insert the word "Male" or "Female" in the Gender field of new records when users type the letters "M" or "F" within the field's text box.  These functions would also improve the user's efficiency when creating new gym memberships, while simultaneously improving the effectiveness of the database.  Additionally, I would like to have learned more about creating input masks within Access.  Using this tool to display the date fields consistently within the database (while creating a new record) would have improved the functionality of the database as well.

Although not required for this project, I actually created an input mask to display all gym members' zip codes properly in the database.  The input mask also ensured the accuracy of my data entered for the creation of the four new members required in the Table and Form activity portions of the project.  By displaying the contents of the ZipCode field in the database with a hyphen to delineate the zip+4 format, I essentially improved the appearance and functionality of each member's record in the database for any user accessing the information.

Works Cited

*All screen shots are original work.

Creating an Avatar with IMVU

For this extra credit opportunity, I decided to create an avatar using imvu.com.  This website contained an abundance of avatar creation tools to change the appearance and fashion of the character displayed.  After selecting the gender and style for my avatar, I had the chance to select features such as hairstyle, eyebrow shape, and eye shape/color.  In addition, I had the choice of picking from different types of tops (shirts), bottoms (pants/shorts), and shoes for the character to wear.

Ultimately, I created the avatar to mimic my look and style.  By using the "Search" field in the "Shop" tab during the creation of my avatar, I found items such as clothing and hairstyles to incorporate into my character.  In fact, the TOOL shirt worn by my avatar in the image above was the exact shirt I was wearing when I created the character.  Although I have never created an avatar before, I found the process to be very fun.  With so many options available to the creator, the possibilities are practically endless.

All you have to do is express yourself....

Works Cited

*Screen shot displayed is original work.

 

Presentation and Web 2.0 Project

Many careers in today's business world require extensive knowledge and use of technology.  For the past several years, software programs such as PowerPoint and Keynote have provided presenters with a powerful set of tools to convey meaningful messages and captivate audiences alike.  Yet, these programs provide merely a foundation for a successful presentation in today's business environment.  With the use of numerous Web 2.0 applications available to enhance a presenter's content, slide shows now have the ability to come alive while providing the audience with a truly memorable experience.

For my Presentation and Web 2.0 Project, I chose to solicit donations for the VH1 Save the Music Foundation.  This non-profit organization provides grants to restore music education programs in America's public elementary and middle schools.  In the presentation, I grab my audience's attention by first detailing my struggle to learn the guitar at a very young age without any formal training available in my public school system.  Following my personal story, I elaborate on the current state of music education in our schools and the need for music to ensure the academic success of our children.  The presentation continues with an explanation of how VH1 Save the Music began along with the Foundation's contributions to America's young people at both the national and local levels.  Finally, I provide the statistics to support the benefits of music education in our children's lives from personal, academic, and professional perspectives before soliciting the first donation.  Constructing this logical sequence allowed me to build a story, to connect me with my audience in the hopes that they would be touched emotionally.

As I developed my presentation, I attempted to anticipate questions my audience may have of the organization; the benefits of music education on young children; and the ways in which the audience could contribute to ensure music education remains in their community's public schools.  To validate my claims throughout the presentation, I obtained statistics from research conducted by noted professionals in the areas of cognitive development, psychology, and neurological science, along with results from prominent surveys.  With so much information to present, avoiding clutter and ensuring readability of the slides was crucial to the success of my presentation.  Therefore, I employed very little text in the PowerPoint slides and thus relied primarily on my narration, digital images, and music to paint the picture for my audience.

In addition to analyzing my own presentation, I also had the opportunity to critique additional presentations from other students.  In fact, I thoroughly enjoyed observing the work of my peers.  After staring at your own presentation for hours (or sometimes days), viewing another student's work was refreshing.  Besides, the work displayed by my peers often inspired me.  Indeed, the amount of creativity and effort exerted in many of the projects I reviewed was truly remarkable.  By providing my fellow students with feedback, I portrayed the audience to their respective presentations.  Furthermore, I inquired about content that was unclear and offered a critical observation of their work.  This effort allowed me to consistently return to my own presentation and analyze my own content with a fresh perspective.

Finally, while working on this particular project, I had the opportunity to work with Camtasia Studio, a Web 2.0 application designed to enhance my PowerPoint presentation.  Camtasia allowed me to insert additional layers of audio into my presentation along with the ability to manipulate various elements of the audio, including the individual volume levels of both my narrative and original music tracks.  This software completely changed the look and feel of my conventional PowerPoint slides.  With the embedded music track fading in and out between slide transitions and vocal narratives, the presentation seemed to breathe on its own.  As a musician and former music major, this project became more than just a slide show.  The project actually turned into a labor of love.  In fact, I plan to create another presentation in Camtasia for an internet start-up shortly after the completion of this project with the hope of uncovering even more of the program's potential.

Tutorial 2: WAV or MP3?

For the past 20 years or so, music enthusiasts have chosen compact discs (CDs) as the primary medium for listening to recorded music.  Before CDs, audiophiles listened to everything from cassettes to vinyl records (even 8-track cassettes for a limited time).  Today, however, music is available via digital download from websites such as iTunes, Amazon, and Napster to name just a few.  With the advent of digital recording and the public’s desire for immediate accessibility, audio formats (such as MP3) are allowing companies to distribute compressed music files, resulting in a sub-par offering for the consumer.


Defining the Formats

Wave Audio File Format or WAV is a format standard developed by Microsoft and IBM for storing audio on personal computers.  WAV is the primary format used by Windows-based PCs for “raw and typically uncompressed audio."¹  Although capable of storing compressed audio, most WAV files contain uncompressed audio in the form of linear pulse code modulation (LPCM), which is the standard audio file format of compact discs.  In addition, LPCM contains “two channels of 44,100 samples per second, 16 bits per sample.”¹  Due to LPCM’s storage of all uncompressed samples of an audio track, professional users and audiophiles tend to utilize the WAV format to obtain the best audio quality.  However, attaining optimum audio fidelity also means accepting disproportionately large file sizes, making the WAV file format unpopular among most of today’s consumers concerned with digital storage.

 

Observing the properties of the WAV file “iii” on my computer’s internal hard disk drive, you can see the file size is very large at 39.2 MB.

By comparison, MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer 3 (MP3) is a patented digital audio encoding format designed to reduce the amount of data necessary to represent an uncompressed audio recording, while simultaneously remaining faithful to the original recording.²  Referred to as a codec, MP3 condenses analog information to a digital medium resulting in a “lossy” form of compression, as some frequencies are lost during the encoding process. Furthermore, these lost frequencies will not return if the user reconverts the file to its original format.³

In a method known as perceptual coding, MP3 formatting uses psychoacoustic models to discard or reduce elements of an audio recording deemed inaudible to humans by compressing certain elements within the audio, then efficiently recording the remaining information.²  For example, digital content on a typical music CD requires nearly 10 megabytes (MB) per minute of audio.  As a song is “ripped” from a CD, mp3 formatting condenses the same minute of audio to approximately 1 megabyte, resulting in a 90% reduction of the original file size.³  Additionally, users may construct MP3 files at different bit rates, or specifically “kilobits used per second of audio.”²  For instance, an MP3 file created at 192,000 bits per second (192 kbps) results in a file size 7.35 times smaller than the original audio source.²

 
After compressing the original "iii" WAV file to an MP3 file format at 320 kbps, the properties reveal a 77% decrease in file size to 8.89 MB.

Compression = Loss of Audio Quality

Unfortunately, the consumer must accept a trade-off between storage capacity and sound quality when determining which type of audio file format to use.  Although audio in MP3 format may sound similar to the human ear, remember that greater compression of the original audio file will result in lost sonic details within the music.  In fact, even the slightest compression will usually discard extremely high and low frequencies within the audio file.  Regardless of whether these lost frequencies are inaudible or not, they provide depth by strengthening the harmonic texture of the music.³  Thus, compressing an audio file inevitably diminishes “the differences between loud and soft passages, [thereby] decreasing dramatic impact.”³  In extreme circumstances, users incorporating a very low bit rate (i.e. 64 kbps or lower) to increase storage capacity may encounter “compression artifacts” (sounds unheard in the original recording) becoming audible in the file.²  However, creating MP3 files larger than 192 kbps will maintain most of the original WAV file’s sonic information.  In fact, at these bit rates, “acoustic instruments tend to keep their natural warmth, and electric instruments sound fuller while retaining their punch.”³  Furthermore, the listener’s environment, attention, training, as well as their choice in audio equipment will influence their perceived quality of an audio file.²

The Recording Lounge provides a terrific example of how two identical pieces of music, in both WAV and MP3 formats, compare in terms of audio quality.


It’s Your Choice: Fidelity or Utility

When selecting which audio file format to use for your music, the choice is clear.  Choose the WAV format if you wish to hear your music in its most pristine, unaltered brilliance or if you want archive quality music in your digital storage medium.  However, if you are on the go and simply need some music to “fill the air,” then load up your favorite digital player with music in MP3 format.  Whatever audio file format you choose, enjoy the music that moves you.

Works Cited

Embedded Links (in order of appearance):

Apple:  http://www.apple.com/itunes/

Amazon:  http://www.amazon.com/MP3-Music-Download/b?ie=UTF8&node=163856011

Napster:  http://www.napster.com/index.html?darwin_ttl=1298190962&darwin=s1210J&regflow_id=s1210J&naps_app_id=0

example:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5gdwpPrv_8

Citations:

¹http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WAV
²http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MP3
³http://www.crutchfield.com/S-kVofihAUYMV/learn/learningcenter/home/mp3.html

^*All screen shots are original work.

Excel Project

Excel is an extremely powerful software application!  In fact, after using the program to complete the Excel Project, I have a newfound admiration for its capabilities.  To analyze large arrays of data in a matter of seconds still boggles my mind!  Although I have worked with Excel in my career, I have only utilized some of the many functions within the program.  However, after working on this particular project, I have a greater understanding for the relevance of Excel’s capabilities in the business world.

The project required me to analyze heart rate data collected from 500 different individuals’ 20-minute exercise sessions.  Initially, I had to rename the worksheet and format row headings/data within the array.  However, the first challenge in the project was to “freeze” rows 1 and 2, which allowed for continuous display while I analyzed the remaining rows of data.  To perform the “freeze,” I simply highlighted row 3 (the row below the two rows I wanted to remain visible), then I “froze” rows 1 and 2 by selecting the Freeze Panes icon in the Windows group of the View tab.  This simple, yet effective, method allowed me to know exactly where I was in the document, regardless of whether I was viewing row 8 or row 492 of the data array.  Furthermore, I had to create additional columns and formulas to obtain the following requested information:

• Maximum Heart Rate (MaxHR)
• Highest Heart Rate Achieved (TgtHR)
• Target Heart Rate Achieved (TgtAchieved)
• Percent Increase in Heart Rate (PctIncreaseHR)

Fortunately, creating the formulas to achieve the desired results was easier than I had expected, because of my previous experience working with Excel.

Finally, I had to create two pivot tables in new worksheets within the Excel Project workbook.  The first pivot table (TgtAchieved) provided the amount of subjects that reached their target heart rate during the 20-minute exercise sessions.  To create this first pivot table, I selected the Gender field for my rows, the TgtAchieved field for my columns, and the TgtHR field for my values.  Then, I chose to summarize the values by count rather than the default setting of sum.  In the second pivot table (AvgIncrease), I had to determine which demographic groups received the most benefit from the exercise program.  To create this second pivot table, I selected the Subject Age field for my rows, the Gender field for my columns, and the PctIncreaseHR field for my values.  With this pivot table, however, I chose to summarize the values by average rather than by count.  Additionally, I grouped the ages by decade (i.e. 20-29, 30-39, and 40-49 years) and deleted the grand totals for both the Age and Gender fields.

From the raw data in the Exercise Study, the AvgIncrease pivot table above displays the average percent increase in heart rate for all subjects.

The Excel Project was a tremendous opportunity for me to hone my Excel knowledge and skills.  I look forward to working with other software programs throughout this semester as I aim to enhance my proficiency in business software applications.

Works Cited

*Screen shot displayed is original work.