Le Moyne College Summer Math Academy August 2007 Information Literacy & The Internet/WWW

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AcademyAcademyAugust 2007August 2007

Information Literacy & The Internet/WWWInformation Literacy & The Internet/WWW

Le Moyne College Summer Math Academy Slide 2August 2007

Information Literacy and The Internet/WWW

• NYS Standard 5 – Technology– Computer Technology

• “… have greatly increased human productivity and knowledge.”

– Technological Systems• “… designed to achieve specific results and produce outputs,

such as …”

– History and Evolution of Technology• “… has been the driving force in the evolution of society …”

– Impacts of Technology• “… can have positive and negative impacts on individuals,

society, and the environment …”


Information Literacy Models (aka information problem-solving

approaches)

Super3 (1)

1. Plan2. Do3. Review

Big6 (1)

1. Task definition2. Information seeking

strategies3. Location and access4. Use of information5. Synthesis6. Evaluation

(1) The “Super3™” and “Big6™” are copyright © (1987) Michael B. Eisenberg and Robert E. Berkowitz. For more information, visit: http://www.big6.com


The Big6 Model1. Task definition

1.1 Define information problem1.2 Identify information needed

2. Information seeking strategies2.1 Determine all possible sources2.2 Select best sources

3. Location and access3.1 Locate sources3.2 Find information within sources

4. Use of information4.1 Engage (read, hear, view,

touch)4.2 Extract relevant information

5. Synthesis5.1 Organize from multiple

sources5.2 Present information

6. Evaluation6.1 Judge product (effectiveness)6.2 Judge process (efficiency)

(1) The “Super3™” and “Big6™” are copyright © (1987) Michael B. Eisenberg and Robert E. Berkowitz. For more information, visit: http://www.big6.com


The Internet &World Wide Web

• Largest collection of information ever constructed by humans– WWW

• As of Jan 2007: 433.1 million host domain names– (see www.isc.org/index.pl?/ops/ds/)

– Library of Congress• As of Dec 2006: 134.5 million items in collection

– (see www.loc.gov/about/reports/)


The Internet &World Wide Web (cont’d)

• Given size of WWW– Makes it challenging to do steps 2-4:

2. Information seeking strategies2.1 Determine all possible sources2.2 Select best sources

3. Location and access3.1 Locate sources3.2 Find information within sources

4. Use of information4.1 Engage (read, hear, view, touch)4.2 Extract relevant information


Internet/WWW Topics

• History of Internet & WWW• How WWW works• WWW search engines• The invisible (deep) web• Security & privacy


Telecommunications History

• Telegraph 1835 Samuel Morse– First circuit connection

• Telephone 1876 Alexander Graham Bell

• ARPANet 1969 U.S. government– First packet-switched connection– First connection: UCLA and Stanford Research Institute

• Internet mid-1970’s

• LAN early 1980’s

• WWW 1991 Tim Berners-Lee


A Comparison

The Internet• The interconnection of

networks– A network of networks

• Why so successful?– Standard Protocols– Simple concept

• Send data in packets

• Drawbacks– No standards for content– Command line interface

The World Wide Web• The interconnection of files

– Hypertext links create a web of resources

• Why so successful?– Standard protocols– Point & click interface– Standards for content

• HTML, XML

• Drawbacks– Too large?


WWW - How it works

• Uniform Resource Locator (URL)– Address of data files on Internet

http://web.lemoyne.edu/~voorhedp/index.html

– Three parts:1 Internet application protocol

http:

2 Domain name - a specific computer on Internet//web.lemoyne.edu

3 Hierarchical description of a file location on a computer

/~voorhedp/index.html


Domain Names

• Computers on Internet communicate via an IP address– IP means Internet Protocol

• Each WWW host (server) has unique:– IP address

• 192.231.124.141

– Domain name• www.lemoyne.edu


Domain Name Servers

• Domain Name Server (DNS)– Converts a domain name (www.lemoyne.edu) to

an IP address (192.231.124.141)– Allows computers to then send data packets to a

specific computer

• Generic Top-level Domain Names– .COM .EDU .ORG .MIL .GOV .NET

• National Top-level Domain Names– .UK .CA .FR .AU


Searching on the WWW

• Most WWW search engines provide:– Simple search

• Type in search words

– Advanced search• Type in search words• Select search options


WWW Search Engines & Directories

• What is a www search engine?• Answer:

– Three separate software programs:1 Spider (crawler, bot)2 Create a huge index (catalog)3 Receive your search request, compare against index,

return results

• What is a www directory?• Answer:

– A structured list of topics, navigable via links

See http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters for details


Some WWW Search Engines

Major Search Engines• www.google.com• www.yahoo.com• www.live.com• www.ask.com• search.aol.com • www.altavista.com• www.lycos.com• search.netscape.com• dmoz.com

Metacrawlers and Metasearch Engines

• www.dogpile.com• vivisimo.com• www.kartoo.com • www.mamma.com• www.surfwax.com

See http://searchenginewatch.com/links for details


General Approach toSearching the Web

1. Use specialized search engine– Check searchenginewatch.com/links

2. Use a WWW directory– Find matching subject category– Use Yahoo or Google directory

3. Use metacrawler or webferret– Gets results from many search engines simultaneously

• Check searchenginewatch.com/links• Focus on first 10 -20 items

4. Use subject directory approach– Use Google to search for “topic directory”


General Approach toSearching the Web (cont’d)

• You’re starting to get desperate!

5. Rethink your search strategy– Subject too new?– Subject too old?

6. Search through older internet archives– Search USENET newsgroups– Use veronica, jughead, gopher, WAIS or some

other internet-based information


The Invisible (Deep) Web

• Crawler software is now much better at:– Reading content in non-HTML format

• E.g., PDF, Word docs, Excel, Corel suite

• The invisible web– Content on www that cannot be found by crawler

software• See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_web for details

– Examples:• crawlers cannot access online databases (i.e., cannot type

username/password)• crawlers exclude dynamic content (e.g., amazon.com book

search)


The Invisible (Deep) Web(cont’d)

• Academically valuable:– Librarian’s Internet Index (lii.org)– Academic Info (www.academicinfo.us)– Infomine (infomine.ucr.edu)

• Other worthwhile sites:– Open Directory Project (dmoz.org)– Digital Librarian (www.digital-librarian.com)– Invisible Web & Database Search Engines

(searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156181)– List of lists (www.specialissues.com/lol/)– About.com (websearch.about.com/od/invisibleweb)


Security & Privacy in a Connected World

• Security– A technical term:

• Protecting access to resources, e.g.:– Physical: buildings, computers– Virtual: databases, e-mail, software,

telecommunications

• Privacy– A legal term:

• Who has the right to CRUD your information?• Who has the right to sell or buy your information?


Security

• Username & password• WWW Browser features

– Automatically save your password?• Never use this feature !!


Security Threats• Computer Virus

– Software disguised as something else• Causes unexpected and usually undesirable events

– Spread through human action

• Computer Worm– A self-replicating virus

• Malware (malicious software)– Designed to infiltrate a computer system without your consent– Examples:

• Spyware, botnets, loggers, dialers

• Trojan Horse– Installs malware while under guise of doing something else


Security Technology• AntiVirus software

– Signatures used to identify viruses, worms, trojan horses• New viruses detected only when new signatures on PC!• Turn on automatic download feature

– Get new virus definition files at least once a week

• Firewall software– Blocks certain packets from being processed on your LAN/PC

• Encryption– Encode/decode data

• Anti-Malware software• Proxy Server

– Separates your LAN from the Internet– Hides your PC’s IP address


Privacy Issues

• Identity theft• National ID system• Debate re: wire taps for IM, web

browsing, discussion forums, etc.• Opt-in versus opt-out


Privacy Technology

• Wire taps– FBI software:

• “Carnivore” renamed “DCS”• E-mail sniffing software

• Use of Biometrics– Finger print, iris scan, DNA, etc.

Documents

Le Moyne College Summer Math Academy August 2007 Information Literacy & The Internet/WWW