[Year 12 IT Apps] ITA U4O1 task 1 weighting

[Ciotti, George W]

I would argue that Acrobat Professional is a very capable multimedia application. It is capable of incorporating video and audio files, it can utilise links to other pages within the resulting PDF as well as links to internet located sites. You can open other documents from other applications from within the PDF. It can quite easily build forms for feedback that can be saved by the end user as a normal pdf document or sent via email at the click of a button. It does have an advantage that all of these elements can be combined and produced to run locally. You can also search through the document.
Having said that, it does take some getting use to because it has its own way of incorporating these elements; it does accept javascript.
For example, students can produce their documentation in either Word or InDesign and then export to PDF via Acrobat where they can augment the PDF. You just have to look at Adobe's own help documents to see how they have transformed their documentation into an interactive document. That and countless other examples using pdf for documentation.
The issue may be that some schools do not allow students to access Acrobat or that teachers are not comfortable with the application but that does not detract from the fact that it is well used as an authoring application in any case.

My 3 cents worth – CPI indexed

Cheers
George

The University High School
77 Story Street, Parkville, Vic, 3052, Australia
Ph: (03) 9347 2022
mobile: 0412934782


From: Mark KELLY <kel at mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au<mailto:kel at mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au>>
Reply-To: Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List <itapps at edulists.com.au<mailto:itapps at edulists.com.au>>
Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2011 22:08:47 +1000
To: Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List <itapps at edulists.com.au<mailto:itapps at edulists.com.au>>
Subject: Re: [Year 12 IT Apps] ITA U4O1 task 1 weighting

Hi all.  The study design says that "To support the ongoing use of these solutions, students produce user documentation using either web authoring or multimedia authoring software."

I think most of us would agree on what "web authoring" software would be - Dreamweaver, Drupal/Moodle etc (but do we include Notepad if it's used to create PHP/AJAX/CSS/HTML5 pages?).

We just need to argue over whether PDF is "multimedia authoring software".  I'd say not.  I'd say its prime function is not the creation of multimedia.

I'd say Powerpoint and Flash are specifically designed as multimedia authoring tools.

2.15c worth (assuming a GST rise to pay for the carbon tax)

Come out lurkers.  What do you think?

Mark

On 25 July 2011 14:23, Andrew Shortell <shortell at get2me.net<mailto:shortell at get2me.net>> wrote:
Hey Mark
At a personal level I do not believe a single PDF is adequate if it is merely a print document such as a text document (NOT necessarily a word doc from microsloth (attribution to Mike B))

However I believe that as part of doing the preparation for creating User Documentation that we create a specification set / design brief. This brief contains all the things that will help them to achieve high in each criteria on the marking scheme.

Thus they know exactly what they need to put in and so the students who are interested in attaining good results put it in.
I consider it no reflection upon myself if they deliberately choose not to put in things that we have discussed and added to the specifications of which they have a copy.  !!

Interactivity is important for user doc; searchability; and lots of other things. Given that you are marking the sacs you need to set the specs. If the students know the specs then they have the best chance of meeting them!

(I think I am missing teaching vce!! And the intellectual challenges therein! As I sit in a year 7 art class.)

Andrew



On 25/07/11 1:30 PM, "Mark KELLY" <kel at mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au<http://kel@mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au>> wrote:

Hi Andrew.  While I acknowledge that PDF has one or two distinctively onscreen features, it lacks most of them.  If I let my kids use PDF as a format, they'd type up a normal Word document and just save it as PDF without exploiting the features they were meant to use.

On 25 July 2011 10:22, Andrew Shortell <shortell at get2me.net<http://shortell@get2me.net>> wrote:
Hi John and Mark

PDF is no longer merely meant to be printed. It is a simple way to keep everything looking like you meant it to look.

PDF docs can contain links etc so they are not merely printed pages

A lot of user doc that one receives nowadays comes as pdf. 100s of pages of it. When was the last time that you printed a pdf manual????????

E.g. Last night I installed a big pond usb modem for a “Senior” couple. The suer doc was a series of pdfs. Telstra is moderately up to date with things......

Back off my soap box and on to teaching and learning

Andrew

--
--
Andrew Shortell

mailto:shortell at get2me.net
Heidelberg Teaching Unit
Ph 9470 3403
Fax  9470 3215


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