Review of progress

Catching up today after the spring break - hope everyone had a good one! ... some appear to be extending it though :P
Finishing off email security today (send, receive and exercise using Outlook Express) and updating research on blogs plus interacting with others.  7 weeks left of term to concentrate on remaining topics of TCP/IP and Internet Addressing - assessment for this will be on 26May10

Email security

Just about finished with this topic now, we've been using www.lockbin.com Outlook Express and Thunderbird to explore sending and receiving encrypted emails and digital signatures.
Almost all have made a start on their research topics by now... challenge each other by posting comments on others' blogs! :)

Review of secure communications

Last week we summarised with each taking their own notes:

    encryption algorithms - types (RSA, DES, blowfish, RC4 etc)

    digital signatures and certificates - Public Key Infrastructure

    secure sockets - encryption protocols (SSL, TSL)
    proxy servers

    firewalls - hardware (network based) or software (application based)

Then today we had a quiz to check understanding of above - team 'Calvin, Gordon, Calum and Pawel' won; well done!

We also talked about different connection types... what's most suitable for where, speeds,etc.  Calum gave an example of a home network where multiple users caused a noticable difference to access and download speeds.

Online security

Continuing with security this week - will review public key encryption then it's over to you... 4 groups checking out digital signatures/certificates, secure sockets, proxy servers and firewalls then sharing their findings.
What do these icons mean and can you find others yourself? (post comments please!)

Encryption

Looking at encryption today - why,  how it works, simple examples.... AYL WMS APYAI RFGQ AMBC?

Puzzles that demonstrate (very basic) encryption: Cryptograms,  Mad Cyphers, Crypto games and software

Research - protocols

Have a look at some of the resources available for TCP/IP including this one, and also check out the video tutorials introducing/comparing OSI and TCP/IP.

Post your findings on to your own blog for this unit eg what are these protocols for; how do their layers compare and what does each one do; what do the layers mean to us (hardware/software)... Once you've done this, you should read over the blogs of others in the class and post comments (or questions) on their entry.

New Course - Intro

Part of Higher NC Digital Media Computing, this course (unit) is core for achieving the national certificate.

Students should each create their own blog and keep this updated by publishig their findings, links and support/questions for each other...

Calvin  Gordon  John  Johnny  Pawel  Sam
Matty  Callum  Ben  Esther Carl