Final assignments...

Hi all! I've finished processing the final assignments for those who handed them in. Hopefully I'll catch up next semester and be able to give individual feedback - but everyone who handed the third assignment in has completed the tasks demonstrating their competence.

If you haven't handed your third assignment in (or your second), it's still worth trying to get it done over the holidays!

See you next semester!

Getting your last assignment done!

For those who weren't in class today, next Friday (17/6) is the last time we'll have class together! I won't be in on the last Friday of term (24/6), although you can come in and work on your assignments in the lab on that day.

This means, you should be taking every opportunity to get your third assignment completed. I'm available for tutorial on Monday afternoons from 3:30-5:30 (but this is no-use next week as Monday is a public holiday!).

Hopefully I'll see where people are up to next Friday!

Introducing SQL

We'll be doing a few riddles, an Excel VBA tip (searching in our first assignment), finishing our Advanced Queries in Access from last week, before venturing on to find out...

...what is SQL? Do I really need to know? (or want to know?). There's a great introduction on SQL at Access Tips (as well as lots of other great tips for Access):

Anyone who has built anything but the most basic of queries using the Access query design window has already been using SQL without knowing it. Criteria like: Between #01/01/2003# AND #01/07/2003# or Not("London") or In("London", "Paris", "NewYork") are all phrases from the SQL language.

Access contains many tools and wizards that hep the user create a powerful database without having to learn SQL. But if you are at all serious about database building (and the fact that you are reading this suggests that you are!) a knowledge of SQL will help you build better, more powerful databases. So my answer is an emphatic "YES!".

This week we want to answer just two things:

• What is SQL (not just what it stands for, but what does it do)
• What's in it for me? (ie. What benefits are there to learning SQL?)

and then, using the simplest Access query in your database (any database), see if you can find the SQL for your query. Create a new post on your blog answering the two questions above, then paste in your SQL query and explain how your SQL queries works (what it does)!

A free Web seminar tomorrow (Thursday)

Just in case any of you Cert III people are interested in coming along (Mark might be interested in coming along too :-) : Russ Weakley, one of the presenters at the annual Sydney Web Essentials conference, will be demonstrating how to build a site using Cascading Style Sheets right here at Wentworth Falls TAFE on the 2^nd June at 11am (in B1.11 – one of the call-off rooms in the “Big Lab”). There’ll also be time for Q&A.

It'll be a great opportunity to see how one expert goes about the actual process of creating a site!

About Russ Weakley

Russ Weakley has worked in the design field for over 18 years, the last 8 as a web designer. Russ is currently the web designer for Australian Museum Online and specializes in front-end development, user interface, navigation, site structure and graphics.

Russ co-chairs the Web Standards Group, whose role is to assist in the education of web developers in new technologies and accessibility issues as well as doing presentations to various industry groups.

Russ has also produced a series of widely acclaimed CSS-based tutorials including Listamatic, Listamatic2, Listutorial, Floatutorial and Selectutorial