Wikipedia:School and university projects/Oscail Computing 1

Introduction

Specific introduction for students is in the next section.

An introductory course to Computing (C1) at Oscail, Dublin City University will ask students to contribute to an article on Wikipedia.

There will be around 20-40 students. Each student will have a separate Wikipedia account, and the group will try to improve a particular article and to expand it to the level as close to Featured Article as they can.

Facilitator: I, User:Dwellings will take care of introducing studends to Wiki and ensuring they and the project are working within the bounds of Wikipedia guidelines. They will be assessed on their work by their tutors through their assignment submission in their Moodle module.

Start date: The project will begin, October 2009.

Status: <status of the project. Ex. At that moment it has led to no editing other than that on the project pages. Please direct any comments to my user talk page or to the project talk page.>

Introduction for students

Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, is an encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone. It has over three million editors (Wikipedians) as of 2007, many of whom are students like you. The vast majority of them are volunteers who find editing this site to be an enjoyable experience, even a hobby. Therefore I hope you will enjoy this exercise and the course! After all, there are not many exercises that tell you to do something that over a million people think is 'fun'. :)

Wikipedia:Tutorial is the best place to start your adventure with this wiki. You may find Wikipedia:School and university projects - instructions for students useful though not all information there is relevant to you. If you have any questions, check the Help:Contents and if you cannot find what you are looking for, ask the friendly people at Wikipedia:Help desk - or just <ex. contact me.>

Before making any major edits, it is recommended that you create an account (Wikipedia:Why create an account?). You definitely need to have an account before attempting to work on your assignment (otherwise we will be unable to confirm if you have completed the exercise). After you create an account, please add your wikiepdia user name in the relevant row of the table below the 'Student Wikipedia userpage' column in the row with your name. Your username should be your C1 web 2.0 id and instructions on how to generate this id are in your C1 study guide.

Remember that Wikipedia is not a project limited only to the Dubin City University. We are guests here and we should all behave accordingly. Please make sure you read Wikipedia:Wikiquette. Our Computing 1 course is the first one at our university to use Wikipedia to such an extent, so please try to think what impression you want other Wikipedians to have of our university—and of yourselves.

People such as the facilitator, other students, your friends, and even (or especially) other Wikipedia editors (not affiliated with our course) may leave you various messages on your talk pages. When working on the assignment, you should log in to Wikipedia and check your messages as often as you check your email (I strongly recommend you read 'as often' as 'at least every two-three days'). Whenever you have a new message and are logged to Wikipedia, you will see a large orange message, 'You have new messages', on every Wikipedia page you access. To make this message disappear, you should click on it and read the message. Note that it is customary to leave new messages at the bottom of the talk/discussion pages, and to reply to somebody's messages on their talk pages. If you want to leave somebody a message, make sure you are editing their talk page, not their user page. Remember to sign your talk and discussion messages.

Some other useful tips: whenever you are done with an edit and want to save a page, fill out the edit summary box and view a preview of the page after your edit to make sure it looks as you actually want it to look. Only then click the "Save Page" button. You may find the page history tool and watchlist tools to be very useful when you want to check what changes by other editors have been made to the article(s) you are working on.

Please direct any questions to <ex. this page discussion page or Dwellings's talk page> but please try to find the answer first on the Help:Contents.

Your assignment

The details of your assignment (assignment 2) will be available in the C1 module in DCU Moodle.

Important note: make sure you are logged into your account before making any edits. If you are not logged in, you are not credited with making edits to an article.

(To get the ball rolling someone should add the {{EducationalAssignment}} template to the talk page of the wikipedia article that we will be working on (see the assignment in Moodle for which exact wikipedia article we will be editing this year).

Below is an example of how this template will render when it is added to the talk page of the article:

Helpful information

You may want to start with this tutorial, which will take you through the basics of editing Wikipedia.

Create a userpage for yourself. Look at the top right corner, you will see your nickname in red. Click on it; write some text (about yourself, about the course, etc.), save the page. Repeat until you are satisfied. Upload an image and add it to your page.

Expanding and improving an existing article in Wikipedia

• Wikipedia:How to edit a page

It is important that an article has references. Please see Wikipedia:Cite sources and Wikipedia:References. You can use Wikipedia:External links as references for this exercise, but bear in mind that for your Working Paper you will be required to use academic books/journals as references as well.

1. If the article is long enough, it should have an introductory paragraph. See Wikipedia:Lead for details on what such a paragraph should look like.

It is important to be able to distinguish between primary sources and secondary sources, as well as to be able to properly cite your sources. References are key to this. Make sure to fllow Wikipedia:Citing sources guideline, try to find reference for every important fact in the article. Please try to use academic, primary sources (like academic journals) instead of non-academic, secondary sources (like newspapers or non-academic websites). See also Wikipedia:Reliable sources for information on what sources are preffered.

Some examples of well-referenced articles: Katyn massacre, Welding, Section summary of the USA PATRIOT Act, Title II, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Battle of Austerlitz, Military history of France, Monopoly (game), Astrophysics Data System, Mercury (planet), Søren Kierkegaard, Eric A. Havelock.

You are welcome to use Wikipedia:Peer Review and related tools and seek creative comments on your article. In additon, please note that any attempt to cheat on Wikipedia will be regarded as seriously as academic plagiarism.

List of Participants

Now please add yourself to here below the last participant added. Give your first name, your Wikipedia username (this should be your c1 web 2.0 id) and one or two things you feel comfortable sharing about yourself.

Give a brief note about an edit or edits you made to the article or something you contributed to its discussion page.

Username	Introduction	Edit to Article	Contribution to Article Talk Page	Any Other Comment
Dwellings	Hi I am Eamon Costello. For this exercise my Wikipedia username is User:Dwellings. Prior to joining Dublin City University I worked as a software developer and IT consultant. I have studied at a distance myself before so I know how challenging and also rewarding it can be. I live in North County Dublin with my wife and cat. Currently I'm listening to Steve Earl.	...	...	...
jalyng_c109	Hi My name is James Lyng. I live in Co. Galway. My user name is jalyng_c109. I am doing the C1 module as part of the IT distance education degree course at Dublin City University.	...	...	...
spjeremiah_c109	Hi, I am Sion Jeremiah, Sion is pronounced Sean I currently work in a datacentre by day and study for a BSc in IT by night.	...	...	...
Acwhelan_C109	Hello,my name is Ann Whelan, user name Acwhelan_C109. I live in Co.Monaghan. Mum of 3 beautiful children. I am studying for the IT degree course through distance learning with DCU.	Added an internal link to a wikipedia article on labour unions and bolded some names by using wiki mark up.Improved the tone of the article by mentioning the internet as a threat of entry of new competitors. Added a reference from Rainer & Turban	Contributed twice to talk page to kick off discussions	...
Ambrady_C109	Hello, my name is Ann Brady, I live in Templeogue, Dublin. I am doing 3 modules through Oscail this year.	Added a link to the bio and information on Kevin P Boyle whose name appears in the article.	Described the update.	Created a user page.
Tabrowne_C109	Hello, My named is Alan Browne, user name Tabrowne_C109. I live in Meath and have 2 small boys. I am currently working in Dublin and studying through DCU as part of a distance education programme.	Added a link to an external website	Suggested that Portors 5 forces model is limited with regards to outside influences.	Added the priorty level for the article to high with regards to business and economics portal
dpdowling_C109	Hi, My name is Declan and I am studying for an IT degree with Oscail. I working in IT and my username is dpdowling_C109.	...	...	...
Oojo_C109	Hi, My name is olajumoke Ojo, I live in Portlaoise, Co.Laois.User name Oojo_C109.I am doing C1 module.	...	...	...
kdnguyen_C109	Hello, my name is Khang Nguyen, user name kdnguyen_C109. I live in Athy, Co. Kildare. This is my first year and I am taking 3 modules through Oscail at Dublin City University.	...	...	...
refarrell_C109	Hello, my name is Emmet Farrell. My Wikipedia user name is refarrell_C109. I am in my first year of Oscail and I currently live in a place called Portmarnock.	...	...	...
EPKENNY_C109	Hello, My name is EndaKenny and I am studying for an IT degree with Oscail. I work as an IT Systems Administrator. My Username is EPKENNY_C109.	I added a line to the intensity of competitive rivalry section "Level of Advertising Expense"	I also added an additional reference at the bottom of the page.	...
mdlukas_C109	Hi, My name is Manuel Lukas, user name mdlukas_C109. I work as a project leader and software developer in Bremen, Germany. I study for the IT degree through distance learning at Dublin City University.	Wikified the article by using wiki markup on the following words: lines of business, product differentiation, fixed costs, game theory and Intel Corporation.	I added a comment on the update (article wikified).	...
Pfduberry_c109	Hello. My name is Paul, username Pfduberry_c109. Studying Computing 1 and Human Sciences 1 modules at DCU which count towards a degree in IT. I live in County Tipperary with my wife Geraldine and 2 children. I own and operate a small computer sales and repair shop in Roscrea.	(Wikified the words 'micro environment', the word 'rights' and made 4 other minor spelling and grammatical edits)	...	...
jmrobinson_C109	Hi,My name is John Robinson.My username is jmrobinson_C109,I live in Co.Offaly.I work in IT support and I'm doing the C1 module in my first year of Oscail.	...	...	...
lobrien_C109	Hi, my name is Lorraine O'Brien, living in Galway at the minute. My username is lobrien_C109. I'm currently attempting(!) all 4 modules.	...	...	...
jfhynes_c109	Hi , Jude Hynes here. User name is jfhynes_c109. I live in County Kildare with my fiance and my dog. I work for an online poker company	...	...	...
Mmmcmahon_C109	Hi, My name is Mary McMahon. My username is Mmmcmahon_C109. I live in Co. Galway and I am doing the C1 module in my first year of Oscail at Dublin City University.	...	...	...
lafitzgerald_c109	Hi, I'm Lorraine Fitzgerald - username lafitzgerald_c109. Living in Dublin and behind on the 2nd assignments!!	I added a line to intensity of competitive rivalry section "Competition between online and offline companies"	Added comment to discussion to agree to a comment. Also added comment after updating article	...
Aphanrahan_C109	Hello all fellow C1 and Oscail students.My name is Alan Hanrahan and my username is Aphanrahan_C109.I live in Waterford City,am a complete technophobe so need all the help I can get.Also married with 4 kids and work as Plant Manager in a food factory.	...	...	...
tmimnagh_c109	Hi, I'm Thomas Mimnagh. My user name is tmimnagh_c109. I live in Longford and I'm attempting all 4 modules.	...	...	...
jpomahony_c109	Hello, My name is Jimmy O' Mahony, username jpomahony_c109. I live in Clonmel, Co. Tipp and am undertaking the C1, CT1 and HS1 modules this year.	(Criticisms of the 5 Forces model: wikified the term "complementors" & wikified the second case of the use of term "complementors")	...	...
DaAnderson_C109	Hi, Deirdre here. User Name DaAnderson_C109. Living in Kilkenny and doing C1 and MS1. Its freezing here today - 5th Jan	...	...	...
kpmurray_C109	Hi, My name is Kieron Murray from Ratoath, Co. Meath. Username kpmurray c109. I'm taking on C1 and CT1.	( I added the reference to Mintzberg, Ahlstrand and Lampel, "Strategy Safari" 1998, and put the book names into italics.)	...	...
Stspelman_C109	Hello, my name is Stephen Spelman. I'm living in Cork and am taking C1, MS1 and HS1.	...	...	...
Kmulligan_C109	Hello, my name is Kenneth Mulligan. I'm living in Mullingar and am taking C1, CT1 and HS1.	...	...	...
kpanderson_c109	Hello. My name is Ken, username kpanderson_c109. Taking on C1, CT1 and HS1 modules at DCU. I live in Dublin.	(I Wikified the words Firm and Firms by creating internal links with the use of square brackets [[ ]] )	...	...
EMcDunphy_C109	Hi All. Eoin here. Better late than never! I live in Kinsealy, Swords in Dublin with my wife and younger daughter. My older daughter nov lives in Edinburgh.I am doing C1, CT1, and HS1 this year through Oscail in Dublin City University.	...	...	...
dacawley_C109	Hello, my name is David Cawley. I'm living in Sligo and am taking C1, and HS1 this year.	...	...	...
blacks_C109	Hello all, my name is Stephen Black. I'm living in Tinahely, Co. Wicklow, and taking CT1 and C1 this year.	I have added page references for the Porter model in our prescribed text. Also added a Wiki link to Porter's Value Chain Model in the 'see also' section.	I have also participated in the discussions page in the discussion titled What the FFF?	...
dvbergen_C109	Hi, my name is David von Bergen and I'm living in Co. Wexford. This is my first year with Oscail and I'm taking C1, CT1, and MS001.	Wikified the two entries of the word "incumbents"	Opened a discussion to get opinions about an edit I thought should be made to a certain line of the text.	...
Cocarroll_C109	Hi, my name is Cathal O' Carroll. I am doing C1, HS1, MS001, and CT1. Probably too much!! We (three kids myself and my wife) live in Ballybrack, south Dublin, I am a motorsport nut, and like to cycle.	I have added Philip Kotler as a reference.	I also added some changes to the text. I pointed that there are external and internal forces in Porters model	I have added a number of points to this article. As we are studying an IT diploma, I thought it was appropriate to point out that technology is a significant source of competitive advantage. It can reduce the threat from competitors and allow firms to charge higher prices.
omball C109	Hello, My name is Owen Ball, and I'm studying C1, MS001, and HS01 under the Oscail distance learning program. I worked for 10 years with an IT firm specialising in EPOS systems before being made redundant last summer. Big Fan of Cycling, photography, and cheese on Toast.	I have Wikified "Price Sensitivity" to link it to an article on "Price Elasticity of Demand"...	...	...
jshanley_C109	Hi All, My Name is Joe Hanley, currently studying C1 this year, have already completed HS1 and MS1. i have one son 4 months old, trying to spend as much time with hm as possible, he's great fun.... Currently working for a telecommunications company in Galway as the Lab Admin.	...	...	...
Rgmooney_C109	Hello all, my name is Ronan. I am looking forward to using wikipedia, I use it in work and would like to get to know and use it's collaboration features.	...	...	...
Rduibhriain_C109	Hi everyone, my name is Rosa. This is my first year at Dublin City University. I am taking 3 modules through Oscail and I am currently living in Dublin.	Added links to company,industry and marketplace.	...	... I use wikipedia on a daily basis and it was fun to learn how to edit these pages.
nswhelan_C109	Hello all, my name is Noel Whelan. I am taking two modules with Oscail this year, C1 and HS1. I am living in north county Dublin and am working as a maintenance tech in Leixlip.	Wikified the term "propensity"	...	...
spscanlan_C109	Hi! Seamus Scanlan here. I am taking three modules this year. I have worked in IT for 13 years. It's fascinating to see if from a more academic perspective.	I added wikilinks for the following terms: competitive advantage and mp3.	...	...