202 sections are a time for you to ask questions about assignments or material and to really talk about the issues we discuss in 202, and we will have each student select one section meeting during the semester to present a 202 in the News story relating to organizing systems out in the world. We will ask each student to be sure to answer the following questions:
- What is being organized – things, information about things, information? What is the scope and scale of the domain?
- Why it is being organized – what functions or capabilities are being enabled, and for whom? Are the uses and users known or unknown? Is the organization being done to achieve personal, social, or institutional goals?
- How much is it being organized – what is the extent or degree of description, classification, or relational structure being imposed? What principles guide and are embodied in the organization?
- When is it being organized – when it is created, at design time, or at runtime, just in case, just in time, all the time?
- By whom (or by what computational processes) it is being organized – by individuals, by informal groups, by formal groups, by professionals, by automated methods?
You will write it up as a short blog post (or long one, if you’re really into it) and post it to the website before your section meets on your selected day. Have fun with this! This is an opportunity to share a connection you’ve made between 202 and the world. Please be sure to tag these posts as you would any other blog entry—lecture number, or descriptive topic tags.
