Once upon a time, a long time ago,
if you count Sundays and holidays,
there was a little boy named John.
— JACK KENT, author and illustrator of Just Only John (1968)
| README | Code | See Also | Q & A | Exercises | |
The Just So Stories each tell how a particular animal was modified
from an original form to its current form by the acts of man, or some magical being.
from an original form to its current form by the acts of man, or some magical being.
— Wikipedia,
Just So Stories
Rudyard Kipling once explained, Dear Dedalus, that once upon a time there was a whale in the sea who ate fishes. Kipling wove a suspenseful tale that tells how the whale used its tail and got its throat. But don't you wonder, O Dear Dedalus, how the sea got the whale? For that matter, how on earth did the sea come to be?
Let’s suspend our quest for tales of whales for a moment and go back to the very beginning. Many persons who are not conversant with mathematical studies might think this is hard. But in fact it's much easier than Pi. What can possibly go wrong when nothing is right?
Give this a try:
- Make a head with a title nested inside it.
- Then perch it on a barren body.
- Toss in a comment or two—maybe a few.
(But you must not forget the comments, Dear Dedalus.)
With those elements, which are bounded by tags, and the comments (which you must not let lie) arranged just so in that text box (on the Code tab over there), making that, formerly known as this, or nothing at all transforms this page into a formless void.
(Have you forgotten the comments, Daedalus?)
Wikipedia
Mozilla Developer Network (MDN)
w3schools.com
Tags
- <html> MDN | w3schools </html>
- <head> MDN | w3schools </head>
- <title> MDN | w3schools </title>
- <body> MDN | w3schools </body>
- HTML Singleton Tags With No Closing Tag
Also on Wikipedia
- Ada Twist, Scientist
- Stem cell
- Daedalus
- Stephen Dedalus
- Martin Gardner & Oz
- Remembering Martin Gardner
- Literate Programming
- Some Pig → Charlotte's Web
- The Elements of Style
- E. B. White
- Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee
- Turing Award
- About W3C
- HTML Living Standard
Just So Stories for Little Children
is a 1902 collection of origin stories
by the British author Rudyard Kipling.
Considered a classic of children's literature,
the book is among Kipling's best known works.
is a 1902 collection of origin stories
by the British author Rudyard Kipling.
Considered a classic of children's literature,
the book is among Kipling's best known works.
— Wikipedia, Just So Stories
Kipling began working on the book by telling the first three chapters
as bedtime stories to his daughter Josephine.
as bedtime stories to his daughter Josephine.
— Wikipedia, Just So Stories
What is Dry Cow Fishing?
Tons of fun!
What if I still have questions?
These had to be told "just so"
(exactly in the words she was used to)
or she would complain.
or she would complain.
— Wikipedia, Just So Stories
- Read Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years by Peter Norvig and then answer the following questions.
- Who is Peter Norvig?
- Can a woman be a fellow? If so, how?
- Peter Norvig is a fellow of the ACM and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. What does the word fellow mean in this context?
- What does the acronym ACM stand for?
- What is the American Academy of Arts & Sciences?
- List the names (first, middle, and last, if possible) of all of the women who satisfy the following condition: the person must be a fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and the person's name must appear on the Q & A tab on this web page.
- How does one become a fellow of the ACM?
- Find a pair of fellows of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences who share the same last name and do so because one is the father and one is the daughter of the other. What are their names and professions?
- Continuing the previous exercise, narrow your search by finding such a pair of fellows that has the same last name as a teacher at Valley Catholic School who earned a bachelor’s in English and a master’s in education, both from Stanford University. How are these three people related to each other?
- Continuing the previous exercise, find a famous math teacher at Valley Catholic School who earned a bachelor’s degree from Princeton University, a master’s in mathematics from Portland State, and a master’s in theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. How is this person related to the individuals you discovered in the previous two exercises?
- What do Peter Norvig, Marvin Minsky, John McCarthy, and Alan Turing have in common?
- How are the previous four questions related?
- Read the Forbes article Meet These Incredible Women Advancing A.I. Research. Which of the women mentioned in the article is doing work that sounds interesting to you? What is it about their work that interests you?
- Peter Norvig created the “Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation”. What is that about?
- Among other things, Peter Norvig also created a web page titled '05 Annual Performance Review: Albert Einstein. What do you think this is about?
- The following exercises gives you practice with a concept called enumeration.
- What does the word enumerate mean?
- What is an enumeration?
- What is an enumerable type?
- List reasons that Peter Norvig enumerates for learning a language like JavaScript when you are first learning to program?
- Using a writing implement that doesn't depend on electricity, in ten minutes make a list of as many types of “things” (including non-tangible things like concepts) that you can think of that can be enumerated in a list of finite length. Title your list "“My Ordered List of Examples of Enumerations”.
- Give an example of something besides the digits of Pi that cannot be enumerated using a finite list of discrete items. (There are an “infinite number” of digits in a base-ten representation of the number known as Pi, so those digits cannot be enumerated in a list of finite length.)
- Make a web page that displays your list. (Don't just copy someone else's work!)
- Use the code tab of this MESS to create your web page. Practice storing and restoring a copy of your page on the computer that you are using.
- Put An Enumeration between title tags in the head section of your page like this:
<head><title>An Enumeration</title></head> - Put Things that can be enumerated between
<h1></h1>tags in the body section of your page. - Use
<ol>and<li>tags to form your list. - For each item in your list, link to (using the
<a>tag) another web page the illustrates or is in some way related to that particular item. - Include Reasons for learning JavaScript on your list of things that can be enumerated and link to Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years.
- Include Things that can be enumerated on your list of things that can be enumerated and try to link to your own web page as an example of that sort of thing.
- Were you able to create a hyperlink that opened your web page when you clicked on the link on your web page? Why or why not? If not, ask for help and figure out how to do it. This is important!
- What does the word recursive mean?
- APA, MLA, and Chicago refer to three popular styles that may be used when citing sources.
- What does the acronym APA stand for, and who commonly uses APA style?
- What does the acronym MLA stand for, and who commonly uses MLA style?
- What is another name for Chicago style, and who commonly uses this style?
- Cite trustworthy sources that support your answers to the questions above; use MLA style.
- Why do you believe the sources you cited (in the exercise immediately before this one) are trustworthy?
- In 1912, someone wrote the following in a publication referred to by the acronym ILN.
An interesting essay might be written on the possession of an atheistic literary style. There is such a thing. The mark of it is that wherever anything is named or described, such words are chosen as suggest that the thing has not got a soul in it. Thus they will not talk of love or passion, which imply a purpose and a desire. They talk of the “relations” of the sexes, as if they were simply related to each other in a certain way, like a chair and a table. Thus they will not talk of the waging of war (which implies a will), but of the outbreak of war – as if it were a sort of boil. Thus they will not talk of masters paying more or less wages, which faintly suggests some moral responsibility in the masters: they will talk of the rise and fall of wages, as if the thing were automatic, like the tides of the sea. Thus they will not call progress an attempt to improve, but a tendency to improve. And thus, above all, they will not call the sympathy between oppressed nations sympathy; they will call it solidarity. For that suggests brick and coke, and clay and mud, and all the things they are fond of.
- Pronounce atheistic.
- In your own words, define atheistic. Cite your sources.
- In your own words, describe what an atheistic literary style refers to as the phrase is used in the quote above.
- Who is this quote attributed to? What is the person's full name? What is a commonly used abbreviated version of this person's name?
- What does the acronym ILN stand for in this context?
- Who was Martin Gardner, and what is the relationship between Martin Gardner and the person to whom the quote above is attributed? (Hint: Wikipedia.) Cite your sources.
- What is the relationship between Donald Knuth and Martin Gardner? Cite your sources. Hints:
- Programmers need strong vocabulary skills in order to choose good names for entities.
- In your own words, describe what the word entity means. Cite your sources.
- List as many attributes of a name that you can think of that would make the name a good one.
- List as many factors that you can think of that might influence which name a programmer chooses for an entity such as a variable or a function.
- Listen to the Web of Stories video clip titled Learning about Symbolic Optimum Assembly programs featuring Donald Ervin Knuth.
- What five letter word does Donald Knuth talk about using in his tic-tac-toe program?
- How many different ways are there to spell tic-tac-toe? Cite your sources.
- The following exercises require you to be original and engaging!
Do not collaborate with anyone on this portion of these exercise except as instructed to below.
And no matter what, always cite your sources!
- Print a hard copy this web page on 8.5 x 11 inch printer paper, double sided. Include the entire first and second printed pages with headers. If this web page exceeds two printed pages (one sheet of paper), you do not need to print pages three or greater, but if you do, staple the pages together. (This portion of this exercise is about following instructions just so and sets up subsequent exercises.)
- In your own words, describe what a backronym is. Cite your sources.
- Create an original backronym of your own for the letters BINGO.
- What does the word etymology mean? Cite your sources.
- What is the etymology of the word bingo? Cite your sources.
- Describe what a backronym is; share and explain your backronym for BINGO; and retell Donald Knuth's story about using the word BINGO in one of his early programs to one of your other teachers or someone on staff at your school, a parent or grandparent, and/or a Sister (with a capital S).
- Show the hard-copy of this web page that you printed (see above) to the people you spoke with in the previous exercise. Somewhere (anywhere) on that piece of paper and in your own handwriting, neatly print the full name&emdash;first, last and middle name(s) (if applicable)—of the people you spoke with.
- Have the persons whose names you wrote on the hard copy of this page sign the paper near their printed name to provide evidence that you completed this exercise. If someone you spoke with has a native language other than English, ask them to sign their full name in English (if they have an English version of their name) and in their own native language.
- This exercise requires access to volume 4A of Donald Ervin Knuth's monumental series of books titled The Art of Computer Programming.
- What is the title of Volume 4A?
- How many different languages can you identify in the Index of Volume 4A? Do your best to provide an example of each in your own handwriting.
- Does Donald E. Knuth prefer to cite sources using the full names or abbreviated names of individuals? Cite the source of your information using MLA style.
