text:
User talk:Open Research

research project - new school
The person at the Wikimedia Foundation who was in charge of grants resigned not too long ago. Let me check to see who you should contact.
 * The grants coordinator position is still vacant. I suggest contacting Cary Bass. --JWSchmidt 21:00, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

"Is it okay to add a new cross-cutting school if the multi-disciplinary subject I want to add does not exist yet, and does not fit into existing schools?" <-- Feel free to create a new school. I have been playing with School:Free Learning. --JWSchmidt 20:51, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Your area sounds fascinating - I'll try to keep up with it. :-) Cormaggio talk 10:52, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

 * "The power of the wiki format is quite something" <-- It is not hard to make MediaWiki a software platform that can theoretically do everything. It then becomes an interesting exercise to ask which tasks can fruitfully be done with wiki technology rather than some other tool. Even if you can do something with a wiki, it is useful to ask: are there other tools that can do the job more efficiently? Sometimes wiki has baggage that just gets in the way. If wiki technology is a viable solution to a problem, you then get into optimizing a wiki community just for that special task. That is good exercise for the imagination, but what captivates me is the idea that wiki technology can allow us to do new things that have never been done before. For some tasks, wiki technology has the power to amplify the power of collaboration in a way that produces emergent phenomena and requires us to change the way we think about our limitations and what is possible. That is a very exciting process and I'm glad to be along for the ride as we explore wiki phenomena. --JWSchmidt 13:48, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

 * "If you can point to references which highlight the strengths and weaknesses of different platforms/media for different uses, I'd be interested to read." <-- Sorry, I'm a bad boy....I've only read bits and pieces of the relevant literature. User:Cormaggio is in the midst of academia's struggle with learning technologies....maybe he can point towards some good reading. Possible entry points for useful information: Research, w:Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination, Change Issues in Curriculum and Instruction/Wikis in the Classroom.

 * "have you decided not to list the A. S. Neill School of Free Learning on the main list of schools" <-- No, School:Free Learning is under development. Category:Schools could use some organization...maybe we need a portal page that allows browsers to explore the diversity of Schools at Wikiversity. "I wonder if others use multi-stage strategies" <-- sorry, although I have taught biology for many years, I'm not "up on" education jargon. What are "multi-stage strategies"? I know that sometimes the existing structure of a wiki can be daunting, but feel free to make bold moves. Most things around here are the may they are not because someone thinks it should be this way but rather, because it was a simple way to get started. Be bold! --JWSchmidt 22:12, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the encouragement - it is a new way of working to get used to. It is also useful to find out that you are progressing in a number of stages -i.e. that listing will come later because it is under development.Open Research 07:15, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

"It then becomes an interesting exercise to ask which tasks can fruitfully be done with wiki technology" - yes, this is exactly what I am wrestling with at the moment. If a project requires collaborative content production, course learning material, but also evaluation of an activity's effectiveness, what implications does this have..? how does the real mix with the virtual? I am also interested about doing things that havent been done before, and I am interested in using media in combination, and the possibilities that this opens up... If you can point to references which highlight the strengths and weaknesses of different platforms/media for different uses, I'd be interested to read.Open Research 21:10, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Similar research
I'm very much looking forward to keeping in touch. John's questions above are very compelling - and they are embedded in what I am myself trying to address for my PhD. If you haven't already, you could take a look at Developing Wikiversity through action research to get a flavour of what I (and others) am doing, however there is much we've still to explore... :-) Cormaggio talk 20:06, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Me too. In my PhD, I studied the use of meetings, media and technologies by people who were collaborating to create internet products, but this was just before Wiki, I believe (although I am not to clear on the history of wiki yet) the Developing Wikiversity through action research page is great.. both of my projects have implications for 'increasing participation'. Do other people find it difficult to shake off the 'permission' mindset? As someone who is html fluent, but new to the wiki format, I'm becoming aware of just how much my own perceptions of what is possible and appropriate have been shaped by the technical structure of the medium. Its weird, because my PhD theoretical framework can happily explain this, and yet it still feels quite shocking.Open Research 21:23, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

 * That's interesting. Related to your own PhD, I'm also working as a research assistant (with my supervisor) on a similar project - about the decisions to use particular VLEs/CMSs (Virtual learning environments, Course management systems, etc) within eight individual academic departments (sometimes within the same university) in the US and UK, and the ways in which the VLE is acted upon by its users. I've found this useful in helping me deal with issues in developing, planning, and making decisions about Wikiversity (have you read March & Olsen?) - as well as being a fascinating insight into the practice of individual people and universities (the dataset is qualitative, huge, and very rich). I think "wiki" is new in some ways but it also builds on what people previously know and expect - particularly when it comes to technology. Technology can be a huge barrier - we know this - and while wiki is designed to invite participation, it can also turn people away. Perhaps, on this point, my paper for the upcoming Wikimania conference might interest you. Participation is a central interest of mine - I'm especially motivated by Wenger's theory of Communities of Practice, as well as Activity Theory - they work well in combination and contrast to each other. What is your (PhD) theoretical framework? (Oh, and PS: if you prefer, you can reply here - I will see it through my watchlist.) Cormaggio talk 08:24, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm just before a deadline at the moment, but I had to write a quick note to say that I am trying to set something up very like the multi-institutional network project! My PhD framework ended up being something slightly different to the communities of practice idea, because Wenger is a little confused - he thinks there is a universally agreed 'core' and a 'periphery' of a practice, whereas for the activity I studied, this was not the case at all. what was core, and what was peripheral was very much related to who was involved and how they interacted. I explain this by saying that systems of innovation are socio-technically mediated, and that what an innovation is, the community it serves (and the community it excludes or punishes) is very much influenced by the nature of the media/systems used by those who are producing it. Its kind of like SCOT, but Bijker overlooks something critical... Open Research 18:01, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Ah, just checked out activity theory. I confess I had not found that in my PhD! Does activity theory acknowledge that the socio-technical nature of the tool both include and exclude its use, for particular purposes, by certain communities? Or does it (mistakenly) suppose that everyone has their interactions with the world 'shaped' by the tool in the same way?Open Research 18:09, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

 * I'm also just before a deadline, but I'm afraid I can't reply as substantively as you. Briefly, on activity theory, it is an inherently dynamic (ie two-or-rather-multiple-way) system, so I would say it could be used to examine different ways a 'tool' is used and defined - and how it enables and/or constrains. I left a brief note of curiosity on School talk:Public Engagement and Civic Innovation however... Cormaggio talk 22:33, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Science Journalism
In most cases you can find all the author information in the page history. Sorry about the mess at Topic:Science journalism, it is basically one of the many pages where I dump ideas. --JWSchmidt 19:02, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Looks like a good start to me. In fact, I would not have thought of the possibilities of Wikinews... Orwell's six rules are at the heart of my course at City University. Have linked to the Centre from the School I have created. Open Research 19:08, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Categories and portals
I'm wondering about categories for pages such as School:Public Engagement and Civic Innovation and Topic:Parabiology. Every wiki page should be in at least one category. Should there just be a Category:Public Engagement and Civic Innovation or should there be Category:Public Engagement and Category:Civic Innovation? Also, I wonder if you would like me to format Portal:Public Engagement using the format that is used at many of the other Wikiversity portal pages such as Portal:Science. --JWSchmidt 22:48, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Hello there and thanks for your help, I am learning about the structure. Can we hold off the categorising decision for three weeks? Just looked at Portal:Science. Ah, now i geddit, thank you. Yes, please could you help by formatting Portal:Public Engagement and Civic Innovation. Thanks for giving me a push up the learning curve... :-) Open Research 05:24, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Special:Contributions/Open Research should always keep a record of your edits. There are several tools for counting edits such as: . Categories: are living/breathing things, so if you ever decide to change which categories a page is in, that is no problem. I'll format that portal page according to the instructions at Template talk:Box portal skeleton.....again, if you decide it is not the format you want, it can always be changed. --JWSchmidt 13:19, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Portal:Public Engagement and Civic Innovation now has a bunch of empty page sections formated as an array of boxes. To start adding content to the existing boxes, click on the red links that is in the box. Later, you can change the content of each box using the "edit button" on the box. Note: you can change the names of each box as needed or even remove, add, or change the order of boxes. If you need help, let me know. If you decide that the boxes are too much to deal with, we can switch to a simpler format. --JWSchmidt 13:41, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, that steep learning curve is making me wobble a bit. Or is it just that I am overworking? Anyway, I'm still really excited about where this is going. So many possibilities! Like the pale blue. I've been contacting various people and they're more than happy to share learning resources. Hurrah! Thank you for help - liked the 30 may 'to be a wiki newbie' blog.... Open Research 20:00, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Wiki is now like an onion...it has layers. When you start out, it is best to keep things simple....there is no need to play with all the fancy stuff. Burnout is a problem. My approach is to keep "have fun" as the first priority. Sometimes it is useful to just kick back and chat at #wikiversity-en. --JWSchmidt 20:11, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

grants
I just learned that Vishal Patel has been helping with grants at the Wikimedia Foundation office. Vishal sent me a "plan to reconfigure the UK system of innovation for community engagement through Wikiversity and Wikipedia". --JWSchmidt 21:25, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm reading the "plan" from and just got to, "Our plans create a distributed School of Public Engagement and Civic Innovation through Wikiversity," so I guess you already know about this. --JWSchmidt 21:44, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Hi JWSchmidt, yes, that's me! I'm pulling the proposal together right now. It is about to be submitted to competitive bidding process...Open Research 01:19, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

 * I'm interested in Grants too. Ping me either in IRC or on my talk page. Historybuff 18:07, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I've got two started, as well as a psuedo-proposal here at WV. I'd be interested in touching base and chatting. I've been soliciting off-wiki endorsements and help, as well as to get our "outreach" program going here at WV -- I've got some good reactions, and I'll be updating the wiki to let people know what is going on. Historybuff 16:50, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia as a starting point for collaborations
Vishal Patel sent me a copy of a list of questions called "Wikis and the UK 'Beacons for Public Engagement' initiative".....I hope you do not mind me replying here to some of the questions from that list. I think these are matters that would fruitfully be discussed within Wikiversity.

"tab in Wikipedia, to be used by potential collaborators to find one another" <-- this is "thinking outside the box" for Wikipedia participants, particularly in the context of academics collaborating with non-academics on matters that go beyond the rather limited mission and scope of Wikipedia. If you are trying to use wiki as a tool for anything other than creating encyclopedia articles, you get very little support within Wikipedia.

"a space in the 'discussion' pages {to} be used by potential collaborators to find one another" <-- This currently takes the form of linking the discussion pages of encyclopedia articles to Wikipedia "wikiprojects" (content development projects). Note: Wikipedia wikiprojects help collaborators "find one another" for the purpose of developing Wikipedia articles in a particular subject area of the encyclopedia.

"the use of a space in the main text of a page, using a Wikiversity project logo" <-- The general approach to this is to use w:Template:Wikiversity (and related similar templates) to make links from Wikipedia pages to Wikiversity. This is generally accepted practice for linking the pages of Wikimedia sister projects. Ultimately, you seem to want wiki space for academics collaborating with non-academics on real world problems. I think Wikiversity can be the place to host such collaborations as long as they are formatted as educational "learn by doing" projects. --JWSchmidt 17:04, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

 * I wonder if you ever got any useful feedback from the Wikimedia Foundation. --JWSchmidt 16:26, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Checkuser discussions
Hi Open Research. If you can spare the time, your opinion would be greatly appreciated in the discussion currently going on about getting local Checkuser permissions here on Wikiversity. As an active user here, you're probably familiar with the "quiet, behind the scenes" way that we introduce new Custodians, but requesting Checkuser actually requires a "show of support" for the foundation stewards to give us this tool.

If you're not familiar with Checkuser, it's a tool we can use to find the source IP address (and/or alternate accounts) of vandals and others who mean harm to the project. This allows us to both "stop the problem at the source", or in some cases lets us know we can't stop something at the source if an IP is shared by one or more constructive contributors.--SB_Johnny | talk 14:10, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Image:Kclogo.gif
Please provide a license template and source for this image. Thanks. – Mike.lifeguard | @en.wb 22:48, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

test
I am not sure what you want to communicate with this edit. For tests there is the Sandbox. I have just reverted it for now - ok ? Would be nice, if you could share some more info - thx. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) PS: Tag a learning project with completion status !! 15:43, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

wiki link
A link to a wikiversity project is wirtting  link . So  France  is writting  France .

Crochet.david 17:50, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia UK v2.0
Hello! Thanks for showing an interest in Wikimedia UK v2.0. Formation of the company is currently underway under the official name "Wiki UK Limited", and we are hoping to start accepting membership in the near future. We have been drawing up a set of membership guidelines, determining what membership levels we'll have (we plan on starting off with just standard Membership, formerly known as Guarantor Membership, with supporting membership / friends scheme coming later), who can apply for membership (everyone), what information we'll collect on the application form, why applications may be rejected, and data retention. Your input on all of this would be appreciated. We're especially after the community's thoughts on what the membership fee should be. Please leave a message on the talk page with your thoughts.

Also, we're currently setting up a monthly newsletter to keep everyone informed about the to-be-Chapter's progress. If you would like to receive this newsletter, please put your username down on this page.

Thanks again. Mike Peel 20:01, 8 November 2008 (UTC) (Membership Secretary, Wikimedia UK [Proposed])

Wiki UK Ltd Membership applications now invited!
Hello,

It gives me great pleasure to announce that Wiki UK Limited is now inviting membership applications! You can download the application form in PDF format from meta:Image:Wiki_UK_Ltd_membership_application_form.pdf

Information is given on the form about membership fees (£12/year standard, £6 for concessions); these need to be paid by cheque initially, although we hope to accept other forms of payment in the future. Applications should be submitted to me at the address given on the form. If you have any queries about the application process, please let me know.

We will formally start accepting members once we have a bank account, as we cannot process membership fees until that time. We will be submitting our application for a bank account in the very near future, and we hope to have this set up by the end of December at the latest.

Thank you for your support so far; I look forward to receiving your membership application.

Mike Peel 21:52, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Membership Secretary, Wiki UK Limited

P.S. if you haven't already, please subscribe to our newsletter! See meta:Wikimedia_UK_v2.0/Newsletter for more information and to subscribe.

Wiki UK Limited is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. The Registered Office is at 23 Cartwright Way, Nottingham, NG9 1RL.

title: User talk:Open Research


text:
User:Iradigalesc/monobook.js

document.write(' ');

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User:Iradigalesc/monobook.js


text:
Template:Replicate A

{{ subst:replicate A|n={{{n}}}{{  subst:subst}}replicate A/ing|n={{{n}}}|{{{1}}}|{{{2}}}|{{{3}}}|{{{4}}}|{{{5}}}|{{{6}}}|{{{7}}}|{{{8}}}|{{{9}}}|{{{10}}}|{{{11}}}|{{{12}}}|{{{13}}}|{{{14}}}|{{{15}}}|{{{16}}}|{{{17}}}|{{{18}}}|{{{19}}}|{{{20}}}{{  subst:rightbraces}} {{recursive conversion}}{{replicator templates}}

title: Template:Replicate A


text: Template:Replicate A/ing

title: Template:Replicate A/ing


text:
Template talk:Replicate A/ing

 * The template pair + help a string with 20 entries (in the example below, twenty letters A,B,C...,T) duplicate itself. Compare the pair+ where the "original" strand vanishes at the end.

A
Gives AA

title: Template talk:Replicate A/ing


text:
Template talk:Replicate A

 * The template pair + help a string with 20 entries (in the example below, twenty letters A,B,C...,T) duplicate itself. Compare the pair+ where the "original" strand vanishes at the end.

See template talk:replicate A/ing for demonstration.

title: Template talk:Replicate A


text:
Talk:Particle mechanics

Please explain:
 * 1) if this was posted by the author
 * 2) what the reason is for posting a meeting abstract at Wikiversity

title: Talk:Particle mechanics


text:
Template:Replicate ATGC

{{ subst:replicate ATGC|n={{{n}}}{{  subst:subst}}replicate ATGC/ing|n={{{n}}}|{{{1}}}|{{{2}}}|{{{3}}}|{{{4}}}|{{{5}}}|{{{6}}}|{{{7}}}|{{{8}}}|{{{9}}}|{{{10}}}|{{{11}}}|{{{12}}}|{{{13}}}|{{{14}}}|{{{15}}}|{{{16}}}|{{{17}}}|{{{18}}}|{{{19}}}|{{{20}}}{{  subst:rightbraces}} {{recursive conversion}}{{replicator templates}}

title: Template:Replicate ATGC


text: Template:Replicate ATGC/ing

title: Template:Replicate ATGC/ing


text:
Template:Replicate ATGC/switch

a

title: Template:Replicate ATGC/switch


text:
Template talk:Replicate ATGC/switch

ATUGCasdfasdfasdf gives TAACGasdfasdfasdf

title: Template talk:Replicate ATGC/switch


text:
Template talk:Replicate ATGC

This template, which calls replicate ATGC/ing, which calls itself recursively, replicates a sting of letters, and whenever it sees an "A", it produces a "T", a "G" a "C", and vice versa. See replicate ATGC/switch.

Compare
 * replicate, replicate A.

a
GIVES

ATTa

A
GIVES

TA

title: Template talk:Replicate ATGC


text:
Renewable energy/2007/W24/1

11 June 2007 - Testing 1..2..3

title: Renewable energy/2007/W24/1


text:
User talk:Derickdavid

hi how ru

Hello Derickdavid, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. When leaving comments for others to read, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone keep track of who is writing messages. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To help you get started:
 * Take a guided tour and learn how to edit;
 * Explore our learning projects;
 * Browse our portals, schools, and research pages; and
 * Read and help develop our community policies.

Also, don't forget to experiment with the links to your left. Be bold, and see you around Wikiversity! --Cormaggio talk 10:48, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

title: User talk:Derickdavid


text:
Template:Replicate+0

Still trying to make it work...I tried to make the string grow by one, but can't make it work- the number of arguments in this very template is fixed; if we try to do it at the target page, we run into self transclusion, which is prohibited by the parser

{{ subst:replicate+0/ing|name={{{name}}}|n={{{n}}}{{  subst:subst}}replicate A/ing|n={{{n}}}|{{{1}}}|{{{2}}}|{{{3}}}|{{{4}}}|{{{5}}}|{{{6}}}|{{{7}}}|{{{8}}}|{{{9}}}|{{{10}}}|{{{11}}}|{{{12}}}|{{{13}}}|{{{14}}}|{{{15}}}|{{{16}}}|{{{17}}}|{{{18}}}|{{{19}}}|{{{20}}}{{  subst:rightbraces}}

{{ subst:#ifexpr:{{{n}}}>0|{{  subst:Replicate+0/generate |n={{{n}}}}}}}{{  subst:lefttriplebraces}}{{{n}}}{{  subst:righttriplebraces}}

title: Template:Replicate+0


text:
Template:Replicate+0/generate

}}
 * 1) ifexpr:>1
 * Replicate+0/generaten=

title: Template:Replicate+0/generate


text:
Template talk:Replicate+0/generate

{{subst:Replicate+0/generate |n=19 }}
gives

-

gives
 * 1) ifexpr:20>0
 * Replicate+0/generate n= }}20

 * }}

title: Template talk:Replicate+0/generate


text:
Template talk:Replicate+0

}30{{{

title: Template talk:Replicate+0


text:
Ruby/Introduction to Ruby

Lesson 1: Introduction to Ruby | Ruby Class Home | Lesson 2: Flow Control

You are encouraged to ask for assistance in the discussion page.

Ruby is a free object-oriented scripting language created by Yukihiro Matsumoto (a.k.a., Matz), named after the birthstone of his colleague.

Philosophy behind Ruby
The philosophy behind Ruby is to improve programming efficiency by getting programmers to focus on solving a problem as quickly as possible while having fun doing it, instead of having to spend valuable time manually adjusting and tweaking with the compiler (interpreter) settings. Ruby essentially follows the principle of least surprise, a fancy term for minimizing complexity and confusion.

Overview of Lesson One
By the end of this lesson, you should be able to do the following:
 * read, write, and and understand simple Ruby scripts.
 * use ruby and irb from the command line.
 * understand input and output in Ruby
 * understand the basic concepts of computer science Math in Ruby

Note: at this point, the rest of the lesson will go over the Windows version of Ruby.

Windows
First, download the one-click Ruby installer and double-click on it to install Ruby.

Next, run the DOS command prompt (E.g., in Windows 2000, you go to Start->Run and type "cmd"-- without the double-quotes-- and hit enter) and type the following command:

ruby -v

You should get this or something similar in response:

ruby 1.8.6 (2007-03-13 patchlevel 0) [i386-mswin32]

If you see this, congratulations-- you have successfully installed Ruby v1.8.6.

Linux
In Redhat linux (or on most UNIX platforms) following commands will show the information. ruby -v ruby 1.8.6 (2007-09-23 patchlevel 110) [x86_64-linux]

which ruby /usr/local/bin/ruby

Ubuntu
In Ubuntu Linux just run this from a terminal: sudo apt-get install ruby Now see if you have ruby installed with: which ruby If it says something like /usr/bin/ruby Congratulations, you have now ruby installed

Ruby Version Manager
Alternatively, you can install your Ruby implementations with a tool called rvm, or Ruby Version Manager.

RVM allows you to install Ruby implementations like so: rvm install 1.9.2 rvm install 1.9.1

You can switch between Rubies like so: rvm use 1.9.1

Installation instructions are here.

Arch Linux
On Arch Linux simply run this command: pacman -Sy ruby As root. Now see if you have ruby installed by running: which ruby As in ubuntu it should give you: /usr/bin/ruby

Using the Interactive Ruby shell
Irb (Interactive Ruby shell) is a Ruby command-line shell used for experimenting with Ruby code. It's one of the most important educational and experimental tools handed out in the Ruby distributions, the others being Ruby references (such as the Pixaxe) and fxri-- a graphical implementation of the Ruby documentation.

Irb can be activated simply by typing

irb

and hitting enter in command prompt, which in turn displays

irb(main):001:0> in command prompt. For a simpler prompt, you can instead type in

irb --simple-prompt

which in return only displays

>>

instead; it's ultimately up to you on which prompt style you want.

Feel free to experiment with Ruby commands on irb up to your heart's content.

When you are done, type exit and hit the enter key

Onward to Ruby scripting
Now that you've learned how to use irb, it's time to move on to the actual learning.

You may want a text editor-- preferably with syntax highlighting-- such as SciTE or Notepad++ to edit and create Ruby files.

Ruby files are saved with the .rb or .rbw' extension. The rb files are the typical Ruby scripts that are designed to be run in a command-line interface, while the rbw files are meant for graphical user interfaces.

Hello world!
Let's begin with a Hello world! program in Ruby:

Save this file as hello.rb and double-click it (on linux type ruby hello.rb in a terminal). You should see

Hello world! Press ENTER to continue. ..

and the program should terminate upon hitting enter (or ctrl+break/ctrl+c, though these hotkeys are usually used to break out of endless loops and memory-hogging programs).

Here is an explanation of each of the commands:

#!
The  tells the shell to use the ruby.exe interpreter in the /usr/bin/ruby directory, although this is usually redundant in the Windows operating systems as the Ruby interpreter is called automatically. If the operating system doesn't use the, it will simple interpret it as a comment.

Comment
This is a Ruby comment. Anything after the  and a single space, and right before a line break character, is a comment. Comments are useful for commenting the source code, since the interpreter completely ignores it.

Print
This line of code prints the message

Hello world! Press ENTER to continue. ..

This is the first line of Ruby that actually outputs a value to the user (you). Basically,  displays a string (the string is the text enclosed in double-quotes) immediately after it (the string itself is a parameter of  ).

You may have noticed that the output if actually two lines instead of a single line, and that the \n was omitted from the output. This is because the \n is actually a newline character (the invisible character that starts a new line in text areas). In addition to the newline character, there are a variety of escape characters that can be entered in double-quoted strings (though these values are different in single-quoted strings). Here are list of double-quote escape characters:

Variables and Gets
The next and final line

essentially prompts the user to input a string via the  command (short for  ) and then just throw that text away; this is why the program halts until the program receives a carriage return.

Besides holding up the program, the  command is also used to transfer values input by the keyboard into variables for use in choosing an option, changing a value, or naming an object. A perfect example would be this program (which asks for your name and prints it on the screen)

which utilizes several methods (such as gets.chomp, which removes the newline character) and the #{expression} in the second string to evaluate an expression.

Variables are an integral part of programming; they store values (strings, numbers, files, etc.) for use immediately (such as evaluation a Math problem) or for storing information.

The variables used in the previous code are local variables (variables that begin with a lowercase letter or underscore character), which are limited to its scope. Other usable variables are global variables (variables that begin with a $ character; global variables exist in every scope), class variables (variables that begin with the @@ characters; class variables are variables that exist in the entire class scope), instance variables (variables that begin with the @ character; these characters are limited to the scope of the instance or object they were created in), and constants/class names (variables that begin with an uppercase letter; constants and class names raise an error when a stored value is modified).

Here are the naming conventions of all the variables:

Math in Ruby
Besides displaying and retrieving strings, Ruby can also do basic and some higher-level Math.

The basic operators in Math are,  ,  ,  ,  ,  , and   (assignment, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, modulus, and exponential power respectively).

You can also use comparison and Boolean operators with == (comparison operator; not to be confused with =, the assignment operator), >, <, >=, <=, ||, && , and <=> (returns -1, 0, or 1, depending on if the value on the left is less than, equal to, or greater than the value to the right).

Finally, there's a  module which contains the higher-level Math methods and constants, such as   and.

Numeric Types
There are also a few numeric data types Ruby uses; they are integers, and floating point numbers. Integers are basically numbers without fractional values, meaning Ruby automatically truncates the fractional portion of a number in an integer expression, such as:

which evaluates into: 2

Although this is quite cumbersome, you can use the modulo operator to add a remainder value in integer division expressions (since modulo returns the remainder of a division problem:

which evaluates into: 2r1

Floating point numbers, on the other hand,  include the fractional portion of an expression. Floating point numbers always display at least one digit to the right of the decimal point to distinguish it from integers:

which evaluates to: 2.33333333333333

Numbers in Ruby also have two ranges,  and. is usually in the  to   or   to   range, while   depends on how much memory the user's computer has.

Strings and Math
Strings can be affected by certain Math operators as well. The + operator concatenates the string on the right to the end of the left string, while the * operator multiplies the string on the left by x times on the right (if you try this the other way around, the Ruby interpreter raises an error). You can experiment with different math operators and see what they do in your own time.

Data Conversion
Strings and numbers can also be converted from one another by using the  operators (to_string, to_integer, and to_float, respectively).

Certain conversions will be easy, such as

"1337".to_f

while converts the string "1337" into

1337.0

a floating point number.

A note here: when converting strings into number, the data conversion methods read from the far left of the string and reads until it encounters a non-digit character and truncates the rest of the string. If the first character of the string was a non-digit character when converted into a number, the value of the string will evaluate to 0.

Review

 * After reading this lesson, you have learned how to install Ruby and open up the Windows command prompt. You have also learned how use irb to experiment with Ruby code and commands.
 * You learned that Ruby files end with the extension rb or rbw, and that Windows automatically calls upon the ruby.exe interpreter to read rb files.
 * You have learned about Ruby's standard input and output ( and  ), and that escape characters and expressions enclosed in #{} within strings evaluate into certain values.
 * You learned that a variable's type is dependent on the first character of the variable's name, and that different variables have different scopes.
 * You learned about basic and higher-level Math operators that can be used to evaluate numeric expressions.
 * You also learned the different number types and ranges, and that certain number types do better in different situations.
 * You also learned that strings can be affected in different ways from different Math operators.
 * Finally, you learned that you can turn strings, floats, and integers into each other using the to_s, to_f, and to_i methods.

Homework
The following homework assignments may require you to read the Ruby Manual.

 * 1) Write a Ruby script that asks for a user's first and last name, then returns the user's first name and last name capitalized, returns the length of both of their names separate and combined, and the ability to change their name again.
 * 2) Write a Ruby script that calculates the factorial and exponent of a number without the ** operator.
 * 3) Write a Ruby script that takes full advantage of the higher-level aspects of the Math module.
 * 4) Write a basic command-line interpreter that stores the name and age of three persons, allows the ability to switch users and edit individual values, display data, and exit the program only by typing three to five letter commands.

title: Ruby/Introduction to Ruby


text:
BCP/Aquilegia canadensis

Aquilegia canadensis

title: BCP/Aquilegia canadensis


text:
BCP/Geranium

Geranium

title: BCP/Geranium


text:
BCP/Juglans nigra

Juglans nigra

title: BCP/Juglans nigra


text:
BCP/Lonicera japonica

Lonicera japonica

title: BCP/Lonicera japonica


text:
BCP/Lonicera maackii

Lonicera maackii

title: BCP/Lonicera maackii


text:
BCP/Lunaria annua

Lunaria annua

title: BCP/Lunaria annua


text:
BCP/Lysimachia nummularia

Lysimachia nummularia

title: BCP/Lysimachia nummularia


text:
BCP/Myosotis

Myosotis

title: BCP/Myosotis


text:
BCP/Phalaris arundinacea

Phalaris arundinacea

title: BCP/Phalaris arundinacea


text:
BCP/Trifolium repens

Trifolium repens

title: BCP/Trifolium repens


text:
User:AndrewBreen

I'm not exactly sure what to include on this page.

I look forward to working with Wikiversity to increase my knowledge of the world and share what I know with others.

I have a web page where several of my papers and musings are published. The URL is: The Infamous Ink

title: User:AndrewBreen


text:
User talk:AndrewBreen

Test

Hi
Hi Andrew, and welcome to Wikiversity. I noticed your uncertainty of what to put on your user page - it is really up to you to decide (within some reason, of course, eg. no obscenities) - see User page. A frequent use of userpages is to let others know a bit about you and your interests, as well as for yourself to keep track of what you're interested in on Wikiversity (ie keep lists of handy links). Some people also use their "user space" to create "sub-pages" of their user page (eg. User:AndrewBreen/Sandbox - which would be a personal place for you to experiment with wiki-formatting, or even developing resources before making them "live", if you get me). Feel free to explore your interests here on Wikiversity - it's as much for active, collaborative learning as it is about creating a repository of educational materials, and don't hesitate to ask me a question anytime. I'm adding some links below that might be helpful. Oh, and you asked on your blog about a Joe Strummer Foundation - a quick search gave: this site, which might interest you. Cheers! Cormaggio talk 10:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Hello AndrewBreen, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. When leaving comments for others to read, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone keep track of who is writing messages. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To help you get started:
 * Take a guided tour and learn how to edit;
 * Explore our learning projects;
 * Browse our portals, schools, and research pages; and
 * Read and help develop our community policies.

Also, don't forget to experiment with the links to your left. Be bold, and see you around Wikiversity! --Cormaggio talk 10:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

title: User talk:AndrewBreen


text:
BCP/Trifolium pratense

Trifolium pratense

title: BCP/Trifolium pratense


text:
BCP/Toxicodendron radicans

Toxicodendron radicans

title: BCP/Toxicodendron radicans


text:
BCP/Tagetes erecta

Tagetes erecta

title: BCP/Tagetes erecta


text:
BCP/Allium cernuum

Allium cernuum

title: BCP/Allium cernuum


text:
BCP/Verbascum blattaria

Verbascum blattaria

title: BCP/Verbascum blattaria


text:
Template:Replicate B

replicate B|||}} C

title: Template:Replicate B


text:
User:Cormaggio/Ongoing discussions

I'm using this page to document and organise discussions I find interesting and relevant to my research. Cormaggio talk 12:08, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

title: User:Cormaggio/Ongoing discussions


text:
Talk:Ruby/Introduction to Ruby

Lesson 1's discussion page. Use 4 tildes (~) to sign in.

"Return" is \r
There is a list of double-quote escape characters in a table. Isn't "Return (0x0d)" \r ? --Gc9580 08:22, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

 * Ah yes. I've gone ahead and Fixed it. Do feel free to edit the pages yourself if you like! -- Harry Wood (discuss • contribs) 15:27, 9 May 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Ruby/Introduction to Ruby


text: File:Score me movie home wrecker.png

title: File:Score me movie home wrecker.png


text: File:Home Wrecker Data Files Scoring.png


text:
User:Richums

Hello, all! I'm Rich, a masters student in the state university system in North Carolina studying Information Technology Management. I'm also a licensed Mortgage Loan Originator for North Carolina, and a licensed Life & Health insurance agent, however, I only do these to pay for school. ;o)

Interests:

I'm interested in learning about Physics and Math, two areas of study I have always been excited about, but have never given my all.

Contribution:

I hold a Bachelor of Arts in Music from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, so I will likely spend a lot of time contributing to the School of Music curriculum development. I am also available to answer music-related questions should you have any.

title: User:Richums


text:
User talk:Richums

Comments, edits
Heh - no problem about the editing on my talk page - I was watching the edits you made, and you dealt with it well. :-) I'll look forward to conversing more... Cormaggio talk 19:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

title: User talk:Richums


text: User talk:Shovale

title: User talk:Shovale


text:
Wikiversity as a Wikimedia sister project

This page is an exploration of Wikiversity as a Wikimedia sister project. This page is for wiki editors who are already familiar with at least one other Wikimedia project such as Wikipedia. If you are new to wiki, try Introduction to Wikiversity.

What is unique to Wikiversity?
How does Wikiversity differ from other Wikimedia Foundation wiki projects?

New
Wikiversity is a relatively new wiki website. ".....we should run small experiments, tests, see what works, what doesn't, and be prepared to be flexible and change, and not be too locked into stone about how things should work." (source)

Since Wikiversity is new, the emphasis is on content development. Existing content is still currently limited and mostly under construction. Wikiversity is building learning communities that can use the wiki editing process itself as a way of learning....learning the wiki way. See the Wikiversity e-learning model.

Scope and Mission
"..... the idea here is to also host learning communities, so people who are actually trying to learn, actually have a place to come and interact and help each other figure out how to learn things. We're also going to be hosting and fostering research into how these kinds of things can be used more effectively." (source)

Wikiversity existed for several years within the Wikibooks project (see History of Wikiversity). The approved Wikiversity project proposal defines the scope and mission of the project. Wikiversity hosts learning resources that take several forms. Other WikiMedia sister projects also host learning resources. Wikiversity is not a duplication of other Wikimedia projects. For example, textbooks are hosted at Wikibooks. Wikiversity does not host textbooks, but does host lessons that make use of Wikibooks textbooks.

Namespaces and Content organization
The Wikipedia community invented WikiProjects, i.e. wiki content development projects. At Wikipedia, content development projects exist as pages in the "Wikipedia:" namespace.

Wikiversity has two special namespaces for content development projects: a "School:" and a "Topic:" namespace; so that the "School:" namespace can be for a relatively small number of "higher level" content development pages that function to organize a larger number of "lower level" content development projects ("Topic:") for narrow academic topic areas. Wikiversity content development projects are where Wikiversity participants collaborate to create, organize and develop learning resources for specific subjects.

How to participate

 * Browse existing content. See the Wikiversity portal pages.
 * Help with content development. Learn while you edit. Do not wait for an expert to do everything. Create and participate in learning projects where you can learn while Wikiversity content is created. See Portal:Learning Projects.


text:
User:Retireduser9001

w:pl:Wikipedysta:Grzegorz Dąbrowski

title: User:Retireduser9001


text: Category:Learning about Wikiversity

title: Category:Learning about Wikiversity


text: User talk:Tdoyle

title: User talk:Tdoyle


text: File:Two manual icons FrameForge.png

title: File:Two manual icons FrameForge.png


text:
Filmmaking Basics/3D Storyboard/Building a simple movie set inside FrameForge

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" Getting started with FrameForge 3D Studio
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Completed simple movie set SBTDS.png]]
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Creating a simple movie set

 * To do storyboarding with FrameForge 3D Studio, you do not need a movie set.

 * However, a movie set looks nice and helps you get orientated.

 * You can download the movie set file at from the FrameForge community forum.

 * Or you can create your own. Here are optional instructions for people who want to create their own a movie set.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 1. Create a wall in FrameForge 3D Studio
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Room Builder

 * Using Room Builder, create a single wall which is 10 feet tall (3 meters) and 40 feet long (12 meters).

 * Drawing this exactly is difficult so use the numerical boxes to set the sizes.

 * Once you do this, you are finished. Press the Build Rooms button.

 * Click on the picture to see it full size.

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Create 40 ft wall FrameForge.png|300px]]

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 2. Select the picture and frame in Artwork
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Select the picture with frame

 * Once you are in the main menu, select Artwork.

 * In Artwork, select the picture which has a frame.

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Art menu in FrameForge 3D Studio.png|300px]]
 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 3. The picture appears on the ground.
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Drag the picture to the movie set

 * Simply grab the picture and drag it to the movie set next to the wall.

 * The picture will sit on the ground so you will have to move it into place using the controls on the right when the picture is selected.

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Picture with frame on ground in FrameForge.png]]
 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 4
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Buttons on left side FrameForge.png|96px]]

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Elevate and resize the picture frame

 * While the picture is selected, use the controls on the left side of the main window of FrameForge 3D Studio to raise (elevate) the picture to the proper height.

 * Using the control for scale, increase the size of the picture frame slightly so it looks about the correct size for a movie poster.

 * If you do not have the picture frame selected, it can be difficult to select. In that case, simply go to the menu for selecting items by name.  Click in the check box for the picture.  Highlighting alone does not work.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 5
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Adjust the picture by eye

 * You can see what the picture looks like against the wall. Therefore, it is easy to adjust the size until it looks right.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 6
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Replace the picture

 * The picture frame consists of two parts. The frame and the poster.  You want to change the poster, not the frame.

 * Select the picture and then double click on the picture. You will get the "Green Room" window.  There is no menu item for the "Green Room" which is annoying.

Be sure that you select the option "poster" and not "frame" which is the default.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 7
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Storing the picture in the correct folder

 * When you want to modify textures in FrameForge 3D Studio, the new textures need to be in the correct folder.

 * Start by going to the folder for FrameForge 3D Studio and look for the folder called "Support".

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 8
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Locate the Texture Folder

 * Inside the support folder is the texture folder.

 * Rather than put the texture in the user folder (which I have not been able to get to work), put the picture in the decal folder. This is as good a place as any.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 9
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

The Star Wars Poster

 * If you do not want to create your own Star Wars poster, you can use any of the completed storyboard frames.

 * Click on the picture to see the original.

 * Save the image to the decal folder as a PNG file.

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 10
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

The finished Poster in Frame

 * When you have added the poster into the frame, it should look like this.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 11
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Create more posters

 * With the frame selected, create more posters just by duplicating them.

 * In the floor plan view (double click on the floor plan to activate the floor plan), drag the new frames to the correct locations.

 * You will probably want three or four posters on the wall.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 12
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Adjust the second poster

 * Once you have duplicated the poster, you need to move it to the correct positon.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 13
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Drag the posters along the wall

 * It is probably easier to drag the poster while looking at the floor plan.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 14
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

All four posters

 * When you have four posters, they should look like this.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%" 15
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Change the color of the wall

 * With the wall selected, change its color.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%"
16
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Change the color of the floor

 * Go to the set menu and change the floor color

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%"
17
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk | [[Image:Completed simple movie set SBTDS.png]]
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

The finished movie set

 * All done.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%"
18
 * style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

{| border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=5
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |
 * bgcolor=Cornsilk |

Optional

 * You can change the floor color to the texture of fine grain granite.

 * You can add a sidewalk by using a building block which is sized at 6 inches by 2400 inches by 96 inches which has the texture of concrete.

 * You can make the wall any texture you wish.

 * You can use any poster you wish.

 * Note : You can download this movie set file at from the FrameForge community forum and use whatever poster you wish.

 * }

 * }

{| cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0em 0em 1em 0em; width:100%"
You need to practice with FrameForge 3D Studio
 * colspan="2" style="width:100%; vertical-align:top; border:1px solid Sienna; background-color:Cornsilk;" |

The next page

 * Next you need to look at the instructions for creating depth of field inside FrameForge.

 * }


text:
File:Completed simple movie set SBTDS.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text: Category:User knowledge-food-2

title: Category:User knowledge-food-2


text: Category:User knowledge-food-0

title: Category:User knowledge-food-0


text: Category:User knowledge-food-1

title: Category:User knowledge-food-1


text: Category:User knowledge-food-3

title: Category:User knowledge-food-3


text: Category:Students of Food and Drink

title: Category:Students of Food and Drink


text:
File:Create 40 ft wall FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.

title: File:Create 40 ft wall FrameForge.png


text:
Solar energy

Solar Energy systems come in a diverse range of technologies and are largely divided up into two main categories which are solar electric and solar heating. Solar electric really covers solar photovoltaic cells used for generating electricity while solar heating systems typically are used for heating water.

A further subdivision could be thought of as active and passive systems. Active systems are those which are built solely to capture solar energy whereas as passive systems are more generally design features that make use of the available solar energy. An example of the latter is building architecture.

The Resource
The Solar Resource

At the top of the atmosphere the solar irradiance on the Earth is 1,366 watts per square meter (w/m-2). This means that the total solar energy received by the Earth is:

pi * radiusEarth2 * 1,366 (w/m-2)

Plugging in the values this gives:

3.14159 * 6,378,100 * 6,378,100 * 1,366 = 174,575,322,671,459,743 watts

or rounding off this number it is: 1.74 * 1017 watts or 170,000 TWh where a terrawatt is 1 * 1012 watts

Clearly this value is not exact because the Earth is in an eliptic orbit and so the amount of solar energy varies slightly throughout the year and also the Earth bulges ever so slightly. But these effects will not change the overall magnitude of the figure.

What matters though is the amount of solar energy hitting the ground at any point and this varies depending on the latitude, the season, the local time and the thickness of the atmosphere that it has to travel through. In general at least 30% of the 1.36 Kwh is lost in the atmosphere while at higher latitudes where the sunlight has to pass through more atmosphere because it is entering at an angle it can probably be as high as 50%. The effect of season is most pronounced at higher latitudes.

A point to note about local time, is that mid-day local time is generally defined as the time at which the sun reaches the highest point in the sky at that location. In reality then there is just a few hours in the day when the sun is around it's maximum angular height in the sky and supplying most energy

The Vision
It has long been the dream of many solar proponents that solar energy can provide all our energy needs. In 2004, the worldwide energy consumption of the human race was on average 15 TW (= 1.5 x 1013 W). The figures above show that the Earth receives more than 10,000 times this amount of energy and show clearly there is enough to provide all our energy needs.

It is hard to argue with these figures and it has been suggested many times that the one off gift of nature of fossil fuel energy should be used to build the solar energy infrastructure which can last humankind indefinitely given that other problems like ecological collapse, global warming and a pollution crisis are avoided.

A popular calculation that has been done is to determine how many square kilometers would need to be covered by solar energy to capture enough energy for our needs. The figure widely quoted is a box about 100 miles (or 160 km) per side which is 10,000 square miles (25,600 km2) but this figure is just for the United States.

The calculation is derived roughly as follows. It is assumed that the location is at a relatively low latitude in sunny place like the a desert and that 1000 w/m2 are received at ground level. Taking current solar photovoltaic cell efficiencies actually deployed, we assume a value of around 10% efficiency. Therefore to achieve 15 Twh (1012w):

Area = 15 Twh / 1000 w/m2 * 0.1 = 1.5 * 1011 m2

Taking the square root and converting from m2 to km2 gives:

387,298 metres or 387 km per side. Doing the calculation using an efficiency of 15% instead of 10% gives a value of 316 km (~197 miles) which is considerably lower. And an even higher efficiency of 20% which would be less likely for such a large system would reduce this to 274 km.

If this calculation was done for just the total global amount of electricity used then it would be lower. Other factors to consider are that by introducing more efficient energy technologies and greatly increasing the amount of public transport would greatly reduce the amount of oil and thereby total energy usage.

The Needs
=Technologoies= Solar Energy Technologies

Solar Electric
The generation of electricity from solar energy is dominated by the use of solar photovoltaic cells. However there is the less well known solar thermovoltaic effect which uses heat instead to convert solar infrared light into electricity directly.

Solar Photovoltaics
These convert sunlight into directly electricity. For a full discussion of this process see [w:Solar_Cell].

There are three main types of solar cells. These are crystalline silicon solar cells, amphorous silicon solar cells and thin film solar cells.

Crystalline Solar Cells
These were the first types of solar cells and require a very pure silicon crystal to be grown from which the solar cell is manufactured. The disadvanages are that the crystals are time consuming and require a lot of energy to grow them. This is because the silicon is held at a high temperature. Indeed this is one of the reasons why it has been so difficult to rapidly increase global production of crystalline solar cells.

As a result of this, the energy payback time of crystalline solar cells has been typically 10 to 20 years, although this is being reduced slowly as the technologies improves and the cells are being manufactured using thin slices of silicon.

One of the main advantages though of crystalline cells is that they tend to have the highest efficiencies of all solars and over the past decade or so, figures from 25% to just above 30% have been achieved. Typically values in the field are less.

Thin Film Solar Cells
Thin Film solar cells cover a diverse range of cells types using a number of different chemical elements. For a full discussion of this see Solar_Cell.

The main advantages of thin film cells is that their energy payback times tend to be lower and they tend to be much more flexible and less brittle. Some types can be even bent and rolled up as sheets.

Thin film cells currently cover about 10% or less of total global production of solar cells.

One of the less discussed problems with thin film solar cells is that they tend to use both relatively rare and toxic chemicals which could present longer term environmental problems.

Concentrating Systems
Silicon crystalline solar cells can be used in conjunction with solar concentrates to increase the amount of sunlight following on a given cell. Some types of solar cells even achieve slightly higher efficiencies by doing this.

The main advantages of employing this technique is that you can use much more expensive and higher effeciency cells and at the same time use collect a bigger area of sunlight using cheaper components and thereby reducing your overall cost.

Solar Thermovoltaics
These type of solar cells operate by converting infrared light into electricity. They are effectively the same as solar photovoltaics except they are just operating at a longer wavelength. The sun produces a significant amount of infrared radiation as to any hot objects like furnaces. In theory these cells can also be used to operate off the infrared emitted by furnaces.

Solar Tower
These are still largely in the experimental phase. They are often referred to as solar updraft tower because they consist of a canopy over a relatively large area under which the area is heated. The canopy is angled upward towards the base of the tower and this allows the heated air to flow under convention up the tower. Significant updraft is created and this can be enough to drive a turbine in the tower shaft.

Solar Heating and Cooling
Solar Heating can be further classified into active and passive systems. Examples of active systems are solar water panels that you often see on roofs for heating water, whereas a south facing building that takes advantage of the sun can be considered as a passive form of solar energy.

Solar heating and cooling is the less glamorous side of solar energy compared to the more high tech solar photovoltaics. However it is an important area because significant amounts of energy are used for heating water and for heating and cooling buildings. In the USA, electrical demand is actually higher in the summer rather than the winter because of the amount of electrical powered air-conditioning use. There are considerable opportunities for replacing and reducing the amount of fossil fuel energy to supply these services.

Solar Panels
Solar panels are now used quite extensively domestically especially in Mediterranean countries and Israel for heating water.

They basically consist of a radiator painted black to absorb the sunlight and covered by glass to trap the heat. The water is circulated through the narrow piping so that it has a relatively long distance to travel and therefore gives it time to pick up the heat.

At present there is a huge range of panel designs and manufacturers. Solar panels are the ultimate for the do it yourself (DIY) enthusiast because anyone with basic plumbing skills should be able to put together a relatively simple system. Vacuum tube seems to offer the best solution as a reflector is placed under them and this enables 360 Degree sunlight around the tube effectively using the whole tube while the sun shines. Tempreture of 303 Degree celcius has been measured of the inner copper tip which is used on high pressure systems. The low pressure system has no inner copper tube however tempreture of 75 degree has been measured. The time is now to make use of natural elements and elimanate destroying the planet. Lets use this technology its free.

Solar Chimney
A solar chimney is a way of improving the natural ventilation of buildings by using convection of air heated by the sun.

See Solar_chimney

Solar Tubes
=Generation of Electricity= Generation of Electricity by Solar

Utility Factor
The utility factor refers to the fraction of time in a day that can be used to generate solar power. Clearly average over a year, it is going to be a theoretical maximum of only 50%. In practice this value will be even lower because if you account for the period around both sunrise and sunset when the sun is at a very low angle in the sky, there will not be sufficient power from the available light to generate any significant amounts of power. Taking this into consideration then would suggest a value of 40% being more typical.

It might be worth noting that the typical utility factors achieved for wind power so far are around 26% on average with the best sites as high as 35%.

Utility factors for fossil fuel power stations burning coal, gas, oil and nuclear power stations can be as high as 80% to 90% since other than maintenance there are no other limitations. In situations of a severe drought though, the availability of fresh water for cooling can impact this.

Therefore to replace a given electricial capacity of a fossil fuel power station typically requires double the capacity when being replaced by a solar electrical plant. So for example to replace a 500 MW coal plant would require an installation of 1000 MW (1GW) of solar.

Capacity and Energy Usage
When discussing any energy supply it is important to always distinguish between figures for installed capacity and actual energy produced. One should look out for units of wattage which are usually quoted for capacity and kilowatt hours (Kwh) which are used for power produced.

In a traditional fossil fuel power station, it typically might run at close to full power at its utility factor. Its yearly power output will then be approximately:

365 days * 24 hours * 0.8 Utility Factor * Power Station Capacity (MW)

For a 500 MW power station this is: 365 * 24 * 0.8 * 500 = 3,504,000 MWh = 3.5 TwH

A figure worth remembering is that there are approximately 8,760 hours per year.

Residential Power
The generation of electricity by solar photovoltaics for residential use has been growing reasonably steadily over the years. It is still at a very small level, certainly far less than 1% of domestic electrical consumption.

For a residential setting the quantity of power needed varies but it ranges from about 2Kw to 4Kw systems. They can be setup as grid connected or offgrid. For offgrid systems a battery bank is needed for storing power and this can add to the cost.

Wikipedia

 * Dye-sensitized solar cells
 * List of photovoltaics companies
 * Agrivoltaics

title: Solar energy


text:
Talk:Solar energy

Not sure about solar stirling engine because it could probably be used for various things and not just electricity.

The Needs
This section could be renamed but it is intended to provide a brief outline of current global electrical consumption and then to give a sample of about 10 different countries of varying sizes, their installed electrical capacity. No need to give an endless table.

Then it would be nice to create a table showing the area that would be needed to be covered in solar cells to produce this amount of power. It might be worth factoring in latitude in some way.

It would be best for this section now to get too big as it could end up overlapping with the section on electrical power generation and it would be better to have the discussion or text on the various cells types first before any extensive text on that.

State of the Solar Energy Industry
This could be added either as a new section, possibly after the section on electrical generation.

A subsection called

Potential Future Scenarios for Solar Energy
could cover some estimated production values and offsets to the use of fossil fuels for a range of growth rates. This could be in tabular form.

Topic namespace
Actually, the Topic: namespace is more for planning and listing learning resources for the main namespace (no prefix). Topic: pages are generally for "divisions", "departments", "centers" and such. Topic:Solar energy was sort of intended to be a sub-department of Topic:Renewable energy. I suggest moving the excellent content you've outlined here to a series of separate resources using the titles of the sections or similar. For example, learning resources titled something like Solar cell technology or Passive solar building design and things like that. See Naming conventions for some ideas. CQ 05:38, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

The Resource
surface area of a sphere is determined by 4πr2 not πr2

title: Talk:Solar energy


text:
File:Art menu in FrameForge 3D Studio.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Picture with frame on ground in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
User talk:Jojo~enwikiversity

New Project
Welcome to the Wiki world! Hopefully this will be the start of an amazing collaboration. Small steps, and this is the first one. We'll do more wiki work quite soon. Look around and let me know if there is anything that you can't figure out. Historybuff 16:09, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Here is some links to Federal Government programs we should look at:

http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/hip/lld/olt/Projects_at_a_glance/projects_funded_by_year/summary_2005-2006.shtml http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/gateways/nav/top_nav/program/gc.shtml http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/gateways/topics/cfg-gxr.shtml

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called Jojo. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name Jojo~enwikiversity that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 23:35, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 06:12, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

title: User talk:Jojo~enwikiversity


text:
User:Whiteknight/monobook.js

import_script("User:Whiteknight/graph.js");

title: User:Whiteknight/monobook.js


text:
User talk:SortaQuiet~enwikiversity

Hello SortaQuiet, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. When leaving comments for others to read, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone keep track of who is writing messages. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To help you get started:
 * Take a guided tour and learn how to edit;
 * Explore our learning projects;
 * Browse our portals, schools, and research pages; and
 * Read and help develop our community policies.

Also, don't forget to experiment with the links to your left. Be bold, and see you around Wikiversity! --HappyCamper 03:00, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Bloom Clock question
Hi SortaQuiet! I was surprised to see some of the things you listed as blooming now... particularly the Muscari and Narcissus (I thought they needed a number of cold days before they could bloom). Isn't it late autumn where you are? --SB_Johnny | talk 09:41, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

 * How are you doing.. The answer is the reason I decided to participate in the bloom clock. I've been in this area for about 4 years and am still trying to understand the weather! Especially this time of year there seems to be a quite a mix up in flowering/growth. It is winter now - had a frost this morning. But still the grape hyacinths have just popped their flowers up, yet the tulips have barely broken the soil! The roses are still blooming and the camelias are in full swing as well. Confusing times eh. SortaQuiet 22:31, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

 * Heh, wow... yeah, tulips are always later than those, IME. I'm a bit jealous though, because I wish those would bloom in December/January for me :). I look foreward to your contributions though... it's incredibly hot here at this time of year (soon to be much worse), and I already miss those days of being bundled up and looking at winter flowers. --SB_Johnny | talk 00:10, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

And another:
Did you mean Agapanthus africanus? (I couldn't find anything on Agapanthus aricanus). --SB_Johnny | talk 00:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called SortaQuiet. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name SortaQuiet~enwikiversity that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 23:43, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 06:23, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

title: User talk:SortaQuiet~enwikiversity


text:
8:00 class/12 June 2007

This is an archive of Wikiversity current events from 12 June 2007.

Colloquium summary
Short summaries of active discussions at Colloquium.
 * Wikiversity downtimes? - related page: Server logs.
 * how to write drama? - time for Topic:Drama?.

Internet Relay Chat topics of the day
Re-cap of topics discussed in #wikiversity-en.
 * Wikiversity computer skills
 * Need for a template that shows a meeting's start time in each time zone
 * Wikimania
 * status of unified login
 * Template:Bcp2
 * Organizing Topic:Topics with Schools
 * GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP)

Email discussions and blogs
Summaries of Email discussions and blogs with relevance to Wikiversity participants.
 * Board election

Recent changes
Today's trends in active editing efforts.
 * Nonphysical
 * Template:Replicate
 * Lecture:The Abbasid Caliphate
 * Film scoring for Musicians:Melody
 * BCP/Ageratum houstonianum
 * School:Agriculture/Papers
 * Operators and expressions
 * Introduction to Ruby
 * Wikiversity as a Wikimedia sister project

title: 8:00 class/12 June 2007


title: File:Image-Pic150.jpg


text:
File:Buttons on left side FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Picture with frame on wall in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Modify texture of poster FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:FrameForge Studio Support Folder.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:FrameForge Studio Texture Folder.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:StarWarsPosterDarker.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.

title: File:StarWarsPosterDarker.png


text:
File:Modified poster frame FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Menu to duplicate objects.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.

title: File:Menu to duplicate objects.png


text:
File:Duplicated artwork in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Drag the selected item in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Four pictures on wall in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Change color of wall in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
File:Change color of floor in FrameForge.png

Used with the WikiU Film School Lesson on how 3D storyboarding.


text:
User:Davidbowling

I was born in August of 1979 and raised in rural Illinois. I grew up loving the arts and entertainment as well as history and civilization. I enjoy writing music and the art of conversation with enlightened people of all cultures, backgrounds and ethnicities.

title: User:Davidbowling


text:
User talk:Davidbowling

Hello Davidbowling, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. When leaving comments for others to read, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone keep track of who is writing messages. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To help you get started:
 * Take a guided tour and learn how to edit;
 * Explore our learning projects;
 * Browse our portals, schools, and research pages; and
 * Read and help develop our community policies.

Also, don't forget to experiment with the links to your left. Be bold, and see you around Wikiversity! --HappyCamper 01:04, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

title: User talk:Davidbowling


text:
Wikiversity talk:Main page design changes

Just this place?
Is this the place for discussion on changing the main page? --HappyCamper 01:05, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Put the Welcome Message at the top...
1. Put the Welcome Message at the top of the page where it can be seen at once. 2. Keep it short (as a professor once said, a good message should be like a girl's skirt: long enough to cover the subject, but short enough to be interesting.

Good luck, Shir-El too 02:46, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree with that sentiment, and the parallel nice one. I would also suggest thumbnails for the main schools


text:
User talk:Adtrace~enwikiversity

Hello Adtrace, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. When leaving comments for others to read, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone keep track of who is writing messages. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To help you get started:
 * Take a guided tour and learn how to edit;
 * Explore our learning projects;
 * Browse our portals, schools, and research pages; and
 * Read and help develop our community policies.

Also, don't forget to experiment with the links to your left. Be bold, and see you around Wikiversity! --JWSchmidt 04:15, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Welcome
Welcome here ! I guess you'll find lots of tasks and projects requiring your help, either in the Peace Studies department or in the School of Strategic Studies where we've tried to launch an ambitious IR curricula... Feel free to ask for help if you need so, we'll do our best to help ! --CorentinB 17:35, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called Adtrace. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name Adtrace~enwikiversity that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 23:27, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 06:02, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

title: User talk:Adtrace~enwikiversity