OU - More thoughts about the future

As I indicated on 13th July, I think MT262 is a definite for next year. But S194 "Introducing Astronomy" caught my eye this evening. Its only a 10pt course and lasts just 12 weeks during the winter - seems like a useful thing to while away the cold, dark, crystal clear, winter evenings! (Well, that and walking over the fields to the Mermaid at Bishopsbourne for a pint or five!)

But why do it, and why only for 10pts - isn't there something more useful you could be doing, Simon? Well, yes...and no. I could, for example, catch up on all the non-OU reading that I want to do. I could get around to fixing the hole where the rain gets in - the one my wife keeps telling me about - in fact I think I'll do that anyway. But actually, astronomy interests me, but I have never had the time to study it properly - so this is a good opportunity. It will also give me an excuse to get my refracting telescope out again - you never know...my son might even be interested (although, if you can't control it by waving a mouse around his interest wanes rapidly). But only 10pts - why all that effort? Well, I did M254 last year - enjoyed it, did very well in it, but it was only 20pts, so I need a 10pointer to go with it (and I ain't doing M253 - no way!). So there you have it - and it can count towards an 'Open' degree...which is maybe where I am heading anyway.

Ah, plans! All put up just to be blown over!

M359 - TMA03 - Result

Well, I did moan back on Friday 13th July about how badly I thought I had done in TMA03 - I really felt quite hacked off about it. I am now making headway into TMA04 and ploughing, full-steam, through Block 4. But tonight, just for the hell of it, I thought I would check to see if my TMA had been marked. It has - and it was not quite as depressing as I thought it was going to be. I would have liked a higher mark...who wouldn't, but I'm happy that it was not the doom and gloom that I had convinced my self it would be.

Perhaps there is hope for me after all.

M359 - Oh no - its back to front!

I have just made a startling discovery....all through this course I have been mis-reading E-R Diagrams with regards to participation. I just don't believe it. Take a diagram that has two entities and lets call them Teacher and Student. Now, suppose there is a relationship between them such that a Teacher can teach many students and a Student can be taught by many teachers. Seams reasonable. Lets also assume that not all teachers are always teaching - sometimes that will take time out to research (I have a friend who is a Professor of Law. Sometimes he has PhD Students to supervise, othertimes he is researching and writing books and has no students). So there is a many-to-many relationship but the participation is different at each end - for Teacher it is optional but for Students it is mandatory (otherwise they are not students). So far, so good. The error that I have made to date is to think that the symbols for participation, which on this course is an open or closed circle, went at the end of the relationship that also give the degree of participation. What I have done in the past is to place the symbol at the end that also shows the degree of participation - but what I really should have been doing is placing it at the end adjacent to the entity type that it relates to. Thus, if the Teacher entity type has an optional participation, then the open circle goes at the Teacher end. It seems so &%**"~ obvious now that I find it hard to believe that I thought it was different from that.

(Yes, I know that Students sometimes take a gap-year, so in that period they don't have a teacher - but I guess that they are still students. But that doesn't alter the main point of me realisation!)

OU - What next?

After my previous post (earlier today) moaning about my (lack of) progress I thought I had better check when the courses that I have already taken expire. It turns out that M206 ceases to be usable for my DipComp at the end of 2008. Now, a few months ago I realised that, assuming I pass M359, I will be left with 10 point needed to get the Diploma. But I don't really want to spend months and months just to get 10 points - and the only 10 point course that is eligible is M253 'Team Working' and I have been tipped-off that this is a complete bastard of a course (thanks for the heads-up on that one, Ian). So M253 is not an option in my eyes.

So what to do? The obvious solution, I think, is to remove M254 (Java) from the list of courses to use against the Diploma - this means that I need 30 points now (because M254 is a 20 point course).

That means that to get the DipComp I need to complete it by the end of next year, and I need to find a 30 point course that I can use. And my inclination right now is to go for MT262 which is a courses that uses C++ for getting computers to do things. The other benefit of this is that it looks like a programming course (as opposed to anything else) and programming is my favourite computing based activity.

So MT262 is probably on the cards. After that I'll have to do some more 60 points courses - assuming that there are some left and they haven't all been converted into 30 point courses.

M359 - TMA03 Done - and so am I.

Well, it has been a long, long time. M359 has taken up more time that I thought it would - and TMA03 in particular has been a real pain. In the end I ran out of time to make a proper job of it, and have had to submit it in what I think is a less than satisfactory state.

The net result of all this is that I am really going to have to work at being motivated - and that is going to be a struggle. Oh, yippy.

On the positive side, there is only one more TMA to do and then the exam. And then I am going to take a break from my studies - I need time to recharge, and my family need time from me.