bodmas blog

Dante Stella runs a nice Web site about photography . Especially nice is his page on the Guerilla Darkroom – I use the kitchen personally, more space.

• Demo of finding the HCF using prime factors

The demo above projected on a screen in a class with people shouting out what they think will be the next step provides a useful way of demonstrating a nice topic in Number at GCSE level.

Mathsnet is a web site that provides interactive demonstrations of maths topics – my only gripe with the demo above is that I can’t pick the pairs of numbers – I’d like to be able to start with numbers with no common factor other than 1, then one prime common factor, then two different prime common factors and so on…

The page was designed for a student on a computer, not for whole class teaching. Maybe some visual basic in Excel…

The Linux-based machines are expected to have a 500MHz processor, with flash memory instead of a hard drive which has more delicate moving parts.

The laptop will be more rugged and flexible than ordinary ones
They will have four USB ports, and will be able to connect to the net through wi-fi – wireless net technology – and will be able to share data easily.

• The latest BBC Technology article with diagrams
• Earlier post with links to project Web site

On the part of the MIT site about the $100 laptop that shows pictures, the following statement appears “Please note: these laptops are not in production. They are not‚Äîand will not‚Äîbe available for purchase by individuals.”. I suppose Dell and HP are not ready to loose a large chunk of their market yet. This machine looks as if it could do 80% of what a hulking great laptop does now…

• Is the hand painted decoration on my Taramundi an accurate logarithmic or equiangular spiral or not?
• Does the geometry of a hand and a brush painting a simple shape reveal mathematical structure?