Welcome to DR's note, your weekly dose of knowledge from the Circuit Stitch Blog

 This week we will talk about autocorrect, spell checker, and grammar checkers.

    To start off, I am not going to talk about how autocorrect, spell check, or grammar check works (even though it might be fascinating to look under the hood on it).  What we are going to talk about are these programs actually making us dumber?  If you think about it, how often do we misspell words and autocorrect is right there fixing them without you intervening.  The problem I see most frequently is the work gets fixed, and I didn't learn how I misspelled the word wrong.  The reason is by the time I notice it was misspelled, it was changed, and I forgot how I spelled it.  Now that might just be me, but I feel that might be many of you out there as well.  How often do you have to google a word in hopes that Google knows what you're trying to type so that gives you the correct spelling, or asking our phones how to spell a word.  I've done it countless times.  Grammar is one of my weakest point and has been since I was a kid.  In fact, after I finish typing up this email, I will run it through an application to check my spelling and grammar.  But are they all bad?

    Let us look at a program I use to help me with my spelling and grammar, it is called Grammarly.  They have a free version (which is the one I use) that not only can help with spelling, but can even see what you are trying to convey and make sure you are using proper grammar.  The program is pretty neat, and is the one I use to check these emails along with other items I write up.  In the settings of Grammarly you can choose; I write in, and choose what language you type in, detect tone in my writing, and writing style.  Detect tone in my writing is Grammarly's way of check to see if you are conveying what you're trying to convey, and if the grammar is correct in that.  Writing style is the personal dictionary, this is where you can add word that you may use all the time but are not maybe spelled properly.  An example of this would be SMC, now it will say that is misspelled, but I can add that to the dictionary, and it won't catch it every time you use it.  This would work for first or last names as well, if they get hit by the spell check every time(I know mine does). 

    So the burning question is, how do these make us dumb?  To answer it simple, the only time I think that it is a detriment to us is when the correction happens automatically.  When it happens automatically, yes it save some time but at the cost of you learning your mistake.  When we make mistakes, they can be used to help us grow and learn.  Does it suck to make mistakes?  Yes, sometimes more than others, but it is in these mistakes that make us who we are.  I know you never hear about people's mistakes only successes, but if you think about it, how many times did they have to make mistakes to get to that success.  A famous quote by Thomas Edison, “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”  Who know, maybe one of those mistakes will make you realize something, then down the road you'll remember those mistakes and maybe learn something new from it. 

    I hope you learned a little about grammar programs and maybe a little about yourself.  If you have a questions or concerns, please leave a comment below.  Also, if you have any topics you want to know more about, let me know, and maybe I'll do a DR note on them.  Have a great week!!

Welcome to DR's note, your weekly dose of knowledge from the Circuit Stitch.

This week we discuss and discover, What is the Cloud?

    So what is the cloud?  The simplest answer I can give is this, the cloud is someone else's computer.  Now by someone else's computer, it could be Google, Microsoft, basically any place that host servers that is storing your data in the cloud.  When you hear the term server, it is not some fancy piece of equipment that is foreign and unknown, it is just a computer that is running an operating system geared towards whatever its main function is.  So if you have a server that is for emails, then you will run an OS (operating system) with software gear to do the sending the receiving of emails.  Then, if you have a Cloud server, you would run an OS designed to save information on it. 

    The cloud server is just glorified online storage, basically a NAS (network attached storage) that is attached to the internet and not just your network at home or at work.  A NAS at home or at work is only able to accessible by being on that network or connecting to that network via VPN.  But the biggest difference is that when you have a NAS, then you are in control of the physical device that stores your data.  You have to take care of it, check to see if it is still functioning properly, etc.  With cloud storage, all of that is handed over to the cloud storage provider to take care of.  They have redundancies to ensure that your data doesn't get erased (by them, not by you, if  you erase it then it's gone) or lost.  Plus, the convenience of cloud storage is that it can be accessed anywhere you have a connection.  Cloud storage is also pretty inexpensive compared to the upfront cost of a NAS, decent NAS units could cost anywhere from $300-$1000.  While cloud storage is either free or maybe a buck a month.  To me, using the cloud is a no brainier.

    I do think it's worth mentioning that if you have copious amounts of data, you might want to invest in a good external hard drive, preferably an SSD (solid state drive) kind.  That way It could help save on cloud cost, and you can take it anywhere, you don't need an internet connection.  You just plug the USB (universal serial bus) into your computer, then you can move over what you need to help clear up space. 

 I hope this has helped you understand what Cloud storage is, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask away.  Also, if you have any topics you'd like me to discus here, please leave a comment, I want to know what you want to know more about.  Thank you and have a great week.