October 1, 2004

A Tool for Formatting Computer Science Lectures in HTML

by Hugh McGuire
http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/


If  can read this,
then you can teach computer !
(;-)


https://www.welcomenewborn.com/



This talk proposes two ideas which are actually somewhat separate:

  • consider using HTML for (CS) lectures
  • consider using the tool  fmt_html presented in this talk


  • I'll start actually presenting the tool first
    named  fmt_html
    basic program written in C
    so universally portable and modifiable by you if you use it
    vs. Microsoft® Office PowerPoint®

    basic operation of  fmt_html is to generate file adding HTML to plain text file
    invocation:

    $ fmt_html lecture.txt [flags]
    $ 
    
    yields file  lecture.html

    optional [flags] can be used to specify course-name etc.

    adds basic HTML as follows
    at top: 
    following each line: 

    e.g.:
    http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/teaching/162/lectures/08/index

    http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/teaching/162/lectures/08/

    if you use some HTML,  fmt_html passes it through
    except comments removed so you can keep those as private notes to yourself
    but in your source notes they are integrated with lecture-material
    unlike Microsoft® Office PowerPoint® (SLiTeX)

    then  fmt_html handles some abbreviations convenient for presenting Computer Science:

    ~             -->      
    @material@    -->     <var>material</code>
    |material|    -->     <code>material</code>
    ^material^    -->     
    ...
    
    blanks such as  really change  fmt_html from yet another formatter
    to a tool fostering interactive lectures
    lecturer types blanks' contents during lecture, asks students for contents,
    students take notes, ...
    avoids boringly having material all preformatted
    can be used to  some material
    yet the material is well controlled

    further examples:
    http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/teaching/263/lectures/
    http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/teaching/ucsb/10/lectures/05/


  • further proposal of this talk is:
    consider using HTML for (CS) lectures
    * as powerful as PowerPoint
    * more universal
    * more flexible with scrolling vs. slide-truncation,
        displayable with other windows
        notably compiler/IDE



    Summary of this talk:


    (Copyright © 2004 by Hugh McGuire   -- for thoughts about this, see   http://www.cis.gvsu.edu/~mcguire/teaching/copyright_thoughts.html .)