Student Observations on Weekly Presentations

[Calvin Waterbury]

Hello,

First off, "BRAVO!" to all who take their time and knowledge to make 
these presentations!  They have been extremely helpful in my learning of 
LiveCode and in being introduced to the programming world outside of 
Windows®!

I also wish to convey my comments herein are not intended as criticisms, 
but as a "reflection" through the eyes of a student.  If nothing 
changes, I will still continue to participate and glean what I can from 
each session.  I realize that "newbies" are in the minority and I do not 
expect nor desire the presentations to be "dumbed down."  I can 
understand that spicing up a presentation makes for a less mundane 
experience.

My comments are from only seeing four presentations.  Perhaps the 
presenters were having "off days?"

Ok, with the above preamble/disclaimers in place, here are some thoughts 
for your consideration when you present...

1. RECORDING - Please make sure you are recording, if you intend to do 
so and let your audience know at the outset you are doing so.  Others 
mileage may vary, but for me knowing I will be able to review the 
presentation allows me to relax and look at the bigger picture and more 
robust interaction of Q&A during the live presentation.  The couple of 
times the chat had comments like "Is he recording?" and "Did he turn on 
the recorder?" sent me into a quasi-panic of myopia and tunnel-vision 
because I did not want to miss any details.

2. SCREEN VIEW - It is nice to match a face to a voice.  Seeing the 
"camera view" of the presenter at the beginning and briefly "here and 
there" during the presentation certainly assists the tardy as well. 
Aside from these brief displays, it is very helpful if the screen real 
estate, the "screen view" is allocated to the computer desktop and 
specific windows where the coding action is happening.  Without doing 
so, it is impossible to read the script, etc. windows.

3. DISTRACTIONS - Just a quick note to say I found the visual effects 
and cartoon animations to distracting for my taste, besides taking up 
screen area.  This is my own personal opinion and not necessarily the 
opinion of any other participant(s).

4. VERBOSITY - I realize this comes easier to some than others, but try 
to verbalize your thought processes as you are working through your 
presentation.  This really helps to "connect the dots," especially for 
those of us who do not have the same familiarity yet.  While I am a 
newbie to LiveCode, I am not a novice programmer and "hearing" the logic 
spoken allows my experience to assist my learning.  Also, if your 
presentation contains a bug, hearing the logic may allow me to assist in 
debugging where otherwise I could not.

5. KEEP AN EYE ON THE CHAT - *We* are able to see and hear you via 
USTREAM, but but the only way you can "see" or "hear" our feedback is 
via the ChatRev.  I noticed more than one instance where the presenter 
was oblivious to what the audience was trying to "say," especially when 
there were problems like sound issues, performance, clarity, etc.


Ok, there are my notes from *my* experiences.  Use what you feel is 
valid and throw out the rest, but by all means please continue to 
present!  :)

I would like to encourage everyone to present something.  Everyone has 
their own personal way of communicating and the way *you* might say 
something could unlock someone's understanding where no one else's 
would.  You don't have to be a guru-coder to present either.  Maybe your 
presentation could be about how you lay out your LiveCode work space, 
what ancillary tools you use to develop, etc.  I am working on a project 
that I will present, hopefully in about six weeks, if I haven't bit off 
more than I can chew. ;)

FYI - I used to work in a television station years ago and have coached 
people into getting over the intimidation, anxiety and stage fright of 
being in front of an audience on camera.  I'll be glad to help if you 
want to try and present.  Unfortunately, I will have to defer the 
technical questions about using USTREAM to other experienced presenters 
at this time.

Fair winds,
Calvin