Week 6 Readings

Encarta's article on computer networks offers a shorter, more authoritative definition of LANs and other networks than anything available on Wikipedia. Most of this information I already knew: LANs handle small distances, WANs (like the Internet) handle huge distances, and Ethernet is used to wire everything together. The YouTube video was helpful for its brief descriptions of PANs and MANs, neither of which I had noticed before. In sum, this was all pretty basic information, and I'm sure it will be covered almost identically in our next lecture.
The article on RFID tags in libraries was actually a really interesting one. I'd read about the technology's applications for fast transactions and package tracking, but I hadn't thought about its potential applications in our field. The several limitations noted - for example, size and cost - are a little discouraging, but the technology is improving all the time. I was most impressed with the idea that RFID tags could prove helpful even when books aren't going anywhere, just by facilitating inventory sweeps. Shelf reading, we hardly knew ye!