Regarding
documenting my day, I found all applications useful for various reasons.
Documenting my day in journal form with the word processor was very straight
forward for me. For someone who enjoys writing, a journal entry describing my
day allowed me to add some creativity to the assignment, such as feelings or
emotions experienced. The word processing application also allowed me to
display important parts of the day in a bulleted list, which is helpful for
readers who want a more straightforward understanding of my day. An advantage
to word processing applications for a user is the number of formatting options
available. A user can choose various fonts and page styles. Another benefit to
word processing applications are the review options available. A word
processing application will automatically display spelling and grammar errors,
which can easily be corrected.
Although
word processing applications can be handy, there are some disadvantages. One
disadvantage is that a user may feel overwhelmed with the number of different
options available for formatting. For someone who is not familiar with
computers or word processing applications, one may struggle when using the
application. Another disadvantage to a word processing application is the fact
that a user is not easily able to organize information like they could with a
spreadsheet. Word applications are also limited regarding calculations and
formulas.
Documenting
a day with a spreadsheet was also very beneficial. I was able to input each
critical aspect of my day into cells, then easily calculate percentages of time
spent on each task via a simple formula. The spreadsheet was straightforward as
far as the information displayed, and I found the spreadsheet to be the most
useful for documenting my day. Some advantages to a spreadsheet application are
the number of formula options available to a user as well as the chart options.
For example, a statistician might find a spreadsheet more useful for displaying
population data for an area. Within the spreadsheet, this user can calculate
means and medians as well as input charts to display the data.
Some
disadvantage to a spreadsheet application is the learning curve that is required
to operate as well as the limitations on text formatting. As with word
processing application, spreadsheet applications require a user to be computer
literacy to use. A user will also need some knowledge to understand how to
calculate formulas. Furthermore, spreadsheets don’t allow users many text
formatting options like a word processor does.
Regarding
the presentation application, I found this one to be the most time consuming
when documenting my day. Presentation applications display data on slides. An
employee might find this type of application the most useful to view
information for a meeting or a teacher might use a presentation application for
a lecture. An advantage to presentation applications is the number of design
options available. Someone viewing a slide show about my day might enjoy this
option the best as presentation applications may be more visually pleasing as
the creator can add multiple pictures, animations or different page layouts to
attract a specific audience. A disadvantage to presentation applications are
the limitations in displaying large amounts of data. Although these
applications allow a user to insert charts and spreadsheets, a user is limited
with the amount of space on the slide itself. It would not be beneficial for a
user to insert a table of data that would require a significant decrease in the
size of the chart to fit on the page as individual viewing the slide may not be
able to see the data.
The
fourth and final application used to document my day was a database
application. I found this application the least exciting. Database applications
are used to store data and allows multiple users to access. Some advantages to
these applications are the amount of data that can be stored and the search
options available. For example, a hospital may use database applications to
store patient information. The hospital may have thousands upon thousands of
records stored yet easily accessible by the staff via search queries. A
cardiologist may need to access records from only heart patients and filter out
all other patients and can do so effectively with a database application.
A
disadvantage to database applications, like some of the other applications, are
the formatting options available. Although database applications are great for
storing data, the look and design are very straightforward. Data is displayed
in cells like a spreadsheet but there are limited options for formatting like
word or presentation applications, and if someone is viewing a database, they
might have a hard time understanding what they are viewing without an
explanation. For example, if someone were to open my database file for
documenting my day, the viewer may not understand what they are looking at as
easily as the journal entry or presentation.
