[Year 12 SofDev] Data dictionary - data formats

[Esther Andrews]

This is what I tell my students:

A radio button is a way to display data.
The data is stored as a variable somewhere else.
If you create a variable in your programming language or you create a field in a database, its type is not "radio button", its type is boolean. And you then have the option to display that data in a number of ways on forms.
I allow students to list "radio buttton" as a method of validation of that boolean variable.

I rant and rave to students about this every year.... Objects are NOT data! And they still get it wrong!

Esther Andrews | Admin Systems Developer, IT and Maths Teacher
Bendigo Senior Secondary College
Box 545 | BENDIGO | Victoria  3552   Australia
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From: sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au [sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Margaret King Iaquinto [iaquinto at ozemail.com.au]
Sent: Tuesday, 5 April 2011 7:25 PM
To: 'Year 12 Software Development Teachers' Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [Year 12 SofDev] Data dictionary - data formats

Radio button yes/no goes into the data dictionary? To me, the radio button isn't data. But it holds the data.

The radio button needs a name (talking about html here) and that name, along with its values, is shipped to PHP . That 'name' is the data that is listed in the data dictionary. So, perhaps its datatype is string since the values are "yes" or "no".

Then the students can use a switch case structure to do stuff with (vague sounding - apologies) or a simple IF THEN ELSE.


What do you think? I would love to have clarification  on this.

Maggie

VK3CFI

On Tue Apr 5 16:22 , Mark KELLY sent:

I'd say (e.g.) for a date, format could be "dddd dd/mm/yyyy", or for floating point "2 decimal places", or Boolean Married? "Radio button yes/no"
Formats specify how data are displayed.

On 5 April 2011 17:32, Matheson, Heath A <Matheson.Heath.A at edumail.vic.gov.au<UrlBlockedError.aspx>> wrote:
Heya All,

In the outcome 2 detailed example in the study design, “students will design a data dictionary that shows the required data items, a description of their purpose, their format, their size and their data type”.

What goes in the format field? Is it the data structure? Is it a range or acceptable values?

I’m just not quite sure.

Have a safe and happy holidays, hope you get lots of eggs and easter buns!

Heath Matheson
Mt Beauty

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