The data for 104 software projects is used to develop a linear regression model that uses function points (a measure of software project size) to predict development effort. The data set is particularly interesting in that it violates several of the assumptions required of a linear model; but when the data are transformed, the data set satisfies…

Today, as difficult as it is for large institutions to keep software and hardware up-to-date, the challenge and expense of keeping up is only amplified for smaller colleges and universities. In the area of data-driven decision-making (DDD), the challenge can be even greater. Because smaller schools are pressed for time and resources on nearly all…

Unlike conventional models of software development, the open source model is based on the collaborative efforts of users who are also co-developers of the software. Interest in open source software has grown exponentially in recent years. A "Google" search for the phrase open source in early 2005 returned 28.8 million webpage hits, while…

The article presents the way in which freeware Internet programs can be applied to teach [superscript 1]H NMR spectroscopy. The computer programs described in this article are part of the educational curriculum that explores spectroscopy and spectra interpretation. (Contains 6 figures.)

With a data-acquisition system and sensors commercially available, it is easy to determine magnetic fields produced by permanent magnets and to study the dipole-dipole interaction for different separations and angular positions of the magnets. For sufficiently large distances, the results confirm the 1/R[superscript 3] law for the magnetic field…

Online reading is evolving beyond the perusal of static documents with Web pages inviting readers to become commentators, collaborators, and critics. The much-ballyhooed Web 2.0 is essentially a transition from online consumer to consumer/producer/participant. An online document may well include embedded multimedia or contain other forms of…

This paper presents FipsOrtho, a spell checker targeted at learners of French, and a corpus of learners' errors which has been gathered to test the system and to get a sample of specific language learners' errors. Spell checkers are a standard feature of many software products, however they are not designed for specific language learners' errors.…

Evidence conflicts as to whether students of social work hold positive attitudes toward the importance and usefulness of social work research. For this study, WebCT[TM] sites were developed to supplement a graduate course on research methods. Students were surveyed to measure the extent to which their attitudes toward research changed over the…

Recently there has been an increasing interest in plagiarism detection systems, such as the web-based Turnitin system. However, no study has so far tried to look at how students react towards those systems being used. This exploratory study examines the attitudes of students on a postgraduate module after using Turnitin as their standard way of…

Reporting methods used in large-scale assessments such as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) rely on latent regression models. To fit the latent regression model using the maximum likelihood estimation technique, multivariate integrals must be evaluated. In the computer program MGROUP used by the Educational Testing Service for…

The dependent variable in a regular linear regression is a numerical variable, and in a logistic regression it is a binary or categorical variable. In these models the dependent variable has varying values. However, there are problems yielding an identity output of a constant value which can also be modelled in a linear or logistic regression with…

Just as many people log onto a Web mail site (Gmail, Yahoo, MSN, etc.) to read, write and store their email, there are Web sites out there with word processing, database, and a myriad of other software applications that are not downloadable but used on the site through a Web browser. The user does not have to download the applications to a…

"Geomlab" is a functional programming language used to describe pictures that are made up of tiles. The beauty of "Geomlab" is that it introduces students to recursion, a very powerful mathematical concept, through a very simple and enticing graphical environment. Alongside the software is a series of eight worksheets which lead into producing…

Molecular modeling is pervasive in the pharmaceutical industry that employs many of our students from Biology, Chemistry and the interdisciplinary majors. To expose our students to this important aspect of their education we have incorporated a set of tutorials in our Biochemistry class. The present article describes one of our tutorials where…

Gas laws are taught in most undergraduate general chemistry courses and even in some high school chemistry courses. This article describes the author's experience of using the laboratory to allow students to "discover" gas laws instead of the conventional approach of using the lecture to teach this concept. Students collected data using Vernier…