Category Archives: Sprint-2-Retrospective

Sprint Retrospective #2

For our second sprint, I think our group had a lot of ups and downs. At the start of the spring (before Spring Break), our group was very productive. Before break, we divided our group into two subgroups, three people working on the programming portion of the project (Sofia, Emmanuel, and I) and three people working on constructing a Docker container (Pernesso, Joao and Dylan). Early on, Dylan was able to get a Docker image and container working for our project. So, the Sprint was off to a strong start. During the last class before break, Sofia, Emmanuel, and I managed to break up the programming portion of the project into separate parts and assigned each part to a different person. So, each one of us knew what we had to work on over and after break. Some of us in the group had made plans to meet up over break using Discord to work on the project over break, but things came up and not everyone was able to meet. Sophia and I managed to work over Discord during break and I think we got a lot done. We did a mix between going over issues on our issue board and actually programming. For example, one of the issues I was going to work on over break was the Oath of Allegiance page and Personal Information page.

https://gitlab.com/worcester/cs/naturalization-interview-confidence-environment/demo-react/-/issues/13

https://gitlab.com/worcester/cs/naturalization-interview-confidence-environment/demo-react/-/issues/31

Originally, we had these issues as one issue which we decided did not really make sense because we were building two different screens. After an extensively discussion with Sophia, we also decided that the Personal Information page should go into our product backlog because if the purpose of our application was to just let people practice before taking the exam, then adding a Personal Information page does not really much to the functionality of our application. If the application was to simulate the exam, then adding a Personal Information page would make a lot more sense. So, we decided adding a Personal Information page was more of a luxury item that we could implement in a later Sprint if we have time. After our meet up, both Sophia and I documented what happened and our decisions on GitLab. So, in the beginning of the Sprint, we had decent documentation. It was what happened that everything kind of went south.

While I think our documentation was fine before and during break, I think documentation was one of the areas that fell apart the most after break. After we came back from break, we never followed up with one another on what we worked on during break or the week after break and so it was difficult to what was or wasn’t getting worked on or even what already done. Another issue that we had was we did not adjust the weights accordingly. When we initially made the issues in class before break, one of the things that we talked about was how for some of the issues, we did not know how to give it a weight because the issue may have been too broad, or we don’t know how to break up that specific issue. So, we were going to break some of those issues over time during the Sprint. This did not end up happening and our weights were off.

What I really to work on as an individual is working on a team. During this second sprint, I talked to my teammates a lot less than I did during the first Sprint. I just worked on the issues that I was assigned to and did not check in with anyone from the group unless I needed their feedback. For example, another issue that I worked during this Sprint was creating a UML diagram.

https://gitlab.com/worcester/cs/naturalization-interview-confidence-environment/demo-react/-/issues/1

This was one of the few times I checked in with my group. I made two different diagrams. One simple diagram and one where I was trying something new and wanted my group’s feedback. So I feel like I need to work on checking in with my group more to see what they are working on and let them know what I am working on.

Another thing that I need to work on is writing issues as they come. Sometimes when I am working on an issue, I encounter more issues and I wait until the end of the sprint to put those issues on the issue board and forget about it until I talk to someone about it.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Just a Guy Passing By by Eric Nguyen and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

“N.I.C.E” Sprint 2 Retrospective

During our second sprint we finally began setting up what we wanted for our application. We discussed the features that we wanted as well as how we wanted to be able to set up the environment for future students. What I was tasked with was trying to develop a docker container that would be able to run react and expo so that others would not need to require to download anything in order to run it. The docker team was not well versed with docker but we managed to figure out how to successfully create one. It was a lot of trial and error, but in the end, we overcame one of our weaknesses. The next order of business was then work with the React team to include all of their dependencies in the docker container so that everyone would have no trouble using their code.

The react team in parallel of the docker team was working on developing the features of the app that we wanted to include. They created the base of the cards with questions as well as the writing portion of the app. Unfortunately, the code provided by one of our referenced sources seemed to be unviable and the writing portion is being put aside for now. With that we are now putting our focus into creating the other portions of our application.

As a team we work well with trying to help one another succeed and adding on to one another’s ideas. Our communication is one of our strongest points as a group and it allows for us to express how we feel about areas we are weak in without the worry of any backlash. There were many times where some of us felt stuck in what we were doing, and we tried to help pick each other up.

One of the biggest issues we faced was not being able to create the proper issues that we needed to. We would have general ideas about what we wanted to do and how to do them but as a result of creating those issues, we would have other smaller issues that would pop up along the way. Although smaller issues would come up, we didn’t realize that we could add those to our issue board as well and it felt like we were not making much of a dent in the work that we wanted to do.

Individually I felt like I was a lost at times and did not know what to do. It was difficult working on things that I did not know much about and trying to teach myself was one of the hardest parts. Docker was one are where I felt as though I knew nothing but took it upon myself to try and learn what I was weakest at. It taught we that with time and hard work that I can achieve anything, but it would have been nice to have someone who was well versed to push me in the right direction because it would’ve saved a lot of time and I also wanted to help the other team as well. I also realized that I do like to work independently most of the time and that might take away from others learning and finding a cohesive solution together.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Life as a CS Student by Dylan Nguyen and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.