Category Archives: Sprint 2

Software Development Capstone: Sprint 2 Review

When choosing an apprenticeship patten to write about for this sprint, Chapter 4’s Rubbing Elbows stuck out almost immediately. The problem raised by the authors is one for those who prefer to work independently when writing and developing software. The agency to decide which direction to approach a task, coupled with the efficiency of being the only decision maker, is appealing, and developers can absolutely be successful working this way.

The downside is, those who work alone cannot draw on the experience and knowledge of others, and place a hard limit on their productivity. Additionally, there are so many micro-techniques that can sometimes only be learned through partnership; small strategies that on their own are insignificant but accumulate over time into a much stronger knowledge-base.

The balance between independent and team focused development is something that I would like to continue to work at. Over the past sprint, I believe I did a better job of communicating progress on my issues and problems I needed help with. That said, I could always be better. I would like to place more focus on making myself available to my team mates for assistance with issues. Partially due to the desire to be productive and deliver a successful product, but also due to the ideas outlined in the Rubbing Elbows pattern. I’ve found over the past sprint that an area I’d like to improve in is the more practical knowledge that I would normally pick up working in groups and communicating with my team.

Some tasks I accomplished during the sprint:

  1. Completed JSDoc Environment setup: Our backend code now uses JSDoc compatible tags in comment lines, which is used to auto-generate developer documentation. Link
  2. buildReport outputs correct report totals with headers: the buildReport class in our reporting system backend correctly formats report headers and calculates correct tallies for visit info. Link

For the final sprint, I plan on finalizing the buildReport backend code and designing tests to be ran on the function. The final component is the connection between the backend code and the database, which I also will be working on with my team. Because we are now in the final sprint, my main overall goal is to finish developing the project as far along as time allows before making sure the environment is prepared for future work.

From the blog Griffin Butler Computer Science Blog by Griffin Butler and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Second Sprint Retrospective

Last week, my team completed our second Sprint. Like the first Sprint, we did a good job. Each of us stuck to the parts we left off after the first Sprint, so with me, that meant continuing with the CheckInventory frontend. The issue I wanted to get done by the end of the first Sprint was connecting the backend to frontend, so that instead of displaying a hardcoded value, it would pull from the backend. By doing so, the frontend would have its full functionality. However, that was easier said than done, as I spent almost two weeks trying to figure it out, only for my teammate to figure it out before me. They had created a shared network for their frontend that connected to the backend. I ended up using the same shared network with no problems. I created a method that called ‘GET’ from the backend in order to display the value. The next issue was figuring out how to call this method upon mounting the page. I spent a week trying to solve this, until it was suggested that I try calling it through a button press, as that had success with my teammate’s frontend. I tried that, but the button simply refreshed the page. Later, I tried a different button, which ultimately worked. However, I was not satisfied with that, so I did some more research and found a ‘beforeMount’ method, which solved the problem. I committed, and made a merge request for both the shared network, method and mount issue. With a week left of the Sprint, I spent time playing around with the design of the frontend, as there was discussion in the visual identity team. I refactored the frontend in order to call the header, CheckInventory, and footer components in the App.vue file, instead of using a router, like it was originally. I then fixed the footer to sit properly, and used the appropriate colors and fonts, according to the school’s guidelines. I completely overhauled the header, using the ‘Thea’s Pantry’ logo, adding a navigation bar, and adding a yellow strip to the bottom. Additionally, I used the correct colors and fonts, once again complying with the school’s guidelines. I was able to commit and merge those changes before the end of the Sprint, and present them to the client.

What worked well was still communication. We all communicate really well, and when we need something from someone, or someone to review something, it’s done fairly quickly. Our chemistry has also become more friendly, we’re more open and joke around with each other, while also being strict with our work. Speaking of work, something else that worked well was solidifying our roles in a way. Since we all stayed working with stuff we worked on during the first Sprint, we knew what we were doing from the beginning, instead of figuring out everything from scratch. Personally, what worked well for me was being proactive, especially with the design part of the frontend. I felt motivated to make it look good, and it felt less like work. However, something that did not work for me was again the expectation of doing enough. Towards the end, I felt like I was, but I felt most of the time I wasted a lot of time researching. It is not exactly my fault, but it also is.

As a team, there’s not much we can improve on, as communication is good, chemistry is great, and we have done a lot of work and progress. Something I suggested in the last blog post was clarifying what we are working on, like a stand up at the start of class. We had done this one time. Although I do not think it’s necessary, it could be a way to clear up confusion if there is any. Personally, what I want to improve on myself is using my time better. I feel I spend too much time researching, and although I cannot just speed that up, I could do it more efficiently.

The Apprenticeship pattern I chose for this Sprint was “Retreat into Competence,” in layman’s terms means I am overwhelmed by how dumb I am. This is referring to the fact that I have to spend time researching in order to fix my issues. There is nothing wrong with doing that, it is just that I spend too much time doing that. If I had read that before the Sprint, it probably wouldn’t have changed anything.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Cao's Thoughts by antcao and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint 2 Retrospective

https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-category-based/frontend/-/blob/WEB-APP-FRONTEND/src/frontend/src/components/BurgerMenu.vue?ref_type=heads

This is the link to the burgermenu component that I recently implemented.

https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-category-based/frontend/-/blob/WEB-APP-FRONTEND/src/frontend/src/App.vue?ref_type=heads

This is the link to the change i made in APP.vue to make sure the navigations between pages was working.

What Worked Well

What worked well this sprint was my ability to identify the direction I needed to go in early. By proactively researching what types of menus we needed (such as a scanning menu and an inventory display menu), I was able to start building out the feature rather than waiting for instruction. Additionally, I took more ownership of frontend work this sprint, which helped me feel more confident in my contributions. Our team also communicated better this time, which made planning and aligning tasks easier.

What Didn’t Work Well

Time management was one of my weaker areas this sprint. While I began working on the menu features early, I underestimated how long certain aspects, like tying barcode input to inventory display, would take. As a result, some parts are still in development. Another issue was not asking for help as early as I should have when I got stuck on some front-end design decisions, which could’ve saved me time.

Team Improvement Suggestions

Our team has improved in communication and breaking down tasks, but we could still do a better job tracking progress on GitLab. Sometimes, issues remain open even after tasks are completed, which makes it harder to see what’s done at a glance. Adding regular, short update posts during the week, even if work hasn’t been pushed yet would help us stay more aligned. I also think we could benefit from regular 15-minute team syncs mid-sprint.

Personal Improvement Suggestions

Individually, I’d like to work on improving my frontend development speed and getting more comfortable integrating UI features with logic and API calls. I also need to be better about reaching out when I hit roadblocks rather than spending too long stuck. Going forward, I will try to break down my assigned features into smaller sub-tasks and check them off one by one to maintain steady momentum.

Apprenticeship Pattern: “Expose Your Ignorance”

Summary:
The “Expose Your Ignorance” pattern, found in Chapter 2 of Apprenticeship Patters by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, emphasizes that developers shouldn’t hide what they don’t know. Instead, they should openly acknowledge areas of inexperience and use that as a tool to learn and grow. This transparency not only helps personal development but also builds trust within teams and encourages collaboration.

Why I Chose This Pattern:
I chose this pattern because it perfectly describes one of the issues I struggled with this sprint. There were a few moments where I wasn’t entirely sure how to implement something correctly in Vue.js, especially around the menu layout and dynamic binding of scanned values. Instead of asking for help or noting my uncertainty in discord chat, I tried to figure it out myself and ended up wasting valuable time.

How It Could Have Helped This Sprint:
Had I truly embraced this pattern earlier, I would have flagged those areas where I felt unsure and asked for input from my teammates or professor. This could have saved me hours of trial and error and allowed me to refocus on other key tasks. Going forward, I want to normalize being transparent about what I don’t know so I can get help sooner and grow faster.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Software Dev Capstone by Jaylon Brodie and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint 2 Retrospective

Gitlab activity:

The most important thing that worked well during this sprint, as addressed in all of the Team Project Effectiveness Reports, was communication. Our team communicates really well in person, and online after class. We use discord as our primary source of communication and everyone is really prompt in responding, whether it be in regard to simple questions or chronic issues that one of the systems is causing a team member. The use of the issue board in Gitlab improved during Sprint 2, which allowed the team to keep better track of what was happening, and more importantly, getting completed during the sprint. This allowed us to easily showcase our work during the Sprint Review because we were able to just look back at the issue board. 

The primary thing that didn’t work well this sprint was a clear idea of the work that should actually be getting done. Plenty of work was completed, but it was done on a basis that should have been pre-defined. Doing work as we find issues or come up with ideas is not the most efficient way to make beneficial changes to the “InventorySystem – Weight Based” and we need to work on this. 

Establishing stricter goals for the sprints will allow us to complete more meaningful work. This is the biggest change I think that needs to be made as a team. Personally, I think my best traits are ensuring that everyone’s voices are heard, and I’ve gotten positive feedback in this regard, and that my teammates are always informed of the work I’m doing. The team has decided that I should remain scrum master, and to fulfill my role, I will encourage us to define the stricter work goals that I previously mentioned.

Relevant Apprenticeship Pattern:

The pattern I have chosen to describe Sprint 2 is “Rubbing Elbows.” This pattern states that the act of collaboration can be referred to as “rubbing elbows” and if you reach a plateau in your individual abilities, collaborating with others may help you continue making progress. It is obvious that collaboration is taking place as this is a group project, but sometimes it is apparent that team members, myself included, struggle with our own work. I chose this pattern because I noticed the prevalence of it today actually. I was working on updating the design elements of AddInventoryFrontend and couldn’t figure out why my changes weren’t being made in the browser. I would’ve pondered over this issue for more minutes than I’d like to admit, but I “rubbed elbows” with Guilherme and was able to notice that merely a single line of code needed to be changed. Being more aware of this pattern during Sprint 2 probably would have encouraged more pair-programming, the use of the TV, or rubbing of elbows to navigate issues. The work doesn’t have to entirely be done alone. Overall, if stricter goals are defined for work that needs to be done, and we emphasize a greater sense of collaboration in class, Sprint 3 will hopefully reap the most benefits in terms of code contributions compared to Sprints 1 and 2.

Source of pattern: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/apprenticeship-patterns/9780596806842/ch04.html?_gl=1*1gf7b0t*_ga*MTQzNTk4ODQ5OC4xNzQ0NzQxNTgz*_ga_092EL089CH*MTc0NDc0MTU4Mi4xLjEuMTc0NDc0MTcyNC40MS4wLjA.#rubbing_elbows

From the blog CS@Worcester – Shawn In Tech by Shawn Budzinski and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint 2 Retrospective

https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/documentation/-/merge_requests/14

This is my merge request for my finished task of writing documentation on how to implement and use nodemon for faster, more efficient development.

For Sprint 2, what worked well for me as an individual was being able to use the other pieces of documentation as a reference, and also being able to utilize Markdown’s formatting to give the documentation a clear and understandable look. I had also kept track of my process of installing nodemon with a Google Doc file, which made it immensely easier to retrace my steps and know what worked and what didn’t. Although it was my first time writing documentation, I didn’t feel lost at any points, and I was able to create a set of instructions I felt confident in and proud of.

As a team, we stayed very organized throughout the entire Sprint, keeping track of issues and merge requests as they were posted. Most merge requests were either discussed in-class or over Discord, which helped the other team members understand the changes being made. I feel like we really gelled well as a team, and morale was high, which enabled everyone to feel comfortable with bringing up issues or asking for help. Everyone has been great at completing their fair share of work, both when it comes to the project itself and the Sprint Review presentations. 

On an individual level, what didn’t work well was I felt as if I became distracted at times during class, when I could have been more focused on completing my work. This is something I am actively working on being better at. I could be a bit more productive in-class sometimes, but this is not to say I never get anything done. I also felt as if I wasn’t completely sure about how the documentation should be written, or if the instructions I wrote would be applicable to everyone. This is something I think is okay at this point, but it was a bit of a back-and-forth struggle when it came to making certain decisions.

On a team level, there was not much that did not work well. We’ve improved our communication from last Sprint, and we are getting issues done and merge requests out at a steady pace. I think something we might need to clear ourselves up on are certain issues regarding visuals, but otherwise I think we are in a good spot.

To improve as a team, we should ask either Professor Wurst, the client, or the Visual Identity Team some clarifying questions about our issues (what the visuals of the webpages are supposed to look like, for example). I think we could clean up our Issue Board a bit as well, as it seems a little cluttered with old Issues.

To improve as an individual, I should definitely try and focus a bit more during class. Productivity would increase, and hopefully I could get more done with the time we have left. I could do better in arriving to class on time, as the last couple of classes I was running late and had to search for parking for a long time. 

For this Sprint, not many of the Apprenticeship Patterns apply to me, so I’ve decided to go with “ Rubbing Elbows”. This describes a situation where one feels there are better techniques to the craft that are escaping them. This may not be exactly true, but it seems to be based on the apprentice’s experience and emotions about what they’re working on. It stems from stagnated learning, which can lead to one feeling inferior about their implementation.

I selected this pattern because while I was writing the documentation for implementing nodemon, I felt as if I was overcomplicating the whole process and that there was an easier way to accomplish the same goal. I felt that, realistically, installing nodemon shouldn’t have been too difficult, and that I was using an inferior way to implement it. It relates to my experience during this Sprint because I was feeling inadequate about my work being the “right” approach to implement nodemon.

If I had read the pattern before/during the Sprint, I would have asked another team member to work with me on installing nodemon to see if it was truly as convoluted as I was making it. The other developer might come up with a different solution, which would be a good perspective to have.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Josh's Coding Journey by joshuafife and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint #2 Retrospective

Hello!

It’s that time of the month again, we’ve just finished up sprint number 2, and now I’ve got to write about how it went! 

I think this sprint was considerably more productive than the last one (even if I still couldn’t get my assigned issue done). I managed to parse out how I am going to make timestamps for the rabbitMQ messages, and I did a significant amount of testing with some files, to the point where I basically had everything working by the end of sprint 2. It would have been implemented were it not for the fact that I ran into some last minute errors that I couldn’t get fixed in time. Like the last post I made, the merge request will be available at the bottom of the post.

I think I did a much better job at communicating with my group this time around. I think I was a little shy before, plus overwhelmed at having to learn a new skill and be a productive member of a group. Now though, I’ve been pretty consistently talking to my group about what I’m working on, and I’ve been asking questions on things that trip me up, which I would consider a wild improvement over last time.

 In terms of things that didn’t go so well, I could do with some better time management skills. If I had planned out my work a bit better, I probably would have had ample time to fix the errors I was getting, and I might even have been able to implement everything I had been working on. I’m not going to fret about that though, I just have to keep that in mind and make sure I give this sprint all the time it needs from me to get everything done. 

As with myself, our group has been doing a lot more communicating lately. Most of it has been really good, but a good chunk of it has not been very on topic. I’m not about to be some kind of narc that wants every minute of every day be spent working, that sounds utterly miserable, but I would like more of our discussions being related to what we are working on.

After looking in the book, I think the apprenticeship pattern that relates the most to this sprint was “Expose Your Ignorance”. The pattern states that the best way to fill gaps in my knowledge is to reveal them to my group, so that I might be more encouraged to find what I am missing. I’ve been the one working on rabbitMQ for two sprints now, and as such, I think it is easy to assume that I know every aspect of what it going on, but the longer I work on this project, the more small problems seem to come out of the woodwork. Oh sure, we have the code needed to send messages, but there is no queue for them to go into, so what is the point, etc. So, had I read this pattern at the start of the sprint, I think it would have been more productive to know what kind of stuff I was missing, so I can avoid any unexpected problems. I would have laid out the plan for the sprint, done some research on everything I was doing if I wasn’t 100% solid on it, and had some better fundamental knowledge going into that sprint than what I had. 

As usual, I will try to keep the things I learned in mind, but I will continue working on my issue, knowing that I do not have all the knowledge I need, and being willing to ask for help in finding it.

 

 

Merge request: https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-weight-based/inventorybackend/-/merge_requests/65

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint #2 Retrospective

Hello!

It’s that time of the month again, we’ve just finished up sprint number 2, and now I’ve got to write about how it went! 

I think this sprint was considerably more productive than the last one (even if I still couldn’t get my assigned issue done). I managed to parse out how I am going to make timestamps for the rabbitMQ messages, and I did a significant amount of testing with some files, to the point where I basically had everything working by the end of sprint 2. It would have been implemented were it not for the fact that I ran into some last minute errors that I couldn’t get fixed in time. Like the last post I made, the merge request will be available at the bottom of the post.

I think I did a much better job at communicating with my group this time around. I think I was a little shy before, plus overwhelmed at having to learn a new skill and be a productive member of a group. Now though, I’ve been pretty consistently talking to my group about what I’m working on, and I’ve been asking questions on things that trip me up, which I would consider a wild improvement over last time.

 In terms of things that didn’t go so well, I could do with some better time management skills. If I had planned out my work a bit better, I probably would have had ample time to fix the errors I was getting, and I might even have been able to implement everything I had been working on. I’m not going to fret about that though, I just have to keep that in mind and make sure I give this sprint all the time it needs from me to get everything done. 

As with myself, our group has been doing a lot more communicating lately. Most of it has been really good, but a good chunk of it has not been very on topic. I’m not about to be some kind of narc that wants every minute of every day be spent working, that sounds utterly miserable, but I would like more of our discussions being related to what we are working on.

After looking in the book, I think the apprenticeship pattern that relates the most to this sprint was “Expose Your Ignorance”. The pattern states that the best way to fill gaps in my knowledge is to reveal them to my group, so that I might be more encouraged to find what I am missing. I’ve been the one working on rabbitMQ for two sprints now, and as such, I think it is easy to assume that I know every aspect of what it going on, but the longer I work on this project, the more small problems seem to come out of the woodwork. Oh sure, we have the code needed to send messages, but there is no queue for them to go into, so what is the point, etc. So, had I read this pattern at the start of the sprint, I think it would have been more productive to know what kind of stuff I was missing, so I can avoid any unexpected problems. I would have laid out the plan for the sprint, done some research on everything I was doing if I wasn’t 100% solid on it, and had some better fundamental knowledge going into that sprint than what I had. 

As usual, I will try to keep the things I learned in mind, but I will continue working on my issue, knowing that I do not have all the knowledge I need, and being willing to ask for help in finding it.

 

 

Merge request: https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-weight-based/inventorybackend/-/merge_requests/65

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint #2 Retrospective

Hello!

It’s that time of the month again, we’ve just finished up sprint number 2, and now I’ve got to write about how it went! 

I think this sprint was considerably more productive than the last one (even if I still couldn’t get my assigned issue done). I managed to parse out how I am going to make timestamps for the rabbitMQ messages, and I did a significant amount of testing with some files, to the point where I basically had everything working by the end of sprint 2. It would have been implemented were it not for the fact that I ran into some last minute errors that I couldn’t get fixed in time. Like the last post I made, the merge request will be available at the bottom of the post.

I think I did a much better job at communicating with my group this time around. I think I was a little shy before, plus overwhelmed at having to learn a new skill and be a productive member of a group. Now though, I’ve been pretty consistently talking to my group about what I’m working on, and I’ve been asking questions on things that trip me up, which I would consider a wild improvement over last time.

 In terms of things that didn’t go so well, I could do with some better time management skills. If I had planned out my work a bit better, I probably would have had ample time to fix the errors I was getting, and I might even have been able to implement everything I had been working on. I’m not going to fret about that though, I just have to keep that in mind and make sure I give this sprint all the time it needs from me to get everything done. 

As with myself, our group has been doing a lot more communicating lately. Most of it has been really good, but a good chunk of it has not been very on topic. I’m not about to be some kind of narc that wants every minute of every day be spent working, that sounds utterly miserable, but I would like more of our discussions being related to what we are working on.

After looking in the book, I think the apprenticeship pattern that relates the most to this sprint was “Expose Your Ignorance”. The pattern states that the best way to fill gaps in my knowledge is to reveal them to my group, so that I might be more encouraged to find what I am missing. I’ve been the one working on rabbitMQ for two sprints now, and as such, I think it is easy to assume that I know every aspect of what it going on, but the longer I work on this project, the more small problems seem to come out of the woodwork. Oh sure, we have the code needed to send messages, but there is no queue for them to go into, so what is the point, etc. So, had I read this pattern at the start of the sprint, I think it would have been more productive to know what kind of stuff I was missing, so I can avoid any unexpected problems. I would have laid out the plan for the sprint, done some research on everything I was doing if I wasn’t 100% solid on it, and had some better fundamental knowledge going into that sprint than what I had. 

As usual, I will try to keep the things I learned in mind, but I will continue working on my issue, knowing that I do not have all the knowledge I need, and being willing to ask for help in finding it.

 

 

Merge request: https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-weight-based/inventorybackend/-/merge_requests/65

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint #2 Retrospective

Hello!

It’s that time of the month again, we’ve just finished up sprint number 2, and now I’ve got to write about how it went! 

I think this sprint was considerably more productive than the last one (even if I still couldn’t get my assigned issue done). I managed to parse out how I am going to make timestamps for the rabbitMQ messages, and I did a significant amount of testing with some files, to the point where I basically had everything working by the end of sprint 2. It would have been implemented were it not for the fact that I ran into some last minute errors that I couldn’t get fixed in time. Like the last post I made, the merge request will be available at the bottom of the post.

I think I did a much better job at communicating with my group this time around. I think I was a little shy before, plus overwhelmed at having to learn a new skill and be a productive member of a group. Now though, I’ve been pretty consistently talking to my group about what I’m working on, and I’ve been asking questions on things that trip me up, which I would consider a wild improvement over last time.

 In terms of things that didn’t go so well, I could do with some better time management skills. If I had planned out my work a bit better, I probably would have had ample time to fix the errors I was getting, and I might even have been able to implement everything I had been working on. I’m not going to fret about that though, I just have to keep that in mind and make sure I give this sprint all the time it needs from me to get everything done. 

As with myself, our group has been doing a lot more communicating lately. Most of it has been really good, but a good chunk of it has not been very on topic. I’m not about to be some kind of narc that wants every minute of every day be spent working, that sounds utterly miserable, but I would like more of our discussions being related to what we are working on.

After looking in the book, I think the apprenticeship pattern that relates the most to this sprint was “Expose Your Ignorance”. The pattern states that the best way to fill gaps in my knowledge is to reveal them to my group, so that I might be more encouraged to find what I am missing. I’ve been the one working on rabbitMQ for two sprints now, and as such, I think it is easy to assume that I know every aspect of what it going on, but the longer I work on this project, the more small problems seem to come out of the woodwork. Oh sure, we have the code needed to send messages, but there is no queue for them to go into, so what is the point, etc. So, had I read this pattern at the start of the sprint, I think it would have been more productive to know what kind of stuff I was missing, so I can avoid any unexpected problems. I would have laid out the plan for the sprint, done some research on everything I was doing if I wasn’t 100% solid on it, and had some better fundamental knowledge going into that sprint than what I had. 

As usual, I will try to keep the things I learned in mind, but I will continue working on my issue, knowing that I do not have all the knowledge I need, and being willing to ask for help in finding it.

 

 

Merge request: https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-weight-based/inventorybackend/-/merge_requests/65

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sprint #2 Retrospective

Hello!

It’s that time of the month again, we’ve just finished up sprint number 2, and now I’ve got to write about how it went! 

I think this sprint was considerably more productive than the last one (even if I still couldn’t get my assigned issue done). I managed to parse out how I am going to make timestamps for the rabbitMQ messages, and I did a significant amount of testing with some files, to the point where I basically had everything working by the end of sprint 2. It would have been implemented were it not for the fact that I ran into some last minute errors that I couldn’t get fixed in time. Like the last post I made, the merge request will be available at the bottom of the post.

I think I did a much better job at communicating with my group this time around. I think I was a little shy before, plus overwhelmed at having to learn a new skill and be a productive member of a group. Now though, I’ve been pretty consistently talking to my group about what I’m working on, and I’ve been asking questions on things that trip me up, which I would consider a wild improvement over last time.

 In terms of things that didn’t go so well, I could do with some better time management skills. If I had planned out my work a bit better, I probably would have had ample time to fix the errors I was getting, and I might even have been able to implement everything I had been working on. I’m not going to fret about that though, I just have to keep that in mind and make sure I give this sprint all the time it needs from me to get everything done. 

As with myself, our group has been doing a lot more communicating lately. Most of it has been really good, but a good chunk of it has not been very on topic. I’m not about to be some kind of narc that wants every minute of every day be spent working, that sounds utterly miserable, but I would like more of our discussions being related to what we are working on.

After looking in the book, I think the apprenticeship pattern that relates the most to this sprint was “Expose Your Ignorance”. The pattern states that the best way to fill gaps in my knowledge is to reveal them to my group, so that I might be more encouraged to find what I am missing. I’ve been the one working on rabbitMQ for two sprints now, and as such, I think it is easy to assume that I know every aspect of what it going on, but the longer I work on this project, the more small problems seem to come out of the woodwork. Oh sure, we have the code needed to send messages, but there is no queue for them to go into, so what is the point, etc. So, had I read this pattern at the start of the sprint, I think it would have been more productive to know what kind of stuff I was missing, so I can avoid any unexpected problems. I would have laid out the plan for the sprint, done some research on everything I was doing if I wasn’t 100% solid on it, and had some better fundamental knowledge going into that sprint than what I had. 

As usual, I will try to keep the things I learned in mind, but I will continue working on my issue, knowing that I do not have all the knowledge I need, and being willing to ask for help in finding it.

 

 

Merge request: https://gitlab.com/LibreFoodPantry/client-solutions/theas-pantry/inventorysystem-weight-based/inventorybackend/-/merge_requests/65

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.