From the blog CS@WSU – :(){ :|: & };: by rmurphy12blog and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Monthly Archives: January 2017
Week 1 Reflection
This is the beginning of the software development capstone. We started the semester by forming the scrum teams we will be working in for the remainder of the semester. the class has been divided into 4 Scrum teams each with about 6 members.
In these teams we will be working on the open source software OpenMRS. OpenMRS is an open source medical record system that aims to provide developing countries around the world with a reliable tool for use in medical facilities with out the high cost associated with commercial options. We will be concentrating on the AMPATH project.
This week most of my time has been spent looking in to Angular 2. Angular 2 is a JavaScript framework maintained by Google. We will be using this throughout the semester as we work on the AMPATH project.
I believe this will be a valuable experience. Throughout the past three and a half years, all of the programs we have worked on in school have been very small in size. In contrast, OpenMRS is a much larger and will offer a good opportunity to experience having to jump into a large project, become familiar, and start developing.
From the blog CS@WSU – :(){ :|: & };: by rmurphy12blog and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Database Fundamentals: Core Concepts
NOTES FROM Database Fundamentals: Core Concepts Adam Wilbert 1. Understanding Database Storage Models What are databases? Databases are at the core of our modern technology and it’s important to understand exactly what they are and the benefits that they bring … Continue reading
From the blog CS@Worcester – thewisedevloper by thewisedeveloper and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Week 1: Reflections on Learning and Work Products
Just finished week 1 of my senior year capstone. This week we started off by getting an overview of what the class is. We learned about SCRUM and actually did some hands-on learning with that. We were given a theoretical problem and then each took a role as either the customer, developer, or monitor in order to solve the problem. This was interesting to me and I learned a lot, especially because I had never even heard of SCRUM before. I really enjoy doing hands-on activities rather then listening to a lecture.
The big thing accomplished this week was being put into our groups that we will be working in all semester long. Although the process of picking teams was a little shaky, it all worked out in the end. We informed that we will be writing in Angular this semester. I have never used Angular before, so I am beginning to work through some tutorials to get a grip on how the language works. The only thing we have done as far as the actual work we will be doing is we were given the information to start looking through the openMRS project. We were told we will be focusing on the AMPATH project specifically, so I have been reading up on that. AMPATH delivers health services, conducts health research, and develops leaders in health care for both North America and Africa (mainly Kenya). I am very excited to work on the AMPATH project, because it is for a good cause and it is a project that helps millions of less fortunate people who deserve the proper health care.
From the blog CS@Worcester – Alex's Comp Sci Blog by alexsblog13 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Reflection on Week 1
Our objectives this week was to learn how slack works, and to learn about openMRS and AMPATH. The OpenMRS community is a worldwide network of volunteers with a wide variety of backgrounds. Its goal is to build the worlds largest and most flexible tech platform to support the delivery of health care in places all around the world. I did a quick demo of the software and at first glance i had no idea what was going on, but after playing around with it for a bit i not have a basic understanding about how it works. Slack is a useful tool that we will use in communicating with our team. I played around with it and found out it has a lot in common with the “discord” application. The only thing it lacks is a voice speak option. AMPATH was created in response to the challenge of treating thosands of people that are HIV positive. AMPATH is expanding from an HIV focus to adress the critial need for primary healthcare in places across the world.
I also started looking into Angular 2 and found out that it uses JavaScript and html which i have a basic understandings of.
From the blog CS@Worcester – Site Title by jonathanpaizblog and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Reflection Week 1
The first week was basically just forming our teams and recognizing what we are going to be doing this semester. We were told told make slack channels for our teams and to study Open MRS, AMPATH, and angular2. We continued to share information on a joint document to help each other catch anything we might have missed. I am also trying to learn angular 2 using online tutorials. The way we ended up picking teams was kind of odd but it all ended up working out, I currently reside with Team ZOLINQ. We will be using SCRUM throughout the semester to try to keep on top of everything and I’m sure all will go well because we will follow its framework and keep communication as our priority.
From the blog CS@worcester – CS Blog by Gautam by csblogbyg and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
The Clean Coder Chapters 1 and 2
This week our reading assignment was chapters 1, and 2 in The clean Coder. Just off these two chapters i have learned a lot about what it means to be a professional. I learned that there is a right time to say no, and that being straight up with your employers is better for both parties. Something that really stood out to me was when the manager and the engineer were having a conversation and the engineer went on a rant about “trying” to get something done and what that implies. Saying that you will try to get something done implies that you were not giving 100 percent effort. You can try all you want to do something, you can try to fly, you can try to turn lead into gold, but some things are just plain impossible. It is best to communicate these things to your manager when the proper situation arises.
From the blog CS@Worcester – Site Title by jonathanpaizblog and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
The Clean Coder, Chapter 1 & 2
Chapters 1 and 2 in the book title, The Clean Coder by Robert C. Martin talks about professionalism and when to say “no” in workplace. Both chapters were very interesting to me, as a matter of fact, I wish that someone had given me this book to read during my first year of being a computer science major.
There were many great advises and suggestions for what makes and what it means to be a professional? If you want to take credit for some job, then there comes great responsibility with it because that job can either be a success or failure depending on your actions/circumstances. Some of the key topics that struck me the most were when the author talks about: work ethics: my career being my responsibility, get really good and grow at your field with time, work with other people and best way to learn is to teach others. I thought the author was speaking to me directly as to get moving on these ideas and get ready for the real world. One of my personal favorites suggestion was “In a week there are 168 hours. Give your employer 40, and your career another 20. That leaves 108. Another 56 for sleep leaves 52 for everything else.” I am so affected by these sentences that I am thinking about applying it to my life because if you do the math it makes perfect sense. It is manageable and applicable.
Chapter 2 gave me a taste of workplace. It explained that in the workplace we will be working with different people with their own goals and agendas, but we have to make sure that we are crystal clear during our communication with others. Make sure that we take a stand for what we say? and do not mislead or over promise. It is not bad or unprofessional to say “no” to your boss once in a while if you think your boss is being unreasonable and does not understand the scope of what he/she is asking for? I personally feel that it would be very hard to say “no” to a boss who is in the same field as you, but if your boss is from the business world and all he/she is concern with the profit and his/her bonus then I do not feel I would hesitate to say “no” if he/she asks me something unreasonable/impossible.
From the blog Software Learning and Development – Site Title by hhussainsite and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Reflections and Learning Week 1 (1/24/17)
The first week of my capstone was pretty much just preparation for the project. When I walked into the class, people kept telling me they wanted me to be a team leader. The fact that I missed the first day of class due to having my wisdom teeth removed put me in a completely clueless state as I did not know what exactly was going on. I ended up being elected as one of the team leaders with no clue what i was doing, but i ended up noticing people were picking pairs to work with so i guessed it was a recruitment kind of thing. After the processor told me what I had to do, i ended up picking people for me team as well as the other folks who picked people for their team too. From that experience, I learned some bits of being a recruiter.
Afterwards, the professor told us that we are working with OpenMRS which I heard briefly about. After setting up Slack, a chatting system that makes communications easier for development, my team and I did research on the project as well as AMPath. We worked together to organize the project we have to work on and are currently planning to start learning Angular (a programming language) since that is what we will be coding in.
I should have gotten information previously before going to class since i missed it, i would have been more aware if i read all the alerts on blackboard. This could apply to actually working at a company and not knowing whats going on since I did not ask any questions. Let alone, this act could have injured communication with my team if i kept acting that way. As learning in the level 3 course, communication is important while developer software. Even though the course was talking about QA testing, the same principle of communication applies here too. In the end, I’m more interested in seeing how to approach working on features for AMPath, as i have not programmed with a team before. That will be a true learning curve.
From the blog CS@Worcester – Dan's Tech Rant by danbarbara and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.
Week 1: The Clean Coder
Week 1 of CS448 I was assigned to read Chapters 1 & 2 of the book, The Clean Coder. A quick summary and my thoughts on both of the chapters:
Chapter 1 discussed what it means to be a professional and some ways to achieve be one. A huge point the chapter touched on is that a professional takes responsibilty for his or her mistakes. An example the chapter gave was, a nonprofessional who allows a bug to slip through to the product delivered to a customer would shrug it off and move on. A professional on the other hand would be writing a company check for $10,000. Some of the major points that the chapter gave to developers that stuck out to me were; they should be testing every single line of their code, they should always make sure to test the whole system before shipping it to a customer (not just the features recently fixed), and that they should be keeping up to date with all of the latest stuff.
Chapter 2 discussed how you should say “no” to a manager, boss or even a customer in the workplace. The chapter went through and gave different scenarios, using dialogue, where someone was asked to have a certain task done by a certain time, which just simply wasn’t possible. A good tip that the chapter gives is that you should never lie boss just because you cannot get done what he/she wants in time. You need to be assertive and let them know respectfully that you will need more time, and what you CAN have done by that time. In one example in this chapter, a woman named Paula is asked by her manager Mike to be done with the work in 6 weeks. Paula tells him over and over again that the team will need atleast 8 weeks and there is no way they have it done sooner. After going back and forth a few times, Mike says “OK, Paula, but I bet you guys can work miracles if you try.” Mike basically wasn’t taking no for an answer. He went on to promise the customer that they will have the demo in 6 weeks. That was an example of the wrong thing to do on Mikes part. You should NEVER make a false promise and tell someone you will have something done for them if you can’t.
My initial thoughts when beginning the reading was that I was a little bit relieved. This book isn’t your average boring text book, which was I was expecting it to be. It’s actually a pretty easy and interesting read. The book engages the reader and explains things in a way that you can relate to. Chapter 1 was interesting to me because I never really thought of the term “professional” in the context they described it as. I just thought if you are in the workplace .. you are considered a professional. However, I learned that this is not the case at all. There is a lot that goes into be professional, and chapter 1 opened my eyes to that. Chapter 2 was my favorite of the two. I personally have had the problem where I didn’t know how to tell my manager I couldn’t get something done in time. In the past I have just said, “Ok, I will have it done”, then last minute broke the news even though I knew from the start I couldn’t do it. I will definitely use what this chapter taught me in the future and say no the right way. Overall, I enjoyed reading this book for week 1!
From the blog CS@Worcester – Alex's Comp Sci Blog by alexsblog13 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.