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Tabor Powelson Software Engineering 2009 COSI 131 |
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Now, at the end
of the semester, I think I accomplished all that I needed to. I worked a great deal to help with the Headstart project, showing them how to use their database
and also helping to create new paperwork forms to make inputting data easier.
Headstart Project:
The local Headstart
program was required to store their information in a database called ChildPlus, so I am working on a team with Wenjin Hu to help teach the Headstart administrators to use the database.
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10/12/05 We are currently working on writing basic
instructions on how to use the program and which data fields in the database
apply to which forms they use. It would
probably be a lot easier in the long run if Headstart
rewrites their forms to match the database, we will bring this up next time we
meet with them.
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10/19/05 I made a rough draft of some child
information forms that would better match the database, which I think will be a
whole lot easier for Headstart. We will still need to map out where the
information in their old forms goes in the database for the paperwork they have
now. We are finding that a lot of
information does not fit anywhere in ChildPlus.
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10/24/05 I continued working on writing out new
paperwork forms. I revised the child
information form that I wrote before, and I also started on an adult
information sheet. We took snapshots of
all of the forms in the database so we could write out instructions on how to
use ChildPlus.
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11/2/05
We finished taking all of the snapshots and we
started writing out more instructions on different features of ChildPlus. One
interesting feature is the label maker, which generates labels for mailing
addresses and such. Editing the label
layout seemed complicated because of it was hard to tell which variables could
be used (name, address, birthday, etc) and how to use them. We are planning to meet with people from the
Canton Headstart again soon.
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11/7/05
We had some confusion as to the order that the
paper forms would be filled out, so we constructed a timeline that we thought
they would follow, and we are going to check that with the people from Headstart. We are
planned to meet with them on November 14.
I wrote out a quick agenda for the meeting, showing what topics we
wanted to cover.
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11/14/05 The workers at the Canton Headstart center met with us and we discussed what we had
accomplished so far. We found that most
of the pieces of information that the paperwork asked for but could not be
stored in the database doesn’t really need to be in
the computers. Also we planned to hold
an instructional session on December 5 to teach about how to use ChildPlus.
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11/21/05 Wen Jin and I are just about finished with the snapshot document,
we are adding instructions to that to use is as a simplified manual on how to
use the program.
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12/5/05
A group of the Headstart
staff came to the ITL and we gave a presentation about how to navigate through
the database. That went well I think, we went through and showed them the basic steps for
inputting a new family into the database.
They are considering buying a web-based database called Data Engine that
they think will be easier to use than ChildPlus. ChildPlus does seem
poorly done and fairly archaic, so it may be worth the money for them to
purchase the Data Engine.
Linux workings:
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10/12/05 I am working to try to learn the basics of
Linux now, but I’m having fairly slow progress.
Not wanting to fully make the leap to Linux, I’m trying to set up my
laptop to do a dual boot of Linux and Windows XP. Also, I’m experimenting with
various Live CD’s so I can try out the different distributions before I
install one on my computer. So far, I
found that Knoppix is one of my favorites.
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10/19/05 I may need to give up my hopes of setting
up the dual boot. I found that I would
first need to resize my nfts partition to create room
for more partitions on my hard drive. I
tried using qtparted from a Knoppix
live cd, but that always causes the computer to
freeze. I also tried ntfsresize,
which I found on the install disk of Mandriva Linux,
but that didn’t work either. I think I
may need to completely clear my disk, then partition it and install Windows and
Linux.
Other:
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11/4/05 I finally got around to starting the IBM
Z series Mainframe Contest. I finished
part one pretty quickly and I should get a t-shirt for it. I’ll try to start part two soon.
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11/8/05 I finished first few tasks of part two,
but was having trouble with step 4. I
could not find the JCL that was submitted to start the TCPIP proc, so I’m stuck
right now.
Last Update
12/5/05
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