B. Luhrs - Capstone Project Status,
MSEI 2001, Section 1, Trimester #3
Bruce Lührs

A running status report of the work and progress on my MSIE Capstone Project, the Virtual Wanderer Web Application. and links to my work:

Trimester #1 (September - December, 2000):

• IT1, WE, and IPL1 (Perl & Java) classes lay the groundwork for the knowledge & practice we'll be incorporating into our projects

Trimester #2 (January - April, 2001):

• IT2, DB1, and IPL2 (Perl & Java) classes lay the groundwork for the knowledge & practice we'll be incorporating into our projects

Trimester #3 (May - July, 2001):

• Semester Break:
  
  • Building on the Perl programs... I play with a Perl program to present .jpg files in a directory for viewing as an HTML page
  • Digital Camera - practice with lens, basic photography skills (some day I need to take a class), and practice using laptop software to size, clean-up & manipulate images captured
  • Lessons learned from camera & image software practice captured as beginning notes for "Field Guide to Data Collection & Preparation"
• May-4 to May-17:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • Worked on Requirements Document, Project Plan, and Preliminary Design Specs
    • Setup project directories on my laptops (home & work), on the MSIE server (bob) and on my Linux server (carson-city
    • Take a hard look at what technologies I'd be incorporating
  • Planned:
    • To talk to my advisor (Mark) and others (Brandt) about some of my concerns
  • Issues:
    • Evaluations based on what can get done & glues-or-content? Should I use Resin?
• May-18 to May-31:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • Got started on the Administrator Operations CGI-script
    • Decide to use Perl-CGI scripts & Perl-DBI to manage the project MySQL database on my Linux Server
    • Continued design & development of the startup screens & some of the User Operation CGI-scripts
    • Really struggled with getting PERL-CGI/DBI/Mysql running on my Linux Server - but it wasn't easy!!
    • Got past a stumbling block of working with nested SQL-Selects (prepares & executes) and the $sth_n->fetchrow's...
    • Preliminary versions of start-page, start.cgi, adminmenu.cgi and a template for the waypoint.cgi scripts
    • Work on test data for DB tables, test html & jpg files .. and the SQL scripts to load the database
  • Planned:
    • Had problems getting Perl::DBI-mysql going on my Linux server but helpful suggestions got me going
  • Issues:
    • 'time'
• Jun-1 to Jun-14:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • Get View & Destination data out of DB and displayed correctly in the view & destination rows. Test Data diagramed. Also fix multiple inserts of 'trip' into navlogs. Do some HTML to make some of the web-pages look slightly better.
    • (took time out to do homework assignments)
    • There's only 7 weeks left to go!
    • Updated the Requirements Spec, Project Plan, Design Spec - Section 1 two-thirds of Design Spec - Section 2 for advisor review
    
    
    
  • Planned:
    • Get the first set of real data (images, field data, and initial html-files) from Mine Falls Park arranged and into the project DB.
    • Get Advisor feedback on direction & status of the project?
  • Issues:
    • Understanding of Poster Fair, Project Presentation and Capstone Project evaluation process is unclear with somewhat mixed-messages coming from the GradCenter vs. the MSIE faculty.
• Jun-15 to Jun-28:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • (Lot of time has been used to do other homework assignments).
    • Finally got back into the project, cleaning up some screens increasing some text-fields lengths, fixing some problems with data, etc ..
    • Got Pan-Left, Right, Go-There working after some stupid problems passing parameters to the waypoint.cgi script on a "re-submit"
    • Added creation of minimal tripleg-entry.
    • Added JavaScript function to my .cgi/html pages, to pop-up separate windows for help or the admin-menu. Giving me clean separation between iwander-main-pages and help/adminops ..
    • Got a lot of the ShowLog.cgi written and debugged
      Things are starting to come together.
    • Fill in design documentation, put real information into the Field Data Collection Guide. Used it to plan field trips.
    • Bug fixes & enhancements: handling of no visible destinations, correctly listing startingpoint-test-urls, and setting current heading to direction of travel between waypoints.
  • Planned:
    • Collection of more 'field data' (photos and their processing)
    • Prepare for 'brown-bag' presentation at work and Capstone Fair.
    • Prepare hand-outs and poster board for Poster Fair (14-July).
  • Issues:
    • 'TIME' - but on schedule.
• Jun-29 to July-12:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • Implemented a conf-file to check for debug mode.
    • Photos & data for Mine Falls Park
    • Processed and tested the Mine Falls Park data
    • Presented the project at work Brown-bag seminar - got some feedback
    • Cleanup web pages, Poster Fair & Presentation prep work
    • Enhanced use of the conf-file so remote MySQL could be used (this allows everything to run on Linux Server (carson-city) or to have CGI scripts/html's on MSIE Server (bob) and MySQL on my Linux Server (carson-city). A 2 or 3-tier configuration.
    • Create deploy and undeploy shell scripts to setup the website from the sources stored in the development directories.
    • Prepare Poster Fair handouts.
  • Planned:
    • Prepare to Deliver Project Presentation (28-Jul-2001)
    • Continue Preparing Project Documentation
    • Perhaps collect field data from the lake
  • Issues:
    • How to present the right information in 15 minutes on 7/28
• July-13 to July-28:
  
  • Accomplished:
    • Some more testing and some more bugs fixed, work on more data
    • Prepare faculty-handout and material for 7/28 presentation
    • Submit Capstone abstract
  • Issues:
    • Where does it go from here?