Computer Science BS Journal: Week 2

                                     Part 1: Review and Reflect Learning Strategy

The Effective Study Skills google document goes into detail that every person is different when it comes to studying and retaining knowledge. Key tips and tricks that are proven to help with your studies are highlighted throughout the document which bring insight into how you should prepare yourself for a study session and how you should conduct your studies. Poor study skills are wasted time, and wasted time leads to frustration and low grades. From the document I can say that the top 3 things highlighted that I am already good at are scheduling, extracting important details, and reviewing and revising. On the other hand the top 3 things I feel that I need to work on are taking notes, taking examinations and gathering materials when I write. I tend to review my assignments and jump right into the deep end, with little to no preparation. I like to work until I hit a wall then figure out the problems and fix them accordingly. I know that going in without a plan rarely works, but I've been doing it all my life and it has yet to let me down.

                                    Part 2: Preview Time Management Skills

Activity Log for Time Management:

Below is an activity log of my day to day classwork/studies. Strictly for classwork, other activities are not included such as errands/chores/cooking/eating as they are not planned and happen spontaneously.

Part 3: Project Management Basics

A project is a task you take upon yourself to create a unique product, service or result to achieve a specific goal. The links provided in this week module that covers WBS(Work Breakdown Structure) why its important and why we should utilize it. There are multiple levels of a WBS, level 0 the project, level 1 the workstream, level 2 the major deliverable, level 3 the sub-deliverable and level 4 another set of sub-deliverables. From a WBS you can determine dependencies, estimate durations, allocate resources into those tasks, and therefore estimate costs. A WBS is a fundamental tool in project management because its a planning tool, its a resource allocator, and a base tool for risk identification. Another tool we should utilize is the Gantt Chart(bar chart). The Gantt Chart plots time along the horizontal axis, the vertical axis is where we list the tasks and activities we need to do to complete our project. If we've already made a WBS then we already have the tasks/activities we need. Each task will be represented by a bar where the length of the bar represents the duration and the position represents the scheduling. In Gantt charts you will typically see these long bars following another along the charts timeline, because each task is essentially waiting for the previous task to be completed. Another symbol typically seen in a Gantt chart is a triangle or diamond which would be used to represent a milestone. Utilizing a Gantt chart to represent a project plan allows us to turn our project into a time schedule. It will help us think through our plan, articulate it, to communicate it and to monitor it during delivery.

                                            Part 4: Check Out Previous Capstones

After reviewing the previous capstone projects the three projects that stood out most to me are OtterParsing, Open Energy Dashboard, and Out of Mana.

OtterParsing is a tool to scan and read resumes in order to summarize useful information a recruiter is looking for. There is a search function that will scan the resume criteria for job durations, skill levels and job titles allowing recruiters to quickly gauge if a candidate is a good fit for the position they're hiring for. The project was well made and I really enjoyed checking it out. The web page aesthetic could use some work but overall the project runs smoothly and delivers exactly the results that were promised.

Open Energy Dashboard is a tool that helps organizations visualize their emissions and resource usage in a web browser. I really liked this project because of the tools utilized in their project as well as the goal of the project. The project was very well done and I enjoyed viewing their presentation. I think the project was very well made and only needs fine tuning here and there and some ui cleaning up to improve it. 

Out of Mana is a roguelike game with the goal to bridge the gap between simplicity and complexity. Made for all ages and built for easy or challenging gameplay, Out of Mana is made to be an auto-battler type game with a weapon upgrade system in which you use materials to upgrade or create new weapons. I think the project was very well done considering it was made by a sole developer. Because the project was self-made the creator is able to take any feedback given and reflect on their own work. The presentation was good and showed us exactly what to expect. However the audio during the presentation was not so great and was getting drowned out by the background music. The project in my opinion does not need very many fixes but the presentation audio should be fixed. 

                                                Part 5: Weekly Summary

In this weeks module lecture we learned about the 2018 global summit, project management, and trends in computing and software development. The 2018 Singularity University Global Summit existed to bring together people from around the world in order to tackle some challenges around the globe as well as discuss and explore exponential technologies. Emerging tech such as AI, biotech, robotics were discussed and their potential to transform society was talked about. These technologies were also focused as a means to solve major problems like poverty, healthcare and climate change. I think the main focus for this summit was to sort of summon everyone's attention onto these key points as well as create a large networking opportunity for everyone who attended. Sort of like "Look, we have these problems and we have this evolving tech that has potential to solve these problems. So lets get to work everyone.". We also were introduced to some project management basics and tools for project management such as WBS and the Gantt Chart as I talked about in part 3. As the weeks go by I'm starting to learn about a bunch of things I had no idea about. I guess I've been wasting my time going in without a plan my whole life. Finally in the lectures we also covered trends in the computing and software development industry. Five trends that shaped software development in 2023 were machine learning and AI tech, cloud computing, sustainable tech, low-code development and the search for digital immunity. There was debate in the reading whether or not AI would replace software developers and the short/long answers were both "no". Simply because AI cannot replace the creativity and critical thinking skills required for software development. AI will however make development much quicker because it is able to automate a lot of the aspects of software development.

Aside from those readings we finished out Industry Analysis Drafts and had to peer review our group members drafts. I honestly don't like doing this sort of stuff but I'm aware being active with my peers is a skill I should pick up, it's just hard to want to do it. I peer reviewed two of my group members drafts and they both did an amazing job, I have yet to review my own drafts comments but I hope that I was able to do well too. I also nearly forgot to do my OLI Collab assignment from last week so thankfully I was paying attention to that. Looking ahead to next weeks module I see a new team project where we survey the CS curriculum which looks interesting because we are going to probably overview our next few years together. Also unfortunately it seems I have to come up with a new essay topic, yay. Guess I'll see you next week.