What I have learnt

A few days ago while I was doing the NUS teaching grading survey, I was surprised that I had more to say about CS3216 than any other modules. Of course, mostly good stuff!! Looking back at the semester, I always jokingly tell my friends "I'm kena sold to computing".

True story.

During poster session

This is the semester that was initially filled with uncertainties and later on transformed into a systematic deadline-based curriculum with small excitements in between.

Uncertainties: I doubted myself when Prof Ben said, 'every sem there're 1 or 2 students who drop the module'. I thought I would be the one cause I'm not that confident in my design skills and honestly speaking I don't know what's gonna come my way. But, I persevered and immediately during the first assignment, I kind of got the hang of it and began to trust what I do.

Systematic deadlines-based curriculum: After staying back in school for the first lecture of cs3216 on my first day of school, i kind of saw the truth about this sem: work work work. During the first few weeks of the sem, I created a list of deadlines for all my modules and to my horror, there seemed to be at least 1 deadline every week! It's like I've been pre-programmed into autopilot mode and all I do is to act like a robot and do projects super consistently, 1 submission after another. I liked the torture actually. At lear I know I've been working hard and even if I can't score well in exams, I know I did not waste any time and learnt a lot.

Excitements: These happens after each submission and every each feedback. Honestly, getting praised for our hardwork is really an awesome feeling. However, the sad thing is, not many modules use peer grading and we don't even get to hear complimentary words from lecturers. I like how we are requires to give comments to each other's works and sometimes, I get confidence boosts from reading the comments! Also, at the same time, I learn a lot from other teams and their projects!

All look so happy! 

What I have learnt:

1)  "definitely, some basic programming skills!"
Yes through the various workshops in the starting of the sem. Subsequently, i was lucky enough to experience some very basic coding in one of my other NM modules where we had to learn how to use Processing to create interactive games. Later on, during the final project, I could understand the big skeleton of the system my team built. I could have explored more on my own but i just didn't have the time due to crazy deadlines from other mods as well. I've gotten a few recommended self-learning sites, i hope to make this holiday meaningful using those. 

2) "more about UI/UX design"

Definitely. What i have done was all evolving around UI design! And i really learnt quite abit on how to design for programmers to use. Also, through UAT with target audience, i learnt that we should always bear this in mind when designing: always think like a user. 

Prize presentation. LOL

3) "how to work well in a team"

Or, should i have said 'how to work well with programmers'. It's real tricky at first cause generally, what they are looking for and what i think they look for are really different. Best take home point: design systematically. Cause we always gotta save each and every clickable element in .PNG file format with the correct size. 

Kids are just so adorable.

To sum things up, I really enjoyed he module. I can easily say its the most fulfilling module I've taken. Thank you Prof Ben for giving me the chance to take this module in the first place! :D I'm honoured to be one of students from the last batch.

10 year down the road, what i will remember about cs3216 are the friendships forged, the night that we stole beanbags to sleep on in utown, crazy laughing sessions at com1 at 1am, the unfinished fight for com1 mayorship on 4square, and many more wonderful moments like this...

For Million Eyeballs!

Just to zoom into 2 points i really like.


Acceptable Response Time: 
According to Fiona Nah's study,  everyone has a 2 seconds tolerance for loading time of webpages. TRUE. I'm really sick of those websites that does not show all the graphics and text properly within 2 or 3 seconds. Users may leave the website asap and switch to other websites as loading time is the most basic from of UX, and the very first interaction with a new website we encounter.

User satisfaction is achieved when experience exceeds expectations.
* Do better than your competition
* Do better than your users' expectations

CSS Sprites:

Using CSS sprites, we can redue the number of image requests. By loading a big image containing all the different images in it, CSS can simply call out for different individual images within it later on .

Example.

Image from this pretty cool tutorial. 

I guess this method is also pretty simple on the designer side, we just have to simple put everything together and save on a single .png file? awesomeness!

Lecture: PhD in Human Nature

Vsee's CEO, Milton, came to give a talk! And it's so coincidental cause only a few days ago, i heard of it and googled it. Turned out that the company came out with a video sharing programme that can edit and share files in real time while conversing with each other. It's amazing that they can share files like word doc even if one of the participants of the video chat do not have word installed on his com. See their website here.

Vsee (See Share Send): solve remote work challeneg, set people free (from all the commuting to and fro work)

3 Key points learnt
1) Microlearning

• Surround ourselves with learners! 
• Every day 3 things
• Break patterns 

I really liked this concept as i feel i'm always forced to learn in school for exams or quizes. We learn for the sake of scoring but rarely for self enrichment which is just sad. Like the speaker mentioned, we need to be with learners to learn. Everyday, reflect about the 3 things learned! I used to do that for a particular module where we had to write down the 3 points learnt in class every session which i thought was pretty meaningful. It will be more meaningful if we do that everyday. The example he gave for breaking patterns was 'using a weaker hand to brush teeth'. I find relevance in activities like this: Used to practice writing with left hand in JC; changed the side which i carry my bag. By doing these, it sure did gave me alot of unique experience even when doing everyday tasks which does not only add colour to our lives, but also give us sense of achievement from time to time!

2) Aim for boredom

• Brain is more active when bored!
• Breakthrough in thinking
• Defense against info overload

'Let your brain wander and feel the boredom'. i was really surprised by the first point, but i agree after thinking!! A lot of times, i realize that it is actually more difficult to think of good ideas when we actively forces ourselves to think. While often ideas come to us when we are unprepared and when we are doing nothing. I don't know what's the science behind it, but i guess it makes sense to say that the brain cells are actively waiting to be put to use when bored as compared to times when occupied while multitasking! Let's al go take random strolls in beautiful utown and think about nothing. hee

3) Learn Sales

I AGREE. The sales people earn alot. Let me rephrase that: the BEST sales people earn ALOT. Of course, not that all of us should learn sales and become a sales person in a company. In life, all of us are salespersons. We need to learn how to convince our parents to trust us; how to sell a party idea to friends; or sell a cool project idea in cs3216, etc. 

I liked Milton's sharing. :D

I shall end of with a quote from him "Live life with urgency, but do the important stuff!"

L3 HTML5, WP7

Today's lecture brought back memories from my intern company 2359media. I remember i had to come up with this presentation on 'Native Apps vs Mobile Web App'. One of the key point raised in the presentation was the role played by HTML5 in the mobile app. With HTML5, Mobile Web Apps seem to be a better choice for a brand's mobile strategy due to its ability to reach various platforms and it having improved functions to provide rich media interaction to users. I shall not summarize what we all have heard in the lecture, but let me show you some of the cool products of 2359 Media.

An example: rich media ad for HTC on the iPad

Employment of touch-based interactions... Video embedding... Mobile devices coupled with HTML5 redefine advertising. So much more can be incorporated to enhance the user experience.

MobDis, the key product of 2359 Media, are a HTML5 site builder for the non-programmers. Zero coding knowledge is needed to create a complete functional site with simple drag and drop.


Yup, i'm awed by what HTML5 brings to the mobile industry. That's exactly what we should explore for the mobile assignment!

WOW ok i just spent 10+mins watching the Mango demo. WP7 seems pretty cool. I like how it has big words and the pages flips to display. I like the fact that the UI is really inspired from objects in our daily lives (ok maybe not ours, theirs).

However, no matter how good a new technology is, tech diffusion takes a relatively long time. With the mobile phone market alr saturated with iPhones, Android, BlackBerry, blah blah, its gonne be hard for WP7. So the sad thing is, most people are not gonna adopt e new design quick enough due to habits. Evangelists gotta do their thing to tell people how great it is. Hopefully, innovators + early adopters can make a difference after sometime.

L2 principles of software engineering?

So here's what i wiki-ed:

Software Engineering (SE) is a profession dedicated to designing, implementing, and modifying software so that it is of high quality, affordable, maintainable, and fast to build. It is a "systematic approach to the analysis, design, assessment, implementation, test, maintenance and reengineering of software, that is, the application of engineering to software."

Lecture wasn't a dry and boring one. It kind of summarized and simplified alot of complicated info into a simple presentation + sharing session from seniors (to suit non programemrs ^.^).

Key take-aways

1) SE involves Process, Programming,People. In our class, mostly are programmers & designers. Programmers are the core drivers of a project i would say, cause any app would require them to churn out all the complicated system. While the designers are the ones that make the outlook of the app pretty and easy to navigate for users.

2) Software development life cycle (SDLC) is somewhat similar to design iterations taught in previous design modules I took.

Iterative design is based on a cyclic process of prototyping, testing, analyzing and refining. Changes should be made according to feedback and thus the process helps to improve the quality and functionality of a design.

3) Decomposition | Abstraction | Design for Change

4) What I found interesting is the "High Cohesion, Low Coupling" theory. Cohesion i understand. Each module should be highly cohesive such that components are closely related and meaningful. But Low Coupling is kinda different from what i learn from Comms which is always stressing in the importance of making lotsa interactions with people. Everyone talks about networking and based on social networks, everyone is linked together. "6 Degrees of separation" proves that. We have been to told to tt interaction good, thus, without much thoughts, i chose the first diagram in my heart Prof Ben asked in class.

Based the programming pov, perhaps we can reflect abit more and probably too much connections with other people ain't good afterall.

On the side note! I created a foursquare venue for SR@LT19! LOL. Im gonna check in every single time and be the mayor! woohoo!

The very first lecture

I survived day 1!!

What i got out of it...

1) I'm more motivated and less anxious of the module. (erm, as i type this, i just got the jitters agains oh wells.)

2) Prof Ben Leong's motivational words are pretty helpful. Kinda reminded me of the very reason why i chose to take up cs3216.! I really like the second quote.

Make a difference.

What doesn't kill you, makes you STRONG!

3) hearing the seniors' advices and experiences made me more certain of this module. Despite the hell-like workload, they persevered till the end and remembered the joy. I would want to experience that as well. The only concern right now is that i'm really scared of my module combination this sem. 3 project-intensive module and 2 examinable ones. Just gotta pull through i guess.

4) OMG. Everyone is SUPER talented!!! Show & Tell was a blast!!! I was amazed by how diverse the whole class is and especially the pharmacy guy who can do programming. Those engine guys who can code and design.. and even make REAL ROBOTS. I mean look at myself, im merely a nooby designer with limited skills and probably no one knows i can design since i forgot to mention that. I totally should have shown the interactive design project i did last sem that won my team a 2nd placing in the UPA competition held in Atlanta. What i wrote on the CS3216 Superheroes paper was mostly for i'm a blogger", "worked in a real company before" and just 1 or 2 "photoshop guru". :/ Ah well, what's done is done.

I guess what i need to do right now is to keep the PASSION going! Not to let it wither!!!

On a side note, i'm really EXCITED about the saturday workshops!! I finally get to learn some programming. Hope i'm not tooo noob to pick it up.