Ages

Ages since I touch this blog again.
I tried to sway away from the design design this time round.
CSS is not a programming language.
Coding javascript now.

Some points to write later:
- Team takes time to get along and then get into the correct gear.
- Loner phantom. Get a life bro.

Case Study 1

Since most of the stuffs have been answered during class, I cannot help but having my thoughts stray to relate this case study to my latest assignment.

I think this case study should be presented before we start working on the assignments. I really like the lessons learnt (sorry I looked at the solutions :P) Many of them I kind of know intuitively and have applied them in the assignments. But I have not phrased them so nicely:
Lesson 1: Too many choices and aesthetics cause confusion:
I think web/ app design is steering more and more towards simplicity. Even for facebook, I rarely use or even bother to look at all the functions given there. Same applied for most of the websites.

Lesson 2: Users need guidance:
This is a great lesson. We should have more prompts for users in our assignment 2 application. I have started to hear from the users about being unclear on the intention of the application. We should have put some nice slogan next to love, me at least.
I have used the tactics of setting a clear number as a target for user. In my case, I asked my friends to help me send postcards to 3 other friends. However, it would have been integrate a prompt to encourage people to send postcards to friends right in the application.

Lesson 3: The Cold-Start Problem
We need early-adopters. That applies for all products I guess. In our case, it's very much us. I have also spotted friends who are most willing to help me send out postcards.


Just a few things that I want to add on the list of problems in the answer file:
1. Usability vs Aesthetics (Is the interface attractive? Is it functional?)
I really think color is very important. Because it's a contrasting color the most obvious things that I notice and very likly the thing that will direct my attention.
I wonder why the emoticons have not been made more obvious. Because if the intention of the developers is to direct the attention of the users to those emoticons (as said in the brief), they should have been made more obvious.

3. Cycle of interaction & incentives (Are the elements of the app engaging?)
I think the incentives in the game appeals the most to young users. However, I think for this app to make a difference in creating a habit of helping out other people, more thoughts should be paid to crafting the incentives. Also to make the action of helping out last, there must be some way to convert the extrinsic motivations (the incentives that is given to the user) to intrinsic motivation (the incentive that the user creates for himself/herself). But I'm really not sure how to do it since I'm pondering upon that for my other project as well.
Probably this app can be developed to be customized for an actual physical locus. Let say like to have a helping system within a HDB block/ within a school. That is if the app is intended to extend to all sorts of help/ favours. As it is said in the case, the help can be in terms of comments/ advices. If that is the products focus, then the app should be reshaped to focus on assisting that kind of help (may be in terms of easily categorize the comments/ advices etc.. the type of incentive may change also)

Case Study 2

Case study 2:

1. Lanh said, “It would be really bad if we have a great idea but are unable to execute it successfully”.
What are your views? Which is more important - the idea or the execution? Why?

Before I actually joined CS3216, I thought idea is the most important component for the project. "The idea is not good enough" tends to be my constant thought when discussing a project. I found the need to wrestle with myself mentally in order to finalize the "idea" before saying it out loud.
However, I set the resolve for myself this year to start getting my hands dirtier. And I think that's the right way to go:
a. Start with a vision, an inspiration and not an idea. Talk it out. Many times I realize what I can articulate easily to myself does not seem easily understood by others. That's the sign of an idea that needs polishing.
b. The idea should center around the users. So it's better to get a prototype/ some rendering of the UI, UX out first. The "idea" is not a definite thing. It can very well be a complex set of intricacies that need to refine over and over.

So I believe that I need an inspiration to start execution, but I need execution to help me realize, understand, reinforce and materialize the inspiration/vision into a definite idea.

2. What have you learnt about Facebook so far?

It's a good way to waste time. Especially for loners, narcissists.
It's a good distraction, which is a need for everyone. So it hits the need of people. But I don't know if it is the initial intention of Facebook.
Facebook is great at creating reciprocity. Every user's action leads to someone else's actions.

3. Comment on the ideas for Another Life and Fan Gang.
Both ideas don't tick with me so I don't really have anything to comment. My impression for Another Life is that the graphic assets must be really really immense and impressive to make it work.

4. Should the team have changed their idea for the Final Project mid-way or stuck to their original
idea? Why, or why not?

For the purpose of the course, I think the team should have stuck to their original idea. So much time has been wasted on the planning. Maybe someone should be more dictatory, have a stronger voice and just set things on course.

5. List the major problems (obvious and non-obvious ones) in faced by the team? How could they
have done differently and better?

There should be a dominant voice. And try to tone down the expectation. Set easier targets to hit.

6. What did the team do right/well?
I guessed to put in so much time with the planning phase. If the team would have turned those precious hours into actual execution, that may have helped them a lot.

7. What would you do if you were Jeremy on the evening of 24th April (and the deadline for the
final project submission was the next day)?

I would try to get all the team together. Talk to everyone as friends. Eventually after the project I would hope everyone remains friends rather than become like awkward acquaintances.

8. How would you handle a situation where one of your team members is unable to deliver on the
work he/she promised because of personal problems?

I would try to ask him/her out privately but frankly. Like a friend. Again, I value friendship beyond the tasks (at least while the work is still considered a school project by me)
9. What, in your opinion, are the key learning points from this case study?

Talk more. There should be more talk beyond the group meetings.
Set the expectations in each other right from the start.

Dust off

It's been a long time since I touched the blog.

I have had a hectic yet great last 3 weeks.
The inspiration I had was eventually put into our idea for assignment 2. And then there was the pitching session. I think I will learn a lot from Dennis, especially from his resolution when it comes to standing up for his idea. It was great to see the audience seems to be quite receptive towards our idea for the final project. I was so glad when a few people approached us afterwards to offer their facilities to test our prototype.

Some of the ideas presented to us during the pitching were incredibly inspiring. I plan to take on some of them after CS3216 is over. I think some of the ideas are really those that can make this world a better place.

Then came the finishing of our assignment 3. Towards the end of the project, the application seems to appear more and more interesting to us, despite all the bugs that we encountered. Apart from the usual designing tasks, I got to learn quite a lot things regarding coding in this assignment! It was great working with my team. Inian is really good at back-end. Kaizhi is a great coder. He was extremely careful and got a good eye overseeing the whole progress. The code was really organized and neat because of the framework that we used. Zenan was a great front-end designer. He was really good with CSS styling as well as Javascript. I got to do a little bit of coding as I try to adopt the swiping function for our application (but there was a slight glitch that I could not have time to fix though :P, guess what it is ;) ) I also tried to let users arrange postcards in a grid, but then we scraped it because that function is rather useless for a small mobile-device screen. But it was fun doing all those stuffs :)

And now the challenge is to squeeze a few weeks of other modules into these 3, 4 days and get ready for mid-terms. And begin, or rather, continue on the final assignment.

But everything is good :)

Miracles are made by real people (just before deadline)

So we have the 1st assignment of CS2316 done.

I'm happy. Very happy :)

I cannot think of a more interesting way to start this post. Also because I feel so sleepy now. But I cannot wait till tomorrow since I'm just afraid tomorrow I will forget something.

Let's just start with what did not go well first. Since the thing that is read later tends to stay in the mind of the reader. That's why let me start with:

What did not go well:

• I tend to waterfall: at the beginning when I read the assignment, I really thought I would avoid this. But then I realized I only avoided the big waterfall. I let myself get caught in a series of mini waterfalls.
• Basically, I let myself be absorbed too much in the task at hand. I guess I just enjoy drawing new vector graphics and making animations so much. I would and should have made the main page interface better rather than spending time making the animations (even though again, I enjoyed making them a lot)

        (I fell asleep at this point.Restarted from here the day after)

         Eventually we could not implement the animation, which bring me the next point.

• I lack programming knowledge/ experience: so this is a perennial problem. I did not foresee that since we use JQuery and thus the graphics are implemented by divs in a table, it would not be easy to superimpose a transparent gif on top of the existing graphic. But that's ok. I did learn something here.
• The biggest pitfall for me in this assignment is that I could have helped my friend more. Not in terms of coding but rather emotionally and mentally. It was unfortunate that we only had 3 members in the group, plus me practically could not help in programming, the burden of programming fell upon my two group mates. I guess my job is rather easy. Once I have figured out the idea for the graphic, the rest is rather straight forward. But debugging is really a pain. Problems lie everywhere and the stress just never ceased. I did notice the tension and stress level of my two friends have been rising through out the process. I did try to ease up some of that. But I guess I could have done more since I'm the one with the least amount of stress coming from the job. I would have talked to both of them more and tried to get the communication more active. Will take note of this for my next few projects.

What went well:

• Sometimes craziness is mistaken as bravery: in retrospect, we were really crazy. I was kind of stupid when I thought a game like what we had would be easy lol. Basically I thought anything that does not involve strategy should be rather easy to make. And I was so so wrong. Managing real-time responses was just pure crazy. But in a sense, it was a plus point. I got to try something really difficult and now I think I gained quite some experience from it.

• I got to do lots of graphic design: and it was real fun. I really had to put in a lot of thoughts when designing the character and everything else. It was fun using Illustrator. From knowing nothing about Illustrator, now I feel quite comfortable using it.

• I got to handle myself under stress: this one needs not to be explained further. Just work and work and work and work and work and work and work night in night out. And look out for others. That's more important.
• WE DID IT: and that's important. At least we got a basic game completed :) and we completed the assignment together. TOGETHER. That's the most important.

   Some lessons to learn from:

• I should get a better laptop lol: my groupmates told me that my laptop sounded like an airplane taking off. And it did not help when once the laptop is heated up, Illustrator just kept crashing every 5 minutes. I should find a better way to do design or get/ borrow a better laptop so that I can do the graphic designs together with the group. It's really more conducive when we can have every working together.

         On a more serious note:

• The group should make sure the back-end front-end can be implemented at similar pace: Of course this is easier said than done and is the ideal case that everyone hopes to achieve. But otherwise,  it's really hard to do testing without both parts somehow in place.
• May be to help the previous point, we should try to plan the project such that we can test the app module by module: this, hopefully, can guarantee that we can always have a few stuffs to test together.
• Should manage the objectives better: I should use the SCRUM more seriously. Should make sure that everyone sees the purpose of SCRUM and make sure that everyone actually sticks to that (should have someone to chase after group members I guess)

Ipad/FB App Seminar

Pocket

“The greatest gift is a passion for reading.”
^{- Elizabeth Hardwick}

This is just some random quote I found on the Internet. It usually sounds cool to start with a quote.

The presentation by Inian, Junwei (Tuan and Qiao Liang) was really rich in the content. Among all, the three main ideas that I picked out from their presentation are:

1. Understand the users' needs at a deeper level: (and do something about it well)
What we understand: Users want to read.
What Pocket understands: Users want to read anytime, anywhere.
Just small refinements but they are really what made Pocket stick.

The "anytime" part is addressed by the main functionality of Pocket: multiplatform bookmarking. By so doing, Pocket makes sure that the stuffs you read on Ipad, Iphone, Android Phones, your lappie can all be viewed by Pocket. Furthermore, the integration with other applications makes sure that Pocket can capture as many "readable stuffs" in your device into its bookmarking system as possible.
The "anywhere" part is addressed by the extra functions offered by Pocket: the day/night modes in which the brightness is adjusted to fit the surrounding's light. Pocket can also store news and video to read and watch offline where there is no internet connection.

2. Commercial potential (or the lack of it)
I did not understand the rationale why Pocket went from a paid app to a free app. My best guess (and I think the group's best guess) is that in the long run, as Pocket gradually builds up a large customers' base (5 million up to now as presented by the group), it can (and is suspiciously doing) mine users' data and sell to interested companies. However, in the long spell when there are new rules and regulations imposed to protect the privacy right of people online, the revenue for companies that mine users' data, Pocket in particular, will be affected.

3. The interface:
In general, Pocket portraits a clean and sleek UI. There can be improvements, however, especially in the organization of the bookmarks, possibly to have some form of categorization of the news by the user's interests or habits.

My impression while using Pocket is that: can it be combined with StumbleUpon? Since Pocket is great for bookmarking interesting pages, what would be better if we can bookmark the random pages that we chance upon but  not having time to read? Especially considering people's habit: if they read a particular news source as a habitual thing, they may allocate their time for that. But for pages that they randomly visit but find interesting, they may want to leave that for a read later. So Pocket may consider allowing people to access random pages as one of its own functions.
Moreover, in order to commercialize its service, Pocket may consider a pay-per-view model by incorporating with some news agencies.
So maybe Pocket can function as a standalone browser? That will be easier for Pocket to implement the "stumble upon" function. My impression is that once they get used to Pocket, it may start to feel odd for people to browse the websites on one browser and read the bookmarked pages on Pocket separately. Also, that may make the collaboration with news agencies easier as Pocket can serve as the client for their web services.
Moreover, Pocket may add advertisements as the waiting screen when the pages are loaded? I'm not sure how they are going to do that since advertisement will also involve some waiting time. Possibly to upload the advertisement in the background and keep them offline so that those ads can accessed without any lag? And only aesthetically appealing advertisements should be put up to ensure that the display of advertisement will not disturb the users.

And now is the random part. I think it would be nice to have everyone present during the seminar. I understand that many of us are not that good in public speaking and presentation, but we should try. That's the whole spirit of this course and education in general I believe. I understand it takes great effort to step out under the bright light and speak up. I'm bad in presentation. But I WAS TERRIBLE in presentation. If anyone noticed, I had to put my left hand in my pocket and my right hand constantly made random movements during the presentation. I know they are the signs of nervousness that I must overcome. Or at least to hide them. But I have improved a lot from what I used to be. Sometimes we just need to run into the fire, and if we don't get burnt, the world seems quite cool after that.

No one can teach u passion

I saw Su Yuen's comment on one of the CS3216's blogs.
"The sky is not the limit. There's still outer space!"

That's funny :D

FB assignment: Pallav's still trying to debug the integration between front-end and back-end. He said he got a basic game running alr. Hopefully we can resolve that soon.

I have done quite a few stuffs for the graphics of the game. Hopefully we can get the code up soon so I can add on the buttons and minor things in the UI that I cannot foresee yet.

3rd Assignment: the anti-inflammation pill taken together with coffee really works like drug! I felt so high today during my tuition and came up an idea for the 3rd assignment (and potentially for the last assignment too!). For the 1st assignment I really love the idea of the game since I really want to have some idea of how to make a game so that I can transfer that into "gamifying" my DCC project. And the game we are building seems really fun to me. But for the 3rd assignment I really want to create st that makes a serious difference (through a fun way though).

 That's it for now. The 6 hrs sleep yesterday really worked wonder. But still miles to go before I sleep.