Recently, we had an all school meeting in which each Fellow presented his or her project. After having a few meetings with Mrs. Carsley and the other Fellows, I wrote down my talking points for my presentation, including what my project is, how I came to create the project, what I did over the summer, and how I will move forward. I really enjoyed hearing about each Fellow's project so far in each of the presentations, but was particularly upset by the Zoom-bomber who interrupted our discussions of our hard work and dedication over the past few months. Overall, I felt pretty confident when giving my presentation, and am excited to see how everyone reacts to my finished project in the spring!
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I met with Mr. Baraty today to discuss my fall goals and timeline. We both came to the consensus that I would be taking a slight break from the coding until after November 1st when my college applications are in. As I have said before, my strong work from the summer has paid off in allowing me to take this break, but I will definitely need to keep up my schedule as I go into November to make sure all the games are finished in time. As for the goals I need to accomplish for my project, they are pretty straightforward: code the games. This is the part of my project that will take the longest and makes up the largest part of it. This will continue into the spring when I will make the finishing touches to the application and test it out with some kids. I am excited to continue working on my Fellows Project in the coming months, and am excited to see what my peers can create as well!
After having a successful meeting with both Mrs. Carsley and my mentor, Mr. Baraty, we all decided that I should take a break on my Fellows Project for the next few months while I work on my numerous college applications. This was achieved through my dedicated work completed over the summer which provided me with a solid foundation for continuing my Fellows Project come November. I am still very excited to be a part of this project and am looking forward to continuing Mapplet in the winter!
I have been working diligently over the past few days to finish the first game, which I have successfully done! I think I have eliminated as many bugs I could find as possible, but further testing will have to be done. In the last few days of August, I will continue looking at the code for the game and application to improve it, but the game is playable to the standards I have set as of right now. By September 1st, I will have the new version of the application with the first game uploaded on the home page for both Mac and Windows, so everyone can try it out! As I always say, any suggestions are extremely helpful and I will use them to improve my application. I am excited to start the school year and continue working on the application as we progress.
I have been working hard on the first game over the past few weeks. This game is titled "Dangerous Drops" for now and has drops falling from the sky and the user must click on the drop to solve the math problem in it before it reaches the bottom of the screen, when they would lose a life. I am running into a few hurdles along the way but I am powering through with the development of this specific game. I should have it finished by the end of the month before school starts. I feel that a schedule of coding one game a month will be perfect, with the last game being finished in March. This would leave April for finalizing the application and May for testing. So far, I am on schedule and am excited to continue working on the application. A picture of the first game in action so far has been uploaded to the Project Gallery on the home page of this website, go check it out!
I spent a lot of time recently figuring out how to upload a beta version of the application for both Mac and Windows, as well as make it intuitive to download (after all, I want people with all levels of experience with computers to be able to access it). After a lot of trial and error, I was finally able to export the application for both Mac and Windows (with Java embedded in each version so no need to separately install Java), create a shareable folder via OneDrive, and write directions for each version on how to use and operate it. I also spent a long time modifying my code to make the application work on virtually any screen resolution (by scaling hard-coded numbers based on width and height of the user's screen). I also tested it on a bunch of different computers including Mac and Windows and different screen resolutions. Posting the beta version wasn't the most important reason for going through all of this, but more for creating the system for the user to download the final version once it is finished. Should anybody have any concerns about downloading the beta version or using it, feel free to contact me!
After finishing my game descriptions and starting to code, I really got more into my element. I love coding and this was honestly no different. It definitely does not feel like a chore at all but is quite fun. As a result of this, I am ahead of schedule with my goals and have pretty much finished my July goal at this point. After adding some of the finishing touches on the menu system which was my goal this month, I will most likely start coding the games earlier than expected. Hopefully, this will allow me some more time to add more features to the application than what I had originally, perhaps adding on a spelling mode or more games. I am absolutely enjoying this project thus far and am so happy I applied for it! When I am finished with the menu system, I will update the download buttons on the home page of this website so users can test it out. If there are any bugs or suggestions, I will be happy to look at them to improve the application!
In addition, I have changed the name of the project. It might continue to change in time based on what features I add to the application. Over the last few days, I have been working to come up with the various games that I will be including in my application. For each game, I have come up with a preliminary set of instructions, an objective, the parameters of each difficulty level, as well as the modes. In total, there are eight games. This number may increase or decrease depending on how easy or difficult it is to finish the application on time. Out of the eight games, six are single player, and two are multiplayer. This is slightly different from my original plan as I thought that creating a few multiplayer games will allow users to play the games together and compete by testing their mathematical knowledge. With this done, my first summer goal is completed, and I can now move on to my second summer goal: programming the menus and navigation of the application. The Word document detailing my various games is attached.
Today, I had my preliminary Fellows meeting with Mr. Baraty, where we talked about my summer plan and moving forward with my project. We discussed my summer 40% and how keeping on task throughout summer is of utmost importance. Since I have pretty good background knowledge for my project, we both felt that I can go ahead and begin working on it to complete my summer goals. We both are very excited to see my project progress, as well as learn new methods and techniques for the Processing coding language throughout to make my code more efficient and succinct.
On 6/2/2020, this past Tuesday, I, along with the other Fellows participated in a Leadership lab to discuss getting started with our projects and creating our websites. In it, we accomplished a number of tasks, such as creating a project pitch and understanding what attracts the attention of others to our projects. We also started the process of building our websites, to which we were left to finish them by this coming Monday, 6/8/2020. I felt that this leadership lab was especially helpful in allowing me to further understand the general idea of my project and how to present that to others who have never heard of it. Getting tips on starting my website was also very valuable.
As I start my project, I hope to continue to stay motivated as I was this schoolyear in accomplishing the task at hand. Since it is summer, that might be difficult. However, my love for coding and activities similar to it should provide enough motivation to complete my 40% over the summer. The first step will be to build a complete outline of the games and menu systems of the application, so that I can have a solid foundation to build off of when I begin coding. This will take place throughout the month of June. In July, I plan to build the menus and navigation systems of the application so that I have a backbone to work off of when I code the games. In August, I will code roughly 1/3 of the games that will be incorporated in my application, building off of the menus I will have built in July. This will then bring me to the start of the schoolyear, where I will finish coding the games, finalize the application, and test it before Fellows presentations next May. My greatest concern at this point is being able to meet the goals I have presented. I know that I have the skills for it, but I will most definitely need to put in a substantial amount of work to make the final project what I want it to be. However, I have no doubt that I will be able to do this, and create an application that not only works, but is fun and intuitive to use. |
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May 2021
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