SYD701 Journal 5 8/5/20

Soft Systems is a methodology which allows us to work with real work example and convert them into a form which can be used with software development.

This is done by breaking down the real world solutions into logical pieces. These pieces better match how systems manage information.

The real world can be messy and their is a lot of ‘noise’ when it comes to determining what is important for a system. Tools like rich pictures and root definitions allow us to filter out the outside noise and convert real world rules into logical statements.

A rich picture is a sketch which represents how we see one entity relating to other entities. When we did this in class we misunderstood what we were meant to be doing. We created a single picture for the entire NMIT but we should have selected an actor and created the picture from their prospective.

Root Definitions is like a written form of a rich picture where each definition explains how Clients, actors, transitions, owners, world views and environments relate. You need to create a root definition for each actor.

After that we can convert to a conceptional model. A conceptual model doesn’t follow all of the available rules for the system we are using but is close to a local diagram and therefore allows us to model data in a way which we can check against our real world rules.

RES701 Journal 5 8/5/20

Today I provided I presentation about randomized trials. A randomized trial is where a group of participants are separated into two groups randomly. One group is given a placebo and the other is giving what is being tested. The treatment for both remains the same.

I don’t know in what way you would use randomized trial in I.T. This is because Randomize trials are generally used in the medical field and the social sciences. If you were ever working with these fields you would have to think about random trials for how you develop the application.

Isolating the group can allow the us to find out if the target of the test is actually effective or if the treatment is the coarse of the results. However, there are several considerations to make when it comes to running these trails. The trail can’t filter out influences out side the control of the treatment. If there is a better alternative for the tested trail it can be hard to find participants.

A part from those minor consideration their is also the moral considerations of given something which you know may not work or withholding something which may work. In recent years these have been taking into account but for most of the trails I found a lot of them may not allow for correction after the trail.

Randomize trail lies heavily on the number side of the research paradigm. I say this because the design of randomize trials is to ‘sacrifice’ some people to gain number which help other people. Even with considerations for morality it is still rooted in a heavy science side.

DAT601 Journal 10

This week we work with Vsphere to set up for our projects.

I have used Vsphere a lot so I didn’t have any problems setting it up. Vsphere is slow, like it always is but it’s easier to use than installing SQL sever on every computer I own and finding a lan cord.

I can’t wait to start working with SQL.

I an slightly worried about having issues with connectors in Vsphere as I very often had issues with the connectors between computers becoming disconnected when I was working with it. This probably wont be a problem because it was set up by someone who knows what they are doing.

Unlike when I was working with Vsphere the computers don’t seem to shut down after a certain amount of time. This is useful as I can leave my work and come back to the same place.

Sorry I didn’t have a lot to write this week.

DAT601Journal 9 + Holiday

This weeks class we went over the next assessment. During this time we brainstormed possible entitles and attributes.

This brief seems to be a lot larger than the the previous assessment. This could be because this assessments is a lot more open ended than the first, if this is the case I am probably over complicating it.

One of the big parts of this assessment will be working out the business rules early on in the assessment. In the practice milestone we didn’t complete the business rules early enough, this lead to many changes in the design. I would like to avoid this this time around.

Databox
ID
Longitude
Environmental Configuration
Latitude
Temperature
Humidity
Ambient light strength
Orientation 
GPS
Part
Manufacturer
Maintenance Date
Distributor
Maintenance Record
Mechanic 
Date
Description
Contract
ID
Video
Type
Stream
ID
Zone
Name
Subscription
Fee(Base price, discount, total price)
Subscription Date
Contact Details
Address
Organization Name
Platinum Subscription
Super Subscription
Staff
Sales person
ID
Administrative Executive role
My Thoughts On Possible Entities

Currently I have subscribers as their own table but it might be possible to reduce the number of table depending on what business this brief has.

I think it is interesting how the databases also has has a table for their parts and then their parts have records of maintenance. To me this wouldn’t be the sort of this I would think of if I wasn’t given a prompt.

One business rule which was mention is how the ‘3D Video Live steams’ always has a complete view of it’s surrounding but only certain subscribers can move these live streams.

During this time we work as a group to complete our first assessment. At this point we have move directly to Microsoft teams to better manage our files, we still use Facebook to organize our meeting.

To manage our work we have assigned one team member to manage a single word document which contains all of our work, the other group member post individual documents. This prevents work from being over written.

Currently I have been working on the written discussion for our conceptual ERD though the process I have found a few issues with the ERD this lead to some small changes to the entire project. As previously mentioned we could have avoided this by completing our business rules first.

Additionally I found a few things in our design which were not wrong but in the future I would do different.

He we have chosen to to have items be singular but I would prefer to have items be many to many as it would allow us to reuse the same items over and over. In our design this could have implications. For example it could mean that a character couldn’t pick up two of the same item.

RES701 Journal 4 30/3/20

Computational Thinking

Sourse 1

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zp92mp3/revision/1

Found though Google with a search for Computational Thinking. Is a web article on the subject. I couldn’t Find date or aurther.

I think this article is morderatly believable as the BBC would be considured to be an OK sourse. Additionally the information here is presented like a teaching suplement, making me trust it more. I would expect the information here to be summerised and maybe missing some information for the sake of brevidy.

Sourse 2

Found though youtube Computational Thinking. Is a youtube video public on 9 of May 2018 by Paxton/Patterson.

I don’t expect the information in this video to be take full. This is becasue the video is particlly short, this mean the information is proberly summerised to an extreme length. Allow this would normally would make the information un trust worthy but the video has it’s comments disable. This means their is no place for scrutieny of the video.

Sourse 3

https://search-proquest-com.nmit.idm.oclc.org/docview/2026813718/3C0AA87489F0439DPQ/2?accountid=40261

Found Though Proquest with a search for Computational Thinking filtering for schoolary Journals.


Being a Schoolarly Journal this is likely going to have more credible information. Ontop of that several people worked on the article meaning their were multiple voice involved. The article was written in a professional maner, without summerising the infomration that was found. The article also provides a references so it would be possible to check their sourses as well.

Virtualisation Technology

Source 1

Found though a youtube search for Virtualisation Technology. Published by IBM Cloud on the 29 of March 2019.

The overwellming amount of possitive feedback does add to the sence of credibility but the channel is trying to sell a product so it is likely somewhat biased.

Source 2

https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://en.wikipedia.org/&httpsredir=1&article=3243&context=etd

Found though the reference section on the Virtualisation wikipideia page.

This is a thesis paper submited by Charles David Graziano in 2011.

This paper is extremely credible writting by someone with a lot of knolegde on the subject published profesionally and reviewed as part of the process. Like most acidemenic paper this one has many references.

Source 3

https://search-proquest-com.nmit.idm.oclc.org/docview/1519835591/54A3A71C195846F7PQ/3?accountid=40261

A magazen article published in Nov 15, 2013 in PCQuest. Found though a serach for the term ‘Virtualisation Technology’ in the titles of any articles.

This text is slightly old and might be out of date. There aren’t any references and I’ve never heard of the magiaze before therefore I don’t give it much crediblilty.

RES701 Journal 3 30/3/20

For this class we discussed different research paradigms. A research paradeign is the set of ontology and epistemology belief which the researcher is incorperatied into their research. This is simlar to a concept I discussed in a previous blog.

The purpose of a research paradigms so that everyone is on the same page to what the researcher believes and what assumtions they have made. Simlar to a methophor a research paradigm allows the researcher to implie a large amount of information with out having to state it all.

The Interpretivist Paradigm

The interpretivist Paradigm is a research methodlogy basied on the the premist we can not sepate our understanding of the world from what were observe. Because of this it is believed that research can be conducted via negations and interview. Interpretivist generally relies on gathering of information from people rater than previous data.

I personally don’t like this research paradigm as I would prefer to do everthing by statics and ‘proven facts’. However I believe this is an important paradigm espically when working with people. The concept of not being able to seperate facts from personal experience is a concept that I experience all of the time. Because of this I understand to when dealing with people fact are normally out weighed by feelings. This makes Interpretivist useful when dealing with a human element.

The Positivist Paradigm

Positivist Paradigm is what I would thing of when you talk about anything to do with the sciences that I learnt in high school. Positivist believes that the world exist regardlise of human obsevation and therefore can be measured and controlled in a logical way.

The Positivist Paradigm is what I would can my safezone for research paradigms. Like previously meationed I understand it and it was what I was taught.

Positivist is vary good at producing numbers. Though the ‘scientific method’ Positivist can product consistant statics. The problems with Positivist are that the data that we recieve can be interptied in different ways and nothing we produce is ever 100% cetain. Addtionally Positivist tends to condrtict what many people observe.

Critical or Subtle Realist Paradigm

This is were I believe that my world view comes from.

The Realist Paradigm is about how the world exist apart from ourselves but we lack the ability to interpritie properly. Realist means that data we colect should be future scrutines to hopefully gain the most accrate form of data. Additionally Realist tends to preform experements more in context that Positivem.

I have seen many ‘scientific studies’ which come under scrutiny because their are visable bias which come into play in the study. Because of this their are many studies which have conflicting resaults for example I have seen conflicting resaults for things like ‘Does negitive reinforment work’ and ‘Do video game corse violence’. In a realist persepective these studies can be looked at and broken down to see why we might have gotten differing resaults.

Personally I believe that each of the three paradigms I have talked about have their own places and can be used to gain knolegde.

SYD701 Jounal 4 30/3/20

This leason we went over the most popular development methodologies. To do this we devided into teams and created presentations for each of the different methodolgies.

For our presentation we had to cover Waterfall, V-model, Sprial and Feature Driven Development.

Waterfall is the basic origional model where you complete each stage before moving on to the next. Easy to plan out but no garenty that the product will be what the customer wants. V-Model is basied on the Waterfall model this time with a testing phase which corrisponds to a design phases and the implementation phase. Sprial is an iterative verson of the Waterfall model. Where at the end of each development cycle the process repeats, allowing us to deal with unknown risks. FDD is an agile process in which features are prioitsed and the aim of the methodogly is to get the features complete.

More information can be found in the presentation.

Most of the methodolfies that we covered in class either used Waterfall as a base or agile as a base. Most Waterfall basied models have the problem where they are easy to plan but can’t deal with change vary well or their like Sprial were the purpose is to add some adaptiblity. While agile are dynamic but normally require an added amount of planning as most places use a varations such as SCRUM ratter than agile itself. Without additional components agile methodlgy can get side tracked with many changes.

My favorite mehtodogly is the Big Bang methodolgy. Most personal projects I try and create are text base, for fun and created basied on speratic ideas I have. Most of the time these ideas are deep enough to stand up on their own. Normally the analyses phase of most models would mean that these projects never happen but with the Big Bang model I can sink time into an idea without worring about it’s vaiablity. This is good as the time sink aspect is the focus of the work rather than the end result. Additionally because something is parcially created it can be retooled and reused in future project making my personal process more like an itteratice feature driven approch.

DAT601 Journal 7 & 8 27/3/20

For thw first class this week we discussed how to convert to a logical ERD.

Some of the rules for this conversion are. Attributes stay the same but compisite attribute are broken down into seperate attributes. The main different is that entites look different.

An example of a entitee with attributes form out first logical diagram.

Some of the relationship in our diagram have to change. And our cadadate keys get put though some more criteria to check if they will work. One to One relationships get to remain the same and the foreign key gets put in either table. One to Many relation ships get the key place in the many side of the diagram. Many To Many have a new entite place in between the two table to properly relate them. Multi valued and specialisations get extended into their own classes which relate back to the origionals.

Additionally any relationship with attributes must ever become tables or if approprate have the attributes moved.

The diagram now uses crows foot which is the diagraming style that I am most use too. Crows foot uses a 3 pronged foot to represent a many relationship. A one pronged foot to represent a one relationship and a 0 or 1 to represnet optionality.

For the second class this week we have been looking at normalisation which is something we have to do before we create our data dictonary. The purpose of normalisation to move data in a way which makes it easier to work with. By sepeating attributes into table which logical corolation.

Their are many different levels of normalisation but for this class we have go Boycost normal form which is half way between third and forth normal form.

1NF requires us to identify the primary key as well as any data which seems to be compisite or multivalued. This data is normalised.

2NF We remove any pasical depedencies. A pasical dependence is an attribute which does not directly relate to the primary key. These dependecies should be moved to their own table.

3NF is when we remove any transitive dependencies. A transitive dendency is when on attribute relates to another though a non-primary key attribute.

DAT601 Journal 5 & 6 10/3/20

For the first class for this week we learnt about how to represent specialization on our ERD diagrams.

There are different types of specialization. These are represented by both o and d. D stands for disjointed and O stands for overlapping. A disjointed specialization means that a object can only be one or the other. While overlapping specialization can be both.

For our project the we have one specialization for each type.

The relation ship between the different types of tiles is disjointed as a tile must be either a home tile or a game tile but can’t be both. This is the opposite for users as a user must be either a player or and administrator but a user can also be both. Their is also the option where a type of object can be specialize but doesn’t need to be.

For the second class this week we looked into common problems which occurs with ERDs. These problems take on two forms a chasm which means that one table can’t reach another table even thought this would be useful.

The other type of issue is a fan trap which is when one attribute relates to many other attributes but those attributes don’t relate to each other.

Both errors can be fixed by adding a relationship between the to entities. In our diagram I have had to add an additional entities to better allow data to flow around our database.

This relation ship is important because I allows us to manage wither or not a player is actively playing the game or if they are just on the menu.

Our group still does understand the game concept as such we ended up playing a game with paper so every one know what is going on. Because of this game we figured out the game doesn’t currently work properly because of the map shape. This has lead to changes to the map but not to the ERD diagram. Hopefully storyboards we will all be on the same page.

It now occurs to me that taking pictures of this mock game would have made for good storyboards.

SYD701 Journal 3 12/3/20

What are some common examples?

Their are two type of metaphors which are used in I.T. visual metaphors and verbal metaphors. Visual metaphors are things like website shopping cart or on and off buttons on appliances. Verbal metaphor are things like the world wide web or viruses.

Why do we use them?

We use metaphors to create a link between the real world and digital technology. This allows us to better explain abstract concepts.

Do we always know when we are using them?

No, most users don’t actively think about metaphors when using technology. The purpose of systems developers using metaphors is so users don’t have to think about new concepts.

What is useful about using metaphors?

Metaphors allow us to create exceptions about how something works. By using a metaphor we can convey more information then if we were to spell out how something works.

What are the issues in using metaphors?

People can’t ignore metaphor so they may create exceptions which don’t effect reality. Additionally people might misunderstand metaphor. For example i always though that the power symbol was a 1 and a 0 but it’s a broken circuit.