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Team:Wellesley HCI/Notebook/LindaNotebook
From 2012.igem.org
Linda's Notebook
May 29: First Day of Research
I woke up bright and early to be surprised that the whole Lakehouse was already bustling with activity. Then, I realized that almost everyone was doing research at Wellesley, so pretty much, everyone walked to the Science Center together!
Today was the first day of research. My group met together, did some intros, and gave an overview of the whole lab. We went over briefly what kind of projects we’re going to be working on and the activities that we’re going to do. And they’re all going to be super exciting!
I’m going to be working with another lab partner on building softwares on the Beast (aka a tabletop interaction surface, but it’s almost the size of a bed!), something unique and made especially by and for our lab. But first we had to make sure that it can display images well, so our task today was to align the mirrors that project the image of the beast to create a desktop smooth background. However, these mirrors were very sensitive and we had a limited amount of space to work with! We were under the table for the whole time and everything took a lot of patience. We all knew that we can get our images aligned and calibrated, but it’s just going to take time. So there we are, under the table/ screen, fiddling around with the knobs, and trying to figure out with way to turn it tighter/ looser (lefty loosy, righty tighty) for the whole day. But wala! It finally worked. We were able to get our images align and smooth out the pattern on top. It was very satisfying to see it work and to know that we did it!
June 4: Microsoft
Today, our HCI lab got to visit a branch of Microsoft that was located at Cambridge, MA. I was super impressed with Microsoft. First of all, they had an amazing view of Charles River. A whole panorama! It was absolutely gorgeous and stunning even though today was cold and raining.
Their recruitment and education chair presented Microsoft 8 to us and their tablet. It was amazing. I’ll be honest and say that I had my doubts about a tablet version of Microsoft because ipad is already amazing. But I quickly learned that Microsoft has some pretty nifty ideas too. With swips on the sides and touches on the corners of the screen, Microsoft 8 seems to be as lively and useful as it can be too! I was really amazed at what other options and ideas Microsoft 8 is going to put forth in the realm of technology. And after seeing and learning about this whole thing, I am absolutely amazed and excited about the technology that I get to work with in the lab and the possibilities/ creativities of the next generation technology.
June 5: BioBuilder
We had a Synthetic Biology bootcamp in MIT and it was pretty cool. (And for once, I didn’t have to wake up at 6:30 in the morning! Wohoo!!)
First of, MIT is just amazing. There is so much stuff/ brain power here and I got the feeling that if you want to learn something or just anything, there will be at least one professor who’s speciality and interest is just that!
The Natalie, an MIT Prof, taught us and gave us an intro on Synthetic Biology. We had lectures in the morning, and labs in the afternoon. She’s amazing! She’s super knowledgeable about the biology, explains things well, and keeps the class interested. It’s very interesting to apply the biology that I learned at Swells and be able to make something out of it.
An igem team from the past came up with the idea of E. coli that smells like wintergreen and bannana based on where the cell is at the cell cycle. It was also very interesting to know that students had to categorize the smell of bananas on how strong the smell is, so on the right, there is a gradient of strength of banana smells! I did smell those and the strength of the weakest one to the strongest one is very different!
June 6: Diamond Spin
My topic is on the macro-development of the beast. I’m super excited to learn about the beast. As I researched for other similar systems that have been developed, I learned that many researchers are aware of the idea of a multitouch table, however, the topic is so new that people are still trying to figure out what is the best way to use a tool like this (or if there is even a best way). There wasn’t really much about a system as big as our beast, making the idea of getting the chance to work with the beast very exciting to me.
During research, I found this app called DiamondSpin, and it’s super cool. It addresses the idea of seeing/ moving objects around different side of the table. It also addresses the idea of what space is public/ private/ important in relation to the workflow.
Feel free to check out (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ok1n0lwY1ZA). It’s pretty cool!
June 7: Interaction with the BEAST
In research today, we finalized our presentation on interactions with the Beast (aka. our bed-sized tabletop) the Beast and everything that I read finally seems to come together. I learned that there are so many different systems out there, but there is so much more you can do with it! Everything that you dreamed of as a computer is totally possible, and it’s probably something that people are already working towards!
For example, today, I learned about Kinect, which senses human as a blob. However, if we represent a human being as joints and points, we can have finer movements. And by connecting the Kinect to a tabletop (with the appropriate software/ apps), we will be able to use gestures to control the tabletop surface without having to touch it.
There are just so much cool things out there! It’s amazing.
June 12: BU + iGEM
Today, we visited BU and learned and bonded with the BU team that we’re going to work with over the summer. We learned about biology and about the projects that the BU team will be trying to do this summer. After today, I realized that iGem is such an amazing opportunity. The fact that we get to not only work on CS (something that I am passionate about) but also learn about synthetic bio and that iGem combines these 2 is just so cool! I can’t wait to brainstorm and come up with ideas/ projects to work on for the rest of the summer.
June 13: Brainstorm
Today was a busy day. In the morning, a man from Agilent came to check out our work, and I helped on presenting an app with Consuelo, Kara, and Veronica. In the afternoon, BU came over and we started a major brainstorming session. First, we started by just gong around the room, individually, and just writing down ideas that came to our mind. Then, we regrouped and discussed the major topics together. This was actually a lot of fun because we were writing down all the ideas we could think of. All of the whiteboard around the room was filled with words or pictures. Everyone has a chance to speak up and say something that caught their interest. All ideas were welcomed. So it was really cool to see how everyone’s minds work and the different ideas we could all come up with. In a matter of minutes, the whiteboard of the topic that we’re discussing would be filled with ideas with all colors of the marker.
This definitely was very cool. However, brainstorming can still be hard. For example, for Semantic Search, we couldn’t really break through the loop. We kept on going in circles and circles and no one really could think of an idea that could solve our problem.
Overall, all this brainstorming is exhausting. I was tired at the end of the day. And tomorrow is an even larger brainstorming session. I hope that we can have some kind of product. That we will find a good idea to work with that will be baller for igem and that we will have a lot of fun with it. I know we can do it. Just gotta wait and see what our combined of brain power can come up with.
June 14: Brainstorm and more
Today, we spent a whole day brainstorming even more. Everyone was tired at the end of the day.
What was really cool about today was that in our research lab, we are also going to have a CS + Art project (MAS) going on. When this group is brainstorming, our instructor invited an Art Swells prof to come and give insights. And then when we were discussing about the idea of an eLabNotebook (an electronic smart lab notebook), the MIT prof who taught us synthetic bio engineering came too and gave her insights.
The fact that we were able to work with so many diciplines across the field was really amazing. But what I really learned today was the fact that people from different subject areas really do view objects/ events differently. Though we may only be undergraduate students, a CS major student vs a Bio major student already have some perceptible perspective differences. Interesting, huh?
June 19: Starting to code!
Research is finally rolling. We realized that we don’t actually have a lot of time left to really implement a project, because not only do we need to code multiple projects, but we also need to analyze, design, implemet, and test it multiple times. With only 7 weeks left, that’s actually not a lot of time. So today, I was assigned with the back-end of this MoClo planner that we’re going to try to work on.
I know some bio, but in the end, I kept on running back and forth (literally- cause somehow we’re at separate rooms) between our bio team and our cs team, so that I didn’t break any bio/cs rules. I realized that I really do enjoy working in an interisciplinary field. The idea that each people specialize at a different topic and we all come and work together, contributing a different field of knowledge and perspective is just so cool!
== June 21: Down...load...ing...==Down..load…ing…. (so much waiting…)
I’m becoming such a tech person! I had been trying to download microsoft 8 for the whole day yesterday and today and it finally got to work around noon. So now, I need to transfer what I’ve been working on in Dreamweaver to Microsoft Visual Studio Express, which to be honest, I don’t have a clue. I’ve been trying to work my way around it but i seriously would need some help. I’m definitely learning a lot, and it’s a lot of fun tyring to fit my piece of work with that of my other lab group’s work. It’s all coming together and I’m really excited for it!!
man. Im getting really comfortable with computer hardware/ moving monitors around! I love working with big monitors!!
June 27: Learning so much
Today, I decided to get down to the basics and learned pretty much the whole CS110 course in a day. It wasn’t too bad because I’ve picked up a lot of things already from my trial-and-error method of coding (but that has been taking me a very long time so I’ve decided to come down to it and go back and review the basics so that I wouldn’t miss anything important). So I picked up some more stuff, like margin vs padding. and some random details. It was definitely helpful. And I’m hoping that my last bit of implementation can come soon. like now. but it’s not there yet. ohwell.
June 28: Textfile -> JavaScript
This morning, I’ve been trying to make javascript read into an external html file (because that was what I decided our backend is going to combine with our front end), but I had the hardest time.
(I’ve gone through using ActiveXObject, but I didn’t want to lower my/ client’s security. And I’ve gone through fso/ fopen/ fclose, but it was to no avail. Then, I read websites that said that it’s impossible (which at my current state, it’s actually quite discouraging, b/c what I wanted to do must be something that can be done. I know it can. ugh).
I thought that I could finish it by our progress meeting with orit, but of course, time came by as quickly and as it goes, and there I am, with only a website backbone. Well. At least the website look nice, so I can show off that, but still, I didn’t get what I wanted to done.
So after fiddling our this problem already for a couple of days, I decided to just go/ take a break, let my mind think of something.
But miraculously, after lunch, I somehow stumbled upon a website with the code that I haven’t seen. So, my strategy for now has always been trial-and-error, which is somewhat time costly, cuase though I can understand the code, I’m still a little iffy whether the program will be able to run smoothly with it. And to my surprise, as I clicked the run button in the microsoft visual studio express 2012, it actually worked! I even jumped up on my seat and put my arms up. hahaha. A couple people around me turned and looked at what I was doing (but quickly fell back to their work).
But man, that felt great. It felt as if a huge stone has been lowered (or whatever that phrase is, you know what i mean).
June 29: BU, MIT iGEM
For research today, we decided to go into Boston and hang out with MIT and BU Igem team (which is perfect b/c I didn’t have to wake up early!).
We went to see Walter Lewin’s physics lecture, and he is a very cool guy indeed. The auditorium quickly filled up and there were camera crews as well. As I listened to the lecture, it was all review for me, but he still made physics very fasinating. One thing that really attracted me the most was the fact that he was very passionate about physics. Everything was “earthshocking”. Everything was “amazing”. And the fact that the demonstrations were all related, really cool, and perfectly done was very fascinating too! He used big metal ladders, polaroid cameras, and the fact that he was so prepared/ organized was just amazing! After listening to his lecture, I really want to attend his other lectures becuase it was just so fun.
For the rest of the day, we hanged out with MIT. Of course, we waitied for a VERY LONG Chipotle line (which was soo worth it), and then visited MIT’s labs and how their iGEM team worked. MIT has a huge team (15 people or so), compared to BU (2 people. hehe). They were interested in what we’re doing and we were also interested in what their doing. And again, their labs are pretty cool. The fact that MIT has so many resources just amazes me all the time!
(ohwell. some labs don’t really like undergraduates.)
As for our group, after this long day, we decided to take a visit into Chinatown and had some bubble tea. I had a watermelon juice with grass jelly. I’ve never had that combination before but I figured that since I like both ingredients individually, they must (probs) taste good combined as well!
July 3: Programming
Programming can be quite hard sometimes. (I’m dealing with UI (user interfaces) = I need to make a database structure that is nice and pretty). Somehow, I kept on getting bugs and no matter what I tried, I couldn’t really do what I want the program to do. So hopefully, I can get it done soon, because i have soo much other work to do.
And today, we got 2 kids from a nearby highschool that will be joining our lab. I got assigned to one of the kids and to think that they are like 4 years younger than me, is kinda bizarre. I remember being in their place, testing out what it means to be doing research at a college/ graduate environment, only to find that I am learning a lot of things on my own instead of being taught of it by teachers. I remembered back then, secretly wishing that they can just take the time to teach me instead of having me to learn on my own (cause it’s so much harder to do that). But now, I realized that today, I did the exact same thing to the high school kids these grad students did to me. I gave my student a basic overview of what their project is going to be like and what they are going to be working on for this summer. Then, I pretty much gave them a lot of resources and have them figured it out themselves. I realized that I allowing my student a lot of opportunity and independence, because I trust that they can handle the task and that if they have any questions, they will come asking one of us. This is a lot of responsibility, and it’s all about learning how to learn. I suppose.
It’s interesting that I was in their shoes, and in a couple of years, they are going to be in mine. I wonder where I will be in the future.
July 6: Almost there?
Well. I got most of what I needed to do done. But I still haven’t nailed the user design quite right. So I’m back to researching what looks pretty and what not. So in lab today, everyone were all pretty nervous because we’re kinda behind schedule. User studies are supposed to be done this past week, but most of us haven’t finished coding. Though each of us has made significant improvements, we’re really not quite there yet. Hopefully, by next week, we’ll be able to formulate it all.
July 9: Better Front End
In order to design a better UI for our datasheet, my task today was to research on what other orgs/ people have done. I looked at A TON of websites (like 10 or so), and analyzed them fairly in depth. Because not only do I need to learn how to organize a lot of information so that it is easy for the user to access it, but also have to make it look pretty so that the user would want to use this program again. After looking it up, I came up with a couple of designs that I will present to my peers/ mentors tomorrow. Most of the ideas are from these databases, and I hope to combine all the things that I like about them into our database/ datasheet. I really do hope that I can get this design part over with, so that I can start coding. I will need to finish the design process, implementation, and pretty much get the whole thing to work by the end of this week. It’s quite a daunting task, I should say. But nevertheless, it’s going to be a really cool thing (and I’m pretty much working alone on this huge project), so hopefully, I’ll get useful input/ feedback from my peers and get this project rolling!
July 12: Trouble(shooting)
I did make some progress today, but the later part of the day was frustrating. The first half of the day, I made the front page/ search bar that connects to the main page. That took me a while because I had to keep on refering to references. I realized that I have learned a lot about researching online for what I need. Sometimes, it’s really easy to find what I need, but sometimes, I just couldn’t find something to work.
For lunch, we went to a CS talk on twitter. It’s was really interesting. I’m not a big twitter fan but after going to the talk, I realized why people really like it or how it’s actually useful. For example, I wasn’t aware that people in countries where press is censored, use tweets to report local news. This works because twitter accounts could be anonymous. But then, a problem comes with how do you know if what the person is tweeting about is true or not. This was what the CS group was researching about. Pretty cool, huh?
After this lunch break, I went back to trying to fix my code. This afternoon was very frustrating, because the problem why the javascipts aren’t working is not because of the code, but because I needed to export it onto the server and publish it. And I didn’t figure this out till I was out of ideas and I went to my mentor for help. Man, I shouldn’t asked help a lot earlier.
July 16: Website going live
I finally go the website to go live. It was a lot easier than I thought. No need whatsoever publish program stuff. Just put it on the server (at the right place- which I had trouble with, of course). I thought I had to download another program and write it in a different language, but I didn’t actually have to. So here it is, live, meaning you can access it at cs.wellesley.edu/~hcilab/UI. I made it!!
For tomorrow, I need to write a cgi script for this website. In english, this means that I need to write a program that will grab information from the web dynamically and put it into the datasheet/ template that I have. Currenlty, the program is grabbing info from a textfile, having a cgi script will make the program more flexible.
July 19: cgi scripts
I finally got cgi scripts to work! Another CS prof had to change our directory’s permission settings (something that we couldn’t do), so there was pretty much nothing I could’ve done to help that situation.
But in order to format cgi scripts, I had to learn how to code in perl, another programming language. So for the most part of today, I was learning perl basics. Which was something that I picked up quite easily. Well. kinda. I mean, the syntax is weird. I could write and understand the easy stuff, but what I really need to do with the cgi script is to create a good search engine, which requires higher level coding and understanding. So… back to researching, learning, and understanding.
As for actual progress today, I got mini scripts to work! And I also made a webpage for search result.
July 23: Back to Square One
So after working last night and today, we tried to trouble shoot our way around the problem of why our executable file is not running on the server. I learned that:
- You can’t just change the bit of a folder from 64 to 32. You have to program the whole thing in a 32 bit software. (So here, I learned about bits, computer systems)
- You can’t execute a Windows based file (C#- the language our executable file) in a linux server (puma). We have a “binary error” because the Linux server doesn’t recognize the file. (Learned about server systems)
- So I tried using Wine, a program that allows cross server systems. However, we realized that this would involve changing settings for the whole server. And this means that we would need another prof to help us (and he’s not around now). So this is not an option.
- we thought about accessing the executable in javascript. However, after researching, I learned that this requires the client to change permission settings of their own computer to work, and it is highly discouraged to do so.
- And finally, we decided that if we’re going to be using a linux server, we might have to write the executable file in java. But that would be more unnecessary work.
So after ruling out all the options that we could think of, we decided that we might have to set up a windows based server. Meaning we either have to set up one ourselves or have someone else come in and set up one.
So I’m back to square one.
Man. my whole research is going in circles.
July 24: More troubleshooting
Today was more trouble shooting. I tried so many more different ways. But, it still doesn’t work. why???
There’s definitely a way around it. I know there is. I can’t go empty-handed to my professor again. I have to make something that she likes. I have been working on the same project the whole summer and I most likely have made the least amount of progress this summer compared to everyone else in my lab. However, I guess when it comes down to how much I learned from all the trouble I have, I definitely didn’t learn less than others. However, I do wish to learn about C#, something that everyone else seems to have gotten the hang of. Instead, I have gotten a fairly good grasp of html/ css/ js, perl, cgi scripts, and working with servers.
ohwell. I really need that Eureka though. sigh. tomorrow. Hopefully, tomorrow will be the day.
July 25: Breakthrew
Breakthrew!!
I came in today and it was as if I stepped into another place in my research. I have literally been going in circles (and if you have been following my blog, you’ll see that there are days where I had “breakthrews” only to be set back again and stuck with code.) But today, a mentor was able to code pretty much my (and my lab mates) whole summer’s worth of code and more, and have it work! all in 1 night. Man, I wish I knew how to code like that.
<!— here’s some cs, feel free to skip —> I learned today that jSON is a subset/ library of JavaScript, so both are compatible (no more compatibility issues). Yeah!!
July 31: Learning, learning, learning
After talking to an advisor, I understood more about what I’m supposed to do. learned more what rubys/ perls/ js/ all this mess and what i’m supposed to link together. I finally go to talk to someone about these concepts instead of learning on my own through the internet. I mean I thknk that I didn’t do that bad with learning on my own. But it was definitely helpful with getting things/ ideas cleared up and getting a better sense of what I’m supposed to do. Yeah progress!!
Aug 3: End of summer?!
I can’t believe 10 weeks just flew by. Because today was the last day, everyone made posters and I was very fun to go around and check out my friends’ or other people’s posters. As a walked around, I realized that everyone made progress this summer. And some people’s posters were very interesting. I saw one on how Disney’s princesses affect the way kids think about gender. As for my project/ summer, I am proud of how much I have learned. Sadly, this doesn’t translate to how well my project is working. My project has literally just begun.
