One, two, three

Assignment 1

Stickats, while not very complete, is the application we developed for Assignment 1. Xuanyi pitched it as a combination of Foursquare and Perx, which is something no one has tried to implement. Loyalty rewards programme meets social; this is quite a unique business model.

The original name was Estuary, a relevant and sophisticated name that is a little hard to pronounce. Then, with Chuyu's creativity did we eventually coin what would be the name of our application.

Evolution of Stickats, clockwise from top-left:
1) cat in stickwoman, 2) Chuyu's Stickat, 3) various Stickats,
4) current logo, and 5) selected Stickat from image 3

Here is what I have learned after having worked on Stickats:

• Setting up your development environment is a chore, so always decide on the language(s) and/or framework(s) to use quickly and early. Why? There is a deadline to meet. Also, applications which are produced in just a few weeks can probably be done on any reasonable language or framework.
• If everyone happens to discuss on a particular part of the application, e.g. the schema or the user interface, make sure discussion is not dragged too long. Time can be better utilised elsewhere than having all the group members disagreeing on what to do for the discussed part.
• When you have a very good hand in Bridge, and if you win with a low enough bid, pick yourself as the partner.
• Do not ever use the "Power saver" plan in Windows.
• Use git merge when you do not need to keep the commits, and use git rebase when you want to retain the commits.
• All the branches merging and stuff on Bitbucket look like MRT lines; how fascinating.

I suppose that the current status of Stickats is a prototype with a lot of dummy merchants and data, as well as Rockats. At the time of writing, we are considering, very likely, to extend Stickats for the final project of CS3216. Time for the coders to bring out their business persona.

Assignment 2

Having had to present for roughly 8 slides x 20 = 160 seconds during Assignment 2, I must say the Pecha Kucha presentation style provided for an interesting experience. Full credits to Eldric for the Phoenix Wright bang table "OBJECTION!" transitioning, it was fun to execute.

Assignment 3

Team Meinv is off to a great start! We are working on the idea that I wrote during my application for CS3216, hopefully it will turn out awesome and useful.