▼Software Development
•Lab Book
8.15.0.2
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Lab Book🔗

keep track of things

Scientists and engineers record their daily work, activities, observations in note books. Programmers should have one, too, so that if anything goes wrong, this personal documentation can help them reconstruct the past and convince others of their position.

For this course, the lab book is to help you manage your pair-programming partnership and learn something about your predictive powers.

Instead of note books, you will use a personal git repo to which you, the lead TA, and the instructors have access. Your partner does not have access.

Your personal electronic lab book will contain at least four types of entries: If you were to use an actual notebook, you would allocate a page per entry and you wouldn’t need to worry about “names” for pages.

  1. partner.md, the partner information entry

    Enter the following information: name, cell phone, preferred social-media contact, and daily email address.

  2. {milestoneIndex}.md or {tahbplLetter}.md, the cover page per project milestone

    Enter the title of the project. Add time and place of the first planning meeting. Write down an estimate of how much time this work will take.

  3. {milestoneIndex}-{Natural}.md or {tahbplLetter}-{Natural}.md, the meeting entry

    We recommend the following shape for these entries:

        DATE/TIME:

        MEDIUM/PHYSICAL LOCATION:

        GOAL:

        NOTES:

        DURATION:

        NEXT : (date/time/place of next meeting)

    If your partner doesn't show up for the meeting, make a note. Also record your response (what actions did you undertake to reach your partner; what did you do with your time). If you sent a reminder email, add a copy to your lab book.

  4. {milestoneIndex}-final.md or {tahbplLetter}-final.md, the conclusion page

    Sum up how much time you actually needed. Write down any general insights about programming, estimates, life with a partner.

If there is any other problem, describe it with special entries. The very moment you think the partnership has gone off track, contact your instructor.

Note You won’t get credit for accurate time estimates. It is about getting good at making estimates. Acquiring this skill is critical for developers as well as people who wish to manage developers. There is nothing like practice to develop this skill.

Inspections We will pull these repos and inspect your lab-book entries at regular intervals. See General for how lab books are valued.

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