This was a short week because of the Memorial Day holiday but still a very productive one. I read several papers and became familiar with the Privacy Goal Management Tool (PGMT), developed at North Carolina State University (NCSU) to analyze privacy policies. I will be using this tool to extract and classify the different goals that appear on a selected group of online privacy policies. I was very lucky to have the opportunity to be introduced to this tool by the folks who designed and use it; it's good to know that all the possible questions I may have will be appropriately answered. When I arrived to the lab, many of the organizational details were already taken care of for me:my computer was already set up, so no sweat. After a slight "snag" with my housing accomodations on my first day, a change in venue provided the perfect housing situation. I was then able to "make myself at home". By the way, NCSU's surroundings are beautiful: there are brick houses and tons of trees everywhere!! That's something you don't get to see very oftenin Miami. Also, on one of my trips to the grocery store, I discovered a bunch of dandelions scattered along the edge of the sidewalk. They are adorable!! Everytime I go to the grocery store (15 to 20-minute walk) I have to literally stop and smell the flowers. In particular, there's a white flower that smells wonderful. Before I leave, I have to find out its name. The squirrels are also very entertaining as a daily attraction. (p.s. the picture was taken in front of the Engineering Building II, where the lab is located).

I took the Wolfline bus for the first time to get my visitor ID card. I still need to familiarize myselfwith the transportation system. Fortunately, my apartmentis within walking distance from Centennial Campus, so every morning I walk for about ten minutes to get to the lab. It's a very nice walk that I truly enjoy. On Tuesday, I visited the gym and the Historic Campus. That day, I also participated for the first time in a reading group. It is an invaluable experience to receive feedback from your peers, mentors and co-authors before you actually submit a paper for publication. My academic work this week has been focused on examining the privacy policies of two foreign airlines: Iberia (Spain) and AirFrance. I compared their Spanish and French versions respectively to their English version. I had the opportunity to brush up on my French skills, which was an unexpected but always "agréablesurprise", and of course Spanish doesn't count because it's my native language. This seems to be a multi-purpose, diversified internship. Some of my colleagues at the lab took me to a Southern restaurant, but unfortunately it was crowed and we decided not to spend our lunch time waiting in line. Hopefully, there will be other chances to taste Southern cuisine.On a personal note, I was pleasantly surprised to see a deer for the first time ever on campus and in my life. Dr. Antón gave me a tutorial on Software Engineering that was extremely helpful because I still haven't taken any SE courses. Over the weekend I visited Chapel Hill, a town near Raleigh (where NCSU is located) and again I was fascinated by its beauty (see above picture, agree?), greenery, fresh colors, and charm. All in all, this has been another wonderful week.

Breaking News!! I've become addicted to Guitar Hero thanks to my roommate. He even had to give me a mini tutorial on video games: PS2, Gamecube, DS, and the like because I'm not a video game person, at all. Although I now play Guitar Hero every day (see picture of the week), I still haven't dared to go beyond the easy level. I've been home alone because my roommate is getting married so I have spent my free time watching Futurama and playing. Workwise, (no, it hasn't been all about playing) I began to work on the Software Requirements Document for a new tool we plan to develop at NCSU. Before I actually start writing the requirements definition, specification, etc.,I need to do a lot of reading and ask more questions.Dr. Antón kindly gave me another absolutely indispensabe tutorial, this time on Requirements Engineering, so when I come across this subject at the university level, it will not be unfamiliar to me. The opportunity to go to a Southern cuisine restaurant presented itself sooner than I expected. We went to the North Carolina Farmer's Market Restaurant. It was my first time eating hush puppies and I'm hooked! I'm looking forward to repeating this delightfully tasteful experience. While surfing the web for "North Carolina attracttions", I found out that the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences was a very interesting place to spend some time during the weekend. There,you'll definitely find manyways to indulge yourspelunker, most nature-driven side.

On Monday, I finally submitted, just a few minutes before the deadline, my application for a travel scholarship to attend the Grace Hopper Conference. I hope I can make it. Back at school, I have resumed my work on the Requirements Documents that I started last week. Because many software engineers consider the requirements elicitation stage one of the most important and complex ones in the software development cycle, it is not surprising that this particular project I'm involved in has been and continues to be an extremely time-consuming endeavor. During the week I met with several PhD students who work in the NCSU Requirements Engineering Lab. They have helped me clarify my overall understading of requirements through helpful explanations and concrete examples. But without question, the most important event of the week was Dr. Antón’s congressional testimony before the Ways and Means Subcommitte on Social Security. It is very rewarding to realize that the work we do at NCSU is having impact at the National level. In addition to watching Dr. Antón's testimony, I listened to her Silver Bullet Security Podcast with Dr. Gary McGraw in which she talks about our privacy research at NCSU. On Thursday, I watched SICKO, which has not been released yet, but they had a special sneak peek at The Mission Valley Cinema before the premiere of the documentary. On another occasion, Stranger than fiction entertained me for a while. Now that I know where the movie theater is, I’ll be visiting it regularly.

As I mentioned on last week’s journal entry, the requirements elicitation process for the new tool we plan to develop is going to be a lengthy process. The good news is that what I have written so far is beginning to look like a real requirements document. I guess the hardest part is to break the ice but once you’ve started it becomes easier or at least less dragging. It was helpful to see the requirements documents of other previously developed tools such as the Security and Privacy Requirements Analysis Tool (SPRAT) and the Digital Rights Management System, both conceived at NCSU. We will be saving a lot of time and resources by gathering all the requirements in a cautious manner at this initial phase.Dr. Antón gave me a tutorial on Privacy, and I was able to understand I discovered other features of Guitar Hero that I had been unaware of (e.g. that you can earn money to buy cool things for your band in the virtual store) My roommate received a Nintendo Wii as a wedding present, so I have temporarily replaced Guitar Hero with some of the Wii games. We spent God knows how many hours over the weekend playing an incredibly fun, crazy and weird game called Rayman (feature picture).

My mentor has been out of town this week. Before she left, she made sure to keep me busy. I was able to finish the first version of the requirements document, so when Dr. Antón gets back, she will have something concrete to look at. The 4th of July, another DMP student in the triangle area, Mercedes Lopez, and I got together to go to the ENO festival in Durham, just about 30 minutes from where I live. We had a wonderful time making a ceramic pot (picture of the week), joining a puppet parade, dancing with the African American Dance Ensemble, and doing other fun activities. It was super entertaining. On Sunday, I watched Ratatouille, which was refreshing and humorous. It has become a habit to spend part of the Sunday afternoon at the movies.

This week Dr. Antón reviewed the first version of the requirements document and gave me some useful feedback. I’m working on resolving some ambiguities and perfecting the overall text. In addition, I began to work on the paper prototype for the tool, which is usually the step that follows requirements elicitation. As it has been the case with my previous assignments, I have had to do some complementary reading, namely the last chapters of a book entitled “Contextual Design” by Hugh Beyer and Karen Holtzblatt. It provided me with great insight on how to create a paper prototype. I was awarded the Google Scholarship for the second time, which will be a generous contribution to my studies considering that I’ll be transferring to a university next spring and tuition and other educational expenses are higher than those at a community college. Not to break with the Sunday afternoon movie routine, Laurie - a colleague from the lab- and I went to watch "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" and after that, we ate at the Abyssinia Ethiopian restaurant. The food was fantastic and it was fun to eat without tableware!

My mentor has been at Microsoft this week. While at Microsoft, the House bill on protecting Social Security Numbers went to “markup.” This is closely related to the testimony she gave about three weeks ago. I'm still perfecting the requirements document, changing words, looking for the ones that best express the idea we want to convey. The more familiar you get with the tool, the easier it becomes to polish the requirements because you try to emulate the user’s interaction with the system and this sheds light on more specific functionality that the system needs to provide. I had an intense Sunday. In the morning, I went to church with my mentor. The mass was inspiring and soothing. In the afternoon, I helped my roommate pack his stuff because he is moving out of the apartment. The lease ends on July 31st, so that means I will also have to leave, although I am waiting till the very last day. I found a university complex apartment for the last 5 days I'm going to be in Raleigh. It is small compared to what I have now, but still close to Centennial Campus.

At this point, we still haven’t decided whether we want to make the tool we are developing a web tool or a desktop application. Accordingly, we might have to adapt some of the current requirements. As part of the privacy policy analysis project that I got involved in during the first weeks –actually it has been a concurrent project- I participated in a group meeting in which we analyzed American Airlines’ privacy policy and followed the goal mining process using the PGMT. Later in the week, we also got together to analyze other airlines’ privacy policy. During the weekend, I visited the North Carolina Museum of Art. Because this was my last weekend in Raleigh, I wanted to make the most out of it, and I think I succeeded!

 

Luckily, I ended up moving with my roommate and his wife to their new apartment (that's their adorable Edson in the picture), so I didn't have to worry about having to find a new place to spend my last days in Raleigh. Everyone has been so nice to me that I'm going to miss them all with all my heart! Even though I've had a wonderful time, I was already beginning to feel homesick. The culmination of the internship has come at exactly the most appropriate time. It was not too short (I actually got something done) and not too long (I didn't have to count down the days to go back home). Thanks y'all for this wonderful experience!