Journal - June
Week 1: June 6-12
Weekend: Left home around 8 on Saturday, dropped Gus (our dog) off at "camp", arrived in Delaware around 5:30 or 6. I'm living with a friend from W&L's parents this summer (the Russells). They live about 20 minutes from UD. Didn't do much Sunday, said goodbye to my parents in the morning (they drove/rode up with me), drove around UD to try to get my bearings.
Monday: Had an email from Sara to meet in the lobby of Smith Hall at 9:30am. Left really early because I knew I'd get lost. My first impression of UD: they need more campus maps! Haha ... actually I think there are maps in the buildings, I just didn't know to go inside. So by the time I found Smith, I was only a little early. Got keys to the lab, a temporary ID, parking passes, etc. Met Sana (also a DREU participant here, but she's working on a different project), Katie and Carrie (well, I already knew Carrie from W&L...) and a bunch of other people working on different projects in the lab. Got a packet of information about the project, our schedule for the summer. Talked about HTML and CSS for this web page. Went to lunch with the gang at a place on Main Street.
Tuesday: Met Dr. Pollock. Started a literature search for papers from the last three years. Split up the journals, conferences, and workshops with Carrie and Katie. Started working on this page. Read some of the background information from the packet.
Wednesday: Read another paper from the packet. Continued literature search. Sometimes it's hard to tell what's relevant (especially since we're still catching up on learning about the project). Went to lunch at a Mexican place with a HUGE group from our lab and another CIS lab. Went to the Italian Festival with Katie, Carrie, and Dr. Sprenkle! Played games, rode a ferris wheel, had way too much funnel cake (yum!).
Thursday: Read the draft paper that was written from last summer's research (we're continuing a project that was started last summer). Discussed problems, goals, etc. in that paper and for us this summer. Discussed the structure of research papers in general. Learned about Bibtex and Latex (the program used to write the research papers in) and how to get the citations and references formatted correctly. Kept working on this page.
Friday: Kept working on Bibtex and Latex stuff. Talked more about that. Worked on this page some more. Actually, a lot more (until around midnight haha). I am just really indecisive about colors and sizes and fonts and formats and ... you get the idea.
{back to top}Week 2: June 13-19
Weekend: Hung out with Carrie most of Saturday. She's from Delaware so she knows all the fun stuff to do. Actually I have a list of 101 things to do this summer (Grant, the guy whose parents I'm staying with, wrote it for me). It's pretty amusing, so we did some of those things: ate at Pure Bread (a sandwich place where all of the sandwiches are named after breeds of dog), shopped TAX FREE! at Concord Mall, got shakes from Charcoal Pit. We also played a little Nintendo and watched "He's Just Not That Into You". Sunday there was a group from Malawi that performed at the Russells' church, which was pretty cool. Then we went to Woodside Farm for ice cream ... it's also a creamery, and they get the milk for the ice cream from cows at the farm!
Monday: Had a brainstorming session with Carrie and Katie on a high level about how users use web applications and what values might be most important (this was a lot of fun!). Talked about this later with Dr. Pollock and Dr. Sprenkle. Started to combine our bibtexs (so looked at overlapping authors, pulled out what was most relevant/not so relevant, started to think about what we'll want to really read, etc.). Finally worked out ... last Friday I went looking for a park that Grant recommended ... didn't find a parking lot & spent so much time looking I didn't have time to work out anymore. So I went for a quick jog around the Hockessin Athletic Center. It was nice, but I need to find somewhere with a longer path, because I hate running in circles.
Tuesday: More bibtex stuff. More brainstorming (on how we can use data mining). Looking over & talking about these web pages. Felt like lots of loose ends. Got a "Fear the Bird" t-shirt from UD's bookstore. Ha. We're going to Lori's house tonight for a picnic with everyone from the lab. Thinking about making a page for DREU Crew pictures ... so that might be coming soon. Also, I think we're going to do DREU Crew t-shirts at some point, so look out for pictures of us in cute matching shirts.
Wednesday: Spent the morning touching up this page. Check out the favicon that we just got up! Brainstormed more this afternoon. We're going to start writing code for analyzing the data tomorrow morning. Decided that since I'm keeping this journal and sent my parents a link to it I don't have to call them as often (... just kidding ...).
Thursday: Wrote code today! We're writing in python and mining data from user sessions. Mostly pretty straightforward stuff today to get back in the swing of writing code and to figure out how to use the new programs, etc. (also because the straightforward stuff is still useful/necessary). We're using subversion so we can all work on the same things at once and not interfere with one another, which is pretty cool! Frustrated that this web page still doesn't look right in explorer. Trying to find the problems.
Friday: More data mining. Not much else today.Had to leave with something not working quite right, which annoys me, but I guess I'll have to get used to it.
{back to top}Week 3: June 20-26
Weekend: Made pancakes for breakfast Saturday, went to the mall and Micheal's and Five Guys. Sunday went to lunch with some neighbors, who also showed me a cute park with a nice long path (it's definitely over a mile around, which is huge for a park! And it's not a DE state park, which is good because they charge you to park there). Talked to my dad and grandpa since it was father's day :)
Monday: Got some of the things from Friday working. Brainstormed again to decide what needs to be done now and summarize what we've done.
Tuesday: More data mining. Also discussed the introduction that we're going to start writing for the paper. Went to lunch with Carrie and a friend of hers who's taking a class here this summer. Played Set and Apples to Apples and ate Peace A Pizza with a bunch of people in the lab after we were all done working for the day. That was fun!
Wednesday: More data mining. And started working on an introduction for a paper. Some neighbors had me over for dinner. It was really nice not to have to think about dinner, and it was delicious :)
Thursday: More work on the intro today. Kept trying different things to get the web page to display better on Internet Explorer (like conditional comments that target IE), but nothing seems to work. So I give up (for now ...)
Friday: Lab lunch today. Combining the different parts of the intro that we wrote.
{back to top}Week 4: June 27-July 2
Weekend: Pretty relaxed. Didn't do much of anything.
Monday: Worked on data mining scripts. We've had a few mor brainstorming sessions since we started so we're not wandering aimlessly. We keep looking at what we have, where we're going, what the data's telling us, what that means we kind of want to know. It's sort of a fun process. My workouts for W&L soccer started this week, so I got up early to run this morning. I was planning to lift after work, but realized that I don't have an athletic tshirt in the car (oops ... I have been keeping a change of clothes so I can stop on the way home and run or something). Went to a park and played soccer with a bunch of people tonight from like 7 to a little after 9. It started to get dark, but we just kept going. Haha. It was a lot of fun.
Tuesday: Got up and left early today so that I could lift before work. It was really empty in the weight room, which was sort of nice. Kept working on the same kind of stuff in the lab today. Went out to lunch with a former W&L kid who's from Newark. Then after work went to Border Cafe (aka EAT ... a tex-mex type place) with Carrie.
Wednesday: Same sort of work in the lab today. Went to lunch with Carrie and some of her high school friends. Stopped at a park on the way home and jump roped and did another soccer workout.
Thursday: More like Friday because it's the last work day of the week. Painted t-shirts (or maybe we did this Wednesday ... I can't quite remember). Finally got a script I'd been writing for a day or two working. Need to generalize it/make it work for other situations. Lifted after work. It was really crowded. Maybe I'll do mornings from now on.
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