Happy August!

I completed the calendar modifications. I set the built-in range, and I fixed an unforeseen issue with the combination of an overall range and a 90-day range. But for some reason, I can't get the calendar to work on my bedbars page. I'm guessing it can't find the right files, or something. I've put up a test case here [Edit: link removed] (and the files it should find are here). Hmm, that's odd, it seems to work now (although the real page still doesn't). But it doesn't have the date range I set. I'll have to look into this tomorrow.

The bar graph now changes its width to accommodate more bars if you select more than 30 days' worth of data. I also have the function pass height and width to the template to be used in the <img> tag -- a small change, but one that keeps the page from rearranging when the graph is rendered. I found out that the module we are using (GD::Graph) can indeed do different data sets on adjacent bars on the same graph. It can't do this at the same time as the stacked bars, though, since it wouldn't know what to stack and what to display side by side. So we're still going with the stacked graph and not the side-by-side graph for now. I also made the image captions (not seen by the average user) a little more readable.

There are now three bar graphs on the page! I had to rearrange the functions a bit so that we could get all the data without running that query once for each type, but now we have a graph for restlessness, a graph for pulse, and a graph for breathing. They are the same size and lined up one right under the other, so that you could compare them, except for the fact that they won't all fit on the screen at once. The query does seem to take a lot longer now. I guess that makes sense; it's having to pull 9 sets of data instead of 4.

I'll try to get this page looking a little nicer before Wednesday's meeting. I especially want that calendar to work, since I've brought it so close to being ready. I'm going to check some of the breathing data (and maybe pulse) against the database just to be sure. I also may want to ask somebody why one of the sensors has never given a certain reading, ever. 

I'm heading to TigerPlace now to make sure I can connect properly via my laptop, to avoid another surprise at the meeting like the one I had last week. Hopefully this meeting will give me some good material for my paper.

The rest of my time here should be interesting. I have two major projects I haven't started yet: the new visualization, and my final paper. 

I finally got the calendar working! It turned out that the form name was different in different places (the calendar elements' attributes were using something else). Since this popup calendar puts the data into a form field, I was able to get rid of some extra processing code.

I showed my work at the meeting today. The automatically-calculated maximum value for the y-axis was sometimes nearly twice as high as appropriate, leaving a lot of white space on the graph. The graphs were also too tall to fit all together on the page, making it difficult to compare data. People seemed to like being able to view 90 days, as this makes it easier to catch intermittent problems. and reaction to the calendar date picker (including the non-tiny font sizes) was positive. We talked about whether to use a weighted sum of the restlessness readings to determine time spent in bed (probably not). We discussed how and whether to use a thermometer in addition to the graphs. It was mentioned that the colors were hard to read, especially since each bar and color is outlined and sometimes the outlines are not much slimmer than the bars themselves. Andy had the idea of a "moving average" - each day could have an indication of what the average was over the past X days from that day, giving a smoother graph.

I addressed a lot of the issues mentioned after I got back to work. I set up the y-maximum to automatically calculate based on the largest value, and that looks a lot better. I set the graph heights to about half of what they were, and now all 3 graphs fit on the screen if the resolution isn't too low. I set up a little more error checking on the dates. The default date range when the page loads is from "yesterday" to 2 weeks prior (I don't like to include "today" by default because the data is incomplete). It can now compensate for lack of an ending date, an ending date before the start date, or an automatically generated ending date (due to one of those errors) that goes past "yesterday." If the popup calendar is used, most of that can't happen. But if javascript is turned off and the user can enter any date they please, any of those (and more!) can happen.

I learned that the syntax to raise x to the y power in Perl is x**y, not x^y.

We decided not to make the other type of bar graph that we had discussed, a graph that has one set of data pointing downward and the other upward for comparison. It seems that what I've got now is going to be more useful.

I need to look over the feedback I got and implement whatever still needs to be done. I need to start on the new visualization, which entails me doing a little research on the best implementation in Catalyst. I need to at least sketch out a rough idea of my paper, especially since that will probably be harder to pick back up after vacation than coding-based projects. And I'm waiting to hear back on a possible bug in the graph that is making small "phantom data" appear. 

So, is it really procrastination if you're surfing the web, reading articles about how to use your time better and how to keep yourself from wasting time surfing the web?

I got inspired by the articles and comments I read and set myself a list of major goals and tasks for the day, categorized by project. Then I took one project on that list at a time and decided how long I would work on it, as well as writing down things like how I would set up and which tasks I intended to accomplish. I found that going over these details helped me prepare mentally to focus on that task. It's neat to have a record at the end of the day of just what tasks I accomplished. Of course, the problem with writing down the times I plan to work on things is that I can see just how much time I spent goofing off in between.

What was on my list for today:

• Paper:
  • I created a reasonably detailed outline for my final report.
• Bar graph:
  • I heard back from the author of our graph module about the "phantom data." He asked for an example, so I prepared a test case and sent it to him, along with a link to a screenshot of the problem.
  • I put together a short readme for the calendar of all the little tips I've been saving, meaning to put in some documentation somewhere.
  • Also on my list was to finish fixing the bar colors, but I am waiting to hear back on my problem with phantom data.
• New visualization - referred to as "patchy," a weak pun on "Apache" and somewhat descriptive of this visualization:
  • I tried to figure out the best implementation in Catalyst for a certain piece of this, but I had to ask the mailing list for help. Waiting to hear back.
  • I began putting together the query that I will need to pull one row's worth of data. I had hoped to finish this and Catalyst-ize it.

I also finished a couple of things that were not on my list:

• Paper: I found several papers to use in writing the section on prior and related work.
• Bar graph: I looked into another way of doing my query that was sent to me. It's not a big change, but it makes the code a lot clearer and therefore reduces the chances of programmer error. As far as I can tell, the results are still identical.

I'm going to be out of town all next week, and then I only have about 3 days left to work. I'm trying to start bringing some things to a close. 

The author of the graph module wasn't able to fix the bug for me at the time, so he told me where I could submit a bug report. I did so, and I'll check to make sure it shows up on the bug list.

I went through my bedbars page and the list of things that I wanted to do on it. The ones that could be done quickly, or that were too important to leave, or that I needed to do myself, I completed. The rest of the things I wrote up in a list (notes, features to add, bugs) which I will leave behind for the next person with my documentation. I'll be sure to leave information about the bug that I found in the graph module - that's the only incomplete part of the documentation.

I wanted to write the "prior/related work" section of my report today. I had a lot of PDFs I wanted to look at to do this, and I wanted to be able to highlight or mark on them, electronically. (No need to print out 100-200 pages.) I looked at different pieces of software for quite a while, but finally I had to settle for something that converts the pages to images. I stick the images end-to-end in KPaint, and then I can just put a mark next to lines I want to quote or otherwise use. It's too bad there's no good way for me to convert them to OpenOffice documents.

One of my coworkers is going to be gone when I get back, since he's taking a break before the semester starts. The crowd just keeps thinning out ... 

See you a week from Monday!

Note to self: Documents I'm using to keep track of everything are "master todo jul28" and "aug4_end."