Blog
School Year
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October 4, 2014 (written 10/11/14):
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Today we talked about “Expectation, Observation, Reflection” and presented it in multiple different ways. We also talked a lot about the trouble with differing information on the internet and how to work with that information. Lastly we talked about how computers do not give exact numbers and how you have to be careful when doing algebra on a computer. For instance, (3/6) - (1/6) - (1/6) - (1/6) does not equal zero.
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October 11, 2014:
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Today we talked all about the rules of Shodor and how to and not to act. I am hoping that none of this will come up again because that would mean that I was in trouble, and that would be bad. We also went around Shodor and talked about how the computers are grouped and labeled our cubbies.
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October 18, 2014 (written on 11/7/14):
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Today I learned about modeling, especially in Microsoft Excel. It was a bit confusing at times because I had not used excel for a while, but I think that some (if very small) amounts of former knowledge is coming back.
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November 1, 2014:
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Today we learned a lot about Terminal and how to use it. In the beginning it was old news because I had done some of it in SSP, but then we started learning some new stuff and it got a lot better. There were a ton of commands we learned so I wrote them all down.
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November 8, 2014 (written on 11/15/14):
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Today I learned about Vensim all over again. I remembered some things about using Vensim, but it was good to have a touch up to make sure that still knew all the basic functions. In the end, I think that it was good to have the touch up, otherwise, I would have made some terrible mistakes in future Vensim models.
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November 15, 2014:
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Today we worked on AgentSheets and built a simple infection model. It hadn’t been too long since had last used AgentSheets so I only needed minimal help before fully creating the model. The model was okay, but I wish I had more time to make it more realistic.
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November 22, 2014:
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Today we learned a bit more about AgentSheets. But mainly we worked on our team projects. We were grouped into partners and asked to do a Vensim and AgentSheets project that depicted four populations: tagged seals, untagged seals, tagged fish, and untagged fish. I am nearly finished with my Vensim model, but I just my populations to stay inside their designated ranges. It’s really annoying me.
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December 6, 2014:
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Today we had a group project work day. I got a lot of work done today, I’m pretty happy about that. I did learn that in fact that keeping the populations inside the parameters is impossible, so that problem is gone. I also helped a lot of people today. During the second half of the day, I was rarely sitting because I was constantly going to help people. Brendan, my group project partner, finished his AgentSheets model so we are both done with our respective models and can prepare our presentation next week.
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December 13, 2014:
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Today we had the morning to work on our group project models, and the afternoon was all presentations. Even after talking to a lot of people, I still did not get my Vensim model to work, which is infuriating. But I did do a lot of work on my website and it looks pretty good, so I am happy about that. Hopefully I can keep learning more html code things to make it even better.
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February 14, 2015 (written February 20, 2015):
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Today we (just me and one other boy) learned about “if”, “while”, and “for” statements. We learned of how to use them and in what ways they are particularly useful. For example, we were tasked with finding the sum of all the multiple of 3 and 5 that are less than 1000. We also had to be careful to not repeat any multiples, such as 15. The group of statements containing the for statement that was our final creation was as follows: var sum = 0; for (num = 0; num%3 == 0 || num%5 == 0; num = num + 1){ sum = sum + num; }
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February 21, 2015:
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Today we learned all about loops, functions, objects, and more. It was interesting although a little bit tedious because there was more listening than there was typing. None the less, the topics were interesting and sure to be extremely useful in future coding ventures. I am still working on completely understanding objects, but I believe that I am getting there and hope that with the knowledge of them, my coding will improve greatly.
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March 7, 2015:
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Today we worked on the newly assigned group project animation. The goal was to make a pre-existing animation of seals and fish more realistic. I had a lot of trouble with what I did, the chasing of the fish by the seals. Finally I got it to work at the end of class. Now time to work on the other parts...
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March 14, 2015:
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Today we continued to work on our projects. I finished all the necessary parts of the project and am finishing up some other small parts. The model looks good, I am planning on changing the physical looks, but the code works well and I see no faults. Hopefully I can finish the things I am working on next time.
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March 21, 2015:
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Today we spent the first half of the day working on our projects and finishing them up. My model looked fine, it really isn't anything particularly special. It’s just the simple stuff. After lunch we presented, presentations were fine, but they were all very nearly exactly the same, so it was a bit monotonous. I am glad to finally be done with this project.
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April 11, 2015:
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Today we learned about supercomputers. Some of the most famous supercomputers include: Tianhe-2 (MilkyWay-2), Titan, Sequoia, K computer, Mira, Piz Daint, Stampede, JUQUEEN, Vulcan, and Cray CS-Storm. They all have an incredible amount of cores, everywhere from 72,800 to 3,120,000. The Blue Waters supercomputer, a computer with 13 quadrillion calculations per second, would be first on the list displayed above. However, the Blue Waters supercomputer is not on the list because the creators of the system opted out of being represented in the challenge.
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April 18, 2015:
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Today we began learning about how to think for parallel programming, as well has how to write in the language of C, the language used for parallel programming. C is very similar to Javascript, a language we already know, but it has some small differences that we have to learn and get used to. We also began today working on a parallel computing program that will hopefully one day be able to calculate a number very close to pi. I suspect that finishing the program will be challenging.
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Today we began our exciting summer studies. To be honest, it starts off a little slow. For example, today we were tasked with writing up an HLD (High Level Design) document with all the necessary details for a pre-chosen scenarios. The topics were “Art Walking, Anew,” “Fashionista Phil: Trending Now,” “Levi Lighting Bug: Flash on! Flash off!,” and “Mobeen’s Myrmecology Madness.” Each of these had their own wacky tale that had to be spun into a AgentSheets or Vensim model. I personally chose the art walk topic, and had to write out the details and descriptions for the agents and some other things. The two agents for my topic are the Curator and the Guest. The Curator records details about the Guests and puts up new art, and the Guests walk around and observe the art (as long as there isn’t too many people and they can’t move). Now I just have to wait and see how it turns out when the person it’s given to creates it.
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Today we received our HLD’s from other apprentices. I received an HLD that is the same topic as mine and began work on it today. I am actually really happy, because I was incredibly productive today and got a lot of stuff done. My AgentSheets model isn’t nearly complete, but has come very far in a day and the majority of it works, except for the things I have to leave for tomorrow. I might even be able to finish tomorrow. I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see.
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Today I continued to work on my model, and was forced to change it significantly. In order to make the art-guest connection work, I had to create four different types of guest, four different types of art, and five different subsections of art inside each type. I spent an incredible amount of time going through all the work setting up the tracking and the like, and finally, after some tedious hours, I finished it. It works, to an extent, but I still need some time to finish. Also, there is still a lot of other things that I need to implement. I have my work cut out for me.
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Today I began my second-to-last day working on the art gallery model. It’s not going so well. I got a really important thing working today, the waiting and tracking of all the art by all the different guests, but I still have a lot of other things to implement. For example, I still need to implement the curator and her duties, the unhappiness, The art appearing at different times, and many other things. This project is actually starting to get on my nerves a bit, because it has taken so long, and I have spent so much time on it...and it’s not even that good. The project just seems like a massive nuisance. I learn things, yes, but also spend an incredible amount of time scratching thinking why in the hell (excuse the language) something is doing something. I am beginning to lose faith in this application, hopefully I (and it) will pull through in the end.
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Today I tried really hard to finish my model, but just didn’t. I was given an extension to finish it over the weekend, so i’ll be working on it a lot over the next two days. I am very close to being done, though. I just have to work out some kinks, finish up some small topics, and it’ll be running like a well-oiled machine. Until then, work work work.
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IT’S DONE!!! The AgentSheets model is entirely finished and handed in. It was accepted as done, and I have been permitted to move on from it. Woohoo! That happened early in class today, for the rest of the day, I worked to understand Inkscape and to create a personal logo. It took a while, but my mediocre logo is now up on my website, and is fully hand made. I wonder what we’ll do for the rest of the week...
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So it turns out that the rest of the week will be spent working on our websites. We’ve been given a lot of different tools to make them better, and we need to implement quite a lot of things. I’m not overly worried about this, but my JavaScript is really not that good, and I foresee myself having some trouble with updating my website and making it work. We’ll just have to see how that goes. On a happier note, I worked on making a “web banner” which can be placed at the top or bottom of my website. It looks a bit strange, but i’m happy with it. Today was kinda slow, hopefully the rest of the week won’t be.
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I spent the entire day today doing absolutely nothing of importance. I was consumed by the idea of making a certain logo for a certain Ojas Patwardhan. I used some photos from the internet and a whole lot of time on Gimp to create a mediocre logo that wasn’t nearly worth the time. I did spend some time working on a website HLD, but got nearly nowhere on that, as I spent most of my time on the logo. Here’s to a day spent badly, now i’ll have more work to do tomorrow.
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I didn't actually do much work today either. I spent a fair amount of time working on my website, and made a new logo, but all that didn't last overly long. I should probably get more work done on my website, you know, make it more my own, but I just don’t know JavaScript very well, so any work I do on my website takes a while.
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Hello again! Still, nothing new to report. Spent a little more time today working on my website, still got more work to do on that though. I also began another logo (I find making logos enjoyable), but I didn't save it and Gimp froze, so I was forced to quit Gimp and lose all of my work. After all the time spent working on it, I didn’t want to restart it all over again. After that, the rest of the day was characterized by boredom. I didn't have a ton to do, and was really tired of staring at code or attempting to make things work, so I spent most of the time watching other people imput cool things into their website. And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for...the weekend!!!
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It’s been quite some time since the last post, and quite some time since the last time I was here. Today my group and I began work on an assigned project which required turning an AgentSheets model into a JavaScript model. Our chosen model was titled “Far Far Away” and was essentially the story of the the Princess and the Frog. It has proven hard work to get much of anything done, seeing as how I really don’t know or understand very much of the JavaScript language. My group partners are Ojas, Lyndon, and Vincent, all of which i’m sure know more JavaScript than me. I’m not sure, but I think that Vincent did the most work on the project today, and will probably be carrying the team. Hopefully not, but we’ll see. Here’s to another day spent staring confused at lines and lines of code.
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Today the group continued work on our project. We tried to finish the “help” document, but didn’t. Also, we were initially trying to make our model act in a smooth fashion, without blocky movement or unnecessary squares, but after talking to Aaron (a teacher), it was determined that a square and blocky design might be necessary. Vincent is going to try and keep the smooth thing afloat by trying to work it out tonight, hopefully he’ll find a good way to make it work. Till tomorrow, Griffin out.
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Today we spent more time working on the model. By the end of today we had a completely working draft, just not with working input boxes. We did have some trouble with things sticking together when they hit each other, but this only occurred at weird angles of collision. Luckily this problem was fixed with some fairly simple unit circle thought. At least we got some work done today.
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Today I got very nearly nothing done. I started out by testing the model again, still working great. But then we added the input boxes and out neat and joyful lives fell into turmoil and pain. Probably not that bad, but still bad. It’s almost as if adding the input boxes just screwed up everything. Specifically though, when trying to add a certain number of frogs, for example, there would randomly be a frog or multiple frogs that pop up in the middle of the model playing. And, when two things touch each other that would cause a change of type (while using input boxes) the model would either stop altogether, pop up the desired thing in a weird place, or do some other extremely weird unexplainable thing. The day started so well, why did the world have to create input boxes!!! We (mainly Vincent) are trying to fix it and have received help from Phil and many other people, but it still remains unsolvable. Hopefully tomorrow will shed a new light on the topic.
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We finally finished our model today! We solved every single problem thrown at us (except the lake) and made the model look beautiful. We gave up on the lake because it was taking too long and it just wasn’t going to work. Everything else, though, we got to work like a charm. I’m so glad to finally be done with it, it took way too much time and had way too much errors.
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Today was the start of a week of morning engineering and afternoon learning from interns. Unfortunately i’ll not be here in the mornings (except for Tuesday), so i’ll be missing all the engineering (also except for Tuesday). Todays afternoon “class” was on recursion, a not-very-interesting topic that consists of some code that I don't really understand. I tried to understand it and to complete the assignment, but just couldn’t. Please understand, I didn't give up, rather I spent time watching other people’s computers and talking to interns, which led to still little understanding. Hopefully tomorrow's engineering and lesson will be more understandable and interesting.
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Today I was able to come for the beginning of the day. It was enjoyable. We got to create a tower out of straws and pipe cleaners, with a goal of creating the most tall and the most strong tower. Our team got third, which was good enough for me. After lunch we learnt from Ishaan about jQuery. It was significantly more interesting than yesterday’s after-lunch topic, and it would appear to be incredibly useful as well. I look forward to using it with my website.
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Today I arrived at 11:00AM and missed the whole morning portion. In fact, the class had ended 45 minutes early today, so we basically sat around for 45 minutes before going to lunch. During which, my day got significantly worse. It was requested that I do “reception” (front desk), which meant that I would miss the whole afternoon portion of teaching and instead sit around and wait for a phone call or person to walk in. By this point I knew that if I had not come to Shodor today, I would have gotten the same amount of work and/or learning done. Reception was not enjoyable or interesting, but luckily, after class was entirely over, the teacher (one Miguel) stayed behind to teach me the info. So at least I did earn the stuff that I missed during reception. Hopefully I won’t have to do reception again this week.
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Today I arrived at 11:00AM as usual this week. Before lunch I worked on some electrical engineering. The class had been taught how to put together some simple wiring to make a flashing LED. I did the project and then went to lunch. After lunch, I set to work on the PHP projects. I’ve pretty much completed the first PHP project, but it’s not quite done. I’ll finish it tomorrow.
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So, I finished the random color generator today. There wasn’t a whole lot of stuff left to do with it, but there still was some work necessary before it could be considered “done.” It looks very nice now, with a very nice button as well. Now i’ll have to do all the other PHP projects, which i’m sure will take me a long time. But, none the less, i’m sure those will turn out well.
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Today I began work on my new website. I decided that my old website was too ugly and disgusting that it just had to go. I started work on an idea in which my website starts out by sort of unfolding itself. It looks like it’s going to take a really long time and that it will be really challenging, but I’m at least going to try it.
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So after Shodor yesterday I went home and tried working on my website idea some more. I realized though, that it just wont ever work. The whole unfolding process would take way too long and might even be impossible. So I trashed the idea and began starting out on a new idea. A cannon shoots out a cannonball that will then explode into the webpage with the info on it. I only just began today with the simple stuff, but with some time, I know I can make this idea work.
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I worked some more on my new website idea. I definitely think that this idea will be possible. I got a cannon, cannonball, cliff (for the cannon to shoot off of), and background image today. Nothing moves yet, but with just the images, the website at least looks really nice.
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Today I started and pretty much finished all of the animation. The cannon shoots out the cannonball, which then travels to the middle of the monitor where it explodes, from the explosion four corners fly out, and then the process ends with the content div fading into appearance. It looks pretty cool. I also made a small simple menu at the top of the content div. When switching into blog or back to home the content div fades out and the cannon shoots out another cannonball which explodes into the page that you requested.
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SO, the webpage is very nearly done, aside from just adding the information. I’ve already added all of the homepage stuff, but the blog and portfolio are still empty, so I have to make those. I also moved the menu to inside the cliff, so that it is always there and is simpler. I also think that it looks cooler. I still have to decide what to do with the blog and portfolio, I don’t know if I want to just make them a list, or make them some other cool thing. I’ll just have to decide next week.
