Future Enhancements
No major enhancements to the project are planned right now. However, this
project could be used as a starting point for future projects. This project
does, however, have room for growth and could be improved. It could be further
refined to place all chairs in the room and have a “better” placement
of chairs rather than just letting go of the chair when it approaches “close”
to a desk. Our approach works fine in respect to how close the chair is, but
a more accurate way could be used. Our approach lets go of the chair when the
robot is within a certain radius of the point where the chair should be placed.
A better approach would be to actually figure out where the chair is, and as
long as it is within a smaller radius, let go of the chair. But this approach
was figured out too late to implement.
Dr. White as Instructor, Manager, and Customer
Instructor
The role of instructor played a very minor part in both CS 425 and 499. In
CS 425, the instructor led the class, chose teams, and guided the projects.
As an instructor, Dr. White was very good. Organization proved to be Dr. White’s
strong point as an instructor. Because of this, schedules were prepared early
throughout the semester. Dr. White made himself very available for our groups
to ask questions and discuss our projects both during and outside class. He
was more than willing to look over any work before submission in order for corrections
to be made prior to grading.
Manager
As manager, Dr. White played a minor role in CS 425, but played an integral
role in CS 499. In CS 425, Dr White only made sure that we kept on schedule
in our documentation. However, In CS 499 management took on a vital role. Team
conflict became an issue that had to be dealt with by management. Dr. White
was fair and dealt with the situation promptly. Because of Dr. White’s
prompt and fair managerial decisions, our group overcame our hardships. After
our team conflicts were resolved, we moved on with no hard feelings and did
quite well on our project. The most significant downfall as manager was Dr.
White’s little knowledge of the robot and its API. Due to his lack of
knowledge, we had to look to other sources when questions arose.
Customer
As customer, requirements for the project were made and adjusted. Early in
our project, we knew we would not be able to complete the original requirement
of finding and placing all misplaced chairs. We narrowed the scope of our project
to find one chair in the northwest corner of EB2029 and place it in a pre-determined
desk. This refinement of scope was the major role of Dr. White as customer.
Along with determining project requirements, judging our progress on the project
was also a customer task.
All Roles
All roles were hard to distinguish. Because the same person served as instructor,
manager, and customer, it is hard to distinguish what Dr. White did as it pertains
to each role. This was the biggest problem with a single person holding multiple
roles in our project. It was confusing on what role the instructor was performing
when changes were being made to the project’s specification. For example,
when we changed our specifications to include the Northwest corner of the room
as the bare minimum, were we talking to the customer or the manager of the project?
