Email
Archive for Project SAIL (2005)
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Jessica |
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Mar 13 |
Hello Java people
I hope this e-mail gets to
you all I’ve never actually used this mailing list before.
Here are the websites I
found in regards to the ideas we came up with last Friday.
Manually finding a linear
regression
http://people.hofstra.edu/faculty/Stefan_Waner/RealWorld/newgraph/regressionframes.html
negative: this program
doesn’t recalculate the line and graph until you tell it to; also it is
equipped to do additional types of regressions that we aren’t interested in;
also the column ‘predicated value’ is vague and you don’t understand where the
number it gives you comes from
Good combination of an
interactive graph and a visual for SSres (boxes)
http://standards.nctm.org/document/eexamples/chap7/7.4/
negative: won’t provide you with equation
for line of best fit
I didn’t find any valuable
websites that took you step by step through the process of finding the linear
regression. Either you had to pay to subscribe to access the program or the
instructions were specific to running a LinReg on a calculator.
Additional ideas:
Combine
entering data points and outputting an actual graph that reflects them into one
program
Link to LinReg program on TI83 (This
step is equivalent to the ‘r’ value provided by your calculator)
For visual of SSres
automatically display area of each box inside the box as well as the sum
of all the areas as the line is moved
Be
concise with instructions. Many of the programs I found had several paragraphs
of instructions that could have been said more concisely.
Incorporate graphs of x and y mean (and their intersection at y hat) into our
program. Consider building the graph as we go. Aka,
plot x mean. Plot y mean. Y hat must go through their intersection at this
point. Plot a y hat that allows the student to play with the slope to see the
changes in SSres and r but remains fixed
at the point (x mean, y mean)
See
everyone at
~Jess Kuntz~
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 13 |
Hey everyone,
I got Jess's email...and decided to send out my own.
http://www.shodor.org/UNChem/math/lls/leastsq.html
This one you can enter data points and it gives you
the graph, best
fit line and equation, and r. Unfortunately, it doesn't give the
squares and SSdev and SSres,
which are kind of important.
http://people.hofstra.edu/faculty/Stefan_Waner/RealWorld/calctopic1/regression.html
This last one doesn't have an interactive visuals, but
it has some
charts and graphs, and it explains lin reg pretty well.
I also found Jess's second one, and it was the best one I could find out there.
Must go back to APUSH research paper. See you all
tomorrow.
Ariela
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 13 |
Hi,
I'll likely bring in a crude drawing of the demonstration I have in
mind for tomorrow (or something like that).
Other linear-regression demonstrations:
http://www.math.csusb.edu/faculty/stanton/probstat/regression.html
- The demo takes place in a Java applet window rather than
an applet
inline in the webpage. This is definitely preferable to the inline
applet in this specific example as it allows the user to (relatively)
easily adjust the window's dimensions to better convey its data.
- The tabs seem to be a decent way of separating the
information,
though if the demonstration had anything more to it, there would
probably need to be a better way to separate the data.
- There really isn't a way to examine any given point – it
would be
nice if there was a list of every point and the information associated
with it. As it is now, there's just a graphical model that shows
every residual; the user gets a rough idea of what's going on, but it
would be helpful if he or she could look at a given point and
understand its deviation, distance from the residual line, etc.
- It's nice to be able to plot the points on the graph and
not enter
each individual point
http://www.math.csusb.edu/faculty/stanton/m262/regress/regress.html
- It's difficult to get an understanding of residuals'
relationship to
data simply from this demonstration because the residuals are in a
separate pane
- Again, it would be effective for the user to view each
point
individually (possibly in a table)
http://www.stat.uiuc.edu/courses/stat100/java/guess/PPApplet.html
- It's noteworthy that this demonstration allows you to
work
"backwards" – you can specify a target correlation and then allow the
applet to plot points that move the r value towards your specified
goal. This feature helps demonstrate correlation's relation to data
more effectively.
- You can specify whether or not the regression line
should be drawn
by simply checking or clearing a checkbox.
- It seems odd that the Residuals button creates a new
window since
it's a hassle that adds little to the demonstration; this would be
better implemented as a checkbox that allows the user to dynamically
view residuals like the regression line.
Ideas:
- There should be a single pane that displays the graph
and points;
having more than one adds unnecessary confusion to the demonstration
- There should be a separate tab that contains a large
variety of
statistics. Each statistic will have a corresponding checkbox. If
the user checks a box, then the demonstration will "track" the
variable. Only "tracked" variables are displayed to the user.
One
teacher could hypothetically tell his or her students to track only
the things that are featured in Precalculus Chapter 8
(SSdev, SSres,
residuals, etc.) while another teacher could tell his or her students
to only track least squares and med-med information. This list would
provide a level of extendibility while successfully hiding data that's
irrelevant to a given lesson; a teacher could tailor the demonstration
to his or her given curriculum. The list, of course, would be limited
to linear-regression only and we'd have to be careful not to try to
implement too many things.
- The user should be able to choose at run-time what
features the
graph should display. This dynamic could be implemented,
possibly as
a checkbox that turns on or off residuals or the regression line
- There should be a pane adjacent to the graph that
displays data the
user has chosen to "track" and nothing else
- There would be, possibly, another tab or section (a tab
may leave it
too cluttered and unusable) that allows the user to view information
about individual coordinates. There would also likely be a table of
mutable coordinates so the teacher could give a list of coordinates to
use.
- There should be a way to reproduce graphs; possibly allow
users to
load a file describing the points (I'm not sure about how we'd
implement this – I'd consider an importable/exportable XML file that
describes the demonstration and possibly make the demonstration into a
stand-alone application though this is way out of the scope of this
task right now)
- It may be a good idea to have a feature that allows the
user to
"work backwords" by giving a correlation
and having the demonstration
plot random points that shift it towards this correlation.
Sorry if I was a little long-winded with that description...
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Mar 13 |
Hi Everyone, Sorry for the lateness
http://www.stat.sc.edu/~west/javahtml/Regression.html
- This applet allows for the user to add a single point to an already
existing scatter plot. It furthermore displays the line of best fit
and the correlation coefficient.
- The main educational benefit is found with the affects of outliers
to the LSR line and correlation coefficient.
- With limiting abilities due to the fact that you can only add one
point, this interactive program also only displays two statistics. It
would have much more value if the SSdev. SSres,
and other stats were
shown.
- Furthermore, this website is poorly constructed in my opinion. With
no visible boundaries and countless limitations, the program's design
prohibits the user gaining substantial educational value.
http://www.stat.uiuc.edu/courses/stat100/java/guess/PPApplet.html
- This interactive software allows the user to create a scatter plot
in the designated space and it calculates the r value and line of best
fit. Furthermore, this program creates a residual plot and a
histogram of residuals. This also carries the feature of creating
random points on the graph and having a target correlation
coefficient.
- There is a lot of educational value in this program. The residual
plot is very useful, as well as the ability to create random points
with a target correlation. It is also very user friendly easy to
understand.
- However, this program lacks key statistics and could have many more
features, such as the visual display of the deviations and residuals
on the scatter plot as well as information on individual points.
- A well constructed and user friendly design adds to the interactive
benefit on this applet.
http://statweb.calpoly.edu/chance/applets/LRApplet.html
- This applet creates a scatter plot with existing points and allows
the user to add points or change existing points to the plot and
reports the r value, line of best fit, the selected point's position
and residual, and the SSE.
- There are nice features such as an expanding plane and the analysis
of individual points. It is also very simple and easy to use.
- Some problems include its limitation on the individual data as well
as statistics about the whole plot. It is best used to show the
information of individual points.
Ideas
- An interactive graph like the examples above and the idea we
discussed in class, with the main goal of understanding the
relationship within the graph for SSdev and SSres. This means a
visual display of both and a new feature of a second and third plane
that shows all the squares visually, then showing how they are summed
up. Additionally, the ability to move the line of best fit will also
affect the squares and consequently affect the two other graphs. The
math behind correlation coefficient will also be shown to enforce the
user's understanding.
- Another idea is to create guide through an example where the user
creates the points and must answer questions about graphs. This will
allow for a greater understanding about the graphical aspects of
linear regression and the visual process of the correlation
coefficient and the line of best fit.
Sorry Again,
Doug Tremblay
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 14 |
Hi,
If anyone (especially the people that didn't submit an e-mail last
night) has any additional ideas or clarifications, please send them to
me now so I can compile them into a single list by tomorrow.
Tomorrow I plan on sending an e-mail to each person individually with
specific questions about his or her ideas. It would be helpful if
everyone could check their inboxes tomorrow night. Tell me if you
have any other suggestions.
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Mar 14 |
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Ariela
Steif Hey Andrew,
The excel sheet looks great, but I had another idea that was briefly
tossed around a few days ago -- interactive quizes so
the user can
check their understanding.
Thanks,
Ariela
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Mar 14 |
I'm really sorry this got out so late, I just noticed that all of the
incoming mail was going to my junk folder and I just realized this, I'm really
sorry. Hopefully it doesn't cause anyone problems.
http://www.math.csusb.edu/faculty/stanton/m262/regress/regress.html
This
one is good, although it doesn't give the actual points.
http://www.mste.uiuc.edu/activity/regression/
This one is good too, but it doesn't really help in
figuring out what's
going on.
http://statweb.calpoly.edu/chance/applets/LRApplet.html
I like this one more than the other two, as it gives the data points and
other necessary information, although it still doesn't help with the math.
http://www.duxbury.com/authors/mcclellandg/tiein/johnson/reg.htm
This one is neat because it shows all of the little
box things, but once
again no math and you can't select the points.
http://www.stat.sc.edu/~west/javahtml/Regression.html
All this one shows is the effect that one point can
have on the whole line.
http://www.stattucino.com/berrie/dsl/regression/regression.html
This one is like the other ones, just a different
presentation.
-None of the websites show any math.
-None of
the websites have any tables of values for x, y, or anything else.
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 14 |
Hi,
I've reproduced Ariela's message below. In the
future, send all SAIL
discussions to ml-math-java-2004@kosbie.net
so that everyone can view
them.
>> The excel sheet looks great, but I had another idea that was briefly
>> tossed around a few days ago -- interactive quizes
so the user can
>> check their understanding.
I've added your suggestion to the list. Would it be possible for you
to elaborate on this idea? Would this quiz be integrated into an
exploration or would it simply be a substitute for a paper quiz but
with interactive elements? This sounds like a
very good idea and it
would be helpful if you developed it further.
Does anyone else have any suggestions or variations on this idea?
(There's no need to debate them or anything, we'll do that later)
Oh, and someone please correct me if I'm giving bad advice.
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Mar 14 |
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Sorry, I actually meant to send it out to the mailing list, but I must
have just hit reply and sent it to Andrew.
As far as interactive quizes, I think the most
effective way to use
them is for it to be a part of the exploration, but not while the user
can actually look at the graph (so it tests what they remember from
the graph). If we end up having multiple graphs that only show one or
two concepts at a time (like have one graph that does y hat and
displayes best fit line with the points and explains
what y hat and
line are, and then another graph that has SSres and
explains the
boxes. In addition to these we could have one main graph that can
always be accessed but doesn't explain the individual areas so it
doesn't get cluttered. Btw, Andrew, this might be another thing to add
to the list.) Sorry for the massive tangent. Anyways, after each graph
there can be a quiz that tests solely what was on that one graph, and
then at the end perhaps a "test".
Hope this clarifies things, please let me know if any of it was confusing.
Ariela
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar
14Hi,
I've attached a matrix containing everyone's ideas. I'll talk with
each person individually about his or her ideas tomorrow through
e-mail and then I'll refine this list. Tell me what you think. (the
formatting is rather bad, I think, sorry).
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Mar 15 |
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Hi Andrew (et al).
First: excellent work, everyone! Keep up the good work!
As for the spreadsheet: good start. I'd like it to be formatted as
follows:
* each ROW is a FEATURE (like you have now)
* each COLUMN is a WEBSITE
* the FIRST row is the URL of the website
* the FIRST column is the feature description (like you have now)
* each VALUE is a measure of that website for that feature
(0 = not present, 1 = present but bad, 2 = ok, 3 = great)
* the LAST row is the SUM of all the scores for the website
* then SORT the table based on the sums, best-to-worst, left-to-right
Thanks.
DK
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
I've attached our current matrix according to Mr. Kosbie's
specifications, but it's rather crude right now. I've listed each
person's ideas in the first column, and I also listed the URL of most
of the sites that people suggested in the top row. (I excluded
several redundant or uninteresting submissions, but I'll add other
sites if someone requests them). I then ranked each site in terms of
the feature list. If you have any other questions regarding the
spreadsheet, take a look at Mr. Kosbie's e-mail or
send an e-mail to
the mailing list.
Now that we have this matrix, we need to revise it. Take a look at
each site, examining each feature implemented. In an e-mail to the
mailing-list, note which features seemed most effective, what
characteristics negatively impacted the demonstrations, how the sites
successfully implemented features, and any new or innovative ideas
you'd like to share.
Ideally, I'd like this e-mail by tomorrow night, but given that the
bluebook exam is on Thursday, I understand this may not be possible
for everyone. If you're really unable to complete this assignment by
tomorrow night, then please have it submitted by Thursday afternoon at
the latest.
With everyone's opinions, I'll revise the matrix by Friday.
If there are any suggestions, corrections, or comments, please send an
e-mail to the mailing-list.
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Jessica |
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Mar 15 |
In looking over the spreadsheet you made Andrew, I was confused by
several things. First,
What are visual boundaries
for applet?
Also,
What is a third pane?
And,
What are tabs?
In addition to that,
program ‘E’ doesn’t work for me. The box where the interactive graph ought to
be stays gray. Anyone else had this problem?
I’ll e-mail you my review
and response by tomorrow night. Thanks for the help!
Jess~
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 15 |
Hi,
Thanks for the response. Sorry, I was unclear on a few things.
>> What are visual boundaries for applet?
>> What is a third pane?
Sorry, I probably should have cleared this up. When I recorded
people's feature suggestions, I accidentally took away the context
they were presented in a few times. I believe Doug mentioned that
http://www.stat.sc.edu/~west/javahtml/Regression.html
lacked clear
borders around its graph. This lack of boundaries presented a few
usability issues (specifically, it's possible to plot a point in the
-x range or even on top of the text near the bottom, though this isn't
clear due to the lack of borders).
As for the "third pane," I was referring to a suggestion I made
earlier to display all the statistics in a window. This was to be the
third display in a series, but out of context I agree that it really
doesn't make much sense and should probably be clarified or removed.
>> In addition to that, program 'E' doesn't work for me. The box where
the interactive graph
>> ought to be stays gray. Anyone else had this problem?
Yeah, it doesn't seem to load correctly in Internet Explorer and I
have no idea why (or it may be some other problem I'm overlooking).
If you really want to see it, you could install an alternative browser
like Mozilla Firefox (http://mozilla.org) - it seems to
work in it for
some reason. But you can probably skip program E otherwise since the
fact that it makes a separate window, using tabs to separate settings,
is really the only thing noteworthy about it.
>> What are tabs?
Good question. The only program that uses tabs, coincidentally, is
program E. A tab is a rectangular box that is used to logically
separate different sections in a window or dialog box. You've
probably seen them at one point or another.
Here's an example of tab use (bad tab use, specifically)
http://digilander.libero.it/chiediloapippo/Engineering/iarchitect/mfame.htm
Thanks for the response,
Andrew Owens
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 16 |
Hi,
We have a new member! Steve Bradley will be joining SAIL and starting
work today.
Mr. Kosbie: His e-mail address is rotwatsb@hotmail.com - You'll have
to add him to the mailing-list if you haven't already.
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
Now that we have a list of features and a crude ranking of each site,
we need to determine the importance of each feature.
For every feature in the matrix, rank its importance on a scale from 1
to 10 (1 being unimportant, 10 being an absolute necessity). I'll
compile everyone's responses and use the average of these rankings to
rate each site on the matrix again. Also share any particularly
useful insights that you have.
In addition to the features we already have, we need to create some
truly unique ones. So, I'm asking everyone to submit at least one
"killer" feature.
Both the feature suggestions and the rankings will be due by tomorrow
evening. Send them together in a single e-mail to the mailing-list.
It would also be helpful if you could alert me of any revisions I need
to make on the matrix I've provided. Please tell me, for example, if
you think I ranked a site incorrectly or unfairly.
So, due tonight (or possibly tomorrow afternoon if you are absolutely too
busy):
- The feature evaluations that we discussed earlier
Due tomorrow evening:
a.) A rank for each feature
b.) One "killer" idea
If you have any questions or would like me to clarify something,
please send a message to the mailing list.
Steve: Because you're just joining us, I'm not going to require you
to rank each feature. You should still come up with a unique idea by
tomorrow, though. Also, you should examine the attached matrix and
visit each site to understand what's currently going on.
Thanks,
Andrew Owens
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Jessica |
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Hello everyone,
I have some specifics
about the list, but my general response was this: Overall, I think we need to
condense this list. There’s a good deal of overlapping going on; for example:
‘table of points’ and ‘plot points on graph or use table’ are listed as separate
features. Another example is feature 29, “Visual for SSres”
and feature 33, “SSres with area of given box and
total sum”. So, let’s group together like features and eliminate redundancy.
As I was looking through
the websites feature by feature I made specific notes on each (feature that is
and the websites that used it). It’s lengthy (given the multitude of features
to evaluate) so I’ll attach it.
If this is missing
something that you want Andrew, let me know what. Otherwise, good luck to
everyone tomorrow on the blue books! Try to sleep. Some.
Jess
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
Excellent work on the evaluations! (It was much more comprehensive
than I was expecting) You seem to have comprehensive knowledge of
these sites so, using the attached spreadsheet, could you evaluate
each site based on each feature on a scale from 0 to 3 as I did? (0 -
non-existent , 1 - partially there or poorly implemented, 2 - good
use, 3 - excellent)
I'd like this spreadsheet by tomorrow night. If you're unable to do
this, please tell me and I'll assign it to someone else since it's
definitely a substantial amount of work.
I'm looking for at least one more person to do this as well - please
volunteer if you can.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Ahoy SAIL - ers (more specifically
Andrew), Sorry about the bad joke
again, but I can't get over it. I didn't know if you
wanted it as an Excel file or as a list, so I did both of them. Heres my list of features from one to
ten. 10 - Table of points |
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7 - More
verbose with math (less magic) |
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8 - Can
toggle Ssdev and Ssres on
and off |
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8 - Must
allow multiple points |
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5 -
Visible boundaries for applet (clear borders around the exploration |
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8 -
Visual display of deviations/regression |
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8 -
Statistics pane for Ssdev and Ssres |
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7 - More
verbose with math for correlation |
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4 - User
moves line of best fit |
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6 -
Synchronized graphs |
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8 -
Guided example |
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8 -
Questions and test in demo |
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6 -
Separate window for complicated applet |
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8 - Tabs
to divide settings and windows |
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9 - Analyze individual points |
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9 - Plot
points on graph or use table |
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7 -
Set target correlation, work backwards |
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7 -
Toggle regression on/off with checkbox |
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5 - Only
one unified and dynamic graph |
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7 -
Separate pane for "tracking" variables/configuration |
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5 - Hide
data in configuratoin |
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8 -
Adjacent statistic pane |
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9 -
Table of points |
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8 - Import/Export (maybe XML) |
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9 -
Ability to enter individual coordinates |
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5 - Noninteractive but informative demonstration |
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7 -
Calculate regression automatically |
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8 -
Visual for Ssres |
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9 - Step
by step guided linear regression |
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8 -
Interactively input data points, output graph |
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6 - Link
to TI83 LinReg function ? |
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6 - Ssres with area of a given box and total sum |
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8 - Concise instructions |
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8 - Show
significance of x-mean, y-mean and show them in the graph |
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8 -
Video |
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8 -
Worksheet or test |
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9 - Interactive Quiz |
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 17 |
Hi,
I'm sorry I neglected to mention this earlier, but I'd like these
rankings in an Excel file. If it's possible, try to keep the features
in the order I sent them. If you need an example,
is exactly what I'm looking for.
Keep up the good work.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Hey Andrew,
I attached the ranking of features and the website rating, hope it
helps. If the attachment fails for any reason, just call me, I'll be
home by 930 if you have any other questions.
Sorry, I didn't have time to think of any great ideas, but I'll try to
think of some during the percussion clinic I have to attend shortly
and I'll email you or talk to you online at that time.
Thanks,
Doug
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Ariela Steif |
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Hey
everyone,
Sorry this is a little late, I got caught up with something at school.
See you tomorrow,
Ariela
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Jessica |
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Andrew, here is the ranking of features on different websites that you
requested (on a scale of 0 to 3). Some of the features I didn’t comment on
because I didn’t feel qualified to rank them. Also, website F is entirely blank
because as you recognized, it doesn’t open of internet explorer. See you in the
morning!
Jess
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Jessica |
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Hi
Forgot to attach the file.
Sorry about that.
Jess
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 17 |
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Hi all. Friendly reminder: as Andrew noted, everyone
should strive to
contribute one really good, really original idea. One new feature that
would make the product much more effective. Just one.
It's a big challenge, but give it a go.
Carpe diem.
DK
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Steve Bradley |
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Mar 17 |
Sry if this has already been discussed
or if it is too general. My idea is
to have some sort of interactive walkthrough that has the user derrive the
formulas for m and b so that they will not be using and reading about
equations that they don't understand.
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
Sorry for the delay, Gmail was down (at least for me)
until around
to 1 for each feature. After I average the feature ratings from
Jessica and Doug, I'll rank each site based on this weighted criteria.
I'm still looking for "killer" ideas. Except for Steve, no one
has
submitted any ideas.
If you're curious, I've attached these feature ratings - don't
consider them final, though.
Except for the lack of ideas, everything seems to be going smoothly.
Keep up the great work.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 17 |
Hi,
I'll present a few unique (but not necessarily good) ideas that I've
had (I actually mentioned a few of these in my e-mail last Sunday, but
I haven't seen them on any exploration)
- Import/Export feature - store configurations as XML files and store
a list of points
- Expose only graph/display to students, teachers configure the
exploration beforehand or have a configuration panel
- A database or automatic e-mail feature that submits students'
answers/results to the teachers
- Students "draw" on the graph with cursor - tutorial asks students
to
draw regression line or residuals for an initial lesson
- Graphs should be generally larger, individual points should be bolder
- User can examine a point by placing cursor over it
- Both the table and the graph are easily accessible simultaneously
I'm not sure if any one of these is a "killer" feature as most seem
rather small.
I'll try my best to have the feature matrix completed by tomorrow morning.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
I've revised the matrix, accounting for everyone's feature ratings and
for every site ranking.
We can discuss the matrix later this morning.
Thanks,
Andrew
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 18 |
Hi all. Please be sure to carefully read this entire message.
When we finish this exercise a few weeks from now, we want to have a clear
deliverable to show for your efforts. That is, basically, a project
report (living on a web page available to other interested parties, such
as district personnel (for advancing Project SAIL, if that seems like a
promising direction) and also college admission offices (for obvious
reasons that will hopefully benefit each of you)). The report will be
authored by all of you, and will include the following elements:
a) Project Goals and Rationale
b) Project Methods, possibly including:
* Each student's roles
* All communications (these will be in an appendix)
* The Feature Spec, UI Spec, API spec, etc
c) The Interactive Lesson, possibly including:
* An exploration (probably a Java applet, along with source code)
* The interactive sample problems (perhaps PHP-generated HTML)
* A question bank
* An interactive assessment tool (using the question bank)
d) Content Deployment
* We will really teach some real 10th graders using this!
e) Analysis
* What worked well? What didn't?
* Scalability: can/should this be repeated? scaled?
* Other questions?
One part of that deliverable is a description of the PROCESS you used to
create the content. To that end, it is important that we CAPTURE as much
of the information flow on this project as possible. That, in part, is
why you should send all your email to the entire mailing list, even if it
is to just one person (though you should indicate the intended recipient
in the Subject line, so everyone knows if they should read the email right
away or may skim it later at their leisure).
Also: we need MINUTES from every meeting that we have. We've not
been
doing that, but we should start. Today. So I want Andy to
send two
separate emails today, one for each meeting. The subject line should
reflect the date and purpose of the meeting, something like:
Subject: Mtg Minutes, 3/18 Project
Meeting
and
Subject: Mtg Minutes, 3/18 Dev Team
Meeting
(The dev team, or development team, is: Andy, Steve, and Doug, and we met
today during 4th period).
For now on, whenever there is a SAIL-related meeting, please be sure that
someone posts meeting minutes to the web site soon afterwards. And, as
always, be concise, to the point, use bullet lists where possible.
Now, as for roles, we should be clear who has what role (although everyone
should always contribute anywhere they feel they can, and everyone is
expected to keep abreast of every aspect of the project). Here is how I
see it to this point:
Andy: Project Lead, Dev Team Lead
Doug: Developer, Test Team Lead
Steve: Developer
Ariela: Content Team Lead
Jess: Content Developer
There are more roles that we'll need filled in the coming weeks.
Some subset of Ariela, Jess, and/or
verify that all our code works, that all our questions and answers in our
question banks are correct, that any sample solutions we provide are
correct, etc). Note that nobody should ever be testing anything of their
own creation!
We'll need a primary author for the project report. Everyone will
contribute, but it would be mayhem without someone leading that effort.
Offhand, I think this is a good role for Jess. Jess, what do you think?
Anyhow, we should choose this person NOW since (s)he should be carefully
collecting all project communications already!
We'll need someone to manage the deployment process. It's very unclear
what this means at this point, but it will likely involve recruiting some
10th grade IM3 students, getting classroom space, setting up student
accounts, testing those accounts, etc, etc.
There may be one or two other roles that will pop up, too. Naturally, I
would like to distribute the load across the team, and to try to maximally
leverage each of your skills. That's the goal, at least.
In closing, I should add two points. First, you have all done great work
to this point. I am very pleased with how this is going thus far.
Second, though this will definitely require a fair amount of work from all
of you in the coming weeks, we must resist the urge for this project to
become all-encompassing. You have other obligations (such as coursework)
which must preempt this work. And you should be sure to have some fun
during Spring Break, too! The trick is to pull that off and still make
Project SAIL shine! I have full faith that you can do it.
Carpe diem.
DK
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 18 |
Hi all,
On the project report/delieverable, I think Jess
would be great at it.
As far as keeping track of the minutes, is Andrew the only one to be
doing that, or should, if the Content Team meets, I do it? And also,
should the post reflect what happened in the meeting, discussions,
decisions, etc.?
Btw, can someone please tell me what SAIL means? I completely missed that.
To the Content Team (Jess and
Can you both email me five or six problems by the end of the week (let
me know if this conflicts with vacations) and I'll compile them with
mine, and email them back to you, probably in a MS Word document.
We'll each rank them and I'll pull together the top four or five (Mr.
Kosbie: How many potential problems did you say you
wanted?).
Thanks,
Ariela
[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/18 Project Meeting
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Mar 18 |
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Discussed:
- Feature-matrix issues (integrating website ratings with feature rankings)
- Determined we spent collectively 10 hours on the project last week
- Time management, theoretical cost of development
- Promptness
- Scheduled time for the spring recess (March 19 to March 27)
- Created development team (Andrew, Doug, Steve)
- Created content team (Ariela, Jessica, Chad)
- Roles of teams
[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/18 Dev Team Meeting
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Mar 18 |
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(Andrew, Doug, Steve)
Discussed:
- Scheduling
- Versions (V1, V2, V3)
- Teachers' needs, students' needs
- Feature specification
- User interface specification
- Storyboarding
- API
- Managing development
- Implementation difficulty and product requirements
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 18 |
Good questions, Ariela. Some answers:
> As far as keeping track of the minutes, is Andrew the only one to be
> doing that,
No.
> or should, if the Content Team meets, I do it?
Yes.
> And also,
> should the post reflect what happened in the meeting, discussions,
> decisions, etc.?
Yes (succinctly, but yes).
> Btw, can someone please tell me what SAIL means?
Student Authored Interactive Lessons.
> Mr. Kosbie: How many potential problems did you
say you wanted?
Depends on how we use them, but it'd be nice to be able to provide 3
separate assessments:
1) homework
2) self-practice (study for quiz)
3) quiz
You should have a decent idea how much material is required for each.
Each should take about 40 minutes for a typical student, and should
provide a reasonable array of questions to adequately assess all aspects
of the problem. How this translates into an actual number is up to y'all.
:-)
Carpe diem.
DK
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 18 |
Hey,
In light of Mr. Kosbie's answers, I'm revising this
week a little.
Instead of coming up with several general questions, please separate
them into catagories: questions that are good for
homework,
self-check, and quizes (btw, you don't have to come
up with a whole
quiz, but rather several potential quiz questions and I'll combine the
majority of them into a quiz).
Actually, what may end up happening with the quizes
is a part of it
will consist of six or seven consecutive questions that all belong to
one larger question or grouping.
For example: (Student is given a set of x y data points)
1. Find x bar and y bar.
2. Using this formula ... find 'a'. (A/N -- this is the equation that
was given to us for the test, and since my notes are in my locker and
it's
3. Using 'a' and the point x bar, y bar, find 'b'.
4. What is the equation for y hat?
...and other questions of this nature. In some ways, however, this is
a bit too leading. (Mr. Kosbie, as a teacher your
input on this would
be great.)
Anyways, please email all questions to me (separated into their
individual categories -- homework, check...) by the end of the week.
Thanks,
Ariela
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Mar 18 |
Hey Andrew,
I think with the task we're going to be embarking on in the next week,
it would be extremly benifitial
if you could help me understand Java a
little better. I consider Java my weakest language and I think that
in order to contribute more effectivly, I would be
nice if you could
help me brush up on some things.
With that said, I think tomorrow (Saturday) Steve has work until 5,
and I have percussion until about 3, so maybe at around 3 we could
meet until Steve joins us at 5. Tell me what you think.
Also, I've thought of a small idea for the quizes and
proofs and such.
With you as project manager, I think you might be interested.
Sometimes in class when we do worksheets or activities, its extremly
easy to just ask your neighbor what they got for an answer and bypass
a great deal of learning. Although the content devolpment
team is
working on ways around that, there is still going to be this factor if
we are looking at the learning process at a whole.
A solution to this potential problem could be a unique example
everytime. Using random numbers and set limits
for the possible data,
I think it could be benifitial to have original data everytime to
prevent copying and force the user to do their own work. Tell me what
you think about this idea too.
Thanks a lot,
Doug
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 19 |
There was some fine email last night! Just a couple quick
thoughts:
1) Ariela: does a question really have to be only of a homework,
self-test, or quiz? Is it possible to use a question in multiple ways?
Hmmm.
2) Content team: did you see Doug's excellent suggestion that the
questions vary each time (same basic problem structure, but different
values for each student)? Very interesting...
3) Ariela said: "In some ways, however, this is a bit too
leading." Here
are my brief thoughts on that very important point. First, yes, it is.
Beware the funnel we talked about (remember how you correctly
"solved"
that triple integral at our last meeting!). But simple questions may be
good for a few uses, like quick self-practice questions or perhaps a few
quick questions on hw or a quiz. You wouldn't want too many like that,
but a few are ok. So perhaps you have A questions (easy, quick) and B
questions (harder, more time intensive) and perhaps even C questions
(challenge questions, like our bonus questions).
4) Ariela said: "Mr. Kosbie, as a teacher your
input on this would be
great." I've already said too much. Y'all run with this.
:-)
Carpe diem.
DK
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 19 |
Sorry to change this around again on you guys, but Mr. Kosbie's right
-- if we group them into quiz/hmwk/check categories,
there will
definitely be a decent amount of overlaping, so
instead group them
into A (easy), B (medium), and C (challenge). See Mr. K's
email for
specifics on this.
thanks,
Ariela
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 19 |
Hey,
I was looking at a program (not on lin reg), but it had a few good
ideas I think we should consider:
-calculator built into program (although whether or not this is needed
will depend on the kind of questions we use)
-a hint box that the user can click on
-has good examples of graphs that the user can manually draw on (e.g.
if we were to have a question for which the user has to draw in
residuals)
If you want to see the program, I'd be happy to send it to you.
Ariela
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Jessica |
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Mar 19 |
I'd be happy to take on the role of authoring and organizing the
project
report. Writing particularly fits my skill set and while I don't know very
much about the website aspect of it (getting it online), I'm sure I can
enlist someone else's help when it comes time. The one thing I'm a bit
concerned about is that I'll basically be out of the loop starting tomorrow
through Easter Sunday. So, that's an entire week of work that I'll have to
play catch up on. However, it you, Mr. Kosbie, don't
think that postponing
the start of the Project Report till Monday is a problem, then yes, I agree
that this is something I'd be good at.
Jess
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 19 |
> I'd be happy to
take on the role of authoring and organizing the project
> report.
Great!
> Writing particularly fits my skill set and while I don't
know very
> much about the website aspect of it (getting it online),
I'm sure I can
> enlist someone else's help when it comes time.
Yes (though you should check out Word's "save-as HTML" feature
-- pretty
easy way to make a web page!). Anyhow, just make it a Word document for
now.
> The one thing I'm a bit
> concerned about is that I'll basically be out of the loop
starting tomorrow
> through Easter Sunday. So, that's an entire week of work
that I'll have to
> play catch up on. However, it you, Mr. Kosbie,
don't think that postponing
> the start of the Project Report till Monday is a problem,
then yes, I
> agree
> that this is something I'd be good at.
The week delay is no problem for the report, since it won't be
due until
the very end of the project. Besides, though you are the lead author,
others on the team will help with the task (though it's your role to
organize where and how they do so). Anyhow, as for this week, just be
sure to carefully review all the email messages upon your return, and to
ask whatever questions you need to of everyone involved to be sure you
understand what has happened and why.
And have a great trip!
DK
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 19 |
Hi,
> -calculator built into program (although whether or not this is needed
> will depend on the kind of questions we use)
> -a hint box that the user can click on
> -has good examples of graphs that the user can manually draw on (e.g.
> if we were to have a question for which the user has to draw in
> residuals)
We'll certainly consider these ideas.
The development team will be meeting this evening. At this meeting,
we plan on creating the feature specification and the user interface
specification, so if anyone has any more ideas, please tell them to us
as soon as possible.
Thanks,
Andrew
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david@kosbie.net |
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More options |
Mar 19 |
Howdy. With the dev team meeting tonight, we have not resolved
the issue
of how we will display math expressions, either in HTML or in Java. This
is a real sticky wicket, with no great solution (at least not that I'm
presently aware of). I'll make it my problem, not yours.
So: for now, just display expressions using plain text. For example,
write "ybar" and "yhat",
and we'll later turn those into pretty
characters. For other things, like summation signs (Sigmas)
and whatever
else you need, just invent a syntax for now. We'll make it work later.
Have a fine meeting.
Carpe diem.
DK
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
We've completed and attached the feature specification. Doug and
Steve are completing the user interface specification, which we've
provided as well.
They'll be responsible for completing the storyboard by Wednesday.
If anyone has any suggestions, please contact us as soon as possible.
Thanks,
Andrew
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[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/19 Dev Team Meeting
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Mar 19 |
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- Refined
feature set from rankings
- Integrated unique ideas into feature set
- Discussed and created feature spec
- Reviewed UI design of several example sites
- Integrated unique ideas into UI specification
- Discussed and began UI spec
- Provided Doug and Steve with information necessary for the future API
- Devised a schedule: storyboard due Tuesday, design API by Wednesday
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 20 |
Hi,
For some reason the feature and user-interface specs I sent turned out
corrupted. I've just copied them here:
Feature Spec:
Development Team
Feature Specification
V 1.
Large graph
Table of points
Toggle configuration
Y-hat, Y-bar, and residuals display
Plot points by clicking on graph or adding points to
table
Display point values on graph and in point table
Ability to clear points
Mathematical explanations
LSR line
V 2.
User drawn line
Input/output points and configurations
Examine point by putting cursor on it
Manipulating a point
Set r, plot points to match it
Visually display residuals and deviation squares
User fitting
Automatic graph scaling
V 3.
Labels
Selectable parts
Hint box
Manipulating multiple points at once
Zoom in/out of graph
Anti-features
Tight integration with external device
Built in calculator
Verbose Instructions
Preliminary UI Spec (note that this may change over the next two days):
User Interface Specification
- Graph
o Approximately ľ of window
o Has a grid, with values on bottom
o Cannot expand boundaries of the frame
o Ability to zoom in and out
o Visual residuals
o
- Adjacent but connected pane/window for
displaying only one of several tabs
o Approximately Ľ of window
o Table of points - Scrollable list of edit boxes
representing x and y
coordinates
o Configuration and import/output panel - List of check
boxes with
corresponding features and button at bottom for import/output
o Statistics and information display - Textual display of
statistics
(SSres, SSdev, y-bar, ext.)
o Lesson/math panel - Explanation of y-hat using SSxy and SSxx and the
correlation coefficient using SSres and SSdev
Miscellaneous graphical features (for later versions)
- Highlight particular features, increase brightness
- Display information about specific points in the
statistics panel textually
Please contact Doug or Steve if you have any questions.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Steve Bradley |
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
I've attached the preliminary design for the classes in the
exploration. Doug's sick right now, but when he is feeling better,
he'll scan our storyboard and our diagram of the classes.
If there are any questions or comments, please feel free to ask us.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Andrew Owens |
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Mar 23 |
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Hi,
Here's the updated development design.
Point (completed)
- Describes a point on a 2D plane
- Extends java.awt.geom.Point2D.Double
- Extends the toString method to
provide a string describing its
location that can actually be used for saving and loading
LineSegment (completed)
- Describes a line segment on a 2D plane
- Extends java.awt.geom.Line2D.Double
- Extends the toString method to
provide a string describing its
location that can actually be used for saving a loading
Line (completed)
- Describes a line on a 2D plane; it's not a line segment
(thus
java.awt.geom.Line2D.* are unusable for this kind of line)
- Methods:
o void setLine( double m, double
b )
Use the given equation to describe the line
o double f( double x )
Returns the y value for the given x value ( f( x ) )
o double findResidual ( Point p
)
Returns the length of the given residual
o LineSegment findResidualLine( Point p )
Returns the line from the point to y-hat
PointTable (in progress)
- Contains a table of points, implemented internally as a
list
- Implements AbstractTableModel
- Methods:
o (methods implemented from AbstractTableModel)
o void addPoint( Point p )
Adds the given point to the table
o void clear()
Clears the table
o AbstractCollection getPointList()
Returns the list of points
Setting (completed)
- Represents a setting in the demo; provides the user with
the means
to determine if the setting is available and the ability to get the
status of the setting (a variant)
- Setting's state is represented as a variant type,
internally as an
Object; a true or false setting, for example, would be represented as
a Boolean object.
- Methods:
o boolean isValid()
Is this setting in use and valid?
o int intValue()
Integer value
o double doubleValue()
Floating-point value
o boolean booleanValue()
Boolean value
o String strValue()
String value
SettingsManager (completed)
- Manages the demo's configuration, allows the ConfigEditor to edit
settings and provides a means to query the manager about the status of
a given setting
- Settings are stored internally in a Map and are
retrieved using an
ID (a String)
- Methods:
o Setting querySetting( String settingName )
Retrieves the corresponding Setting
o void setSetting( String settingName, Object settingState
)
Adds or modifies the given setting in the manager,
stores it
internally as a Setting object
StatManager
AO - I'm considering removing the StatManager or
drastically changing
it since its purpose seems rather redundant
- Using the PointTable and the ConfigManager, abstracts the raw point
data and the regression line. Provides the full stat query needed by
the StatPanel, filtering these statistics using the
configuration.
- Methods:
o String queryStats()
Returns a list of all stats, filtering them through
the
configuration; usable by the StatPanel for
immediate display
o void addPoint( Point p )
Adds the described point to the PointTable
o Iterator pointIterator()
Returns an iterator to the
PointTable
o Iterator residualIterator()
Internally calculates the residuals and then
provides an iterator to the list
o Line calcRegressionLine()
Returns the regression line for the PointTable
Application (in progress)
- Creates and initializes each component of the demo
- Extends JPanel
- Methods:
o static void main( String[] args
)
Creates a new Application which in turn creates and
initializes each
component of the system
o Constructor
Creates and initializes each component of the system
o void initTimerThread()
Creates a timer thread that calls Application's onTimer regularly
o void onTimer()
Each time the timer thread calls this method, it
updates the panels
and repaints the graph
PanelSeparator (completed)
- Separates with tabs TableEditor,
ConfigEditor, and StatPanel,
initializes each one and provides them with the objects they
necessitate
- Extends JTabbedPane
Panel (completed)
- An abstract base class that the panels on the right side
of the demo
derive from.
- Extends JScrollPane
-
TableEditor (in progress)
- A panel that provides the user with a means to edit the
point table
through providing it with specific points. Has an edit-box for each x
and y. Needs to access the PointTable.
- Extends Panel
ConfigEditor
- A panel that provides the user (especially teacher) the
ability to
change the demo's settings. Needs to access the ConfigManager.
The
list of settings is given as a series of checkboxes or drop-down
boxes.
- Extends Panel
StatPanel
- A panel that collaborates with the StatManager
and provides the user
with a display of each relevant statistic
- Extends Panel
Grapher
- Collaborates with the StatManager,
uses the list of points and
relevant statistics to plot the graph
Graph (in progress)
- The Grapher class uses the
Graph to plot points and lines.
- Extends JComponent
- Methods:
o void paint( Graphics g )
Paints the graph
o void renderLineSegment(
Graphics g, LineSegment line )
Paints a line segment on the graph
o void setScale( double scaleX, double scaleY )
Sets the graph's scale
o void zoom( double factor )
Scales the graph's dimensions by the given factor
o Point setView( Point bottomLeft, Point upperRight )
Sets the dimensions of the graph-window
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David Kosbie |
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Hi. Great work so far.
I had mentioned that some math symbols are tricky to render in Java (as
for HTML, you can check out
http://www.kosbie.net/ml/04-05/honors-precalc/linearRegression.htm
for
all the symbols you need for this problem).
Attached is MathSymbols.java, which shows how to
render HTML in Java
(nothing exotic, as you can see). Problem: overline
does not work.
Thus, xbar and ybar will
not render properly. Worse: I don't see a
simple workaround that's worth our investment for this proof-of-concept
experiment. Thus, just for now, when rendering in Java (instead of
HTML), please use UNDERLINE instead of overline for xbar and ybar. The
attached code does that. It's not a great solution, but it keeps us
moving ahead on the issues that really matter for now.
Carpe diem.
DK
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Hi everyone,
Sorry about the last email, wrong button. Also, sorry if this is
late, my illness has kept me from sending it.
I'm going to have to send this in three emails because of the
excessive size of the files.
The attached storyboard is broken up into three sections, one for each
tab. However, there is a fourth tab: Math Lesson. This tab is
designed to detail the lesson done by the content team. Therefore, we
won't begin this tab until the Content Team proposes a lesson format.
Thanks,
Doug
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
We occasionally receive a ConcurrentModificationException
when the
user plots points (by clicking on the graph). The error doesn't
terminate the program, but it probably just kills the separate thread
we use to constantly update and repaint the graph. I think that the
PointTable object (which internally uses an ArrayList to store its
Point objects) is being accessed simultaneously, causing this error.
If this is the problem, is there any way we can make the PointTable
thread-safe? I've tried simply catching the
ConcurrentModificationExceptions, but that didn't
seem to work.
I've attached the .class files (to run it, execute the Application
object) and the source code.
Thanks,
Andrew
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David Kosbie |
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Mar 24 |
Hi Andrew. Good question. I've not been able to reproduce
the bug --
it works fine on my machine, at least for the twenty or so points I
plotted. Do you know of a (fairly) reliable way to generate the bug?
Anyhow, here are some suggestions:
1) ArrayLists are not threadsafe.
Vectors are. ArrayLists are faster,
but if you need thread safety, go with Vectors.
2) From the Java doc: "it is not generally permissible for one
thread
to modify a Collection while another thread is iterating over it."
Be
sure you aren't doing this. Synchronize your two threads as necessary
to avoid this (do you know how to do that?).
3) One low-tech way around this: do ALL your work in the Swing
thread. This may be suboptimal, performance-wise, but it's easy to do
and avoids all threading issues. Your timer can call
SwingUtilities.invokeLater(timerRunnable),
which then calls
timerRunnable.run() at some later point IN THE SWING
THREAD. This cuts
both ways: on the upside, since you're in the Swing thread, you can't
have problems with input events (they are processed only by this thread)
and you can directly modify all data structures (you are forbidden from
modifying Swing data structures except by the Swing thread). On the
downside, also since you're in the Swing thread, the application FREEZES
until you finish executing, so you have to be zippy-quick (though if you
have to do something that takes a long time, you can do it in small
steps, issuing another invokeLater() call at the end
of each step, thus
allowing the UI to run freely as you complete the task).
For now, to move this forward, I recommend using Vectors and using
SwingUtilities.invokeLater().
Good luck with it.
DK
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 24 |
Hi everyone,
Just got back this evening from my long college visits...and had about
45 emails to deal with...but anyways, I have several of my own
questions (although very few of the C type/challenge ques)
ready.
As for Jess, she is out of town and there is no way that I'll get her
questions until Sunday at the earliest. Once I got all of the
questions, I was planning on sending them back out to the Content Dev
team for feedback and then compiling all of them into a final draft.
Looking at our timeline, however, this doesn't look very feasible. Is
there anyway that we can push this back a few days? How will this fit
in with where the Dev Team is?
Let me know how everyone wants to do this; I'm happy to just compile
things moving.
Ariela
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
We've almost completed the first version, but there are still a number
of bugs and missing features. I've intentionally turned off each
setting in the configuration - you can toggle the settings on and off
in the Configuration tab.
I'd like you to run the exploration and do the following things.
Report:
- Bugs that you encounter
- Annoying behavior that should be removed
- Performance problems
- Runtime exceptions - send an exception's full description
- GUI oddities and usability issues
- Any changes we should make
Answer:
- Are there any features missing from V1 (aside from the Lesson tab)?
- What should be the default configuration?
- Are there any other statistics or configuration options that should
be included in V1?
- Are there any ways to integrate this exploration with the content
team's lessons?
I probably won't be able to work on the exploration much this weekend
since I'll be out of town, but I'll try to act on your responses
tomorrow.
To run the exploration, extract the contents of LinearRegression.zip
and then follow the directions in readme.txt. Alternatively, you can
compile it from source (provided in LinearRegressionSource.zip)
and
run it in your favorite IDE.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 24 |
Hey,
I started to take a look at the attachments, but the only one I could
get to work is the Application one -- the one with the statistics,
config, and table. Is this the only one I need?
Anyways, I still need
to take a solid block of time and still look at it (an initial problem
I noticed is that you can enter several x/y points, but when you go to
config there are no points there. However, I can
click on the blank
space to create dots, and when the "show equation" is toggled on a
yhat comes up (and residuals as well when toggled on)
for the points
that were randomly clicked on -- not the entered data points.
I'll send you a much more organized and comprehensive email tomorrow
(friday) that answers the questions in your previous
email.
Ariela
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Mar 25 |
Dear Ariela,
Sorry I've
been so long in getting these questions to you, but here they are:
Just a
thought though, if we had a quiz where it simply asked every single column in
the Linear Regression chart, while it might be leading, would be easy to
check. And if the answers go off somewher, then
the teacher could check the remaining problems. While it involves teacher
work, it does cut down on a lot of the problems.
Easy
Questions (A)
What is ybar?
What is xbar?
These
aren't leading, as one would need to know what bar means.
Which is
better fit, yhat or z(x)?
50/50
chance, and the definition of yhat is best-fit.
Medium
Questions (B)
What is a?
What is yhat?
Both were
supplied in the equation given to us.
What is r?
I can't remeber if this was on the quiz, but this is a little
leading.
What is SSdev?
What is SSres?
Asking
these instead of (y - ybar)^2 and (y - yhat)^2 (which are hopefully right) requires that the
student knows what they are doing.
Hard
Questions (C)
What set
of points would have r = .8?
This is
the bonus question from the quiz, I can't think of any others.
Hopefully some of these questions will help, but I think
many of them are too obvous.
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David Kosbie |
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Mar 25 |
Hi all. I continue to be pleased with your progress! Keep
up the fine
work!
There's some question as to what should be ready by Monday. Here's what
I would like:
Dev Team: debug Andrew's code as much as possible -- aim for a
reasonable working demo Monday morning.
Content Team: collate your work into a single document, if possible (I
understand that this may not be possible, depending on if/when Jess gets
back to Ariela on Sunday). Also: try to be a bit more inspired
about
both the questions you are generating as well as how you see those
questions being used.
Do not fret about integrating across the two teams -- we can do that
later. Also, again: do not impose undue burdens on yourselves.
Keep
this fun!
As for Monday, here is the agenda:
Team leads (Andrew and Ariela): please be organized and ready to lead a
10-minute demo and discussion of your team's work. Be focused.
Start
on time. End on time. The goal is to first get everyone in the room
quickly informed as to what you have done so far, and second to lead a
focused, effective discussion about that work. So the first part is
about you informing everyone, the second part is about them informing
you. 10 minutes is almost no time at all, so you should be
well-prepared (eg, have the demo running *before*
handouts of the content already printed (if you think that's useful),
etc). On request, I can arrive earlier than
Carpe diem.
DK
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Douglas Tremblay |
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Mar 25 |
Hi everyone,
The following problems may be attributed to my machine because of
resolution, performance, etc... however I believe they are note worthy
After plotting a 16th point, the left pane expands to make room for
the scroll bar. I found this bug slightly distracting. Furthermore,
if you plot a point to the right extreme, the point disappears after
the left pane expands.
The Add Point feature is definitely useful, however the point is
defaulted at (0,0)/ This is fine for version 1, however, the added
default point skews the regression line causing for a visual
disruption on the graph until the user adds the new point. For a
later version, the exploration would benefit from this point not
appearing until after the user has entered data.
Text in the statistics tab is left justified almost to the point where
it cuts off the left portion. This flaw is barely noticeable, however
we can achieve a cleaner look if the text was moved a little to the
right.
We discussed changing the regression line and the residuals to
different colors and widths to further distinguish them. I feel that
this is an important aspect to eliminate confusions.
I think that all of the configurations should be on except for
plotting the residuals.
I can't think of anymore features that should be included in V1 at the
moment, I will contact you if I can think of anything else
Thanks,
Doug
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 25 |
Hey,
Thanks for emailing me the questions. I'm going to incorporate them
with mine, however there is some overlaping.
For example, we both have the question, "What is xbar"
(btw, it might
be redundant to have both xbar and ybar). Your's is an open
ended
question, which is fine and probably checks the users knowledge
better, and mine is multiple choice, which is easier to grade. I think
what I'll do is put all the questions in one document, regardless of
whether or not they are the same question (as above) and redundancy,
and then when you and Jess send it back to me, put comments into it
and we'll take it from there. What do you think?
Ariela
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Ariela Steif |
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Hey,
Here is the list of questions; please go through them, and beneath
each one put your comments in bold. Some of the questions are
repeated (in a different manner -- see my last email) so comment in
which one you think we should keep.
Comments:
*which ones are good/bad
*placed in the wrong category
*hard to grade
*leading
You get the idea...just gie me some general feedback;
I'll revise it
and have it ready for Monday's meeting.
To Jess: i'll be up until around
you'll have time to email me your response when you get back.
Thanks,
Ariela
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 26 |
Report:
> - Bugs that you encounter
**The problem that I mentioned before with the entered data points now
showing up
> - Annoying behavior that should be removed
**None so far as I can see.
> - Performance problems
**See Bugs
> - Runtime exceptions - send an exception's full description
> - GUI oddities and usability issues
**Nothing major
> - Any changes we should make
**The list of x/y points should be numbered for clarity, although this
is a minor point
**I know this is a rough draft, but the program simply does it for
you...there's no explaining.
> Answer:
> - Are there any features missing from V1 (aside from the Lesson tab)?
**xbar and ybar...I'm
assuming everthing else that is missing will be
on the Lesson tab
> - What should be the default configuration?
**???
> - Are there any other statistics or configuration options that should
> be included in V1?
**There might be...but probably everything that I'm thinking of will
be covered in the Lesson tab
> - Are there any ways to integrate this exploration with the content
> team's lessons?
**Yes, we'll talk about it more on Monday, but it is possible --
although the graph will have to be a bit more interactive.
Sorry this is a little late.
Ariela
*******************************************************************************
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
I've updated the linear regression exploration. I think I've
accounted for all the bugs you've reported.
Along with the bug-fixes, I've added a few features, which include:
- Movable points
- Entering "empty" points in the table
- A tool-tip describing a given point when leaving the cursor on it
- x-bar and y-bar display
- All settings except x-bar and y-bar display are turned on by default
- Larger points
- Slightly changed color scheme for the graph
Again, I'd like you to test it and comment on any bugs, missing
features, or things to improve.
I've attached both the program and source code.
Thanks,
Andrew
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 27 |
Hi all. Quick note, mainly to Andrew (but of interest to
everyone,
perhaps): when distributing files for testing, make life as easy as
possible on your testers! For now, that means placing all your class
files in a properly-constructed "jar" file, so they can simply open
the
jar (say, by double-clicking on it) and immediately run your application.
You can also distribute the ".java" files, but that's only for
reference,
in case a tester is interested in seeing the code behind the behavior (and
that's not going to be the usual case). There's no particular value in
distributing the ".class" files in any case.
Also, when mailing larger files, it's nice to store them on a server and
just email a link to the file. It's kinder on the mail servers and keeps
everyone's mailboxes smaller. Also, this gives you the ability to easily
ARCHIVE each test iteration, which is a very good idea for many reasons.
To do this, you should have a major number of this release (this is
version 0 -- we've not yet reached version 1), and a minor number (start
at 1 and keep adding) (professional dev teams often add a third number,
but there's no need for that here). So your first test release is
linearRegression0.1.jar, and the second is linearRegression0.2.jar and so
on. Be sure to archive both the jar file and the accompanying source
(which you can either place directly in the jar file or in its own zip
file -- it does not matter). In any case, to do this, you'll need an ftp
account that stores files that are accessible via a web server. Depending
on how tomorrow's meeting goes, I may set this up for you.
[ Aside: professional dev teams skirt this issue altogether by using CVS
or SourceSafe or some other software that manages creating, editing,
merging, archiving, versioning, and unrolling code changes across a team
of developers. ]
Actually, in this case, a nice combination of these approaches is to
convert the current application to be an applet, then to distribute it
simply via a link to its web page. So folks just click on the link.
Doesn't get simpler than that!
For now, just use a unified "jar" file distributed via email.
Carpe diem.
DK
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Andrew Owens |
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More options |
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Hi,
I've added a few new features and fixed a couple of bugs. If you have
time, then please test out and debug the provided exploration.
New features:
- A point displays its residual line and a line to (x-bar, y-bar) when
the user leaves the cursor over it
- Better looking points (using the point image we made)
- New graph color scheme (as suggested by Doug)
- All settings except for "PlotResiduals"
are turned on by default (as
suggested by Doug)
Bug-fixes:
- It no longer crashes when the user uses the "Add Point" button in
the table editor when no points are present
- It no longer throws an exception when the user enters an empty value
in the table
- Fixed the bug that caused the left border of the Statistics panel to
disappear
Issues:
Steve: I tried to add the ability to plot the square-residuals, but I
think there's a code in either your Line class or my Grapher
class.
I'll take a look at it later, but I've disabled this feature for now.
Note: I've provided the program in LinearRegression0.3.zip because I
couldn't figure out how to access an image file in the .jar. So, I
added the image to the .zip archive along with the .jar file. Extract
the contents of LinearRegression0.3.zip (make sure the image and .jar
file are in the same directory) and locate the .jar file. To run it,
do "java -jar LinearRegression0.3.jar" in the command-line.
Depending
on your configuration, you may be able to just double click on the
.jar file
If there are any issues, please tell me and I'll try to fix them by tomorrow.
Thanks,
Andrew
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Jessica |
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Mar 27 |
Sorry this is so late. See you both tomorrow morning. Happy Easter!
~Jess
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Questions for Linear
Regression Quiz/Test:
Q. A line of perfect fit
has a correlation coefficient of [blank] or [blank]
A. 1, -1
Q. Show graph of x mean,
points and boxes
The SSdev
is the sum of the [blank] of the boxes.
A. area (fill in the blank
or multiple choice)
Q. Put the steps in order:
a. Find SSres and SSdev
b. Solve for ‘a’
c. Find y and x mean
d. Find r^2 and calculate
the correlation coefficient
e. Solve for ‘b’
A. c, b, e, a, d
Q. The SSres
of a line is 0.071. The SSdev of the same line is
12.67. Find the correlation coefficient to the nearest thousandth.
A. 0.960
Consider changing numbers
for every student
Q. Given this table,
calculate SSres to the nearest hundredth
Xi
Yi
Y mean
Y hat
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1 |
3 |
5.33 |
3.15 |
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2 |
5 |
5.33 |
4.79 |
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4 |
8 |
5.33 |
8.07 |
A. 12.67
Q. The line y = 5x + 4.56
has a correlation coefficient of .85 for a set of data points. The line is a:
a. perfect fit
b. not a line
c. okay fit
d. does not fit the points at all
A. c
Q. To find ‘a’ in the
formula y = ax + b, the correct formula is:
a. SSxx/SSxy
b. SSxy - SSxy
c. SSxy/SSxx
d. SSxy – SSxx
A. c
Q. We are given a table of
data points. The value for ‘a’ is 6.78. To find ‘b’ we ought to plug in;
a. the y intercept
b.
the first point in the table
c.
the point (x mean, y mean)
d.
none of the above
Q. The line of best fit is
aka:
a. y mean
b. y hat
c. x mean
d. r
A. b
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Steve Bradley |
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Mar 27 |
Hi, I've been testing this new realease and
I havn't come across any huge
bugs. I really like the movable points. The only probelm with them that I
see is that they don't plot exactly in the middle of where the user clicks,
which would be nice. That also makes it so that the residuals don't line
up
exactly with them. Other than that the only recomendation
I have involves
the add point feature. I like how it's been changed to not default the
new
points to (0,0), but I think it would be really nice if maybe we
automatically provided the user with space for just one more point. Then
once that space is used we automatically make space for one more entry.
That's it.
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david@kosbie.net |
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Mar 28 |
Hi all. Fine meeting this morning. You're definitely off
to a good
start! The trick is to move it along EFFICIENTLY now. We're not yet
in
the home stretch, but we need to begin moving the project towards
completion. This is tricky, given that you've not yet even fully defined
WHAT the project is, let alone actually built it and tested it. It's even
trickier, given that you're all back in classes now, and classwork
MUST
take precedence over this project.
But, again, I have faith in all of you. I'm sure you can do it.
We meet again Friday morning at
then. Until then, be sure to communicate via the mailing list.
Final note: I continue to be very impressed with your dedication and the
quality of your work. Kudos, and keep up the fine work!
Carpe diem.
DK
[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/28 Project Meeting
Inbox
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Mar 28 |
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- Dev team presented exploration 0.3
- Critiqued 0.3, listed new features and flaws (specifically: grapher
settings, color scheme, naming conventions, selectable parts,
restructuring interface, integration with content team's work)
- Content team presented questions, lessons, and ideas for integration
with dev team
- Critiqued questions (specifically: terminology, other lesson types,
videos, quantity of questions, integration with dev team)
- Discussed ideas for adding the lessons to dev team's application
(lesson embedded in application, separate web page)
- Arranged independent meetings for the dev team and content team and
a meeting for representatives of both
- Set next meeting for Friday
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 28 |
Hey,
We have a lot of work to do on this content, so can each of you please
email me the following by 9:00 pm on Wednesday:
--3 new "outside the box ideas" (Mr. K's
was the video)
--a summary of how the questions presented in the meeting will be
implemented into the program itself (feel free to expand on this one
or even give two possible senarios if you'd like):
*Do you think we should have that opening screen? What should it
say?
*How often should there be questions? What kind of questions (A,
B, C)?
*Should there be answers to any of these questions? Which? Where
should the answers be?
*Give some rough numbers for how many questions.
--2 more of the Type C (challenge) questions each. Use your book if you need
to.
Thanks,
Ariela
[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/29 Dev Team Meeting
Inbox
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Mar 29 |
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- (Steve)
fixed bugs in the Line class
- Added "Plot Square Residuals" to settings
- Reconfigured color scheme
- Now plots filled, alpha-blended rectangles for square residuals
- Modified grid display
- Discussed testing with libraries like JUnit
- Discussed design for shapes to be selected, highlighted, and dragged
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Ariela Steif |
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Mar 29 |
Outside the box ideas:
1) cartoons (kind of like political cartoons)
2) a step-by-step acronym for finding r, starting from just data
points (recall learning long division -- there was an acrostic poem
thing in order to remember all of the steps)
3) On homework and "non-real" quizs, have a
button that gives a hint,
such as a moving graph (I'll elaborate on this later, in person)
Summary:
-"Title" page
*tests (25-40 questions, depending on length; B and maybe C)
*quizs
-quick self-check or review (5-10 short
questions; mainly A)
-normal length (15 questions; a few A,
several B)
*homework (7-15 questions, depending on length; A, B, and C)
*tutorial
-brief explanations, one concept at a time
-example given
-link to questions regarding the explanation
(2-3; A, someB)
-at end of a section of explanations, provide
a link to the
related quiz (which can also be accessed via the title page)
C questions:
-y hat = 5x + 9, find six points that make this true
-Do a power regression using five made-up points.
Mtg Minutes -- 3/30 Content Team Meeting
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Mar 30 |
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-Discussed
new "out of the box" ideas
-Came up with content of Title page
-Discussed various questions, when they will occur
-Designed a tutorial
[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes,
3/30 Dev Team and Content Team Meeting Inbox
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Mar 30 |
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-
Discussed lesson/exploration integration
- Created specifications for title page
- Discussed whether or not to embed worksheets or to write separate web pages
- Created specifications for statistic explanations in the Statistics panel
- Differentiated between Lesson tab content and statistic explanations
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Andrew Owens |
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Hi,
I'm attempting to add the ability to highlight, examine, and drag all
parts of the graph (not just points). I've written the abstract
GraphShape class and GraphPoint,
but I'd like both of you to help
complete one other class (tentatively: GraphRegressionLine,
GraphRectangle, GraphResidual,
or GraphDeviation). These new features
required huge structural changes - I'm not sure if we'll be able to
have all this completed by Friday, but we should aim to finish by
then. We also unfortunately will not be able to implement the
features requested by the content team (title page, embedded lessons,
statistic explanations, interactive testing) until the program is
restructured.
I'll also attempt to convert the application into an applet, so it can
be embedded in a web page.
Regarding testing, we probably won't have time to do a comprehensive
test by Friday. Hopefully Doug and I can create a testing environment
using JUnit this weekend.
I'll need to meet with both you at some point tomorrow.
Steve: Can we meet during 8th period?
Doug: We'll arrange something - maybe tomorrow evening.
I've attached a copy of the source code if anyone's interested. It
compiles, but it's pretty broken right now. It probably isn't a good
idea to test it until it's restructured.
Thanks,
Andrew
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[ml-math-java-2004] Mtg Minutes, 4/1
Project Team Meeting
Inbox
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Apr 2 |
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-
Discussed content team's ideas
- Discussed "bubble" lessons
- Decided that some features and ideas may not be implemented due to
time constraints
- Discussed the need to prioritize certain features and ideas
- Discussed the upcoming math department meeting
- Decided the content team and development team must create a clear
plan and prioritize features by Monday
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Ariela Steif |
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Apr 3 |
Hi,
Jess and I were discussing how we were going to compile the 125 emails
that the mailing list has, and I came up with the idea of creating a
gmail account, like SAIL@gmail.com
and the password anything nomal
like "password" or "sail" that we would make available to
all people.
I'd archive all of the emails and there would be a link from the
website to them. What do you think?
Ariela
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David Kosbie |
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Apr 3 |
Hi Ariela. Thanks for the message. The idea is ok (and I
very much
encourage this sort of thinking by all of you!), but... I'd rather Jess
manually compile the emails. First, she can strip out all of the
duplicate
materials (folks, myself included, often include the whole original email
when responding, but we have no need for that duplicated material in our
archive). Second, this gives Jess a chance to apply some editorial bias.
We don't need literally every communication. 10 emails confirming that
Monday is a better day than Tuesday for some meeting is probably not
shedding much light on this process. But we need enough to capture the
processes involved, which probably entails most, but not all,
communications. Finally, we want a permanent archive in the form of a
single Word document. A gmail account cannot
provide that.
It's a bit tedious work, but it's really not that big a deal. Each email
should not take more than, oh, 20 seconds to process (hint:
"forward" the
email, so you can cut-and-paste the relevant portion of the email and its
header, then close the message without forwarding). So 120-odd messages
should take less than an hour to assemble. Then each evening just append
that day's messages. A few minutes of work. Right?
Also: be sure to BACK UP your files every day. One slip can cost you
hours
of work!
Carpe diem.
DK
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Andrew Owens |
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Apr 3 |
Hi,
In order to develop a schedule and plan for future development, I need
to have a clear idea of what sort of content will be provided for
instruction, evaluation, independent learning, and exploration. I'll
also need a list of features that we need to implement.
We've implemented almost all of the features requested at last
Tuesday's meeting - I'll write a plan describing how we'll finish the
rest. I cannot, however, create a complete plan without discussing
the content team's requirements.
Here are a few ideas I heard in Friday's meeting. Please tell me
whether or not (or how) we should plan to implement them:
- Title screen with links to lesson, evaluation, instruction, flash
cards/independent learning
- Some sort of interactive flash-cards
- Interactive worksheet to go along with the program
- Selectable parts on the graph for evaluation
- "Bubble" lessons
Thanks,
Andrew
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Ariela Steif |
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Apr 3 |
Hi,
As we have our meeting tomorrow, I'm not going to directly answer your
questions now. The content team met today (Sunday) and came up with
an exact draft/specs for the content of the program, which we will go
over at tomorrow's meeting. After that, I'm happy to either talk with
you or send an email detailing anything else that you felt needed
clarification or whatnot, and any part that we neglected.
Btw, do you want me to post today's meeting minutes?
Ariela
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Jessica |
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Hello everyone
I got a start on
writing the project report and have attached it for you all to read. So if you could,
look over it and reply with comments, whether it be that I missed some
important idea, was unclear with my wording, missed a comma (highly likely), or
any other suggestions that might come to mind, let me know. Obviously, this
should include all our thoughts, but if you don’t have any strong ideas or
options on what I’ve gone so far, I’m not requiring a response from everyone.
Anyhow, I look forward to your responses! See everyone in the morning!
Jess
PS. Please pay extra
attention to ‘Student Roles’ to ensure that your list of roles is
comprehensive. Let me know if I missed anything.
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Douglas Tremblay |
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