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Version Control

In this lab you will start building your system. You will be expected to demonstrate its functionality in the first lab next week.

Resources:

  1. Lecture slides

1. Planning

There are a couple of steps you need to take before diving into the development process. These include:

  1. Deciding what feature to implement
  2. Dividing the work between the team members
  3. Configuring the git repositories

1.1 Deciding What to Build

Looking back at your original plans that were drawn up during the first week of labs, choose a very simple feature that you feel able to deliver in 7 days. Make sure all the team agree this can be achieved and, use paper, pens and whiteboard, analyse the task and discuss any technical issues that need to be agreed. Discuss this with the lab tutor before continuing to make sure you have not missed anything important. You should consider:

  1. What sensor you need.
  2. What microcontroller will be used and why.
  3. How the data will be sent wirelessly to the base station.
  4. How the MCU and sensor will be powered.
  5. How the base unit will receive the data.
  6. How the base unit will store the data.
  7. How the front-end (website/app) will access the data.
  8. How the data will be displayed.
  9. What security needs to be put in place.

1.2 Organising the Team

Once the plans have been agreed, the larger team should split into a number of sub-teams and the necessary work distributed between these. Make sure you are clear how the data will be moved between the teams and its format.

1.3 Configuring the Repositories

Each team will need their own repository to store any code or documentation they generate. Each team should carry out the following steps:

  1. Create a directory on the local computer.
  2. Use the terminal/bash shell to navigate to this new directory.
  3. Use the git init command to create a new repository.
  4. Add a readme.md file and edit it to explain the purpose of thie repository.
  5. Stage the changes using git add --all.
  6. Commit the changes using git commit -m 'initial commit'.
  7. Log into the University GitHub repository.
  8. Use the New button to create a repository, the name should start with the name of your team!
  9. Click on the Clone or download button and copy the repository link.
  10. Add this remote using the git remote add origin xxx where xxx should be replaced with the link you copied.
  11. Push the changes using git push origin master.

Now everyone in the team should clone this repository. Complete the following:

  1. The person who created the repository should invite the rest of their subteam to become members.
  2. Each person should then copy the link to the repository using the Clone or download button.
  3. After navigating to their documents directory using terminal/bash shell ehey should clone the repository using git clone xxx where xxx is the link copied to the clipboard.

Now everyone in each subteam have a copy of the appropriate repository and can start development...

2 Begin Development

Now the preliminaries have been completed you and your team need to start working. Decide quite early on:

  1. How you will communicate within the sub-team.
  2. How the sub-teams will exchange key information and have discussions.
  3. When the members of each sub-team will be getting together to work on the project.
  4. How the work will be split between the members of the team.

Once this is agreed, you can make a start. Remember that although you are only going to be implementing a small feature you only have a week to achieve this!

3 The NSS Survey

The NSS survey is a tool that the government use to rank UK universities. It is completed by all final year students and asks them to reflect on their academic journey since thay joined. The results will be used to generate the league tables that will tell employers about the relative worth of the institution and therefore the value of your degree. It is very important that you answer the questions as accurately and completely as you can.

After clicking on the link please read carefully the information contained in the two tabs:

  1. Why take the NSS.
  2. About the NSS.

Then complete the survey.