I have figured out how to include html iframes in Canvas, allowing us to display any page with JavaScript enabled.
My next goal will be to teach myself html and JavaScript. I will then find out how to pull data from the Canvas API, and from our game server.
Sunday, September 23, 2018
Saturday, September 15, 2018
(9/15) Canvas Discovery
This week was a great week.
I figured out how to use the canvas API to pull student data from within a course, including grades, attendance, and assignment performance, all utilizing only GET requests. All this information is available using only the teacher's account, so we don't need every students' information.
My second goal was to find a way to display game data from a remote web server in canvas itself. I then discovered canvas is capable of displaying HTML and Javascript, which is incredibly useful if I want to use something like AJAX to display an Iframe of another site from within canvas.
My next goals are to implement two things: first would be displaying our test website in a canvas home page, and the second would be to display student class information on another website that I would be hosting myself.
I figured out how to use the canvas API to pull student data from within a course, including grades, attendance, and assignment performance, all utilizing only GET requests. All this information is available using only the teacher's account, so we don't need every students' information.
My second goal was to find a way to display game data from a remote web server in canvas itself. I then discovered canvas is capable of displaying HTML and Javascript, which is incredibly useful if I want to use something like AJAX to display an Iframe of another site from within canvas.
My next goals are to implement two things: first would be displaying our test website in a canvas home page, and the second would be to display student class information on another website that I would be hosting myself.
Tuesday, September 4, 2018
(9/1) Canvas Update
During the first week, I emailed NMT ACT in regards to a Canvas API, as well as CanvasLMS.
I was approved for a free Canvas teaching account, which will greatly help with me familiarizing myself with the application and finding anything that could help achieve this project's goal.
I found online documentation for the Canvas API. However, I was emailed back a few days later by David Iver from NMT ACT claiming security concerns would prohibit my use of a Canvas API. I will continue searching and asking, but it appears an API is out of the question, and I will have to rely on some kind of Canvas module.
This next week, I will continue searching through Canvas' modules.
I was approved for a free Canvas teaching account, which will greatly help with me familiarizing myself with the application and finding anything that could help achieve this project's goal.
I found online documentation for the Canvas API. However, I was emailed back a few days later by David Iver from NMT ACT claiming security concerns would prohibit my use of a Canvas API. I will continue searching and asking, but it appears an API is out of the question, and I will have to rely on some kind of Canvas module.
This next week, I will continue searching through Canvas' modules.
(8/25) First Week
I'd like to start off by saying how honored I am to be a part of this program. Looking at past blog entries has made me incredibly excited and optimistic about our future work. I am still fairly new to research projects in general, but I'm happy to be learning from my gifted mentor Dr. Kuo.
This last week, I focused on learning what our project was about. I also decided on which part of the project I would focus on developing, which was the reward system linking the application to the school grade-management system.
For now, I'll be looking at documentation regarding Canvas, the grade-management system used by New Mexico Tech, in search of any possibilities of using an API or any other way to be able to interface with data provided by Canvas.
-Donovan Jenkins
This last week, I focused on learning what our project was about. I also decided on which part of the project I would focus on developing, which was the reward system linking the application to the school grade-management system.
For now, I'll be looking at documentation regarding Canvas, the grade-management system used by New Mexico Tech, in search of any possibilities of using an API or any other way to be able to interface with data provided by Canvas.
-Donovan Jenkins
Sunday, May 7, 2017
Final Post for CREU '16-'17 group
"How lucky I am to have something
that makes saying goodbye so hard."
It is with a great deal of bittersweet emotion that we say goodbye. Last Thursday, May 4, marked the last meeting of our research group. We discussed the work that still has to be completed, like analyzing the data from the user surveys. Over the course of the summer, Nico will analyze the data we collect and use that data to write another research paper.
This past academic year has challenged us in ways we never imagined and allowed us to grow as students, researchers, software developers, and collaborators. Overall, our group is very pleased with our accomplishments and we are extremely thankful for the opportunity to participate in this amazing program.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
NMT CREU '16-'17 group
Friday, April 28, 2017
(4/28) A brief analysis of work completed
Over the course of the program, Hugo, Eugene and I have learned much more than I think any of us expected to about the research process, mobile development, databases, and creating a RESTful API server. This post will serve to summarize the work that we've done on the server, and where our research will go from here.
We have written 3845 lines of code for the server. About 92% of this code is Java, leaving about 8% of the code as HTML/CSS. We have made 201 commits to our master branch for the server, which represents about 1 commit per day. The graph of these commits shows a clear spike as we neared the start of the experiment, and another spike as we ran into bugs that prevented us from testing in early April. Despite these spikes, the graph also shows that we have been consistently working on the server since early October.
The CREU program ends on 5/5, which is the same day that Eugene and I will oversee the last session our app is used. Once the final session is complete, we will issue an exit survey, which asks students to rank the methods of authentication and asks questions about the usability of the application. After this, we will no longer have funding, but Dr. Zheng and I have arranged for me to take Directed Research course over the Summer to analyze the data we have collected from the experiment, write a second research paper, and to write any documentation necessary for a future CREU team to continue to use our application for their research. This CREU team could add notifications to our application to study the effect of personalized feedback on student attendance rates, or could move forward with authentication using facial recognition or location determination via Wi-Fi networks.
In all, I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity to have worked on this project. This is definitely the longest I have ever worked on a single software project, the largest codebase I have ever worked with, and the most demanding in terms of my time. I have learned much more than I thought I would, gotten a feel for the research process, and worked with some really amazing people.
--Nico
We have written 3845 lines of code for the server. About 92% of this code is Java, leaving about 8% of the code as HTML/CSS. We have made 201 commits to our master branch for the server, which represents about 1 commit per day. The graph of these commits shows a clear spike as we neared the start of the experiment, and another spike as we ran into bugs that prevented us from testing in early April. Despite these spikes, the graph also shows that we have been consistently working on the server since early October.
The CREU program ends on 5/5, which is the same day that Eugene and I will oversee the last session our app is used. Once the final session is complete, we will issue an exit survey, which asks students to rank the methods of authentication and asks questions about the usability of the application. After this, we will no longer have funding, but Dr. Zheng and I have arranged for me to take Directed Research course over the Summer to analyze the data we have collected from the experiment, write a second research paper, and to write any documentation necessary for a future CREU team to continue to use our application for their research. This CREU team could add notifications to our application to study the effect of personalized feedback on student attendance rates, or could move forward with authentication using facial recognition or location determination via Wi-Fi networks.
In all, I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity to have worked on this project. This is definitely the longest I have ever worked on a single software project, the largest codebase I have ever worked with, and the most demanding in terms of my time. I have learned much more than I thought I would, gotten a feel for the research process, and worked with some really amazing people.
--Nico
(4/23) Another hiccup
This is the fifth in a series of backdated blog posts.
Our application now works with all methods, though we did suffer another setback last week. We host the server component of our application on a virtual machine managed by NMT's Computer Science department, which had its storage machines go down Monday of this week. Because of this, many machines' hard drives went into read-only mode, including the machine hosting our server. Even though our machine was restarted, our Tomcat instance was not, and so no students were able to sign in Monday. We compensated for the delay by holding two sessions, so this didn't affect our schedule.
Our application is also in the review process for the Apple App Store, which means that, proctoring the last few sessions and performing data analysis aside, we've basically reached the end of our project. I'll make a post next week detailing the work done on the server side, and our continuing research after the end of this year's CREU program.
--Nico
Our application now works with all methods, though we did suffer another setback last week. We host the server component of our application on a virtual machine managed by NMT's Computer Science department, which had its storage machines go down Monday of this week. Because of this, many machines' hard drives went into read-only mode, including the machine hosting our server. Even though our machine was restarted, our Tomcat instance was not, and so no students were able to sign in Monday. We compensated for the delay by holding two sessions, so this didn't affect our schedule.
Our application is also in the review process for the Apple App Store, which means that, proctoring the last few sessions and performing data analysis aside, we've basically reached the end of our project. I'll make a post next week detailing the work done on the server side, and our continuing research after the end of this year's CREU program.
--Nico
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