As we inch closer to the finish line of this term, I want to talk about my experience and breakthroughs while working on the capstone project. I have signed an NDA for my capstone project so I cannot go into specific details about the technologies we are using. Instead, I will talk about my learning journey and working as a team.
One of the earliest roadblocks I encountered was starting work on a technology I was unfamiliar with. The sponsor for my project had an API that they wanted our project to utilize and due to its requirements, we had to build our application using a programming language that I had never used before. I felt very overwhelmed with new information after spending the first week of the term reading numerous documentations. My breakthrough with learning the language and technology was when I saw a code snippet my teammate had written to request information from the API. I realized that the syntax was similar to Javascript, a language I used in past projects. I used what I knew about coding in Javascript and was able to adapt my code to fit the language we were using. As I spent more time throughout the term working with this new language, I came to understand that the underlying data structures were the same between both programming languages. After that realization, the documentation for that technology made much more sense and my learning became more productive.
Another breakthrough I had during this term occurred during the third week when I had created a few elements for our project that corresponded to a specific user story and my next step was integrating it with the code my teammates had written. Working on a team requires you to adapt to how your teammate think and structure their code, whether it is in a class or at a company. My breakthrough in understanding our current codebase came after our second team meeting where everyone did a mini demo of what they were developing. Our team also decided we would conduct code reviews before merging any code to the main branch. Doing code reviews gave me a chance to ask questions to better understand any new changes that could affect what I’m currently working on. This breakthrough allowed me to contribute to our project and highlighted the importance of open team communication to our success in working together.
In terms of personal growth, I learned that I worked best when I set personal deadlines for myself. Our team has decided to organize our tasks and progress based on a list of user stories given to us by our sponsor. Some user stories are more involved than others so those could take multiple weeks to complete. By setting smaller deadlines within those tasks, I was able to keep my workload consistent between weeks and minimized stress when I had work due in my other course. Consistency is the key to being successful and productive during long project cycles so it is something that I will continue to work on after the capstone is over.
Overall, this course and capstone project have highlighted for me the different skills needed to work and be successful in a team. I was able to learn a lot about new technology and about myself. These soft skills are essential to any career that involves working on a team, including working as a software developer. I will definitely be applying these skills and strategies in future classes and at work.
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