May 18th Status Report

This week in class we had a couple of lessons on ergonomics and we started a new assignment using arrays, while and for loops. The major program we did this week was a program that calculated the number of lotter tickets, so that the vendor or company could calculate the number of days he recorded, days it took to sell 200 tickets or the highest ticket sales in a day, as well as others.

We learned about ergonomics, what it is and how companies use it to improve efficiency and the happiness of their workers. We learned how to sit properly at a desk, how to type on the keyboard and how to use your mouse. We learned about the dangerous affects of working for long periods of time on the computer, and a medical problem called Carpel Tunnel Syndrome. I learned that I should take breaks , when I am using a computer for an extended period of time. Regarding the program, it seemed pretty basic, it was just a matter of choosing the best loops and methods for the actions.

Next week I am going to finish the program. We still have three more lessons on ergonomics, and I hope to learn about computer safety. I hope to recieve a good mark on my lottery ticket program.

May 4th Status Report

This week we finished our SIN projects and they were marked. The Sin project was made to ask the user to input their 9 digit SIN number, afterwards the program would see if the SIN was valid. It it was valid the program would output a message "SIN number is Valid", if it was invalid another message would be displayed;"SIN number is Invalid". To stop the program the user would enter the number"999999999". We also had an interesting side project, on drawing in Visual Basics and we had to fill out a sheet about origins and computer terms.

I had some problems writing the code for the the SIN validation program. The messages were outputting for the wrong SIN numbers, when I put in a valid SIN it would output the wrong message. Once I figured out I had jumbled the code up, the program worked flawlessly.

Next week I would like to finish the program that we got on Friday, I hope to continue learning more controls in Visual Basics.

April 27th Status Report

This week in computer programming, we learned about a new control called the Timer Control. We were taught a lesson on the properties of the timer and we learned when and how the timer control should be used into our programs. One of the programs that we did to incorporate the timer control was an application that shows a running clock and also a program that is a stopwatch. As a continuation from the essay that we completed last week, each group had to present two of their computer related careers. On Thursday we had our unit test on strings, loops, timer controls , tracing and operators.

The timer control was not a very had control to use, the notes that we were given were very clear and were easy to follow and use. The computer related careers presentations really opened my eyes to all the possibilities that go with working with computers. Regarding the test, I had some trouble with it, although I reviewed my notes and was pretty well prepared I believe I could have done much better. The biggest problem I had was writing the code on paper and not on a Visual Basic form. I felt awkward writing the code on paper, and I wasn't really comfortable writing the the program that added only odd numbers. I remember doing this program but switching from visual basics to paper was to confusing for me. I also had some trouble with the tracing with the remainder process in the program, I am not very familiar with it and I regret not learning more about it before the test.

In the future I hope that I will be better prepared for the tests and I will be able to do well on the tests and not just the programs. I am looking forward to the new control or programs that we will be doing next week.

April 20th Status Report

This week we continued learning about for and next loops. We learned about a new function called "exit for" which stops the function and immediately skips after to the next. We made more programs using this exit for. Our biggest program this week was the Mini slide show application. I didn't have any problems with the actual creating process but there were some security problems on the school computers and the programs could only run properly when they were played from our USB keys.

The second part of the week was spent creating an essay about 6 computer related careers. The essay was to be about the job description, responsibilities, education requirements, potential workplaces and earnings. Next week, I hope to learn more about loops and I would like to use multiple loops in a larger program.

April 20th Status Report

This week we continued learning about for and next loops. We learned about a new function called "exit for" which stops the function and immediately skips after to the next. We made more programs using this exit for. Our biggest program this week was the Mini slide show application. I didn't have any problems with the actual creating process but there were some security problems on the school computers and the programs could only run properly when they were played from our USB keys.

The second part of the week was spent creating an essay about 6 computer related careers. The essay was to be about the job description, responsibilities, education requirements, potential workplaces and earnings. Next week, I hope to learn more about loops and I would like to use multiple loops in a larger program.

April 13th Status Report

This week we learned about loops and we did some small programs on them. My group finished the pizza palace program and we got it evaluated on it. While working on the program we had some difficulties but we prevailed and finished the program successfully and we got a great mark. The rest of the week was spent learning about loops in Visual Basics. We learned about about For and Next statements and how to trace these kinds of programs as well as nested loops. We also had some handouts that were based around making loops in programs, finding the output and tracing them, but the main idea of this activity was to better understand the process of loops.

The only problem I had with working with the loops is that before I found out that I had to change the text boxes to multi line the output was giving me a strange answer. Once I cleared that problem up it was quite easy to work through these programs. I believe I grasped the concept of tracing loops. In the future I will be able to debug any programs that have loop statements in them. Every week as we learn a new process or statement in Visual Basics I feel that I am getting to be an overall better programmer.

March 6th Status Report

This week I started to work on a midterm project in a group of three. My group was Alex, Roman and I. We worked well together and we are making a lot of progress. This Pizza Palace order form was similar to the payroll application because it also used dialog boxes. Having finished the payroll application a week ago, it was easier to finish the Pizza Palace dialog boxes. The order form had to allow the user to choose between a small, medium and large pizza and different types of pizzas including; pepperoni, mushroom, veggie or Hawaiian. The difficulty with the program started when we had to create a function for the user to make their own pizza, choosing from a choice of toppings. The user could also choose to order bread sticks and wings and also soft drinks, orange juice and water. After the user had chosen everything they want the total amount would be calculated. The next step of the program was making the option of changing the prices of the pizzas, drinks, sides and toppings.

My group has not yet finished the program, hopefully we will complete it on Tuesday. The hardest part of the project is just the very large amount of coding that goes into finishing this big project. The way we are working on the project is we take turns writing the code, if one of our group members is unable to do something we ask for help from our peers or very often we ask Ms. Emami for help.

This week my group faced a couple of problems, most of the time they were silly mistakes, but sometimes they took some time to fix. I learned about the shear time and effort that goes into making a program that is complicated. Even though I faced many problems while making this program I am still proud of myself with what I have accomplished this week as I feel I am improving as a programmer.