Week 1

Principles and Practices ,
Project Management

January 26 2022

About the Class

In both the local and global lectures, the focus was on creating a solid workflow for online documentation. This included an introduction into the history and functionality of git for version control. Besides, best practices for web design were highlighted, including HTML, Markdown, Wikis and file size management. Another brief look was offered into audio and video codecs of various kinds.

My Project Idea

For the upcoming Fab Academy challenges I want to use the skills gained to build a modular synthesizer and/or a digital loop station. This would include both microelectronics, as well as fabrication workflows to build the final product. This way, I aim to incorporate many areas of expertise that I will hopefully have the chance to explore over the upcoming months.

Notable Past FabAcademy Documentations

For this week‘s homework, I went through past documentations of the Fab Academy in order to find inspiration for improving my own practice. In the following I want to highlight three examples and what stand out for me about them.

Jean-Luc's documentation stands out amongst last years students, because of the technical depth he draws from his employer D'assault Systems.

Jonathan's documentation is an interesting read, because it highlights the professional growth and the insights that be drawn from the Fab Academy program. Jonathan is now, among many other things, a tutor in the MDEF 'Agri Zero' seminar.

J.travis' website is a joy to browse because of the wonderful pre-90s minimal aesthetics. The site also has basically no loading footprint.

Further Links

synchronization
  rsync
  unison

version control
  RCS
  CVS
  Subversion
  Bazaar
  Mercurial Bitbucket
  Git Git Cola GitHub GitLab class archive
  Dropbox ownCloud

Web development
  file:// http-server NGINX Apache
  W3C HTML CSS HTML5 templates
  view source
  (g)vim emacs
  Atom VS Code Sublime Geany Brackets
  Eclipse Visual Studio
  loweb SeaMonkey Dreamweaver
  JavaScript Bootstrap jQuery
  Markdown Markserv Strapdown.js Pandoc Hugo Jekyll VuePress MkDocs
  CI/CD YAML
  CGI, PHP, security

blogs, wikis, documentation, content management systems
  GitBook
  DokuWiki
  TiddlyWiki
  Hatta-Wiki
  MoinMoin
  GetSimple
  Moveable Type
  WordPress
  Drupal
  Moodle
  security

collaboration
  Slack
  Mattermost

videoconference
  protocols
     H.323 SIP H.239
  codecs
     H.261 H.263 H.264
  Multipoint Control Unit (MCU)
     hardware software cloud
  clients
     software
        Spark RealPresence Ekiga Linphone
     hardware
        Polycom LifeSize speakerphone webcam
  WebRTC Jitsi
  OBS Studio

remote desktop
  Remmina xrdp
  TightVNC x11vnc
  Vinagre vncviewer
  noVNC

cloud computing
  AWS EC2
  Google Compute Engine
  Digital Ocean
  Linode
  Heroku

project management programs
  TaskJuggler OpenProj GanttProject
  Trello Taiga GitLab

project management principles
  triage
  demand- vs supply-side time management
  serial vs parallel development
  spiral development
  bottom-up vs top-down debugging
  hierarchy, modularity
  document as you work
  Mythical Man-Month

assignment
  work through a git tutorial
  build a personal site in the class archive describing you and your final project
     example example example