Final Presentation
Today we gave our final presentation in which we were able to present the PetCom project with the proud enthusiasm our hard work deserved. The presentations went pretty smoothly, and the public seemed genuinely interested in the project.
After presentations we were also able to do a public demonstration of the project, to great interest also. Now, we only have our final report left to hand in, and after that, we will have reaped the hard-earned rewards of our college efforts: a great senior project experience and the right to graduate!
- Outliers
Final Happy Hour
After long days (and nights) of intense work, the final prototype was completed and tested successfully on time for the third and final happy hour. Everything worked as planned and we were more than happy to know our final evaluation exceeded our own expectations.
-Outliers
Going Strong!
The second Happy Hour came and went and we managed to show very good progress overall. The project was almost back on track, we managed to complete the individual modules, and we were already working on integration.
We only have a week left to finish and test the whole system, and we’re hard at work turning it into a reality.
- The Outliers
Crunch Time
It’s been a very exciting week for the PetCom project. For starters, we have completed and tested code to allow the microprocessors to interact with each of the hardware modules so now we’re building the finished prototypes (with sufficient time before next Tuesday’s happy hour for some more testing). The Web Application is also running alone fine, with most of its servlets finished and serial communication classes implemented to interact with the main console.
However, we’ve also run into a few problems. One of our Xbee modules stopped working completely, thankfully with enough time to order a new one. And mesh networking, which at first seemed pretty easy to implement, turns out to require much more effort on the developers’ and the microprocessors’ part to implement and manage. While we will not be able to complete it by the next happy hour, we will do our best efforts to evaluate the plausibility of using it the final product.
- The Outliers
First Progress Report and Presentation
The team managed to complete the progress report by Sunday with plenty of time left for review and rest for the next day presentation. More than informing the class about our progress, it helped us see our own progression through the project development and identify the critical steps to follow during the next weeks. Even though we are still a bit behind schedule, the team is catching up to date and the development seems to be going smoothly.
-Outliers
Progress Report
This is the final concept for our food dispenser with all of its sensors, modules and connections.
We are currently working on the Progress report and monday presentation, we are off to bed tonight! Tomorrow is going to be a long Day 
-Outliers
Academic Recess and Happy Hour #1
The last couple of weeks have been somewhat tumultuous because of what became a week-long recess in the middle of a semester due to the Puerto Rican government layoffs, among other things. Capstone, however, takes no breaks, so we immediately put our contingency plans in action. We took some of the hardware components with us, to complete initial testing, and decided to concentrate on software development, which we could do without any lab equipment.
Immediately after classes started, we found out our first happy hour would be the following day. The consensus among the professors and team members was that the project was running behind schedule, so increased effort will be applied by all team members. Also, various last-minute changes are being carefully considered, at the professors’ and instructors’ request, specifically, modeling the data with a lite database solution instead of an xml file, using sensors instead of ZigBee to know the pet’s location, and using weaker stepper motors.
- The Outliers
First Shipment
Since Monday, FedEx has been knocking on our doors delivering components. Having the first revision of hardware schematics complete, the real challenge is about to begin. Meetings in the laboratory as well as the first oral presentation were scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, but this was unexpectedly postponed as a consequence of a 48 hours strike. The team decided to divide tasks and take as much components and equipment as possible to start working during these days. Hopefully Friday won’t be affected.
-Outliers
Planning Start
This week was a super important week for the projects implementation. The Proposal was finally graded and we had some minor allegations that were discuss with Dr Couvertier. The components needed to assembly PetCom were order from Spark, TI, and Ebay. The schematics are almost done and the implementations are in progress.
Proposal Corrections
After two meetings in which tasks for completing and perfecting our proposal were assigned to all members, we have finally completed it. This version of the proposal is clearer, includes more details about the project implementation, and covers the various legal and ethical issues that may arise from PetCom’s surveillance features. Heavy emphasis was also given to the Software Diagrams and the Testing Plan. Finally, the Gantt chart was edited reflecting the various changes that have been ocurring to the milestone dates due to external factors such as strikes, hurricane warnings, and date changes. We are eager to start working, and we are confident that this proposal will be the gateway to a successful semester.
- Outliers
