Post final presentation

After johns feedback he was looking for a possibility of another church, at the current time there is some difficulty trying to add another database in to extend the current one. the easiest and worst possible way which are doing currently is adding them in manually row by row as well as having some team members adding in the id to the objects and renaming them in unity

Read More

Getting data from multiple tables & Campaign slider

This week i discussed with Stephen on advice in getting data from multiple Tables with the single primary key, the issue here is that the primary key only identifies a particular row and is unique, so contacting another table could cause issues. With some tedious work i managed to collect data from multiple tables with the help of Stephen of course as knowing how sql or database works is something brand new to me. 

Another thing John asked for was a campaign slider which you could slide and it would display a period in which it was built. I originally contacted Stephen on how it should be done where he explained having multiple arrays and two sliders showing campaigns between two periods which is similar to the script David had worked on with a slider filter. Though with the time constraint it was difficult to understand how the script fully worked! I worked on my own solution on created a slider which only goes up by intergers rather than float which meant its segmented. from then on it would check if the current value is what and display the correct campaign, the issue here now is that it will keep updating because the current value is still true. I then worked on adding a way around it which tells it to stop loading if the current value is the same as the previous value.
Another issue was the current value is reset once the campaign is loaded, but with some slight help from Maki we change it so it hid the campaigns rather than loading a new level!

Read More

Presentation Analysis - Remuneration

This week i could not attend this studio session due to a funeral i had to attend, this was planned 2 weeks prior and i had to go overseas for a few days which caused a clash with this studio. This was also the week that John had come in for our second review and i had not know until a week prior so i could not change the times at all. I had completed as much work as i could for the small presentation to John and had passed the work to my team members with an explanation of how it was set up and how it worked.
I can not put up the death certificate here as it is a public domain, but if you would like proof please contact me on wikinexus@gmail.com

Read More

Getting Data from the database & Navigation

This week, i successfully got a response from the database with the data i needed from a single table. This can collect information from all the data that is related to the Primary key that is associated, but the data that is collected is only done though everything in that 'row' in the currently table specifically. At this point the response is only collected from a single table, in this case coga_buildingelements. there are also other tables that it does not currently collect from such as coga_(courses, affiliatoins, campaigns, departments, label_action).

Also this week i looked at redesigning and trying a new way of navigating when using the game. previously what Maki had done was have a crosshair in the middle of the screen and you would move your screen and have the cross hair aimed at something to select objects in the scene. I felt that it was a bit uncomfortable to use, almost like moving your head to select something, so what i implemented what the ability to only moving the screen when you hold down right click, and then you use your mouse cursor to select objects rather than the cross hair previously.

Read More

Presentation analysis - Conflict

Aerial rope way - Shaun, Paul, Rochelle, Eugelyn, Elah & Reina
The topic covered was quite detailed, but the slides itself seemed a bit heavy on content and may have been a bit distractive. I think they could have went over a bit on their experiences as a group itself.
From personal experience with my group i think decisions over tasks over what each member does causes the most conflicts, more so if one member isnt producing particularly quality work, one way i personally deal with it is try and help them do a few things to rework it and let them continue on and doing it better which may go into 'difference goals and experiences' conflict types.

 Ben, Daming & Molly
The presentation felt more like reading a book to me than it was trying to present something to me. The slides did have a readable amount of content which doesnt draw away from the presenter but i felt it could have been planned better. It seemed i grasped more information from the slides than the presentation itself, although they summed the topic much better than the previous group.

Read More

Side Bar and navigation

This week, i re-did the sidebar and integrated button features on it that allow the screen to be re sized be proportionate to any size, this is also done with the buttons so that they remain next to each other.

I addition to this, the sidebar would also only pop up when an object with the correct id is selected and can also be turned off/on by pressing Tab.
To explain a bit more about the 'correct id'. previously the pop up feature meant that the script had to be applied to all objects, this proved to be very tedious and inefficient. What ive recreated is the sidebar would only pop up if a response from the database is correct.

A small note also, i redesigned the navigational feature we previously had with the cross hair that Maki created/. the issue with that was, you could not select the buttons on the side bar without moving your screen which meant that it was a flaw and felt clunky and it is not part of our user experience that we are trying to achieve. What ive done is redone the script so that the screen would only 'move' if the right mouse button is held down, so you now have the ability to navigate both ways.

Sucessfully getting a response from the server now, i am getting the data sorted inside the side bar, with formatting which would take to sort out as well as filtering this data which would be my next few steps.

Read More

Creating section and campaign views

Following the review from John and the Tutors during week 8 there has been some discussion from where we are headed. Our plan now is to create a link between the database and object in its most basic form, currently we are still having difficulties with this. I am able to connect to the database and create a link to the id provided, but there seems to be an error when collecting information from

Highlighted in blue is what i mentioned before with the issue when getting a response from the database.

Due to the halt with this issue, i have been working on creating possible level changes which allow you to see sections and also the campaign periods real time and dynamically. although one of the issues when working with this is having the ability to link back to the database if the object was cut. the reason for this issue is the time needed to reassign all the objects its correct id(in order to section the building, everything is exploded so everything could be cut, therefor the id is lost).

Image illustrates the issue when subtracting multiple objects and having to reassign all of them an individual id. This is also taking into account when passing on the work to others and the difficulty required when they reproduce the same qualities but different churches.





From this period on, i have been trying to make an addition to the script which saves the players position when the churches element changes. Until we find a solution to getting a data response from the database.

Read More

Presentation Analysis - IP

Intellectual property - Motorcycle configuration
Alyssa & Vedran
As a whole they covered the topics quite well, one of the difficulties when doing something which is so large is putting and communicating it into a presentation, and i think they kind of suffered in this part. the slides were really dense in information so making it difficult to read as well it being from a distance.
I think one point they seemed to cover quite subtly is how serious the nature is with how IP relates and revolves around our work so much, but there is quite a complexity around this subject that is specifics with what type of protection and rights do you have over work you do.

Intellectual property - Gothic Architecture
Dorothy, Maki, Stefan, Alan, David and Ricky

Overall i think as a group we did well as a presentation, the video covered the topics quite well and was light hearted which gained attention also the contrast between the seriousness and fun between topic and video worked really well.
From creating this presentation, there has been quite a lot of discussion over how we should approach this presentation which took over several weeks of planning, one thing that caught my mind was how little issues of ip and protection is looked at in a small business, most of these conflicts usually happen in a large scale, where chances are they wont persue you, but it is always better to have that umbrella.

Read More

Video Tutorial and Interface Pop up

Part of one of the requirements addressed was a video tutorial to allow other users in creating a model themselves and having them import into unity, this also includes setting up the files so they are automatically updated.
At this moment the tutorial is subject to change due to how we keep going back to change things.

Another script I developed is, a pop up script when clicking an object a pop up window appears with information. The window size can be changed to any size

When clicking an object a window pops up.

When clicking "back to main menu" it takes you to to the start menu 

Read More

Communication presentation

Communication

The Creation of Gothic architecture
Anthony, Lorrain, Lauren, Ben, Theodore, Baz

I honestly am not a fan of Prezi presentations, seems too clunky in my opinion, I think they could have summarized the information a bit better as a wall of text is difficult to grasp. It was interesting in their video to highlight the different forms of communication available to terms of easy access, of course there are weaknesses in each of them, these forms of communications. I think they could go over a bit more on just verbal and technological communication such as expressing ideas by drawings and such.

The Last Suprematist
Marina & Anthony

I think think group of two done a really good job as a two person group, In comparison to the previous group there really is a different dynamic between this group and the previous. because this group is working in a smaller scale it reminds me of how in our group, we work in smaller teams in a group of 6, where we sometimes split into smaller groups which allows people to aid each other if one is stuck. Unlike working by yourself where you may find aid difficult.

The Bus Stop of the Future
Martha, Anthony, Daniel, Darren, Kerre

Its great that this highlighted the forms of communications and highlighted the strengths and weaknesses and how some may be more effective than others. One form is verbal versus written, where written communication there is always an ability to refer to it as well as passing through the same information to everywhere. unlike verbal it kind of works like chinese whispers and may prove difficult when not every member is there to acknowledge it. A point in the presentation that always brings to my mind is Daniel speaking about having not everyone attend meeting with the client because they may be busy and such. It can sometimes be difficult for one person to relay a message and like i said before, it may always be interpreted in a different way, so it would be good to have some others to attend meetings so it is not left for one person to relay all the information.
One thing that comes to my mind is not being dependent on having one person relay messages but rather its better to have multiple people in communication to get a more accurate and different interpretations of the same message.

Read More

Presentation - Planning

Planning

Aerial Rope way in a world Heritage Environment 
Daisy, Iqra,Yen, Maria, Matt, Bethany

Being the first group to do the presentation and also first topic, i think they did quite well, setting a pretty high benchmark for the rest of us. It is interesting to point out their mention of a constant renewal of Planning, after all, tasks never always finish on time. I write this during week 6 and read upon the notes and remember in relation to our group that it is important just to set a deadline even if it may not be completed as a way of pushing yourself to get things done, its more a psychological thing i guess. The on going process of planning is quite effective in that it reminds me taking little steps to reaching the final goal and also adapting to peoples availability and problem solving that comes a long the way, but like anything creating a timeline is always good, especially in a group aspect so everyone could relate to it and adjust it to their personal timeline, it is a good way to communicate as a group and not only that, there is a visual sense of time that is available rather than sorting things out by weeks which i generally do personally.

Bus stop of the future
Jason, Michael, George, Violet
Overall as a presentation i would say quality wise, it seemed clunky when scrolling through a webpage and quite disorganized information was laid out. But the information provided was quite satisfactory. The style of planning compares to that of Aerial rope way was quite different in the sense of planning. There is a different objective in their planning which is sort of like getting a building built. So such things as delivery of materials that gets cut to size, queue for the availability of machines and duration it takes to cut, assembly and delivery and so on. The fact is, There are things we need to take account no matter what it involves, the further you take into the account of tasks, the smoother it may run. ultimately though there are things that never go to plan, the only way to minimize is allowing a gap for error.
What seems common that ive noticed in this presentation is how when certain things slow down or halt, it is likely that it effects the system as a whole. With our group, our production is kind of like a system where the database and the model work together at the same time the interface gui also relates to the model as well as the database. And like a traffic jam or computer when one thing stops moving it passes along.

Read More

Week - 4

This week we got more updated files from the ones we received previously from russell, it includes the database file and the completed Cerseuil model.
It took us a while to find but, ended up finding the File Maker software which is used for the Database and could only be opened with that software.
I am still trying to go through the database trying to get an understanding of it, but plan on discussing the database and how it will all work with stephen this week as we could not open it last week.

In light not having no much progress with Database work i continued with learning C# this week, which took a bit of time to get use to from previously knowing Java.

Also i have been looking at a few possible interface ideas which i briefly sketched up.

This sketch briefly explains having a search bar that is constantly accessible while the user wanders around and having the search results appear on the side when a search initiated. Also in addition to that, there could be another possibility that another side bar to pop up on the side so you could compared information, but that is still dependent on the database  and what it shows.
Also i felt a small plan in relation to where you are would be helpful in navigating around the church, additional information along with the map could display the church's name, location and compass as it is all information that is related could be grouped. I plan on showing these ideas to the group and having their feedback as well as their proposed ideas.

Upon looking into the database, we(David and I) tried to decipher it. We tried to sort the information based on the building, campaign and etc, the reason for this is because we were given the database in a file format made in FileMaker(software for databases that john and his team uses), it proved to have issues in terms of formatting the information and exporting it into a more easily readable file (xml) seemed a bit inconsistent(we compared the exported database to filemaker data exported). 

The process that followed was working with Stefan into creating a object naming method which allowed the object to be linked with the database when in unity. The end result was:

Name

CERSE_(CAMPAIGN ID)_(COURSE_ID)

e.g. CERSE_2a_BAS

BASE - BAS

PORTAL - POR

CAPITAL - CAP

SILL - SIL

ARCADE - ARC

ROOF - ROO

HEAD - HEA

VAULT - VAU

PISCINE - PIS

The difficulty is communicating a method that is easily understandable when trying to communicate a method of naming large quantities of objects.

What is odd is having to link the 'campaign'(period in time) to other churches but, i couldnt seem to find a 'campaign id' which could create this linkage.

This is in its most basic form of naming. It should also be noted that we have no previous of linking database and creating an 'external' and 'internal' database varies in difficulties(this project being done in external). So the naming is subject to change, at this point we discussed with Stephen about creating a external database server which is part of the requirement in gathering data is beyond our skillset so he offered into helping us set up the external database.

Read More

GUI interface and unity

I could not get started this week on my database role as a few things needs to be sorted first as i have discussed with Stephen Davey. I spent this week looking into creating our own interface GUI. Creating an interface involves Java scripting which i feel may be a bit weak right now.
I intend to look into learning a bit more with Java Scripting along with unity to gain a better understanding.




Learning the basics of Java, this script involves clicking a button which is part of the interface and the colour of the box would change. Although the script also makes repeating this step would change the box colour to white, however it doesn't seem to work as i hoped and intend to seek for some guidance during this weeks studio.


A Documentary on the making of the game "The Last of Us" which talks a bit about Interfaces i found quite interesting
(1:24:23) - It should automatically divert you there

As a general sort of research i was thinking a few rules that we may take account on when designing our interface
*Law of preferred action - User will be comfortable when they understand preferred action
*User expects to see interface controls close to the object he wants to control
*User will rarely change default settings
*User will likely do something that is suggested
*User feels confident if you provide clear and constant feedback
*User will be more inclined to perform a complex action if its broken down

Reference:http://99designs.com/designer-blog/2014/01/15/7-unbreakable-laws-of-user-interface-design/
Last checked: 25/03/2014

Read More

Week 1 - Project Interest

Download the full Pdf

Read More