Project URL:
http://mglowecheckmark.scriptsaws.mitaf.edu/813/checkmark/gr4/cm/
For this prototype, we suggest using OSX with Chrome to access CheckMark.
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Drawing inspiration from the heuristic evaluations, I aimed for simplicity in redesigning the aesthetic appearance and layout of the gradebook. I restructured a significant amount of the back-end to support user modification of gradebook entries and provided more affordances on the front-end for the user to identify the grade modification functionality. These changes provide a more dynamic experience by allowing the user to modify grades by simply clicking on the grade entry itself, entering a new score into a popover, and pressing "save." If the user enters an invalid grade, the popover closes. If the grade entered is valid, the gradebook reloads immediately with the newly entered grade incorporated into the total, average, and letter grade that displays. I also added user customization and feedback to sending grade reports, which treats assignments like attachments in email and allows for the optional inclusion of messages. Finally, I provided a legend that appears when the user presses the help icon, which maps the letter grades to the percentages, providing more information without sacrificing simplicity or adding clutter.
Marcus
My contributions to the project were largely in the formation of the overall interface's layout and representation. This included efforts in creating establishing a framework so that other parts of the application could determine which students were currently selected. In this, I also established the notification system so that when a parent messages the teacher, she is aware and notified and is able to correctly select the selection of students that would allow her to read messages. To allow for this interaction, I utilized socket.io within our implementation. In addition, I constructed a large majority of the backend and data model. Because we wanted our GR4 to be fairly well put together, we decided to have most of the "backend" established and integrated into parts of the code. The "backend" at this time was just a series of classes written in javascript that were loaded and allowed for other portions of the code to get and set certain data parts. In moving to node.js, we were able to reuse a lot of these classes and thus have it so that the other parts of our project did not have to be ported over to new backend services. This was a necessary optimization that required some foresight but improved the quality of both checkpoints in this project. I also had a small hand in the creation of the conversations of messages and the grades page.
Evan