About

Elevator Summary

Problem: Troy, like many other localities, suffers from a disengaged citizenry and unresponsive political system. Currently there is no infrastructure in place for an online project management system which is capable of dealing with the real world constraints found in grassroots efforts. Constraints such as flexible membership, variable commitment, and grassroots project proposals.

We are proposing the creation of a social project management system, supported by the Troy Downtown Business Improvement District, which would allow streamlined project management and development in a uniquely inviting and open way. The goals of this project are five fold:

1. Provide a system for existing groups to organize projects, get people involved, and archive project states for future development.

2. Allow citizens of Troy (and/or any locality where this is deployed) to submit and develop project ideas online.

3. Facilitate the project actualization process through a guided web system as well as by connecting people with the necessary resources to solve problems.

4. Integrate with existing systems via APIs facilitate the growth of projects through social networking connections.

5. Openly allow affiliation with projects by new members to create an open-source model in the physical sphere.

Related Projects and Literature

A literature search returned no current open source projects currently filling this niche. There are many acclaimed online project management applications, such as Basecamp and No Kahuna; many problem- or goal-based social media sites, such as Stack Overflow or Kickstarter, but we were able to find no intersection between the two fields or any project management software focused on a community as opposed to a fixed team or business.

We believe that this hole exists because community-based action—with flexible teams, clear project archival, and multiple allegiances—is not is not something traditionally thought of as under the realm of project management. However, a centralized accountability source is clearly a need for the community. We hope that by integrating tested features of project management while focusing on the unique attributes of a community and building an accessible project memory we will be able to fill this current niche in the Troy community and beyond.

Schedule and Plan of Action

This project will follow a 10-week timeline; two weeks will be allocated to the elaboration and transition phases while the bulk of the work—8 weeks—will be the construction phase. During the elaboration phase, we will design the user interface for the site by completing the mockups and mapping out the functionalities and their technical specifications. The framework will be Ruby on Rails using SQLite for development; additionally, JQuery and AJAX will be used to enrich the user experience beyond static pages.

The construction phase will be broken up into four two-week iterations. The first iteration will focus on developing the project submission and progression mechanism, which would display inputted fields in different manners depending on the project’s stage of development (idea, review, feasibility, and implementation). Additionally, this step involves creating an algorithm to control project progression from idea to implementation. The second iteration will focus on the project archival and search features, during which time we will implement a problem-based map and introduce a tagging and verification system into the project submission and progression forms. The third iteration will focus on the creation of users and groups in the application and customizing the individual user experience through traditional project management tools (calendars, tasks, list of projects, updates, etc.) The fourth iteration is integrating more application features with Google or Facebook through use of wall posts, Facebook Applications, on-site commenting and foruming, and other current heavily-used features. The transition phase will encompass the final testing processes and project deployment

Each iteration within the construction phase has a base set of functionality requirements in order to make the web application accomplish its purpose. However, each of these iterations has potential to be expanded upon to make the final product more robust. This development plan gives us the flexibility we need to ensure that the end product will be functional and fulfill its purpose while ensuring that each feature is fully tested.. Frequent iterations allow us to meet often with the project stakeholders to ensure the project is carrying out their vision to its fullest potential.

Deliverables

The minimum deliverable will be a functional community-based project management web application with verified users, user/group pages with individually relevant information, project entering mechanism, project progression (rules that promote an idea to a work in progress to review to implementation with associated individual features), some basic project management tools including tasks, milestones, and discussion, and a search and archival mechanism. The maximum deliverable will include the core functionality of the minimum deliverable while further developing the social interaction through integrating with Google, Facebook, foruming, and other currently-used social media outlets and user interface through developing several different models of increasing complexity and control based on how a user ranks their technical skill/interest. Additionally, the maximum deliverable will include a problem-based searching mechanism by which a user may submit problems

Relevant Experience

Two students will be working in collaboration with the Troy Business Improvement District (and their liaison, Anasha Cummings) in order to complete this project: Lee Sharma (AERO, ‘12) and Reilly Hamilton (CSCI/ECON, ‘12).

Lee Sharma is a junior in the Aeronautical Engineering curriculum. She has experience in programming in a variety of programming languages including C, C++, Ruby, Python, Perl, Java, Ruby on Rails, HTML/CSS/JavaScript, MatLab, Labview, and some PHP. Her past relevant coursework includes Artificial Intelligence, Computer Architecture, and Neuroscience Tech Lab. She has experience working with C, C++, MatLab, LabView, Python/Ruby/Perl, Java, HTML/CSS/JavaScript, and some Ruby on Rails and PHP.

Lee has been involved in several projects through her classes, but the most extensive of these was working on the development of a quad-directional neural-directed wheelchair, which processing the input of an EEG cap through MatLab, LabView, and a C++ program in order to control the motion of an electronic wheelchair. Lee has not been an active programmer for the past three years due to her involvement in Student Government and other community activities, and she looks forward to this opportunity to improve her skills while benefiting the community.

Reilly Hamilton is a junior Computer Science and Economics major. He has a thorough background in C++, Java, PHP/MySQL, Ruby on Rails, and HTML/CSS/Javascript. His relevant coursework at RPI includes Open Source Software, Software Design and Documentation ,E-Commerce, Social Networks, and Collective Intelligence, Network Programming, and Operating Systems.

Reilly has participated in several WebTech projects such as Shuttle Tracking and Flagship Documents. He has developed internal titling and graphics software for RPI TV’s live production environment using PHP, GD, ImageMagick, and MySQL, created a detailed college hockey ranking and prediction program, and has developed and maintained several web applications in both PHP and Ruby on Rails.