I’m pleased to announce the alpha launch of WebPlannr!
This first public release is a ‘base version’ of sorts. It includes all of the major functionality I’ve discussed in previous posts, as well as some extras that I chose to throw in. I encourage you to sign up and play around with it, I have no doubt that it will help keep your academic life organized.
There are a few bugs to be aware about:
- When you go to create a class, the time picker is in 24hr format, even though it says AM/PM. This is an issue with the timepicker package I used and I’m working on a fix
- The ‘Settings’ page is unfinished and extremely ugly. I plan to add more functionality very soon.
Please, send me feedback about the app! There are definitely some parts that have issues (see above), and I want to hear your thoughts. I don’t want to know if it sucks (it does, it’s an alpha) but how. Your feedback will help me focus on important bug fixes. If you find it useful tell your friends to sign up! The more people that test it out, the better the finished product will be.
Y’all ready for this? Head over to http://dev.webplannr.com to register an account.
As always, any questions, comments, or feedback can go to dev@webplannr.com or @WebPlannrDev
Just wanted to post a quick update and let you guys know the state of the project. As of right now, the main features are all coded. I’ve ‘froze’ the codebase for the alpha release so that I can focus on design and user interface stuff. I have a pretty solid design draft and I wanted to share it with you guys and get feedback. Without further ado,
I decided to split the dashboard into two main elements: the assignment list on the left side and the main calendar. The assignment list will show approaching deadlines and long-term assignments lingering in the future. The calendar takes up most of the view, with a more visual representation of stuff that you have to do. In this case I took a screenshot of my google calendar, but the WebPlannr implementation will look very similar.
Color-wise, It’s green and uh, grey. When I think of schoolwork I think of those green 3-ring binders filled with paper. This might change, but I don’t think the colors are worth fussing over at this point… so long as it’s consistent (and not chartreuse) the colors don’t really matter.
Right now I’m slicing up the photoshop document and slowly translating it into HTML/CSS.
As always, feedback is welcome and encouraged. Design definitely isn’t my strongest skill. Every little bit of help counts!
If you haven’t already signed up, do so here! Also be sure to follow @WebPlannrDev on twitter.
Stay tuned.
After a few months of this idea bouncing around in my head, I finally have the time and technical knowledge to bring it to life. For the past few weeks, I’ve been planning out and coding my newest project: Webplannr.
WebPlannr is an online agenda book for the busy college student. After finishing my second year, I realized that I only survived my hectic schedule thanks to my little blue agenda book. My book was basically my school life in written form; it held everything from class schedules to long-term assignments. My agenda book was a good solution for solving my organizational woes, but it came with some problems… what happens if I lose this book? What happens if I don’t have it with me when I need to write something down or reference something? A physical book was good for most things, but it only took a few forgetful days for me to investigate a better solution.
WebPlannr solves this.
Webplannr is a service that keeps track of all of your classes and assignments — online. With WebPlannr you can enter, update, and complete your assignments just like you would in your little book. It also allows you to enter classes that you are currently taking, with meeting times and repeating days. All of this information is displayed on a huge calendar where you can see long term assignments and upcoming deadlines. WebPlannr solves one of my problems, and I think it can help other people too.
Now for some geeky details. The application is built on the Django framework running on my Linode box. Django is an MTV (model, template, view) framework based on python. I chose django after picking up python earlier in the summer. I’ve never been much of a programmer, but python made perfect sense in my brain and was easy to learn. I took a java programming class last semester and was constantly frustrated with the verbosity of the language. The app is using MySQL for the database. For the user interface, I’ll be working in HTML5 and CSS3, also using some fancy javascript where I can squeeze it.
So that’s it?
Well… yeah. I want to get a simple, stable, application out the door before fall semester starts. There are a ton of features that I want to add, but the core functionality needs to kick ass before I start directing my attention elsewhere.
Here few ideas that I’m playing around with:
- Mobile site – I want to have m.webplannr.com bring you to a feature-rich mobile site where you can use the site from your phone. It’s likely that this will happen soon after launch, due to the awesomeness of django’s templating framework
- Gradebook – A part of the site where you can enter your grades and have your report card calculated before the college does
- Native iOS and Android applications – I think something like this can really shine with an iPad app
As of right now, I have most of the backend logic coded. The front end, however, needs some work. I’m in the process of brainstorming and sketching out some ideas for user interface elements. Pretty soon I’m going to fire up photoshop and draw with some pretty gradients. Here are some quick sketches:
Yeah, they’re pretty crappy but you gotta start somewhere!
Interested? Head over to webplannr.com and sign up for early access. I’m releasing an alpha within the next two weeks and will be relying on user feedback for making improvements.
As always, you can hit me up on twitter at @WebPlannrDev or shoot an email to dev@webplannr.com
Before you ask, yes I was incredibly bored when this idea was hatched. Yes, this idea is completely ridiculous. And yes, I should have devoted the time to more important work. But what kind of data junkie would I be if I didn’t do some research on such a fun question?
This entire post was inspired by the tumblr blog EpicFacts. On July 6th, they posted this image:
I read this, giggled, scrolled, scrolled back, and thought about it. “Vanna White must have clapped her hands like a bazillion times” I thought. “Well, maybe not a bazillion, probably more like a hundred bajillion. I wonder what the real number is?” At this point, I couldn’t leave the question unanswered… I had already invented numbers to try and describe the total.
Let’s begin.
Read the rest of this entry »
Wow, just wow.
I’m sitting here writing this with a lump in my throat. I can’t believe I’m already writing about the end of my sophomore year. As cliché as it is, move-in day feels like yesterday. I can clearly picture me and my parents dragging the shit-ton of stuff I brought to college up to the fourth floor of Shaw.
The past year has been filled with ups, downs, and practically everything in between. Fall semester, in general, was pretty boring. I came into sophomore year expecting the friends from freshman year to carry over. They did to an extent, but for the most part everyone had found their respective niches. I spent many a night trying to find people to hang out with, only to hear that they were all going out with their small group. My two best friends even had their own small groups of core friends that they hung out with: one based around a selective college major and the other based around a sorority. To be perfectly honest, I was jealous of what they had. The group of people that I became closest with was a group of 30-somethings that I worked with. This definitely wasn’t a bad thing, but they weren’t people that I would call up on a Friday night to go out partying with. Looking back on fall semester, most of it was forgettable. Sure, I had some fun nights and kissed a few girls but nothing really substantial happened. The fall left me yearning for more in the spring.
Spring semester was, without a doubt, one of the best times I’ve had so far in college. Adults always say that college was the best time of their life, and up until spring semester I had never really felt that way. I was always waiting for that awesome college moment to happen, but it never did.
Looking back, my waiting was why nothing happened. I was too busy waiting for something extraordinary to happen, and wasn’t out there doing it! But I digress…
Spring semester started out great. Everyone was so happy to be back on campus, and the classes were awesome and interesting. There’s something about spring semester that just puts people in a great mood, even if it’s 2 degrees and snowing.
Ultimately, the highlight of the semester (any my college life thus far) was the last few weeks after spring break. One random saturday night I texted my friend Anne Marie to see what she was up to. As it turned out, she was with a bunch of people and heading to a house party on campus. I quickly got ready and met them on the corner outside my dorm. I knew a few people, but for the most part they were all strangers. We walked around in the cold for a while, which is usually terrible, but we were all talking and making jokes the whole time. I could tell that we sorta “clicked” together. It felt like we were close friends.
Eventually, towards the end of the night, a few people had left and done their own thing. However, me and the “core” of this random group remained. We decided to call it an evening and go to the late-night dining center. We sat down and devoured our munchies, joking, talking, and laughing the whole time. On the way out, I jokingly challenged one of the girls, Alise, to steal the napkin dispenser… and she did! It was absolutely hilarious to watch her put it inside her jacket and walk out right past the security guards.
If I look up from my computer screen I can see that dispenser sitting on my shelf; a reminder of an awesome night
We never got into a party, but it was probably one of my favorite nights of college. I knew that I had found my niche, and would become great friends with these people.
The last four weeks of school were an awesome experience. I was having a blast hanging out with this random crew. We would hang out on the quad, eat dinner together, and even just hang out and watch a movie. It was the kind of fun that I had been waiting for… and it happened so randomly!
This whole thing really made me think about choices. What if I hadn’t texted Anne Marie that night? What if she decided not to go out? So many choices were made that night and they all perfectly lined up to form something awesome… what are the chances?! This reminds me of a great quote from the movie Synecdoche, New York:
“There are a million little strings attached to every choice you make; you can destroy your life every time you choose. But maybe you won’t know for twenty years. And you’ll never ever trace it to its source.”
Seemingly insignificant choices do make a difference.
As a person, I’ve grown a lot this year. I’m starting to get more comfortable with myself, and it shows a little more each day. I’ve also become a lot more confident. Having conversations with strangers is no longer a chore, but something that I enjoy. On the other hand, I still let fear control me a little too much. In social situations, I’m almost always too concerned with the “what ifs” and never actually make a move. This definitely screwed me over in one particular situation this year, but it’s something that I’m working on. I’m learning to just say “fuck it” and overcome the fear.
This year I’ve learned two important lessons: be yourself no matter what, and always go for the kiss… even if you’re unsure.
As for next year, big things are happening. In the fall, I’ll be traveling to London with SU Abroad. I have no idea what to expect, but I’ve been told that I’ll have the time of my life. I’m a little bummed about this because I have a few close friends that will be doing the same thing in spring semester. This means I won’t get to see these people until senior year! Even though I won’t see some people for a while, I’m really looking forward to traveling abroad.
All in all, I would give this year two thumbs up. It was a little slow, and I made some dumb moves, but the last few weeks were absolutely spectacular.
Here’s to a great summer.
