Dacopan project                                MEETING MINUTES
                                               Apr 13th, 2004

Meeting

    Apr 13th, 2004, at 16:15

    Department of Computer Science


Attendance

    Carlos Arrastia Aparicio
    Jari Aarniala
    Jarkko Laine, secretary
    Turjo Tuohiniemi, instructor
    Vesa Vainio, chairman
    Alejandro Fernandez Rey

Absent

    Jonathan Brown


1. Start

    Mr. Vainio started the meeting at 16:34 after a while of general small 
    talk and demoing the current implementation of the animator.


2. Assessment of the situation

    The implementation was started last week even though the design document
    isn't completely finished yet. The group members have been separately 
    programming different parts of the software.

3. Discussion

    3.1 Coding conventions 

    Coding conventions were briefly discussed. Mr. Aarniala had added earlier
    a paper on them on his web site, and he promised to put the link to that 
    file on the TWiki site. 
 
    It was decided that the Java standards are used. The following issues 
    came up in addition to that:
       - Braces should always be used with blocks - even when they contain only
         one line of code. 
       - Line length of 100 characters should be used. 
       - Spaces should be used instead tabs, 4 spaces = 1 tab.


    3.2 Package structure 

    It was decided that classes should be put into packages according 
    to their functions, i.e. only the classes that are directly related
    to the MainFrame (animation panels) should be in the ui package 
    and for example all the settings dialogs should be in the settings 
    package (and not ui).

    The following package structure is used:

      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.animseq:  Animation Sequence Framework
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.contsig:  Control Signal Framework
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.model:    Data Structures
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.settings: Settings and settings panels
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.ui:       MainFrame and related UI classes
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.pef:      Reading PEFs
      - fi.helsinki.dacopan.scenario  Reading scenario files


    3.3 Unit test plan    

    It was decided that Mr. Fernandez starts creating the unit test plan by
    writing a skeleton for the document. Mr. Aarniala explained unit testing 
    a little and pointed out that in unit tests we should always test the 
    smallest possible units. He told that he has started to code so that he 
    always thinks about how the code can later be tested as easily as possible - 
    Mr. Tuohiniemi stated that this is a good approach and that it should be
    carried out through the whole process starting from requirements.


    3.4 Protocol events file

    The Petrozavodsk team had sent a question concerning the Protocol events 
    file that the Helsinki group hadn't yet answered. It was decided that 
    Mr. Aarniala thinks about the suggestion and sends a reply. Mr. Arrastia and
    Mr. Fernandez volunteered to help Mr. Aarniala with this task.

    Mr. Aarniala also promised to write the description of the file format 
    to the global design document.
    

    3.5 Localization

    Localization was briefly discussed and it was decided that Mr. Vainio
    will look at localization and create the code needed to make the 
    software easily localizable.


    3.6 Diverse implementation issues
 
    Several small implementation detail were mentioned during the meeting:
       - All layer information will come from the XML PEF file so no 
         hardcoded information about layers should be present in the animator
       - SplitPane should be used for all MainFrame panels
       - Javadoc @author tags should not be used
       - When creating animation panels paintComponent() should be overriden 
         instead of paint(). This will allow Swing to still draw borders etc. 
         correctly. 
       - Every time a panel is drawn, it should ask for its size and do 
         the drawing based on that information. This way the panel is always
         scaled correctly.


4. Action points
   
   - All: continue implementation and doing what you are doing.
   - Mr. Aarniala: 
        * Go through the code and see if there are any severe errors
        * Comment on the PEF file suggestions
        * Write a description of PEF to the design document
   - Mr. Arrastia 
        * Help Mr. Aarniala with the PEF issues
   - Mr. Fernandez
        * Start unit test plan (create document skeleton)
        * Help Mr. Aarniala with the PEF issues
   - Mr. Vainio
        * Work on localization 

5. End

    Mr. Vainio ended the meeting at  17:45.  

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