Everything has its end and so is the database course. But the final lecture for the reports of our plug-ins doesn’t mean the end of learning database – data are everywhere in life and what the most important is that we should know how to use things we learned from the course after class and even till our life.

         Though the number of blog entries is enough before the final-exam weeks comes, it is still necessary for me to make an additional blog at the end of the term after tests as a summary for this term, as well as some of my feelings and opinions.

         Database Knowledge

         This is the basic but important part of the course (it is not a course of course without telling knowledge we need). Though the lectures for database are separated to each group, it is still a unique system of knowledge if we join them together. From the lectures, The so-called “traditional concepts” for a database course in contented, includes the basic concept of database, database models, the normal form and normalization, database design, data storage and query, transaction, and further, system architecture and the application design. Though the way of learning changed, the basic contents similar to the traditional textbooks are still not missing.

         Transaction is the content of our group’s lecture. It was quite a hard process for us since the concept of transaction is abstract in contrast and the sense can be seen usually only when it faces with things in large scales – but “textbook’s examples” are usually small and simple. We tried hard to associate the concept in the traditional “textbook” with the facts in real life, and find a way to show it clearly. This is why the student-made lecture is necessary in this course. The traditional way of learning is telling you the things on the textbooks and asking you to solve the problems, on the textbooks as well. A link with the real world is necessary and in this way the database course requires you have to find out such a link by yourselves. I worked a lot on this, read several books and articles and as well lots of information on the Internet. I tried to organize them in to a technical presentation view and finally the slides are given out, which has been talked about in the earlier blog. What I got after that is that, things seen in the real world always wake my consideration with database knowledge up, for example, the terrible train tickets selling system in China this year would make me think of the bad design of transactions and make me have a think about if any method can be used in this case. It is a more consideration of life with knowledge.

         However, the new way of generating knowledge still has its shortages I think. Though the later groups need to know all things told by the earlier groups in order to associate the knowledge to give a lecture of their content based on all the contents in the class before, the earlier groups may have less effort to listen to the later part since some of them might think their jobs have been done and what they only need to do is the plug-ins. Though the plug-in may also call for the database knowledge, it is still need a further consideration of learning in lecture time but not only in the after-class time.

         Technique & Skill

         The development of Wordpress plug-ins is a specific method so that we should use the knowledge in practice, thinking of the targets and functions, designing the database system and system architecture, and see how it can face with the problems in reality. Based on the basic knowledge of database, it calls for more effort in technique and skill in programming as well.

         Things we learnt should be implied by certain tools or methods. We have to choose the tool to build up the database, for example MySQL for Wordpress plug-in, and choose the tool to use the data like php and javascript. Only when things run with your hard working on it, you would know what the knowledge really is.

         At first my part of job focused on the function and interface design after the user research and database building. However, a good interface would help you gain a more attentions but what really attract the users is still if it can work and help them in their lives. So after the midterm we pay more energy in the functional development and interaction design to make it more practical. (So sorry for the bad taste of the interface ;-) ).

         Though at last most of teams’ plug-in became websites other than a simple wordpress plug-ins, it is still a practice to run the knowledge we learnt, but not just use the knowledge for test like other courses, for our group as least I think.

         I found some interesting graphs of statistical results in programming and application developing area. I did not find a right time to show them so I put them here. I think they have very important information for those who are interesting in web development.(Click to see in a large view)

         We can see that it is more flexible in practice even the same function or even similar concept of database design, the methods and software can choose are varied, no mention the large amount of jQuery or some are API we can use. Many other facts includes the developing environment and the thoughts of the users are also need a further consideration. What we need to is not only to try and find the best combination of techniques to make the plug-in in use but also to know how they work and why we need them. What we tried is just a little part on the earth. The learning of tools includes the MySQL, php and css is a hard and long way, but also interesting and exciting when it works.

         But not everyone fits the programming task and has a skill in learning development tools quickly. Such a member may sometimes gets the task that has less contact with the inside database knowledge. How to provide them the same effort of learning database knowledge is still a problem in my opinion.

         Other Personal Skills

         The learning blog entries require us to build up a habit that you should write down what you learnt immediately as a record. In fact, such records are important in programming and even science researching. This skill should be used later in life. As well, it also provide a chance of mind exchanging only when you try to show the things you own to others. However, when the entries are regarded as only a task that you have to finish, a perfunctory writing would make it meaningless. The details and experience will disappear quickly after several days, which mean a later filling up makes little effort in our learning process. It becomes just “task”. Since the norm of learning in China seldom calls for such a method to record the things you learnt, always just notes but not telling things as a blog, it still need more time for me to bring up such a habit even I keep my writing during the term. But hope I can try to keep it after the course.

         The presentation skill is also an important part during the course. It is quite a hard work to show your mind to others without a good way to presentation. On one hand, the speech may have effort in presentation, but this skill need a long-run practice and also connected with some other personal characteristics and what we need is keep speaking out. On the other hand, which is more important and can improve the situation significantly if you pay attention in, the way you show your things. I don’t think the presentation slides our group made is gorgeous, complex or perfect, but it should be one of the most impressive ones and it tells things clearly. It is an outcome of ours careful consideration. And I got a lot of practice in this process.

         Team spirit is the most important fact in group-divide program, and all include the lecture and the plug-in development needs a good member cooperation and management. If you really do things seriously in this term, one of the most you can get is to know what the function you can be in the team and to discover what the ability you really have. But if not, you would just follow the others’ advice and even do things you are not interested in. You might even learn nothing after the hard working. Thank goodness that I have a active group and all of us really did a good jobs, I’m so proud of them. 

         So, it is an end of the course, but not the end of study and learning. To a certain degree, the database course is a new way of learning through our study life till today. It provides not only the environment for us to learn the knowledge of database and generate new idea ourselves in the learning it, but also the training of learning itself: find the way of learning, which means, learn to learn. And hope everyone get what they want in this period and have an effort in our future.