What Worked Well:
Sprint #2 was another productive learning experience for our team. We were able to continue building upon the momentum gained from Sprint #1 and were able to achieve commendable progress. In this sprint, we were tasked with completing eight different issues to reach a total issue weight of 30. We crushed this number, completing all eight of our issues on our issue board before the end of the sprint. Something worth noting was our familiarity with the project, what tools we needed, and the process. When comparing last sprint to this one, we found ourselves navigating through GitLab and GitPod more efficiently without any major issues. This resulted in a much smoother workflow. Additionally, I thought that our communication throughout the Sprint remained a cornerstone of our success. We stood up to date with scheduled meetings through Discord and in-person, allowing us to touch on some points, any updates, problems, discussions, and allowed for collaborative problem-solving. This consistent communication fostered a sense of cohesion within the team and ensured that every team member stayed aligned towards completing our tasks. I also found our workflow to be great. We completed some issues together and some individually, but as we finished one thing no one was hesitant to pick up another issue, help someone out, or review work. In regards to what didn’t work well, I don’t have much. Sprint #1 was a learning process for the entire team and once we understood everything, how to time manage our work, and how everything functions in the system, we brought what we learned into Sprint #2. We were able to complete tasks in a very timely manner while also knowing exactly what’s happening in the system and how to correct any issues.
Improvements As A Team:
We made some drastic improvements from the previous sprint in regards to how we took on work, the time we worked on it, our review process, and much more. Although I really liked the progress our team made throughout this sprint I believe one possible area for improvement could potentially be commenting or adding notes for work being completed. As stated, some tasks we completed individually. With this being said, when having other individuals of the team review work, it can be a little challenging to actually see what was changed, added, or the thought process behind someone’s work. By adding some comments directly to issues or connected to merge requests, it allows for both reviewers and anyone going through the work to easily understand what was completed, added, or needs to still be done. A simple message such as, fixed linter errors or solved merge conflicts can go a long way.
Improvements As An Individual:
During Sprint #2, I was able to complete one issue individually and two issues with my team. My first issue was Get Inventory Backend Test Working in InventoryBackend. In Sprint #1, we had some issues with the Inventory System test pipeline. I wanted to really get that testing pipeline to work to continue progressing the project forward. This issue involved me creating a test-runner file, along with an automated_testing_docker-compose.yaml file to integrate into the project. I also communicated with other groups for what they were completing to then integrate our work together and have the testing pipeline run and pass. My second and third issues were completed with my team. This being Verifying that all Thea’s Pantry projects have the correct extensions, linters, and pipeline stages in the GuestInfoBackend, and Verifying that all Thea’s Pantry projects have the correct extensions, linters, and pipeline stages in the GuestInfoAPI. These issues involved adding and enabling the different linters in our system and testing their respective pipelines to ensure they passed. If they didn’t pass, we needed to go into their specific files to make changes and correct the issues. In regards to improvements as an individual, I’d like to see myself become more of a team player for our last sprint. Sometimes I tend to get so focused on fixing and completing one issue that I forget to check in with the needs of the rest of the team. For me, this could be jumping in to help someone that’s stuck on a specific issue, reviewing the team’s work and providing feedback, and even voicing my thoughts, interests, or opinions more to my team. By doing so, I believe it’ll help me grow as an individual and a teammate, and help me tremendously with my professional career.
Conner Moniz Blog 