programming – Page 2 – CA Work Experience Program

Day 7

Today was my last day at Field2Base and it started off with stand-up as usual. There was also grooming that occurred after this for about 45 minutes since there were a few bugs that needed to be addressed in the software code.

Afterwards, Mary gave us some more forms that customers had reported errors on and she asked us to try and recreate the errors and then find a solution. We were able to find a solution to one of the errors, but some of the other ones were out of our scope of capacities. Mary then gave us a form that a customer attempted to digitize on their own, but that had many issues. We went through and created a list of suggestions for the customer to fix on his own.

Before going out to lunch, Nathan and I watched Mary create a support ticket about a bug she noticed which was awesome. After lunch, we talked with Howard and Rachel for some time and then it was time for us to go. We said our goodbyes and gave some gifts to the employees. It was awesome to spend nearly two weeks working here and getting to know some of the employees well!

Day 6

Today was my second to last day but we still had tons of work to get done. Once stand-up was over, Nathan and I were tasked with creating a program where a user could input a ZIP code and in return the system would print out the time zone they were in. Our original plan was to use the internet and find an API that could do this, and we were in fact able to find one. The issue was that the API would cost money to use more than one time per hour and this couldn’t work because our code was meant to be used for a real customer who would need to access this feature more frequently. Luckily, Nathan was able to find an excel sheet online that had every zip code in the United States and their relevant time zones. We knew how to read the excel sheets on the form creating program, but we ran into another issue: daylight savings. The excel sheet had this included in a separate column, but we had to figure out how to account for this in our code. Luckily, Nathan and I were able to get it working and it was really exciting to have our code work and to know that it would eventually end up in a consumers’ hands. After lunch, there was an office meeting to discuss all the bugs that they needed to fix, and this took some time. Every one of the programmers shared what they were working on and what needed to be fixed next. Can’t wait for tomorrow!

SAS Work Experience Day 5

Today all of the Cary Academy students doing the SAS work experience program were together again to learn about and work with the specific software and technologies that employees at SAS use to analyze data and create visuals. From being introduced to the programming system, the SAS design studio, and the visual analytics program, we were learning and experimenting all day – with a mid-day break for chicken tenders at Building T’s cafeteria of course.

One of our main activities was learning about SAS’s programming system. Since I, and all of the other CA students, had never programmed before the idea of this was somewhat daunting. However, with a detailed, step by step introduction to programming, it was much less complex than I had originally imagined. Below are some screen shots of the work we did.

For our data, we entered in some random numbers and then ran the program to create a frequency analysis and means analysis. Some things we learned include always remembering to put a semicolon at the end of each action, and also how to make notes that sit within the code but do not actually run through the system – these show up in green. Also, if the run fails, we learned to go to the log tab – shown below – and see if there are any errors or notes to indicate what went wrong, which is very useful.

After learning the basics of SAS programming, we were introduced to the SAS design studio where visual analytics can be created from data. Together we went step by step through a few examples, with various types of visuals like bar graphs – pictured below, line charts, lists, and more.

Once we had completed these models, we were able to work independently and experiment with the program to create our own visuals. What made this entire process especially interesting is that we were using real data from the UN about frequency and pricing of foods in different nations. Pictured below is one visual that I created with a pie chart and list, set up so that when you select a certain food on the list the pie chart will depict the frequency of it in specific nations.

Overall, today was an amazing introduction to the world of data science, programming, and analytics, which will be extremely useful in the future!!!

Day 5

As expected, our day began with stand up which was decently short today; Rachel was also back with us today which was nice. From the end of stand up until the start of lunch, Mary (one of the employees at Field2Base that works on digitizing forms for other companies) gave us two forms to work on for new companies. Today’s forms were a bit different since we had to not only connect the forms to an excel sheet, but we also had to make the forms function by writing true scripting code in JavaScript. JavaScript is very different than regular java, but we were still able to translate some of our knowledge over from Java and other languages to make it work. Additionally, they had very well written documentation of how to use each function that they had built in to the software. Once we were done with the two forms, we ate lunch outside and enjoyed the weather. After lunch, we had a video call with Ravi who is the only employee that works remotely for the company. It was interesting to get more insight about working a job where you can’t physically interact with your co-workers. We spoke for roughly an hour before we ended the call. Once the video chat was over, we spent the rest of our day working on another form that Mary assigned us to complete.

Day 4 – Programming… again

Today started out very similar to yesterday. Once again I was able to start at 9. When I arrived at Bavarian Nordic, I quickly went into the conference room. Janelle told us that they would be interviewing an applicant for a Clinical Trials Manager this morning and that we were welcome to sit in. Kaitlin and I very excitedly agreed. The applicant’s name was Josh and had been in the ClinOps field for quite some time. Kaitlin and I sat quietly towards the end of the table and observed as Bavarian Nordic employees asked Josh a variety of questions. Most of them were the standard interview questions like “what’s your greatest weakness?” and “explain a time where you faced conflict.”

After the interview had finished, we said goodbye to Josh and stayed behind with Janelle and Ms. Handelsman to discuss the candidate. We discussed his various strengths and weaknesses and how he presented himself in the interview. It was very helpful to see the reflection process after an interview. I now feel like I am more prepared for upcoming interviews if I have the chance to do some in the fall. I learned that you should never lie in an interview because they can easily see through it. It is also important to ask lots of questions to show that you have done your research and you are engaged. In addition to this, it is imperative to maintain good body language and eye contact.

Once we had finished debriefing, Kaitlin and I went back to our SAS training. After a couple hours of programming, we stopped for lunch. Midway through my lunch, Ms. Eason stopped to check up on me. It was really cool telling her all I learned. That gave me a chance to reflect a little bit on the last 4 days. Once lunch was over, I went back to my desk for more programming. After a grueling couple hours, I finished the SAS training. I was overcome with joy for a split second until I remembered that I was not done with my training. Erika instructed us to complete one more online lesson dealing with the formatting of data. These chapters were much quicker. Once I was finished, I saved my certificates and headed out for the weekend. It was a very tiring day, but I will have a chance to rest up over the weekend so I can be ready to hit the ground running next week!

This took way more work than it should have…

Day4

As usual, today started with Stand-Up at 9:30. Today was a bit different since Rachel wasn’t with us. Regardless, after stand up was over we met with Mary again and she gave us a form that she wanted us to work on for one of Field2Base’s clients. We were actually able to get it to work and we tested it on the android application to make sure it would be fine when the client tried to use it. It was really cool that we were able to work on a form that would actually be given to a customer! After we got the form working, we met with Howard who showed us a bit more about SQL and databases. We briefly met Howard on Tuesday, but he was gone Wednesday and Thursday with his family. The meeting lasted about an hour, and afterwards we ate lunch at the office today. Once we were done eating, Howard assigned us a challenge to try and complete to test our knowledge. We spent the rest of the day working on accomplishing the task since it ended up being a lot more difficult than it seemed. The task was to try and create a form that had a drop-down menu where you could select a name from a list of names and then it would fill in the rest of the data for that person. The trick is that the data all had to come from an excel file, so it was a separate challenge trying to link the form program with an excel file. He also tasked us with using an API to find out the city and state of a student based on their zip code by pulling the zip code from the excel. This was by far the most challenging part of the assignment; however, by getting help from both Mary and Howard we were able to get it all working. By the time we finished the challenge, we were exhausted! Shortly after, we packed up and headed home. Can’t wait for next week!

Day 3 – Lots and Lots of Programming

Today, my day did not start until 9. I was very grateful for this because it gave me a chance to sleep in a little. After my leisurely commute, since I missed the traffic, I arrived at Bavarian Nordic and found Erika and Kaitlin in the conference room. To my sheer sadness, Erika told us we would be learning to program in SAS today. Programming was definitely not one of my best subjects last year so the thought of spending all of today learning to do it in a new language was terrifying. I thought I had escaped it, but I was wrong.

Erika set us up with our laptops and an extra one with the correct software (since we were having technical difficulties). She also explained to us that we would be using SAS to manipulate data. Erika does this very often for her job. She compiles reports and displays tons of tons of data in an easily understandable way. This skill is very important in the field of clinical trials and statistics in general. As Kaitlin and I made our way through lesson after lesson online, we quickly realized that sharing a computer to program wouldn’t work. Therefore, Erika tried to set up our personal computers so we could do the SAS online training there.

Our technical difficulties continued as I could not get the software to completely boot up and Kaitlin could not get it to download. While we waited for our computers to cooperate, Kaitlin and I had lunch with some of our co-workers. I had a very in-depth conversation about spaghetti squash (which was my lunch today), college, and traveling in New England. Once my relaxing break was over, I went back to my computer to try to troubleshoot the issue. After watching many YouTube videos and reading loads of articles, I was able to reconfigure my settings to support the software. By 2, I began to continue my online lessons. There are 11 total lessons that I need to complete before I can receive my certificate. However, each lesson takes so long to complete.

Kaitlin was not able to get her computer working, so Erika sent her to NC State to ask the IT department. I stayed for an extra couple hours chipping away at the lessons. I only got to lesson 7 so I will need to finish the rest tomorrow. It is important that I finish the SAS online training because I will be using what I learn now to manipulate data from the Brachyury trial next week. After hours and hours of programming, my brain was fried. I would like to say that I learned to love programming today, but I did not. However, I did learn that programming is not something I would like to pursue as a career!

Day 3

Today was our third day at Field2Base and it was definitely the best one we’ve had. As usual, the day started with stand-up, where the programmers went over their goals for the day. However, after the stand-up ended, the programmers stayed back for ‘grooming’. Grooming is a process where the developers look at future projects and they each independently rank how long they think the feature will take to add/fix and rate it on a scale of 1-10. Once they all have their numbers decided, they enter it on an app on their phones and show it to each other to make sure they have similar estimates of how much effort the task will take. The issue we went over today averaged a 2, so it likely won’t take too long to resolve. After grooming, Nathan and I met with Mike who writes all the code for Field2Base’s IOS application. Since I was asking so many questions, we ended up talking for nearly two hours. This meeting stuck out to me since I was able to see all the code that goes into their IOS application and some of the classes had thousands of lines of code. I found it unique that he had written all of the code and that he was the only IOS developer. I was under the impression that there were multiple people working on writing the software code for the Apple applications. Once the meeting finished, all the staff went to the food truck in the office parking lot (the office has a food truck that comes and serves lunch every Thursday). All the staff ate together today since one of the employees is leaving, and it was nice to get to know the employees a bit better. We ended up talking for a long time, so once lunch was over we came back and met with Mary, who works through customer requests. She showed us more about what her specific role is at the company and then gave us some more forms to practice digitizing. Once we finished up, we headed out!

Day 2

Once again, Nathan and I arrived at 9 AM for our second day at Field2Base. The morning started with the usual Stand-up; however, after today’s standup there was subsequent meeting to discuss what everyone needed to get done in the upcoming weeks. I learned more about how the programming style functions here as they explained their method of breaking down ‘bugs’ in the software code into shorter tasks that multiple people could be working on at the same time to resolve.

After the meeting, Rachel showed us Zendesk which is the program that the company uses to track customer issues. Since the software is still being developed, the customers often run into issues when trying to use newly released versions of the program. The customers can go on the website and submit issue alerts, or they can even request new features. All of these requests filter into Zendesk where Rachel and the staff can work to resolve the issue.

Rachel also showed us a new program that Field2Base is working on that allows companies to send one-time-use forms to customers who aren’t a part of the company. For example, a company who wants to use Field2Base to make their job applications all virtual might use this feature so that people can fill the job application out from their house rather than having to go to the company and fill out the form on one of their computers.

After explaining this to us, Rachel instructed us to install another piece of company software that sent all of the forms to a designated database, so the company could have access to it. Once we got it working, it was time for lunch. After lunch we met with Brendan, who showed us around the company website for about an hour. After this, we wrapped out for the day and headed home. Looking forward to tomorrow as today was really fun!

Day 1

Arriving at 9 A.M., Nathan and I were ready to work at Field2Base. The company is located in Morrisville in an office complex with a few other companies also leasing office space. We were introduced to Rachel, the individual who will be guiding us for the next two weeks at Field2Base. She showed us around the two offices (they have two separate offices in the same complex) and then gave us our schedules for the next two weeks. She created an hour-by-hour list of all the events we will be doing at Field2Base, many of which are learning about the company itself. After she went over the agenda with us, it was time for their Daily Stand-Up. The stand up occurs at 9:30 AM every day and during this time all the programming staff gathers and discuss what they achieved in the prior day and what they plan to achieve during the current day.

After this occurred, we were issued laptops to use for the next two weeks. While the computers were being worked on, Rachel gave us a presentation about the company and told us about her past while offering opinions on potential job paths. Afterwards, 3 employees plus Nathan and I all went out to eat at a Mediterranean restaurant located in Morrisville. We discussed some of the company’s goals while getting to know each other as we ate delicious food.

After we returned, our laptops were ready to use, and we installed some of the beta software that Field2Base offers to its’ clients. We practiced using the software and were helped out by some of the employees that were available to do so. We ended the day by meeting all of the employees at the company.