Re: [Tutor] Conceptual Question About Use of Python for Employee Training Program
What's step 4? On Sat, Jun 25, 2011 at 10:08 AM, Mac Ryan quasipe...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, 25 Jun 2011 06:18:14 -0700 (PDT) Adam Carr adamlc...@yahoo.com wrote: Good Morning: I am very new to Python but I am enjoying the learning process. I have a question about the application of Python to a problem at the industrial business where I work. My two main questions are: 1. Can Python be used to achieve the goals of the possible project? 2. Where are the best places to look (books, blogs, websites, etc.) for programming examples or modules that would help me begin to assemble and test some code? We currently have a Windows-PC based safety training program that was put together in MS Access around 2001 snip Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my long note. I appreciate any help or direction that can be offered. Hi Adam, from the way you describe your problem, to me the obvious answer would be web application. This way you will be able to: 1. Make sure all employees will use the latest up-to-date training material and software version. 2. Have a central DB able to track employees' activity (this opens up the possibility for extra functionalities like sending a gentle reminder e-mail to those who are not taking tests frequently enough, statistics on what topics employees struggle most with, etc...) 3. Be platform independent. 5. Save time on developing the GUI (which - done properly - is a very time consuming part of desktop projects). That said, python is a great tool for web apps too. I personally looked a bit into Django (www.djangoproject.com), which is one of the python web frameworks and I was impressed by the speed you can prototype a fully working application. As for presenting the training material, for iteration #1 I would simply make them available as a download link. But in following iteration of the project I would also integrate them with the web (so as to make the entire application truly portable. I once used S5 for a project. Here you can see a presentation of it that is - coherentely - done with the standard presented: http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/s5/s5-intro.html#slide1 However an alternative I did not experiment with is XOXO, which I read has python code examples available (see http://microformats.org/wiki/xoxo-sample-code-python) HTH, Mac. ___ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor ___ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
Re: [Tutor] Conceptual Question About Use of Python for Employee Training Program
On Sat, 25 Jun 2011 06:18:14 -0700 (PDT) Adam Carr adamlc...@yahoo.com wrote: Good Morning: I am very new to Python but I am enjoying the learning process. I have a question about the application of Python to a problem at the industrial business where I work. My two main questions are: 1. Can Python be used to achieve the goals of the possible project? 2. Where are the best places to look (books, blogs, websites, etc.) for programming examples or modules that would help me begin to assemble and test some code? We currently have a Windows-PC based safety training program that was put together in MS Access around 2001 snip Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my long note. I appreciate any help or direction that can be offered. Hi Adam, from the way you describe your problem, to me the obvious answer would be web application. This way you will be able to: 1. Make sure all employees will use the latest up-to-date training material and software version. 2. Have a central DB able to track employees' activity (this opens up the possibility for extra functionalities like sending a gentle reminder e-mail to those who are not taking tests frequently enough, statistics on what topics employees struggle most with, etc...) 3. Be platform independent. 5. Save time on developing the GUI (which - done properly - is a very time consuming part of desktop projects). That said, python is a great tool for web apps too. I personally looked a bit into Django (www.djangoproject.com), which is one of the python web frameworks and I was impressed by the speed you can prototype a fully working application. As for presenting the training material, for iteration #1 I would simply make them available as a download link. But in following iteration of the project I would also integrate them with the web (so as to make the entire application truly portable. I once used S5 for a project. Here you can see a presentation of it that is - coherentely - done with the standard presented: http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/s5/s5-intro.html#slide1 However an alternative I did not experiment with is XOXO, which I read has python code examples available (see http://microformats.org/wiki/xoxo-sample-code-python) HTH, Mac. ___ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
Re: [Tutor] Conceptual Question About Use of Python for Employee Training Program
Just thought to google for S5 python, and google came out with a lot of interesting links! :o /mac Good Morning: I am very new to Python but I am enjoying the learning process. I have a question about the application of Python to a problem at the industrial business where I work. My two main questions are: 1. Can Python be used to achieve the goals of the possible project? 2. Where are the best places to look (books, blogs, websites, etc.) for programming examples or modules that would help me begin to assemble and test some code? We currently have a Windows-PC based safety training program that was put together in MS Access around 2001. Access has evolved through several versions since then, as has the Windows OS, and the original author of the database has left the company. Originally designed to be deployed on an employee's desktop, the database is now restricted to two older PCs in the facility that run a version of Access compatible with the original. In short, the program is quickly becoming obsolete. The safety training program is a monthly exercise for all thirty nine employees at our location. The training is mandated by OSHA, and the subject matter is chosen based on the relevance to our processes. The program consists of the following general steps. 1. The employee is prompted to enter his or her employee identity number. 2. A confirmation is generated showing the employee name and other minor details, accessed from a simple list, to be sure the identity number and the person are correctly matched. This requires employee acknowledgment. 3. The employee freely selects a training subject from a list. 4. Once a subject is selected, a PowerPoint (or could be the OpenOffice Presentation) is launched. The training information is in the presentation. The employee can navigate forward or backward through the presentation, or they can exit. 5. Once the presentation is complete, or the employee has started and used ESC to exit from the presentation, they are prompted to take a quiz or exit the training program. 6. The quiz is a simple true-false ten question process based on the material in the training presentation. 7. The employee clicks on their answers to questions, the quiz is completed and scored. The employee must get at least eight of the ten questions correct to pass the topic. 8. Right now the Access version of the program prints the quiz, the employee's answers and the correct answers to the quiz, and the hard copy is signed and left with their supervisor. The printer is the default location set for the machine on which the training and quiz are completed. I think that the only reason the quizzes are printed is because no topic and quiz verification process was written into the program. In other words, an employee can take the time to review a topic, take and pass the associated quiz but if the printed copy is lost there is no way to verify that the employee completed anything. I would like to see a program that can be deployed as originally intended, on individual PCs, that can be more easily maintained and modified than the behemoth Access program we now have. We are running a Windows network with most production floor PCs using the latest version of XP and most individual desktops and laptops using Windows 7. I have the blessing of our network gods to pursue an open source solution because the options for this kind of program, which is tailored to individual locations, are few. The best approach the network folks suggested was a Lotus Notes database, which would work great I'm sure but the development cost is very, very high and each of the company's many manufacturing locations would require a slightly different version of the database. Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my long note. I appreciate any help or direction that can be offered. Adam ___ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
Re: [Tutor] Conceptual Question About Use of Python for Employee Training Program
On Saturday, June 25, 2011 06:18:14 am Adam Carr wrote: Good Morning: I am very new to Python but I am enjoying the learning process. I have a question about the application of Python to a problem at the industrial business where I work. My two main questions are: 1. Can Python be used to achieve the goals of the possible project? 2. Where are the best places to look (books, blogs, websites, etc.) for programming examples or modules that would help me begin to assemble and test some code? We currently have a Windows-PC based safety training program that was put together in MS Access around 2001. Access has evolved through several versions since then, as has the Windows OS, and the original author of the database has left the company. Originally designed to be deployed on an employee's desktop, the database is now restricted to two older PCs in the facility that run a version of Access compatible with the original. In short, the program is quickly becoming obsolete. The safety training program is a monthly exercise for all thirty nine employees at our location. The training is mandated by OSHA, and the subject matter is chosen based on the relevance to our processes. The program consists of the following general steps. 1. The employee is prompted to enter his or her employee identity number. 2. A confirmation is generated showing the employee name and other minor details, accessed from a simple list, to be sure the identity number and the person are correctly matched. This requires employee acknowledgment. 3. The employee freely selects a training subject from a list. 4. Once a subject is selected, a PowerPoint (or could be the OpenOffice Presentation) is launched. The training information is in the presentation. The employee can navigate forward or backward through the presentation, or they can exit. 5. Once the presentation is complete, or the employee has started and used ESC to exit from the presentation, they are prompted to take a quiz or exit the training program. 6. The quiz is a simple true-false ten question process based on the material in the training presentation. 7. The employee clicks on their answers to questions, the quiz is completed and scored. The employee must get at least eight of the ten questions correct to pass the topic. 8. Right now the Access version of the program prints the quiz, the employee's answers and the correct answers to the quiz, and the hard copy is signed and left with their supervisor. The printer is the default location set for the machine on which the training and quiz are completed. I think that the only reason the quizzes are printed is because no topic and quiz verification process was written into the program. In other words, an employee can take the time to review a topic, take and pass the associated quiz but if the printed copy is lost there is no way to verify that the employee completed anything. I would like to see a program that can be deployed as originally intended, on individual PCs, that can be more easily maintained and modified than the behemoth Access program we now have. We are running a Windows network with most production floor PCs using the latest version of XP and most individual desktops and laptops using Windows 7. I have the blessing of our network gods to pursue an open source solution because the options for this kind of program, which is tailored to individual locations, are few. The best approach the network folks suggested was a Lotus Notes database, which would work great I'm sure but the development cost is very, very high and each of the company's many manufacturing locations would require a slightly different version of the database. Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my long note. I appreciate any help or direction that can be offered. Adam You might want to check out Dabo (www.dabodev.com). It was designed to replace Visual Fox Pro, Access, and Visual Basic desktop programs. Dabo does a very good job with dealing with the GUI and data. That of course assumes you want a desktop app. You could also use Django to create a web app. But if this is your first python project I think I'd go with a desktop app rather than deal with HTML, JavaSript, CSS, and python for the first project. Johnf ___ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
Re: [Tutor] Conceptual Question About Use of Python for Employee Training Program
Adam Carr wrote: Good Morning: I am very new to Python but I am enjoying the learning process. I have a question about the application of Python to a problem at the industrial business where I work. My two main questions are: 1. Can Python be used to achieve the goals of the possible project? Yes. 2. Where are the best places to look (books, blogs, websites, etc.) for programming examples or modules that would help me begin to assemble and test some code? Do you know Python? If not, start with a tutorial or three. Google is your friend: google for python tutorial or learn Python. Don't just read them, do them. Don't start with code. Start with a list of Functional Requirements. FRs should be technology independent, and preferably written for non-tech people. In other words: BAD: The training notes are opened in Powerpoint using a remote procedure call. GOOD: The training notes are shown to the user by the system. You already have the skeleton of an FR, your text below. Don't think the FR needs to be a huge, technical, ISO-standard document. A single page may be enough. You're just trying to identify the target you are aiming for, so you can tell whether or not you've hit it. Requirements includes things like: - How scalable does this need to be? Do we have 10 users, or 10 million? - Do we have to service remote users over the Internet? - What sort of security is needed? Do you need fear staff cheating? Don't be afraid to postpone functionality for the next version. You don't need all the bells and whistles from day one. In fact, I recommend that you start with the simplest application you possibly can do, and add extra features afterwards. Release early, release often. Get the Powers That Be to approve the FRs. Make sure that everyone (especially you!) understands that no changes will be accepted to functionality without it being put in writing. Now you have a stable target, rather than a moving one. Now write a technical design document: this is where you choose the technologies used. This is the point you start thinking about: - Do we need a database? Which one? SQLite? Postgres? Oracle? - A web app or a desktop app? - Which web framework, or GUI toolkit? - Do you have a server that can run this web app? - Do you need a server-class machine, or can it run off a cheap PC? Again, this may be quite short, although probably a bit longer than the FR. Don't think that you *need* to answer every question up front, although it is best if you can. Especially for small projects, you can leave gaps to be filled in later. But the gaps will guide you, by showing you what you need to learn before you can even start writing code. E.g. if you decide you need a web application, but you have no idea which web framework to use, you now know that you need to spend some time investigating frameworks. CherryPy, Django, Zope, Pylons... http://wiki.python.org/moin/WebFrameworks Once you know what sort of code you need to write, then you can start writing code. More comments below: [...] 2. A confirmation is generated showing the employee name and other minor details, accessed from a simple list, to be sure the identity number and the person are correctly matched. This requires employee acknowledgment. You state that the employee name and details are accessed from a simple list? That's a technical design choice, not a requirement of the program. Perhaps it would be better to come from a database, or a Python dict, or an INI file. Who knows? The requirement is that the employee must acknowledge that he or she is who the system thinks he or she is based on the ID number. Everything else is design. 3. The employee freely selects a training subject from a list. I would put it as, freely selects a training subject from a menu of available subjects. This could be implemented as a list box GUI widget, or a set of checkboxes, or a set of push buttons, or by typing the name of the subject... the user interface is a design choice, and should be kept separate from the requirement that the employee somehow choose a subject. You should see the pattern now... keep design *choices* separate from functional *requirements*. Nothing you have stated seems impossible for Python. Far from it, I would think that Python is a good choice for this project. [...] I would like to see a program that can be deployed as originally intended, on individual PCs, that can be more easily maintained and modified than the behemoth Access program we now have. We are running a Windows network with most production floor PCs using the latest version of XP and most individual desktops and laptops using Windows 7. I have the blessing of our network gods to pursue an open source solution because the options for this kind of program, which is tailored to individual locations, are few. The best approach the network folks suggested was a Lotus Notes database, which would
