2020 REFRESH

[Apexal]

If it isn't obvious, I abandoned LATE this summer to focus on my internship at Blackstone and other personal projects. Throughout my time at Blackstone, I was introduced to new technologies and the proper methods of full stack development. This proved to me that the LATE codebase is a mess in terms of architecture (not code quality!). The scope is too wide and the packages I'm using were not the best choices (Koa over Express, MongoDB). There are also smaller issues that remote work has brought up now that not everyone is in eastern time. However... there are 670 RPI students on the waitlist and more are added each week! So I clearly can't just drop the project. So what is my plan...?

RCOS

As a RCOS coordinator, I am teaming with coordinator alumni to implement a variety of reforms in the organization. One development I am extremely excited about is to create an RCOS identity server that student projects can use for authentication in the same way that you can sign in to a website with Google and it can request some of your information. This will replace CAS and provide much more useful info to web apps such as name, cohort, major, etc.

Microservices

LATE set out to do too much. It should be a coursework manager and that's it. Nothing more or less. If I implement the RCOS identity server in time, LATE can be split up into separate services to form an ecosystem all linked together with the identity server.

So what am I actually doing?

I have this last week free where I am not working or teaching before I move in back at Troy in an apartment. I will figure out my actual concrete plan then.

[Apexal]

I started a modern rewrite of LATE in Express and TypeScript until I realized that was a total waste of time. Instead, I am cutting all non-coursework related features.

[Apexal]

Realistically, I will never get to the automatic scheduling of work blocks so I should remove all features related to that:

• branding

[Apexal]

Well this was a crappy semester... I've been trying to juggle online courses, RCOS administration and a complete overhaul of the club's data organization, a RPI course parser and API, an Open ID Connect provider for student projects to use, and my service work for the non-profit back at home. I have literally not had the space in my mind to relearn how LATE works and pick back up where I left off. I've wanted to tear down the whole thing and start fresh, but I recognize that I only have 1 more year of college left and obviously will drop everything in my life relating to coursework once I get away from this place. So what do I do?

[Apexal]

No way is this possible. I'm now freelancing for PCC and the Historical Society, maintaining the ITWS Discord server and bot, as well as the ORCA API. And that's before classes started. I will have to work with what I have.