Profile of the Skagit Valley College Information Technology Development Team

Profile Of The Skagit Valley College Information Technology Development Team

I am writing this profile about the Skagit Valley College Information Technology Development Team because of the exciting research and development being done in the areas of paperless applications and responsive web technology. This innovative r&d is being done at my workplace so this is a subject that I have plenty of access to, and I am inspired by ideas and curiosity about it. If you use the SVC website frequently, then you will find the behind the scenes information to be very interesting and informative.

AI generated image from the text prompt "In the I.T. office where I develop paperless applications, the clack of heels in the hallway is echoed with the clickety clack of a keyboard that is most likely being worked out at over 50 wpm."
AI generated image 

In the I.T. office where I develop paperless applications, the clack of heels in the hallway is echoed with the clickety clack of a keyboard that is most likely being worked out at over 50 wpm. There is a distinct buzzing noise that can be recognized as a computer’s fan, clearly straining to remove the heat and keep the hard working processor from melting into silly putty. Not too many people would notice such odd noises, these subtle signs of a computer user pushing his technology to the limits. These cues could easily blend into the background noises that surround our everyday environments and be indistinguishable from the hustle and bustle of the numerous students going about their daily studies.

Our team at the college is responsible for things to do with computers, technology and the Internet.
AI generated image

Our team at the college is responsible for things to do with computers, technology and the Internet. There are 5 men in our core crew of Information Technology Developers. We create and manage the web pages applications, graphics and user interfaces that many of the students use every day. The information technology team that is quietly powering the entire Skagit Valley College information infrastructure is a talented team of Technology Specialists. This diverse group of enthusiastic developers has helped redefine the way technology is used and have dramatically impacted the future of web development. People may be surprised to know that this local team of developers has come up with such a remarkable system of responsive web development that is well ahead of major corporations.

There’s an interesting culture surrounding the information technology offices: they have rituals of coffee and pizza and...

There’s an interesting culture surrounding the information technology offices: they have rituals of coffee and pizza and laughter. They have very critical functions within the community of students who depend on them daily for support for everything from login to printing to writing the code that is behind the scenes running the very classes that they attend. There is a quiet sense of partnership and teamwork. A question is met with a smile and enthusiastic explanation, however I sense they want to stay behind the scenes and quietly keep everything running.

When people hear about the responsive website that the information technology development team created for the college, and how it’s a different user experience on every device, they seem find it very interesting and want to hear more about it. I began with the initial research of web frameworks and responsive web technology, and then I presented my findings to the web team. From there we decided to go with a responsive web site rather than creating a separate mobile site. The technology that we have put in to place can now detect a user’s screen size, and then “respond” by changing the web page to best fit the user’s devices from PC to smart TV to iPhones and beyond.

“Paperless Applications” is a new and rapidly growing field of technology. Going well beyond the traditional web form, this is a very green and efficient way of gathering information. Computer and mobile technology has advanced to the point that it is finally feasible to do away with paper forms and use electronic devices to gather information that a person would normally put on paper. This paperless technology is also a much more secure way to store the information, which is important as usually you are giving your name address and other personal information when you fill out these forms.

Let’s take for example the traditional job application form. If you go apply for several jobs and fill out paper applications with your name address and social security number and leave it with an employee behind the counter you are taking a big risk with your personal information and at the very least your privacy. An online web form based job application is easily accessible and filled out by anyone with a computer or mobile device. When the applicant has finished filling out the application this data is then saved and stored securely and only show the up for authorized personnel.

Some other great reasons to use paperless applications when the data is stored into a storage device, the device may be powered down and it then uses is almost no resources. The information that is stored in this method may be much easier retrieved and displayed in organized reports achieving higher efficiency than paper document storage.

I have future plans for this technology that I would like to use to really enhance eLearning and create a more interactive online classroom environment. I also have an application designed to protect children and sign them in and out of school, daycare or pretty much anywhere. That particular application is currently deployed in one day care and under consideration by the state of Washington for schools as well as the YMCA for their membership needs.

Student Club Roster Form

I was assigned the task of turning the Student Club Roster Form paperwork into a paperless web application. This was a challenging project involving a lot of dynamic elements and on the fly data validation.

I created a day of the week chooser to hide some intrusive and unintuitive form checkboxes and turn it into a slick ui with a responsive modern design.

See this post for more information about the day of the week chooser.

Make a calendar date picker using jquery

Due to the strict Web Content Accessibility Guidelines for institutions that serve public internet content to users around the world, I am updating some legacy apps to use a date picker to allow user to enter their birthdate. After some research I’ve decided that the jQuery UI datepicker would be the perfect thing to use due to its ability to work in almost every browser that exists.

The first thing I will do is to  read the docs at jQuery official site. Now that I have a good understanding of the scripts and code involved, lets break down the minimum requirements to have this working in a page.

I would want the user to click into the text field…


…and have the picker pop up, with drop downs to choose the month and year…

…then they click to chose the day.

The audience for this user case scenario are adults of an age to be interested in information about college. The device target includes desktop and laptop computers. Mobile devices have native form controls that would conflict with this script.

We start with my html 5 template, then add the calls to the google cdn to get the jquery plug in scripts.
[code language=”html”]<script src=”http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.11.1/jquery.min.js”></script>
<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.10.4/themes/smoothness/jquery-ui.css” />
<script src=”http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.10.4/jquery-ui.min.js”></script>[/code]
Next we have  a form  with a date element, given proper name and id attributes.

<form><input type="date" id="mydatefield" name="datefield" value="" placeholder="Enter birthdate" /></form>

Now, all I have to do is call the jquery date picker function on the form element, with options changeMonth and changeYear setup as so…

 $( "#mydatefield" ).datepicker({ changeMonth: true,   changeYear: true, yearRange:"c-80:c"  });

That’s all there is to it. While testing on the desktop, it is working well in Chrome,  Firefox and Internet Explorer.

To avoid the problems of overlayed natives on mobile devices , We  just use a “text” input instead of the html5 “date” input element. We can easily use CSS media queries JavaScript to change the data type on the fly.

Find text in a string, compare two strings for similar match VBScript ASP classic

According to the Microsoft Docs, The InStr(string1, string2)  function returns the position of the first occurrence of one string within another.

We can use this to find a string within another one. For example. I wish to see if an email address is from the Skagit.edu domain. I want to see if the address is firstname.lastname@skagit.edu so I can use the first and last name in a greeting.

string1=”@skagit.edu”
string2=”firstname.lastname@skagit.edu”

stringcount = InStr(string1, string2)

If stringcount>0 Then
response.write(“We have a skagit.edu domain address”)
Else
response.write(“This is not a skagit.edu email address”)
End If

Basic Email Validation With VBScript / ASP classic

I need a server side check for basic email address syntax. I will use a regular expression to match the pattern of xxxxx@yyyyy.zzz

 Function GetEmailValidator() 
      Set GetEmailValidator = New RegExp 
      GetEmailValidator.Pattern = "^((?:[A-Z0-9_%+-]+.?)+)@((?:[A-Z0-9-]+.)+[A-Z]{2,4})$" 
      GetEmailValidator.IgnoreCase = True 
End Function

This is a great function, but how to use it? Well, you test it like so:

Dim EmailValidator : Set EmailValidator = GetEmailValidator()
If EmailValidator.Test(to_email) = False Then ..... execute code for when an invalid email is found

detect object in dom jquery see if a table exists on html5 page by id

have a table that is created dynamiclly. need to see if its there, create it or append to it based on its existence.

 

Lets set a var usertableexists=false;

if($(“#mytableid”).length){usertableexists=true;}

console.log(“the table exist var is “+ usertableexists)

Job History: Information Technology Developer

I would like to begin by describing how I worked my way up to my current position of I.T. Developer at Skagit Valley College. I started working at the help desk assisting students with log-ins and computer issues. During some downtime my supervisor, Benjy, decided to test out my Web Assistant skills. I seemed to have a natural talent for editing the web pages and Benjy saw my potential, so he put me to work doing Web Assistant tasks. I began to develop what Dr. Coorough, the MIT department chair, has said are rare talents: the ability to learn HTML, CSS, Javascript, and pretty much any other programming language. I can also do most everything multimedia related such as graphics, video production, printing, and Flash. As a technician, I can solve technical support issues, hardware upgrades and application installation. I was doing such a good job that I was asked to be hired on part time as an IT developer. Benjy moved me from the help desk down the hall into an office with him, and we set to work designing the first Paperless Progress Reporting System for the college. I began by creating the Information Architect Documents. After thorough documentation and planning I began to implement my designs by hand coding using a relatively new technique called Model View Controller. This is very different than a standard webpage, and even a normal web application is not the same as an MVC web application. The MVC technique of coding is very powerful and allows me to perform complex operations from a web page interface. Benjy and I put that power to use in the form of converting an age old paper progress reports system into a paperless progress reporting system.

Job History: Property Management

Successfully managed 68 unit apartment complex. Responsible for advertising and renting empty units, collection and recording of rent, coordinating move-outs and move-ins, customer service and tenant relations. Responsible for rapid turnover of move outs including cleaning, painting, maintenance, repair and  remodeling of units. Routinely perform grounds keeping, landscaping, building upkeep, and preventative maintenance of entire premises including outdoor lighting, automated sprinkler system, security entrances, elevator. Conducted weekly inventory reports and ordered parts/supplies.

Notable achievements include keeping complex full with a waiting list, modernizing units with new appliances, fixtures and accessories. Responsible for unit turnovers and emergency maintenance with skills including custom carpentry, counter tops, cabinets, major remodeling, installation of appliances, hot water tanks, plumbing, electrical, drywall repair, texture and paint.

Include letters of reference from tenants.

Western Homes http://westernhomesapts.com/

I. T. Project Request Form

The head of the I.T. Department at Skagit Valley College asked me to convert the paper form that was used for submitting an I.T. Project Request. I used my 3DW DevCloud Tools to whip out this project in a small amount of time. My project management cloud is the perfect way to track and complete this project. As you can see from the tabs in the screen shot, I’m logged into my DevCloud, and have my task lists, notes and planning documents right at my fingertips. These powerful tools allow me to compete projects quickly and efficiently, using the best practices and techniques I have honed through the years of web application development at Skagit Valley College.

Job History: Crab Fishing Process Foreman

I flew to Anchorage, Alaska then took a small plane to Dutch Harbor.  I went on board the Diomedes, a Russian owned crab fishing and processing vessel. We were the only boat allowed to fish in the Russian Sea of Okhotsk. During 6 months at sea, I became experienced in pulling crab pots with live crab using the Hansen Hauler hydraulic system and sorting male/ female and legal sized crab. Skilled at baiting crab pots on deck of vessel. Experienced in all phases of seafood processing and packing including butchering, cooking, and packing of crab. Also including freezer on and off loading of finished product and supplies. Promoted to process foreman in charge of 13 men and responsible for additional duties included  quality control, cooking and freezing of product, and maintaining processing equipment.