My thesis is 131 pages long

The length of my thesis has ballooned because I started working on the appendices again, which led to the initial explosion of the page count when I first began. The actual content of my thesis is 53 pages.

I redid my user testing today. One of our UROPs brought a bunch of his friends over, and I baked brownies for them. I had redone the user interface, the remove a screen in the middle, which had been giving users difficulty. Everyone still complained about the terribleness of the cursor system, and its like "I know it sucks! Its not my fault!" (It sucks because the computers are too slow for what we want out of them.) But, at least people were able to do the task.

I also revamped my intro, and will probably soon revamp chapter 2, and then chapter 5.

My thesis is 102 pages

I have posted a new chapter on the Diane's Thesis Webpage (http://web.media.mit.edu/~dhirsh/thesis. Anyone who wants to read it, please let me know how it goes -- how it reads, if you are confused about anything, if you are thinking to yourself "huh?" That will help me a lot!

Tomorrow, I am going to redesign the user interface, and Tuesday, I am going to re-run my user study so I can write chapter 4. (After reading my first draft of chapter 4, my advisor told me to do it again.)

After I finish writing this entry, I am going to take a crack at my "future work" section, but I think that the conclusions might need to wait until after I re-finish the user testing. (Although, I basically plan to re-do the user testing until everyone is able to do the task, and then say "see? the framework works because everyone can do the task!"

We went to the Publick House yesterday, and I wasn't thrilled. If it were ten minutes away from us, it would probably be my choice : it has a lot of the good things about having the reception at a big hotel, without being a big hotel. But its not 10 minutes away, its an hour and change away. So, it didn't edge out the Holiday Inn, which is still the front runner.

We are going to the Newton Marriott next weekend. The price difference is significant, so they are going to have to wow me to get my vote.

I really want something to wow me and get my vote. Because I'm not really voting for anything at this point.

My thesis is 88 pages

I have finished chapter 1 and 2. (The Introduction, and the description of the framework).
For those interested in such things:
Here is where I am posting the pieces of my thesis for my advisor.

Working on the section where I talk about the applications, the user testing, and the future work.

We are going to Sturbridge this weekend to check out the Publick House, which looked very nice in the photographs. It will be a pain for people flying in from out of town, and certainly won't be conducive to site-seeing. But, maybe that will be okay.

Today, as I was leaving school, I stopped to talk about getting some sort of group rate on a Beantown Trolley. He gave me the unexpected piece of information, that I could charter them to bring people from the hotel to the ceremony, or from the ceremony to the reception, or probably anything else within reason. This could open up some new possibilities for the Downtown Boston soiree scenario.

We have a new contender

So, today we went to look at the Holiday Inn, and the Doubletree Guest Suites in Waltham. I tell you, between the two of them, I like the package at the Holiday Inn better. Now, if this sounds crazy to you, bear with me. There was nothing wrong with the ballroom at the Holiday Inn (I actually kinda liked the style of the chandeliers better than at the Doubletree), and there was this cute little separate area where we could have the cocktails that had some trellises and an garden-ish feel. And, we both liked the person there (who Mike said was quite flaming, but I didn't get it.) better than at the Doubletree. So, the Holiday Inn and the Aquarium are now tied. This is a long way from the day when Mike came home, and the first thing I did was stomp my feet (literally) and declare "I don't WANT to have my wedding at the Holiday Inn!"

The problem with the Aquarium is that the whole package is expensive and kinda inconvenient. I feel like the way they sell their stuff is kinda nickel and diming (You have to count how many pieces of passed appetizers you want to pay for). And the hotels downtown would represent a financial hardship! (I will look into is more, however). And parking is a PAIN IN THE A**. The problem with the Holiday Inn is that its kinda in a slummy area. Which is probably why it is 2/3 the cost of the Aquarium or the Doubletree. And its not as fun. Maybe I could buy like 20 plush penguins and have them as centerpieces.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

P.S. My thesis is now 73 pages.

If not for those penguins...

So, we went to the Aquarium last night to check out the layout, and ....
I wasn't thrilled.

I wanted to walk in there and be like "Oh, this is perfect! THAT'S where you put the tables!"
So, there's the penguin tank in the middle of the aquarium (surrounding the big tank). There's a little over-hang in front of the penguins, and they put the tables on the side and in the back. So, the tables on the side can't see the tables in the back. And, if we go over 120 people, we have to put people on the second floor where they can't see anything (except the fish and penguins, of course). And god forbid YOU are the one at the table NOT next to the cute blue penguins, and next to the weird tank with the red light and nothing in it. And most of the the tables can't see the front, where the toast, dancing, cake-cutting would happen. Everyone could come to the ramp, and look down at it (which is a pretty nice view)... And I couldn't have my fruit centerpieces, because the skewers could hurt the penguins. And we'd have to start late. And there is paid parking. And rooms at the Marriott are EXPENSIVE, and not only that, they won't give us a block of rooms unless we have some sort of function (rehearsal dinner) there. And, and and... In short. I disliked the package deal enough that I am re-examining other options.


This is my diagram of the aquarium layout:
The 'T's are for Tables.
The B is for the Bar
The P is for the Podium
the space in the middle is the penguin tank
The (ooo) represents the big tank in the middle.

_________________________________
|                               |
|   T      T     T    T         |
|       __________________   T  |
|      |                  |     |                                 
|      |                  |  T  |  
|      |     (ooooo)      |     |  
|      |    _________     |  T  |  
|      |    |       |     |     |  
|      |____| P     |_____|     |                                      
|                               |
|          B                    |
|_______________________________|

But the penguins are so cute!


P.S. My thesis already 70 pages long!

Blast from the Past, Man!

My Dad just sent me this photograph from BU graduation.
From the left, Mike Theriault, Richard Hirsh, Clara Hirsh, Dave Hudson (in front), Diane Hirsh, Janet Hirsh, Ed Carrel.

My thesis is already 35 pages long!

And I haven't written a thing! Well... I've written chapter titles and sections. And LaTeX did the rest! Yay LaTeX!

Once again, I am VERY SORRY I have not been good about updating the blog. I am just trying to graduate, man!

Right now, I am going to document the APIs of my various modules, and start writing some English paragraphs about how my modules are put together and why I made the design decisions I made. My related work section is going to be ugly -- I have like 5 or 10 areas of computing that are relevant to my work. Dear god, I hope none of them already did the stuff I am writing about in my thesis. That'll learn me -- do the reading research BEFORE you start writing code.

We are just about settled on having the wedding reception at the New England Aquarium. We are going to go take a look at it, set up for an event, tomorrow evening. I got good reviews from the references they gave me, so I hope everything just goes smoothly. I want to have these fruit bouqets as my center pieces. They want to approve all centerpieces, because of the penguins, and I hope there isn't a problem with the fruit bouquets!

When I told my Dad that we would probably get a DJ, his exact words were "DJ, patooey!" So, if he wants a live band (and he wants to pay for it), we can have my crazy guitar teacher's band play for us so we can dance in front of the penguins.
I am thinking I am going to try to reserve rooms at the Marriott on the Wharf, which is right next door to the Aquarium.