How did we do it?... From zero to WebSteer in less than 3 months!...

The WebSteer project begun in the 8th of January, 1996, when we started teaching a Java summer course (nicknamed "The Summer in Java" by students and faculty alike) to around 35 students from 1st year undergraduate to 1st year MSc level at UFPE. That was only the second Java course on campus; we did the first in October/November 1995, when the people who taught the second round got acquainted with Java.

Out of the 35 students in the Summer course, 8 were chosen to be part of The Recife Java Team and were given a 10 day holiday. In the end of the second week in February the instructors of the Summer course met and decided they would try and implement something (then) that now is WebSteer and discussed the general idea with everybody else.

We then talked a lot about the project and tried to convince ourselves that we could do it in the time available. Having decided that, we broke off for the brazilian Carnival Holidays, quite a party in Recife and Olinda, where we all live.

On the 26th of February the team met again, after reading the informal specifications, and the real design and programming begun. In the meantime, we started thinking about the CaJa (Calculus in Java) course, which would use the potential of WebSteer to teach maths to 1st yr engineering students. Part of the material, the first prototype for the pre-calculus course, is also being submitted as part of the package, being two of the JetScriptted set of lectures included in the package.

This is it. We did it. The lack of a proper programming environment added a lot to the hassle, excitment and hurry but we could not only manage the whole group to the last minute but also to create something that we are quite proud of: not only "an applet", but a system, a novel real application that we think shows how Java can be used for serious business.

WebSteer will be used by the Department of Mathematics at UFPE as the host environment for the pre-calculus CaJa course for the engineering degrees starting in the second semester of 1996.

WebSteer project data:

• 146 classes, 24.3KLOC, out of which:
  
• WebSteer's core corresponds to 26 classes and 3.4KLOC,
• The Slide Projector is 41 classes large, nearly all of them re-used and modified from HotJava, clocking at 6.8KLOC and
• CaJa, the Calculus in Java Course, corresponds at the moment to 67 classes and 13.1KLOC.

The CaJa course will be under development and testing through the semester until early August, when we hope to have reached a useful version of it. Considering that we are in mid-term and all students and lecturers are going about their normal businesses as well, we estimate that a total of 3.100 person/hours were spent in the project so far, including design, implementation, testing and development of the CaJa course. So far, it was worth the while and the work continues...