Tag Archives: Journal

Rachel’s Public Journal – Data Management+

Steven’s DMP checklist was very logical and it helped our team talk through our current conceptualization of the project. I posit that one of the biggest unseen benefits to completing the data management plan early in the project (though really, we’re in the thick of it now — I think it will feel like we are just getting started until we’re racing to the finish line, if it’s like any other of my projects during the pandemic) was how it crystallized some of the artifacts around our site. 

I think the reason that the data document was so logical for us to conceptualize was that an archive —or, as I am inclined to believe – what we may have, to Lisa Rhody’s point in her talk a couple weeks ago, a ‘collection” 🤔 — may have more concrete ideas about what data will be used due to the nature of its thing-ness. Nevertheless, our project still has ambiguities that were fun and helpful to sort out with the team using the data management checklist and provided examples. 

I think my biggest non-DMP challenge overall has been tamping down my control freak nature, which is great for solo projects and horrible for group work — lessons learned as a young undergrad — and letting the team as a whole guide the project with their interests, ideas, and areas of expertise. It’s been great so far, and I’m learning so much. 

Additionally this week we identified some areas for interaction within the WordPress platform which will be both the stretch goal and a fun technical challenge for me. No spoilers, but hopefully it will allow users to interact with the collected rebus puzzles that already have solutions. I did a bit of outreach, and also “solved” a French rebus critical of Napoleon’s efforts while away from France with my mom, who normally likes to Zoom in and do a Sunday crossword with me. I may just extend this to my nascent network of relevant rebus riddlers, and see if we can “swarm on the (rebus) problem,” one of my favorite agile practices, for fun and project progress.

“Project = Process” (personal journal 1~23 Feb)

Not quite sure what, if anything, is necessary for the Tuesday personal journal this week.  I’m completing this late (technically we are 3 minutes into Wednesday), as I just got finished proofing and posting our revised RRW project proposal in my combined role as Project Manager (dreams of grandeur) and Copy Editor (reality of comma insertion).

To try to speed-learn more about what the former job entails, I attended  the ITP Skills Lab/Kimon Keramidas (NYU) Project Management workshop on Monday which was helpful and reassuring.  Kimon K. provided his signature blend of examples of gorgeous and robust projects he’d produced, basic knowledge told in clear and non-patronizing language, and back-end details for those who could handle them.  His comparison of the stages of crafting a project to those of writing a long paper I found apt (having written a number of overly long works myself) and I assume helpful for those unused to large, multiform projects that can take months if not years (!).  While “more fragmented and modular” than a paper, according to him (he obviously hasn’t read my dissertation), a project benefits equally from preplanning, “ideation, iteration, critique,” and repetition (“planning loops”): in short, prepare to “plan, organize, change, replan, reorganize” . . . . and do it all the way through the project (hence “project = process”).

Most helpful for me, given my lack of official management background (teaching undergrads and bossing my relatives notwithstanding), he ran through a number of different tools both for project management in its purest form and for citation organization and editing.  He is a big fan of Basecamp (while acknowledging that it’s expensive as a rule–we had a quick discussion about whether Office 365 Planner could serve as a cheap alternative) but also demonstrated Trello (again, the tile-formation vs Basecamp’s “hill” curve led to an interesting conversation about organizational styles and visual inclinations); Redmine (“good for techie back-endy projects”; on a LAMP server; natively digital; what CUNY Grad Center uses for systems admin/bugs & features); and Slack (“envisions everyone working around a table” in real time– this was the tool about which he knew the least).

We then compared Zotero and Endnote for shared citations, images, and bibliographies (while costing $50 a year for advanced features, Endnote “grabs more than Zotero” works well on multiple platforms and constantly syncs–hence it’s his preference).  We also looked briefly at the possibilities of using Wikidot.com/Wikis and Scrivener (plaudits) as alternatives to Google Docs ( a productive if brief gripe session ensued in the chat).

I had to leave before the breakout-room section but I strongly recommend attending this when it’s offered again and, as well, taking the opportunity to attend a Keramidas instructional session of any sort: he’s generous, theoretically sophisticated, responsive, and practical.  And entertaining besides.

Oh, and, I’m more inclined to use at least one of these tools for this or other project(s), although I don’t know which one yet and it’s not my unilateral decision to make in the case of RRW.  TBD Thursday. Stay tuned.

Herding the Kittens

What a busy first week! It’s always a slog to get the initial admin and organization tasks set up, but I think we’ve really established a rhythm that will work for the team. We’re all onboarded with Discord (thank you Joanne!), trello, and some organized Google docs.

I volunteered to be PM because of my professional experience working in this area. I’ve gotten pretty good at herding the kittens to the finish line over the years. But I also jumped at this role because I don’t have another super strong skill that would be applicable to this specific project. I am really looking forward to providing support on our content/editorial strategy and hopefully shadowing some web development. I think I’m suffering from a bit of imposter syndrome and not giving myself enough credit because I know that I could pick up any skillset quickly if I dedicate myself to it. It’s fascinating to see what each of our backgrounds are and what we all bring to the project. A few things that kept me busy this week as the PM: setting agendas, scheduling the weekly meetings, sending out notes and action items, and putting the final tweaks on our group project proposal and collab agreement.

We met on Sunday afternoon for our first out of class sync, and we were very productive. A few high level bullets on what we discussed:

  • What’s our goal number of submissions to the archive? We’ll need enough submissions to allow for the user experience to be compelling. You’d scroll more or go to a second page.
  • It will be very important to ask everyone the same controlled, open-ended questions. Editorial control is important here.
  • We looked at the site coronastories.world. Model for us to see the pros and cons.
  • Explore and decide between using Adobe Portfolio and WordPress for our prototype.
  • Thinking about longevity of the project: How will the archive live on after this semester?

We covered a lot. And we know we can’t yet come up with the perfect plan for all of this right off the bat. But it’s helpful to keep a running list of open questions to guide us both in our initial work, and over the next couple months. Trying my best not to get overwhelmed.

I’m inspired by our team’s willingness to jump right in. So far, we’re doing a great job of balancing expectations and scaling small. Scope creep is real, y’all.