Hello World!

Alex here, developer fellow with Transport Canada’s Marine Safety & Security division. We’ll get to know each other over the next nine months, but right now I am here to tell the story of the first week landing in Transport Canada.

Monday

Monday morning was all about getting to our floor and meeting the team from Marine Safety and Digital services. Everyone’s excitement was contagious we had an amazing first day! One problem though was that only Keith had his digital equipment the rest of us would have to wait, he was also fighting off a cold.

Tuesday

Tuesday we met the extended team from the Digital Services, who were very much excited about the project we were working on as well as extended support in helping us eliminate blockers that we would encounter (getting our equipment for example). Kay and I set up a semi-structured plan of all the main activities we would have to do in the coming weeks. In the afternoon I finally got my equipment and was able to start setting up. Kay would be handed a loaner computer while waiting for a more permanent. Oh yeah, and Keith was diagnosed with Pneumonia and had to stay home.

Wednesday

Wednesday Keith took the day off to recover, which was a good decision as he could come back in better form. We were shown a Demo of what MPDIS is by Paul, one of the developers helping us on the project. We had lunch with the other team of fellows at Transport Canada. Keith also made a surprise appearance in the afternoon, where we did a user manual exercise to learn how each of us likes to works User Manuals

Thursday

Thursday Thursday afternoon saw the progressive return of Keith. We got into a session on roles and responsibilities. Our project is unique in the sense that we have a lot of people involved and needed a way for everyone to get on the same page as soon as possible. Here the activity that we tried Roles & Responsibilities.

Friday

Friday morning we aligned our team on the problem statement. We were unable to finish the problem statement, but we did generate some interesting discussions that helped the team get aligned overall. We then had a session with Ken Shuter, where we went over what myTC could offer our project, another great presentation and I look forward to connecting more with Ken in the future. In the afternoon, We met with the Director and discussed our plan concerning our project. We were excited to be able to share our vision and learn about the various concerns and how we planned to address them moving forward. The conversation was enlightening and helped us gain a better understanding of the project. We are very excited to start research!

Looking forward to having y’all join us on this adventure!