Week 15 - Reflection

Reflection on the Project

Being a part of this project has been an overall positive experience. I have learned so much about technologies in the field of software engineering (such as ruby, rails, git, and postgreSQL), as well as the general processes and hard work that goes along with a research project. Our team worked together throughout the year addressing the different difficulties we each were having while working towards the same goal: finding out something useful at the end that would actually mean something. It is a unique and difficult challenge to take a question as open-ended as “Are source code files less likely to have a vulnerability given more code inspections from more people?” and create a plan to prove the answer with hard evidence. One of the main differences between this project and a number of other school projects that I have participated in would be how much of the work was reliant on the individual. I have learned through this experience that a lot of being a researcher is self-motivation and self-teaching. While our advisor gave us guidance and help whenever necessary, it was still mostly up to the students to find a means to the end. We were the driving force behind the project and where it was headed. That concept was something different than what I had experienced while working on projects in the past, and something I truly enjoyed.

Thank you!

This project could not have been possible without our guiding Professor, Andy Meneely. He was a great leader and his thirst for knowledge and love of research were inspirational and motivating. We’d also like to thank the CREU project that we were all apart of. CREU is a project led by the Coalition to Diversify Computing which allows for students of underrepresented groups in computing to paricipate in a funded research project. Thanks so much to all of the people at CREU and their support throughout the year. This project would not have happened without that program and the hardworking people who run it.

This project is sponsored by the Collaborative Research Experiences for Undergraduates, funded by the National Science Foundation.