Steven Armenta

The first artifact I have included in my ePortfolio is a mobile inventory management application. I originally developed the Android version in Android Studio using Java in a Mobile applications course at Southern New Hampshire University. I redesigned the application for iOS using SwiftUI and Xcode as part of my Capstone course. This updated version reflects my continued effort to deepen my understanding of full-stack development.

I chose to include this artifact because it demonstrated my foundational and growing skills as a Software Developer. This artifact showcases my ability to design user interfaces for different mobile applications. The component of the artifact that showcases my skills and abilities is being able to enhance the original Android Studio application into a fully functional iOS app I pushed myself past my comfort zone, and used new tools like Xcode, Swift language syntax and Apple’s declarative framework. This enhancement improves the application by offering the application on another platform which is iOS.

In Module One, I planned to meet the outcomes one, two and three: Employ strategies for building collaborative environments that enable diverse audiences to support organizational decision making in the field of computer science, Design, develop, and deliver professional-quality oral, written, and visual communications that are coherent, technically sound, and appropriately adapted to specific audiences and contexts, and design and evaluate computing solutions that solve a given problem using algorithmic principles and computer science practices and standards appropriate to its solution, while managing the trade-offs involved in design choices. To meet course outcome three more clearly, I will also try to meet this course outcome with my second enhancement updating the applications algorithms for adding an item. I learned so much enhancing and modifying this artifact and I learned to make more time for these enhancements because it took longer than anticipated for specific steps. I learned that it is possible to learn new languages like Swift and how to use Git version control to make sure my changes are updated on different machines I use. I am still learning how to use Xcode and that is a challenge I face being able to understand where all the features are at in that environment and getting the emulator to work properly. Overall, I will continue improving and enhancing my artifact so that it runs successfully and I am able to list it on the app store.

Through this enhancement, I demonstrated the ability to use well-founded software engineering techniques to create maintainable and efficient applications. The implementation of a new iOS application from an originally Android application and the application of features such as input validation, and user authentication showcases my commitment to developing secure applications. The enhanced user interface and user experience design reflects my ability to create user-centered solutions that align with industry standards.

Artifact two for the algorithms and data structures category is my enhanced inventory management application, which I migrated from Android to iOS/Swift while implementing sophisticated algorithms and data structures. This transformation demonstrates my ability to work across different platforms and apply advanced computer science concepts to improve application performance and functionality.

As part of my second enhancement project, I significantly improved the application by integrating a Binary Search Tree (BST) for efficient item look-up by ID and implemented algorithmic principles to optimize the programs search performance. The original application did not have search features as it only displayed the inventory items as a list, but I enhanced the project by creating a search function using BST which would be faster than a linear search.

This artifact was selected for my ePortfolio because it demonstrated my ability to apply key Computer Science principles like data structures and algorithm optimization in a real-world scenario. The integration of BST specifically showcases my ability to go beyond default Swift UI features and use fundamental algorithms to improve application performance. The app’s filtering and search capabilities previously were not existent but would be linear if created and these were enhanced to logarithmic time complexity (O (log n)) through BST search while a HashMap structure supports constant-time (O (1)) access. These features reflect my understanding of both theoretical and applied aspects of data structures.

The course outcomes I planned to target were course outcomes three: design and evaluate computing solutions that solve a given problem using algorithmic principles and computer science practices and standards appropriate to its solution, while managing the trade-offs involved in design choices and the fourth course outcome: demonstrate an ability to use well-founded and innovative techniques, skills, and tools in computing practices for the purpose of implementing computer solutions that deliver value and accomplish industry-specific goals. This second enhancement fulfills those objects by showing how a BST can manage large volumes of inventory data more effectively.

The process of enhancing this artifact was deeply educational and I learned so much about BST search and HashMaps. I learned how to design a binary search tree in Swift manage its nodes and integrate it with Swift IO components for dynamic search results. One of the biggest challenges I faced was keeping the UI responsive while implementing the underlying tree-based data structure. Swift UI doesn’t natively support complex structures like BSTs, so I had to write the logic manually which strengthened my skills in algorithm design and object-oriented programming. I learned how to bridge the gap of applying what I do know and learning a new skill as a Developer such as learning on the job and learning how to complete the BST search as I did not have a strong grasp of the concept before, but I was able to learn and apply this to my artifact. The challenges I face are ensuring this artifact and IOS application works on the different iPhone models and testing my application with Xcode emulator or with my physical phone as I have not had a chance to ensure the program functions as expected. My plan to overcome these challenges is to make sure I spend time these next few weeks to test and improve my IOS application using precise iterations to ensure the application functions as expected.

The third artifact I have enhanced for my eportfolio is an interactive web-based dashboard that was built using dash for monitoring and analyzing animal shelter data stored in a MongoDB database for a client/server course I have taken at Southern New Hampshire University. I enhanced this artifact by supporting auto-refresh functionality so the database and dashboard is always updated with the latest information in the database and improves data interaction without requiring page reloads. I have also included a Pie chart for data visualization. The final version of the artifact includes dynamic updates, a new manual refresh button that has now been added with time stamp listed for verification of the latest information displayed, an enhanced pie chart for data visualization and improved user experience with updates like record counts.

I included this artifact as part of my ePortfolio because it best demonstrates my ability to develop a complete user-friendly software application that integrates frontend and backend components. The dashboard showcases several skills like web development using Dash, asynchronous data handling, real-time data visualization with Plotly and database integration with MongoDB. The enhancement specifically added updates to the dashboard every 30 seconds, a manual refresh button, visual indicators like current record counts, and latest update timestamps. I have also updated the Pie chart data visualization for a more insightful breed distribution visual. These enhancements made the dashboard more robust, user-friendly, and aligned with modern data dashboard expectations.

I met the course outcomes I planned to meet with this enhancement in Module One which were outcomes two, four and five. I’ve met the fifth course outcome by developing a security mindset that anticipates adversarial exploits in software architecture and designs to expose potential vulnerabilities mitigate flaws, and ensure privacy and enhanced security of data and resources by creating a database for a company that has transparency of the records kept and also ensure privacy by hosting this web application away know from the SNHU apporto virtual machine to the user’s local machine. I plan to add more coverage for the courser outcomes by ensuring each of my artifact covers two or three course outcomes to ensure that each of the outcomes are met.

Reflecting on my enhancement project I learned about managing asynchronous updates and state persistence in web applications. I learned about Dash’s callback system enabling real-time interactions and how to coordinate multiple parts of code together. I also learned how to create this web application for myself as I lost access to the original database and website due to that virtual machine being removed from me because I finished that class, I had to change everything to get it to work in my local machine. I learned how to install MongoDB, get the server working, install Jupyter Notebook and how to load the CSV file data to populate the database with command prompt and to continue iterate till the application runs as expected. Overall, I am happy with how this enhancement turned out and I learned so many lessons along the way.