Experience of a lifetime
Sarah
Experience Information
Employer: GVSU Information Technology
Job Title: Web development Intern
Major: Computer Engineering
Received Credit: Yes
Paid: Yes
Abroad: No
Description of the Organization
Grand Valley State University's Information Technology Department is divided into different sections such as academia, help-desk, network support,software analysis and e-learning. I had the wonderful opportunity to obtain an internship with the software analysis crew. This section is located at the fourth floor of Kindschi Hall of Science.
Description of the Tasks/Projects Completed
Throughout six weeks as an intern, I have completed 5 projects : - Update GVSU It Department's Wiki page - Implement bootstrap to web pages - Detect illegal characters from file names and alert the user - transfer data from XML files to an Oracle Database - Apply JQuery and JQuery Ajax to JavaScript functions.
Skills/Knowledge Gained Through The Experience
I learned how to program in: -JavaScript -ColdFusion -HTML I have gain more skills on critical thinking,research, debugging and problem solving. I have learned how to implement bootstrap to a website; how to manipulate and transfer data to an oracle database and how to interpret user input.
Favorite Part of the Experience
My third project, which was about parsing XML files and importing a specific amount of data into an oracle database, was very interesting considering that I had no experience with XML files, Linux, database management and FTP sites. One solution to this problem found in the Oracle website was to write an XML schema file, which would describe each element in the XML file. However, I encountered another problem; while looking at the solution provided by oracle I did not realized that the only way possible for the schema file to work was to also create the table in the file. An alternative solution was to write a Groovy file which could be used to easily extract the information needed from an XML file. Once the GROOVY file was written I had to write a bash script which would initiate a few commands: a java command which calls the groovy file that will generate the text file from the XML file; an sqlldr command which uses a control file that describes the database table and tells the SQL loader where to put each data information; and finally, a Linux command that will rename the text file generated before sending it back to the user using the system of FTP. I would not be able to describe my joy when I completed this project. I now know that I am capable of doing anything that I put my mind into, and that from now on nothing should intimidate me.
How the Experience Influenced Future Career Goals
This internship has made me realized that my interests are mostly based on software and web development. I previously had the dream to obtain my master in computer engineering, but I recently decided to master in software engineering; I believe that I will be more successful in that field. It is interesting to see that a couple of weeks can change plans that were made years ago. Even if I am completed lost on a few subjects, I know that I will be able to solve any problems as long as I stay determined and confident. I am really looking forward to my future challenges as an engineer.