working out the logic

So I’ve worked out [I think] the logic and database architecture for the vote system. It only took a quick chat with a MA tutor to figure out the database structure. Amazing how little 1-2-1 is took to make it pretty clear. If only this course had a strong link with this kind of activity. Sion tells me that the course is going to have OSX development classes [that me might teach] which is pretty wild. But solid MySQL/PHP teaching would be invaluable. Anyhow are is the workings out:

da shopping webapp

Not blogged this yet but Carla did already [proving her document effiency] This is a snap of a webapp I built using cakePHP to get a little bit to grips with it. Pretty simple technologically but really useful. It is a user protected, multi user, shopping list. It it designed to fit on our iphone screens and load quick as possible but it is also available on any internet connection [the mac]. I recently added a click to put in basket [strickthru and greyed out] as a way of keeping that. So far so good. Next feature will probably include one button recipie additions, things like that.

Voting System vote interaction

One of the design parts of the voting system that is likely to make a serious difference to useage is the interaction of the preference ordering. It is only a little thing but one that I think I must get right. I spent quite a while getting the interaction like this:

http://process.gianticebox.co.uk/htmldev/vote1/

I think the dragging is more proactive than just checkboxes or radio buttons. Also the dragging makes clear that you can/need to select more than one answer. The system also allows you to not have preference for something.

I also started on the results section. I think that the data from all the votes should be openly available in the same place that the votes take place. Either each round of voting or the stacked bar chart from the final two options should be shown. This will be a technical matter I suppose, if the data is exported on each round in a format that is sensible. Anyhow I started having a go at using some graphing APIs; you can see my results here [it is a bit slow tho]

http://process.gianticebox.co.uk/htmldev/vote1/archive.html

Voting System w/ Sheena

So I had my crit with Sheena today about the voting system. It was good to have a general discussion about the project, but unfortunately a lot of the talk ended up being about domestic party politics. This is somewhat unsurprizing and I don’t make it any better as I am always happy to talk about that, but this project is not about that.

This is a clearly political project, but it is not about domestic politics. I want the voting system be to about the use of one kind of democracy in certain groups. I know that there are a great many arguements to make and have about voting systems, I am aware of these and accept them as part of democracy in action; all people have different views. However I want to make a system to benifit those who know these arguements and want to use an AV voting system to find a consensus decision with one answer from many options.

I looked at the Campaign for Electoral Reform website only just before I went to see Sheena; I should probably have looked earlier.

Voting system development 1

So the voting system has a rough plan and model. I have started building it, thus far only doing the front end as a way to imagine what backend is needed.

This mockup is the start to show how the system will work. Thus far I can see that I need a secure authentication system and a database table of users. Then I need a good way to perform the vote interation [the above is non functional ATM] which will submit the results of the interaction into some kind of database struture that will then be processable as a vote.

I am going to build using CakePHP, which is a development framework that should make a project like this possible for someone of my reasonably low level of php skill. My largest problem is the database design and the php script for the vote processing. This I think I will need extra help with, I’m not sure if Sion will have the time or motivation to do this…

Personal brief 1 : Voting system

Yesterday I proposed to the first degree show meeting of the year that we should run [some of] the executive decision making though a electoral system. And I proposed not to use normal ‘First Past the Post’ because I don’t think it would be appropriate for the context of our show.

This was my presentation: proposal PDF

Our degree show project is unusual for many reasons; in terms of organisation it is unusual because of the impossibility of a power structure. There is no way in which any one member of our course could say that they had more power than another member. Members of our course are all equals and the opinion of any member of the year group is never more or less valid than any other opinion. So how can the decisions be made that are necessary for the show event to occur?

1. A few people steamroller other people into basically doing what they want or think should be done [v likely]
2. Somehow though collective roundtable discussion a consensus of opinion can be decided upon [seems unlikely considering the 180 people in the year]
3. People could vote on all decisions that need to be made and live by the results
4. An elected group is formed and given the mandate and power to make executive decisions
5. I’m sure there are others …

I was concerned that basically the first option will happen, people will take it upon themselves to make decisions and later people will ask:

“when did that happen? – no-one asked me about that”

This happened pretty much countless times on the popupshop project. It pissed me off that decisions were made that I totally disagreed with and yet I heard nothing about them and couldn’t present an alternative until too late. It also pissed me off that parts of my contribution to the shop project, such as logo development, poster design and website were criticized at a later date, as I had no intention of misrepresenting anyone or just doing my own thing when I was working on them. I feel that the lack of communication and of a mandate to make executive decisions really hampered the effective collaboration of the group.

SO

My solution is to create an online voting system that uses a more fair voting system [PR/STV/AV/whatever] that can be used to create a mandate for action inside this project. If more than 50% of the year group officially and formally agree on something it is hard for people to grumble at a later date. They would have known the options and expressed their opinion and not been in the dark.

Also Sion wants to create a collaborative platform for task subdivision and other parts of the show project that would perfectly match with a voting system to make important decisions.

There is still a lot to be worked out…