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Evaluation
I have now fully finished the video platform project. I have learned that it is very hard to estimate deadlines. When I was
working on the project plan, I could easily write down: ok, at this point in time I will have this part finished, and then I will
do this. But, when you are actually working on the assignment itself, you realize that many different factors come into
play.
You encounter errors, there will be new requirements, or other parts need to be changed. Because of this I did fall behind
from time to time, and I needed to push harder through to make sure I would be able to keep up again. I know now that
whenever you make a deadline (i.e. in a project plan) you need to take a lot more factors into consideration. Had I taken
into consideration the errors, and change of requirements; I would have changed my deadlines a bit, and pushed them a
bit further in time.
I have to say I did really enjoy my time at MAD Consultancy; I was getting enough attention from the company directors
and whenever I would get stuck, they would guide me. It was however a very small company, at a larger company it’s not
possible for the directors to guide you too much. A short time after working on the project I stopped asking too much
questions to the company directors. They were probably busy working on other things and it was a lot better if I tried to
find the answers to my questions by myself.
This was a very nice thing to learn; I wouldn’t need to wait till the company director had time to come and take look; no, I
would find the solution by myself and thus actually working more efficient.
Before I had never worked with videos and I didn’t know that different browsers would play different formats and that
mobile videos was becoming more and more popular. While at the beginning some of the terms that were being used with
videos and video platforms were very confusing, I quickly got the hang of it. I have learned quite a lot about implementing
videos and working with video players and the video formats.
Now, I also have quite some experience with the PHP framework Laravel and I have to say I really like it. I had never
worked with a framework like this, and in the beginning of my project I felt overwhelmed by it. But, I can see now why it is
so popular; it’s quite powerful and it makes programming with PHP more fun. I believe that for any other personal projects
in the future, I will definitely use Laravel.