Justin Wilson

The Data Access Request Tracker (DART) application is used for the Institutional Review Board (IRB) Research Data Access request and Preparatory to Research processes. The DART application was created for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and can be used by any other approved agency. Primary investigators submit one DART request per protocol or proposed protocol and any changes to the request after approval must be accomplished by amending the same request, not by creation of a new… Show more

The Data Access Request Tracker (DART) application is used for the Institutional Review Board (IRB) Research Data Access request and Preparatory to Research processes. The DART application was created for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and can be used by any other approved agency. Primary investigators submit one DART request per protocol or proposed protocol and any changes to the request after approval must be accomplished by amending the same request, not by creation of a new request.​

DART uses a dashboard landing page with five additional steps for most requests. Each step has a page with an identifying tab: Activity Information, Participants, Data Sources, Documents, and Submit for Requestors or Decision for Approvers.​

DART was designed with interaction in mind, knowing that requests are rarely complete on the first attempt. All interactions are captured and permanently stored to ensure a complete history of events is clear and available. Notifications are also automatically generated for all parties when a modification or request is made to ensure there are no lapses in communication... Show less

The last time I left you I had completed some Linear Regression models and found that weather does in fact have predictable patterns associated with it. As time passes so does the size of my data sets and I am starting to get a good series of data to work with across the nearly 20,000 cities I track on an hourly basis.

I know that Linear Regression will only go so far so it is time to move on to other types of analysis. Before going to far, I do predict one day into the future every hour… Show more

The last time I left you I had completed some Linear Regression models and found that weather does in fact have predictable patterns associated with it. As time passes so does the size of my data sets and I am starting to get a good series of data to work with across the nearly 20,000 cities I track on an hourly basis.

I know that Linear Regression will only go so far so it is time to move on to other types of analysis. Before going to far, I do predict one day into the future every hour for every city and have found my accuracy to be within +-4 degrees for approximately 80% of the cities I track. If I expand the +- to 8 degrees I get around 90% accuracy. The other 10% is so far off that it is not even worth mentioning. The main reason behind this is the city is isolated and only has a small amount of surrounding cities which means a smaller data set to train with. Show less

In part 3 I discussed how I was surprised that the weather was so predictable based on the linear regression model I put together. To recap, my classifiers are Cloud Coverage, Barometric Pressure, Humidity, Min. Temp, Max. Temp, Wind Degree, and Wind Speed. The label is the Temperature itself and the index column is the Date and Time.

My first attempt was to use 100% of my data, which at this point is nearly a months worth of hourly updates on nearly 20,000 cities in the United States… Show more

In part 3 I discussed how I was surprised that the weather was so predictable based on the linear regression model I put together. To recap, my classifiers are Cloud Coverage, Barometric Pressure, Humidity, Min. Temp, Max. Temp, Wind Degree, and Wind Speed. The label is the Temperature itself and the index column is the Date and Time.

My first attempt was to use 100% of my data, which at this point is nearly a months worth of hourly updates on nearly 20,000 cities in the United States. As of a few minutes ago this is now over 5 million rows and growing rapidly. Show less

The need has arisen, the desire is there, and I finally have an idea I am excited about. The need is to complete my Master’s Thesis, the desire is a life long passion for meteorology, and the idea is to attempt to forecast the weather based on our past.

Knowing that my data source was the Open Weather API, mainly due to costs, I imported their cities list which gives me their internal CityID and the latitude and longitude. The current weather API they expose gives a range of data from the current temperature, to cloud cover, to humidity, pressure, wind speed, and more. I chose to import all of this data and normalized it into a relational series of classes. Remember, I am using InterSystems IRIS Data Platform which is behaves much differently… Show more

Knowing that my data source was the Open Weather API, mainly due to costs, I imported their cities list which gives me their internal CityID and the latitude and longitude. The current weather API they expose gives a range of data from the current temperature, to cloud cover, to humidity, pressure, wind speed, and more. I chose to import all of this data and normalized it into a relational series of classes. Remember, I am using InterSystems IRIS Data Platform which is behaves much differently than a more traditional database would. Show less

My first step is to get more familiar with the data and attempt to isolate anything that truly stands out when statistics are applied. To do this I am running Linear Regression algorithms against the data in different configurations to see if anything jumps out. The idea being that certain indicators will play a larger factor when predicting the temperature than others. e.g. if the wind speed and direction change, does that truly have a major impact on the temperature.

There is nothing more satisfying than building your own computer from scratch. The whole experience from picking out the parts, to assembly, to the first time it spins to life is satisfies my needs quite well. Recently, I decided to try out a more unconventional build by using the Thermaltake Core P90 case and I was not disappointed!

I am going to start a new series entitled “Back to Basics” where we take a step back from our existing knowledge base and act as though we are all first day developers learning everything for the first time. My hope is that this series will help new developers in their journey while also reminding experienced developers of some of the basics.

To kick the series off the right way I want to focus on the importance of formatting code properly. I cannot express how important it is for code… Show more

I am going to start a new series entitled “Back to Basics” where we take a step back from our existing knowledge base and act as though we are all first day developers learning everything for the first time. My hope is that this series will help new developers in their journey while also reminding experienced developers of some of the basics.

To kick the series off the right way I want to focus on the importance of formatting code properly. I cannot express how important it is for code to be properly formatted, not only for readability, but also because some languages rely on it. The most basic formatting technique is to use the tab key to indent blocks of code. Show less

We have all worked for that boss who takes jabs and cheap shots at our comment to code ratio. They make comments like “I don’t even know what’s going on in your code because you don’t comment.” No, you do not know what is going on in my code because you are not a coder!

With the inclusion of Generics in C#, this problem quickly became an easy task that did not scare me near as much. I stumbled across a snippet of code, partially below, that quickly became one of the first things I import into any new C# program. This single snippet of code has dramatically reduced the number of lines of code I write in an application. Sometimes on the order of thousands of lines of code. Let me explain why.

To address the need of the HSR&D community in having more than just static information available, the VINCI team provided an update to its internal website, VINCI Central, that offered a user-centric makeover, expanded offerings, and functionality to draw together and display all VINCI resources related to each user.