Once you're done with orientation, it's time to find your dev team and take part in a Dev Team Scrum meeting. You will be doing a Dev Team Scrum meetings most days while you are at Epicodus. While it may feel like a novel concept at first, Dev Team Scrums are very common in the tech industry. Daily Dev Team Scrums at Epicodus are meant to help you communicate about things you've learned, issues that are coming up, and anything else you might need to cover to have a successful day as a group. They'll also prepare you for Dev Team Scrum meetings in the real world!
This lesson covers finding and meeting with your dev team for both in person and online students.
At the end of orientation, your instructor will give you a link to a spreadsheet that lists all the dev teams assignments. Keep in mind that you will have the same dev team for the entire course section, but for each day's pair-programming, you will work with someone new from within your dev team. Generally, each dev team will meet at the start of class for a fifteen minute Scrum, though the length of this meeting may vary depending on what you have to cover that day. For instance, it's totally fine if your first day Scrum goes longer.
Dev Team Scrum in Person and on Campus
If you are a student studying in our online program, scroll down to the section titled Dev Team Scrum Online and on Discord.
Meeting With Your Dev Team in Person
Dev Team Scrums are held by grouping up in the classroom. On the very first day, your instructor will help you find your dev team and give you a location to meet.
On typical class days, you will decide where you and your dev team will meet by yourselves. Sometimes space is limited, so do your best to find a good location, and ask an instructor for help if you are having trouble doing so.
At the start of every course section, you will consult the spreadsheet to find your next assigned dev team.
Running Dev Team Scrum in Person
You should begin the each Dev Team Scrum by logging in to the Epicodus attendance system. Make sure to remind your fellow dev team members to do so as well.
The next step is to make sure all members of your dev team are present. Naturally, some students will be absent or arrive late, but always double check if you are missing anyone who may be in class before getting started.
Keep in mind that in every Dev Team Scrum, each group member should share. Unlike other days, today you'll be doing an icebreaker! Each person should take a few minutes to tell the group about the following:
- Your name, your gender pronoun(s), and your preferred nickname if any.
- A little bit about yourself and a fun fact!
- What would be your superpower if you had one?
- Why do you want to code?
Finding a Pair & Next Steps
Once you've all had a chance to speak, you're ready to wrap up the Dev Team Scrum. The next step is to find a pair, and then move to a voice channel to pair program in. If there is an odd number of people in your dev team, there will be one group of three.
Rely on your dev team for help! If you and your pair have questions or issues with your code, you'll reach out to your dev team for assistance before posting any questions in the Discord questions channel or asking an instructor for help. Even if you aren't having any issues, make sure to keep an eye on the questions channel so you can help out others on your team as needed.
If you are an in-person student and you've completed the steps in this lesson, you are ready to move on to the next lesson to do a second icebreaker using VS Code Live Share.
Dev Team Scrum Online and on Discord
The instructions for holding Dev Team Scrum meetings online are more detailed and lengthy. Don't rush! Carefully read through the instructions and make sure that everyone in your dev team is present and able to connect before getting started! If you have any uncertainties or questions, reach out to your instructor.
Meeting With Your Dev Team Online
Online Dev Team Scrums are held in voice channels in Discord. Your teacher will assign your dev team to a specific voice channel. Voice channels have sound icons to their right to show that they are voice channels. Here's an example of some voice channels in Discord:
In the image above, there's a limestone-group voice channel. This is the channel where the limestone-group's Dev Team Scrum will be held. You'll also see four limestone-pair channels. After Dev Team Scrum, the members of limestone-group will break up into pairs for pair programming. Each pair will take one of the limestone-pair channels.
To join a voice channel, simply click the name of the channel. Your name and Discord icon will be added to that voice channel and you will be automatically connected with anyone in the voice channel. In the image below, you'll see that Brooke, Travis and Veronica have all joined the limestone-group voice channel by clicking the name of the channel:
Communicating with Members of Your Team Online
You will communicate with your peers and Epicodus staff by voice and video on Discord throughout the online program.
Starting a Voice Chat
Once you are in a voice channel, you can unmute yourself and start talking!
In the image above, there is a mic icon at the bottom of the image. You can click this to mute or unmute yourself. If there is a red line across the mic, you are muted. If there isn't, you are not muted. This is really important to keep an eye on. You don't want to be speaking when your mic is muted and you also don't want to inadvertently make noise when you think your mic is muted but it's not.
You can also click the headphone icons to toggle the Discord channel sound. Generally you should keep this on so you can communicate with your dev team and pair but there may be times when you'll need to turn the sound off.
Starting a Video Chat
To start a video chat, click the title of the voice channel a second time. Doing so will open up a new view in Discord where you'll see large icons of all of the members in your channel. See the picture below as an example:
When you hover over the window with the large member icons, you'll see a menu pop up:
From left to right, these icons are for:
- Starting or stopping video
- Sharing your screen
- Muting or unmuting your mic
- Ending the call
When a member turns on their video, their icon will turn into their video stream. You can click on a member's icon or video to make it larger. You can toggle between Focus or Grid views by clicking the icon with 3 or 4 (depending on the view) white squares in the top right hand corner of the window as shown in the image below.
Finally, you will also want to set up a group direct message (DM) with the members of your dev team. This will probably take a few minutes as you'll need to friend each other and accept each other's friend requests in Discord. At that point, one of you can create a group DM following the steps in Direct Messages in Discord. Make sure that everyone in your group is included in this DM!
Running Dev Team Scrum Online
You should begin the each Dev Team Scrum by logging in to the Epicodus attendance system. Make sure to remind your fellow dev team members to do so as well.
The next step is to make sure that your entire team is present. If anyone is having technical difficulties with hearing or speaking in the voice channel, take a few minutes to help each other troubleshoot. It's your first day of remote programming and not everything is going to go smoothly. We recommend that everyone share their video streams but if your team agrees otherwise or it's not possible for some members to do video due to technical issues, a voice call without video is also fine.
Once everyone is present in the voice channel and ready to go, start doing the icebreaker! Each person should take a few minutes to tell the group about the following:
- Your name, your gender pronoun(s), and your preferred nickname if any.
- A little bit about yourself and a fun fact!
- What would be your superpower if you had one?
- Why do you want to code?
Wrap Up & Find a Pair
Once you've all had a chance to speak, you're ready to wrap up the Dev Team Scrum. The next step is to find a pair, and then move to a voice channel to pair program in. If there is an odd number of people in your dev team, there will be one group of three.
Before you break out into pairs, make sure that you have your dev team DM set up. If you and your pair have questions or issues with your code, you'll reach out to your dev team for assistance before posting any questions in the Discord questions channel or asking an instructor for help. Even if you aren't having any issues, make sure to keep an eye on the DM so you can help out others on your team as needed.
Other than reaching out to your dev team by direct message, another great way to communicate with other pairs is to simply drop into their voice channel. Always make sure to ask if it's a good time to interrupt before asking your question.
We also suggest using a direct message for written communication between you and your pair to share resources and links as needed.
When you've completed the steps in this lesson, you are ready to move on to the next lesson to do a second icebreaker using VS Code Live Share.