User Guide

TAlent Assistant™ is a desktop, lightweight and centralized management system catered to NUS School of Computing professors for managing the interview scheduling process of candidates applying to be undergraduate Teaching Assistants (TA). Professors will be able to access the candidates’ application data easily and review their general availability for scheduling interviews during office hours. TAlent Assistant™ is optimized for use via a Command Line Interface (CLI) while still having the benefits of a Graphical User Interface (GUI). If you can type fast, this application will be able to help you manage all things under the hood of the TA initiative faster than traditional GUI applications.

• Quick start
• Navigating the Display
• Features
• Viewing help
  • Viewing help window: help
• Managing candidates
  • Adding a candidate: add
  • Editing a candidate: edit
  • Listing all candidates : list
  • Finding candidates by keyword(s) search: find
  • Sorting candidates by attribute field: sort
  • Updating a candidate’s remark: remark
  • Deleting a candidate : delete
  • Bringing a Candidate’s Information to the Center Panel : focus
• Scheduling interviews
  • Scheduling a candidate for interview: schedule add
  • Rescheduling an interview: schedule edit
  • Deleting an interview: schedule delete
  • Viewing scheduled interviews view
  • Clearing interview schedule schedule clear
• Miscellaneous commands
  • Clearing all entries : clear
  • Exiting the program : exit
• Processing data
  • Saving the data
  • Editing the data file
• New features to be added (Coming Soon!)
• FAQ
• Command summary
  • Managing candidates
  • Scheduling interviews
  • Miscellaneous commands

Quick start

1. Ensure you have Java 11 or above installed in your Computer.

2. Download the latest TAlentAssistant.jar from here.

3. Copy the file to the folder you want to use as the home folder for your TAlent Assistant™.

4. Double-click the file to start the app. The GUI similar to the below should appear in a few seconds. Note how the app contains some sample data.
   

5. Type the command in the command box and press Enter to execute it. e.g. typing help and pressing Enter will open the help window.
   Some example commands you can try:

   • add id/A0123456B n/John Doe p/87654321 e/E0123456@u.nus.edu c/Computer Science yr/2 avail/1,2,3 Adds a new candidate into the system.

   • list : Lists all candidates.

   • delete 1 : Deletes the first candidate displayed in the system.

   • find k/Alex f/name : Searches for all candidates with name containing “alex” (case-insensitive).

   • sort s/name : Sorts all candidates by name in ascending alphabetical order (i.e. A-Z).

   • schedule add candidate/1 at/05-05-2022 10:00 : Schedules the first candidate for an interview at 5 May 2022 10AM.

   • help : List all commands in the system.

   • exit : Closes and exits the system.

6. Refer to the Features section below for details of all the available commands.

Navigating the Display

Features

• Viewing help
• Managing candidates
• Scheduling interviews
• Miscellaneous commands
• Processing data

Viewing help

Viewing help window: help

Lists the application commands that are available in the system.

Format: help

Managing candidates

Adding a candidate: add

Adds a candidate into the system.

Format: add id/STUDENT_ID n/NAME p/PHONE e/EMAIL c/COURSE yr/SENIORITY avail/AVAILABILITY

All fields of a candidate below should not be blank and will be validated.

• STUDENT_ID is format-sensitive with ease of case sensitivity i.e. Allowing lower caps, and in this format AXXXXXXXX e.g. A0123456B.
  • The first character has to be A or a.
  • Followed by 7 digits.
  • The last character with any alphabet is allowed.
• NAME should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.
• EMAIL is format-sensitive, and should only be in this format EXXXXXXX@u.nus.edu.
• PHONE is format-sensitive, and should only be a local Singapore number. i.e. Starting number of Singapore’s common phone/telephone numbers - 6, 8, 9.
• COURSE should only be Computing courses. e.g. Business Analytics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, Information Security, Information Systems.
  • The first character of each word in the course i.e. C in Computer and S in Science for Computer Science is case-sensitive.
• SENIORITY is a single integer ranging from 1 to 4. i.e. 1 to 4 inclusive.
  • This attribute field serves as a gauge for the SoC professor (user) on which year the candidate is in to better understand how far along they are in their undergraduate studies. It follows the faculty classification from COM1 to COM4, and does not differentiate beyond COM4 following the faculty system classification.
• AVAILABILITY is an input to represent the available days. e.g. 1,2,3 corresponds to an availability of Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. It accepts a number range from only 1 to 5.
  • Each available day represented by the corresponding integer number should be comma-separated. It does not matter how the days are ordered in the user input.

Examples:

• add id/A0123456B n/John Doe p/87654321 e/E0123456@u.nus.edu c/Computer Science yr/2 avail/1,2,3 adds a new candidate with Student ID, A0123456B, named John Doe.

Editing a candidate: edit

Edits a candidate in the system.

Format: edit INDEX PREFIX/NEW_VALUE [PREFIX/NEW_VALUE]…​

• Edits the candidate at the specified INDEX. The index refers to the index number shown in the displayed candidate list. The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​ .
• At least one field must be provided and the rest are optional fields.
• Existing values will be updated to the input values.
• as prefix short for Application Status should only be either Pending, Accepted or Rejected.

Examples:

• edit 1 n/Jane Doe yr/3 avail/1 Edits the name, year and availability of the 1st candidate to be Jane Doe, Year 3, Monday only respectively.
• edit 2 c/Business Analytics Edits the course of the 2nd candidate to be Business Analytics.
• edit 3 as/Accepted Edits the application status of the 3rd candidate to Accepted.

Listing all candidates : list

Displays all candidates found in the system.

Format: list

Finding candidates by keyword(s) search: find

Finds and lists candidates whose attribute field(s) contain(s) any of the given keyword(s).

Format: find k/KEYWORD [k/MORE_KEYWORDS]…​ [f/ATTRIBUTE_FIELD]

• The keyword search is case-insensitive. e.g hans will match Hans.
• The attribute field is case-insensitive. e.g. NAME is equivalent to name.
• The search will return a list of all candidates containing any of the specified keyword(s) in the specified attribute field.
• For f/all, the search will find keywords across all attribute fields of the candidate records.
• Only full keywords will be matched e.g. k/jane doe f/name will not match candidates with name jane koe or just jane.
• Candidates matching at least one full keyword (in the specified attribute field) will be returned i.e. OR search, e.g. k/Jane k/Doe f/name will return candidates with name Jane Koe, John Doe.
• If multiple ATTRIBUTE_FIELDs are provided, only the last field will be used.
• If no ATTRIBUTE_FIELD is provided, the search will be conducted across all fields by default.

Examples:

• find k/Jane f/name returns candidates with name e.g. jane and jane doe.
• find k/Computer k/science f/course returns candidates with the course field i.e. Computer Science and Computer Engineering.
• find k/Jane k/Tan f/name returns candidates with name e.g. Jane, tan and John Tan.

Sorting candidates by attribute field: sort

Returns a list of candidates sorted by the specified attribute field in ascending order (A-Z, 0-9).

Format: sort s/ATTRIBUTE_FIELD

• The attribute field is case-insensitive. e.g. NAME is equivalent to name.
• The search will return a list of all candidates sorted in ascending order. (i.e. A-Z, 0-9) with regard to the specified attribute field.

Examples: Let’s reference a default sample list of unique candidates with attribute fields stated as (name, studentid):

1. (Ben, A5588565L)
2. (Alice, A2344567B)
3. (Charlie, A0188565L)

sort s/name returns candidates sorted by name in the following order:

1. (Alice, A2344567B)
2. (Ben, A5588565L)
3. (Charlie, A0188565L)

sort s/studentid returns candidates sorted by student id in the following order:

1. (Charlie, A0188565L)
2. (Alice, A2344567B)
3. (Ben, A5588565L)

Updating a candidate’s remark: remark

Updates the remark field of a candidate to the user input keyed in.

Format: remark INDEX [r/REMARK]

• To remove the remark of the first candidate displayed in the system, the user can simply key in remark 1 or remark 1 r/, which will update the remark of the candidate to be empty.

Examples:

• remark 1 r/a good candidate Updates the candidate’s remark field to reflect ‘a good candidate’.
• remark 1 r/ Removes the candidate’s remark field to reflect ``.

Deleting a candidate : delete

Deletes the specified candidate from the system.

Format: delete INDEX

• Deletes the candidate at specified INDEX.
• The index refers to the index number shown in the displayed candidate list
• The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​

Examples:

• list followed by delete 2 deletes the 2nd candidate in the candidate list.
• find k/bernice k/alex f/name followed by delete 1 deletes the 1st candidate in the results of the find command.

Bringing a Candidate’s Information to the Center Panel : focus

View more details about the Candidate in the middle panel.

Format: focus INDEX

• Additional details of the Candidate will be displayed on the center panel in the application.
• To switch to another Candidate’s information, user can enter a new focus command and the new index of the candidate.

• If a Candidate is in focus and the user decides to delete the candidate, the middle panel will be cleared.

  

Scheduling interviews

Scheduling a candidate for interview: schedule add

Schedules the specified candidate for an interview.

Format: schedule add candidate/INDEX at/DATE_TIME

• Schedules the candidate at the specified INDEX for an interview on given DATE_TIME.
• The candidate index refers to the index number shown in the displayed candidate list.
• The candidate index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
• DATE_TIME must be specified in the format dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm.
• DATE_TIME must not be earlier than the present date and time.
• Interviews must be scheduled within the office hours, defined as Monday to Friday, 8AM - 6PM (i.e. The last interview for the day allowed is at 5:30PM).
• Attempts to schedule an interview within the duration of another interview will result in an error. (e.g. Interview A starts at 10AM on a given day. Scheduling an interview from 9:31AM up to 10:29AM is prohibited).

Examples:

• list followed by schedule add candidate/2 at/05-05-2022 10:00 schedules the second candidate in the candidate list for an interview on 5 May 2022 10AM.

Rescheduling an interview: schedule edit

Reschedules the specified interview to a new date and time.

Format: schedule edit SCHEDULE_INDEX at/DATE_TIME

• Reschedules the interview at the specified SCHEDULE_INDEX to the given new DATE_TIME.
• The schedule index refers to the index number shown in the displayed interview schedule.
• The schedule index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
• DATE_TIME must be specified in the format dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm.
• DATE_TIME must not be earlier than the present date and time.

Examples:

• view all followed by schedule edit 2 at/06-06-2022 15:00 reschedules the second interview in the interview schedule to 6 June 2022 3PM.

Deleting an interview: schedule delete

Deletes the specified interview.

Format: schedule delete SCHEDULE_INDEX

• Deletes the interview at the specified SCHEDULE_INDEX.
• The schedule index refers to the index number shown in the displayed interview schedule.
• The schedule index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​

Examples:

• view all followed by schedule delete 2 deletes the second interview in the interview schedule.

Viewing scheduled interviews view

Returns the list of scheduled interviews within the specified time period.

Format: view TIME_PERIOD

• The attribute field is case-insensitive. e.g. ALL is equivalent to all.
• Scheduled interviews are automatically sorted from earliest to latest.

Examples:

• view all returns all scheduled interviews still in system whether in the past or upcoming.
• view today returns all scheduled interviews on the same date as the current time.
• view week returns all upcoming scheduled interviews within the next 7 days.
• view month returns all upcoming scheduled interviews within the next month period.

Clearing interview schedule schedule clear

Clears the list of interviews in the schedule.

Format: schedule clear

Miscellaneous commands

Clearing all entries : clear

Clears all entries (candidates and interviews) from the system.

Format: clear

Exiting the program : exit

Exits the program.

Format: exit

Processing data

Saving the data

TAlent Assistant™ data are saved in the hard disk automatically after any command that changes the data. There is no need to save manually.

Editing the data file

TAlent Assistant™ candidate and interview data are saved as JSON files [JAR file location]/data/talentassistant.json and [JAR file location]/data/interviewlist.json respectively. Advanced users are welcome to update data directly by editing that data file.

Caution: If your changes to the data file makes its format invalid*, TAlent Assistant™ will discard all data and start with an empty data file at the next run. It is highly advised that you do not modify the JSON files unless you are aware of what you are doing. When making changes to a candidate’s details in talentassistant.json, the corresponding candidate’s details in interviewlist.json (if applicable) must also be updated. Likewise, if an interview is deleted from interviewlist.json, the interview status of the candidate should be updated according to your desired outcome (scheduled or not completed). *Format is considered to be invalid when either one of the JSON files are missing, or if the JSON files are edited to contain duplicate candidates and/or (conflicting) interviews.

New features to be added (Coming Soon!)

• The following features are being considered for future versions of TAlent Assistant™:
  • A new feature to pinpoint the exact interview in conflict (if any) when a user attempts to schedule an interview
  • A new feature to allow the user to schedule interviews of flexible duration is under consideration for future versions of TAlent Assistant™.
  • Extension of the find command to enable searching across multiple fields.
  • Extension of the view command to enable user to bring up a list of scheduled interviews for a customised date range.
  • Extension of the sort command to enable user to customise the sorting order (ascending or descending) as well as sorting by availabilities.

FAQ

Q: How do I transfer my data to another Computer?
A: Install the app in the other computer and overwrite the empty data file it creates with the file that contains the data of your previous TAlent Assistant™ home folder.

Command summary

Commands in this section have been organised based on the expected scope of behaviour.

Managing candidates

Scheduling interviews

Miscellaneous commands