Museum Speelklok is a museum that aims to provide its visitors with an interactive experience that teaches them about the history and operations of music machines. In 2026, the museum plans to launch an exhibition called "Music, Machines & Me" (originally "Music, Motion & Me"), for which we were commissioned to design a program that would allow visitors to create their own music machines. Our program consists of a web application that allows visitors at the museum to experiment with connecting gears and belts, and connecting these to different instruments. These instruments will then play a sound if the chain of gears and belts is correct. This application simulates the mechanics of a music machine.
Our client was Museum Speelklok. This is a museum located in Utrecht about music machines. In our first meeting, we introduced ourselves and discussed the main requirements of the program. They also invited us to have a look at the museum to get familiar with the music machines and their mechanics. This helped us a lot during the project. We had biweekly meetings on Mondays in which we discussed the requirements we implemented and any changes in requirements we still had to do. We also provided a demo in every meeting to get feedback from the museum. Our team leader had contact by email about any uncertainties regarding the requirements and how they must be implemented. The client was very open to improvements from our side, which helped a lot to create the best application.
Our team consists of six students (Bryan Kaak, Tim Zuijderduijn, Ronan Smedeman, Volodymyr Kalinin, Raaed Khan, Justin Wisker), of whom two were DSAI students (Volodymyr and Raaed). Bryan was the team leader and managed the product backlog of the scrum. Volodymyr was the scrum master, he divided the requirements/tasks according to the individual qualities. We divided the tasks before each sprint and after the meeting with the client. Everyone contributed as a developer to the project. Although we had a bad start because of other courses and group dynamics, we completed the project according to our planning. We also had a big obstacle halfway through the project, because the museum changed the goal of the application. Luckily, we could use a lot of the already implemented requirements from previous sprints. It was a big change in requirements, but it did not cause any delays. We are very proud of the web application and how we managed to finish it in time. We also had a pleasant time with the client.