Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Final Year Project
Book Notes
- Research - "The good
researcher is not one who
knows the right answers but one
who is struggling to find out what
the right questions might be"
- Originality
- Can be original in
the way you do
things
- Producing something that
hasn't been done before
- Ways in which
you project can
be original
- Tools, techniques, procedures and
methods
- Exploring the unknown
- Exploring the unanticipated
- The use of data
- Process/ Types
- Sequential
- 1. Identify the broad area of study. 2. Select a research
topic. 3. Decide on an approach. 4. Plan how you will
perform the research. 5. Gather data and information. 6.
Analyse and interpret these data. 7. Present the results
and findings.
- Generalised
- Sequential but with decided topics
- Circulatory
- Continuous research
- Evolutionary
- Evolving research continously
- Questions to try to answer
- What am I looking for?
- Why am I looking at it?
- How shall I set about it?
- Where shall I start looking?
- Reasoning - the step
you take during your
research
- Inductive reasoning
- Drawing conclusions from what
you observe, what you are
studying and what you already
know and believe
- Deductive reasoning
- Affected by your own personal understanding of the
world and assumptions about what you're
investigating
- Solving the problem
- Pappus Method
- Assume the problem is fixed
and work backwards
- Terullus Method
- Assume a solution is impossible
and try to prove why
- Random guesses
- Analogy
- Is the problem similar to anything else that
already has a solution or explanation?
- Inversion
- Try to look at things from
the opposite angle
- Partition
- Break the problem
down
- Choosing a Project
- Tips
- Choose
something
that interests
you
- Make
sure it's
not overly
ambitious
- Consider any
personal
development
- Make sure it has an
outcome of benefit
- Make sure that you can
obtain the resources you
require
- Look into past or
suggested
projects
- Make sure to
consider Legal
Ethical and
Social Issues
- Project
Definition
Document
- Current Research in
the field
- Identifying a gap
in the market
- Identify how your work
fills the gaps
- Identify
risk and
solutions
- Choosing your supervisor -
things to consider
- How many students
have they completed
- What would be there
role in it all
- What do they specialise in
- How accessible
are they
- Project Planning and
Risk Management
- SMART Targets
- Specific
- Measurable
- Appropriate/ Accurate
- Realistic
- Time
based
- Planning
- Work breakdown
- Break down the main
objectives from the project
definition
- One solution could be in each phase of the lifecycle
task how you are going to complete each objective
- Time estimation
- Milestone identification
- Significant things
in the project
- These could include progress checks
- Scheduling
- Re-planning
- Rescheduling/ re-thinking things through
before you start
- Are you doing too
much or do parts need
more time?
- Activity Sequencing
- Gantt chart/ network diagram
- Role wave planning
- Not constructing a detailed plan but a
skeleton that identifies key stages
- Progress is made on the fly
- Risk Management
- Identifying risks
- Identify any sources
to your risk
- Can be
individual events
- Types of occurence
- Event Driven
- Evolving
- Has this been occurring since the
project has been continued?
- Types
- Technical
- Non-technical
- Assess impact of risks
- Risk impact = likelihood * consequence
- Require a rating system
- Alleviate critical risks
- Avoid
- Stop from happening at all
- Deflect/Transfer
- Passing the risk over
- Contigency
- Putting
something in
place to deal
with the risk
- Control Risks
- Monitoring
risks as they
occur
- Making sure you have the right
resources to deal with risk
- Literature Search and Reviews
- Two main components
- Search
- Looking for, sorting, managing and
digesting the available research
- Review
- Understanding, evaluation, conceptualisation and
presentation of the materials
- Purposes
- Acts as an
introduction
- Justifies your project
- Sets your project within context by
discussing all research you've conducted
- Process of
Contextualisation
- Explains how your
project evolved
- Process
- 1. Define search
- 2. Perform
literature search
- 3. Evaluate Material
- 4.Write literature review
- Go back to stage 1 and
repeat process
- Identify the boundaries of your search
and the topics you are interested in
- May want to create a conceptual model
- Relevance
Tree
- Spider
diagram
- Research
territory map
- Not all independent tasks,
may need to do some in
parallel
- Search
- Systematic gathering of published
information relating to a subject
- Critical Evaluation -
Points to consider
- What kind of
article is it?
- What can you gain
from it?
- Is the author well recognised in
their field/in their area?
- Context
- What is face and
what is an opinion?
- What do you feel
about what has been
written?
- What references
does it use?
- Can you see the
results from the
article in your own
work?
- Conducting your project
- Software Development
- Requirements
capture
- Documents
to produce
- Requirements
definition
- Requirements
specification
- Functional
Specification
- Note: Not all of these
would be required
- Build Models
- Build and
Fix Model
- Problem: After several fixes the
software becomes difficult to
maintain as it is poorly
structured
- Often doesn't match user
requirements as hasn't gone through
SDLC
- Incremental Model
- Delivering the system in a series
of sub-systems over a period of
time
- Add more functionality
after each release
- Important to have the entire outline at the start, allows you
to pick the easiest/most beneficial parts to do first
- Prototyping
- Easier for projects that are
not well defined
- Prototype developed to help
pin-down the requirements
- Prototyping provides an effective method for
generating feedback about what is good and bad
about an idea and is often only the really effective
method for doing this
- Experimental
- Used when someone
is unsure about the
technical solution to a
problem
- Experimenting with
materials/resources
- Where next
- You can throw it away,
if it's not any use to
your project
- Continue to develop it
as a base for the
project
- Extreme Programming
- Encompasses the
methods of agile
- Encourages the user to be interactive
with the development
- Agile Methods
- Releasing software in
short bursts or releases
- Quicker
time scales
- Smaller
development teams
- Face to face communication
with users
- Suitable for
unclear
requirements
- Configuration Management
- Linked to revision and version control
- Four stages
- Configuration Identifiaction
- Change Control
- Status accounting
- Configuration audits
- Making sure changes do
as they say they will
- Recording the
configuration baselines
- Managing and approving changes to
the item and adjusting the baseline
- Identifying the attributes that
define the item you are hoping to
control
- Which approach to use?
- Conventional types
- Low risk projects
- Incremental development
- Clear requirements
- Throw away prototyping
- Unsure on
requirements
- Which programming
language to use?
- Typically dependent on
what platform you
want to use
- Consider what you know
and are already good at
- Controlling Your Project
- Getting started -
Project Initiation
- Assignment
of tasks
- Establish working practices,
area and environment
- Initial meeting with
supervisor and team
- Project Folder
- Need to manage
efficiently
- Time
- Resources
- Money
- Quality
and
Scope
- Dealing with
problems
- Weakening
- Lack of
- Motivation
- Confidence
- Direction
- Caused
by
- Working yourself
too hard
- Burning
yourself out
- Doing too much in the
time available
- Resolved
by
- Making sure you're interested
in the project you are doing
- Working on another part -
refocusing your attention
- Personal
Problems
- Aided
by
- Keeping your
manager in the loop
- Managing
your time
- Project won't
always be your
only priority
- Need to
manage other
parts of life as
well
- Work
Goals
- Family
Goals
- Community
Goals
- Self
Goals
- Time logs
- A daily log of how you use your
time could be used to show where
you could be making use of time
more effectively
- Could turn into a daily
performance chart
- Plan
- Make a development
plan and include all of
these things
- Make a list for each and the
time scale you aim to
complete them in
- Make sure you plan has
room for flexibility and
adjustments
- Prioritize
tasks
- Tips
- Grains of
time
- Small periods of time
could be making the most
of
- Pick a small task that could be
easily completed to do in this
time slot
- Making the
use of
emails
- Folders and filtering
- Set up a signature
- Set up an auto
reply
- Include how long you aim to get
back to someone
- Unfinished
business
- Keep a list of things
that still need
completing
- Perfectionism
- Waste
of time
- People
don't expect
it from you
- Losing
things
- Keep things in
good order
- References need to be
up-to-date
- How you
manage
backups
- Breaks
- Short
breaks
- Take a note
of where you
are working
- Note what you want
to work on next
- Long breaks
- Holidays
- Don't completely
forget about your
project
- Interruptions
- Hide away
from them
- Turn your phone off
at points you are
working
- Do not disturb
notice
- Learn to
say no
- The Future
- What are you going to do
with your project now you
have completed it so far?
- What did you
learn from it?
- How have the skills
you've learned by
useful in the future?
- What would you
have done
differently?
- What did you do well?
- Where could
the project go
next?
- If you could do it
again what would
you improve?
- What job role
could this lead
you into?
- Presenting your Project
- Extra things you may
want to include in your
report
- Chapter
breakdown
- Table with what
information is contained
in which chapters
- Make a checklist
of all the things
your presentation
should be
- Preparation
- Clarify so you
can plan around
- Think about who is
going to be attending
- How much time do you
have available?
- Demonstrating
Software
- Prepare as you would for a
oral presentation
- Solo running
- Running through a planned
sequence of tasks on your own
- Seem as though you are
only demonstrating it's
strengths
- How it appears to the audience
- Might not
necessarily be the
case
- Rolling demonstration
- Software runs itself through
a predetermined
demonstration
- Demonstration
package
- Audience
participation
- Allow the audience to
request demonstration of
key features
- Most common
approach
- Audience running
- Permit the audience to run
through your software
- Supporting presentation
- Presentation runs
alongside the
demonstration