Office hours

There will be no office hours on Tuesday, December 6.

Sign up for the final presentations

The fourth assignment includes a presentation to the client and the instructor. See the Assignments page for information about the presentations.

The available times for the presentations are on the following page:

• Assignment 4 presentation times

To reserve a time for your presentation, send email. It is your responsibility to ensure that the client is available at the time you schedule.

Previous Tests

The sample tests on the Tests page have been replaced with the tests that have been already taken this year and the remaining tests from last year.

Room Change for all Tests

All four tests will be in Phillips Hall 101 from 7:30 to 8:15 p.m.

Course Description

This course is an introduction to the practical problems of specifying, designing, building, testing, and delivering reliable software systems. Other topics covered in lectures include professionalism, project management, and the legal framework for software development. As a central part of the course, student teams carry out projects for real clients. Each project includes all aspects of software development from a feasibility study to final delivery.

The Teaching Assistant does not have scheduled office hours but is available to help you by email or by appointment.  Please send all message about the course to both the Instructor and the Teaching Assistant.

Syllabus

The course syllabus is posted on the Syllabus page of this web site.  It has the schedule of lectures and assignments.  Note that the syllabus is subject to change as the course progresses.

Much of the work in this course is collaborative, but some parts require individual work. To understand when collaboration is appropriate read the web page on Academic Integrity and understand how it applies to this course.

Projects

The groups projects are a central part of the course. See the Projects page for more information.

Team assignments

• The projects are divided into four parts, each of which ends in a milestone. At each milestone, the team submits a written report.
• After the second, third, and final milestones, the team makes a presentation to the client and the course team.
• After the first milestone, each project team submits a weekly progress report.

For more information, see the Assignments page.

Individual assignments

• There are four tests that are based on the material covered in the lectures. For more information, see the Tests page.
• At the time of each milestone, there is a survey about the progress of your project. It is a required part of the course. See the Surveys page.

Grading

The weightings given to the components of the course are expected to be as follows, but these weightings may be changed:

Team meetings

The recitation period on Monday evenings is available for group project meetings. Project teams may agree to meet at other times, but it is important that each project schedules a team meeting at least once per week.