Introduction

Note: You should attend the introduction to group and individual projects on Wednesday, 2nd October, at 11am in 308

This web site contains information specific to the third year group projects taken by all Computing and JMC students. You may return to this page by clicking on "Introduction" in the left menu bar.

The third year group project will be a unique experience in your student career because it will give you a glimpse of what the `professional world' is really like. Normally, professionals work in groups, have tight deadlines and have to be able to communicate and co-operate with other people. The performance of a group does not depend simply on the sum of the abilities of the individuals within it. Careful planning, frequent meaningful meetings, goodwill and co-operation are needed to make a group successful.

The following are the important aspects of this group project exercise:

• Your project must be one of those listed on the Project List.
• Your group and project will be chosen by the group project coordinator, taking into account preferences that you state on group project entry form.
• Groups are normally comprised of five students, all of whom must fall into one of the following categories:
  • BEng: Students taking BEng Computing or BSc/MSci JMC
  • MEng: Students taking MEng Computing
• If you fail the group project, then you fail to gain professional accreditation for your degree. Also, if you are an MEng computing student you will be forced to change to the BEng programme.
• You must keep to the Schedule. In particular:
  • As for many projects in industry, time is short. Do not delay any tasks, otherwise you will quickly run out of time.
  • Take group meetings (a minimum of two per week) very seriously. Discuss at these group meetings what each member's task will be for the next period and how the last task was (or was not) accomplished.
  • Keep in contact with your supervisor on a regular basis (probably once per week).
  • It is essential that by the time that you submit the project specification report (Report-1), the group clearly understand what is to be done and who does what. You should negotiate with your supervisor a realistic set of minimum specifications for this report.
  • For the remainder of the project, careful plans should be made of what will be achieved and by whom. You should plan for backup in case somebody falls ill or other unforeseeable problems occur.
  • Deadlines are firm. Being late with reports will lead to the loss of marks. In extremely unusual circumstances waiving of penalties can be applied for to the Group Project Coordinator in writing after the report is submitted. No extension of deadlines in advance will be given. All reports are submitted to SGO and proof of submission (stamp) will be used for determining lateness and penalties.
• It is more important to have a simpler project that works and demonstrates well, rather than a complex one which does not do either of these two things.
• Supervisors consider your final product as the achievement of the whole group. However it is possible to award different grades for individuals in the group if the amount of effort is seen to have been variable amongst group members.
• You are expected to spend one day per week for your group project. At critical times this will not seem enough. However, you should not neglect your lectures, tutorials, and assessed course work. Careful planning and steady work (especially during the early phases) will not put unreasonable demands on you at the final phases.
• Take an interest in all aspects of the project not only in your own part of it. It is obviously to your own advantage to try to help others in your group.

Organisation

In each group, one person will be elected as group leader and another as secretary by the members of the group. The group leader and secretary should have less coding/testing responsibilities than the other three members. The group leader decides what route to take when there are different opinions among group members. Also, it is the group leader's responsibility to ensure that group members deliver what required of them and that they are on time (by bugging them constantly if necessary). Normally, the group leader is in charge of the integration process when the various members' contributions are moulded into a single working product.

The secretary is responsible for the proper keeping of a log-book, for keeping records of the meetings and attendance of members and for integrating documentation (usually provided by all members) into professional looking reports. Each member of the group should keep an individual record of how much time they spent and what they accomplished each week. Actual time spent per week for each member and work carried out should be recorded in the log-book.

Project Assessment

Project assessment is conducted by the supervisors after the final report is submitted. Each supervisor assigns a suggested mark for his or her project, and then all the supervisors as a group ensure that marks are assigned uniformly for the class as a whole.

The assessment is according to three mainly equal areas:

• Group Organisation, Planning and Management
• Documentation, Presentation and Demonstration
• Substance and Quality of Work Done

Recommended Reading

The Mythical Man-Month by F.P. Brooks Jr. (Addison Wesley 1982) describes a real project for real money (and prestige). You will see that it is not that dissimilar to your own experience even though the project described in the book represents thousands of man/woman-year effort. The reading of this book is a must for group leaders.