| PSD3 Group Exercise 1 |
A Support System
for Group Projects |
Assignment |
| last update: 1/12/08 |
The Level 3 programme includes several group projects, including:
Group management and organisation can take up a lot of time and energy and, if done poorly, can jeopardise a group's success. A variety of organisational techniques and tools are available to help, some computer-based, but none of them have been tailored for the particular requirements of group projects in this Department.
The clients have identified group projects as likely to benefit from the provision of computer support. An initial informal feasibility study has been performed, suggesting several areas that might benefit from such computer support. These include:
Project supervisors usually arrange to meet weekly with their groups. However, these meeting arrangements are typically ad hoc and subject to disruption. For example, the supervisor might have to move a meeting from its regularly scheduled time. This can result in a flood of emails as a new day & time are negotiated.
One of the main potential outcomes of supervisory meetings is an "action list" for the supervisor and the group members. Such a list can serve as a useful aide memoire and as a starting point for a review of progress at the next meeting. However, even if taken, action minutes are often not easily accessible when needed.
Project supervisors often ask for project documents, code and draft versions of project deliverables to be submitted for checking and feedback. Arrangements for these submissions typically vary from one supervisor to another. It is often the case that deadlines are poorly specified or forgotten by students. The format for submissions and the submission process are also often variable, unclear and subject to failure.
Supervisors often give informal feedback to the group, both during project meetings and via other channels (email, conversations with group members). This feedback can often be lost or forgotten unless recorded and made available for subsequent access. Even if a group keeps notes on this feedback, supervisors typically do not keep notes and may forget what they have told a group.
The clients believe there may well be other advantages to computer support that would be identified via a more extensive and careful analysis of the problem domain.
However, clients are also aware that there are serious constraints on resources for analysis, design and, especially, implementation, so that the level of sophistication of the system developed may have to be limited to stay within available resources. Therefore, the clients have agreed on the following constraints:
Constraint 1
Assume that the maximum effort available for the design and implementation of this system is the capacity of a Level 3 Project Team. That is, consider this system as one that could be developed via a Level 3 Team Project. Constraints 2 & 3 are added in order to help maintain this first constraint.
Constraint 2
The system need only deal with interaction between a supervisor and a group. Interaction within a project group may benefit from the system being designed, but support for such intra-group interaction is not the primary aim of the system.
Constraint 3
The system need only handle textual data (no graphics or multimedia elements) or graphics- and media-free html (e.g., this exercise sheet is an example of an acceptable format). This is not an HCI design exercise and additional credit will not be given for sophisticated user interfaces. You should concentrate on the functional requirements and on non-functional requirements other than those related to usability.
You should plan on investing about 30 hours per team member in this group exercise (i.e., 3 hours per week). All of the work will be done in the first semester.
To enhance your training in Level 3, any prototyping work for this exercise must be carried out within the Linux environment. The prototype must be implemented using schell scriptiong only. Implementations written in a general purpose language such as Java or Python will not be accepted. In particular, the user interface sould not invollve graphical elements (e.g., Java widgets). Further details about the purpose and requirements of the prototype will be presented during the PSD3 module.
Your clients are the PSD3 lecturers: Phil Gray and Ray Welland.
You will have regular opportunities to meet with and interview the clients about the scope and nature of the group exercise. As you will discover, the clients will initially have poorly defined and sometimes contradictory notions about the requirements. This is intentional. One of your tasks will be to impose some clarity upon the problem and the system requirements.
You will have limited opportunities to speak with other staff and students, but these opportunities will have to be kept under careful control to ensure that this exercise doesn't make undue demands on those not directly involved with PSD3.
The potential users of your system are the staff and students of the Computing Science Department and, possibly, external project supervisors. Clearly defining and understanding the user population, their needs, expectations and capabilities, will be one of the project tasks.
The main aim of this group exercise is to provide group members with a reasonably realistic setting in which to practise techniques of requirements capture, specification and evaluation, plus project management. Note: although you will design a prototype, you will not be expected to produce a formal specification of your design. Design specification techniques will be assessed during term 2 of PSD3.
At the end of this group exercise, you will be able to:
There are no explicit prerequisites.
Each group must identify, specify and evaluate the requirements for a UNIX-based system supporting project group communication.
There are several distinct parts to this, including:
Each group must turn in a report including:
Further details of each of the deliverables will be given during the semester.
Items in italics will be worked on in workshops and turned in during the term. You will receive feedback on these items at this stage, but no grade will be assigned. Therefore, you can make amendments to these items before handing in the revised version as part of the final Group Exercise 1 hand-in.
The Group Exercise 1 Report must be produced using Latex.
In addition, each student must also hand in an individual report of 4-5 pages which discusses the following issues:
Students are encouraged to use latex for producing the individual report. However, other formats are acceptable.
Further details of each of the deliverables will be given later in the semester.
The group exercise timetable, in the form of workshops and deadlines for items to be turned in during the course, is given in the PSD3 semester 1 timetable.
The complete Group Exercise Report must be turned in by 2pm, Friday 12 December.
Individual reports must be turned in by 2pm, Monday 19 January (i.e., at the beginning of the PSD3 workshop on that day)
Unless advised otherwise, your submission must be submitted in printed form in the course submission box in Lilybank Gardens. Contact a staff member if you're not sure where to find the box.
There will be feedback on Group Exercise 1 deliverables during the course of the semester. In addition, each individual's group exercise submission will be assessed. Basic information about assessment is given in the module description. Further details will be supplied later in semester 1.