Software Engineering 460

Concept and Proposal Assignments

2008-02-08T09:11:00.000-08:00

For those of you who want to look at the PDFs of the first two assignments, I've posted the concept paragraph assignment and the proposal paper assignment. I'm working through your concept paragraphs right now and should have email out to each of you on some basic feedback later this morning or early this afternoon.

Some "process" alternatives

2007-03-07T14:54:00.000-08:00

The waterfall process is the traditional view of software engineering, where the stages of development proceed sequentially. In recent years, a number of alternative methods have been formalized and studied. Of these IBM's "RUP" (Rational Unified Process) and Agile XP ( Extreme Programming) methods stand out. Both of these methods emphasize the importance of communication and iteration. In general, RUP is best suited to larger groups or sparse teams, i.e. best for groups that can't always work closely together. Agile methods emphasise tight group collaboration, this is especially true for extreme programing approaches. These alternative methods offer important strategies for accomplishing complex system developments with tight time constraints.

Here is a link to a more descriptive coverage of Agile Software Development.

cute /. discussion on requirements and specs...

2007-03-07T14:49:00.000-08:00

Slashdot has a cute discussion on gathering software specifications from *uncooperative* clients.

Squeak Land!?!

2007-02-28T12:59:00.000-08:00

Alan Kay, a pioneer of computing and object oriented design, is a lead figure in a software framework and language that is suitable for children. Squeakland is this project.

Oh, dreamy web 2.0

2007-02-07T10:47:00.000-08:00

Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Kansas State, Michael Wesch, works up a starry-eyed flutter for web 2.0. "What is it?" you ask. "It's you!" you'll find out. And all this time, I thought it was just drop-shadows and gradients.

(via Wonderland)

Room change part 2

2007-01-31T12:57:00.000-08:00

It's official, we have moved to Sara Reynolds 102! Starting Feb 5.

UML

2007-01-29T10:49:00.000-08:00

The Unified Modeling Language exists as a standard for making illustrations of system behaviors. In software engineering, UML has the role of illuminating difficult system interactions and serves as a tool for working out complex sequences or dependencies. Many tools exist for UML design, but many people still prefer good old pencil and paper.

Tools:

argoUML: free and usefull
IBM's Rational Rose: not free
JUDE: not free, but has 20 day trial.
UMLet: free *Drawing* tool for uml
Poseiden for UML: free for 30 days

More ideas here? Drop a comment.

PERT

2007-01-29T10:32:00.000-08:00

PERT, an acronym for Program Evaluation and Review Technique, is a classic method for organizing and scheduling project milestones. It has two nice features: 1) visual display of project progress, and 2) nice quantitative evaluation methods for estimating time to completion. Ray Morgan, an NASA subcontractor, explains a creative use of PERT charts as part of his development process.

Room change part 1

2007-01-29T09:14:00.000-08:00

Class will be held in Ferris 141 today Monday Jan 29 and Wednsday Jan 31. We will be getting a new classroom soon, so there will be a part 2.

Assignment 2: Proposal

2007-01-24T10:32:00.000-08:00

The proposal assignment involves expanding your concept into a more formal and complete description of the project. I am interested in content, i.e. did you consider and address the issues? I am not going to grade you on the document's formatting. Formatting is, however, important; it can convey a level of professionalism and originality. There are two deadlines for this assignment. The first deadline is for the proposal draft, the second is for the revision. The deliverable for part two is both the document and a short, 15 minute, presentation.

Key issues for assignment 1:

Have someone proof read your proposal.
Spel chcek
Thorough previous work research.
Clear description without bogging down in technical details.

Design Books

2007-01-22T11:05:00.000-08:00

Just a note: I have updated the class syllabus with supplementary design books. These include Design Patterns, Effective & More Effective C++, Effective Java, and Modern C++ Design. These are books that I have personally found helpful. Any other suggestions are welcome, drop a comment.

Some Fall 06 Projects...

2007-01-17T12:58:00.000-08:00

Evoart

Trans.latio.us

Assignment 1: Concept Paragraph

2007-01-17T12:50:00.000-08:00

Your first assignment is a concept paragraph, or executive summary, of a software project that you might like to do for this class. Your concept should be no more than one page typed, but it need not be a single paragraph. You should avoid going too deep into technical details. Focus on the key aspects of the project; who will use it, why is it needed, how does it work, how much effort is required to finish it. This paragraph will become an abstract for a full project proposal in the coming weeks.

Kevin DeVries of Vertical Power has an excellent project involving embedded system programming that is available for this class. Below is an example concept paragraph provided by him.

Vertical Power is developing a power management system for small experimental aircraft. One of the subsystems, the Large Switch Panel, is used by the pilot to control the power settings of the different avionics and electrical components of the aircraft. A small 16x1 character display is used to provide feedback and allow setup of the management system.

The project scope includes the User Interface Specification and development of the specification on actual hardware. The interface must be usable and intuitive, despite the limited resources of the panel (a dozen switches and a push-button). Although the primary focus is application-level software, the students will become familiar with the Atmel family of micro-processors and the issues that surround real-time software.

The students will be rquired to implement all stages of software development, including requirements, design, development, and test. Any student involved with the project will have the opportunity to test the system during ground and flight tests.

Welcome to Software Engineering

2007-01-17T10:37:00.000-08:00

It's spring! This is the CS 460 blog. Check here frequently for news, updates, and assignments. Notice that each post has the option to leave a comment. Please do. Other students will often have the same questions that you do. Comments are a great way to get things answered, either by the instructor or fellow students.

Final Presentations Dec 12

2006-11-30T09:28:00.000-08:00

The final class meeting is Dec 12 10am-12pm. Each group will present their project. Presentations should be 15-20 min in length, and well rehearsed. Your presentations should:

Desribe what the project is.
Demonstrate the application.
Discuss the level of completion.
Discuss the group's working process, what worked and didn't work.

Best of the web roundup

2006-10-28T21:01:00.000-07:00

The site "Software Development in the Real World" has a nice roundup of websites that emphasize good design and organization.

Object Oriented Programming in C

2006-10-26T08:55:00.000-07:00

There are several in the class that have "C" as their native language. How then can they map all of our discussions of object oriented programming to this "arcane" procedural, portable assembly. The answer may surprise you, "Object oriented programming is a state of mind." It's away of solving problems, not a language paradigm necessarily. Laurent Deniau illuminates Object Oriented Programming in C. Here is a lengthy, detailed manual for doing OOP in C by Axel-Tobias Schriener. Yet another useful resource .

Code Style and Conventions

2006-10-19T08:53:00.000-07:00

Code Style and Conventions should appear in your SDD. The central aims in devising a coding style for your projects is predictability and readability:

Predictability Can members of your group identify semantic features of the code at a glance. You should avoid bad variable names (a, f(), etc), instead use nouns for variables and verbs for functions (m_date, up_vector, computeLocalTime()). Use names to indicate member variables "m_date". If you are using set/get style for member variables, use those names "setTime(), getTime()"; make sure you have symmetry in your names too.
Readability Can you read the code and tell what it does. The pinnacle of readable code is Literate Programming, which intertwines documentation and source. You can move toward this without a special programming environment by enforcing good names, liberal use of space, and frequent English comments to lead the eye through the code.

Since many of you are using a web interface, be sure to have conventions for your HTML and style sheets, even if they are automatically generated.

Standard Java conventions.

Details on Naming Conventions.

An example style guide for Mozilla code practice. Note, this style assumes "C" code. Here is a more java friendly style guide called "Turbine".

An example of a code style enforcer for visual studio.

System Design Document (SDD)

2006-10-17T09:16:00.000-07:00

The system design document will be a very important component of your system. Yet more writing! This document is designed for internal use, for your team. It plays an important role in system documentation and maintenance. A successful SDD will capture the design philosophy and system at a high level, as well as detailed object level descriptions. This document should reflect your requirements document, i.e. reference reqs by number, and identify how the requirements were captured by the system. Brad Appleton has a nice template for SDDs. One might consider using Doxygen to generate at least some of the SDD directly from the code comments.

Requirements Recap

2006-10-02T16:13:00.000-07:00

Karl Wiegers has a nice article about Writing Quality Requirements. This article covers strategies for validating your requirements. Please pay attention to the section Reviewing Requirements for Quality.

Because the quality of any product depends on the quality of the raw materials fed into it, poor requirements cannot lead to excellent software.

Startup Myths

2006-10-02T16:00:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Peter for this one.
Top 10+1 Myths of Business Geeks, by Ron Garret covers a few of the common misconceptions about starting a tech business. A few items are bit contrived, but important points.

As Dwight Eisenhower said: plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.

Journal Entry: Plan and Process

2006-09-28T08:47:00.000-07:00

Journal entry assignment three asks you to discuss your plan for getting code done and integrated into your system. Please discuss how you will approach the problem of fulfilling requirements and what process you will use. How will you keep on track and avoid procrastination? How will you motivate your teem to do the same. Please be specific about your strategy, and identify how you utilise or contradict the ideas from existing process frameworks (Agile or RUP for example).

... due Thurday Oct 5

Systems Engineering Lecture from JPL

2006-09-27T14:53:00.000-07:00

Friday Sept. 29, 10:00am, ME 218
Brian Muirhead, chief engineer at JPL, will be giving a lecture, "Take Risk, Don't Fail: The Art and Science of Systems Engineering." Please plan to attend, extra credit will be given if you submit a short summary of the talk.

--This talk will provide a unique overview and insight into the process of systems engineering and qualities of the engineers who practice it. Examples of specific problems taken from recent NASA/Jet Propulsion Lab missions including the Mars Exploration Rover, Deep Impact and Mars Pathfinder will illustrate different approaches and skills needed to identify, assess, resolve, and validate solutions to complex, multi-disciplinary problems. This talk will emphasize the inherent "fuzziness" of systems engineering problems and the roles and characteristics of the teams who must solve them.

Alternatives to the "Waterfall process"

2006-09-26T13:22:00.000-07:00

Top Ad$ense earners

2006-09-26T13:15:00.000-07:00

Google's Adsense provides a simple mechanism for generating advertisement based revenue from web pages. John Chow has the latest roundup of top Adsense earners. Notice that the top earner does it all by himself!

Assignment 3: Proposal Revision & Presentation

2006-09-06T10:38:00.000-07:00

The next assignment involves revising and polishing your proposal. It will be due Tues 12 Sep. On this date you should also have a short, 7 minute presentation describing the project. This will be done in front of the class, and each presentation will be critiqued. There are some common issues with all of the proposals, be sure to address these in your revision:

Always have someone else read your proposal! Ask someone to give you feedback and explain your project to you. This will help you identify holes or unclear explanations.
Avoid informal language, like "you" and "I". These can be directly substituted with "one" and "we". Imagine that the document speaks for you and your "company", rather than it being written by you.
Background, background, background. Be sure to do your due diligence in finding competing work. It will be rare that you have truly novel idea, who else thought of it?
Make strong points. Avoid weak or self deprecating comments. This document should convince me that you are the right person/team for the job.
Avoid too much internal detail in system description. Your description should be detailed, but only with respect to system boundaries. Delving into specifics about its implementation will confuse the reader, and in many cases make the system seem fuzzier rather than more concrete. Focus on aspects of the description from an "outside" point of view.

Also, make sure that you have reasonable section headings, your cover sheet is only one page and contains your contact info, if you have an itemized budget be sure that it has a total at the bottom. You should go back through the assignment 1 description, and make sure you have addressed each of the topics. Your grade on this project will depend on the amount of improvement when compared to the draft you just submitted.

A Requirements Specification Template

2006-09-04T13:26:00.000-07:00

The Volere Requirements Specification Template, available here , is a detailed breakdown of the requirements elicitation process. This document covers all of the categories you should consider when developing and negotiating the requirements for your project. While not all of the 26 categories will be immediately relevant to your work, this template can serve as a guide for evolving requirements during the lifetime of the software. Use this document in conjunction with chapters 4 and 12 in the book for the next phase of the project; negotiating requirements and deliverables.

Free Security Engineering Book

2006-08-31T14:18:00.000-07:00

Ross Anderson has just released his classic security book for free (as in beer). Have a look. Security is a seriously hot issue these days, and likely to continue into the foreseeable future. This is a whole other aspect of software engineering that is often overlooked.

UML Cheatsheet

2006-08-31T09:15:00.000-07:00

Lou Franco has produced a nice, short UML Cheatsheet under the Creative Commons licence. Have a look and use it to keep your diagrams straight!

Journal Entry 2: Modeling and Rationale

2006-08-31T09:02:00.000-07:00

Now that you are working on a more detailed proposal, I would like you to pick one aspect of your project and sketch a UML model of it. I want the journal entry to record how this model changed as you completed the sketch, and how it changed the proposal that you are writing. Refer to Chapter 12, Rationale, for some things to think about when discussing the changes that happened; what were the issues, alternatives, criteria, arguments, and decisions you made? Aspects of the project that you can model include, tasks (timeline), the user interface, the data model, etc. If this approach is helpful in the creation of your proposal, consider modeling multiple aspects; think about how these models interact.

Due Thursday Sept 7.

Ajax Demystified

2006-08-29T19:58:00.000-07:00

"Ajax, shorthand for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML, is a web development technique for creating interactive web applications. The intent is to make web pages feel more responsive by exchanging small amounts of data with the server behind the scenes, so that the entire web page does not have to be reloaded each time the user makes a change. This is meant to increase the web page's interactivity, speed, and usability."
-from Wikipedia

Here is a nice article by Drew McLellan at xml.com about the design methodology. Article includes basic code examples!

Assignment 2: The Proposal

2006-08-28T21:07:00.000-07:00

This assignment asks you to develop a full proposal for the project that you identified in the concept paragraph. You will end up doing two revisions in the course of two weeks, with a presentation at the end. Together, we will determine which of these proposals will become class projects. There will also be a special award for those who's project is chosen! Please start early, writing isn't easy, and you will have other work to do during that time.

Timing is Everything

2006-08-28T14:23:00.000-07:00

Robert Martin contrasts traditional and agile project management and timeline methods in a nice article from 2003.

"Project plans are afflicted by uncertainties that turn schedules into random variables. Fortunately we can measure that randomness and use it to determine the probabilities that certain tasks will be complete by certain dates. Once we know the probabilities, we can manage the project by adjusting scope, manpower, and schedule so that the probability of a desirable outcome remains high."

Not to my surprise, Wikipedia has a concise but comprehensive description of Project Management from a number of perspectives.

Educators from CMU discuss rapid game prototyping

2006-08-24T14:14:00.000-07:00

Kyle Gabler, Kyle Gray, Matt Kucic, and Shalin Shodhan from CMU have a delightful Gamasutra article on ultra fast Game Prototyping. This article discusses a methodology for quickly exploring and developing new ideas. This methodology will be revisited later in the course, when we discuss development strategies like Agile XP.

Journal Entry 1: A Process Summary.

2006-08-24T11:38:00.000-07:00

Your first required journal entry will be a one page description of the software engineering process, as you see it now. What steps, tools, and skills are involved? How do you predict the project will be managed?

Due Thursday Aug 31.

Nice, Short Proposal Writing Guide

2006-08-24T11:30:00.000-07:00

Alice Reid covers general Proposal Writing concisely.

"The general purpose of any proposal is to persuade the readers to do something -- whether it is to persuade a potential customer to purchase goods and/or services, or to persuade your employer to fund a project or to implement a program that you would like to launch."

An excelent article on the (engineering) process

2006-08-23T16:26:00.000-07:00

Gary Pollice discusses various issues related to the project development process.

Gary Pollice is a professor of practice at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, in Worcester, MA. He teaches software engineering, design, testing, and other computer science courses, and also directs student projects. Before entering the academic world, he spent more than thirty-five years developing various kinds of software, from business applications to compilers and tools. His last industry job was with IBM Rational software, where he was known as "the RUP Curmudgeon" and was also a member of the original Rational Suite team. He is the primary author of Software Development for Small Teams: A RUP-Centric Approach, published by Addison-Wesley in 2004. He holds a BA in mathematics and an MS in computer science.

Assignment 1: Concept Paragraph

2006-08-23T12:50:00.000-07:00

Your task is twofold: 1) identify a "novel" idea suitable for a small group project, and 2) write a short, high-level overview of the project. Item 1 can involve picking up an unfinished project from a previous class, a pet project that has captured your interest but never made it to the top of the heap, or some other creative idea that you feel has some value or demand. I want you to identify something that has marketability, and doesn't directly copy some other, existing idea. For item 2, you should imagine a non-technical target audience. What is the thing you propose? What does it do, and who will use it? Consider previous work, and how this project differs from that. I want a clean, executive summary; no spelling or grammar errors please.

This assignment will be the introduction for Assignment 2, the project proposal, due a week later.

Welcome

2006-08-23T12:31:00.000-07:00

Welcome to cs460: Software Engineering. Is it art, architecture, or bureaucracy? A bit of each, I guess. Mostly, it's a required, core cs class. Another hoop to jump through. For me, it's a bit more. Software Engineering encapsulates some of the most challenging aspects of "real" software design. While much of the course deals with formal methods for specification and project management, the real take-away is experience communicating about software design at multiple levels of abstraction.

The class syllabus is here.