Project Proposal Guidelines
CS/IS 409 Practicum - Lake
Write a Project Proposal
To write and submit a project proposal, please follow these steps: 1. Read carefully the description of the projects described in the projects list. 2. Review all of the projects. 3. Choose three projects. Rank the projects from 1 to 3, with 1 being your first choice and 3 being your last choice. • Create a project proposal for the project that your team rated as first. The goal of the project is develop software for an online service -- for example, an online grade book, online music/video store, online backup service, online collaboration service, etc. (use your imagination). Key components that the project must include are: The minimum project proposal will include the following: • Start with an initial idea of desirable services and provide as much detail as possible. • GUI - webpage storyboard • database schema • work breakdown structure (WBS) • schedule
The project proposal is competitive; i.e., the best project proposal will receive the project. Other important characteristics: • The system must be accessible over the Web, using a web browser or a specialized application client. • It must also include a security and access control mechanism that takes into account the different types/roles of users (customer, system administrator, etc.). • Support for managing users and maintaining user state (e.g. profiles). Security will play a role here as well. • Online help capability and error reporting/tracking capability. This Project Will Include Programming. When deciding about the project, the most important thing to keep in mind is that the software product you will develop will require some programming. For example, creating a data-bank and processing this data is a programming task. If your system just allows the user to set or modify values of different database records, that is not programming. Examples of programming include, data re-organization, keyword-based search and retrieval, filtering and summarization of the data, selecting a small group of users for notification, etc. However, just saying: “The system will provide search facilities”, may mean that your project is using SQL database calls and doing no programming at all. Programming is done in a programming language, such as C, C++, Java, Visual Basic or C#. Note: Designing web pages passive web pages which contain only HTML is not programming. Therefore, your project can include web page design, but that is not enough. On the other hand, designing active webpages using ASP.NET, C#, Visual Basic, AJAX, or Flash is programming and is acceptable for this class project.
Focus more on automatic data processing: not what the user can do manually, but what the application does automatically to save the user's input. For example, suppose you are designing a system for online purchasing of airline tickets. You could incorporate the following data processing features: • When user queries for the available flights, sort the results by price or some other attribute before displaying them; • Allow pending reservation requests for a price below a certain threshold, or in case another passenger cancels a completely booked flight; • Design a feature for marketing to the users based on their travel history; • If the flight gets delayed or cancelled, the system should automatically send notification to the passengers; Strive to reduce the user's manual interaction with the application and increase the application "smarts"! Let the application do the work for the end user! Nobody is impressed with an application where the user has to invest hard work to perform a simple task. Make every effort to reduce the number of clicks and keystrokes necessary for task completion.
Project Topic
The topic will be provided to you. Your project will be web based, and must include programming. Start with an initial idea of desirable services and include as many details as possible with your team members in an effort to determine whether or not your team can develop it in the given time frame. Of course, you'll have chance to adjust your goals during the term, as you learn more details about your target product.
Proposal Format
Each proposal should contain the following: 1. Project title 2. Team members 3. Information About Your Project Team; team assignments/organization 4. URL of the project web-site 5. Team profile: a. Individual qualifications and strengths (such as: programming, design, presentation, documentation, management and organization) Note: It is expected that every team member shall be involved in all project activities; this only indicates individual strengths, not their sole responsibilities b. Name of the elected team leader, if any (having a team leader is optional) The team leader should act as facilitator, to organize group meetings and generally keep track of project activities 6. Proposed project description a. If you are proposing one of the projects described in class lecture notes, write down the project name and describe briefly if you plan to modify the project in any way, relative to the original description. b. Make sure to include the following: i. Statement of the project goal ii. List of the services to be provided by the proposed system (describe each service very briefly) For every feature, state whether you will write the programs to support it, or you will use existing programs.
For example, if you state: The system will provide search facilities, will you write the program to perform the search, or you plan to use existing software? iii. Description of the programming part of your project Explain what kind of data processing/analysis you will do. Tell us exactly why we should consider your project as programming. Just saying: The system will provide search facilities, may mean that you are using SQL database calls and doing no programming at all. iv. Description of the typical application customer v. Project schedule The first proposal is more of a marketing document, and less of a technical document. However, it must be clear from the proposal what value is in your proposed project for the potential customers. The project proposal will be prepared using automated devices, i.e., a computer generated product. Points will be deducted for handwritten or hand-drawn figures.
Proposal Submission
Since the project is a team assignment, each team submits a single document to the instructor. Bring a printed copy of the document to the instructor on or before the due date. Submission deadline: 4:20 p.m. on the due date
Demo #1
The teams are encouraged to be ambitious in the first iteration of the project. You will have an opportunity to revise your project objectives at the end of the first iteration, Demo #1. At that time, you must be realistic and your may have to decide that you need to scale down the project scope to finish the project.