Suggested Project Paper Outline

Please carefully read (below) the suggested outline for your paper;  you are not obligated to follow it slavishly, but you need to include all of the following topics in a coherent order in your paper.

IMPORTANT:  See formatting instructions at http://blogs.evergreen.edu/sosw/project-report-2/.

  1. Cover page – title of project, participants, where the code can be found
  2. Introduction – 1-2 pages
    – What does the project do?  What’s its point or objective?
    – What is the motivation for the project?  e.g., do you intend to market it, was it needed by a client? Did you embark on it for certain learning objectives?
  3. Body of the report:
    – Project specifications (if more information about what the program is supposed to do than what you put in the introduction).  If you are doing a game, this would be a good place to put the rules of the game.  Similarly if you have some constraints, such as a certain platform or language, put them here.
    – Use Cases (if any) – What specific functions does your project accomplish for its user?
    – Implementation choices (development context) – e.g., Hardware Architecture, O/S, Development Framework, programming language, etc.
    – Software Architecture – how is the code itself organized into classes and/or functions?
    – Test Cases – describe how you tested your code.  Say where test cases can be found.
  4. Status – what is currently working or not working on the project. To what extend does it do what you wanted it do?
  5. Conclusion:
    – What design or programming issues did you run into and how did you address them?
    – Lessons learned

    1. To what extent did the final version of your project resemble your original design for the project (as described in your project proposal and project plan)?
    2. Which parts of your project work went the way you expected them to? Which ones didn’t?
    3. How did keeping minutes affect your group’s work? How did it shape your experience of your project work?
    4. If you were to do this project again, what would you do differently next time?

    – Future work – if you were to continue this project, what would you do and in what order?

  6. Full bibliography and Acknowledgements (also include here s/w and other resources).

In Addition, each person on the project should include with the final draft (Week 10) the information listed below.  Do not include this in the LNCS formatted paper!  These will NOT be published in the Proceedings.

  1. The work you did for the project. Fully but concisely explain the role you played in the project and the work you did.
  2. What you learned. What do you now know that you didn’t when you started your project? Feel free to address your learning in particular subjects (e.g. computer science) as well as in any other relevant areas you can think of (e.g., group work, project design, self-discipline). It is crucial to give examples rather than write generally about your learning. This section in particular may develop into part of your self-evaluation. You may find it useful to consider the following questions as you develop this part of your individual report:
  3. How your project work deepened your understanding of concepts in computer science.