Undergraduate Course: System Design Project (INFR09032)
Course Outline
| School | School of Informatics |
College | College of Science and Engineering |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 9 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | The System Design Project is intended to give students practical experience of (a) building a large scale system (b) working as members of a team. The project involves applying and combining material from several courses to complete a complex design and implementation task. At the end of course each group demonstrates its implemented system and gives a formal presentation to an audience of the students, supervisors, and visitors from industry. |
| Course description |
During this project students work in groups of about ten on the design and implementation of a complete system to solve some practical and useful problem. Each group can chose the specific task within the broad theme of 'assistive robotics', i.e., the system should have both software and hardware components to achieve a task in the real world, with a suitable user interface. Recent examples of projects include: a robot shopping trolley for the visually impaired; smart switches to convert any household switch to be remote controlled with an app; a robot chess opponent; robot rubbish collection and sorting; etc.
Each group is provided with the same facilities, including a dedicated working area. Available equipment includes Raspberry Pi, Arduino, cameras, other sensor, Lego mindstorms, Lego construction kit, access to 3D printing etc. They also have a small amount of money to spend in any way they choose on any extra items they feel might enhance their particular design.
Workshops and dedicated office hours from domain experts will be available to advise and guide all aspects of the task, such as time and task management, robot construction, software libraries, interfaces, etc. Each group is assigned a mentor. The mentor's task is to advise and provide feedback on the progress of the group during the project but not to provide technical support. Groups meet with their mentors at least once a week. They also meet amongst themselves more frequently to plan and coordinate their activities. Specific demonstration points are timetabled regularly during the semester when progress will be assessed and feedback provided.
Towards the end of the semester, a day is set aside for groups to demonstrate their implemented system and to give a formal presentation of it to an audience of the students, mentors, and visitors from industry.
Relevant QAA Computing Curriculum Sections: Computer Based Systems, Systems Analysis and Design
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | Students MUST NOT also be taking
Informatics Research Proposal (INFR11071) AND
Informatics Project Proposal (INFR11147)
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Other requirements | This course is open to all undergraduate Informatics students including those on joint degrees. For external students where this course is not listed in your DPT, please seek special permission from the course organiser (lecturer). |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2019/20, Not available to visiting students (SS1)
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Quota: None |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 5,
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 12,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 40,
Formative Assessment Hours 6,
Summative Assessment Hours 6,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
127 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
The assessment is based on the achievements of the project work described above and its documentation, typically a process report, a user guide, and technical report. Each group member also submits an individual document reflecting on his/her contribution to the project. For each student the mark will be based on the group mark, moderated by the individual contribution. Students who make no contribution to the work of the group will receive a mark of 0%.
You should expect to spend approximately 167 hours on the coursework for this course. |
| Feedback |
Not entered |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Working as members of a team in designing and implementing a complex and multi-faceted system
- Planning and monitoring the effort of a project to meet milestones and deadlines, within a limited time scale
- Drawing together knowledge and understanding of wide areas of software and hardware systems
- Demonstrating and presenting the outcome from a practical project
- Documenting the feasibility, design and development of a potential product
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Reading List
The Elements of Style, W.Strunk Jr & E.B.White
Lend me Your Ears, Max Atkinson
The Visual Display of Quentitative Information, Edward Tufte |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Barbara Webb
Tel: (0131 6)51 3453
Email: bwebb@inf.ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mrs Michelle Bain
Tel: (0131 6)51 7607
Email: michelle.bain@ed.ac.uk |
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