Project and Project Writeup Suggestions - COM1204 and COM1370, Summer 2003

Professor Futrelle, CCIS, Northeastern University

Version of July 9

The following comments are gleaned from the grading comments for Project #1 for COM1370, but are applicable to both courses. Some additional comments are included too. Also, some are edited to remove references to specific projects/topics. See the further suggestions page of 7/15/03.

• There is no document of any kind (prose, in English) that explains what you're doing, what your goals are, what your plans are, how you're proceeding. It's all work at the implementation level with no hint of planning.
• Your Report #1 (in English) is much too short compared to the code you've written. There's lots to discuss, so discuss it.
• Sometimes, in your reports, you are listing a series of items. But they're described in a run-on sentence or in a series of sentences. In such a case a bulleted list might be better (as I've done in this document you're reading).
• One or more nice HTML pages discussing your project are sorely needed.
• Please do not produce documents that we have to download in order to read -- use HTML or plain text files (.txt .text) wherever possible.
• Who is doing what in this project? Please give details on each person's contributions.
• No indication that the group has begun to study relevant sections of the textbook or any related source of information.
• This is a technical problem in a technical subject so work on the technical issues has to begin right away (esp. for COM1370).
• Give a more specific reference to the code you found elsewhere.
• Good to list meetings and progress at them.
• Forget the Applet work; it's too limited in the Java versions normally available in (Windows) browsers. When you're doing graphics or building GUIs please use Swing and Java2D, as necessary.
• Good background research, good links.
• You can start (and maybe finish) with a non-interactive system.
• Check the URLs you give us to be sure things are reachable. Cutting and pasting the working URL from your browser will guaranteed that it will work for us.
• Let your creativity reign, but work slowly and steadily toward the more interesting possibilities.
• Basically, you've got the energy. Now you have to focus your energy on doing main-line technical work using the proper approaches and the appropriate technical language to explain your work.
• All in all your starting off in the right direction, but you've made only modest progress so far. You need to accelerate now.
• Study the technical strategies required and try to get an approach designed that will work.
• When mailing your URL to Ms. Shao, mailto:myshao@ccs.neu.edu, be sure to list the email addresses of each of the project members to make it easier for her to mail my grades and comments on your project.