cs121 - software development

announcements || description || schedule || lectures || project (website) || resources

CS 121 - Fall 2010
Lectures: TR 2:45-4:00pm - SPR LSC

Instructor: Alexandre R.J. François (alex@cs.hmc.edu)

Page last modified: 7 January 2011

course description

objectives

The objective of this course is to introduce you to the theory and practice of software design and development. You will study the processes involved in software development, from system design, requirements specification and analysis through system architecture specification, code design, implementation, and testing. You will study ways to organize and manage these stages. You will also learn principles of software design.

You will apply these principles and techniques in the design and development of an interactive computer system (possibly a game). The whole class will collaboratively design, prototype and test a common system. The project will follow an iterative design process.

We focus on interactive systems for several reasons. Interactive systems require solutions to a broad range of problems that rarely show up in a single software project. They are real-time systems with stringent performance constraints. Usability must be a central concern in their design. They typically use computer graphics and sound. can draw on other areas of computer science as well, such as artificial intelligence, computer networking, and computer art. And they often involve the modeling and simulation of physical systems, which requires concepts from mathematics, engineering, and physics. Inceidentally, interactive systems such as games are fun projects, and most students have a strong sense of what constitutes a good product.

Prerequisites: CS 70

Textbook: Code Complete 2nd Edition by Steve McConnell, Microsoft Press, 2004.

assessment

Evaluation is based on:

• Project: 70%
• Daily quizzes: 5%
• Midterm exam: 20%
• Class participation: 5%

project

The class will collectively design, prototype and test an interactive system. An interactive system is one whose behavior is directly influenced by its environment. Video games are good examples of interactive systems (but obviously not all interactive systems are games).

Organization

The project will follow an iterative design process alternating divergence and convergence phases, and promote early and copious prototyping. The overall design process will integrate traditional software construction techniques such as requirement elicitation, architectural design, code design and refactoring, reviews, unit testing, etc.

Some activities will involve the class as a whole, many activities will be conducted in smaller teams (3-5 people). In addition, if necessary or desirable, some "individual" activities might be conducted in pairs. Each and every individual is expected to be a responsible and actively committed member of the team for the duration of the project. Everyone will be encouraged to exercise leadership as the project progresses.

Possible modalities and procedures will be explored and selected as the project develops.

Assessment

The whole class will work together to design, prototype and test one single interactive system. Collective output (e.g. documents) will contribute to a collective component of the project grade. Team-based activities will contribute to a per-team grade component. An individual component, based on a weekly activity log/portfolio, will round up each student's project grade. The weights are as follows:

• Common component: 35%
• Team component: 25%
• Individual component: 40%

Deliverables

Collective deliverables:

• Design document (10%)
• Requirements document (10%)
• Software design description document (10%)
• Website and publicity material: synopsis + picture + video, etc. (5%)

Team-level deliverables:

• Goals and subgoals reports (5%)
• Code with documentation and tests (15%)
• Reviews (packages and results) (5%)

Individual deliverables:

• Weekly log/portfolio (40%)

schedule

lecture notes

• Introduction [pdf]
• Project organization 1 [pdf]
• Design [pdf]
• Requirements [pdf]
• UML [pdf]
• SAI/MFSM [pdf]
• Architectural patterns (SAI) [pdf]
• Code design: basics [pdf]
• Logical design [pdf]
• Classes [pdf]
• Debugging and testing [pdf]
• Post mortem [pdf]

project: platitude

Platitude is a hybrid game that combines the platformer genre with aspects of the tower defense genre. Up to five platformers race to reach the end of the stage while their opposition, the builder, attempts to block their progress by placing various platforms and defenses in their way.

Project public website: www.cs.hmc.edu/courses/2010/fall/cs121/Platitude

A prototype of the system was demonstrated on 7 December 2010. The demonstration system successfully implemented the game mechanics in a distributed system. Pictures of the project demonstration are posted at: www.cs.hmc.edu/courses/2010/fall/cs121/Pictures.

Project Trac: www.cs.hmc.edu/trac/cs121fa2010

resources

essential links

Trac guide: trac.edgewall.org/wiki/TracGuide

SAI: pollux.usc.edu/~afrancoi/sai
MFSM: mfsm.sourceforge.net
User guide: mfsm.sourceforge.net/UserGuide.html
Reference guide: mfsm.sourceforge.net/Reference/

references

Design

(Norman, 2002) Donald A, Norman, The Design of Everyday Things, Basic Books, 2002, ISBN-10: 0385267746.

(Miller, 1956) George A. Miller, "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information," The Psychological Review, vol. 63, pp. 81-97, 1956.

(Moggridge, 2007) Bill Moggridge, Designing Interactions, MIT Press, 2007, ISBN-13: 978-0262134743. [website]

Software design

(Winograd, 1996) Terry Winograd, Bringing Design to Software, Addison Wesley, 1996, ISBN: 0201854910.

Game design

(Fullerton, 2008) Tracy Fullerton, Game Design Workshop, Second Edition: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games, Morgan Kaufmann, 2008, ISBN-13: 978-0240809748.

(Rouse, 2001) Richard Rouse III, Game Design - Theory and Practice, Wordware Publishing, 2nd. Edition, 2001, ISBN-10: 1556229127

Software Engineering