MSc Dissertation Project

CSC8099

Dr Ellis Solaiman
[email protected]
CSC8099
• Projects are a really important part of yourMSc
degree.
• Expected to occupy you full-time from the end of your
examinations, up to your dissertation submission
• no vacations until after submission!
• CSC8099 is worth 60 credits, i.e. 600 hours of work
• and is a key part of your final assessment.
• failing the project almost always means failing the degree.
• You (not your supervisor or module leader!) have to
take the responsibility for identifying and driving your
project through.
Example projects from the past year:
• Predicting heart attacks with Machine Learning.
• Electric Car Journey Planner.
• A Support Tool for Boolean Networks.
• Blockchain simulator for edge computing.
• Minesweeper Assistant.
• Jazz Piano Lead Sheet Arrangement via Deep Learning.
• Usability and UX of UK Gov Covid-19 website.
• A system to support teaching of algorithm design.
• Persuasive mobile app for healthy lifestyle.
• Formal Verification of Petri Nets.
• NHS track and trace app design.
• Charity Blockchain app.
• Hotel management website.
• Sleep monitoring using ubiquitous sensing techniques.
Selecting a Project
• If you have not agreed a project yet with your supervisor (All should have a
supervisor by now):
• Start by considering your interests and strengths.
• A good project will be challenging (involve CS topics you are
unfamiliar with) and also realistic.
• Make sure you talk clearly and honestly to your supervisor before
writing up your project proposal so that they are aware of your
background and what you can/cannot do over the course of 2.5
months!
• If you have selected a project, contact your supervisor to ensure they
have registered you on NESS.
• Once your project proposal has been submitted, you cannot change
the details of your project!
Process
1. Find a project and supervisor
• Supervisor has to “sign-up” student in NESS, to indicatethat
they have agreed to supervise you
2. Fill in and submit to NESS a Preliminary EthicalAssessment
Form by 10th June
• Some projects may require full ethical approval. Module leader
and supervisor will contact you if this is needed.
3. Submit Project Proposal to NESS by 17th June
• 2-3 pages (max) description of project giving
• Title
• Supervisor’s Name
• Project Aim: high-level description, couple of sentences
• Project Objectives: bullet points
• Description: 2-3 paragraphs; main focus of project
• Initial areas of research: what are you planning to do first
• Expected outcomes: what will you produce by the end of the project
• Project plan
Process: (continued)
4. Submit Video/ demo of your project to NESS by
12th August
5. Submit your dissertation electronically to NESS by
12th August - hard copy is not required
6. Celebrate the end of your MSc year ☺
Ethical Assessment
• ALL students MUST complete a PreliminaryEthical
Assessment Form (available on Canvas)
• The form is a series of yes/no questions and must be checked
with your supervisor
• This does not constitute ethical approval, it is just a check list
to see whether ethical approval is required or not
• It is expected that the majority of CS projects do not require
ethical approval, but a few students may subsequently be
asked for more information to gain ethical approval
• Advice: Avoid projects that require full ethical approval
because getting Ethical approval may take a significant
proportion of the time available to do your MSc project.
Project Planning
• Early in the project’s lifetime you need to define clearly the
Aim and objectives
• You need to produce a PLAN (usually in the form of a Gantt
chart) for your time & effort to address those objectives
• milestones & deliverables
• risk management: contingency plan, fall-back positions
• Remember the different software development models
• use one to help yourplanning
• Be realistic in your time estimates
• Discuss the plan with your supervisor
• Use your plan!
• Re-plan when things do not go to plan
• Don’t forget to plan for dissertation writing
Supervisor’s Role
Supervisor will:
• Provide starting points for project.
• Give advice and suggestions throughout project.
• Provide feedback on software/models you develop.
• Read and comment on drafts of your dissertation.
• Meet regularly (weekly or every 2 weeks depending on your needs) with
your supervisor and know when they will be away over the summer.

The supervisor will NOT

Design or write programs for you.
Test or debug your programs.
Write your dissertation for you.
Teach any background material.
Be available for the whole of the summer period.
Chase you to attend meetings or submit work.
Demo Video
• You must demonstrate your project to your supervisor and
second marker by submitting a video to NESS

• Involves running the system/model you developed and

discussing results.

• Your demonstration should last 10 -15 mins.

• Pass/Fail exercise – you fail your project module if you do not

submit the video demonstration.
• Deadline: 12th August.
Your Project Should Have ...
• An overall aim – high-level statement of the area the
project is investigating and what the overall aim is
• A set of (technical) objectives
• which contribute to that aim
• which will be returned to in your evaluation of your work
and when writing up your conclusion section.
• which are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic,
Timed)
• there may be personal objectives as well
• A set of tasks through which those objectives can be
realised and results generated
• A plan of how those tasks will be addressed
What is a Dissertation?
• Formal document to satisfy the examiners that youhave:
• carried out a substantial piece of work
• investigated a solution to a problem
• engineered an effective solution to that problem
• learnt something during your time at Newcastle!
• Takes a LOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time to write
• Each chapter will need several drafts.
• Should involve your supervisor (reading drafts).
• End result must be well written
• clear
• concise
• coherent
• complete and stand-alone
• YOUR OWN WORK!
What Should Be In a
Dissertation: Overall Form
Title Page (Title, name/st №, supervisor, date, word count)
Abstract (One paragraph, summarising the dissertation)
Declaration “I declare that this dissertation represents my
own work except where otherwise stated.”
Acknowledgements (Anyone you want to thank)
Table of Contents (Chapters, sections, sub-sections + pagenumbers)
Chapter 1 (Start each on new facing page)
. ..
Chapter N
References
Appendices (Detailed results, etc.; no source code listings!)

More formatting details coming up ...

Chapter Contents: 1
• Introduction: scene setting.
• lead into the problem investigated. Why was it a problem?
Why was it worth solving?
• what was the overall aim of the project?
• hence what were the objectives of the project.
• scope of your work: as originally planned, and as actually
achieved (no detailed results though).
• project management aspects – tasks, and how did you plan
out the work (e.g. which software development model).
• outline of the dissertation (what material is where, and why).
Chapter Contents: 2
• Background research and technical material.
• a detailed review and critical evaluation of background
material relevant to your project (including literature survey)
• to put your work into context.
• to show you have investigated related areas, e.g.
• similar projects.
• similar systems.
• customer requirements.
• To introduce (briefly) any languages/tools/technologies
used in your work.
• To demonstrate a conceptual understanding – analysis
of existing work, not just a re-presentation of that
work.
Chapter contents: 3
• What you did and why you didit.
• software engineering aspects (design, implementation,
testing strategies).
• high-level explanation rather than low-level
implementation details.
• Details of testing.
• user manual (if appropriate) (full details usually in
appendix).
Chapter Contents: 4
• Results (What have you achieved?).
• Evaluation of results - of what you achieved against
what you set out to achieve.
• Details of any user questionnaires/ surveys / interviews.
• how well did you meet the requirements (and why
didn’t you meet themall?).
• tools and techniques used (e.g. software engineering
aspects of the project).

Note: Avoid mistake many students make: Testing

(from previous slide) is NOT the same as Evaluation
of results! They are two completely different aspects
of your work!
Chapter Contents: 5 &
References
• Conclusions
• how well did you meet the objectives (and why didn’t
you meet them all?); provide an evaluation for each
objective. And how well did you meet your overall
aim?
• both positive and negative aspects of yourproject.
• retrospective look back - what have you learned
• future, follow-on work
• References + URLs
Plagiarism
• The disciplinary offence of attempting to pass someone else’s work as your own
• innocently orotherwise!
• All dissertations will be checked for plagiarism
• Information AND software reuse are encouraged, but:
• All sources must be acknowledged clearly in your dissertation and
references/citations provided
• If you copy someone’s words, make this clear – use quotation marks, indented
paragraphs and citation
Indeed, it has been said [Bloggs03]:
“This is possibly the best programming language ever
invented.”
• If you paraphrase someone’s words, provide a citation
• If you are reusing any software, make this very clear in your program listings AND
in your dissertation
• It MUST be completely obvious to a reader of your dissertation what is your work
and what is not
• Reading: Swales and Feale, Academic Writing for Graduate Students, University
of Michigan 1993
• https://www.ncl.ac.uk/academic-skills-kit/good-academic-practice/plagiarism/
References And Citations: 1
• Reference – in the Reference Section – full details of the original
document or web-page
• Citation – the shorthand you place in the main body of text
• There are a variety of different styles - examples:
... is a well developed field [Lee91].
... shown by several authors [Lee and Anderson94, Randell93a].
... as has been discussed elsewhere [1].
... although some doubts have been expressed [ABL05].
But not:
... is important. [Lee81] addressed the topic of....

• EndNote, Mendeley or Zotero are useful tools for managing

references and citations
• Be consistent with your chosen style.
References And Citations: 2
• Reference should include the citation, be easily looked up
(e.g. alphabetic), and be complete to enable the reader to
find the original
[Fowler] H.W. Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage, OxfordPress
2002, ISBN: 0198605064.
[Lee91] P.A.Lee, “Exception Handling”, Software Practice and Experience,
Vol. 3, No. 5, Jan. 1991, pp.23-31.
• URLs as references can be problematical
• The “quality” of any document they reference.
• Time-dependent.
• Should not be the only source of reference material.
• Place all URLs together in a separate section of your reference
chapter, together with date last accessed.
[Fixit99] The Fixit Software Distribution Kit,
http://www.nowhere.ac.uk/fixit/fixit.zip, June 2005.
General Writing Tips

• Must ensure the English you right is correct and

understandable.
• Technical writing style required – formal, concise and
precise.
• Avoid using “I” or “me”.
• Make full use of bullet points, figures, and tables.
• Make sure you continually proofread what you write.
• Get feedback from your supervisor on drafts.
Marking
• Sections are given marks with the following
weightings:
• Introduction 10%
• Background 10%
• What was done, and how 40%
• Results & Evaluation 20%
• Conclusions 10%
• References 5%
• Form 5%
Project Dissertation: Submission
Details
• ~15-20K words (use Word’s word-count facility),
excluding the References andAppendices
• Electronic submission to NESS (no hard copy):
• A PDF file with the dissertation. May include Appendices, butnot
the code listing
• a ZIP file with your code and any additional files (‘Supplementary
material’)
Formatting Details For
Dissertation
• Word processed
• A4 page
• line-spacing: single
• font such as 12 points Times (courier for program snippets)
• margins: 25mm minimum,especially for the binding margin
• number pages, diagrams,tables
• The title page should give:
• Project title
• Your name and student number
• Name of your supervisor
• Date
• Word count (excluding references and appendices) at the bottom
Other Resources
• Canvas has information, including the schedule, ethical assessment, outlines
of project proposal and dissertation, and the guidance notes
• Examples of text and code plagiarism:
• https://odoc.princeton.edu/curriculum/academic-integrity
• “How to write a bad assignment”
• https://openpolytechnic.ac.nz/assets/Learning-Central/How-to-write-a-bad-
assignment.pdf
• Strunk, Elements of Style
• http://www.bartleby.com/141/
• Bill Bryson, Mother Tongue: The English Language. Penguin 1991
• Lynne Truss, Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach toPunctuation.
Profile Books ‘03
Thank you for your time

Any questions?