Project Guide Modified April 22
Project Guide Modified April 22
PROJECT GUIDE
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1.0 INTRODUCTION
As part of the HND programme, each student is expected to complete an individual or
group project/research. This guide describes the process that students must follow when
completing a project/research work. Much of the process is the same for both project and
research, However, where there are differences, it will be stated categorically. Most
projects involve the development of software products, although a research project can
also be done.
3.0 PREREQUISITE
Student must register and study the following courses, as prerequisite for the
final project work
• Research Methods
• Systems Analysis and Design
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Students are also expected to register for the CSD 321 (PROJECT) course during the fifth
semester course registration, select a project topic and write a project proposal to be
submitted to the computer science department for approval before the end of the fifth
semester (3rd year, second semester).
The project proposal is written by the student in consultation with the supervisor, and
must be approved by the supervisor, computer science department and the School of
Applied Science and Technology before the student can proceed to the actual project.
Any use of others’ work must be properly referenced. Students are required to start and
complete their project proposal by the fifth semester.
In writing the proposal, students need to introduce the chosen subject area to the reader,
focusing their interest within the subject area on a specific problem. They are expected
to develop arguments that back up the aim and objectives of the project. Students are
advised that, one of the main purposes of the project proposal is to convince the reader
that the project is worthwhile. Thus good justifications of the importance of undertaking
the project are necessary at this point.
See Appendix A for proposal cover page and Appendix B for proposal content structure.
The proposal should include:
4.1 INTRODUCTION
A few paragraphs with appropriate references where needed should be sufficient
to cover the background to your project. Introduction to the project describes the
main reasons for carrying the project, and placing the project in context.
4.3 OBJECTIVES
State clearly what is to be accomplished and it’s significant as a Higher National
Diploma (HND) project.
4.4 JUSTIFICATION
Students should justify the selected topic: reasons why it is important to
investigate the chosen problem by explaining how the project will meet the
requirements of the HND programme and the student’s course of study, why the
topic interests the student, and what he/she hope to gain from the project.
4.5 SCOPE
The scope of a project is a description of what activities the student plan to carry
out, and the functional or academic boundaries of the project. In order for student
to do this, it may be useful to list the boundaries of the project: areas where the
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project will not cover. Functional boundaries will help to define which parts of a
problem or business you will be addressing.
4.6 ACTIVITY/METHODOLOGGY
Describe in details how the objective will be achieved, describing the development
phases and task that will be performed. Include chart, graphics, diagrams and
project model, if they will explain the activities more clearly.
4.7 ENVIRONMENT/TECHNOLOGY
This describes the computer programming language, software and hardware
that will be used for the development or the research project.
4.8 DELIVERABLES
Define clearly what the final product of the project will be. Identify what will be
delivered to the supervisor and the Computer Science Department when the
project is completed. Possible deliverables include:
• Final report (required for all projects)
• Source code
• User manual etc.
The project format and content is described in Appendix B.
4.9 CONSTRAINTS
Students should identify and list possible constraints to the project. The main
constraints are likely to be:
4.10 SCHEDULE
The schedule is an important part of the project. It defines what student plan to
achieve and at what time. Students should consider how long each activity will
take, which activity must precede other and how much overlap is possible or
desirable. The schedule identifies task to be performed, milestones to meet and
the estimated number of hours for each task. Student must work closely with the
supervisor to develop the schedule. It helps in defining the scope of the project
and establishes a baseline for measuring progress. A schedule must be within one-
semester span.
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4.12 PROPOSAL SUBMISSION PROCEDURES
Students are expected to submit a hard copy of the proposal, with a signed cover
to the Computer Science Department for review and approval. It must be
submitted on or before the deadline date.
When the student submits the proposal, he or she signs up on the next available
line on the list of project proposals. The student may be asked to submit electronic
copy of the proposal.
4.13.1 ACCEPTED:
The student may start work on the project, but should contact the
supervisor for comments;
4.13.3 REJECTED:
Proposal is unacceptable: The student must contact the supervisor for
advice. Proposals that are conditionally accepted or rejected must be
resubmitted to the department one week before the start of the next
semester. Students are not allowed to start the project until the proposal
is approved.
6.0 SUPERVISION
The supervisor is one of the most important support resources available. Students will be
allocated a supervisor who may or may not have knowledge of your topic. However, they
will be able to point students to sources of information. Most supervisors are limited in
the time that they have to support students’ project and will be supervising a number of
other projects. Thus, student must be efficient and effective in the use of their
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supervisors. Being efficient means making sure they turn up promptly for meetings. Make
sure the issues they want to discuss are the important ones and prepare in advance for
the meetings.
Supervisors are advisors and critical reviewer of the project. Students must not expect
supervisors to do their project for them or consult them on every trivial issue as that
creates impression that students are not able to work on their own.
If students arrange meeting with supervisor but unable to make it, they are to make
supervisors know in advance.
• To meet with the student at regular WEEKLY MEETINGS to advise and guide the
progress of the project;
• Manage and oversee the administration of the project and help the student from
time to time to identify the direction that the project should take;
• Give the student reasonable assistance in obtaining access to advice, material and
resources with which to carry out the project and reasonable advice on
documenting and presenting the project;
• Recommend appropriate methodologies
• Mark the project elements
• Establish whether the project meets the NAPTEX requirements for award of HND
project.
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State the name of the university, the faculty, department and the title of
the project (topic) on this page. Label the page with other relevant
details, such as the course code and title, your name, identification
number and the examiner's name (see appendix E).
8.1.2 DECLARATION
See appendix D
8.1.3 ABSTRACT
This should be a total of one page, summarising the project. This should
not be a restatement of the original project outline. A suggested flow is
background, problem statement, objectives, main achievements,
recommendation for future research. From the abstract a reader should
be able to ascertain if the project is of interest to him/her and presents
results that he/she would like to know the details of.
8.1.4 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Students are expected to show appreciation to whoever may have helped
in the project in anyway.
8.1.5 CONTENTS
Table of content should include titles and page numbers of all sections
and subsections. Chapter 1 begins on page 1. Students are expected to
use roman numerals for all pre-text pages, e.g. title page (i), signed
declaration (ii) abstract (iii), acknowledgments (iv) and contents (v) etc. It
is preferable, but not compulsory, to include a separate list of all the
figures in the project (figure number, label, page number), and a separate
list of all tables in the project (table number, label, page number).
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A good literature review is synthetic: general trends and positions in the
research area should be identified, and the cited papers should be
compared and contrasted. A literature review is not simply an annotated
list of papers you may have read; it should cover a range of relevant
material to the project. Any material used should be cited by reference to
the bibliography at the end of the project. It is good practice to state and
explain the theoretical frameworks associated with the research.
Everything that the student writes at this section must be his/her own
words and must cite other people using references. Students may also
quote sentences from the work of others. These must be included in
quotation marks and again the relevant work must be cited. It is
recommended that not less than fifteen books, journal articles, web
materials etc. be used for the literature review. Failure to do proper
referencing will amount to plagiarism which attracts punishment based on
the university’s code of conduct.
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The implementation of the project should provide a clear description of
how the solution to the problem is realised. As with the other parts of the
project, the selection of the implementation method should be described
and justified, and the nature of the solution will depend on the nature of
the project.
This section should include:
• Discussion of the technology used and how this was applied to the
project.
• How the design was converted into a working system.
o Any differences from the design stage should be discussed.
• Discussion of what was successfully implemented and what was
not
• Did any of the key features prove to be particularly challenging and
involve more work than originally anticipated? How did you
overcome these problems?
8.1.11 FINDINGS:
Present all the results (products, experimental findings, theories, etc.) generated
during the project. This may also include some off-topic findings that were not
expected, or which were side-effects of other explorations.
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This should address two things: new areas of investigation prompted by
developments in this project, and secondly parts of the current work which was
not completed due to time constraints and/or problems encountered.
8.1.15 REFERENCES/PLAGIARISM
There is no doubt that a project will build upon and contain references to the work
of others, proper referencing should be employed. (See Appendix F)
Any attempt to copy the work of others will be dealt with severely under the
University’s regulations regarding plagiarism. Note that the whole scale copying
from the Internet or books as opposed to using and clearly referencing the source
of any material will also be treated as plagiarism. Plagiarism will not be tolerated.
It is very important for students to make references to all materials and resources
(books, online, journals, articles etc) used in the project to:
• acknowledge debts to other writers
• demonstrate the body of knowledge upon which the research is based
• enable all those who read the work locate the sources easily
The department of Computer Science recommends the Harvard system of
referencing: this is by far the most straightforward way of references, because all
that a writer needs to do is to mention the author and the date of publication of
the material in the text and a bibliographic list of sources at the end of the project.
The department will check for plagiarism using open source software known as
Viper, Students are therefore encouraged to check plagiarism level of their works
before submitting them to the department.
8.1.16 APPENDICES
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• Conceptual framework
• Scope of the study
• Limitation (Constraints)
• Organisation of the study
• Definition of terms
9.6 REFERENCES
Harvard system of referencing is recommended. (See 8.1.13, REFERENCES)
9.7 APPENDICES
10.2 PARAGRAPH
• Alignment: justified
• Line spacing: double
• No extra spaces between paragraph
10.3. FONT
• Font size: 12points
• Font: Times New Roman
• Font colour: black
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10.4 PAGE NUMBERING
• Use Arabic numeral for text
• Use small roman numerals for the pretext(abstract, acknowledgement, dedication etc)
• Numbering should be at the footer and centred
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APPENDIX A:
COVER PAGE OF PROJECT PROPOSAL
Department/Program: __________________________________________________
Award: _______________________________________________________________
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APPENDIX B:
PROJECT PROPOSAL
1. A sample table of contents and outline for the proposal is shown below
2. Cover Page (see Appendix A)
3. Table of Contents (including Tables, Figures. and Appendices)
4. Introduction
5. Statement of the Problem
6. Objectives
7. Hypothesis /Research Questions
8. justification
9. scope
10. Activities/methodology and technology
11. Deliverables
12. constraints
13. Schedule
14. Literature Research (Brief)
15. References
16. Appendices (as needed, for supporting documentation)
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APPENDIX C:
OUTLINE OF CHAPTERS AND SECTIONS FOR A SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT PROJECT REPORT
A sample table of contents for the final report for a development project is shown below
PRETEXT
I. Title Page (Approved Cover Page)
II. Declaration
III. Certification
IV. Acknowledgement
V. Dedication (optional)
VI. Abstract
VII. Table of Content (including Tables, Figures and Appendices)
VIII. Definition of terms
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3.2 DESIGN
3.2.1 Introduction to design
3.2.2 Model for the proposed system
3.2.3 Prototypes
3.2.4 Interface design
3.2.5 Database design
3.3 Chapter Summary
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APPENDIX D:
DEVELOPMENT PROJECT REPORT
DECLARATION
I hereby declare that the project work entitled “Online Hospital Management System”
submitted to the Koforidua Technical University, is a record of an original work done by me under
the guidance of [name of supervisor] of Computer Science, Faculty of Applied Science and
Technology. This project work is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award
of the Higher National Diploma (HND) in Computer Science or Networking Management (choose
one)
The results embodied in this project have not been submitted to any other University or
Institution for the award of any degree or diploma.
STUDENT NAME
---------------------------------------
INDEX NO.
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APPENDIX E: PROJECT COVER PAGE
BY
[STUDENT NAME]
[INDEX NO]
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APPENDIX F:
HARVARD REFERENCING
When citing: referring to an article or book within the text of your report, you should include
just the surname(s) of the author(s) and the year of publication,
for example:
• ‘Jones (2002) has suggested that’.
• (Department of Information, 2001),
• It has been argued (World Bank, 2009) that…
If a work has more than one author, it is recommended that all the authors’ surnames are listed
or use ‘et al’ if there are more than two,
For example:
For each article or book referred to in the report, students must include a full entry in the list of
references: provision of a consistent description of the elements needed to identify a source:
author, date, title, publisher etc. in the bibliography at the back of the report. The Harvard
system format for:
A FULL BOOK:
Surname, forenames or initials of each author (year of publication) Full Title
(edition), place of publication, publisher.
For example:
For example:
‘Jones, (2002) ‘How to program’, Journal of your project, 6 (2), 120-123.
INTERNET REFERENCING
If you have obtained a journal article or electronic version of a book from an internet site, you
should add the (URL) and access date to the end of the reference,
For example:
Yin,J., Alvisi,G., Dahlin,M and Iyengar,A. (2002) ‘Engineering web cache consistency’
ACM Transactions on Internet technology, 2(3),224-229. Available from
http://www.research.ibm.com/people/i/iyengar/toit02.pdf (10 January 3003).
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If the article has been published solely on the internet you should attempt to record as much
information as you would collect for a printed article.
In many cases volume and issue numbers will not exist, but you should attempt to record at
least the following:
Full names of the authors (may be an organisation), Year of publication, Full title of article,
Full name of on-line journal, Publisher, Place of publication (if known)
Internet address, Date of access
For example:
DSDM Consortium (2002) ‘The Underlying Principles’ DSDM Website. Available from
http://www.dsdm.org/en/about/principle.asp (accessed 7 January 2003).
Students can also reference CD-ROM, online databases, email etc. visit:
http://libweb.anglia.ac.uk/referencing/harvard.htm for more information.
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