http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~sitar/BSE/BSEHonsBrochure/

1  General Matters

Welcome to the Bachelor of Software Engineering Honours program. We hope that you will have a successful and enjoyable year in your course. If you are having any problems related to this course, or if you need course-related or general advice you should talk to the BSE Course Leader.

• Sita Ramakrishnan (Room G.05, Blg 63,sitar@csse.monash.edu.au) for Honours in Bachelor of Software Engineering (CSE xxxx)

• Lloyd Allison (Room 109, Bldg 26, Lloyd.Allison@csse.monash.edu.au) Honours Project Coordinator

• Other people you may need to deal with include
• Technical Services Unit (tech@help.csse.monash.edu.au): any questions related to computing accounts.
• Fran Boyce (Rm 150, Blg 26, fran@csse.monash.edu.au): room keys.
• Karen Fenwick, G29, Info Tech building (Blg 63):day to day Honours administration such as changes of unit registration.

Library Orientation

There will be a library orientation session in March (Date & Time - to be finalised). The focus of this session will be on using the library as a research resource and will include a hands-on session with electronic databases. Please meet Ms Sara Miranda at the Information Desk, Hargrave-Andrew Library; the session will be conducted in the IT training room.

2  Course structure

Each Honours student must undertake 4 coursework units (each worth 6 points), a group studio project (worth 12 points over 2 semesters) and an individual research project (worth 12 points over 2 semesters) which together add up to 48 points.

CSE417 Communication and Research Skills

All students must take the compulsory unit, CSE417Communication and Research Skills. It should be taken as part of CSE4402. This unit is intended to improve the oral and written presentation skills of students and to teach skills required for the critical analysis of research. CSE417 will take place over both semesters.You will receive a separate handout for this unit in your first class: in March (date to be announced) Room 135, Blg 26.

Seminars

School seminars are held regularly throughout the year (typically once a week). We consider these to be part of CSE417 Communication and Research Skills. You are require to attend at least 5 seminars each semester and fill out a seminar evaluation sheet (available in separate handout) for each seminar you attend and submit it immediately after the seminar to the Honours coordinator. Also, attendance at the interim and end of year honours project symposia is mandatory.

Unit Selection

By the end of the second week of semester you must complete a (BSE) Honours Unit Selection Form, identifying the units you wish to take in addition to CSE417 Communication and Research Skills. This form comes in three flavours:

• BSE (Hons)
• B.DigSys (Hons) and
• B.CompSci (Hons) and B.Science (Hons)

Be careful to choose the appropriate form. The completed form should be handed in to the Enquiries Office by the end of 2nd week of semester. After you have submitted your selection form, it will be checked and approved by the course leader, Sita Ramakrishnan or the Hons Project Coordinator, Lloyd Allison. You will be notified if there are any problems - watch the notice board. The form is attached. You should not directly enrol in non CSE400 units, but must enrol through the School.

You must then formally notify your intention to change a subject by sending an email to Karen Fenwick (karen@csse.monash.edu.au). You will receive email approving (or not) the change. All changes must be approved. Should you fail to formally notify the School of subject changes or fail to get approval, marks for the original subjects will be used to calculate your course work component.

The lab for the final year BSE Students in 2002 including BSE Hons. Students will be in Bldg.19, Room 112.

An Ethernet LAN links a large number of workstations and compute servers with major file servers sharing hundreds of Gigabytes of disk space.

Final Grade

The formula for deciding final Honours Grade (H1, H2, H2A, H2B, H3 or fail) for the Bachelor of Software Engineering Course is a weighted average of the core units CSE3305, CSE3308, CSE3322, CSE3323, CSE4002, CSE4402, CSE4213 and CSE4333, plus 12 points of approved level 3/4 CSE electives, with CSE4402 carrying double weight.

In BSE Honours, we have

3  Projects

Students undertaking the BSE Honours program must complete a group SE Studio Project and an individual Hons. research project, worth 12 points each. Two important parts of the Hons. Research project work are written and verbal presentations of the project.

For many Honours students the Honours project is unlike anything they have done before. Sometimes it is hard to know what you should be doing and when and how you should be doing it. Here are some general guidelines. However, they are not applicable to all projects and your supervisor will be able to - and should - provide more project specific guidelines and goals.

The Research Project is designed to take about 300 hours for the average student. A Research Project may be concerned with theory, program development, hardware development, evaluating and improving on a new technique, analysing performance - in fact anything associated with computing which involves a reasonable amount of intellectual and practical effort. The student is expected to read the relevant literature and carefully analyse the problem posed, to formulate a solution or proposals for a solution, and where appropriate, to implement and prove, evaluate or test the validity of their results and proposals. The project solution will usually require creative and original thinking. Typically, a project is designed for a problem in some area associated with a research program being carried out by a member of staff. The Research Project involves substantial mentoring by a staff member, and is designed to teach research skills. These skills are particularly important if the student wishes to undertake a post-graduate research degree.

Project Registration Procedure

A list of projects will be handed out separately and is also available on the Web. It contains a brief outline of each project and the name of the supervisor. Supervisors can individually provide further information about a project and are willing to discuss what is involved.

Visit http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/hons/2002/2002resProjs.html for a list of projects available for BCS, BDig Systems and BSE Hons. Talk to the supervisors and make sure you indicate that you are a BSE student wanting to do a 12 point Hons. Project.

If you have a project in mind that you would like to do you are encouraged to approach a relevant member of the academic staff to suggest this project. Most supervisors appreciate this sort of initiative and will be happy to supervise such a project if it is well-defined and in their area of research. However, students do not have a right to insist on their own project, and in the great majority of cases they will do projects from the published list. Students may not always be able to do the project of their choice, either due to the popularity of a project or because each staff member is restricted to supervising a maximum of three projects.

Project registration and allocation will be done in the first week of Semester 1. Please fill in the Project Allocation Form which is attached. Give at least 6 preferences in ranked order. Your preferences should be supervised by at least 3 different supervisors. Hand your completed form in to the Enquiries Office by Friday 12noon of week 1 semester 1. The Honours coordinator will announce project allocations as soon as possible after this time by email.

Evaluation of Projects

The School takes the evaluation of projects very seriously, as they are a substantial contribution to the student's final mark. The following are part of the project assessment.

NOTE: Some of these items are part of the assessment for CSE417Communication and Research Skills; see CSE417 handout for details of assessment weightings.

1. A research proposal is due around the last week of April (precise date to be announced soon). By this time the student is expected to have read sufficient literature to be able to form a fairly good plan of how to attack the chosen problem. Thus, this report typically contains a description of the project and plans for the solution of the associated problems. The report should show evidence of the thinking the student has done about the project, and possibly some initial experiments which indicate that the suggested approach seems plausible. A time-table accompanies the said plans. A submission must be made by the due date and handed into the Enquiries Office. Re-submission will be requested for unsatisfactory proposal.
2. Around the end of May, a symposium will be organised which all academic staff and Honours students will attend. Each student will be given approximately 10 minutes to describe their project and what they have done on the project so far. A short question and comment time will follow. This seminar is intended to give experience in such presentations and to provide for input from other academic staff concerning your plan and approaches.
3. A first draft of a Literature Review is due by 12 noon around end of 1^st week of June.The final literature review is due around the 26th of July (dates tba)..
4. A first draft of the thesis is on Friday of week1 in October, 12 noon (date tba) so that the supervisor can provide comments before the final report is submitted. (You should of course get drafts to your supervisors before this date.)
5. The final report is due by 12 noon, around Melbourne Cup Day. This is followed by a School Cup Day gathering to which Honours students are invited. The final report provides the basis of the project assessment and is examined by at least two staff members, one of whom is usually the supervisor of the project in question. It may be appropriate to demonstrate your project to your examiners.

Only under exceptional circumstances will an extension of the thesis submission deadline be granted by the Honours coordinator.

6. The final talk will during the week of October 22-26th (exact dates still to be arranged). You will be informed in CSE417 as to the required length of presentation. A question and comment time of five minutes will follow. Examiners take the seminar presentation and fielding of questions into account when assessing a project.It is compulsory for you to attend all final talks.
7. The poster presentation session will take place at the end of semester, at a time still to be arranged.You must produce a poster on your project and attend this poster session. As in recent years, it is intended to present selected posters to representatives from local and international companies and research organisations at the ``Industry Day''. Use this chance to impress your potential employers!

After the second talk, the staff meet and each project is discussed individually. The final grade is determined from the marks assigned by the two examiners, although their recommendations are sometimes changed by consensus to ensure that all projects are fairly marked. The examiners take into account each of the above, with emphasis given to the final report. If the two examiners' marks differ significantly, then a third or even fourth detailed examination may be called for. The final grades for the project and overall grade for the year are determined at a staff meeting after all components of the assessment have been marked. An external assessor will also independently examine selected projects and will be present at the staff meeting so as to ensure objective marking.

Most projects have a significant practical content, involving hardware and/or software development. It is crucial that by the time of the research proposal you have reached some agreement with your supervisor about the extent of this practical work. It is equally important that by the time you hand in your final report this practical work has been completed, as you are likely to lose marks for incomplete work. Your practical work will be judged for its quality in at least the following categories;

• correctness and completeness,
• sound, modular design,
• testing,
• ease of use,
• documentation.

Some projects will have a large theoretical component. Theoretical work will be judged for its quality in at least the following categories;

• formal correctness,
• problem understanding,
• innovative and independent problem solving,
• conceptual elegance and simplicity.

Guidelines for Carrying Out the Project

For most students, the hardest part of the Honours year is managing their time so as to work consistently on the project throughout the year amongst the short-term pressures of course work assignments and exams. Start your project early (that is, in March) and keep at it. Your project is worth a fair proportion of your final marks for the year! Do not get bogged down spending a disproportionate amount of time on small course work assignments which are worth relatively little in your overall mark. Learn to manage your time effectively.

A rough timetable for your project should be:

• 1st week of semester. Choose project and supervisor.
• First 3 weeks of Semester 1. Do background reading - typically 5 to 10 papers. Understand the problem and why it is important.
• Weeks 4-6 of Semester 1. Plan how to solve the problem. Write research proposal.
• Rest of Semester 1Undertake preliminary tests of your approach. Prepare interim presentation.
• First 9 weeks of Semester 2. Finish most of the implementation or proofs in your project work. First draft of your report.
• Rest of Semester 2. Write your report, and perform extra research suggested in the writing up stage.

The following hints may help your research and time management:

• You should have a regular weekly meeting time with your supervisor. Attend the meeting even if you have not completed anything.
• Keep a research diary where you write down your research ideas, progress on the project and a log of your meetings with your supervisor. This is a hurdle requirement for CSE417 Communication and Research Skills.
• Allocate about 25 - 30% of your time to your project as appropriate. Regardless of course work requirements, spend at least one day a week on your project.
• Choose reasonable weekly and monthly goals in consultation with your supervisor.
• Read the background material critically - look for the underlying ideas, limitations and usefulness. Do not believe anything blindly just because it has been published.
• Start writing early. Do not leave it until the last weeks. Your research proposal and your literature review should form the basis of the first draft of your final report.
• Get help with your proposal, literature review, poster and final report:
• your supervisor will help with structure and contents
• you will receive help with your presentation in your CSE417 classes.
• other students can help - form a self help group.
• Discuss your project with other Honours students. Communication is one of the keys to successful research.
• Practise your talks. In the final talk a working demonstration or video is often impressive.

4  Guidelines for the Final Report

The project report must be typed on A4 paper. It should be no more than 30 pages long, excluding the literature review, appendices and bibliography. Access to the laser printers will be provided. You should realise this is a privilege. Drafts must be kept to a minimum; use the postscript previewers or WYSIWYG packages on the Macintosh/PC computers. A quota of pages produced on the laser printers may be imposed for each Honours student. Three copies of the report must be submitted. Photocopying of the second copy can be arranged through the Enquiries Office.

It is important that the report contain a complete account of the work done. In general, the report should contain:

• a clear description of the problem you have tackled and why it is important,
• a description of how your project relates to related published work,
• the approach taken (with ample justification), and also methods used to solve the problem,
• the results or conclusions obtained, and
• if appropriate, a detailed description of the software and/or hardware you have implemented.

With scientific writing, organisation and structure is half of the task, and so considerable effort should be invested in detailed outlines before any text is composed. Changing outlines is quick and easy; rewriting text is time consuming.

The supervisor will advise on all aspects of the preparation of the thesis, and will check through the draft at least once if received by the first draft deadline, but the student is reminded that it is not the supervisor's responsibility to write or re-write all or part of the work. Refer (with caution) to existing Honours theses of the School for an indication of the required format. Note that as a student you are being examined not only on research and organisation ability, but also on your ability to present and defend ideas. Conformity to conventions, both scientific and grammatical, is important. It is vital that the thesis contains a complete account of the work you have done: Make clear what your achievements are and how much time you spent on your project. Your second reader will sometimes know your project only superficially, and your thesis is the best way for him or her to get to know it better.

A reasonable thesis structure is as follows:

• Title Page
• Declaration of Originality
• Thesis Abstract
• Acknowledgments
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• Introduction
• Main Body of thesis (Chapters or sections depend on topic)
• Conclusion and Further Research
• Appendices
• Bibliography

If you choose to use LaTeX, a suitable style file will be provided. The recommended font size is 11 point. Essential footnotes are normally placed at the foot of the page to which they refer. Number pages consecutively, including pages carrying diagrams, photographs, maps, etc. Diagrams should be computer drawn and included as postscript/latex graphic/etc files directly into the document, or at least photocopied onto the particular page. Photographs must be mounted with dry mounting tissue or spray adhesive, and where possible copied photographically as a whole page and included in the thesis in the normal manner. References must be referred to in the text, and listed in the bibliography following a standard and consistent format.

The "Declaration of Originality"must be on a separate page and contain the following wording:

I < student name > declare that this thesis is my own work and has not been submitted in any form for another degree or diploma at any university or other institute of tertiary education. Information derived from the published and unpublished work of others has been acknowledged in the text and a list of references is given in the bibliography.

-------
(student signature)

-------
Date (day, month and year)

The Abstract on a separate page should not exceed 500 words.

Appendices are not intended as a means to 'pad-out' a sparse thesis with peripheral material, or to circumvent the page limit in an' obese' thesis. They serve as a repository for useful products of the research (e.g., documentation including installation of a program and a detailed example run of the program) which are not an integral part of the main body of the thesis. Where the raw data of a thesis cannot be extracted directly from the test figures and tables, it is essential that they be tabulated in an appendix. In short, appendices preserve valuable information which might otherwise be lost, but the thesis should be able to stand without them. Long, detailed program code should be put on a CD ROM or floppy disk in the back of the thesis, rather than listed in appendices.

In addition, student are expected to leave a copy of their thesis available for online viewing (either html or postscript).

Guidelines for the Research Proposal and Literature Review will be in the handout for CSE417 Research and Communication Skills, to be given out in week1 of class in Room 135(Blg 26).

5  Postgraduate Study

All Honours students should consider their potential and options for continuing into some form of research study. The original purpose of an Honours degree is to provide training for students who wish to continue on to postgraduate study. This is still one of the main objectives of the degree, and an understanding of this will doubtless help you to make sense of much of the course work you do get. If you are interested in postgraduate study, make your interests and desires known to your lecturers and project supervisor. They will be only to happy to help you gain additional insights and perspectives on what is to them a fascinating field of study. Not only will they enjoy your interest, but you may find it gives you the additional impetus to do well in what may be your final year of formal examinations. Good luck in those examinations!

Scholarships are available to support you. They start at about$15,000 per annum (tax-free), and can be supplemented to higher figures in particular circumstances. There are a number of different types of scholarship, the main ones (roughly in order of prestige and amount) being:

• Australian Postgraduate Awards (APA).
• Monash Graduate Scholarships
• Faculty of Information Technology Scholarships
• School of Computer Science and Software Engineering Scholarships

Students intending to apply for scholarships are urged to talk to the Postgraduate Coordinator. There are a number of options available to those who miss out on the very competitive APA and MGS awards. Competition for all scholarships is fierce. Usually only students with an H1 grade for Honours are successful in obtaining scholarships.

Further announcements about Postgraduate Study will be made later in the year. Also see the Postgraduate Handbook on the School WWW entry.

6  Appendix: Subjects offered in 2002

6.1  CSE 417 Communication and Research Skills