SENG302-25W (C) Whole Year 2025

Software Engineering Group Project

30 points

Details:
Start Date: Monday, 17 February 2025
End Date: Sunday, 9 November 2025
Withdrawal Dates
Last Day to withdraw from this course:
  • Without financial penalty (full fee refund): Sunday, 16 March 2025
  • Without academic penalty (including no fee refund): Sunday, 24 August 2025

Description

The Software Engineering group project gives students in-depth experience in developing software applications in groups. Participants work in groups to develop a complex real application. At the end of this course you will have practiced the skills required to be a Software Engineer in the real world, including gaining the required skills to be able to develop complex applications, dealing with vague (and often conflicting) customer requirements, working under pressure and being a valuable member of a software development team.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Enrolment in this course requires attendance of course activities on campus while the campus is open. There is no support for off-site students, unless the campus is closed and all teaching activities for all students are moved online.

This course provides an opportunity to experience first-hand the joys and sorrows of working together as a team to develop a large, complex software application. At the end of the course you will have a deeper appreciation of what it takes to be a Software Engineer in the real world, not to mention gaining the required skills to be able to develop complex applications, deal with vague (and often conflicting) customer requirements, work under pressure and be a valuable member of a team.

This year’s project will be based on an agile software methodology called SCRUM. During the year you will develop your software in several “sprints” (typically of a few weeks in duration) that will allow the requirements to unfold in a flexible manner along the way, but (hopefully!) with  sufficient structure that you will be confident of your progress to the final awesome product.

The course focuses heavily on “learning-by-doing”. There are only a few formal lectures, but all students are expected to work on the project, with their teammates, during all timetabled sessions (see below). Regular "formal sessions" are scheduled for students to share and demonstrate their progress on their project. Attendance to those formal sessions is compulsory. Students are also encouraged to share their knowledge, including with other teams. The course is overlooked by a large teaching team with various roles, replicating an industry context.

SENG302 builds on the material introduced in SENG201 and is intended as a companion course to SENG301 Software Engineering II. It is aimed at students who have a strong background in both object-oriented design and Java. History tells us that students who lack the expected background are likely to perform poorly individually and as team members. If you have any queries about your suitability for SENG302 then please discuss them with course staff.

Learning Outcomes

1. Apply up-to-date software development methods, techniques, and tools through the development of a sizable software-intensive system [WA1, WA3, WA5, WA11]
2. Function and communicate effectively in a team-based, highly collaborative, professional software development environment [WA8, WA9]
3. Apply techniques to mitigate the risks posed by sizable software development projects WA4, WA11]
4. Assess and evaluate the performance of individuals and teams, including the ability to reflect on own professional practice [WA4, WA8, WA10, WA12]
5. Communicate technical knowledge and professional opinion effectively in written and oral forms [WA10]

University Graduate Attributes

This course will provide students with an opportunity to develop the Graduate Attributes specified below:

Critically competent in a core academic discipline of their award

Students know and can critically evaluate and, where applicable, apply this knowledge to topics/issues within their majoring subject.

Employable, innovative and enterprising

Students will develop key skills and attributes sought by employers that can be used in a range of applications.

Prerequisites

SENG201 and COSC265 and approval by Head of Department.

Co-requisites

Timetable 2025

Students must attend one activity from each section.

Workshop A A
Activity Day Time Location Weeks
01 Monday 16:00 - 18:00 Rehua 102
17 Feb - 6 Apr
28 Apr - 1 Jun
14 Jul - 24 Aug
8 Sep - 19 Oct
Workshop B B
Activity Day Time Location Weeks
01 Tuesday 16:00 - 18:00 134
Jack Erskine 133
17 Feb - 6 Apr
28 Apr - 1 Jun
14 Jul - 24 Aug
8 Sep - 19 Oct
Workshop C C
Activity Day Time Location Weeks
01 Thursday 14:00 - 16:00 134
Jack Erskine 133
17 Feb - 6 Apr
28 Apr - 1 Jun
14 Jul - 24 Aug
8 Sep - 19 Oct
Workshop D D
Activity Day Time Location Weeks
01 Friday 13:00 - 17:00 Rehua 005
17 Feb - 6 Apr
28 Apr - 1 Jun
14 Jul - 24 Aug
8 Sep - 19 Oct

Timetable Note

Please consult the UC web site for the latest information about the times and locations of SENG302 activities (the CSSE department is not responsible for this).

All sessions listed must be attended.

You should ensure that you do not arrange other activities in the scheduled SENG302 session times. Activities which contribute to the assessment profile (described in a later section) are associated with each type of session and attendance should be regarded as compulsory.

Examples of how session times will be used are listed below.

• Formal ceremonies (such as sprint planning, reviews, retrospectives, and stand-ups)
• Times when your group can all get together for meetings and other activities such as co-located development
• Class presentations and demos
• Sessions to introduce you to important material about the SCRUM process and the tool set you will use. As the year proceeds, a few sessions will also be used to address common issues (e.g. estimation, testing strategies . . .) on a workshop basis where content is driven by issues raised by students
• Guest lectures and workshops by those working in industry

A schedule for SENG302 will be published on Learn in term 1 and updated during the year. This will tell you exactly which type of activity is occurring on a particular day.

Writing software is a serious business! In addition to attending scheduled SENG302 sessions you will be expected to devote significant additional time each week to the project. As a rough guide, the workload for courses can be estimated at 10 hours per credit point so you will be expected to log no less than 300 hours on your project over the year.

Course Coordinator

Fabian Gilson

Lecturer

Miguel Morales

Tutors

Marina Filipovic and Morgan English

Assessment

The assessment approach used in SENG302 differs significantly from that of other CSSE courses.
There are no tests or exams, or even conventional assignments. Instead, your performance is  monitored throughout the course and the assessment team will consider your portfolio of achievements when determining your final grade. Students who do well in SENG302 demonstrate continual improvement in their technical and teamwork skills throughout the year. Individual programming skills are not sufficient to earn a good grade.

You will work as part of a team throughout the year on a substantial software development project, and assessment will be an ongoing process that gauges the quality of your individual contributions to the software product and to the engineering processes and practices of your team.

You will be assessed individually, but the success of your team will significantly influence your personal results.

You will be required to make regular submissions and presentations to the assessors and to the whole class. Your written materials and oral reports will be assessed regularly throughout the year to provide you with feedback on your progress, and to provide the assessors with an overall picture of your year’s work, from which your final grade will be derived. Much of the feedback you receive during the year will be qualitative—think coaching rather than test marks—and is intended as the basis for ongoing interactions you will have with course staff.

Notes

There are several important documents available online about departmental regulations, policies and guidelines at the following site. We expect all students to be familiar with these.

Notices about this class will be posted to the class forum in the Learn system.

COSC students will also be made members of a class called “CSSE Notices”, where general notices will be posted that apply to all classes (such as information about building access or job opportunities).

Additional Course Outline Information

Grade moderation

The Computer Science department's grading policy states that in order to pass a course you must meet two requirements:
1. You must achieve an average grade of at least 50% over all assessment items.
2. You must achieve an average mark of at least 45% on invigilated assessment items.

If you satisfy both these criteria, your grade will be determined by the following University-wide scale for converting marks to grades: an average mark of 50% is sufficient for a C- grade, an average mark of 55% earns a C grade, 60% earns a C+ grade and so forth. However if you do not satisfy both the passing criteria you will be given either a D or E grade depending on marks. Marks are sometimes scaled to achieve consistency between courses from year to year.

Students may apply for special consideration if their performance in an assessment is affected by extenuating circumstances beyond their control.

Applications for special consideration should be submitted via the Examinations Office website within five days of the assessment.

Where an extension may be granted for an assessment, this will be decided by direct application to the Department and an application to the Examinations Office may not be required.

Special consideration is not available for items worth less than 10% of the course.

Students prevented by extenuating circumstances from completing the course after the final date for withdrawing, may apply for special consideration for late discontinuation of the course. Applications must be submitted to the Examinations Office within five days of the end of the main examination period for the semester.

Indicative Fees

Domestic fee $2,244.00

International fee $12,475.00

* All fees are inclusive of NZ GST or any equivalent overseas tax, and do not include any programme level discount or additional course-related expenses.

Minimum enrolments

This course will not be offered if fewer than 10 people apply to enrol.

For further information see Computer Science and Software Engineering .

All SENG302 Occurrences

  • SENG302-25W (C) Whole Year 2025