CS 4301 Software Engineering and Project Management

Instructor

W. Michael McCracken ( mike@cc.gatech.edu )
Office: CoC Room 265, x6172
Office Hours: by appointment, send mail to gwen@cc.

Teaching Assistant:

Aparna Pappu. ( aparna@cc.gatech.edu )
Office Hours: by appointment

Go to Class Newsgroup

Class Hours Tuesday and Thursday 4:35 pm to 5:55 pm

Lectures

Course Outline

This course covers the organization, operation and management of the information industry and in particular the management of software projects.

The course assessment will be based upon:

• (15%): A first project report. This will consist of your plan of activities for your project, including, the overall outline, the detailed weekly plan as well as the goals and ob jectives of the project.
• (20%): A midterm examination.
• (20%): A midterm review and presentation of your project to the class. In addition, a gift to me of your project write up, as of this date.
• (25%): Your final project presentation to the class and the write up of the project results.
• (20%) A final examination.

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Notes for the Uninitiated.

Two interesting topics we need to talk about. This course is based on reality, that is, you are the workers and I am the big boss who sits in his chair and smokes cigars and criticizes everything you do. The course is to be run as a group learning process w ith me learning as well as you. What this means is a lot of group interaction and no forma l class room lectures with me standing at the board and you falling asleep. You are Georgia Tech students and I expect that you are self motivated, and capable of self manageme nt and possess the skills that allow you to understand a problem and formulate a soluti on. As far as discussions with your classmates, I assume you have accounts on the appropriate machines and thus, you can have mail discussions with me and your fellow students. If you don't have a background in software engineering (i.e., CS 3302 ), get out of this class.

Rules of the Road

The only rule is have a good time. If you aren't having a good time with this class , I suggest you look for another class.

The Project

To Be Announced in Class, but it will concentrate on software process assessment as outlined by the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University.

Project Plan due date is October 8 1998

The Road Map

Date                         Topic

Sept 24,26               Introduction and Project Assignments (Process Models and                                    Organizations)
Sept 29, Oct 1        Process Models and Process Assessment Oct 3 Management 101
Oct 6,8                     Management 101 (Project Plan Due)
Oct 10, 13,15          Planning Oct 17 Project Origins (RFPs, SOWs, Business Plans)
Oct 20, 22                Work Decomposition (Sometimes called planning)
Oct 24                      Resources and Risk Analysis (Permute Known and Unknown)
Oct 27                      Midterm
Oct 29                      Standards (Why? Why Me?)
Nov 3                       More Rot (Cost and Schedule Estimating - and The Mythical Man                                    Month)
Nov 5                       Process Metrics (How many dynes per SLOC?)
Nov 10                     Total Quality Assurance
Nov 12                     More Q&A
Nov 17                     Configuration Management
Nov 19                     Risk Management & What Can GO Wrong
Nov 24                    Organizing software and development groups
Week of Dec 1      Project Presentations
Week of Dec 7      Final Exam

Classroom 2000 Recordings of Lectures

October 15 1997
October 17 1997
October 20 1997
October 22 1997
October 24 1997
November 3 1997
November 5 1997
November 7 1997
November 10 1997
November 12 1997
November 14 1997
November 17 1997
November 19 1997
November 21 1997
November 24 1997
November 26 1997
December 1 1997
December 3 1997
December 5 1997

Contact Information: