| CODE | CIS2205 | |||||||||
| TITLE | Group APT for Software Development | |||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 02 - Years 2, 3 in Modular Undergraduate Course | |||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | Not Applicable | |||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 10 | |||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Computer Information Systems | |||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | A group practical task (GAPT) is a purpose-designed piece of work that is intended to assess the student's mastery of the major project-related skills, including intellectual engagement (the ability of the student to discover, absorb, master and reflect upon theoretical knowledge, accepted practice and methodologies relating to the field in question), engineering (the ability to successfully harness theory in the service of the practical task at hand, as judged by the quality of any artifacts produced), self-organisation (this includes aspects of project planning i.e. the ability to divide the project into manageable subparts), time management (i.e. the ability to define and execute a schedule for achieving the subparts), personal drive (ability to take own initiative) and communication (the ability to work in a team and successfully present the work undertaken both in written and oral form). In terms of software development, the GAPT is meant to be first and foremost a development exercise adopting the above- mentioned skills. A great deal of emphasis will be placed on how students manage to exhibit such skills while working on a concrete development project. Software developers are expected to be familiar with relevant ethical and legal issues raised by the project, and identify them and address them as part of their report. Study-unit Aims: - To ensure that practical teamwork skills are instilled amongst the arsenal of skills given to our graduates; - To understand and experience industry-grade best practices in software development and associated processes (e.g. code/team management); - To instil in students a sense of ethical behaviour and an appreciation of appropriate legislation in the field of IT; - To provide students with mechanisms to analyse from an ethical point-of-view scenarios related to the development of software. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Explain and demonstrate operation of a team working on a project, roles and responsibilities of members on a team; - Work as a member of a project team; - Liaise with clients (role taken up by a project stakeholder, where applicable); - Draft a project plan; - Describe and analyse ethical issues related to the software they are developing; - Identify how the software they develop, its intended use, and the manner in which they collect and process data, complies with appropriate legislation; - Handle irregular and non-standard conditions that may arise within their teams; - Distribute work in a fashion that allows fair and appropriate demonstration of individual skills. 2. Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Design and implement a solution to a fairly substantial problem; - Assess and select the right tools/technologies for a given job; - Perform correctly as team player in different roles; - Gain practical experience in team work; - Gain practical experience in design and implementation of more complex tasks useful also for the 3rd year Final Year Project; - Handle interpersonal issues commonly occurring in software development teams; - Gain practical experience in ensuring that their approach is both ethical and legal. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Johnson, D. G. Computer Ethics. 4th Edition. Pearson. 2009. |
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| ADDITIONAL NOTES | This study-unit is offered only to students enrolled for the B.Sc. IT (Hons) in Software Development degree programme. | |||||||||
| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture, Independent Study and Project | |||||||||
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| LECTURER/S | Peter Albert Xuereb |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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