Components

Project Management is split into three deliverables:

1. Project Plan
2. Project Update
3. Project Conclusion

Expectations of Project Plan

Your Project Plan must define:

• The problem your team will solve
• The approach you will use to solve the problem, and to manage the project
  
• The roles and responsiblities of team members
  
• A schedule of work, e.g. Gantt chart
• Anticipated challenges and mitigation strategies
  
• A set of deliverables and outcomes that will demonstrate success in the project

Expectations of Project Update

Your Project Update will be a short document that highlights the project issues encountered so far, and strategy for successful project completion. You will have an opportunity to identify and justify changes to your project relative to the original Project Plan.

Expectations of Project Conclusion

Your Projet Conclusion will be a document that discusses issues in the project management aspects of the project. You will present your final schedule and other project management artefacts, and have the opportunity to justify why the delivered system differs from the original project plan.

Format and Submission

All three deliverables must be submitted as Microsoft Word documents. Microsoft Project may be used for the Gantt chart, but if the Project file is submitted, then a readable screenshot or image of the Gantt chart must also be included in the Word document.

Contribution to Grade

1. Project Plan: 12%
2. Project Update: 4%
3. Project Conclusion: 4%
   

 Group Contributions

The deliverables are group work. In most cases, all team members will receive the same mark. However if the project mentor or Unit Coordinator detect significant differences in contributions across team members, then interviews may be held to determine individual contributions, and individual marks allocated based on those contributions.

Marking Criteria

Your Project Plan will be marked based on:

1. Depth and quality of planning.
   
2. Application of appropriate project management techniques.
   
3. Presentation. For example, formatting, grammar, referencing.

Your Project Update and Project Conclusion will be marked based on:

1. Application of appropriate project management techniques.
2. Clear and appropriate justifications for changes to the plan.
   

Detailed marking criteria are available on Moodle.

Components

The Journal is a live document containing evidence of your learning achievement throughout the project. You are required to deliver three versions of the Journal across the term, with each version containing entries from the start of the project up until the due date of that version.

1. Journal 1: entries from start of project until end of Week 4
2. Journal 2: entries from start of project until end of Week 8
3. Journal 3: entries for entire project

Expectations of Journal

Your journal will consist of multiple (at least weekly) entries that you use to:

• demonstrate the activities you and your team conducted during the project
• keep a record of key information need during the project
  
• comment on problems and successes in the project
• reflect on the relationship between activities in this project and your studies throughout the degree.

The journal serves as evidence to others (the project mentor, other team members, Unit Coordinator) that you have made significant contributions to the project and have the ability to critically evaluate your own performance. The journal also is a diary for yourself. You should use it not only to record information that may be needed later in the project, but also to document information and issues that you may refer to in your future career. For example, imagine you have graduated and are preparing for a job interview. You may present your journal to the prospective employer to demonstrate not only your technical knowledge and skills, but also your ability to identify difficulties, learn from mistakes and improve yourself.

Format and Submission

The software you use to maintain your journal should:

• Allow inclusion of different artefacts, including: written, formatted entries; screenshots; logs and outputs; code samples; links to other resources.
• Include evidence of date of contribution (e.g. timestamp)
• Be private to you, but shareable to your project mentor and/or Unit Coordinator
• Be able to be uploaded to Moodle before the deadline *.

Given these requirements, you are recommended to select one of the following options for creating and maintaining your journal.

1. Microsoft OneDrive: Create a folder in your CQU student OneDrive account and share it with your project mentor. Use one Word documents (.docx) for your written entries. To get started, go to https://cqu365.cqu.edu.au/ and login with your CQUniversity username and password. All CQU students already have a free Microsoft Office365 account, which includes OneDrive.
2. Git Repository: Create a private Git repository, e.g. on GitHub.com, and invite your project mentor as a collaborator. Use one or more Markdown (.md) files in your repository for your written entries.

If you would prefer to use another option, discuss with your project mentor and seek approval from the Unit Coordinator. But keep in mind it should meet all four of the requirements in the above dot points.

Contribution to Grade

1. Journal 1: 5%
2. Journal 2: 5%
3. Journal 3: 10%
   

Individual Contribution

The journal is individual assessment. Every student must maintain their own journal. There is no need to share your journal with any other student (doing so may be considered academic misconduct). Your score will be based upon your own contributions, and not related to scores of your team members.

Marking Criteria

You will be marked based on your contributions to your journal:

1. Significant and relevant contributions. Your contributions must contain information and reflections that are relevant to your project. This should be about technical issues and project management issues (e.g. teamwork, planning the project). The entries should demonstrate your significant contribution to the project. Entries about activities that you haven't been actively involved in or are not relevant to your project should not be included, and will result in low marks. For example, discussion of difficulties in other units or at work is not relevant, however discussion of how these external factors are impacting on your project schedule (and how you are resolving that) may be relevant.
2. Professional contributions. Your contributions should be presented at the same level as any report you would submit. While the journal is similar to a diary, it is not an informal document. Similary, if you are reflecting on teamwork and other team members, be professional in your writing. While your journal will be private between you, your project mentor and the Unit Coordinator, write entries as if other people may read them.
3. Regular contributions. You must make contributions (that is, write entries) at least weekly. And the entries must be made when the activities occur. For example, you cannot just add 12 "weekly" contributions at the end of term. Infrequent contributions does not provide sufficient evidence of your significant contributions and does not demonstrate true reflections, and therefore will receive very low marks. You are responsible for ensuring there is evidence of your regular contributions.

Each journal version (1, 2 and 3) must contain entries from the start of the project up until the deadline. However most marks will be allocated based on the entries since the previous version. For example, most marks for Journal 2 will be based on the new entries since Journal 1 (although you must still include the entries from Journal 1).

Detailed marking criteria are available on Moodle.

Components

The Project Report is split into two deliverables, an Interim Report due mid way through the term and a Final Report due at the end of term.

Expectations of Interim Report

Your Interim Report must document the progress made so far on your project. The content may vary depending on project and the problem being addressed. The following are examples of what may be included in the Interim Report. You are not expected to have all of these items complete in the Interim Report, rather that you are working towards some of them (relevant for your project).

• Detailed description of the problem from a business and technical perspective
• Review of existing/competing products, solutions, or literature
• Identification, selection and justification of appropriate network and security technologies to solve the problem
• Specification of requirements, e.g. functional, usability, reliability, performance, security
• Logical and/or physical network designs
• Design of network/security architectures, protocols or algorithms
• (Draft) network and security policies, e.g. disaster recovery plan, password policies, business continuity plan
• (Initial) risk assessment
• Recommended security controls to solve the problem
• Rapid prototype of a solution to the problem
• Plans for or results of (initial) security/penetration testing on a system
• Deployment of network/security components, e.g. database/web servers in the cloud

Expectations of Final Report

The Final Report is a continuation of the Interim Report that documents the complete project. You should document all technical aspects of your project, for example, finalising the items listed above and adding other relevant content. Your final report may also include other technical deliverables in the main body, in appendices or attachments, e.g. test results, code, installation instructions, configuration files, videos, experimental data, packet captures, simulation files.

Format and Submission

The reports should be presented as formal, technical documents (e.g. with title, section headings, references, diagrams, tables). The reports must be submitted as a Microsoft Word document. Where appropriate, additional files may be submitted using different formats (e.g. code in .java files, packet captures in .pcap files). Any additional files must be referred to in the main document.

Contribution to Grade

1. Interim Report: 15%
2. Final Report: 25%

Group Contributions

Both reports are group work. In most cases, all team members will receive the same mark. However if the project mentor or Unit Coordinator detect significant differences in contributions across team members, then interviews may be held to determine individual contributions, and individual marks allocated based on those contributions.

Marking Criteria

Your reports will be marked based on:

1. Problem definition. You must give a clear and concise statement of the problem your project is attempting to solve.
2. Approach. The methodologies, tools and techniques you use to solve the problem must be appropriate.
3. Solution quality and depth. Your solution must demonstrate an investigation into significant depth and the resulting outputs must be of quality expected of a graduate.
4. Presentation. For example, formatting, grammar, referencing.

The reports, and especially the solution quality and depth, will be assessed taking into account the Project Management documentation. For example, if the project does not deliver what the Project Plan promised and the changes are not justified in the Project Conclusion, then a low score may be awarded. However, if the project does deliver what is promised, but there is little technical depth in that deliverable, then a low score may still be awarded.

Detailed marking criteria are available on Moodle.

Components

The Presentation is a single deliverable involving a live group presentation on the main contributions of your project.

Expectations of Presentation

In your presentation you must convince the audience that the work you have done is substantial, high quality and relevant for your major, and that you have applied appropriate processes to complete the work. The audience may include students from this unit, other students, your project mentor, Unit Coordinator, other academic staff, alumni, and industry representatives. The presentation will be time limited (30 minutes or less; to be confirmed during term). Therefore you must design your presentation to convey the key aspects of your project, taking into account the audience and time limitations. While the content/structure of your presentation is mainly your choice, it must at least include:

1. Identification of your project topic, mentor and group members
2. Reflection on technical challenges, e.g. what new things did you learn, what was difficult, how did you solve problems.
3. Demonstration of the system you develop or problem solved.

You may use a variety of presentation tools (including live demonstrations, videos, screenshots), but must be supported by slides.

Format and Submission

Your group must deliver your presentation using Zoom video conferencing. The presentations will be scheduled in a conference-style event, running up to 1 day. Groups will be assigned to present at time slots during the day, and also be required to view presentations of other groups. The presentation day is planned for Monday 7 June 2021; the detailed schedule for presentations will be announced during the term.

You must submit at least Powerpoint slides on Moodle by the deliverable deadline. Other formats of the slides (including PDF) are not acceptable, unless permission is granted in advance by the Unit Coordinator. You may optionally submit other resources (e.g. videos) in addition to the slides.

Contribution to Grade

1. Presentation: 20%

Individual and Group Contributions

This is a group presentation. All members of the group must present in the group timeslot. 15% will be a group score, while 5% will be an individual score. All members will receive the same group score (unless exceptional circumstances, e.g. one member does not present). The individual score will be based on how you present your part and answer questions. Different students in your team may receive different individual scores.

Marking Criteria

You will be marked based on:

1. Content quality and relevance (Group 10%). For example: sufficient technical depth, appropriate contributions presented, interesting and clearly explained content, reflections on learnings.
2. Presentation organisation and flow (Group 5%). For example: keeping to time limit, preparedness, visual aids.
3. Presentation skills (Individual 5%). For example: speaking skills, confidence, responding to questions, demonstrated understanding of the content.

Detailed marking criteria are available on Moodle.