IS 295a / IS 295b Project Preparation Guidelines

IS 295a / IS 295b
Project Preparation Guidelines

Prof. Roslen S. Anacleto
Faculty of Information and Communication Studies
University of the Philippines – Open University
Los Baños, Laguna

email: ranacleto@upou.org

Latest Revision: June 22, 2004
Original Document: February 29, 2004


Introduction

This document is designed to help you get started with your Information
Systems Application Project, one of the final requirements for you to earn your
Master in Information Systems at UPOU. It is not exhaustive, as you can see,
and in fact is a work-in-progress designed to grow and respond to your needs as
you undertake IS 295.

To better prepare you for the work ahead, you first have to understand what
graduate-level research is all about.

Graduate research is an academic activity whose distinguishing mark is “an
original contribution to knowledge” (Chinneck, 1999). The manuscripts you
prepare and the resultant Information System you produce for a target clientele
are proof of your original contribution to knowledge. In your case, contribution to
knowledge may come in the form of an incremental improvement in an area of
knowledge, or the application of known techniques in a new area. Failure to
prove that you have indeed made such a contribution generally leads to failure.

Now that you have that in mind, you are now ready to move on.

IS 295 is divided into 2 major undertakings: 295a and 295b. In 295a you are
expected to come up with a project proposal that needs to be approved by your
adviser and the Faculty of Information of Communication Studies before any
subsequent work is started. Approval of your proposal does not necessarily mean
that your work already is an original contribution to knowledge as described
above. You are just halfway through, and any approval at this point means that
your initial work shows innovative ideas and promise that may lead to that
desired significant and original contribution.

IS 295b is where refinements to your original idea are done and where the actual
information systems development takes place. This is the other half of the entire
course and therefore the amount of time, energy, and other resources you need
to get the job done is also roughly half the total amount of time required. The
expected output is a bug-free1 Information System that will be stored in the
open-source repository of researches and academic work of UP Open University.

The following section details the prescribed content of your project proposal. The
outline is exhaustive insofar as the entire IS project proposal is concerned, and it
is expected that the same will be seen in your submitted proposal.


Project Proposal²

Your project proposal should be representative of your ideas and the project you
are proposing. The following guidelines specify what you are to include in your
proposal and suggest how you might present them.


Cover Page
Ø Title (subtitle Optional)
Ø Name of Project Proponent
Ø Date Submitted


Disclaimer
The following disclaimer should appear on the page following the cover page:

“This project is submitted to the Faculty of Information and
Communication Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for
the degree Master in Information Systems at the University of the
Philippines – Open University, Los Baños, Laguna. It is the product
of my own work except where indicated in the text. The project
report or any portion thereof including the source code or any

---

1 Presumption of Innocence also holds true in Computer Science and stated in the (recursive)
corollary: Any software released is bug-free unless proven otherwise, in the latter case,
appropriate corrections need to be done to ensure that the software now becomes bug-free.
2 This is a proposed standard to be evaluated by the Faculty of Information and Communications
Studies of the University of the Philippines – Open University.


section of it may be freely copied and distributed provided that the
source is acknowledged.”


Acceptance Sheet

Ø Introductory paragraph

This project proposal entitled “” submitted to the Faculty of Information and
Communications Studies, University of the Philippines – Open
University, Los Baños, Laguna in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree Master in Information Systems is
hereby accepted.

Ø Signature of Adviser
Ø Date

Ø Signature of the Chair, MIS Program
Ø Date

Ø Signature of the Dean, Faculty of Information and Communication
Studies
Ø Date


Abstract

This section gives an overall view of your project in not more than 300
words. The contents must mention the following:
A. Your users/clientele
B. The problem domain
C. The project output
1. What you propose to develop

D. Objective and significance of the project
1. What the project is supposed to accomplish
2. Why you chose to work on it
3. The major benefits the users/clientele can derive from the
project output, and the benefits you will get while working on
the project

E. Identity of project sponsor (if any)
F. Description of setting and institutional background
1. How project originated

G. Description of the system development process you plan to follow
H. Design studies you plan to do during development
I. Proposed project assessment scheme


I. The Problem Domain
This chapter should be able to elaborate on the following sections in not
more than 900 words:

A. Statement of the problem
1. What your project will address

B. Background and Objectives of the Project
1. What initiated the project. Could be:
a. Current relevant institutional gaps
b. Improvements/enhancements to the current running
systems
c. Requests by users/clientele for systems development
initiative.

C. Significance and Scope of the Project

D. Documentation of Existence and Seriousness of the Problem
1. Documentation of current system/s (if any)
2. Problem/s identified with the existing systems
3. Process models of existing systems contributing to the problem
4. Data models of these existing systems
5. Data (or any form of statistics) that may be relevant to prove
existence and seriousness of the identified problems


II. Review of Existing Alternatives

This chapter should be able to present the following in not more than 600
words:

A. Description of how the users/clientele cope with the problem currently.
B. Assess the best available resources for addressing the problem.
C. Describe how you propose to take advantage of existing and current
best practices in your project.


III. Approach to be taken in this project

This chapter should be able to present the following in not more than 900
words:

A. Theoretical Framework
1. Information Systems theories you intend to use
2. Systems design principles you intend to use. These include
relevant process and data models

B. Rationale for the framework
1. How it fits the problem domain and goes beyond the existing
alternatives

C. Technologies you plan to consider or use
1. Why these technologies are appropriate
2. What they add to the most promising existing alternative


IV. Project Plan
This chapter should contain the following in sufficient detail within 1200
words:

A. Concept
1. Description of the design as you currently envision it
2. Process model, data model, and other schematics to visually
present your concept
3. List of key features of the proposed design with brief
explanation and rationale for each feature.

B. Methods
1. Brief description of the methods you will use to develop the
project. Include all important steps you have taken and plan to
take such as:

a. Design studies
b. Review of existing systems
c. Literature review
d. Assessment of existing alternatives
e. Production of prototypes3
f. Tryouts of prototypes with users
g. Development of assessment instruments
h. Analysis of assessment data
i. Revision of prototypes
j. Preparation of final project documentation/report.

C. Plan for user testing and project assessment
1. How will you determine if the problem identified has been
successfully addressed?
2. What questions do you plan to focus on answering?
3. What kinds of evidence will you collect?
4. What methods of inquiry will you use to collect this evidence?
What users, occasions, treatments, and outcomes will you
study?
5. How will you analyze and interpret your findings?

D. Plan for collaboration (For collaborative projects only)
1. How will the work and responsibilities by divided?
2. How will individual contributions be integrated into the group
product?
3 May be taken in the context of any preliminary design / proof of concept that is intended to
orient the users/clientele of what outputs are expected from the project.


V. References
This chapter contains the list of articles, books, and websites that will be
useful to this project.


VI. Appendices
This chapter contains any material that impedes the smooth development
of your presentation, but which is important to justify the initiation and the
subsequent results of the project.

A. Deliverables and Milestones
1. Proposal
2. Prototype
3. User testing and assessment plans
4. Report of results from user testing and project assessment
5. Suggestions for revisions of the prototype for the next version

Milestones are timelines by which deliverables are scheduled. An
example of which is:

Date Deliverable
mm/dd/yyyy Project proposal submitted
mm/dd/yyyy Project proposal approved
mm/dd/yyyy Design studies complete
mm/dd/yyyy Prototype design complete
mm/dd/yyyy Plans for user testing and project assessment
Complete
mm/dd/yyyy User testing and learning assessment complete
mm/dd/yyyy Presentation
mm/dd/yyyy Final report submitted

B. Budget

C. Qualifications
1. Knowledge, skill, and experience you bring to this project.
2. Brief summary of accomplishments that shows your preparation
for undertaking this project.
3. Learning agenda: Knowledge, skill, and experience you plan to
gain during your work on this project.
4. Educational background

D. Contributors / Collaborators
1. Others who will bring additional knowledge, skill, and
experience to the project.

E. Resources
1. List of resources needed for the project, including access to
technology, project sites, testing environment, materials, and
others.


Style and Layout of Project Proposal
This is scientific work and therefore all writing involved must follow a
“dissertation-style” of writing. Following are some general tips that may be of
help to you:

1. Always keep the reader’s background in mind (Chinneck, 1999). Put in
mind the expected audience and stakeholders of your project. The
expected ones are your professors, and your target clientele. Once you
have that mental picture, imagine that you are explaining your ideas
directly to that person or to the group.

2. Dissertation-style writing is not designed to be entertaining. Nor is it a
story. Avoid flowery rhetoric and/or lengthy philosophical discourses.
Go straight to the point.

3. Writing must be clear and unambiguous.

4. Write using third person’s point of view. Only in the preface (if any) is
a first person’s point of view allowed.

5. Terms must be consistent throughout the document. Do not use two
or more terms to refer to the same idea. You will end up confusing
which would result to outright rejection of your proposal.

6. Information presented in figures/tables/graphs must have preceding
introductory paragraphs. Following the figure/table/graph, make sure
that you discuss it.
7. Figures/Tables/graphs where no discussions can be made, or the
inclusion of which may derail the flow of discussion must be relocated
to another section or may be placed in the Appendices.

8. Terse sentences are encouraged rather than long expository ones.

9. Avoid phrases like “Clearly, this is the case…”, “Obviously, it follows
that…”, et cetera which imply that if the readers do not understand,
then they must be stupid. (Paraphrased from Chinneck, 1999).

10. Stay away from getting your opinions on paper. Make sure that
literature or the solution you have presented should substantiate
whatever claims you make.

11. Logical organization. The structure and flow of your manuscript is very
important. Remember, each paragraph begins with a topic sentence
and the entire content of the paragraph must relate to this topic.
Paragraphs must follow a logical sequence.

12. Before submitting your work, in any form, to your adviser (that would
be me in this case) for perusal or approval, make sure that it has been
edited for any grammatical, spelling, and punctuation errors, or any
composition-related shortcomings. You may also subject it to
professional scrutiny by somebody who is from the ICT industry to
check for proper word/term usage. I cannot guarantee nor will attempt
to do the corrections myself.


Layout
1. Typeface and size: Serif fonts size 12 (preferably Times New Roman or
Bookman Old Style) for text. Sans-serif fonts size 12/14 (preferably
any of the following: Tahoma, Arial, Helvetica) for chapter/section/subsection
heading.
2. Margins: 1.5” top and left, 1.0” right and bottom
3. Paper size: 8.5”x11.0”
4. Left-justified. First line indented 0.5” from left margin.
5. Double-spaced. Entire document except tables/graphs/figures.
6. Section Numbering: You may follow the format as presented in the
proposal outline discussed in pages 2-6.


How to Cite

There are many different ways to cite works of other authors as shown in the
following examples: [ALRE93], [1], (Albacea and Revilla, 1993). While the first
two imply brevity, I recommend that you use the last one as it allows the reader
to easily recognize the referred work without need to lookup the keys in the
References.

In the References, you list your references alphabetically by the first author's last
name. Different rules apply for different kinds of publications. Below are some
examples for each type of publication.

Book:
Koeford, P.E. (1964). The Writing Requirements for Graduate
Degrees. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, U.S.A.:Prentice-Hall,
Inc.

Article in Book:
Castelfranchi, C. (1992). No More Cooperation, Please! In Search of
the Social Strata Verbal Interaction. In Ortony, A. et al.
(eds.): Communication from an Artificial Intelligence
Perspective, Springer Verlag, pp. 206-227.

Article in a Journal:
Russel, S. (1997). Rationality and Intelligence. Artificial
Intelligence, vol. 94, pp. 75-89.

Thesis:
Anacleto, R. (1997). Image Processing Using Artificial Neural
Networks. MS Thesis, Institute of Computer Science,
University of the Philippines, Los Baños, Laguna.

Webpage:
Chinneck, J.W. (1999). How to Organize Your Thesis.
http://www.sce.carleton.ca/faculty/chinneck/thesis.html.

http://www.cs.rpi.edu/grad/MSProj.html

Final Project Documentation

The chapters of the project proposal constitute the first chapters of the final
project documentation. Insert an Acknowledgement page before the Abstract
and a Table of Contents after the Abstract.

Rewrite the chapters in your proposal from future tense to past tense and insert
the following chapters before References.

1. Results and Discussions
2. Conclusions
3. Recommendations. Contains suggestions for further research.

Include any additional references that helped you complete the project to your
existing list. (You may also do some editing of your document to streamline the
presentation of ideas and substantiate the weaker spots.)

For the Appendices, insert the following:

1. Complete program listing
a. The program listing must be complete such that compilation of
the source code would lead to the fully functional computerized
system
b. Any 3rd party tools embedded or used in the development of the
computerized system must be fully and completely documented.

2. Technical reference
a. Final system specifications
i. Hardware
ii. Operating Systems
iii. Programming language
iv. Server applications used

b. Maintenance plan for the software system
i. List the location and content of all relevant files and
instructions for installing, compiling, and configuring the
software.
ii. Dependencies on hardware and software systems should
be described.

c.

3. User manual
a. User manual must empower the intended users/clientele to use
the system with minimal to no technical support. Screen shots
must be captured and embedded in the document to facilitate
faster assimilation of the inner workings of the system.

4. Tables and figures verbose enough to impede the smooth flow of
discussions in the main body of the project documentation.


Assessment Guidelines

The following guidelines are adopted from the General Guidelines and
Dissertation Guidelines to Masters Dissertation of the University of Skövde,
Sweden. (http://www.ida.his.se/ida/kurser/dissertation/)


General Assessment Criteria
The following are overall minimum requirements for passing IS 295.

1. There must be evidence of the student’s ability to relate the subject
matter of the Information Systems Project to the existing body of
knowledge in the field;

2. There must be evidence that the student has undertaken an individual
systematic research on Information Systems theories and other
relevant Information and Communications Technologies leading to a
working Information System that addresses the identified
organizational gaps;

3. There must be evidence that the student has performed an individual
formal systems analysis and design, and subsequent development of a
computerized Information System.

4. There must be a satisfactory level of literary presentation.


Specific Assessment Criteria

The following are specific evaluation criteria (used where appropriate):

1. Understanding.
Ø The extent to which the basic issues and arguments relating to
a topic have been grasped and placed in the general context of
the chosen field.
Ø The field should be clearly within the areas covered by the
Master in Information Systems program, or in some clearly
defined overlap area.
Ø Selection of appropriate Information and Communications
Technologies that support the identified solutions to identified
organizational gaps or problem areas.

2. Coverage.
Ø Inclusion of appropriate material and exclusion of irrelevant
material so that:
a. The research context of the project is clearly located;
IS 295a / IS 295b Project Preparation Guidelines Page 12 of 12
b. Previous problems and solutions to the problems raised
are adequately described at a detailed as well as general
level.

3. Organization.
Ø Conformance to the prescribed documentation format.
Ø Referencing which makes clear which elements are attributable
to the work of others and which are attributable to the student.

4. Reading Base.
Ø Evidence of focused reading.
Ø Evidence of exhaustive background study leading to project
initiation.

5. Use of English.
Ø Good, clear and accurate English expression.

6. Judgement.
Ø Capacity to arrive at reasoned and principled conclusions, both
when analyzing the problem and when presenting solutions.

7. Synthesis.
Ø The capacity to bring together a variety of ideas and research
and development outputs to form them into a coherent research
and development project manuscript.

8. Insight.
Ø The capacity to make meaningful and novel contributions based
on information gathered.
Ø The capacity to enter and take on board the point of view of
other people as well as generate hypothetical points of view.

9. Critical Analysis.
Ø The capacity to exercise judgement and insight to arrive at
independent, sustainable conclusions.

10. Software System Accuracy.
Ø The software system has matched the need of the intended
users/clientele reflected in the preliminary analysis and system
design.
Ø The software system has outstanding passing results in
unit/integration/systems tests.

11. Software System Reliability.
Ø The software system produced must work the first time every
time within a guaranteed reliability period and within the
prescribed operating environment.
Ø Disaster control and recovery procedures, and underlying
mechanisms must be incorporated in the software system
design and associated documentation.

The preceding 11 evaluation criteria are characteristics of persons able to pursue
independent academic Information Systems development initiatives. That being
said, therefore, all of the identified evaluation criteria are of independent and
equal importance, and are rated as either S (Satisfactory) or U (Unsatisfactory).
For you to pass, you need to exhibit sweeping satisfactory performance.


About Proprietary Ownership of Results
The results of the Master’s Project are public domain. This means that anyone
who requests to see the project results, in general, will be allowed to do so. This
can be a problem for a student who completes a Master’s Project for an
organization that wishes the results to remain proprietary.

If you happen to fall into the category just described, it is encouraged to discuss
and settle the issue prior to committing to the project. If the project results will
contain software or concepts that an organization will claim as proprietary, then
the project is not an acceptable Master’s Project. Any settlements facilitating the
continuance of the project should be reflected in an official document and
included in the Appendices.



References

Chinneck, J.W. (1999). How to Organize Your Thesis.
http://www.sce.carleton.ca/faculty/chinneck/thesis.html

General Guidelines and Dissertation Guidelines to Masters Dissertation. (2003).
http://www.ida.his.se/ida/kurser/dissertation/

Guidelines for LDT Master’s Project Proposals. (2001).
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/SUSE/ldt/docs/masters_template.pdf

Guidelines for Project Judging. (2003).
http://www.sims.berkeley.edu/academics/masters/final_project/guidelines.html

Hints for Research Students.
http://www.virtosphere.de/schillo/research/tips.html

Kaufman, R. (2003). Writing a Successful Proposal.
http://www.geocities.com/Broadway/Orchestra/5108/cap22.html

Koeford, P.E. (1964). The Writing Requirements for Graduate Degrees.
Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, U.S.A.:Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Levine, S.J. Writing and Presenting Your Thesis or Dissertation.
http://www.LearnerAssociates.net

Librero, F., Suva M.M., and Tirol, M.S.C. (2002). Dev Com 204: Communication
Research and Evaluation. University of the Philippines – Open University.

Master’s Project Guidelines: Guidelines for Computer Science Masters Projects.
http://www.cs.rpi.edu/grad/MSProj.html

MSc.I.T. Project Guidelines 2001.
http://nick.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/~ohearn/MScIT_Projects/

Rudestam, K.E. and Newton, R.R. (1992). Surviving Your Dissertation: A
Comprehensive Guide to Content and Process. U.S.A.: Sage Publications,
Inc.

Writing the Research Proposal.
http://nsm1.nsm.iup.edu/rgendron/proposal.shtml

Information System Project I (2 units)

Design of an information system.