Third Year Computing (Level 7) Course Overview

Software Project Management and Quality Assurance
Upon successful completion of this subject, students should:
• Understand the generally accepted Project Management Body Of Knowledge (PMBOK) as applied to software development;
• Understand their responsibilities when participating in a real world software development project;
• Understand the role of management in software development, particularly from the viewpoint of the practitioner as a member of the project team;
• Understand the many problems facing software development management and to note the "best practices" being utilised in order to produce effective, efficient and quality computer systems projects on time and within budget;
• Appreciate how a practising software project manager actually applies project management skills, methods, techniques and tools in the software development industry;
• Use an industry standard project management software tool;
• Understand what exactly a quality system is and how it is achieved in software development;
• Understand how the disciplined application of software quality assurance can lead to significant productivity gains;
• Understand the ISO 9000:2000 standard and how an organisation can get certification under this standard;
Computer Management, Ethics and Security
Security
• Introduction to information security
• Security design principles
• Access control and Authentication
• Network, Host and Application security
• Security management
Ethics
• Introduction to ethics and reasoning
• Representing ethical arguments
• Professionalism and information and communication technology
• Professional responsibility
• Ethics and the systems development process
• Privacy
• Intellectual property in information and communication technology
• Computers and work
• Ethical challenges and future directions
Frontiers of Data Mining
• Create data warehouses from heterogeneous sources.
• Choose and apply statistical, neural network and other methodologies to extract patterns and trends from data in a wide variety of contexts.
• Use standard software toolboxes for large scale data mining projects.
Modeling and Decision Support
• Understand the basic principles, paradigms and methods of modeling;
• Develop and evaluate simple numerical models;
• Locate, access and use software and data resources available on-line locally or through Internet;
• Write simple programs to solve major classes of problems;
• Apply simple visualization techniques;
• Understand different types of query systems.
Project Preparation and Professional Practice
• Analyse the client/professional relationship in the context of developing a project;
• Communicate effectively in a professional manner within the context of the project being undertaken;
• Define a problem and incorporate business objectives in developing a project proposal;
• Use project management skills to initiate, plan and manage the project;
• Produce a requirements specification

Second Year Computing (Level 6) Course Overview

Project Management
• Understanding Project Management Process Groups and the Project Management Life Cycle
• Time Management
• Cost Management
• Scope Management
• Quality Management
• Risk Management
• Preparing a Business Case
• Creating a Work Breakdown Structure
• Creating a Gantt Chart
• Managing Project Changes
Data Analysis
• Analysing system data requirements
• Analysing System processes
• Object Oriented System Analysis
• Use Cases
• Sequence Diagrams
Database Management (SQL Server 2005)
• Installing SQL Server
• Configuring SQL Server
o Configuring Log and Data Files
o Specifying a Recovery Model
o Configuring Server Security Principals
o Configuring Database Securables
• Creating Database objects such as Tables, Constraints, and User-Defined Data Types.
• Creating Indexes
• Working with T-SQL
• Creating Functions, Stored procedures and Triggers
• Implementing Views
• Backing up, Restoring, and Transferring Data
• Using T-SQL to Manage a Database
• Working with SQL Server Agent Jobs
• Optimizing Databases (Indexes, Index design and Index Maintenance and File Groups)
• Capacity Planning
• Managing XML Data
• SQL Server Performance Monitoring
ASP.NET Programming (.NET 2.0)
• Programming with Objects
o Custom Classes
o Working with Objects
o Interfaces and Delegates
• Database Programming
o Visual Database Tools
o Programming ADO.NET Objects
• Intro/History ,HTML revision
• Cascading Style sheets
• Building a Web Application
o Designing Web Forms
o Maintaining State
• ASP.NET Objects
o Response Object, Request Object, Server Object, Session and Application Objects, Page and previous Page Objects
• ASP.NET Web Controls
• Using Cookies
• Developing Data-Driven Web Applications
• XML Web Services
Advanced Windows Administration (Windows Server 2003)
• Understanding TCP/IP
• DFS
• Monitoring Microsoft Windows Server
• Create A Disaster Recovery Plan
• Backup And Restore
• Setting File And Object Auditing
• Assessing Security Needs Of An Organization
• Analyzing Security Risks
• Reducing The Risk Of Software Vulnerabilities
• Designing A Management Infrastructure
• Designing Active Directory Security
• Protecting Data
• Hardening Services
• Hardening Client Computers
• Designing A Public Key Infrastructure
• Protecting Intranet Communications
• Protecting Extranet Communications
• Hardening Web Services.

First Year Computing (Level 5) Course Overview

Business Communication
• Text processing skills to produce business information
• Learning Microsoft Office suite to produce complex documents
• Establishing a Systems for maintaining and promoting quality of text processing production
• Oral presentation skills
• Group formation, advantages & disadvantages of groups, group effectiveness, group stage development
• Group roles, groupthink, leadership styles
• Culture, conflict management
Windows XP Administration and Networking
• Installing Windows XP
• Installing Devices, Service Packs and updates
• Installing Applications
• Installation planning and Documentation
• Network topologies, Hardware and Connection Media
• Network protocols and OSI model
• Windows XP networking (Peer to Peer, Joining Domains)
• Administering Windows XP user accounts
• Administering Windows XP Security
• Printing with Windows XP
• Windows XP Local group Policy
• Managing User Profiles
• Windows XP backup and restore
User Support
• Help Desk Processes and Procedures
• Service level agreements
• Staffing the Help Desk
• Problem Escalation
• Problem Closure
• Maintaining Positive Customer Relationships
• Using statistical techniques to analyse problem trends
• Maintaining a user support database
• Providing level 1 and level 2 support

Visual Basic Programming (VB 2005)
• System Development Life Cycles
o Generic
o Waterfall
o Prototype
• Windows Forms and Console Applications
• Working with Windows Controls
• Handling Strings, Characters, and Dates
• Storing Data in Collections (Arrays, Arraylists, Hashtables)
• Accessing Files and Folders
• Reading and Writing Text Files
• Error Handling and Debugging
• Application Deployment

Database Design and Implementation (MS Access 2003)
• Normalization (1NF, 2NF, 3NF, BCNF)
• Defining Tables (Columns and Datatypes)
• Implementing Referential Integrity
• Create and Implement queries using QBE
• Create and Use Forms
• Create Reports
• Design and implement a simple database (At least 10 related entities)