Final Project
Project Proposal
The Project Proposal is a written document listing the team members, overviewing the topic (for example, speech recognition) to be addressed by the project, with a literature or research review relevant to the proposed project, complete with citations and references in standard (e.g., IEEE journal) format, and a proposal as to the specific project and goals to be performed. That is, the Project Proposal should be a description of the intended final "product", (e.g., DSP-based program for recognition of the digits 0-9), and a description of the specific algorithms or approach that will be taken for the implementation, based on the results of the literature/background review. Typically, this would consist of a detailed block diagram of the proposed system along with which algorithm or method will be used to implement each block. The Proposal should summarize two milestones to be achieved during the course of project development, along a description of the final deliverable and mock-up of the application. The minimum viable product (MVP) and stretch goals should be clearly delineated. The Project Proposal can generally be expected to serve as a basis for the Introduction, Background Research, and parts of the system design portions of the Final Report, should the proposed approaches prove successful.
It is expected that a group of 3 team members will have a project of larger scope than a team with 2 members.Design Review
The Design Review will consist of a prepared oral presentation with supporting visuals (e.g., PowerPoint), to an expert panel consisting of the ECE 420 teaching staff and possibly additional outside experts, describing in detail the project goals, the proposed project design, the background research findings or other arguments leading to the selection of this approach as the preferred solution, and a plan for completion including milestones, timetables, and individual responsibilities or work packages. A test and verification plan must also be included. Results and observations from the Assigned Lab will be included as part of this presentation.
The Project Proposal and Design Review serve to summarize the background research and the preliminary decisions as to the exact scope of the project, the algorithms and approach to be used, and the expected final product. The resulting Revised Project Plan serves as a kind of "contract" with clearly measurable milestones to specify (to the mutual agreement of both the student and the teaching staff) the technical accomplishments required for full credit. Final evaluation of the project will be based on successful completion of the proposed work as agreed in the Revised Project Plan upon after the Design Review.
Project Milestones
During the project, students will have to demonstrate 2 milestones toward the completion of their projects. The Revised Project Plan must clearly state what are deliverables at each of these project milestones as "contract" between the student and the ECE 420 teaching staff. These project milestones (5% each) will be evaluated based on this contract.
Final Project Demonstration
The final project demonstration will be a scheduled but relatively formal review by the ECE 420 teaching staff of the (hopefully) completed project in action. The project team will deliver a presentation describing the final project deliverable and the algorithm(s)/approach taken in implementing that deliverable. The project team will then demonstrate their system, or all working components if incomplete, perform verification experiments or show test results confirming to the satisfaction of the course staff that it works as designed, and answer any questions.
The lab tablets can be connected to the project via HDMI for better visual during the final demonstration, however the HDMI changes the behavior of the tablets slightly and can be overrided. Refer to the NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet page under Resources for more information.
Final Report
Each project team will submit a final report. This written report should include at least:
- An Introduction
- A Literature or Research Review including a brief description of the reference, other approaches that existing apps/papers use to tackle the same topic, your unique upgrades or secret sauce
- A Technical Description of the project including equations, block diagrams, and possibly pseudocode
- Screenshot(s) illustrating the application "in action" and highlighting salient features of your app.
- A Results section including descriptions of the testing done on the project and problems encountered
- Suggestions for Extensions and/or Modifications
- Software/Hardware Documentation including an overview of the program structure (e.g. responsibilities for each file/function), logic diagrams, etc., as applicable.
All source code that you wrote should be zipped (.zip file) and attached to the submission. Refer to submission instructions for more information.
There is not a strict page requirement, but 5-10 pages is a reasonable range to consider. The documentation should be concise, but sufficient to convey the application's purpose and underlying algorithm structure and implementation. Another student should easily be able take up where the project left off or to use the results in a future project.
Final Video (extra credit)
Each project team has the option to submit a final video for extra credit. There are no specification or requirements for the final video, other than be creative and show off your own final project, so future students, course stuff, your friends and potentially company recruiters can appreciate your unique APP. Please upload a short video to Youtube and submit the link by attaching it to the front page of the final report. Do not submit the video files directly.
Videos from past semesters can be found on the Past Projects page.