CSC 498/499
Capstone Design Project

• You need to have a weekly meeting with me to discuss your progress. This includes the first week of the trimester for both 498 (probably Fall) and 499 (probably Winter). We probably won't have a regular meeting time set up yet during the first week, but it's still your responsibility to find some free time to set up a meeting with me. If you have another adviser on your project besides myself, it is your job to reach out to all of us and figure out a time when we can all meet. I'm fine with my office being the meeting place. Since your progress (both weekly and over the course of the term) counts for half of your total grade, you don't want to miss meetings. Meetings for CSC 498 will probably last between 30-60 mins. Meetings for CSC 499 will last between 15-30 mins.

• Except for the first week, you need to turn in a weekly report to me at each meeting detailing your progress. This report should include:
  • your goals from the previous week that you wanted to meet
  • what you actually got done
  • justifications for why you did what you did, including any changes made to the design of your project
  Here is an example of a good report so you can see what I'm expecting. And here is one that is not so good. You can use this MS Word template to make your reports if you want, but it's not mandatory that you use it. Please email me your report by 5pm the day before we meet in person. 1% off your total grade for each late/missing report.

• You are required to attend and participate in all CS seminars that we have throughout the year. These normally occur during the common hour on alternate Thursdays, though we do have exceptions. Plan ahead by regularly checking email and consulting the seminar web page. I expect you to pay attention (i.e. not be checking your phone or computer) and ask questions. I don't expect you to understand every point the speaker makes -- but that would make for a good question, wouldn't it? "Hey, speaker, can you go back to slide so-and-so and explain that again please?"
• Though not required, I hope that you'll also consider participating in the Steinmetz Symposium in late Spring. Since participating means just giving your presentation and/or showing your poster again, it is not a lot of work. If you are considering getting honors in Computer Science, then participation in Steinmetz Symposium is required.

Deliverables

More info about these can be found on the department's thesis page.

By the end of CSC 498, you'll create

1. a poster that you will present at a poster session
2. a "final design report" detailing the complete design of your project. Details about this paper can be found in these design report guidelines.

By the end of CSC 499, you'll create

1. a revised poster with complete results (but you won't present it)
2. a final formal presentation. Every CS senior project student will present their work by recording a short video using Zoom, in which you'll describe your project, the results, and your evaluation of the results. (15 minutes)
3. live Q&A session with your advisor and one other faculty member who watched the video you uploaded. You'll be asked questions on your project which you will answer live. (30 minutes)
4. your final report showing the results of your experiments, screenshots of your completed implementation, conclusions of your research, etc. Details are available in the LaTeX template on our thesis page.

You are required to write all papers in LaTeX. LaTeX and poster templates as well as 498/499 grading rubrics are all available on our thesis page.