Ashley's presentation from LCA2010 education miniconference, Wellington.

1. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Ashley Maher
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

2. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Questions?
When the presentation is only 15 - 20
minutes in length there is very limited time to
be properly interactive during the
presentation, sorry.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010 Ashley Maher

3. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Background
How did Software Engineering come into
being?
Definitions
Course work – Text Books
What is missing?
The Group Project
Out comes
Moving forward
Questions
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010 Ashley Maher

4. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
I am not an academic
Several of my close friends and colleagues
are academics
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010 Ashley Maher

5. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
A new academic could not take up position
until later in the Year, so I was invited from
Industry to teach the Spring Session 2009
Software Engineering Subject at the
University of Wollongong.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

6. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● The field of software engineering was born
in 1968 in response to chronic failures of
large software projects to meet schedule
and budget constraints
● Recognition of "the software crisis"
● Term became popular after NATO
Conference in Garmisch Partenkirchen
(Germany), 1968
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

7. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
http://war.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:01_khafre_north.jpg
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

8. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:20090529_Great_Wall_8185.jpg
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

9. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122 http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tacoma_Narrows_Bridge_destruction.ogg
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

10. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Let us consider some modern definitions
● The IEEE Computer Society defines software
engineering as: "(1) The application of a
systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to
the development, operation, and maintenance of
software; that is, the application of engineering
to software. (2) The study of approaches as in
(1).”
● "IEEE Standard Glossary of Software Engineering
Terminology," IEEE std 610.12-1990, 1990.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

11. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Let us have a quick look at some course
outlines and some text books
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

12. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● Quickly we notice points like:
● principles
● qualities
● processes
● requirements elicitation
● formal methods
● diagrams
● Testing
Didymo Designs
OO [and UML]
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410 ●
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

13. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Such courses are very good.
Some students have great results and
excellent understanding following such
courses.
There is however no comment on
Programming in the Large.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

14. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● Points of understanding:
● principles
● qualities
● processes
● requirements elicitation
● formal methods
● diagrams
● Testing
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
● OO [and UML]
P.O.Box 410
communication
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia ●
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

15. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Then placing the student in a situation similar
environment to those developers in the
1960's gives the learner a far greater insight
to what is needed to be understood rather
than something more to learn.
I will expand on this.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

16. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Software Engineering Practices & Principles
CSCI318- MCS9318
Spring Session 2009
Group Project Description
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

17. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● Projects Approved
● School web project
● Timetable project (Multi-Lingual)
● Real Estate Project
● YouTube style site
● Team Management Project
● POS-ERP Project
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

18. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● FOSS Projects used as basis
● Drupal ==> Drupal has installation profiles,
the first 5 projects aim was to create
installation profiles to achieve their end goals.
So an end user could down load Drupal with
their installation profile and have a functioning
application quickly
● OpenBravo ==> Is a FOSS ERP-POS their
aim was to customise OpenBravo for use in a
Furniture Store.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

19. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● The project is a Software Engineering
Teaching, Learning and Evaluation
exercise, it is not a software project per
sea.
● This was not about FOSS
● Morally wrong to turn the students into FOSS
experts in a Software Engineering Course,
the aim of taking such a course is to learn SE.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

20. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
● Students should feel comfortable to be
able to pursue any career path
● One students career goal is to work for
Microsoft, this student very much enjoyed the
project and felt he had learned a great deal
from the exercise.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

21. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Lecture Discussions
Refinement of the Assignment was
undertaken in Lectures under direction from
the Lecturer or by Student question
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

22. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Lecture Discussions
So if I am claiming the students learned by
participating in larger projects, how large?
469 contributors to Drupal 7.x core
4940 contributed modules
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

23. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Lecture Discussions
OO is mentioned in many SE courses
We see here:
http://drupal.org/node/547518
“Drupal programming from an object-oriented
perspective”
Modularity – Reuse code
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

24. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Lecture Discussions
●Information hiding
●Code Quality
● http://drupal.org/contributors-guide
● http://drupal.org/developing/modules
● Why have these tools? Why even specify
white space?
●Large to Small
● Mindset
Didymo Designs ●point
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

25. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
37 students in the course
24 attended the final lecture
All those attending the final lecture completed
the assessment of the Group Project
Assignment.
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

26. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
How well did the project full fill its role of
giving students an understanding of
programming in the large (Sliding scale out of
5)
Mean: 4.5
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
Standard Deviation: 0.5
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

27. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
How well did the project full fill its role of
giving students skills and experience
transferable to the workplace (Sliding scale
out of 5)
Mean: 4.28
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
Standard Deviation: 0.6
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

28. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
Would you run the Project in the same way if
you were the lecturer?
22 yes or pretty much
1 smaller deliverables
1 no
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

29. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
Why to answer of previous question:
taught valuable lessons
great
programming is not all
clear to understand SE
clear and effective showing students working
in groups
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

30. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Results of Student Survey
good project, good group size gives idea of
larger, good open source
all good
real world experience
excellent way to teach SE
well structured met outline
great experience in SE
the process of software engineering seamed
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
concisely conveyed
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

31. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
So!
What does this prove?
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

32. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
NOTHING
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

33. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Concluding Remarks
FOSS has a part to play in providing Student
Software Engineers a greater understanding
of Software Engineering.
OpenBravo has realised this and does this
well:
http://wiki.openbravo.com/wiki/Universities
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

34. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Oh
And
http://drupal.org/project/anytm
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010

35. FOSS in the Teaching of
Software Engineering
Ashley Maher
ashley.maher@didymodesigns.com.au
ashley.maher@unsw.edu.au
amaher@uow.edu.au
Didymo Designs
ABN 91 109 275 265
P.O.Box 410
North Sydney,
NSW 2059 Australia
P.O. Box 1122
Wollongong
NSW 2500 Australia
Ph +61 1300 762 599
Fax +61 2 8002 0071
www.didymodesigns.com.au Ashley Maher Education Mini-Conference LCA Tuesday 19th January, 2010