Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!udel!rochester!rit!mjl
From: mjl@cs.rit.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sw.components
Subject: Re: Maintenance
Keywords: knowledge, expectations, fairness
Message-ID: <1399@cs.rit.edu>
Date: 14 Nov 89 14:19:36 GMT
Sender: news@cs.rit.edu
Reply-To: mjl@prague.UUCP (Michael Lutz)
Organization: Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY
Lines: 44

In article <80225@linus.UUCP> gmitchel@mitre.org (George Mitchell) writes:
>In article <376@cherry5.UUCP> murphyn@cell.mot.COM (Neal P. Murphy) wrote:
>`
>`Students are in a similar position.  While they have may have solidly mastered
>`the basics, they have yet to learn how to make a good, fine, large software
>`system.  They couldn't possibly learn enough about the system to be modified
>`to properly make the changes.
>
>This appears to address the quantitative rather than the qualitative
>issue.  Certainly the size and difficulty of an assignment must be
>appropriate for the level and scope of the course.


Let's remember that this thread has fused with another one on "Why
doesn't anyone make students change a 60K line program in two weeks?"
I think Neal's response was perfectly appropriate in this context.
Indeed, I would probably give an "A" to a student whose reaction to the
60K line problem was "This is infeasible."  On the other hand, building
on an existing base is good experience -- we do it here in most of our
upper division lab classes (operating systems lab, compiler construction,
and distributed processing).  This has the secondary benefit of letting
students get farther in a 10 week quarter than would otherwise be
possible.

Mike Lutz

P.S.  By the way, we view these lab classes as an excellent way for
to address three areas mentioned in these discussions:

	a) students get a chance to enhance their skills in a particular
	   application area.

	b) they gain experience working in teams (3-5).

	c) they get a chance to apply the software development principles
	   they were taught earlier on a project of moderate complexity.

Also, all of our students *must* complete 4 quarters (1 year) of
*relevant professional* co-op work experience before graduation.  If
this hasn't attuned them to the "real-world", then it's the folks in the
"real-world" who are to blame.
Mike Lutz	Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester NY
UUCP:		{rutgers,cornell}!rochester!rit!mjl
INTERNET:	mjlics@ultb.isc.rit.edu