Decay On Net

Keep having flash back of what happen during my Poly's FYP. This is really bad. Sometimes I wonder if the problem lies with me or am I just plan unlucky to always get bad tutors for my project.

During the first meeting, we left the class having strange feeling. Somehow, the tutor make everything seem to easy. She keep stressing that we shouldn't make things too complicated. And from the sample she gave us, it seems to be a simple project. But it turn out to be otherwise. My first proposal was somewhat similar to her sample in terms of difficulities. I thought I would had nailed it, but I was so wrong. The marks were so low that I could almost see Titanic beside it.

It was during the second meet up when I understand roughly what the scope should be. Either it was a miscommunication during the first meetup, or she gave us the wrong information. Nevermind, we will put it aside and move on.

Another thing is that she keep stressing that we should get a real life client for this project. This is to ensure that we got someone to get the user requirements from and don't have to think about the requirements ourselves. That statement seems quite fine in the beginning because we all thought the scope she is expecting from us is quite simple. When I finally realise the actual scope she wanted, I was wondering.... How the hell am I going to find a real life client for this?

You see, we are still students. We can only find startups and SME for our project. Big companies would most likely ignore us. But most startups and SME don't require such a complicated system. And those who requires such a complicated system would most likely had employed someone to do it for them. Would anyone dare to put such an important system in the hands of a student? I doubt so.

And lets face it. In real life, you will not see such complicated scenarios. This is unlike school projects when they give you a textbook case study that covers every feature of the programming language you have learnt in the module. I always admire the case study in our textbook and project. The scenario is so perfect that it requires you to use every single feature that you've learn. And everything fits in so nicely. But you will never ever get such textbook scenarios in real life. Never.

And in real life, it is always best to keep things as simple as possible. Yes, there are many fanciful modules and features. But as much as possible, avoid using them unless absolutely necessary.

Its not that I don't want to find a real client for my project, but if I were to find a real client, I would not be able to display my knowledge of the subject. Because real client most likely wouldn't need all the features. In the end, I cook up a nice story to submit to my tutor. A scenario which look so perfect on paper, but deep down inside, you know such scenario will not happen in real life. My tutor feel that this client and his requirements are good enough for the project and he gave me the go ahead.

I guess I managed to fool him into thinking that there is really such a company that requires such a complicated system with such perfect requirements that involves almost every feature that we have learnt in the module AND they dare to put everything in the hands of a student.

Sometimes I wonder if my tutor has working experience outside or not.....

Posted by DK on Thursday, April 12, 2007 at 1:00 PM