General Comments on Lab Work

The CAE laboratory itself should be used both for the scheduled laboratory exercises, and also for "private study": the primary way of studying software engineering is to do it! The laboratory exercises are crucial to this course: you should learn more from the time you spend in the laboratory than from lectures and tutorials combined.

Each student attends one three-hour scheduled lab session every two weeks. You should aim to spend at least three further hours of private study time in the lab over the same period. The scheduled lab sessions are deliberately structured so that each student has a separate PC; however, for private study you may find it easier to get at a machine, and also more effective, to work together with one or two others - provided that you spend time discussing what is happening, and taking turns at actually operating the PC.

For the first lab session you are required to bring along a new, unused, copybook or notebook to be used as you lab logbook. However, in contrast to most other laboratory subject, this logbook will not be used to hold formal lab reports. Instead, you will maintain the logbook just with your own personal notes; but these personal notes will serve as the basis for writing separate formal reports, which will actually be submitted electronically for marking. This is a new initiative in the academic year 1994/95, and will be explained in more detail during the first lab session.

You should consult the Laboratory Report Guidelines for advice on how to prepare lab reports, and the criteria which will be used in marking them.