Elliott Capstone Projects

2.0 Updates 2026-01-04

none

Project Responsibilities

Project Manager.
1. Strongest warning: more groups fail from lack of an effective Project Manager than for any other reason. Choose carefully. Immediately address the the problem if you have made a mistake in choosing.
2. Responsible for the whole project.
3. Guarantees that all other responsiblities are met, or will initiate reassignments.
4. Must solve people problems in the group.
5. Guarantees that meetings will be held, will be efficient, will have agendas
6. Manages the deadlines
7. Manages differing development styles among group members.
8. Bottom line for some tough decisions about deadlines, personnel, and group structure.
9. Liason to instructor
10. Required skills: MUST show up early, leave late; MUST be organized; Good Cop when necessary and Bad Cop when necessary; problem solver that finds solutions; proactively contacts all group members regularly; good communication skills; genuinely concerned about the desires of others; able to earn the respect of the group through hard work; tough skin for a sometimes (externally) thankless job; clever at getting the most out of people; a person you trust to adapt as needed to get the job done.
11. Be wary of: Someone who is not on time and not prepared for all meetings; someone not strong on collaboration tools and good at communication; Dominant social presence, big talker, but then makes excuses and does not deliver; talks about how busy and important they are at work, on other projects, in business, and does not focus on the group; "sales" person that presents an attractive front but does not understand the true nature of a technical project (management is good—lack of technical understanding is bad); does not put in the time needed; lack of strong organization; poor people skills; seeks to create a group culture that is not inclusive of ALL people in a professional environment; always seeks to make friends instead of focusing on getting the job done.
Education / prompt specialist (Winter 2026)
1. The most crucial technical role in the actual affectiveness of this new technology.
2. May have to manage a spcialist team.
3. Through experiments develops the prompt templates to be sent as instructions to the LLM through the Together.ai API for forming high-quality essay test questions, and grading rubrics.
4. Develops prompt templates for the grading instructions of essay questions.
5. Develops prompt templates for generating grading explanations.
6. Must have adequate coding skills to create utility programs to specifically test the quality of exam essay questions, grading rubrics, and grading prompts, all while using an AI coding collaborator.
7. Must be able to work with different models as part of the experimentation.
Implementation Manager
1. Responsible that the project will actually run on each of the days that deliverables are due.
2. Manages the development team: assesses the strenghts of members of the team, guarantees that everyone's code will run, and is compatible with the work of others.
3. Manages the translation of the design into running code.
4. Works with the designer on technical issues relating to the running project.
5. Responsible for the passing grade of every group member.
6. Is the bottom line on whether or not any particular code will make it into the official final project.
7. Stands behind, gurarantees that any code shown in demostration will run.
8. Manages the backup systems such that they are ready to come online on a moment's notice during demonstrations.
9. Communicates with the project manager, the designer, and the planner, among others, about how the development is proceeding.
10. Required skills: MUST have strong technical knowledge; MUST be able to assess the quality of the code produced by the team; MUST be able to say "NO!" when code that someone has worked on is not appropriately robust to make it into the final project; must work well under pressure and deadlines. MUST DELIVER!
11. Be wary of: Any hint of lack of responsibility; weaker than discussed technical skills; lack of communication with other group members, especially near deadlines (the loner ); abrasive personality that interferes with communication; lack of understanding of how important all aspects of the project are; lack of comments in the code which may scare away potential future employers of group members.
1. Responsible for the basic configuration of the Ubuntu Linux system if you use one.
Collaboration Software Manager
1. Strong technically
2. Available especially during the firs few weeks of the quarter
3. Patient with group users not familiar with particular communication packages
4. Available by email or other means to help give tech support for extending the use of the packages—available!
5. Willing to explore new packages, install them and give them a try before making recommendations to the group.
6. Able to bootstrap communication in the early weeks of development.
Video / Media manager
1. Can work under stress to deliver demo videos on time and running.
2. Absolutely reliable with backups, early running "safety" versions, and deadlines.
3. Knowledgeable about video recording and editing packages, and production, or willing to become so.
4. Works well with Presentation Manager and Project Manager
5. Good with organization to make sure component pieces are delivered in time for the full production.
6. Able to help others make local videos and stills remotely.
7. Has, or can get access to software to produce videos.
8. Be wary of: unreliable person. If the video is not done on time, the group fails the demo.
Planner
1. Responsible for plan that the whole group must follow this quarter.
2. Must create, early in the quarter, the formal, online, planning document with dates, hours, modules, tasks, names of group members responsble for each task, and dependencies of one task on another in it.
3. Works with the project manager.
4. Communicates regularly to report on the status of the plan
5. Provides positive feedback to group members "good job!" by keeping everyone informed of the progress of all aspects of the group project
6. Prepares the final plan for the project booklet. Works with the documentation manager.
7. Works with the presentation manager to have the plan ready for the RDP demo.
8. Makes updates to the plan as tasks are completed through the quarter.
9. Works with the group and the project manager when the plan must be dynamically altered.
10. Required skills: Must be organized; MUST be willing to insist that group members all report regularly on the status of group tasks in the plan; must be smart to figure out how the complex pieces of the plan will fit together; must work hard early in the quarter to lay out the plan for the next eight weeks; must be willing to make proactive contact with group members, checking on deadlines; must be willing to insist on group members reporting their status on group tasks.
11. Be wary of: Unwillingness to make group members uncomfortable when they are not regularly reporting their status on tasks; inability to manage the plan early in the first two weeks of class; inability to manage the technical aspects of putting the plan online.
12. Required skills: Must have a strong grasp of website management. Must be able to integrate technical features into the website to serve the group, and also provide consulting, at least, for the project itself.
13. Be wary of: Someone that will not maintain the group website on a daily basis. This is the central communication hub of the project!
Documentation Manager
1. Must be able to work with an AI collaborator in developing the project manual.
2. Must be able to draw on many different sources (code files, prompt window dumps, web pages, .html files, .xlsx files, PDF files, .docx files etc.) to produce a cohesive, elegant set of documentaion for the project. Crucial role in the project.
3. Responsible that the shared Group Time Log entries for all group members are updated in a timely way, andandavailable online throughout the quarter.
4. Responsible for the final project manual. Note that this may be crucial for group members when attending job interviews.
5. Required skills: Must have a strong enough personality to demand the raw materials from the group in a timely way. MUST be organized, good at preparing documents, and able to work under time pressure. Must be able to insist that group members keep up on their time logs. Creativity that manifests itself in the written document is important.
6. Be wary of: An irresponsible person, or a person who does not do quality work, which may result in a poor document, and can have a serious impact on both the project grade and future job interviews of the group members.
Requirements Manager
1. Responsible for the extensive formal Requirements for the group project.
2. See the lecture notes
3. Manages the wolf and thief groups
4. Prepares the formal requirements document
5. Prepares the Requirements section of the RDP demo
6. Works with the documentation manager to prepare the requirements document for inclusion in the project booklet
7. Required skills: Must already understand, or must be able to rapidly research and learn, how to construct formal written requirements for a large project. Must have a strong grasp of technical writing. Must be able to manage the requirements group, including the gang of theives and the wolfpack.
8. Be wary of: Someone that cannot translate large, fuzzy, ideas into specific requirements, and specific tests.
Design Manager
1. Responsible for producing the full, technical, design from which the project code will be written.
2. See the lecture
3. Works with the group to turn the initial ideas into a technical document that the group can follow.
4. Works with the implementation manager to select the hardware, database, client, server, and implementation platforms.
5. Performs the due dilligence research to see what has been done before, what is available, what can be improved, how the design will solve problems for which there is a market.
6. Produces the formal design document (see class website).
7. Works with the presentation manager to prepare the design for the RDP demo.
8. A faulty design, in the worst case, can guarantee failure.
9. Required skills: MUST produce a valid, comprehensive design document.
10. Be wary of: Not having the technical know-how to produce a real design.
Unix Systems Programmer
1. Responsible for managing all aspcts of the unix system, if one is used, including security, logins and backups.
2. Teaches the rest of the group members about unix tools, as needed
Testing Manager
1. Responsible for the testing plan for the group project
2. Manges the testing group
3. Produces formal tests of the project for the project booklet.
4. May design, plan, and execute, the testing of requirements.
5. Groups may organize around the testing plan: pass the tests, the project is complete.
6. Required skills: MUST produce a robust testing plan that guarantees the project will run on the day it is due.
7. Be wary of: Unclear tests; imprecise testing techniques; overemphasis on unimportant details.
Presentation Manager
1. In the modern world, and with respect to this project, is a critical role.
2. Responsible for only allowing high-quality contributions into the official video presentation.
3. Must insist on the use of quality microphones and reasonably quiet, echo-free, audio environment.
4. Mananges the critical, extensive, demonstrations of the group's work
5. Has executive control over the look, and effectiveness, of the group during the critical minutes of the presentation.
6. Guarantees that the running project will be shown at the demo.
7. Required skills: Ability to organize and rehearse / compose the presentations; technical ability to manage the software for presentations; MUST be able to be say "NO" if one of the presenters is not effective; MUST be ABSOLUTELY certain that backups can come online if needed and that the group will not fail any demos.
8. Be wary of: Someone who cannot say "No" if a presenter is not being effective; someone who does not insist on rehearsed demonstrations with good qauality sound and video; someone who cannot work with the technical team to guarantee success of the running project.
9. At all costs, avoid someone who will not have a well-prepared presentation delived well ahead of the deadline. THE DEMO DELIEVERY DEADLINES ARE ABSOLUTE!
Usability Manager (Optional unless HCI/IM majors are present in the course.)
1. Responsible for managing all aspects of the HCI component of the project.
2. Works with the design manager and the requirements manager to influence the design according to valid HCI principles
3. Responsible for the formal usability study.
4. Required skills: Understanding of how to conduct a valid usability study.
5. Be wary of: Someone who is not able to explain these ideas to others, and make the case for using science in the approach to usability.
(Optional) Contingency Manager
1. Responsible for guaranteeing backups of the running system are ready to come online in less than thirty seconds.
2. Responsible for contingency plans that may be necessary during the presentations.
3. Responsible for disaster recovery if the code / project documents are lost to, e.g., a disk crash.
4. Required skills: Responsible person that makes timely updates.
5. Be wary of: Someone that blows off the backups.
(Optional) Creative Director
1. Responsible for the creative content of the project. Oversees the development of the graphical content, the design content of the interface, the design content and quality of any project content.
2. Required skills: Understanding of design, and what appeals to people.
3. Be wary of: Someone that is "too artistic" to be practical, fights with the group over unimportant details.