ITD103 IT Systems Design - Assessment Task 3 - Design Challenge 2
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Assessment Task 3: Design Challenge 2 (DC2)
This document provides you with information about the requirements for completing and submitting Assessment Task 3 (Design Challenge 2). It is highly important that you read all of this document carefully. Also, the Criterion Reference Assessment (CRA) Rubric that markers use to grade the assessment task is included at the end of the document.
Task Overview
Assessment name: | Assessment Task 3 (AT3): Design Challenge 2 (DC2) |
Task description: | This is a case-based assessment. Most of the tasks need to be completed based on the IT cases that have been provided in this document. We also have provided templates for your answers (available on Canvas). This assessment focuses on the analysis and design of the structure of an information system. The topic for this assessment is to respond to two IT cases by analysing and designing the structure of a system for said case topics. The first case is similar to many real-world digital businesses, and the second case is a real IT case. Please see more on these case studies below under Case 1 and Case 2. The process involves requirements determination and developing several models that illustrate the results of your analysis and design activities. Please note that there is no single best design. Some creativity is expected in coming up with an interesting and innovative design which is also compliant with the users’ requirements. There is no oral presentation. You need to complete these systems analysis and design tasks weekly. Each part of this assessment needs to be completed individually. |
Learning outcomes measured: | This assessment is particularly related to the first, second, and third learning outcomes of the unit:
1. Apply analysis and design thinking principles, theories, processes, methods, and contexts to produce practical IT solutions to a real-world problem. Relates to: ACS CBOK: 2 2. Analyse user requirements and apply system analysis and modelling techniques to generate a human-centered design for a client. Relates to: ACS CBOK: 2, 4, 4.1 3. Apply written, verbal and visual communication skills to explain the design outputs and gain feedback from users and peers. |
Due Date: | Friday of Week 13 at 11:59pm. |
Estimated time to complete task: | Students are expected to read the guidelines (available in this document) for weekly tasks, work on each weekly task prior to attending the tutorial, show the first version of their answer to their tutor and receive feedback from them, and improve the work based on the feedback. This means that a student needs to spend around 35 hours on the assessment. The exact number of hours depends on how well the student uses the provided opportunities to receive feedback and improve the work in an iterative way. |
Length: | Each item has variable length. Please see specific details noted in this document. |
Weighting: | 45% (individual mark) |
Individual or Group: | Individual |
Authentic assessment: | Yes |
Formative/Summative: | Formative and Summative. Progress checks and feedback provided in the tutorials. Moreover, feedback will be provided on the final/submitted work. |
How will I be assessed: | 7-point grading scale using a rubric |
Resources needed to complete task: | Please read this file carefully, review the teaching material available on Canvas, and try to use all the opportunities that the unit and the tutors are providing during the tutorials to ask your questions, receive feedback and revise your work. |
Plagiarism: it is not worth it at all. | QUT policy for plagiarism is strict. According to our several years of teaching experience, if an individual only focuses on his/her own work, the probability that two individuals have the same results is almost zero. We have a big teaching team and all students’ assessment files go under a strict moderation process. It is not worth copying from another individual’s work. Do not provide your answers for anybody. Any copied item will receive zero. If more than two items have been copied or are identical, the assessment will be flagged and go under review as per QUT policy for plagiarism. Also, asking someone to do your work (online, via a website, offline, paid and/or unpaid) is considered as a serious plagiarism case. Please also note that you cannot use the same answers that you had provided in a previous submission (e.g. if you have failed the unit before) because it is considered as self-plagiarism (this is a policy that came to effect several years ago). There is only one exception: The requirements matrix may/possibly be similar among some submissions. The assessment is not just a test. The aim of the assessment is: learning how to use the concepts. It is a goal-oriented set of project activities. We hope that you enjoy completing your weekly assessment activities. |
What feedback will I receive? | There will be opportunities across the 6 weeks allocated to this task to receive formative feedback from tutors and peers. This will allow you to refine your work prior to the submission date. Also, you will receive individual feedback on this assessment task around two-three weeks after submitting your work. |
Moderation: | All staff who are assessing your work discuss and compare their judgements before marks or grades are finalised. In many cases, files will be compared to ensure that submissions are genuine/original. |
Some more important information | If you submit your assessment late (even one second) it is a late submission. Late assessments submitted without an approved extension will not be marked and will receive a grade of 1 or 0%.
If a technical issue with a QUT system (such as assessment submission link on Canvas) happens before the deadline: The probability that such a technical issue happens is very low, however if it happens you can email your assessment files and a screenshot (or another type of clear evidence) of the technical problem as soon as possible to your ‘tutor’. The screenshot (or any type of clear evidence) should indicate the date and time of the issue. If the evidence does not have these characteristics, your work will not be accepted. Also, issues such as lost, stolen or broken laptop, issues related to your data storage (e.g. lost USB or lost folder), personal internet/network issues, and issues that arise because of not submitting your work well ahead of the deadline (e.g. a last minute temporary software error) are not acceptable reasons. |
Submission Information
What you need to do: | This assessment is to be submitted digitally using the ITD103 Canvas. A submission link will be available on Canvas. This assessment is completely individual. Please ensure you: · Clearly label and date your work. · Ensure that all text-based and diagram-based answers are included in one single PDF document. · Use this naming convention to submit your work: “Firstname_Lastname_ITD_DC2_TutorName” |
Assessment Activities (list of the outputs you need to produce)
The table below shows what you need to deliver for your assessment. The items are organised based on the sequence of the topics that we teach at lectures and tutorials. Please put all contents (answers in the form of sentences and screenshots of diagrams) in one single PDF file. The assessment will need to be submitted via Canvas. There is no oral/video presentation. All tasks are individual (this is ‘not’ a group assessment).
Assessment Activities | Output |
1. Requirements determination (Week 8 tutorial) | Requirements Table/Matrix |
2. Model the structure of the system (Week 8 tutorial) | 2(a) FMC Diagram |
2(b) Why is it important for designers to draw a FMC Diagram? (50-100 words) | |
3. Analyse how users will interact with the system
(Week 9 tutorial) | 3(a) Use Case Diagram |
3(b) Why is it important for designers to draw a Use Case Diagram? (50-100 words) | |
4. Analyse the data structures that should be implemented
(Week 10 tutorial) | 4(a) Class Diagram - Inheritance |
4(b) Why is it important for designers to draw a Class Diagram? (50-100 words) | |
5. Analyse how the system will respond to the use cases
(Week 11 tutorial) | 5(a) Activity Diagram |
5(b) Why is it important for designers to draw an Activity Diagram? (50-100 words) |
There are no new tasks for Weeks 12 and 13. The tasks above will require multiple attempts and close collaboration with your tutor. The tutorials in these two weeks are intended to give you additional/extra opportunity to seek feedback from your tutor and to further improve your models. It is our expectation – from experience – that most students will need to make good use of these last sessions if they are going to succeed.
Guidelines for Completing the Assessment Items
Here is the information you need to complete the weekly assessment activities (the five categories of items mentioned in the table above). Please consider the information as guidelines (not as information that directly results in an answer). By nature, design is an iterative process. It is supposed to be a bit challenging, and this is why it is fun (university education, right?). What does iterative mean in this context? It means you need to use this information to draw the first version of your diagram before your tutorial each week and then show it to your tutor at the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it based on the feedback. Your tutors will be unable to give feedback on a diagram if you do not provide them with the first draft of the diagram. This is intended to be a consultative process, so you will struggle to reach a good design without getting feedback from your tutor.
Item 1 – Requirements Determination (this activity relates to Week 8):
· You need to read Case 1 and record the requirements in the template that we have provided for you (available on Canvas; please see the teaching material in week 8).
· Each requirement should be concise (usually between two to five words) and should start with a verb (e.g. “search purchase history”, “pay online”, “provide…”).
· In each row of the table, you need to mention whether a requirement is essential or desirable. An essential requirement is a requirement that is necessary for achieving the goal of using the system. On the other hand, it is possible to achieve the goal of using the system effectively without a desirable requirement (in other words, not including desirable requirement/functionality is not going to affect how effectively the system works), but it would be good/preferable to have it implemented.
· To answer this question well, watch the lecture recordings, prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, show it to your tutor during the tutorial to receive feedback and ask your questions.
Item 2(a) – FMC Diagram (this activity relates to Week 8):
· Please use the template that we have provided for you (available on Canvas; please see the teaching material in week 8). Using the template is highly important.
· This item is standalone and not based on either Case 1 or Case 2. The shapes (agents, storage, arrows, etc.) and their labels need to be based on “these five requirements only”: personalise level of service access; personalise level of service support; edit user profile; use a chatbot (to receive personalised service support, personalised information about product,…); and track orders. You should not consider any other requirement for drawing this FMC diagram.
· Consider these external service providers for your FMC diagram: credit card institutions, PayPal, parcel delivery, and a software vendor who provides additional technical support.
· You can use Draw.io, Signavio, or any other similar software that you prefer. For this diagram, Signavio is the most suitable software. Please see the “software” section in this document.
· To answer this question well, you need to: (a) watch the lecture recordings (or at least review the lecture slides) and pay special attention to the part that is about determining a suitable label for an agent or storage shape, (b) prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, (c) show it to your tutor during the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it.
Item 3(a) – Use Case Diagram (this activity relates to Week 9):
· For this item, you need to read the part of Case 1 that is about requirements related to B2C customers and draw a use case diagram ‘only’ for these requirements: “choose type of user”, “personalise level of service access”, “personalise level of service support”, “provide feedback on the service”, and “pay online”.
· There is no specific template for drawing a use case diagram. A relevant use case diagram is only based on the requirements above.
· All use cases should be in one use case diagram. Consider “Purchase online” as the start point (as the starting use case) in your diagram. Each of the above five use cases becomes a branch of “Purchase online” and may have sub-branches. Pay attention to “and” and “or” words in the requirements in Case 1, as they indicate the need to use “includes” and/or “extends”.
· You do not need to draw any subject boundary for drawing this use case diagram.
· Each use case should start with a verb and should be between one to five words (usually, 2-3 words).
· To draw the diagram, you can use Draw.io, Signavio, or any other similar software that you prefer. Please see the “software” section in this document.
· To answer this question well, watch the lecture recordings (or at least review the lecture slides), prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, show it to your tutor during the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it.
Item 4(a) – Class Diagram (this activity relates to Week 10):
· You need to use the template that we have provided for you (available on Canvas; please see the teaching material in week 10). Using the template is highly important.
· You need to identify the most suitable attributes and operations/methods for the specified classes by yourself.
· Mention multiplicity for the association relationships.
· You do not need to name/label the relationships.
· Attributes should be ‘nouns’. Operations/methods should be ‘verbs’.
· The attributes that you write for the parent (super) class should be general, so that they ‘generally’ cover the attributes of each child class. The attributes and methods/operations that you write for each child class should describe the class clearly (i.e. the attributes and operations/methods of a child class need to be different from the attributes and operations/methods of another child class). There could be one similarity between the attributes and one similarity between the operations/methods of the child classes, but try to avoid this similarity.
· Feel free to add one or a few extra attributes or operations to a class, but do not add any new class.
· You do not need to mention the type of data (‘string’, ‘date’, ‘percentage’…) in your diagram. Type of data is important for some of your other/future units, not for this unit.
· You can use Draw.io, Signavio, or any other similar software that you prefer (see the “software” section in this document). Each of these tools is good for the diagram.
· To answer this question well, watch the lecture recordings (or at least review the lecture slides), prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, show it to your tutor during the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it.
Item 5(a) – Activity Diagram (this activity relates to Week 11):
· You need to draw an activity diagram for one of the systems that have been mentioned in Case 2. You need to mention for which website you draw your diagram, otherwise you may not receive the complete mark.
· The process of online purchasing should cover all purchase activities (activities including the login step to receiving the receipt of purchase).
· There is no specific template for drawing an activity diagram. Drawing a relevant activity diagram depends on the websites mentioned in Case 2. To draw the diagram, you need to explore the website you have selected and follow the process of purchasing one or more items. You do not need to actually purchase an item – just explore the website.
· As mentioned in the lecture, the label/name of each activity should describe a user’s actions (e.g. pay online, receive receipt, and checkout), not how the system processes information (e.g. process transition, send the receipt…).
· You can use Draw.io, Signavio, or any other similar software that you prefer (see the “software” section in this document). Each of these tools is good for the diagram.
· How big/detailed the diagram should be? Please use between 50 to 80 shapes (boxes, decision nodes, fork and join, arrows…) to show the process that a user goes through to purchase online. You should use two or three pairs of decision nodes and two or three pairs of fork and join in your model. Do not omit important activities and do not include highly detailed activities. The numbers in this bullet point and feedback from your tutor can help you adjust the size of your activity diagram.
· You do not need to use swimlanes. Also, preferably, your activity diagram is vertical (not horizontal), so you can include all required information/shapes in the diagram.
· To answer this question well, watch the lecture recordings (or at least review the lecture slides), prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, show it to your tutor during the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it.
Items 2(b), 3(b), 4(b) and 5(b) – Diagram Discussions (relate to weeks 8-11):
· Please see the table in the previous section. To answer Item 2(b), Item 3(b), Item 4(b), and Item 5(b) well, you need to: watch the lecture recordings and/or do some online search and use reputable websites (e.g. IBM’s website) as additional sources of information, prepare the first draft of your answer before attending your tutorial, show it to your tutor at the tutorial to receive feedback and to improve it.
· You do not need to provide any reference for these items.
· Please keep the answer for each of the items between 50-100 words total. Answers that are less than 50 or more than 100 will receive less mark. The exact mark depends on the quality of answer.
· Do not copy any text from anywhere, as it can be considered as plagiarism. The sentences should be based on your understating/learning from the lecture, tutorial and from the sources you found during your online search. Please see the “plagiarism: it is not worth it at all” section (which relates to both diagram-based and text-based answers and how the answers are moderated).
· We recommend font: Arial or a similar font, font size: 10 or 11, and single-spaced lines.
Software: What Software Do I Need to Use in My Modelling?
You should use a tool/software to draw your diagrams. We usually suggest Signavio for most diagrams, but you can choose a different software. Please see our suggestions below. They are free (you do not need to buy any of them). They are intuitive and easy to use. No training is needed for using them, but you can always ask your questions from your tutor if you experience any challenges.
Signavio: First you need to visit https://academic.signavio.com/p/login and register if you don't have an account. We suggest that you use your QUT student email address. Create a new file by clicking on New and selecting a type of diagram. For example, for drawing FMC you need to select New --> System Architecture Diagram (FMC). Next, you will need to drag and drop relevant shapes to draw your diagram. Please note that the interface may be slightly different for different systems (Mac, Windows…).
Draw.io: Search it via Google or visit https://www.draw.io/ . You may need to search for the shapes in the search box on the left side of the main page. You will need to drag and drop relevant shapes to draw your diagram. Please note that the interface may be slightly different for different systems.
Lucidchart: Search “Lucidchart” via Google. Register if you don’t have an account. Select the type of diagram you want to draw (e.g. UML). You need to drag and drop relevant shapes to draw your diagram. Please note that the interface may be slightly different for different systems. Finally, please note that sometimes the free version of Lucidchart becomes inconsistent in terms of the number of shapes that you can use for drawing a diagram. If this becomes a limitation for drawing a diagram, please use a different tool such as Signavio or Draw.io.
Case 1 (for items 1, 2a, 2b, 3a, 3b, 4a and 4b):
Design and Transform (DT) is a small company who designs a range of customer-focused digital solutions for various industries. In September 2022, three IT graduates from two Australian universities started the company. Two years later, in September 2024, the founders decided to expand their company through an internship program. They employed several university students who have the knowledge of systems analysis and design. The internship program focused on engaging the students in a project where a business client has asked for a fully functional online store. The client sells a variety of products such as computer games, a range of laptop brands, software and computer accessories. The client currently owns a website, but it provides limited functionalities. The new online store is expected to include a range of functionalities that make the online purchase process a convenient, personalised and efficient process for customers.
Your responsibility:
You are one of the students who is working at the company. Your job is to analyse and design the system. After interviewing the potential users of the system, you have identified the following functional requirements. You have around five weeks to deliver your results to a software developer. You must act in the best interest of the client with a high degree of autonomy.
Functional requirements of the website:
Users of this system are:
a) Individual customers who use the Business-to-Customer (B2C) module of the system to purchase a product
b) Employees who use the Intranet module to manage internal business operations
Functional requirements related to individual consumers: the B2C module of the system should enable the consumers to:
· Sign up.
· Edit user profile.
· Search for a product (e.g. laptop, e-book, music, and computer accessories) via a search box or the picture search functionality.
· Browse products (e.g. computer games, computer accessories and software) by category.
· Personalise level of service access: a customer can choose guest access, limited customer service, or 24/7 customer service.
· Personalise level of service support: customers can select period of subscription (one-week free trial, one month, six months, one year, or unlimited), type of service (bronze, silver, or gold), and type of warranty (limited, complete, or platinum).
· Choose type of user (guest, adult, or student).
· Pay online via voucher, PayPal, or credit card.
· Ask specific questions (about product or a specific service problem such as late delivery of an item) from a chatbot.
· Provide feedback on the service via star-rating, via the comment feature, via the chatbot, or by using an embedded user platform.
· Interact with customer service representatives and other customers via the embedded user platform.
· Track orders directly via the website, via a live chat with staff, via the chatbot, or by using an embedded user platform.
Functional requirements related to employees: the Intranet module of the system should enable the employees to:
· Generate tax invoices.
· Calculate monthly expenses.
· Update product information and service information each hour.
· Audit accuracy of data (product data, customer data, service, and order data) that the chatbot has access to.
· Interact with customers (e.g. answer questions) via the embedded user platform.
The enterprise does not aim to include a Business-to-Business (B2B) module for the website. Also, the enterprise would like to run everything in the cloud, therefore there is no need for any significant purchase of hardware infrastructure.
Case 2 (for items 5a and 5b):
This part of your assessment specifically focuses on the online store of Nike (https://www.nike.com/au/) or BCF (https://www.bcf.com.au/). You need to draw an activity diagram for the process of online purchase via the system (item 5a), and then discuss why it is important for designers to draw an activity diagram (item 5b). You also need to mention for which website you draw your activity diagram, otherwise you may not receive the complete mark. The online stores are well-designed systems, which help you to model a very nice activity diagram that shows the process of online purchase. You do not need to draw any requirements table/matrix for your activity diagram. Note: in order to answer items 5a and 5b, you will need to explore the website and follow the process of purchasing an item. The “Guidelines for Completing the Assessment Items” section provides guidance on how to format your answers, including your answers for Items 5a and Item 5b
Please ensure that you submit on time
