What was your final year college/university project?

[Taz]

I was wondering what people did for their final year projects at college/university? I guess it would provide an interesting insight into how technology has moved on over the years and how computing-related courses have changed.

Just state the course name, the year you did your final year project and a one-paragraph decsription of what you did, problems you had to overcome and technology involved.

To get the ball rolling:

Course: Computer Science BSc

Date: 1986

Project: 3D Kitchen Designer

Description: Two of us worked together on BBC Model B computers to create a 3D Kitchen Designer. We attached an A4 graphics tablet to it (the type with a pen-shaped stylus) and wrote the driver to make it work. We also wrote some speech synthesis software so it could talk to you! The design part was based on our graphics course using 3D wire-frame graphics. You set out the dimensions of your kitchen and, using the graphics tablet, picked standard shaped floor and wall units and placed them into the wire-frame display of the kitchen. You could then rotate the kitchen on a 3D axis and 'walk' into it.

[tiggerai]

Course: Internet Engineering BEng

Date: 2005

Project: Multidevice and multi-markup timetable application.

Description: A web based application written in J2EE that will determine the type of device you are trying to access information in, then marking it up in a corresponding language.
Pulls out data from a database, turns it into a XML DOM then trnasforms it using the correct XSLT stylesheet for the markup that's needed.
Didn't quite get it working on the web from a stand alone mobile device (my project concentrated on HTML for PC browsers and WAP for mobile devices) due to the restrictions hosting it from uni... but it all does work! The timetable application was just to give it some scope, but the idea is one data store of information that can be used on many devices.
It recognises WAP emulators as WAP markup and browsers (including firefox and opera) as HTML markup. Gonna carry on developing it to give it management and security functionalities (GUI to add/take away devices)
I had a pretty bad year with illnesses and general motivation issues, but I got a 2:1 for it, so I was happy.

(and just to confirm for all those that don't know, I am a girl!)

[Totem]

Course: Biomedical Science

Year: 2005

Titel: Comparison of a range of organic and inorganic calcium antagonists on smooth muscle contractile function.

[iranu]

Course: Metallurgy and Materials Engineering BEng

Year: 1995

Title: High Temperature Corrosion of Engineering Ceramics (Silicon Nitride, Silicon Carbide)

Subjecting various forms of these two ceramics to high temperatures (1200-1400 degrees C) over a long period of time in an ambient (air) atmosphere aswell as a combustion atmosphere in a burner rig using aviation grade fuel. The aim was to measure the level and rate of corrsion and determine the corrosion products in order to understand the mechanism of corrosion so the potential of using these sorts of materials in high temperature environments, namely jet engines, could be assessed.

[zachig]

Course: Electrical Engineering, BSc.
Year: 2003
Title: Linearization of a Differnetial Amplifer using the 'Self-Linearization' Technique.

My project was based on the 'well-known' (oh well, it's not that known) method of 'self-linearization' in order to improve the linearization of a differential amplifer based on bipolar transistors by cancelling its Harmonic and Intermodulation distortions.
By implementing the Differential Amplifer with diodes (two diodes for each transistor, according to the Ebers-Moll Equation) it is possible to develop the output voltage equations of the amplifer according to Taylor Series and then, by adding a linear component (i.e. resistor) in the Transistor Emitters, to cancel its Harmonic (2nd order) and 3rd order intermodulation distorations, and thus, increase the amplifier's linearity.

Sounds complex? Believe me, IT IS!!!

[Aaron]

Course: Physics BSc.
Year: 2003
Title: An Introduction to Genetic Algorithms and their Application to Physics

My report gave the reader an introduction to a problem solving algorithm, based on evolution theory and popular in mechanical engineering, physics and finance. It is then used to solve the Hartree-Fock approximation for 4He nucleon-nucleon interactions.

[Paul Adams]

Course: Computer Science BSc.
(Started as Computer Science & Cybernetics, but dropped the Cybernetics part after the interesting bits of the 1st year were done)

Graduated: 1996

Project: DOS application written in C/C++/Assembler to take the ray-tracing source files for PoV-Ray (shareware ray tracing program) and render instantly in 3D polygons for a "preview" and to have the ability to edit the image displayed and save the file back.
Designed to be a tool to speed up the design process of rendering complex images without having to wait an eternity between each render, great practice for playing with linked lists, memory management and file parsers/compilers as well as the 3D graphics engine.

[amjedm]

Someone may be interested (apologies if no one is)

Course: BSc Business Information Systems (did HND and transferred to placement year)

Year: 1995

Project: stuck with the placement so didn't go back to do 4th year and hence no project

Reason: one of my friends at Uni (he was a year ahead) said "the project has grown men in tears". I didn't fancy crying at Uni so never went back!

[smtkr]

Course: Computer Science BSc.

Graduated: 1996

Project: DOS application written in C/C++/Assembler to take the ray-tracing source files for PoV-Ray (shareware ray tracing program) and render instantly in 3D polygons for a "preview" and to have the ability to edit the image displayed and save the file back.
Designed to be a tool to speed up the design process of rendering complex images without having to wait an eternity between each render, great practice for playing with linked lists, memory management and file parsers/compilers as well as the 3D graphics engine.

One of my flatmates did some pretty cool raycasting projects last year. I, being such a programming illiterate, was baffled.

[schmunk]

Course: Engineering BA/MEng

Graduated: 2003

Project: 'Friction Stir Welding of Aluminium Alloys'

So dull I can't be bothered to explain what it involved... Hence why I'm not an Engineer now.

[Endymion]

Course: BA(Hons) English Literature

Year: 2005

Title: Representations of masculinity in the early modern English drama.

Just finished it; really enjoyed writing it.

[TheAnimus]

Course: Computer Science & Cybernetics Bsc

Year: 2005

Title: Signal Analysis/Generation Toolkit for Schools + Enuthisastes using low cost / standard prepherialls.

ie, making an oscilloscope out of a video card, with some small external circuirty. Runs on windows, .net for usermode, c/asm for device drivers (thou i'm trying to avoid doing what i've done at presant).

I can't help but feal projects are getting easyer and easyer when you have a quick google, also how insainly boring mine is (no matter how useful the finished toolkit is for me). A friend of mine last year did lip recogonition, in order to help people with speach disorders speak properly. I think i'll go steal some of her custard creams now actually.... yummie!

[fathazza]

course: Artificial Intelligence & MAthematics

Year: 2004

Title: Artificial Joke Generation

basically using prolog to make a programme that invented rather bad puns

[Stigggeh]

noooooooo i am gonna get laughed at


course : Ba Business management
Year : 2005

Title ageism in employment.... yeah it was like having teeth pulled. i did ok anyhoo

[directhex]

Course: BSc Computer Science

Year: 2004

Project: I forget the exact title. Something like "Visual representation of detailed analysis of arbitrary audio signals"

Description: The original plan was to make a clone of Dreamcast game Rez, with (relatively) realistic scenery like the Chemical Brothers' Star Guitar, which took any .ogg file as input. However, the project was a LOT harder than I anticipated, and it fell somewhat short of that. The beat detection algorithm WAS great though, with a better success rate at correctly determining the tempo than Sony ACID Express (mixing software). I wasted FAR too long on my attempt to write a realistic 3D perlin cloud function.

[herulach]

Course: Mphys Theoretical Physics

Year: Now (got till feb to finish)

Project: Monte Carlo Solutions of the Split Wigner equation.

Description: Solving the split wigner equation numerically using montecarlo methods, with an emphasis on discovering how much it is acceptable to 'coarse grain' quantum mechanics.