Final Project

The climax of this course is its final project. The final project is your opportunity to take your newfound savvy with programming out for a spin and develop your very own piece of software. So long as your project draws upon the course’s lessons, the nature of your project is entirely up to you, albeit subject to the staff’s approval. You may implement your project in any language(s) as long as the staff approves. You are welcome to utilize any infrastructure, provided the staff ultimately has access to any hardware and software that your project requires. All that we ask is that you build something of interest to you, that you solve an actual problem, that you impact campus, or that you change the world. Strive to create something that outlives this course.

Inasmuch as software development is rarely a one-person effort, you are allowed an opportunity to collaborate with one or two classmates for this final project. Needless to say, it is expected that every student in any such group contribute equally to the design and implementation of that group’s project. Moreover, it is expected that the scope of a two- or three-person group’s project be, respectively, twice or thrice that of a typical one-person project. A one-person project, mind you, should entail more time and effort than is required by each of the course’s problem sets. Although no more than three students may design and implement a given project, you are welcome to solicit advice from others, so long as you respect the course’s policy on academic honesty.

Extensions on the final project are not ordinarily granted, except in cases of emergency.

Ideas

Here are just some of the possibilities, organized into (non-exhaustive) "tracks". Discuss any and all with your TF!

If at a loss for ideas, look here for more inspiration!

Software Track

  • a web-based application using Python and SQL, based in part on Problem Set 7’s distribution code

  • a web-based application using JavaScript, based in part on Problem Set 8’s distribution code

  • a web-based application using PHP or Ruby

  • a plugin for CS50 IDE using JavaScript

  • a Chrome extension using JavaScript

  • an iOS app using Swift (or Objective-C)

  • an Android app using Java

  • a command-line program using C

  • …​

Cross-Course Track

Like to combine two courses' projects? If taking some other course this semester that has a final project, you are welcome and encouraged to combine this course’s project and that course’s project into one, toward an end of applying lessons learned in CS50 to some other field, so long as the joint project satisfies this course’s and that course’s expectations. Before pursuing a joint project, though, you must disclose to both courses and receive approval from both courses (as from your TF in CS50).

Cross-Campus Track

  • Like to build a website via which undergrads can schedule Classroom-to-Table meals with faculty? Email Dean Rakesh Khurana for details!

  • …​

Hardware Track

Like to integrate hardware into your project? Know that CS50 has the following hardware with which you’re welcome to create something amazing:

If you’d like to borrow something for a project, email borrow@cs50.harvard.edu, and we’ll do our best to oblige, sharing hardware across classmates as needed. Let us know, too, if there’s some other hardware or software you’d like to utilize for a project, and we’ll do our best to find it.

HSA Track

Like to make an impact on campus by building a project for the largest student-run corporation in the world? Consider tackling one of Harvard Student Agencies' suggested project ideas and applying for the HSA Dev Bootcamp, which picks up in January where CS50 leaves off! Thereafter, consider joining HSA Dev!

Schedule

Pre-Proposal

due by noon on Fri 10/28

Proposal

due by noon on Fri 11/11

Status Report

due by noon on Mon 11/28

CS50 Hackathon

from 7pm on Thu 12/1 until 7am on Fri 12/2

Implementation

due by noon on Thu 12/8

CS50 Fair

from 11am until 4:30pm on Fri 12/9

Extensions on the final project are not granted, except in cases of emergency.

Specifications

Pre-Proposal

Intended to promote early thought, the pre-proposal is your opportunity to bounce one or more ideas off of your teaching fellow. Quite simply, by this pre-proposal’s deadline, send an email to your teaching fellow describing one or more ideas that you have for your final project. Short, casual emails are fine, but do explain the motivation behind each of your ideas (i.e., why it interests you). Treat this requirement as an opportunity for counsel. Certainly include any questions or concerns that you have in this email.

The subject line of your email should be Pre-Proposal.

If, incidentally, you have an idea for a final project that you think someone should do (if not you), post it CS50 Discuss! And if you’d like to solicit one or two collaborators, do post there as well.

Proposal

The proposal is your opportunity to receive approval and counsel from your teaching fellow before you proceed to design. Submitting a proposal amounts to answering a few questions about your idea. Once you have a project in mind, submit your proposal at cs50.harvard.edu/proposal. If working with one or two other classmates, it suffices for just one of you to submit the proposal.

Your teaching fellow will either approve your proposal or require modifications on your part for subsequent approval. Your proposal, even if approved, is not binding; you may alter your plan at any point, provided you obtain the staff’s approval for any modifications. Projects submitted without approval may not receive credit.

After submitting your proposal, a teaching fellow other than your own may be appointed your advisor and grader for the remainder of the final project, depending on your proposal’s nature.

Status Report

Not only is the status report intended to keep the staff apprised of your progress, it is an opportunity to keep yourself on track. Submitting a status report amounts to answering a few questions about your project. Your answers will also influence the setup of the CS50 Fair. Submit your status report at cs50.harvard.edu/report.

CS50 Hackathon

The CS50 Hackathon is an epic all-nighter during which you can dive into your final project’s implementation alongside classmates and staff. If you choose to partake, you’ll be asked to propose three milestones for yourself that evening: a "good" one that you intend to achieve no matter what; a "better" one that you think you can achieve; and a "best" one that you hope to achieve.

Dinner will be served around 9pm, second dinner will be served around 1am, and those still standing around 5am will be treated to breakfast at IHOP.

Additional details on the CS50 Hackathon’s logistics will be announced via email and the course’s home page the week before the CS50 Hackathon.

Implementation

Ultimately due are implementation and documentation of your final project. Your submission thereof must include all of the below.

  1. Documentation for your project in the form of a file called documentation.txt. This documentation is to be a user’s manual for your project. Though the structure of your documentation is entirely up to you, it should be incredibly clear to the staff how and where, if applicable, to compile, configure, and use your project. Your documentation should be at least several paragraphs in length. It should not be necessary for us to contact you with questions regarding your project after its submission. Hold our hand with this documentation; be sure to answer in your documentation any questions that you think we might have while testing your work.

  2. A "design document" for your project in the form of a file called design.txt that discusses, technically, how you implemented your project and why you made the design decisions you did. Your design document should be at least several paragraphs in length. Whereas your documentation is meant to be a user’s manual, consider your design document your opportunity to give the staff a technical tour of your project underneath its hood.

  3. Any and all files required to run your software (even if intended for some infrastructure other than CS50 IDE), including source code as well as, if applicable, configuration files, Makefiles, sample inputs, SQLite databases, and so forth. Needless to say, all source code should be thoroughly commented.

  4. A short video (that’s no more than 2 minutes in length) in which you present your project to the world, as with slides, screenshots, voiceover, and/or live action. Your video should somehow include your project’s title, your name and year, your dorm/house and concentration, and any other details that you’d like to convey to viewers. See CS171’s tips on how to make a "screencast" though you’re welcome to use an actual camera. Upload your video to YouTube as "public" or "unlisted" and take note of its URL.

How to Submit

If you have collaborated with one or two other students, each of you should submit via this same process.

If your project requires (for execution and testing) hardware or software other than that offered by CS50 IDE, be sure that the TF advising you is aware of and has approved your project’s needs.

update50
cd ~/workspace/project/ # or wherever you've stored your project
submit50 project

Step 2 of 2

Submit https://forms.cs50.net/2016/fall/project/implementation!

CS50 Fair

The CS50 Fair is an epic display of final projects, your opportunity to showcase your work not only to us but also to others on campus. You will be expected to bring to the CS50 Fair a laptop with which to demonstrate your project. Plan to tell attendees what you have done and why you have done it. And perhaps have in mind a few anecdotes about lessons you learned, roadblocks you hit, or the like.

The CS50 Fair will take place in the atrium of Northwest Science Labs at 52 Oxford Street.

Additional details on the CS50 Fair’s logistics will be announced via email and the course’s home page the week before the CS50 Fair.

Assessment

Your pre-proposal, proposal, and status report will be evaluated on the bases of, at least, clarity and thoroughness. Your implementation will be evaluated along four axes primarily:

Scope

To what extent does your code implement the features required by our specification?

Correctness

To what extent is your code consistent with our specifications and free of bugs?

Design

To what extent is your code written well (i.e., clearly, efficiently, elegantly, and/or logically)?

Style

To what extent is your code readable (i.e., commented and indented with variables aptly named)?

All students, whether or not taking the course for a letter grade, must ordinarily submit this final project to be eligible for a satisfactory grade unless granted an exception in writing by the course’s heads.

Academic Honesty

This course’s philosophy on academic honesty is best stated as "be reasonable." The course recognizes that interactions with classmates and others can facilitate mastery of the course’s material. However, there remains a line between enlisting the help of another and submitting the work of another. This policy characterizes both sides of that line.

The essence of all work that you submit to this course must be your own. Collaboration on problem sets is not permitted except to the extent that you may ask classmates and others for help so long as that help does not reduce to another doing your work for you. Generally speaking, when asking for help, you may show your code to others, but you may not view theirs, so long as you and they respect this policy’s other constraints. Collaboration on the course’s test and quiz is not permitted at all. Collaboration on the course’s final project is permitted to the extent prescribed by its specification.

Below are rules of thumb that (inexhaustively) characterize acts that the course considers reasonable and not reasonable. If in doubt as to whether some act is reasonable, do not commit it until you solicit and receive approval in writing from the course’s heads. Acts considered not reasonable by the course are handled harshly. If the course refers some matter for disciplinary action and the outcome is punitive, the course reserves the right to impose local sanctions on top of that outcome that may include an unsatisfactory or failing grade for work submitted or for the course itself. The course ordinarily recommends exclusion (i.e., required withdrawal) from the course itself.

If you commit some act that is not reasonable but bring it to the attention of the course’s heads within 72 hours, the course may impose local sanctions that may include an unsatisfactory or failing grade for work submitted, but the course will not refer the matter for further disciplinary action except in cases of repeated acts.

Reasonable

  • Communicating with classmates about problem sets' problems in English (or some other spoken language).

  • Discussing the course’s material with others in order to understand it better.

  • Helping a classmate identify a bug in his or her code at office hours, elsewhere, or even online, as by viewing, compiling, or running his or her code, even on your own computer.

  • Incorporating a few lines of code that you find online or elsewhere into your own code, provided that those lines are not themselves solutions to assigned problems and that you cite the lines' origins.

  • Reviewing past semesters' quizzes and solutions thereto.

  • Sending or showing code that you’ve written to someone, possibly a classmate, so that he or she might help you identify and fix a bug.

  • Sharing a few lines of your own code online so that others might help you identify and fix a bug.

  • Turning to the course’s heads for help or receiving help from the course’s heads during the quiz or test.

  • Turning to the web or elsewhere for instruction beyond the course’s own, for references, and for solutions to technical difficulties, but not for outright solutions to problem set’s problems or your own final project.

  • Whiteboarding solutions to problem sets with others using diagrams or pseudocode but not actual code.

  • Working with (and even paying) a tutor to help you with the course, provided the tutor does not do your work for you.

Not Reasonable

  • Accessing a solution to some problem prior to (re-)submitting your own.

  • Asking a classmate to see his or her solution to a problem set’s problem before (re-)submitting your own.

  • Decompiling, deobfuscating, or disassembling the staff’s solutions to problem sets.

  • Failing to cite (as with comments) the origins of code or techniques that you discover outside of the course’s own lessons and integrate into your own work, even while respecting this policy’s other constraints.

  • Giving or showing to a classmate a solution to a problem set’s problem when it is he or she, and not you, who is struggling to solve it.

  • Looking at another individual’s work during the test or quiz.

  • Paying or offering to pay an individual for work that you may submit as (part of) your own.

  • Providing or making available solutions to problem sets to individuals who might take this course in the future.

  • Searching for or soliciting outright solutions to problem sets online or elsewhere.

  • Splitting a problem set’s workload with another individual and combining your work.

  • Submitting (after possibly modifying) the work of another individual beyond the few lines allowed herein.

  • Submitting the same or similar work to this course that you have submitted or will submit to another.

  • Submitting work to this course that you intend to use outside of the course (e.g., for a job) without prior approval from the course’s heads.

  • Turning to humans (besides the course’s heads) for help or receiving help from humans (besides the course’s heads) during the quiz or test.

  • Viewing another’s solution to a problem set’s problem and basing your own solution on it.