Web Based Projects

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Showing off Computer Science Knowledge

Project markers are looking for evidence of understanding of Computer Science issues. A Web based project allows you to show off the ability to:

Put together a variety of off-the-shelf systems
Use the facilities provided by those systems

This may take a long time and a lot of effort, but doesn't count for very many project marks. Unless you are very careful, it is not easy to show off more conventional CS skills:

Data structures and algorithms (you use ones already provided)
Class design (the design is often just one class per Web page)
Logical problem solving (the off-the-shelf services solve the hard problems for you)

Web project code often contains a lot of straight line code which calls ready-made facilities. Even if there is a lot of code, it does not demonstrate the above design skills.

Moral: make sure your project contains plenty of real Computer Science content. It must involve data structures, algorithms, class design, and/or problem solving as well as just getting data to and from a database and displaying it on some Web pages.