Documentation

The documentation requirements for the project are simple: you need to provide documentation that supports your idea and justifies your decision-making processes. That is, your documentation should provide value to the client.

Teams are free to manage their documentation any way they wish, but you should discuss with your client what they expect or how they manage documentation in-house.

Default process

There is no ‘report’ to produce in TechLauncher; instead, your project reviews will require putting together a snapshot of your processes. The easiest way to do this is to give your Tutor, Observers and Convener open read access to your documentation.

A suggested process is to follow an iterative systems engineering process, with documentation addressing the following areas:

• Requirements analysis - tools that address the need, such as requirements mapping, technical performance measures or a business model canvas
• Functional behaviour analysis - tools that abstract how the system works, such as use cases, or functional and logical flow diagrams
• Architectural synthesis - tools that describe how the system is structured to meet the functional need, such as data models or system interfaces
• Validation and verification - tools that demonstrate how your described system meets the described requirements

In addition to these processes, if your group applies for a microgrant we will require documentation describing the life-cycle cost of your idea. Instructions will be provided by the Professional Services Team.

Minimum requirements

The only requirement on documentation is that it should be traceable, and easy for your tutor and observers to navigate. We suggest creating ‘Design Notes’, which are self-contained notes dealing with one tool. A Design Note might cover, for example:

• the requirements of the system
• the use cases of your system
• the system interface of your system
• the testing procedures around requirements

These separate documents should be linked through a title block, which includes the following information:

Potential tools

There are many tools to help you manage documentation. Some suggested tools are:

Online/live systems:

• CECS GitLab
• Specific project management applications, such as Confluence
• Wikis, such as Dokuwiki
• Content Management Sytems, such as RedMine

Well-known document sharing systems:

• Dropbox
• Resilio Sync
• Office 365
• Google Drive