Final year project...

cybergeek

cybergeek

cybergeek

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I'm in my final year and looking at writing up a proposal for my project by the end of the next week. Ideally I need to something networking based... however I would like to have some virtualisation in there too or maybe storage.

Anyone have any ideas on things I can do?

Any help would be appreciated.
 
I did my dissertation (studied Computer and Network Tech BTW) on sending serial signals over a wireless network to control a robot that could only normally be controlled by an RS232 connection.

Another guy on my course did a pretty easy one where he just had to virtualise a network and they gave him various challanges like getting a Linux server to interact with AD. Nothing that couldnt be found with a quick google.

Can't think of any others that were of any interest...one guy had to make some software that would stamp GPS signals on to a photo to prove its location (this was before geo tagging came about)

Best thing to do would be go and speak to a tutor.
 
Thanks for your reply J.B.... the problem is my tutor hasn't replied to any of my e-mails and have found out that he is off for two weeks. So will be speaking to another tutor this afternoon instead.

I'm studying Computer Networks and Security btw.
 
I'd throw some iSCSI SAN use into the mix, or perhaps windows based DFS if you prefer to stick with hyper-v as your hypervisor of choice.
 
J.B said:
I did my dissertation (studied Computer and Network Tech BTW) on sending serial signals over a wireless network to control a robot that could only normally be controlled by an RS232 connection.
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That sounds like a decent dissertation.

J.B said:
Another guy on my course did a pretty easy one where he just had to virtualise a network and they gave him various challanges like getting a Linux server to interact with AD. Nothing that couldnt be found with a quick google.
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That doesn't. That's the sort of thing I do when I'm bored on a weekend.
 
An interesting project (if it meets your course requirements is different) is a self scaling virtualisation system. I wrote a proof of concept of a load balanced web server which ran with two VMs as web servers normally and then booted more as load required it, added them to the load balanced cluster, then removed them and shut them down as load went down again.

The idea was to develop an automatically sclaing web infrastructure which could be deployed on something like amazon ec2 but I never got round to porting the code from the vmware API over to ec2 or similar.

Might be an interesting thing to play with if you're interested in some of that stuff...
 
cybergeek said:
With OpenFiler I presume? :)
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Certainly.

Does your university offer you the MSDNAA access? If so, and you have access to the full catalogue, perhaps try and implement an entire enterprise class infrastructure, with complete clustered failover across a WAN to multiple remote sites?
 
paradigm said:
Certainly.

Does your university offer you the MSDNAA access? If so, and you have access to the full catalogue, perhaps try and implement an entire enterprise class infrastructure, with complete clustered failover across a WAN to multiple remote sites?
Click to expand...

Something along those lines sounds very appealing to me, I have always been interested in failover so this would be something I could look at. I do indeed have access to MSDNAA and also have my own TechNet sub too, so getting access isn't going to be a problem.

I will need to discuss this with my course leader to see if it will meet the criteria.
 
We did a lot of that in one of our final year modules so they might not be too keen on you doing it if you have a module that incorporates it.
 
paradigm said:
Certainly.

Does your university offer you the MSDNAA access? If so, and you have access to the full catalogue, perhaps try and implement an entire enterprise class infrastructure, with complete clustered failover across a WAN to multiple remote sites?
Click to expand...

While I guess it's real world it sounds horrifically mundane to me - I'd be in two minds if I was interviewing someone who'd done that as a final year project.

While it's real world and shows they actually know how to do some basic bits it just seems a bit dull and unimaginative (and maybe easy) for a final year project of a computing degree.

Just my view but I'd probably be more interested in someone who'd developed some interesting system or looked at some innovative or cutting edge area.
 
bigredshark said:
Just my view but I'd probably be more interested in someone who'd developed some interesting system or looked at some innovative or cutting edge area.
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And then you'd continue by employing them to do the "mundane" tasks that you would have turned your nose up at on their CV?

Experience counts for more than qualifications IMO, what use is a recently graduated student who managed to wirelessly cook himself breakfast and have it delivered on a methane powered blimp, when I could employ someone who has experience with what he will be doing for me?
 
paradigm said:
Experience counts for more than qualifications IMO, what use is a recently graduated student who managed to wirelessly cook himself breakfast and have it delivered on a methane powered blimp, when I could employ someone who has experience with what he will be doing for me?
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Because someone who has an engineering and creative transferable skills are more likely to learn new skills quickly and effectively - or even better, come up with solutions to problems in a way that could be more useful.
 
Burnsy2023 said:
Because someone who has an engineering and creative transferable skills are more likely to learn new skills quickly and effectively - or even better, come up with solutions to problems in a way that could be more useful.
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Not in this kind of environment in all honesty. Think about the forum you are currently in, and then explain to me how engineering skill will help him to take better command of an AD infrastructure?

As I said, I'd rather have the guy with real world experience in what he is being employed to do, and infact I do choose my candidates that way.

Whilst having a wider range of skills will be of benefit to the individual, allowing him seamless transition between job roles, it wouldn't exactly benefit myself as the manager of a department who requires a certain skillset.
 
paradigm said:
Not in this kind of environment in all honesty. Think about the forum you are currently in, and then explain to me how engineering skill will help him to take better command of an AD infrastructure?
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What if you want to integrate Linux or Mac directory services with AD? The guy with the engineering mind would be worlds apart. Anything that's out of the ordinary is difficult for people with experience but no other transferable skills.
 
paradigm said:
And then you'd continue by employing them to do the "mundane" tasks that you would have turned your nose up at on their CV?

Experience counts for more than qualifications IMO, what use is a recently graduated student who managed to wirelessly cook himself breakfast and have it delivered on a methane powered blimp, when I could employ someone who has experience with what he will be doing for me?
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Yeah - I want people who're passionate about their jobs, people's who're inquisitive about the technology even if they'll be playing with group policy all day.

I can send people on a course to learn how to do everyday stuff, I can't send them on a course for the other stuff. There's also the fact you're not designing a failover infrastructure on day one, that's after you've got 4-5 years experience and there's a difference between Microsoft best practice in a university lab and what we do in the real world.

I very much like experience and I'd almost always prefer it to a graduate, but if you are a graduate then I expect something more than just setting up a pretend infrastructure in a lab as the culmination of your course. If that's it your degree was something of a waste - you're significantly less employable than somebody with a couple of years experience and an MCSE...(or just somebody with a couple of years experience and the desire to do an MCSE...)

Maybe it's personally coloured by my distaste for people who've spent 3 years at uni and achieved the equivalent of sod all...but if you've really made the most of your course and finished it by working on a challenging and interesting project then I've got all the time in the world for you...
 
Burnsy2023 said:
What if you want to integrate Linux or Mac directory services with AD? The guy with the engineering mind would be worlds apart. Anything that's out of the ordinary is difficult for people with experience but no other transferable skills.
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This is perhaps the point I was trying to make, somebody who's designed an innovative and creative system as a project is attractive because I know they can do that.

Somebody who's designed an off the shelf failover solution isn't as attractive, because when I ask them for something bespoke that's beyond what can be done off the shelf I've no idea how they'll manage - somebody with no direct experience but who's demonstrated their ability to think creatively about problems I have some faith in their ability to approach it productively.

Maybe not always the case and I'm hiring for engineering rather than support, so technical creativity and problem solving is more important to me than it is for other roles.
 
Its an interesting debate, and employability is important, but more importantly you've got to think what you will enjoy doing for a year.

When I was doing my dissertation there are times where I contemplated driving that blumin robot down the stairs...only I couldnt because my project wasnt working!

Bottom line is looking back Im glad it was challanging and forced me to learn new things. Like Burnsy, doing that kind of project is something I might do if I was bored just to kill time, would not of been very challenging.
 
Well, for some ideas.

Mine was a password system using mobile phones and public/private key to access boxes for remote admin. (Think an off-the-shelf solution to RSA secure-id cards). You could maybe adapt that for firewell/network access.

A friends was controlling household devices from a web browser (could turn kettle/cooker/fridge/telly on off) could take that further and have it programming anything that took an infared signal, have more controls (was only an 8 bit controller messing with replay switches so just 8 plug sockets on/off).

Think outside the box a little. The link back to your original course can be soooooooo tenuous.
 
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