Preliminary Scope

Due:

11:00pm, Friday September 22, 2023

For this assignment, you start thinking about the scope of your project. You will create a Decision Matrix (DM) for your problem. If you want to have multiple DMs for individual sub-problems, then that is fine too.

A DM is a spreadsheet (table) where the top left cell contains what decision you are trying to make for which problem. The columns are approaches to the problem, the rows are criteria, and the cells are aspects.

The first row (or two) should have a succinct description of the approach. If you are modifying something that exists, that should be first approach, that is the ‘status quo’. Other columns can be things others have done in the same situation and your initial ideas. Note that by going through this process, the goal is to create a great approach and the answer is typically an approach that you did not begin with.

The row are criteria about the problem. You should include a criterion if (and only if) it is relevant or salient. Type of criteria you might include are:

• fitness for solving the problem
• various ‘-ilities’ such as usability, reliability, etc.
• various costs
• risks
• complexity

The aspects are a succinct description of approach per criterion. This should be a description of how the approach handles the criterion (or does not). You should avoid yes/no, true/false, and numeric rank. These descriptions should be objective so you should avoid judgement in the text.

Submission

The team leader must submit the document (or a zip file containing the documents if you have more than one) to the appropriate folder on D2L before the deadline.