Welcome to our final episode on software evaluation! Today, we're covering Period 26, where we'll focus on three more critical criteria for assessing a program: usability, maintainability, and robustness. Our goal is to help you evaluate a program on these points and complete your final evaluation task. 📝

The Final Three Evaluation Criteria

We'll start by defining each of these criteria:

• Usability: This is all about the user experience. Does the program have a clear and intuitive user interface? Are the on-screen prompts easy to understand? Is the screen layout clean and simple? We'll discuss how to evaluate if a program is easy for an end-user to interact with.
• Maintainability: This criterion focuses on the code itself. Is the program's code readable and well-organized? Does it use modularity effectively (e.g., functions and procedures)? Are there clear comments to help another programmer understand how the code works? We'll show you how good programming habits directly lead to a more maintainable program.
• Robustness: This is about a program's ability to handle errors gracefully. How does it cope with unexpected or exceptional data? Does it use proper input validation to prevent common mistakes? A robust program is one that doesn't crash easily and provides helpful feedback to the user when something goes wrong.

Hands-on Analysis & Completion

We'll analyse the provided "EVALUATION OF MUSIC FANS PROGRAM" template and notes, breaking down how to write effective comments on each of these three criteria. You'll then complete the evaluation for Task 10, Problem 1 from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf".

For those who need a bit of extra help, we'll provide a checklist of things to look for in your code to address each evaluation point. Your understanding will be assessed by a review of your completed evaluation, demonstrating your ability to not only write code but also to critically analyse its quality from a professional perspective.

Welcome to our final episode of the series! Today, we're covering Period 25: Evaluation, where we'll teach you how to critically assess a program. Our goal is to help you evaluate a program in terms of fitness for purpose and efficient use of coding constructs.

Evaluation Criteria

We'll start by introducing the key criteria for a thorough program evaluation:

• Fitness for Purpose: Does the program solve the problem it was designed to solve?
• Efficient Use of Coding Constructs: Is the code written well?
• Usability: Is it easy for the user to interact with?
• Maintainability: Is the code easy to modify and update?
• Robustness: How well does it handle errors and unexpected input?

For today's episode, we'll focus specifically on the first two criteria. We'll show you how "Fitness for Purpose" requires you to go back to the original analysis (or software specification) to see if all requirements have been met.

Next, we'll discuss what makes for an "Efficient Use of Coding Constructs". This involves looking at the code itself to see if it uses the most suitable data types, loops, arrays, nested selections, and modularity to achieve its goals. For instance, did the programmer use an array when a simple variable would have sufficed?

Hands-on Analysis

We'll analyze the provided "EVALUATION OF MUSIC FANS PROGRAM" template and notes, breaking down how to write effective comments on both Fitness for Purpose and Efficient Use of Coding Constructs. Then, you'll begin working on Task 10, Problem 1 from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf", where you'll summarize your own evaluation points. This task will give you the chance to apply everything you've learned to a practical example. By the end of this episode, you'll have the skills to not only write code but also to evaluate it professionally.

Welcome to our final episode on debugging! Today, we're covering Period 24, and we'll be discussing two powerful tools for finding errors in your code: breakpoints and watchpoints. Our goal is to help you describe and exemplify breakpoints and watchpoints and show you how to use them effectively.

Using Breakpoints and Watchpoints

We'll start by explaining what breakpoints are: they are designated stopping points in your code. When you run your program in debug mode, it will pause at a breakpoint, allowing you to inspect the values of variables at that exact moment. We'll show you how to set and use breakpoints in a tool like Thonny.

Next, we'll introduce watchpoints. Watchpoints are similar to breakpoints, but they stop the program only when the value of a specific variable changes. This is incredibly useful for tracking down unexpected changes in your code. We'll also discuss the limitations of watchpoints in a standard Python IDLE and explain why you might need a more advanced IDE to use them.

Hands-on Practice & Assessment ✍️

You'll get hands-on experience by practicing with breakpoints on programs from previous tasks, specifically Task 10, Problem 3a and 3b from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf". These exercises will help you get comfortable with using this powerful debugging technique to pinpoint logic errors. By the end of this episode, you'll be able to use breakpoints and watchpoints to make your debugging process more efficient and effective.

Debugging: Dry Runs & Trace Tables 🐛

Welcome to this episode where we're tackling a crucial programming skill: debugging. Today, we're covering Period 23: Debugging Techniques, and our goal is to help you describe and exemplify dry runs and trace tables.

The Art of Finding Bugs

We'll start by defining debugging as the process of identifying and correcting different types of errors in code:

• Syntax errors (typos, incorrect grammar)
• Execution errors (run-time issues like dividing by zero)
• Logic errors (the code runs but doesn't produce the intended result). Our focus today is on logic errors, and we'll introduce two powerful techniques to find them.

First, we'll explain dry runs. A dry run is when you act as the computer, manually stepping through each line of your code to see what it does. This helps you understand the program's flow and logic.

Next, we'll introduce trace tables. A trace table is a more formal, systematic way to perform a dry run. It's a table used to record the value of each variable after every step of the program's execution. We'll emphasize their utility for pinpointing exactly where a variable's value changes incorrectly, leading to an error.

Hands-on Practice & Assessment ✍️

We'll work through two examples from "Trace Tables.docx". Example 1 will show a simple trace table with columns for num, num < 500, and OUTPUT. Example 2 will introduce a second variable, count, to demonstrate how trace tables can track multiple variables simultaneously.

You'll then apply these techniques to tasks from your booklet. You'll work on Task 10, Problem 1a and 1b from the "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf" which focus on dry runs. Then, you'll tackle Task 10, Problem 2a and 2b which involve creating trace tables.

To help you, we'll provide pre-drawn trace tables and guide you through the first few steps of a more complex table. By the end of this episode, you'll be well-equipped to use dry runs and trace tables to diagnose and fix logic errors in your code.

Welcome to our podcast! Today, we're shifting gears to a critical part of the software development lifecycle: Testing. We're covering Period 22, and our goal is to help you describe systematic and comprehensive testing and design a test plan using normal, extreme, and exceptional data.

The Importance of a Test Plan

We'll start by discussing why a thorough and systematic approach to testing is vital. It's about more than just checking if a program works; it's about making sure it works reliably under all conditions. This is where a comprehensive test plan comes in. It's a structured approach to ensuring your code is robust.

We'll explain the three main categories of test data you should use:

• Normal data: This is typical, expected input. It confirms your program works for the average user.
• Extreme data: This includes the boundary values or limits of valid input. For example, if a valid number range is 1 to 100, you would test with 1 and 100.
• Exceptional data: This is invalid or unexpected input. It's designed to see how your program handles errors, like a user typing a letter where a number is expected.

Designing Your Test Plan

We'll analyse an example Test Plan Design for "Get Valid amark" to show you how to structure your own plan. You'll then begin working on Task 10, Problem 2a from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf", where you will design a test plan for "Get valid emark."

To assist you, we'll provide a template for the test plan. For an extra challenge, we'll encourage you to justify why each test case falls into its category. Your understanding will be assessed by a review of your test plans, checking for clarity, comprehensiveness, and your ability to choose the right data types for each scenario.

Welcome to our episode on advanced file handling! Today, we're covering Period 21, where we'll be combining what we've learned about file handling and arrays of records. Our main goal is to help you read from and write to files using arrays of records and to understand how to work with CSV files. 📁

Reading and Writing Structured Data

We'll begin by showing you how to read data from a file directly into an array of records. This is a powerful technique for organising structured data. We'll use cityDetails.txt as an example to demonstrate how each line of the text file can be converted into a single, cohesive record and stored in an array.

Next, we'll reverse the process and show you how to write data from an array of records back to a file. This is essential for saving changes and creating a persistent copy of your data.

Working with CSV Files

We'll also introduce a specific and widely used type of text file: CSV (Comma-Separated Values). We'll discuss how CSVs are simply text files where each data field is separated by a comma, making them easy to read and write.

You'll get hands-on experience by typing up and testing the provided examples for reading and writing arrays of records, as well as working with CSVs. Then, you'll apply these skills to a practical task: Task 7, Problem 3 from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf". This task involves working with a BankStatement.csv file.

For those who need a bit of extra help, we'll provide partially completed code to guide you through the more complex file handling operations. Your understanding will be assessed through observation of your practical coding and a review of your output for the file handling tasks.

Welcome back to our series on File Handling! Today, we're covering Period 20, where we'll focus on the essential skill of writing data to text files. Our main goal is to help you create, open, write, and close text files efficiently.

The Writing Process

We'll start by discussing the process of writing data to a file. We'll cover how this process creates a new file if one doesn't exist and how it overwrites an existing file by default. We'll briefly mention the concept of appending to a file, noting that it's beyond the scope of this course but is a useful skill to be aware of. We'll focus on the write mode ("w"), which is crucial for our activities.

We'll review three key techniques for writing to a text file:

1. Writing a single string to a file.
2. Writing the contents of a 1D array to a file, with each element on a new line.
3. Writing data from parallel arrays to a file, which is perfect for saving structured data.

You'll get hands-on experience by typing up and testing the provided examples for each of these techniques. Then, you'll work on a practical application: Task 8, Problem 2 from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf". This task involves creating and writing data to a file named dogData.txt.

Differentiation & Assessment 🧑‍💻

For those who need a bit of extra help, we'll provide helper functions to make the file-writing process smoother. For those seeking a challenge, we'll ask you to think critically about how you would prevent overwriting an existing file if you intended to append to it instead. Your understanding will be assessed through observation of your practical coding and a review of your output for the file-writing tasks.

Welcome to this episode where we're moving beyond temporary data storage to Period 19: File Handling! Today, we're focusing on how to read data from text files. Our main goal is to help you open, read, and close text files in various ways. 📖

The Importance of Persistent Data

We'll start by discussing why file handling is so important: it allows for persistent data storage. Unlike variables and arrays that lose their data when a program ends, files on a disk can store information permanently. We'll explain the different modes for opening a file, specifically the "read" mode ("r") which is crucial for our work today.

Reading Techniques & Practice

We'll review three key techniques for reading from a text file:

1. Reading the entire file into a single variable.
2. Reading each line of the file into a separate element in an array.
3. Reading data into parallel arrays, which is great for handling structured data.

You'll get hands-on experience by typing up and testing the provided examples for each of these techniques. Then, you'll work on a practical application: Task 7, Problem 2 from "Software Design and Development Booklet v1.4.pdf". This task involves reading data from a file named Pupil Details.txt, which will give you a chance to apply what you've learned.

For those who need a bit of extra help, we'll provide pre-made text files so you can focus on the coding. We'll also provide guidance on useful functions like .split(",") for separating data and how to handle data type conversion. Your understanding will be assessed through observation of your practical coding and a review of your output for reading text files.