E-Business and E-Commerce Systems
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
The module provides a theoretical and technical understanding of the major issues for existing large-scale E-Business and E-Commerce systems. Theoretical aspects include alternative E-Business strategies, marketing, branding, customer relationship issues and commercial website management. The technical part covers the standard methods for large-scale data storage, data movement, transformation, and application integration, together with the fundamentals of application architecture. Examples focus on the most recent developments in E-Business and E-Commerce distributed systems. Critical analysis of current and emerging technologies for E-Business and E-Commerce is carried out during seminars.
Information Technology with Business & Management Project
- 60 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
The dissertation will describe an extensive piece of research work undertaken as an individual IT project or Business/Management case study, supervised by an appropriate member of faculty.
This project or case study should be the culmination of your degree, as such it should focus on an area(s) studied or associated with the degree. Therefore, this project may focus on any aspect of Information Technology, Business (including E-Business and E-Commerce) and Management (including innovation), and should position itself with respect to the literature in the area of study and demonstrate your ability to apply relevant methods to solve a research problem and critically evaluate the solution.
The dissertation should indicate an appropriate methodology has been adopted, for example, if an IT project is chosen then a requirements gathering, specification, design, implementation, test and evaluation should be documented in the dissertation, e.g. design and development of a dynamic e-commerce web site. On the other hand, if a business or management case study is chosen, then a systematic empirical/experimental study of some aspect of Information Technology, E-Business, or E-Commerce, Business, management is topic would be undertaken, e.g. a detailed cases study of an E-Commerce sector or IT strategy.
Managing Complex Projects, Products and Systems
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
During this module you will address three central issues:
Organisational capabilities: how organisational forms and capabilities in project management, systems integration and software engineering are essential in the design and production of CoPS. Special emphasis is given to project management capabilities.
Models of innovation: how industrial structures, product life cycles and innovation management in CoPS differ from the conventional model of innovation often based on the mass production of consumer goods.
Firm strategy: how firms are changing their strategic positions, building new service capabilities and creating customer-centric organisations to provide bundles of products and services as integrated solutions to their customer's needs.
Web Applications and Services
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
This module provides an introduction to the models and technologies used to provide distributed applications and services over the Internet. You will study the features and problems of building distributed applications, such as naming, security, synchronization, replication, object persistence and content distribution. You will also use the framework provided by the Java Enterprise Edition to build distributed web applications.
Web Computing
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
In this module, you are introduced to the models and technologies used to provide Web Services (over the Internet) - in particular XML technologies.
You cover topics including:
- XML
- DTD
- CSS
- XML Schema
- XML Transformation
- servlets and Java APIs for parsing
- processing documents.
The main aim of this module is to introduce you to the prevailing technologies underlying the emergence of the Web Service as a major computation model over the Internet.
3D Modelling and Animation
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
Digital media professionals need to be able to synthesis high quality 3D animated content. This module covers the 3 key areas of the development pipeline using industry standard software, to produce animated 3D content.
- 3D modelling allowing candidates to create 3D geometries, adjust material properties and apply appropriate texturing (colour maps, specular maps, bump maps).
- Rigging models for animation, enabling motion with critical analysis with regards to industry standards.
- Exporting the content produced to external programming suites (e.g. Unity). You will learn how to export content across applications, to enable control of the content produced from external suites.
Advanced Software Engineering
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
In this module, you study modern approaches to large-scale software production.
You start by reviewing the key concepts in the whole life-cycle of a software product, such as:
- requirement analysis
- software architecture and design
- implementation
- quality assurance
- maintenance activities.
You investigate modern software engineering technology, such as:
- version control
- build automation
- testing
- logical approaches to specification
- verification of programs and domain-specific languages.
As part of this module, you undertake team-based coursework, which involves the production of a significant software system.
A solid knowledge of programming is important for this module. Programming exercises will be in Java.
Business and Project Management
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
This module addresses wider business and project management issues which affect the technological and engineering environment. Some of these issues include: principles of strategic management, project management and planning, the business environment, auditing and control, organisational structure, business legislation, resource management, global markets and supply and forecasting.
HCI Advanced Topics
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
This module will explore advanced topics in Human Centred Computing Systems, by providing opportunities to reflect on, synthesise and gain a deeper understanding of the concerns, perspectives and interdisciplinary nature of this area.
The module also aims to support the development of research, design and study skills through literature reviews, case studies involving the critique of systems, presentations, group discussion of research and hands-on experiences.
Human-Computer Interaction
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
Human computer interaction (HCI) is concerned with designing, evaluating and deploying usable, effective and enjoyable technologies in a range of contexts. This module provides an introduction to the key areas, approaches and developments in the field.
Topics include:
- principles of user-centred design
- techniques for prototyping and implementing interactive products
- methods for evaluating interactive technologies with and without user involvement.
The module will also give you practical experience of all four stages of the user-centred design process.
Intelligent Systems Techniques
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
This module will introduce you to the range of knowledge representation techniques used in contemporary Artificial Intelligence, and give you an understanding of their various strengths and weaknesses.
Machine Learning
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
In this module, you explore advanced techniques in machine learning.
You use a systematic treatment, based on the following three key ingredients:
- tasks
- models
- features.
As part of the module, you are introduced to both regression and classification, and your studies emphasise concepts such as model performance, learnability and computational complexity.
You learn techniques including:
- probabilistic and non-probabilistic classification and regression methods
- reinforcement learning approaches including the non-linear variants using kernel methods.
You are also introduced to techniques for pre-processing the data (including PCA).
You will then need to be able to implement, develop and deploy these techniques to real-world problems.
In order to take this module, you need to have already taken the 'Mathematics & Computational Methods for Complex Systems' module (817G5), or have taken an equivalent mathematical module or have equivalent prior experience.
Management, Innovation and Organisational Performance
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
This module aims to help you develop a critical awareness and deep understanding of the principles and practices associated with management and performance excellence, and provides insight into the drive for continuous improvement of products, services and processes for enhanced competitive positioning from effective innovation management.
The module includes a focus on strategies for sustainable improvement in performance of operating systems, ethical practice, organisational mindset, and planning and control mechanisms employed to effectively manage and monitor socio-economic performance for sustainable business operations.
By critically assessing the application of a range of tools, techniques and frameworks within a variety of best practice organisations across a number of industry sectors, at both national and international level, you will examine 'value' from a range of stakeholder perspectives.
Object Oriented Programming
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
You will be introduced to object-oriented programming, and in particular to understanding, writing, modifying, debugging and assessing the design quality of simple Java applications.
You do not need any previous programming experience to take this module, as it is suitable for absolute beginners.
Organisational Behaviour, Leadership and Change
- 15 credits
- Autumn Semester, Year 1
Change and Leadership will provide you with the theoretical grounding to understand and appraise different modes of organisational change, their drivers, the responses of staff and other stakeholders, and the role of leaders in leading and responding to change. The relevance of theory will be explored in contexts including cultural change, restructuring and mergers/acquisitions. The module examines the principles of managing change at a number of levels building progressively from individual change, to team change and organisational change up to change at the meso-macro level in complex economic systems (eg change of sectoral or even national importance). The distinctive roles for leaders and approaches to leadership will be explored in relation to these levels.
Within the continuum, reflecting positioning of the module between organisational behaviour and strategy, topics to be addressed will cover six main areas including:
- Behavioural, cognitive, humanistic and psychodynamic theories of individual change
- Teams: their constitution, internal dynamics and role in organisational change
- Historical approaches to organisational change (under ad-hoc management, scientific management, human relations and contigent approaches)
- More recent (and emerging) paradigms in organisational change
- Planned vs. emergent change: complexity and inter-organisational influences
- Leadership: role choices and constraint, and frameworks for managing change
The assessment is a coursework-based task requiring you to select a change scenario for a chosen organisation and to describe how that change process should be undertaken, with specific reference to options for change and appraisal of their suitability, through reference to relevant theories of change. Strengths and weakness of relevant approaches will be identified. Specific attention to the role and style of leadership required for the change process or programme will be a key component of the report.
Strategic Management (Business & Management)
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
This module aims to give you a strong grasp of the issues, tools and theoretical perspectives underlying the practice of strategy and its links with management. Using a combination of theory, practice and cases you will learn how to apply principles of strategy to companies.
The module begins by covering key skills and tools for strategic analysis. These include tools for analysing a firm's macroenvironment and competitive environment, as well as an organisation's own resources and capabilities. It then provides an in-depth summary of the strategy process as it is used by managers, and then discusses the range of theoretical perspectives that inform our understanding of this process.
The Business Context in East Asia
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
The main aims of this module are to explore the international business environment in East Asia, to provide an overview of the various East Asian economies, their interrelationship, and their importance in the world economy, and to examine the lessons which may be drawn both from the economic success of the East Asian economies, and from the Asian financial crisis.
The Business Context in Europe
- 15 credits
- Spring Semester, Year 1
The main aims of this module are to explore the international business environment in Europe, to provide an overview of the various European economies, their inter-relationships, and their importance in the world economy. Attention will be paid not just to the major member States of the European Union, but to newer member States and other European economies.