Work-related Learning in Practice
20 Credits
(Compulsory)
This module provides the opportunity to mesh theoretical and practical learning activities. Students will be required as a key part of the module and its assessments to undertake a work placement in a computer science or computer science-related setting for one hundred hours. Students will participate in a work-based learning experience, such as data collection, data analytics, mobile app development, or cybersecurity. The activity must contain elements of research, including a systematic review of the literature, critical analysis, ethical considerations, and dissemination. The module also contains an element of reflection on digital skills for the workplace, reflecting on professional development, working with others, and work-based learning.
Cybersecurity
20 Credits
(Compulsory)
The popularity of the Internet, coupled with the explosive growth of mobile computing devices (such as smartphones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and laptops), has led to the world of universal electronic connectivity. While this level of connectivity may bring us many benefits such as improving our quality of life and running services with a global presence but with reduced costs, it does open vast opportunities for unauthorized access to data, services, and other resources and for fraud and forgeries in commercial and business activities. The first part of the module covers the fundamental concepts required to understand and work with security. These security concepts include historical background, security and security threats, and practical measures (such as identification, authentication, audit trails, security models, cryptography, and network security). The second part of the module provides students with the opportunity to explore computer system security via hands-on activities. Current issues relating to security will be discussed and possible solutions will be investigated.
Human-Computer Interaction
20 Credits
(Compulsory)
This module enables students to investigate the scope and challenges of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and interaction design. They will develop an understanding of HCI concepts and apply HCI methodologies to augmented reality and tangible user interfaces. Students will investigate current user-centered design research and participate in the process of designing a high-fidelity prototype that meets user requirements. They will explain, discuss and apply the underlying principles of HCI, including human physiological, psychological and technical aspects. Usability evaluation methods will be deployed to assess potential design options and trade-offs.
Machine Learning
20 Credits
(Compulsory)
Machine Learning, a subset of Artificial Intelligence, is concerned with creating learning models that allow a computer to exhibit behavior that would normally require a human to do. Typical applications include computer vision, speech recognition, and intelligent robots. The emphasis is on creating these models automatically from data provided and for them to act without necessarily being explicitly programmed, for example, creating a face recognition system from a data set of facial images. In the past decade, machine learning has given society effective web searches, self-driving cars, practical speech recognition, and an understanding of the human genome. In this module, students will learn about the most effective machine-learning techniques and gain practice in implementing them successfully.
Mobile App. Development
20 Credits
(Compulsory)
This module aims to teach students the concepts, skills, and knowledge required to develop mobile applications. Students will appraise the tools, processes, and techniques used to plan, design and deploy mobile applications. This module provides the students with the opportunity to evaluate the technical and management dimensions of mobile applications development. The students will critically review relevant guidelines, principles, and research to identify different application development strategies and build on existing software development skills to create a mobile application for a given context.
Robotics
20 Credits
(Optional)
In this module, students will address the general problem of sensor-based mobile robot navigation and explore the implementation of intelligent behavior in mobile robots. Throughout the module, students will be introduced to different characteristic problems in robotics, derive mathematical models for those problems, develop algorithms that apply these mathematical models to solve robotic problems, translate proposed algorithms into a program, and implement and test these programs on a mobile robot.
Creative Computing
20 Credits
(Optional)
The module presents the student with the opportunity to articulate creative ideas through computing. At the end of the module, students will understand the foundational creative processes in the form of computer programs that produce audio-visual content to a high standard. The module provides the foundational aspects of programming for creativity, principles of form, structure, transformation, and generative processes for image, sound, and video. Students will explore the methods and conceptual tools used in the creative industries. They will also implement creative concepts that are not easily realized with commercial software packages. A level of originality would be expected in their creative work. Students will also understand the main concepts of signal processing, investigate how perception works, and apply their knowledge to produce innovative creations.