Project Report Format

This section gives basic format requirements that everyone must obey. For advice on how to organise your work into chapters, what should be covered in the main body of the work, what should go in the Appendix, etc, see the section on project structure or talk to your supervisor.

The format requirements are not overly restrictive - for example there is no requirement for you to use a particular font style. However, do not use too many different typefaces in your report, or in general spend too much time developing an elaborate visual presentation. It is better to keep the look of your project report simple and straightforward. (An elaborate presentation can in fact create a negative impression, that the author thought the material was rather thin and felt an eye-catching style might disguise this!)

By all means use plotting/drawing packages to create graphs and figures, but if, for example, it is going to take you most of a week to learn to use a drawing package, you would be better advised to hand-draw your figures neatly and get on with something else. You would lose few, if any, marks for having hand-drawn a picture, and your time is precious.

Title

As well as the title of the project, the year of submission, and your own name, you should also include the name(s) of your supervisor(s).

Disclaimer

On the title page you must include a disclaimer in the words given below.

This report is submitted as part requirement for the MSc Degree in [your degree title, 'Intelligent Systems', 'Vision Imaging & Virtual Environments', etc] at University College London. It is substantially the result of my own work except where explicitly indicated in the text.

The report may be freely copied and distributed provided the source is explicitly acknowledged.

The report will be distributed to the internal and external examiners, but thereafter may not be copied or distributed except with permission from the author.

Students are reminded that the project is an individual project and that the work submitted should be substantially your own as stated in the standard disclaimer (above) that you are required to put on your project submission.

You should identify clearly in your report:

• which work you have completed by yourself and represents your own individual contribution
• which work you have completed in conjunction with other students with whom you have collaborated (such as fellow students from your degree programme)
• which work you have incorporated from other sources, such as from previous years' students, from external sources (e.g. third party algorithms, methods, publications, source code or code libraries), or from Research Projects with which you have been allied with during your project work (e.g. those of your Supervisor or of external companies)

Abstract

On the page immediately following the title page you must have a short abstract (no more than one page in length) giving a descriptive summary of your project. You will also need to submit two unbound copies of an abstract when the time comes to hand in; you can use the same text here as for the abstract that is within your report, but please put your name, your supervisor's name and the project title on these unbound abstract copies.

Inclusion of Project Plan and Interim Reports

If you handed in these documents (which will be the case for the vast majority of you), please also put copies of them in the Appendix of your report. However you should note that you are being asked to do this in order to comply with a request from the external examiners, and that these documents will not be part of the formal internal assessment of your project by the 1st/2nd markers (see 'How your project report is marked' for more information about this) - in other words, if you didn't complete one or other of these documents for some reason, this will not be a reason for your losing marks.

Other format requirements

1. The total report length should under no circumstances exceed 120 pages; most projects are somewhat shorter. There is no value in trying to artifically lengthen your project by 'padding' it. Each project is unique and has its own natural length, and you will probably know when you have said everything that you think needs to be said. If in doubt, of course, ask your supervisor if they think you've included everything that's relevant.

2. You are strongly recommended to use 12 point type and 1.5 or double spacing. On no account should you use a typeface less than 10 points - it's unreadable! It is also preferable to use single-sided printing, as the result when bound by the departmental machine is more easily readable.

3. Pages should be numbered (in case they become accidentally separated before the report has been bound).

4. It must be possible for the whole work to be bound in a single volume.
   (NOTE: Please do not submit your project already bound - the CS department will bind it in a standard format.)

5. If you have too much code to be able to include all of it in the Appendix of your report, you must submit the rest on a CD-ROM. However in this case you must include at least 20 pages - you can print two pages on one side using the 'a2ps' printing facility in order to reduce the bulk - as we need to have some of your code easily available for examiners to assess.