The department of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Hull is looking for software projects for their Masters level students and would like to invite you to submit your proposals for free software development.

As part of the fourth year of study, our candidates are required to participate in an in-house (at the University) placement where they work part-time to develop real software for real clients in small teams. These are self-managing agile teams but are supervised by a commercial manager and supported by a team of academic staff.

Each project will have a small team (usually 3-5) dedicated to it who spend around 40 working days in the office, spread between October and July. Past projects have included:

·        Mobile applications

·        Web applications and websites

·        Big data analysis and manipulation

·        Desktop and enterprise software solutions

·        Games and training software

·        Virtual and augmented reality environments

·        Research and development projects

Whilst a project which can be completed in the time available is usually well received, projects which span multiple academic years are also feasible – but, understandably, more complex and slow to develop. You’ll be working directly with the students so if a project spans multiple years you would be working with different groups.

Due to the nature of the development we cannot offer any guarantee, warrantee or assurance of completion. However, we have many successful projects that are now in regular use nationwide. As there is no associated cost, many of our clients use this service to develop prototypes, produce exemplars for funding bids or generate a sample to have developed further in the future. As we try to encourage teams to work in an agile manner, all projects should produce something of value in the time available.

All we ask in return is that you are willing and able to regularly engage with the students for meetings, to discuss your priorities and requirements and to be able to answer their questions (e.g. by email). As they typically only work 1 day per week this overhead is small.

If you are interested all we’ll need is a short (no more than a page is necessary) project proposal or outline and your contact details, sent to john.dixon@hull.ac.uk before September 13th. The students will use this proposal to understand the project and whether they are suited to it and then use it as a basis for the requirements gathering phase.