Eduqas A500QS 1.6: System design
The free BugBot lessons that teach this point, a robot to try it on, and the past-paper questions that test it.
What it covers
Analysis said what the system must do. Design decides how, before any code is written. A design is a plan other people can check and build from: the modules and how they fit together, the data and where it flows, the algorithms, and what the user will see. At GCSE you decomposed problems and drew flowcharts (F4.4 and F5.2); at A level you need the diagrams that describe a whole system.
- What a design contains
- Top-down design and structure charts
- Data flow diagrams
- Designing the data
- Designing the interface
- Designing the algorithms
Or do it in the simulator, with tasks that mark themselves
Lessons that teach it
- A14.4 System design Software development, law and ethics
Structure charts, data flow diagrams, designing data, algorithms and the user interface, and printing a structure chart with recursion. - A14.9 Project: the delivery robot Software development, law and ethics
A small project taken through analysis, design, implementation, testing and evaluation, the way the NEA is written up.
Try it on a robot
The task from A14.4 System design, running here. Change the program and press Run.
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