ECON2300: Introductory Econometrics Research Project 2 October 9, 2024 Instruction Answer all questions following a similar format to the answers to your tutorial questions. When you use R to conduct empirical analysis, you should show your R scripts and outputs (e.g., screenshots for commands, tables, and figures, etc.). You will lose 2 points whenever you fail to provide R commands and outputs. When you are asked to explain or discuss something, your response should be brief and compact. To facilitate our grading work, please clearly label all your answers. You should upload your research report (in PDF or Word format) via the “Turnitin” sub- mission link (in the “Project 2” folder under “Assessment”) by 16:00 on the due date Friday, 25 Oct 2024. However, the Turnitin system may slow down as the deadline approaches due to high traffic from multiple submissions. To avoid potential issues, submit your report well in advance. This time, late submission penalties will be strictly based on the submission time recorded in the system. You are allowed to work on this assignment in groups; that is, you can discuss how to answer these questions with your group members. However, this is not a group assignment, which means that you must answer all the questions in your own words and submit your report separately. The marking system will check the similarity, and UQ’s student integrity and misconduct policies on plagiarism apply. Panel Data (35 points) Background DiTella and Schargrodsky (2004) examine how the street presence of police officers reduces car theft. Rational crime models predict that the presence of an observable police force will reduce crime rates (at least locally) due to deterrence. The causal effect is difficult to measure, however, as police forces are not allocated exogenously but rather are allocated in anticipation of need (i.e., reverse causality). The innovation in DiTella and Schargrodsky (2004) was to use the police response to a terrorist attack as an exogenous variation. In July 1994, there was a horrific terrorist attack on the main Jewish center in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Within two weeks, the federal government provided police protection to all Jewish and Muslim buildings in the country. DiTella and Schargrodsky (2004) hypothesized that their presence, while allocated to deter a terror or reprisal attack, would also deter other street crimes, such as automobile theft. The authors collected detailed information on car thefts in selected neighborhoods of Buenos Aires from April-December 1994, resulting in a panel for 876 city blocks. They hypothesized that the terrorist attack and the government’s response were exogenous to auto thievery, thus a valid treatment. They postulated that the deterrence effect would be strongest for any city block which contained a Jewish institution (and thus police protection). Potential car thieves would be deterred from a burglary due to the threat of being caught. The deterrence effect was expected to weaken as the distance from the protected sites increased. Their sample has 37 blocks with Jewish institutions (the treatment sample) and 839 blocks without an institution (the control sample). Questions Use the data set DS2004 .csv to estimate the following regression model: theftsit = β0 + β1Dit + uit , (1) where the subscripts i and t label city blocks and months respectively, Dit = sameblocki × post-attack t, and post-attackt is a binary variable indicating months in the data after the terrorist attack; i.e., post-attackt = 1 if month ≥ 8, and 0, otherwise. See the definitions for variables thefts and samebloack in the data description. For all the questions below, exclude observations for July. (a) (3 points) Is this a balanced panel? Hint: Use the is.pbalanced() function in the plm package. (b) (7 points) Estimate β1 in (1) with OLS and compute the cluster-robust standard error (SE) (3 points). Why is it important to use clustered standard errors for the regression (2 points)? Do the results change if you just use heteroskedasticity-robust standard errors for cross-section model (2 points)? (c) (5 points) Control time (month) fixed effects in model (1) and test if there are significant time fixed effects. Hint: Consider including month dummies. (d) (10 points) Extend model (1) to estimate the deterrence effect of the street presence of police officers using a difference-in-differences (DID) approach and compute the cluster- robust SE (5 points). Give your estimation result a causal interpretation (5 points). (e) (5 points) Add time (month) fixed effects δt to (1) and write uit = αi + eit. Then model (1) extends to theftsit = β0 + β1Dit + αi + δt + eit. (2) Treat αi in (2) as entity (block) fixed effects, estimate β1 with fixed effects (FE) method (entity demeaning), and compute the cluster-robust SE. (f) (5 points) The data has the dummy variable oneblock which indicates if the city block is one block away from a protected institution. Extend the FE regression in (e) by including one additional treatment variable–oneblock interacted with the post-attack dummy. Use this model to test if the deterrence effect extends beyond the same block? Binary Choice Models (30 points) You want to study female labor force participation using a sample of 872 women from Switzer- land (swiss.csv). The dependent variable is participation (=1 if in labor force), which you regress on all further variables plus age squared; i.e., on income, education (years of schooling), age, age2 , numbers of younger and older children (youngkids and oldkids), and on the factor foreign, which indicates citizenship (=1 if not Swiss). (a) (10 points) Run this regression using a linear probability model (LPM) and report the regression results (4 points). Test if age is a statistically significant determinant of female labor force participation (3 points). Is there evidence of a nonlinear effect of age on the probability of being employed (3 points)? (b) (10 points) Repeat (a) using probit and logit regression models and report your results. (c) (5 points) Use the probit model to compute the predicted probability of being in the labor force for a Swiss female (A) with median income and age of the sample, 12 years of schooling, one young kid, and no old kid. (d) (5 points) Keeping all other factors the same as in (c), consider another Swiss female (B) with the 75th percentile age of the sample. Compute the difference in the predicted probabilities of being in the labor force between A and B. IV and TSLS (35 points) Use the following regression model and dataset cigbwght .csv to estimate the effects of several variables, including cigarette smoking, on the weight of newborns: log(bwght) = β0+ β1male + β2parity + β3log(faminc) + β4smoke + u, (3) where male is a dummy variable equal to 1 if the child is male; parity is the birth order of this child; faminc is family income (in $1000); and smoke is a dummy variable equal to 1 if the mother smoked during pregnancy. (a) (7 points) Estimate regression equation (3) using OLS and report regression results (3 points). Interpret the estimated coefficient on smoke (2 points) and test if the population coefficient β4 is zero at the 1% significance level (2 points). (b) (8 points) Some studies suggest that smoking during pregnancy may have different impacts on male and female babies. Modify the specification of the regression model (3) and test this hypothesis (4 points). In your modified model, does smoke still has significant (at 5% level) effects on the weight of newborns (2 points)? Explain your answer using test results (2 points). Hint: You don’t need to report regression results here, but writing out your modified regression model may be helpful. (c) (6 points) One of your classmates expresses her concern about the validity of your re- gression analysis and argues that there may be unobserved health factors correlated with smoking behavior that affect infant birth weight. For example, women who smoke during pregnancy may, on average, drink more coffee or alcohol, or eat less nutritious meals. If this is the case, do you think the OLS estimates you obtained in (a) are unbiased (con- sistent) (2 points)? Explain your answer (2 points). Is this a threat to your regression analysis’s internal or external validity (2 points)? (d) (4 points) You classmate then propose to use cigarette tax (cigtax) in each woman’s state of residence as an instrumental variable (IV) for smoke and run a two-stage least squares (TSLS) regression to estimate (3). Take her suggestion and report your TSLS regression results. (e) (10 points) Are coefficients of model (3) exactly identified, overidentified, or underidenti- fied (2 points)? Does this TSLS regression suffer from the weak IV problem (2 points)? Why or why not (2 points)? Is it possible to test the exogeneity of cigtax as an IV for smoke (2 points)? Explain your answer (2 points).
Homework 3 This homework is worth a total of 100 points. Each question is worth 20 points. 1. What are the main motivations for reducing a dataset’s dimensionality? What are the main drawbacks? 2. Suppose you perform. PCA on a 1,000-dimensional dataset, setting the explained variance ratio to 95%. How many dimensions will the resulting dataset have? 3. How can you evaluate the performance of a dimensionality reduction algorithm on your dataset? 4. How would you define clustering? Can you name a few clustering algorithms? 5. What are some of the main applications of clustering algorithms?
Homework 2 This homework is worth a total of 100 points. Problem 1 is optional and will not be included in your final score. However, it is highly recommended that you complete this section. Problem 2 - "Short Questions" is mandatory and will be graded. Problem 1 The TensorFlow playground is a handy neural network simulator built by the TensorFlow team. In this exercise, you will train several binary classifiers injust a few clicks, and tweak the model’s architecture and its hyperparameters to gain some intuition on how neural networks work and what their hyperparameters do. Take some time to explore the following: 1. The patterns learned by a neural net. Try training the default neural network by clicking the Run button (top left). Notice how it quickly finds a good solution for the classification task. The neurons in the first hidden layer have learned simple patterns, while the neurons in the second hidden layer have learned to combine the simple patterns of the first hidden layer into more complex patterns. In general, the more layers there are, the more complex the patterns can be. 2. Activation functions. Try replacing the tanh activation function with a ReLU activation function, and train the network again. Notice that it finds a solution even faster, but this time the boundaries are linear. This is due to the shape of the ReLU function. 3. The risk of local minima. Modify the network architecture to have just one hidden layer with three neurons. Train it multiple times (to reset the network weights, click the Reset button next to the Play button). Notice that the training time varies a lot, and sometimes it even gets stuck in a local minimum. 4. What happens when neural nets are too small. Remove one neuron to keep just two. Notice that the neural network is now incapable of finding a good solution, even if you try multiple times. The model has too few parameters and systematically underfits the training set. 5. What happens when neural nets are large enough. Set the number of neurons to eight, and train the network several times. Notice that it is now consistently fast and never gets stuck. This highlights an important finding in neural network theory: large neural networks rarely get stuck in local minima, and even when they do these local optima are often almost as good as the global optimum. However, they can still get stuck on long plateaus for a long time. 6. The risk of vanishing gradients in deep networks. Select the spiral dataset (the bottom-right dataset under “DATA”), and change the network architecture to have four hidden layers with eight neurons each. Notice that training takes much longer and often gets stuck on plateaus for long periods of time. Also notice that the neurons in the highest layers (on the right) tend to evolve faster than the neurons in the lowest layers (on the left). This problem, called the vanishing gradients problem, can be alleviated with better weight initialization and other techniques, better optimizers (such as AdaGrad or Adam), or batch normalization. 7. Go further. Take an hour or so to play around with other parameters and get a feel for what they do, to build an intuitive understanding about neural networks. Problem 2 Each question is worth 10 points. For Problems 3 and 6: . Please submit your work by providing the following files: 1. The Jupyter Notebook/Lab file in .ipynb format. 2. The converted .html version of the Jupyter Notebook/Lab. . Ensure that your notebook includes: 。 Clear comments and documentation explaining each step of your process. 。 A detailed description of both the process and the results to demonstrate your understanding. 1. What is the fundamental idea behind support vector machines? 2. Why is it important to scale the inputs when using SVMs? 3. Train an SVM classifier on the wine dataset, which you can load using sklearn.datasets.load_wine() . This dataset contains the chemical analyses of 178 wine samples produced by 3 different cultivators: the goal is to train a classification model capable of predicting the cultivator based on the wine’s chemical analysis. Since SVM classifiers are binary classifiers, you will need to use one-versus-all to classify all three classes. What accuracy can you reach? 4. What is the approximate depth of a decision tree trained (without restrictions) on a training set with one million instances? 5. If a decision tree is underfitting the training set, is it a good idea to try scaling the input features? 6. Train and fine-tune a decision tree for the moons dataset by following these steps: a. Use make_moons(n_samples=10000, noise=0.4) to generate a moons dataset. b. Use train_test_split() to split the dataset into a training set and a test set. c. Use grid search with cross-validation (with the help of the GridSearchCV class) to find good hyperparameter values for a DecisionTreeClassifier . Hint: try various values for max_leaf_nodes . d. Train it on the full training set using these hyperparameters, and measure your model’s performance on the test set. You should get `roughly 85% to 87% accuracy. 7. Why was the sigmoid activation function a key ingredient in training the first MLPs? 8. Name three popular activation functions. Can you draw them? 9. Suppose you have an MLP composed of one input layer with 10 passthrough neurons, followed by one hidden layer with 50 artificial neurons, and finally one output layer with 3 artificial neurons. All artificial neurons use the ReLU activation function. 1. What is the shape of the input matrix X? 2. What are the shapes of the hidden layer’s weight matrix Wh and bias vector bh? 3. What are the shapes of the output layer’s weight matrix Wo and bias vector bo? 4. What is the shape of the network’s output matrix Y? 5. Write the equation that computes the network’s output matrix Y as a function of X, Wh, bh, Wo, and bo. 10. How many neurons do you need in the output layer if you want to classify email into spam or ham? What activation function should you use in the output layer? If instead you want to tackle MNIST, how many neurons do you need in the output layer, and which activation function should you use? What about for getting your network to predict housing prices?
Sustainability and Construction Innovation Paper Code 6030 Assessment 2 – Individual Presentation 1. Learning Outcome 1: Students will be able to understand the principles of sustainable construction and its importance in mitigating environmental impact. 2. Learning Outcome 2: Students can analyse innovative construction techniques and technologies to reduce carbon emissions and promote resource efficiency. 3. Learning Outcome 3: Students can evaluate sustainable construction practices’ economic and social implications on project development and community well-being. 4. Learning Outcome 4: Students can develop strategies for integrating sustainability considerations into sustainable construction practices’ economic and social implications in construction project planning, design and execution. 5. Learning Outcome 5: Students can critically assess case studies of sustainable construction projects to identify best practices and lessons learnt. Assessment Instructions Instructions: ● Each student will select a specific case study from the provided outline or propose a related topic for approval. The topic should align with the course aim and learning outcomes. ● Conduct in-depth research on the chosen topic, gathering information from reliable sources such as academic journals, industry reports, and reputable websites. Utilise a variety of sources to gather comprehensive and up-to-date information. ● You can use resources as long as they are obtained legally and the process is ethical. Cheating or plagiarism is strictly prohibited. You can collaborate and discuss with your peers and share resources, including course notes, reading materials, library resources, websites, and other sources. However, it is important to avoid copying from each other when completing this assessment. Presentation Delivery: ● Prepare visual aids such as slides, diagrams, and images to enhance the clarity and effectiveness of your presentation. Ensure the visual aids are well-designed, concise, and support your key points. ● Deliver your presentation in a clear, confident, and engaging manner. Use appropriate language and visuals to effectively communicate your ideas. Pay attention to your body language, eye contact, and vocal tone to maintain audience interest. Presentation Structure: ● For this course, you must present the findings of four case studies. The presentation should effectively communicate the key points and outcomes for each section. Use the following structure to organise your presentation: Introduction: • Provide a brief overview of your presentation, including its objectives, key findings, and principal conclusions. • Summarise the main points of your presentation concisely and compellingly. • Introduce the importance of sustainability in the construction industry and how it relates to building design and construction processes. • Discuss the current challenges and opportunities facing sustainable outcomes in New Zealand. • Highlight the significance of innovation for addressing these challenges and improving sustainable practices. Part 1: Innovative Approaches for Sustainability • Select two case studies that demonstrate innovative approaches to improving sustainability in building design and construction in New Zealand. • Explain in detail the innovative techniques employed and their resulting sustainability outcomes. • Use visuals, examples, and data to effectively demonstrate the success of these approaches. Part 2: Building and Environmental Legislation and Industry Initiatives • Present two case studies that show the application of building and environmental legislation and industry initiatives to improve sustainability in building design and construction in New Zealand. • Discuss the specific legislative measures or industry initiatives implemented and their impact on sustainability outcomes. • Use evidence and examples to highlight the effectiveness of these measures in promoting sustainable practices. Conclusion: • Summarise the key findings of your research and provide a cohesive conclusion based on the information presented in the body sections. • Emphasise the importance of sustainable practices and the role of innovation, legislation, and industry initiatives in achieving sustainable building design and construction. Ensure the audience understands sustainability’s significance and potential impact in the construction industry. ● Weightage 50% = 100 marks ● Assessment Grading: The grades in this program are determined by the level of achievement in learning outcomes addressed through assessment points. All assessments are compulsory and must be attempted to pass each paper. Final Grades for the papers are recorded as %age Mark Range Grade Definition 90-100% A+ PASS 85-89% A PASS 80-84% A- PASS 75-79% B+ PASS 70-74% B PASS 65-69% B- PASS 60-64% C+ PASS 55-59% C PASS 50-54% C- PASS 40-49% D FAIL 0-39% F CLEAR FAIL
STORYTELLING: PHOTOGRAPHY & WEB MEDIA 4MEST001W Module Handbook BA CONTEMPORARY MEDIA PRACTICE 2024-2025 College of Design, Creative and Digital Industries MODULE OUTLINE This module establishes the interrelationship between media theory and practice by introducing theoretical and conceptual frameworks that underpin creativity in the contemporary media arts industries. This interconnectedness is reflected in the assessment structure, which comprises an interdisciplinary Storytelling Project (70%) and a Written Essay (30%) to be chosen from a series of questions based on themes and debates addressed throughout the module. As such, the module develops key academic and creative skills for critical research and analysis. MODULE AIMS • To contextualise creative media arts socially, politically and culturally. • To develop a critical understanding of media creativity and the important relationship between media arts practice and theory in conceptual development. • To introduce students to a range of key creative technologies for interactive media practice, photography, and web media. • To develop an understanding of storytelling through image, sequence and interactive narrative. • To develop the ability to research and communicate critically and analytically. • To develop collaborative skills and visual and verbal communication skills LEARNING OUTCOMES Note: Learning Outcomes describe the minimum acceptable (threshold) standards, and students must therefore achieve all Learning Outcomes to pass the module. By the end of the module the successful student will be able to: Knowledge and Understanding (KU): LO1. Display an awareness of a range of approaches to media arts practice, and associated theoretical frameworks LO2. Respond to set topics by drawing from established and emerging media debates and theories Professional and Personal Practice (PPP): LO3. Apply given methods to the close reading and analysis of media texts and contexts Key Transferable Skills (KTS): LO4. Communicate effectively in audio-visual and written work using appropriate academic protocols LO5. Undertake guided theoretical research to respond to set tasks LO6. Work effectively on group and individual projects, completing work to schedule TEACHING AND LEARNING METHODS Teaching and learning methods Indicative teaching and learning methods (with typical scheduled / supervised time for each student): - Lectures and seminars introduce key ideas and debates - Group and individual tutorials support students in completing the set tasks - Presentations of research enable students to share learning - Completion of the ICMP Project through the use of supervised technical facilities and/or work on location but will vary according to individual need. In addition to scheduled sessions, students are expected to undertake creative and contextual research, including set readings, during their self-managed study time. The approximate balance between taught activities is shown in the table below. Activity type Category Student learning and teaching hours* Lecture Scheduled 22 Seminar Scheduled 22 Tutorial Scheduled 1 Project supervision Scheduled Not applicable Demonstration Scheduled Not applicable Practical Classes and workshops Scheduled 36 Supervised time in studio/workshop Scheduled 15 Total Scheduled 96 Independent study Independent 304 Total student learning and teaching hours 400 *the hours per activity type are indicative and subject to change. MODULE STRUCTURE The module is delivered in two sessions per week and follows the same pattern most weeks, but please ensure that you refer to the schedule below and your online timetable to ensure that you don’t miss anything. - Tuesday 2-4pm – Lectures and Seminars - Fridays 10-5pm – Practice There is also one additional workshop on Tuesday 1st October at 12, which is an induction to the Photography studios. You must attend this session to be able to use the studios. Week Dates Tuesday - Lecture 2-4pm Friday (10am-5pm) 1 24/09/24 & 27/09/24 Introduction to the module (EA) Introduction to Photography and SLR cameras – studio and on location (JL) 2 01/10/24 & 04/10/24 Studio Induction (12-1pm) Ways of seeing (2-4pm) (TV) Studio lighting (JL) 3 08/10/24 & 11/10/24 Thinking About Photography: From Image to Visual Perception(EA) Studio Digital SLRs(JL) 4 15/10/24 & 18/10/24 Introduction to Visual Communication (TV) Scanning: storytelling with images, composition, framing (JL) 5 22/10/24 & 25/10/24 Realism, Ideology and Disinformation (EA) Image Postproduction (JL) 6 29/10/24 & 01/11/24 Interactive Narratives and Transmedia Storytelling (EA) Moving Image 1 (JL) 7 05/11/24 & 08/11/24 Academic Skills: Essay Development (EA) Moving Image 2 (JL) 8 12/11/24 & 15/11/24 Histories of the Internet (TV) Introduction to Coding (EA) 9 19/11/24 & 22/11/24 Convergence & Participatory Cultures (EA) Graphic Design and Wireframing (TV) 10 26/11/24 & 30/11/24 Creativity in the Age of Gen AI (TV) Intro to Web Platforms (TV) 11 03/12/24 & 06/12/24 Digital Identities and Metaverse (EA) Project Development (TV) 12 10/12/24 & 13/12/24 Essay Tutorials (EA/JL) Crit Week – all must attend
School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering Semester One Examinations, 2023 COMP3400 Functional and Logic Programming §Very Short Answer Question 1. [20 marks] The following ten questions are worth two marks each for a total of 20 marks. Part (a) [2 marks] A Pythagorean triplet is a triplet of positive integers (a, b, c) such that a2 + b2 = c2. Write a Haskell expression that produces a list of a hundred Pythagorean triplets. Part (b) [2 marks] Define a function f so that > : type f f :: (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a up to renaming the type variables. Your implementation does not have to be total. Part (c) [2 marks] The zip of two lists xs and ys is given by [(x,y) | x y then ys else y:[] Part (h) [2 marks] What is the β-normal form of λx.x(λy.y)x? Part (i) [2 marks] Using the applicative for Either write a Haskell expression that adds Right 1 and Right 2 to get Right 3. Part (j) [2 marks] Define map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b] using the fold r function. §Short Answer The following eight questions are worth five marks each for a total of 40 marks. Question 2. [5 marks] Give the β normal form for the following λ-calculus expression or show the expression is divergent. (λx.xx)(λy.y)(λz.z9)(λy.y) Question 3. [5 marks] Suppose there is an Integer in the name password which has global scope. Implement the function verify :: IO () that gives a user three tries to guess the password. Example usage in REPL: > password = 1234 > verify Prompt: 2 Prompt: 10 Prompt: 7 Failure . > verify Prompt: 1234 Success Question 4. [5 marks] Part (a) [3 marks] Write a function group :: Eq a => [a] -> [[a]] that groups adjacent equivalent items in the following way > group [1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 4, 4, 1] [[1,1],[2,2,2],[3],[4,4,4],[1]] Hint: Recall the functions dropWhile and takeWhile of type (a -> Bool) -> [a] -> [a]. Part (b) [2 marks] Using afold write a function biggest :: [[a]] -> [a] to find the largest group. If there are ties, the group with least index in the input is returned. > biggest $ group [1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 4, 4, 1] [2,2,2] Question 5. [5 marks] Consider the higher-order function unfold unfold p h t x | p x = [] | otherwise = h x : unfold p h t (t x) Part (a) [2 marks] What is the type of unfold? Part (b) [3 marks] Define map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b] using unfold. Question 6. [5 marks] Write a Haskell function numSums :: Integer -> [Integer] -> Integer where numSums target xs is the number of ways the target can be computed by summing members of xs. Preconditions: The members of xs are distinct and positive non-zero. > numSums 30 [25, 10, 5] 5 because 25+5, 10+10+10, 10+10+5+5, 10+5+5+5+5, and 5+5+5+5+5+5 are the comprehensive ways you can make thirty from a 25, 10, and 5. Question 7. [5 marks] Define the norm of a list xs to be given by norm xs = (sum $ map (^2) xs) ** 0.5 (the square root of the sum of squares of the list’s elements). Part (a) [3 marks] Define a function trNorm :: Float -> [Float] -> Float. that computes the norm of a list tail recursively. Part (b) [2 marks] Give an iteration invariant and bound value that proves the correctness of trNorm. Do not prove that your function satisfies this invariant or that your bound value is valid – just state them. Question 8. [5 marks] Define a function mapMaybe :: (a -> b) -> [Maybe a] -> Maybe [b] which maps a function over a list of Maybe a. If Nothing is in the input list the answer is Nothing: > mapMaybe (>0) [Just 1, Just 0, Just 2] Just [True,False,True] > mapMaybe (>0) [Just 1, Nothing, Just 2] Nothing Question 9. [5 marks] Define a custom data type Walker a and the functions fromList :: [a] -> Maybe (Walker a); fromList [] = Nothing stepL :: Walker a -> Walker a stepR :: Walker a -> Walker a peek :: Walker a -> a so that we have the following functionality: > Just xs = fromList [1,2,3,4] > peek xs 1 > peek $ stepR xs 2 > peek $ stepL xs 1 > peek $ (stepR . stepR) xs 3 > peek $ (stepL . stepR . stepR) xs 2 > peek $ (stepR . stepR . stepR . stepR) xs 4 §Long Answer Show your work. Unsupported solutions will receive little or no credit. Question 10. [10 marks] Consider the following datatype for representing polynomials with integer degree and coef- ficients from a: data Polynom a = Mono a Integer | Add (Polynom a) (Polynom a) | Mul (Polynom a) (Polynom a) deriving (Show, Eq) For instance, 2x4 + 3x + 1 is given by Add (Add (Mono 2 4) (Mono 3 1)) (Mono 1 0). Part (a) [3 marks] Define a functor for Polynom that maps a function over the coefficients: > (+1) Add (Add (Mono 2 4) (Mono 3 1)) (Mono 1 0) Add (Add (Mono 3 4) (Mono 4 1)) (Mono 2 0) > (/2) Add (Mul (Mono 1 2) (Mono 3 4)) (Mono 5 6) Add (Mul (Mono 0.5 2) (Mono 1.5 4)) (Mono 2.5 6) Part (b) [7 marks] Prove fmap id = id (i.e. the first functor law) for your functor.
Homework 3 Question 1 A local garage has only one worker who works a normal eight-hour per day. Local people come to repair their cars with an arrival pattern of people following a Poisson (random) distribution, with a mean of 10 people coming to the garagel each day during the eight-hour interval. The distribution of time spent by a car to be repaired is exponential, with a mean of 30 minutes. The garage receives complains from costumers, being reported that indi-viduals often wait over 45 minutes to be served and more than 75 minutes in the queue and being served. The owner knows that the worker works only 5 hours out of 8, on the average and thinks that the customers are wrong. Are the customers right? If yes, what could the owner do? [35 marks] Question 2. Consider that an office printer can print an average file in one minute. Every seventy five seconds somebody sends another file to the printer. a. How long does it take for a user to get the print job? b. To increase efficiency, the company buys another printer that is exactly the same as the old one. What is the reduction in time for a user to get their file printed when two printers are available? c. If instead of buying a second printer, the existing printer is replaced with one that can print a file in an average of thirty seconds, how long does it take for a user to get their output with the faster printer? d. Which of the case b) or c) leads to a shorter time? [35 marks] Question 3. A small dental practice with only one dentist can hold only three patients, one being treated and two waiting. Additional customers are turned away when the system is full. On the average, a patient arrives at the dental practice every half an hour and the dentist usually spends 20 minutes to service one patient. a. What is the waiting time for each patient before being treated? b. What is the rate of patients being turned away due to the clinic being full? [30 marks]
Homework #4 Nuclear and Solar Energy Question 1 Carry out the rudimentary design of a small modular nuclear reactor that delivers 100 MWe. The reactor is based on a Rankine cycle where the steam is expanded in a turbine from 12.5 MPa and 350°C to condensed water at 5 kPa.Assume that the generator is 98% efficient, the actual cycle achieves 90% of the efficiency of the ideal cycle, and 90% of the thermal energy released in the nuclear reactions is transferred to the working fluid. If the reactor uses uranium as a fuel which is enriched to 3% U-235, what mass of fuel is consumed each year? Provide your answer in kg/year. Question 2 What is the flow rate of steam in kg/s required when the reactor in problem 1 is running at full power? Provide your answer in kg/s. Question 3 Suppose in Problem 1 that the reactor has a capital cost of $1500/kWe costs $5 million per year for refueling, and $6 million per year for nonfuel maintenance costs. If the project lifetime is 25 years and MARR=6%, what is the levelized cost of electricity per kWh? Provide your answer in $/kWh. Question 4 A reactor has a rated capacity of 1 GWe and produces 7.9 billion kWh/year. It is fueled using fuel rods that contain 2.5% U-235 by mass. The electric generator is 98% efficient, the thermal cycle of the plant is 33% efficient and 90% of the thermal energy released in fission is transferred to the working fluid. What is the capacity factor of the plant? (The capacity factor is the actual output divided by hypothetical output if the plant had operated at maximum capacity for the entire year). Provide your answer as a percentage (ex. If your answer is 0.123, enter '12.3'). Question 5 For the reactor in Problem 4, What is the rate of U-235 consumption in milligrams/second in order to deliver the average output? Question 6 For the reactor in Problem 4, what is the total mass of fuel rods consumed each year? Provide your answer in kg/year. Question 7 For the reactor of Problem 4 and based on the amount of energy released in fission reactions, what is the reduction in mass of fuel each year? Provide your answer in kg/year. Question 8 Consider a photovoltaic cell, which achieves a 97% collection efficiency for photons in the range of energy values from 1.5 × 10-19 J to 6.00 × 10-19 The absorption coefficient is 82%. Photons arrive at the surface of the panel at a rate of. Photon energy values have a Weibull distribution with measured in units of. Using the Weibull probability distribution for frequency of photons as a function of energy, calculate / for this device. Provide your answer in A/m2. Weibull probability density function: Question 9 Given a PV cell with light current 0.035 A/cm2 and saturation current 1.5 x 10-10 A/cm2, calculate maximum voltage if the ambient temperature is 32°C. Use parameter m=1. Provide your answer in mV. (Ex., if your answer is 0.1234 V, enter '123.4'). Question 10 Given a PV cell with light current 0.035 A/cm2 and saturation current 1.5 x 10-10 A/cm2, calculate maximum current if the ambient temperature is 32C. Use parameter m = 1. Provide your answer in mA/cm2. Question 11 1. Given a PV cell with light current 0.035 A/cm2 and saturation current 1.5x 10-10 A/cm2, calculate fill factor if the ambient temperature is 32°C. Use parameter m = 1. Provide your answer as a percentage. (Ex, if your answer is 0.123, enter '12.3').
INFOSYS 306 Digital Business and Innovation Tutorial 6 Objectives This tutorial aims to • deepen your understanding of the platform lifecycle Tasks 1. Instagram has attempted to evolve by launching its online marketplace in March 2019. You may read more about it at https://business.instagram.com/shopping. Is this an envelopment? What benefits can Instagram and content creators reap from the marketplace? 2. Josh Petersen, an Amazon employee, once said, “We sold more books today that didn't sell at all yesterday than we sold today of all the books that did sell yesterday” at Amazon. What business phenomenon/model/strategy does this statement describe? Explain why it cannot work well in an offline context but can work well for digital businesses. 3. Continue with the group assignment.
STAT3600 Linear Statistical Analysis Class Test 1. Consider a linear regression model when Y is regressed on X for 21 observations. It is given that (a) Calculate the least squares estimates of the intercept and the slope. (b) Prove that where and are the LSE of the intercept and slope, respectively. (c) Calculate the sum of squared errors and the unbiased estimate of the variance of the error. (d) Calculate the coefficient of determination. Interpret the result. 2. You are given the following matrices computed for a regression analysis yi = β0 + β1xi1 + β2xi2 + ∈i as The matrices are properly ordered according to the regression equation given above. (a) Calculate the least squares estimates of the regression coefficients.Describe the effects of the regressors on the response variable quantitatively. (b) Construct the analysis of variance table and hence, test whether there is a regression among Y and X1 and X2 at the 5% level of significance. State the alternatives, decision rule and conclusion. (c) Test the hypothesis that H0 : β1 = β2 at the 5% level of significance. State the decision rule and conclusion. State the null and alternative hypotheses, decision rule and conclusion. (d) Estimate the mean Y for two cases where = (0, 1) and = (1, 0). Construct the 95% simultaneous confidence intervals for the expected values by the Scheffes method.
INTE2401/2402/2691 Cloud Security Assignment 3 Assessment Type: Individual assignment; no group work. Submit online via Canvas →Assignments →Assignment 3. Marks awarded for meeting requirements as closely as possible. Clarifications/updates may be made via announcements/relevant discussion forums. Due date: Week 12, Sunday the 1nd June 2024 11:59pm As this is a major assignment in which you demonstrate your understanding, a university standard late penalty of 10% per each working day applies for up to 5 working days late, unless special consideration has been granted. Weighting: 35 marks (Contributes 35% of the total Grade) 1. Overview The objective of Assignment 3 is evaluating your knowledge on the topics covered mainly from Lecture 9 to 11. Topics include Data Privacy Protection Techniques, AWS Identity Management and Database Security, and AWS VPN and Firewall Practices. However, topics covered from Lecture 1 to 8 are required as prerequisite. Assignment 3 will focus on developing your abilities in application of knowledge, critical analysis, decision making and using AWS security services. Assignment 3 contains several problems related to the topics mentioned above. You are required to prepare your answers and programming codes, videos and upload them as a single zip file in CANVAS. In this assignment, there are 4 (four) questions in total. Question Q1 is about how to protect cloud data privacy with Homomorphic Encryption. To protect our data privacy in cloud and meanwhile allow the cloud server to process our data, the best solution is using homomorphic encryption scheme, e.g., Paillier encryption scheme, to protect our data in the cloud. In this question, you are expected to understand how homormphic encrytion technique can be used to protect your data privacy in Cloud and analyse data privacy. Question Q2 is about Key Recovery with Shamir Secret Sharing. In Question Q1, the decryption key of homomorphic encryption is required when decrypting the ciphertexts downloaded from the cloud. If you lost your decryption key, you would lose all of your date stored in the cloud. In this question, you are expected to use Shamir’s secret sharing scheme to recover your decryption key of homomorphic encryption. Question 3 is about Secure Data Management via Amazon S3. Amazon S3 is an object storage service that offers industry- leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance. Amazon S3 provides easy-to-use management features so you can organize your data and configure finely-tuned access controls to meet your specific business, organizational, and compliance requirements. In this question, you are expected to demonstrate your understanding of how to create three secure buckets in Amazon S3 to keep the data from the three departments of a company, respectively. Question Q4 is about AWS Virtual Private Network (AWS VPN). AWS Client VPN is a managed client-based VPN service that enables you to securely access your AWS resources in your on-premises network. With Client VPN, you can access your resources from any location using an OpenVPN-based VPN client. Client VPN offers the following features and functionality: secure connections, authentication, granular control, ease of use and etc. In this question, you are expected to demonstrate your understanding of how to create an AWS VPN server for a company and allow the staff of the company to get access to the AWS VPN server and then AWS VPC. Develop this assignment in an iterative fashion (as opposed to completing it in one sitting). You should be able to start preparing your answers immediately after Lecture 9 (in Week 9). At the end of each week starting from Week 9 to Week 11, you should be able to solve at least one question. If there are questions, you may ask via the relevant Canvas discussion forums in a general manner. 2. Learning Outcomes This assessment is relevant to the following Learning Outcomes: • Demonstrate knowledge of cloud security principles and mechanisms • Demonstrate computer programming and configuration skills required to develop a cloud security infrastructure • Identify cloud security weaknesses by recognising and discovering threats and vulnerabilities to cloud computing • Problem solve how to fix cloud security weaknesses and mitigate security threats to cloud computing • Demonstrate knowledge and skills to prepare for industry cloud security certificate exams, e.g. CCSK, CCSP. • Communicate clearly and effectively using the technical language of the field correctly. 3. Submission You must follow the following special instructions: • You must use the values provided in the questions. • Hand-written answers are not allowed and will not be assessed. Compose your answers using any word processing software (e.g. MS Word). • You are required to show all of the steps and intermediate results for each question. • For Questions 3 and 4, use screen shots to show clearly the outcome of each step you took to arrive at your answers. And, also include videos to demonstrate your configurations. • Upload your answers together with programming codes and videos as a single zip file in CANVAS. This assessment will determine your ability to: • Follow requirements provided in this document and in the lessons. • Independently solve a problem by using security concepts, principles and mechanisms taught over the course. • Meeting deadlines. After the due date, you will have 5 business days to submit your assignment as a late submission. Late submissions will incur a penalty of 10% per day. After these five days, Canvas will be closed and you will lose ALL the assignment marks. 4. Assessment details Please ensure that you have read Section 1 to 3 of this document before going further. Assessment details (i.e. question Q1 to Q4) are provided in the next page. Q1. Data Privacy Protection with Homomorphic Encryption (Marks: 2+2+2+2+2=10) In cloud computing, you may store your data in cloud. Although the cloud server is able to protect your data against various attacks from the outside, it cannot guarrantee your data privacy if your data is not encrypted by youself. The cloud data administrator may be able to get access to your plain data stored in cloud and reveal the privacy of your data. To protect your data privacy in cloud and meanwhile allow the cloud server to process your data, the best solution is using homomorphic encryption scheme, e.g., Paillier encryption scheme, to protect your data in the cloud as shown in Figure 1. Figure 1. Homomorphic Encryption Assume that you want to store your monthly incomes in the first quarter in the cloud and decide to use the Paillier encryption scheme to encrypt the incomes and upload them to the cloud. (1) Use the tool https://www.mobilefish.com/services/rsa_key_generation/rsa_key_generation.php to generate your public key for Paillier encryption and determine your private key for Paillier decryption. The size of the modulo is required to be 1024 bits. (2) Use your public key to encrypt your monthly incomes from January to March and upload the ciphertexts to the cloud. Assume that your monthly income is MD5( ID ||the month) (mod 10000). What are the three ciphertexts? ID set as s4001812 (3) How does the cloud server compute the encryption of the sum of your monthly salaries for these 3 months (assume that the cloud server returns one encrypted result to you)? What is the ciphertext computed by the cloud server? (4) How do you decrypt the encrypted result to get the sum of your monthly salaries for these 3 months? Show the steps in detail. (5) Implement Paillier encryption algorithm (submit your code) and verify your encryption results in (2). Q2. Key Recovery with Secret Sharing (Marks: 2+2+2+2+2=10) In Question Q1, the decryption key of homomorphic encryption is required when decrypting the ciphertexts downloaded from the cloud. If you lost your decryption key, you would lose all of your date stored in the cloud. In order to be able to recover your decryption key, suppose that you decide to use Shamir’s secret sharing scheme. Shamir's Secret Sharing is an approach to share secret, where a secret is divided into parts, giving each participant its own unique part. To reconstruct the original secret, a minimum number of parts is required. Following Shamir’s secret sharing scheme, suppose that you divide your decryption key into 4 parts, storing 4 parts in four different clouds as shown in Figure 2. If you lost your decryption key, you should be able to recover it with any 3 parts. Figure 2. Key recovery with Shamir’s scheme (1) Select a suitable polynomial (using s4001812 as one of the coefficient and determining what Paillier key parameter in Question 1 should be considered as the secret); (2) Divide your Paillier key parameter into 4 shares (assume uploading them onto 4 different clouds, respectively); (3) Recover your Paillier key parameter with any 3 of 4 shares (show the steps in detail); (4) Implement (1)-(3) with JavaScript. (submit your codes); (5) Analyse the security of your Paillier key parameter in the case of 2 of the 4 clouds collude to derive your decryption key. Q3. Secure Data Management via Amazon S3 (Marks: 2+2+2+2+2=10) Overview “Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) is an object storage service that offers industry-leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance. Amazon S3 provides easy-to-use management features so you can organize your data and configure finely-tuned access controls to meet your specific business, organizational, and compliance requirements”. ➢ AWS S3 Developer Guide This task requires you to demonstrate your knowledge of cloud security principles by creating secure buckets in Amazon S3. Task Suppose that you are an IT manager for a company with three departments – marketing, sales and services. The CEO of the company decides to move all company data to Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3). For this purpose, you are required to create three buckets in Amazon S3 to keep the data from the three departments, respectively, as shown in Figure 3. Figure 3. AWS S3 Questions Assume that Alice, Bob are two staff in the marketing department, Smith and Turdy are two staff in the sales department, and Charlie is a staff in the service department. 3.1. In order for the five staff to upload and download data to and from Amazon S3, create user accounts for them (please accounts’ name as s4001812a, s4001812b, s4001812c, s4001812d, s4001812e). 3.2. In order to protect data privacy between departments, different department buckets should be encrypted by different secret keys. Generate the marketing key, the sales key, and the services key, respectively. 3.3 Allow Alice and Bob to access the marketing key, Smith and Trudy to access the sales key, and Charlie to access the services key. 3.4 Create three buckets in S3 for the marketing, sales and services departments, respectively. 3.5 Encrypt the marketing, sales and services department buckets with the marketing key, the sales key, and the services key, respectively. ➢ For Question 3.1 to 3.5, use screen shots with a video to show clearly the outcome of each step you took to arrive at your response. Your responses will be assessed for clarity, completeness and correctness. Q4. Create AWS Client Virtual Private Network (Marks: 1+1+1+1+1=5) Overview “AWS Client VPN is a managed client-based VPN service that enables you to securely access your AWS resources and resources in your on-premises network. With Client VPN, you can access your resources from any location using an OpenVPN-based VPN client.” ➢ AWS Client VPN Guide This task requires you to demonstrate your knowledge of cloud security principles by setting up and configuring a VPN Server using AWS Client VPN. Task Suppose that you are the IT Manager for ABC Bookshop PTY LTD. ABC Bookshop has decided to move all services including its web server and databases to Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC). As the IT Manager, your job is to set up an AWS VPN Server. You are then required to configure this server so that staff are able to access the server and then the Virtual Private Cloud (VPC). Please see Figure 4 for the AWS architecture diagram representing the final solution. Figure 4. AWS VPN (IP addresses here are used for example only) Questions 4.1 Create an AWS VPN Server in AWS. 4.2 Configure the AWS VPN Server connection. 4.3 Setup a password for your staff to get access to the AWS VPN Server. The password set as s4001812. 4.4. Demonstrate admin login and client login to the AWS VPN Server. 4.5 Jane, the CEO of Bookshop PTY LTD is concerned about the security of the VPN solution. Explain to Jane how secure your solution is. ➢ For Question 4.1 to 4.4, use screen shots with a video to show clearly the outcome of each step you took to arrive at your response. Your responses will be assessed for clarity, completeness and correctness.
Module Code IB3M10 Module Title Fintech Exam Paper Code IB3M10_C Exam Paper Title IB3M10_ Fintech_ IB3M10 _Paper_ Summer 2022-2023 Duration 2 hours Exam Paper Type Fixed time - Open Book Question 1 1.1 what is a hash collision? What is the optimal number of collisions that a good hash function should have? [2 marks] 1.2 Explain why public-key encryption is a necessary element of decentralized ledgers such as Bitcoin block chain. [3 marks] 1.3 your colleague claims that, due to the proof-of-stake consensus mechanism employed by Ether eum block chain, it is harder to tamper with E there um transactions contained in older blocks rather than with transactions that were added to the E there um block chain recently. Do you agree with this statement? Explain your answer. [3 marks] 1.4 write down and explain the incentive compatibility condition against an attacker that is used in the paper "The Economic Limits of Bitcoin and the Block chain" by Bu dish (2018). [Hint: begin by defining the ingredients of the equation. ] [6 marks] 1.5 your colleague claims that the rate of change in the total supply of Bitcoins is inversely proportional to the amount of block rewards. Do you agree with this statement? Explain your ans we. [2 marks] 1.6 what is the custody risk faced by clients of centralized exchanges (CEX) such as coin base? propose some steps that the clients can take to mitigate this risk when they use CEX. [3 marks] 1.7 what are the two main types of collateralized stable coins? For each type, explain how it works and provide examples. [4 marks] 1.8 what are the major criticism s in the current implementation of digital media NFTs that we discussed in the module? In each case, explain the associated limitations and discuss potential solutions. [4 marks] 1.9 Illustrate schematically the working s ofa decentralized exchange (DEX) such as uni swap. [Hint: draw the main parties involved and relationships bet ueen them.] [5 marks] [Total marks: 32] Question 2 2.1 you are working at a central bank and your team is exploring potential ways of introducing CBDC. your colleague claims that: "In order to introduce CBDC digital cash, at frst , the central bank has to retire banknotes and coins— physical cash." DO YOU agree with this statement? Explain your answer. [2 marks] 2 . 2 what is the role of market makers in traditional fnancial markets? Why would a market maker be willing to make payment for order fow to a brokerage such as Robinhood? [3 marks] 2.3 Explain why enterprise D LTS, as opposed to public block chains such as E there um, might be better suited for firmns working in the fnancial services industry. [3 marks] 2 . 4 what is a tech stack? Explain the application of the idea of the stack to fnancial services that we discussed in the module. provide some examples. [4 marks] 2.5 your friend claims that modern rob o-advisors such as wealth front have incentives to gam- ify the experience of their clients. Do you agree with this statement? Explain your answer. [3 marks] 2.6 Describe securities fraud and approaches to its regulation that we discussed in the class. what trade-of do regulators face when thinking about securities fraud? [4 marks] 2 . 7 Illustrate and explain how the stock ownership is tracked in the traditional fnancial system. [Hint: draw the main parties involved and describe relationships between them.] [4 marks] 2.8 Explain how the concept "garbage in, garbage out" can be applied in the context ofML models. provide an example. [2 marks] 2.9 working in an insurance company, you are tasked to use ML tools to calculate appropriate car insurance premiums. which category of ML, out of the three main categories that we looked at in the module, would you choose? Outline the steps, including a description of the data that you need, that you would undertake to complete your task. [4 marks] [Total marks: 29] Question 3 All questions below refer to the programming language python. 3.1 Describe what break statement does. provide an example of a situation where it can be useful. [2 marks] 3.2 Describe what the following script. does. [Hint: use the line number s on the left if you need to refer to apart of the code. 1 def withdraw(spend , wallet) : 2 balance = len (wallet ) 3 if spend < balance : 4 return wallet [spend] 5 6 amount = O 7 for i in range (4) : 8 result = withdraw (amount , ''Collude'' 9 print (result) 10 amount += 2 what is its output? [6 marks] 3.3 your colleague claims that a List rather than a pandas Data Frame is amore appropriate data type to store time series data such as daily prices of Doge coin. DO YOU agree with this statement? Brieay describe the two data types and explain your answer . [2 marks] 3.4 Describe what the following script. does. [Hint: use the line number s on the left if you need to refer to apart of the code. 1 import pandas as pd 2 houses = pd . Data Frame ({"Bathrooms " : [2 , 4, 2 , 5] , 3 "state " : [" CA" , "CA" , "NY , "FL "] , 4 "price " : [150 , 100 , 150 , 200] }) 5 6 HM = houses [ "price" ] . mean () 7 houses ["price"] = ( houses [ "price "] - HM) 8 new = (houses [" state"] == "CA" ) I (houses [ " state " ] == " FL" ) 9 houses_new = houses [new] 10 11 grouped = houses-new . group by ( ["state "] ) ["price"] . agg ( [max , min] ) 12 grouped . sort-values (by= 'max ' , ascending=False) What is its output? [6 marks] 3.5 your team is training a neural network model that aims to estimate values of used cars. you have already collected data and trained the model. Explain what steps need to be taken next in order to understand whether the model is over- or under-fitted. what could be done in each case to combat the problem? [4 marks] 3.6 Describe what the following script. does. [Hint: use the line number s on the left if you need to refer to apart of the code. 1 import date time 2 class Block chain() : 3 def ___init___ (self , block , chain) : 4 self . block = block 5 self . chain = chain 6 def add__blocks (self) : 7 temp = date time . date . today() 8 my-block = temp . year 9 added = (my-block - self . block) *52560 10 return print (self . chain+blocks added : about " + str (added) ) 11 12 bitcoin = Block chain (2008 , "BTC " ) 13 bitcoin . add__blocks () What is its output? [6 marks] 3.7 you are building an ML model that would be applied to predict value of used motorboats. To begin with, you have collected the data from a website that aggregates data on current and past sales of boats. In the data, for each boat, you have its characteristics (such as length, engine horsepower, fuel type, etc.) and its sale price. when preparing the data for training of your ML model, you realize that about 19% of observations have 555,777 as a sale price. Based on your knowledge and experience from the module, diagnose the issue and propose at least 2 ways how you can deal with it to proceed further with your ML training. [3 marks] [Total marks: 29]
Data Structures, Algorithms & Databases Main Spring Examinations 2023 Answer ALL questions. Each question will be marked out of 20. The paper will be marked out of 80, which will be rescaled to a mark out of 100. Question 1 Analysis of Algorithms and Tree Data Structures Part 1 Consider a function named arrayToBST that takes an array of integers a and inserts the elements of a in an AVL tree T. Therefore, function insert has re-balancing. Tree arrayToBST( int [] a) { Tree T = ✄ ; for ( int i = 0; i < a . length; i++) { T = insert(T, a[i]); } return T; } Is it possible to construct an input array a of any arbitrary length n that results in the outcomes described below? When it is possible to construct an input, give an example with length n = 8. (a) Algorithm arrayToBST runs in time O(n). [4 marks] (b) Algorithm arrayToBST runs in time O(n log n). [4 marks] (c) Algorithm arrayToBST returns a perfectly balanced tree. [4 marks] Brie y explain your construction. Note that your construction should apply to arrays with any arbitrary length n; you cannot choose the length. Your input array may or may not have repetitions. Part 2 Consider a tree data structure where every node has at most three children: left child l , middle child m and right child r. We call it a ternary tree. (d) Give the maximum possible number of nodes of a ternary tree of height 4? [4 marks] (e) Give the minimum possible number of nodes of a ternary tree of height 4? [4 marks] Brie y explain how you compute these numbers. In particular, be clear about the de nition of height you are using. Question 2 Entity-Relationship modelling A company operates an online store where customers can place orders for various products, and has the following description of their requirements for a database: Customers need to provide details such as their name, email address, and shipping address to create an online account. Each customer may have multiple orders, and each order is associated with only one customer. An order contains one or more order items, where each order item represents a single product ordered by the customer. An order item includes the quantity of the product ordered and its price at the time of purchase. Each product has a unique product ID, a name, and a description. Additionally, the company may track reviews for each product. A review includes the name of the reviewer, a rating, and a comment. Each review is associated with only one product, and each product may have multiple reviews. Finally, each order is associated with a payment. Each payment has a payment ID, an amount, a date and a payment method. (a) Develop an Entity-Relationship model for the application. Explain the key design decisions made in your choice of entities, relationships and any other (ownership or hierarchical) aspects. [8 marks] Annotate it with multiplicities and hierarchy annotations, as required. [4 marks] (b) Carry out logical design for the model, representing the design with relational schemas for tables. [4 marks] (c) Write SQL CREATE TABLE statements for 2{3 tables. Include among them a ta- ble that represents a relationship or incorporates a relationship, a weak entity or a subclass entity. The other tables can be for the adjoining entities. [4 marks] Question 3 Graphs and Max-Heap Trees Part 1 Consider the following weighted directed graph (with 7 vertices and 16 edges): (a) Calculate the shortest path from A to G using the Dijkstra's algorithm. ("Shortest" means the path with the lowest total weight.) [10 marks] You are expected to show your work using a table of the following form and also list the shortest path (e.g. A- >B- >C) and and specify the resulting weight: Total Weight: Shortest Path: Part 2 Consider the complete binary tree below. Answer the following questions (b) In the process of building a Max-Heap Tree, the rst swap is between and (write down the two numbers). [2 marks] (c) And the second swap is between and (write down the two numbers). [2 marks] (d) Draw the nished Max-Heap Tree (intermediate work is not required). [6 marks] Question 4 Relational algebra and normalisation Consider the following schema for product sales for an online shop. product(pid, cat, price) customer(cid, cname) sale(pid, cid, date, qty) (cat" is short for category and qty" for quantity). For estimating e ciency, assume around 100 products, 10,000 customers and several million sale records. (a) State in English what the following relational algebra expression computes: [2 marks] (b) The expression given above is considered ine cient. State all the ways in which it is ine cient. [4 marks] (c) Give a more e cient version of the expression. Make it as e cient as you can, and explain how it achieves e ciency. [6 marks] (d) Consider a schema T(A, B, C, D) with the functional dependencies AB -→ C , AB -→ D and BC -→ D. If we decompose the schema into (A, B, D) & (B, C, D), is it a lossless decompo- sition? If yes, explain why. If not, try to produce a counterexample. Are the two subschemas in Boyce-Codd normal form? Explain. [8 marks]
ECMM164 MSc Dissertation MSc Programme Leads • Martino Luis – Director of Education (PGT) • Programme Directors: • James Webber – Water Engineering • Prakash Kripakaran – Civil Engineering, Civil Engineering & Management • Julian Londono Monsalve – Mechanical Engineering • Baris Yuce – Engineering Business Management • Asela Kulatunga – International Supply Chain Management • Alessandro Tombari – Construction Design Management • Mohammad Akrami – Sustainable Engineering • Shuhang Shen – Electrical Power and Smart Grids Introduction • The aim of the MSc dissertation is to provide students with the opportunity to undertake individual research of engineering nature at MSc level. • The project proposal must be agreed with the assigned supervisor and submitted to your programme leader before a deadline set usually in January. • The main body of the project will be completed until mid August when the dissertation will be submitted by the student for examination. • Detailed requirements of the module are provided in the descriptor of the project module. INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES (ILOs) • M1 – Apply a comprehensive knowledge of mathematics, statistics, natural science and engineering principles to the solution of complex problems. Much of the knowledge will be at the forefront of the particular subject of study and informed by a critical awareness of new developments and the wider context of engineering. • M2 - Formulate and analyse complex problems to reach substantiated conclusions. This will involve evaluating available data using first principles of mathematics, statistics, natural science and engineering principles, and using engineering judgment to work with information that may be uncertain or incomplete, discussing the limitations of the techniques employed. • M4 - Select and critically evaluate technical literature and other sources of information to solve complex problems. • C15 - Apply knowledge of engineering management principles, commercial context, project and change management, and relevant legal matters including intellectual property rights. • M17 - Communicate effectively on complex engineering matters with technical and non-technical audiences, evaluating the effectiveness of the methods used. Project Requirements • Focus on an engineering topic and combine technical and management approaches; • Demonstrate: ✓ A deep and systematic understanding of the engineering knowledge; ✓ Comprehensive understanding of research techniques and methodologies; ✓ The ability to utilise critically the engineering knowledge; ✓ The ability to apply research techniques and methodologies with critical awareness; ✓ An analytical, systematic and creative approach to engineering problems; ✓ The ability to collect and analyse research data and to use appropriate engineering analysis tools; ✓ An understanding of sustainability and sustainable development; ✓ Independence and self-direction in problem solving and decision making; ✓ Exercise initiative and personal responsibility in professional practice; ✓ Effective communication skills using a variety of commonly available media and techniques. Project Allocation • Selection of five broad research themes of interest from a list circulated by the module leader • Supervisors are then allocated to students based on research interests and available expertise • Form. 1a- Broad Research Themes Selection form. (EBM and ISCM programmes) • Form. 1b- Broad Research Themes Selection form. (Civil, Civil & Management, Mechanical, Construction Design Management, Sustainable, Electrical Power, and Water programmes) • Some programme leaders may use online selection form. Project Proposal and Preparation • 1,500 words project proposal (max. 8 pages including figure captions and tables, and excluding cover page, table of contents, references and appendices, e.g., questionnaires, interview questions and the ethics application pack) on the specific topic agreed with your supervisor • The project proposal is expected to include: ✓ A brief background and description to project; ✓ Research project’s aim and objectives; ✓ The proposed methodology; ✓ The design of the research process (including Gantt chart) ✓ Descriptions of the preliminary work which has already been carried out ✓ Descriptions of the planned work • Form. 2 - MSc project proposal template Compliance, Governance and Risk • You must consider whether or not your project requires ethical approval • Q: When does research require ethical review? • A: If research (at any level) involves one of the following, it will normally require ethical review: ✓ Research involving human participants, or the use of material derived from human participants (this includes questionnaires and interviews) ✓ Research involving the use of any personal data ✓ Research involving animals is not allowed in this module ✓ Research that has the potential to raise social issues or have any environmental impact
Final Project - Hand Drawn Animation This final project introduces you to the world of animation through the technique of rotoscoping. Rotoscoping is a method where you create animation by tracing over real-life references, much like motion capture. For this assignment, You'll select a short video clip 3-5 seconds, break it down into individual frames, and then animate these frames to bring your selected footage to life. This project will challenge your drawing skills, creativity, and understanding of animated motion. You have the option to work with Analog (hand drawn) rotoscoping or Digital: Analog Instructions: Week 8 Sections: Preparing Your Footage Select your video: Choose a three-second video clip from either footage you've shot on your smartphones or from videos found on the web. Ensure that the footage is sharp, in focus, and has a clear separation of the subject from the background. There should be minimal overlap or cropping of the subject with other elements. Edit Your Video: During the first class meeting, you will be responsible for editing your selected video down to precisely three seconds. You can use either your phone's video editing tools or computer software to achieve this. Convert to Frames: After editing, visit the website https://ezgif.com/video-to-png/ (https://ezgif.com/video-to-png/) to upload your edited three-second video. Download the resulting frames as printable PNGs. You should have 30 frames in total (use 10 frames per second). Printing Your Frames: Visit Triton Print & Digital Media (https://blink.ucsd.edu/facilities/tritonprint/wepa.html) (or a similar campus resource available) to print out your 30 frames. Remember that you'll only pay for the pages or sides you print. Ensure that you have all your frames ready before moving on to the next week. Wēpa’s cloud-based printing solution lets you conveniently upload, print and pay for documents. Rates are Black-and-white - single sided: $0.11 | Color - single sided: $0.30 Approximately $3.30 - $9.00 Week 9 Sections: Rotoscoping Animation Animating Your Frames: In these class meetings, you will start animating your frames using rotoscope techniques. Rotoscoping involves tracing over each frame, adding details and movement, and creating a smooth transition between frames to simulate motion. The aim is not to recreate the source exactly but translate it aesthetically, thematically or in terms of subject. Photographing Your Drawings: Once you have completed the drawn animation process, you will photograph your drawings using animation software to create an animation sequence. Upload your completed animation to the assignment page before your critique meeting week 10. In the last class meeting, we will screen all the animations created by the class. This will be a final critique format where you can discuss your process, challenges, and the results of your rotoscoping project.
FIT1047 Introduction to computer systems, networks and security – S1 2025 Assignment 4 - Cybersecurity Purpose 1. Students will analyse and discuss a recent vulnerability or cybersecurity attack. This demonstrates an understanding of related cybersecurity topics and the ability to research information on cybersecurity incidents. 2. Students will show how a given set of security controls are used in a medium- sized enterprise scenario. This demonstrates an understanding of the different security controls and the ability to assess and explain their use. The assignment relates to Unit Learning Outcomes 5, 6, and 7. Your task Part 1: Your weekly reflection (Weeks 10 - 12) Part 2: Choose one article from your allocated category, analyse and discuss this recent vulnerability or cybersecurity attack, and also provide a comparative analysis on another article (or a conference/journal research paper) in the same security category. Provide a video presentation with slides to present your analysis. Part 3: Provide another set of video presentation and slides that shows how a given set of security controls are used in a medium-sized enterprise scenario. The instructions below contain concrete questions you should answer. All files have to be submitted via Moodle. Value 30% of your total marks for the unit Parts 2 and 3 are 15% of the total marks for the unit each. Word Limit See individual instructions Due Date 11:55 PM, Monday 9 June 2025 Submission ● ● ● ● ● ● Via Moodle Assignment Submission. Turnitin will be used for similarity checking of all submissions. DRAFT upload confirmation email from Turnitin is not a submission. You must click the submit button to accept terms and conditions in Moodle. Note that DRAFT submissions are not assessed. Once the submission is confirmed, any requests to revert it back to DRAFT will not be accepted. Also, any incorrect, corrupted, empty or wrong file type submission will not be assessed. Please check carefully before confirming your submission. This is an individual assignment (group work is not permitted). In this assessment, you are allowed to useChatGPTfor Parts 2 & 3 and if you use it, it must be appropriately acknowledged. For details, please refer to the instructions. INSTRUCTIONS Read carefully the entire specification FIRST before you start working on the assignment. Part 1: Reflections [hurdle requirement, no marks] Collect your reflections for weeks 10 – 12 from each week’s Ed Lesson and create a single PDF/DOC/DOCX document. You can simply copy/paste your reflections, but please add headings for each week. A template is available on Moodle. Submit your file through the Moodle Assignment 4 Part 1 activity. Submit your reflection for this part (Part 1) as a PDF/DOC/DOCX file. PART 2 - Analyse cybersecurity vulnerabilities or incidents [15 marks] Information on security problems, weaknesses and attacks can be found in many places (blogs, newsletters, experts' pages, etc.). Your task is to first pick one news item from your assigned allocation group of URLs, read the news item, look up and read the referenced sources. Then, choose another item in the same allocation group OR a conference/research paper in the same security category and perform a comparative analysis. Finally give a video presentation with slides on the findings. Incorrect news item selection for analysis will not be assessed. Group 1 or 6: Students with student number ending with “1” and “6”: Data Breach 1. Yale New Haven Health Data Breach Exposes Information of 5.6 Million Patients Updated: 28/02/2025 https://www.ctinsider.com/business/article/yale-new-haven-health-data-breach-20292710.php 2. Western Sydney University discloses security breaches, data leak Updated: 11/04/2025 https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/western-sydney-university-discloses-security-breaches-data-leak/ 3. TalkTalk Investigates 'Customer Data Breach' After Hacker Puts Private Details for Sale Online Updated: 15/02/2025 https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/tech/14237885/talktalk-data-breach-hacker-customer-details-for-sale/ Group 2 or 7: Students with student number ending with “2” and “7”: Software Security 4. Google Urges Android Users to Update Devices Amid Zero-Click Vulnerability Exploits Updated: 08/05/2025 https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/tech/14755693/google-android-pixel-phone-update-may-2025-attack/ 5. Critical Security Vulnerability in Automatic Update System for Asus Mainboards Updated: 12/05/2025 https://www.heise.de/en/news/Critical-security-vulnerability-in-automatic-update-system-for-Asus- mainboards-10380387.html 6. Commvault Backup Software: Further Vulnerability Attacked Updated: 07/05/2025 https://www.heise.de/en/news/Commvault-backup-software-Further-vulnerability-attacked-10374500.html Group 3 or 8: Students with student number ending with “3” and 8”: Network Security 7. ASUS Confirms Critical Flaw in AiCloud Routers; Users Urged to Update Firmware Updated: 19/04/2025 https://thehackernews.com/2025/04/asus-confirms-critical-flaw-in-aicloud.html 8. Critical Apache Roller Vulnerability (CVSS 10.0) Enables Unauthorized Access Updated: 15/04/2025 https://thehackernews.com/2025/04/critical-apache-roller-vulnerability.html 9. Masimo Manufacturing Facilities Hit by Cyberattack Updated: 08/05/2025 https://www.securityweek.com/masimo-manufacturing-facilities-hit-by-cyberattack/ Group 4 or 9: Students with student number ending with “4” and “9”: Human Behaviour Security 10. Deepfakes, Scams, and the Age of Paranoia Updated: 13/05/2025 https://www.wired.com/story/paranoia-social-engineering-real-fake 11. Deepfake Scam: Company Loses Around Rs 207 Crore After Employee Connected to a Video Call Updated: 13/05/2025 https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/deepfake-scam-company-loses-around-rs-207-crore- after-employee-connected-to-a-video-call-2497996-2024-02-05 12. AI-Powered Romance Scams Rake in Millions as Fraudsters Get More Convincing This Valentine's Day Updated: 11/02/2024 https://www.techtimes.com/articles/309339/20250211/ai-powered-romance-scams-rake-millions- fraudsters-get-more-convincing-this-valentines-day.htm Group 5 or 0: Students with student number ending with “5” and “0”: AI Security 13. Critical Vulnerability in AI Builder Langflow Under Attack Updated: 06/05/2025 https://www.securityweek.com/critical-vulnerability-in-ai-builder-langflow-under-attack/ 14. 2025 API ThreatStats Report: AI Vulnerabilities Surge 1,025%, 99% Connected to APIs Updated: 31/01/2025 https://www.securitynewspaper.com/2025/01/31/2025-api-threatstats-report-ai-vulnerabilities-surge- 1025-99-connected-to-apis/ 15. Understanding AI Vulnerabilities | Harvard Magazine Updated: 07/03/2025 https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2025/03/artificial-intelligence-vulnerabilities-harvard-yaron-singer Follow the steps below: 1. Choose one of the 3 news items in your allocated group above, read the text. 2. Look up and read additional three or more articles and information referenced in the news item. If there are less than three articles and information referenced in the news item, search relevant ones from Google. 3. Record a video presentation (using Panopto, Zoom, Teams or any software of your choice) showing the slides and you talking to the slides (length of video: maximum 8 minutes excluding self-introduction) a. At the start of the video, introduce yourself (you MUST turn on your camera or it will not be assessed) and show your ID (Monash or others) while introducing yourself. b. The video needs to be in a common video format (e.g., MP4, AVI, WMV and MOV) that can be played by built-in players in either Windows or MacOS, and should be of high enough quality to be clearly understood and viewed. The video should be no more than 500MB in size. 4. In your presentation, first address the followings: ● Provide a short summary of the news item ● Identify which software, hardware or system is affected. The identification should be as precise as possible. Include exact product names, distribution of the product, version numbers, etc. ● Describe how the problem was discovered and how it was initially published. Try to find this information in the referenced articles. The problem might have been found by researchers at a university, by a professional security company, by some hacker, published in a scientific conference/journal, in a newspaper on a blog, etc. Was it the result of targeted research, found by chance, were any tools used, etc? ● Discuss how serious the issue/weakness/attack is, describe what is necessary to exploit the weakness, evaluate what the consequences might be if it is exploited. 5. Choose another news item in the same allocated group OR find a research conference/journal paper of the same category. If you choose the latter, for example, if your allocated group’s category is Network Security, the paper should be related to Network Security. 6. Also, in your presentation, provide a comparative analysis of the two incidents and address the followings: ● Identify at least two similarities and two differences of the two incidents, in terms of causes (e.g. Why did it happen?) and outcomes (e.g. What were the consequences? Who/What were impacted?) ● Discuss what measures you think are necessary/useful on (i) a technical level, (ii) in terms of human behaviour, and (iii) on a policy level, to avoid/mitigate the attack/vulnerability. 7. The presentation slides MUST be PPT or PDF format. The maximum number of slides MUST NOT exceed 16. The last slide of your presentation MUST include at least 3 more references excluding the original two article references as a discussion/comparative analysis. You can easily Google to find more references. You MUST use the APA 7th referencing style. Do not forget to add the references of the original two articles (the two that you have chosen). So altogether, there should be at least 5 references included in your last slide. You may use extra slides if the reference list cannot fit into a single slide. Submit your work for this part (Part 2) as 2 different files: 1. One file for your presentation slides 2. One file for your presentation video Part 3 - Security controls in an IT network of a medium sized company with automated production of vacuum cleaners [15 marks] For this task you take on the role of a security architect (as defined in the NIST NICE workforce framework) You are responsible for a re-design of a company network (using best practices - refer to NSA Network Infrastructure Security Guide), including placing security controls in the right places of the network. As security always costs money, prepare a video presentation with slides that explains to the management of the company why each security control is required at that particular part of the company network. The company has several departments, but the focus is on three network areas: ● Production with automated machines controlled from PCs connected to the network. Production runs 24/7 and outages would be very expensive for the company. The company is very modern and customers can design their own colour combinations and specifications for their vacuum cleaner. Thus, data needs to frequently (every 6 hours) be transferred to the PCs controlling the machines. ● Outward facing servers including a web server that is used for marketing and online sales and the company’s mail server. ● Administration with PCs and laptops, a server running administration software and databases, wireless printers and Wifi for meeting rooms and general office areas. Employees also travel with their laptops and need to access the administrative network, but not the production area. Provide ALL 10 security controls mentioned below to be used and a number of entities that need to be connected in the internal network. Depending on the role of the entity, you need to decide how they need to be protected from internal and external adversaries. Entities to be connected: ● PCs to control production machines ● Production machines themselves ● Employee PCs and laptops for administration ● Server for administration and internal databases ● Wireless printer and scanner for administration use ● Authentication server ● DNS server ● Webserver ● Mailserver ● WiFi access points ● Routers ● Switches Security controls and appliances (can be used in several places) ● Firewalls (provide port numbers to be open for traffic from the outside of the respective network segment) ● VPN gateway ● VPN clients ● TLS (provide information between which computers TLS is used) ● Authentication server ● Secure seeded storage of passwords ● Disk encryption ● WPA3 encryption ● Air gaps ● Intrusion detection system In your presentation, 1. Create one or more diagram(s) of your network (using any diagram creation tool such as LucidChart or similar) with all entities. 2. Place security controls on the diagram(s). 3. For each security control, explain what it is used for and why it is needed in this particular scenario. 4. Record a video presentation (using Panopto, Zoom, Teams or any software of your choice) showing the slides and you talking to the slides (length of video: maximum 8 minutes excluding self-introduction) a. At the start of the video, introduce yourself (you MUST turn on your camera or it will not be assessed) and show your ID (Monash or others) while introducing yourself. b. The video needs to be in a common video format (e.g., MP4, AVI, WMV and MOV) that can be played by built-in players in either Windows or MacOS, and should be of high enough quality to be clearly understood and viewed. The video should be no more than 500MB in size. 5. The presentation slides MUST be PPT or PDF format. The maximum number of slides MUST NOT exceed 16. The last slide of your presentation MUST include at least 3 references that can support your claim. You can easily Google to find more references. You MUST use the APA 7th referencing style. You may use extra slides if the reference list cannot fit into a single slide.
BUSMGT 713 Financial Accounting and Control Practice Test Practice Final Test (Time Allowed: 120 minutes) Section 1: Journal entries Section 2: Financial statements Section 3: The accounting cycle SECTION ONE: JOURNAL ENTRIES Sara launched a clothing and accessory store called Fashion Forward Limited on 1 January 20XY. Record the transactions that occurred in January 20XY using the accrual method of accounting and a perpetual inventory system. a) 1 January: Sara contributed the following assets to the business: • A delivery van. The van had a carrying value of $13,000, a residual value of $1,000, and a useful life of 5 years when contributed to the business. • Inventory of clothing and accessories valued at $15,000 at cost. b) 1 January: Fashion Forward Limited borrowed a loan from ANZ of $18,000 at 8% p.a., $4,500 of which was used to buy a computer for the business. The rest of the loan was kept as cash in the business. c) 4 January: Completed a cash sale of designer dresses for $2,400, which cost $1,000. d) 7 January: Purchased inventory of a new line of accessories for $1,200 on account. e) 10 January: Paid $4,800 for rent covering four months. Record this as a prepayment. f) 12 January: Received $5,000 cash for styling services to be done in February. g) 15 January: Purchased office supplies on credit for $400. Record the supplies as an asset in the company accounts. h) 18 January: Paid for the credit purchase on 15 January. A 2% discount was received for prompt payment. i) 22 January: Sold 15 designer handbags to Elite Boutique for $300 each on credit. Each handbag costs $120 to make. j) 24 January: Elite Boutique paid for the handbags purchased on 22 January. k) 26 January: Elite Boutique returned 3 designer handbags purchased on 22 January. The returned handbags are undamaged, and Fashion Forward Limited plans to sell them to another customer at the full retail price. Sara refunded $900 to Elite Boutique. l) 30 January: Salaries expenses of $900 need to be recorded, with $720 paid in cash and the remaining balance as PAYE, to be paid to the tax authorities next month. Adjusting entries as at 31 January: 1. Adjust the depreciation expense for the van as at 31 January. 2. Correct any overstated rent expense as at 31 January. 3. Office supplies worth $100 are still on hand. 4. Interest on the bank loan is to be paid annually. Record the interest expense for January. Required: Prepare the journal entries and adjusting journal entries to record the transactions for the month of January 20XY. SECTION TWO: FINANCIAL STATEMENTS The adjusted trial balance for Choco-delight Limited for the 12 months to 31 December 20XY is as follows: Choco-delight Limited Adjusted Trial Balance as at 31 December 20XY RCash49,848Accounts Receivable12,060Inventory3,330Prepaid Rent10,800Prepaid Insurance12,000Equipment78,600Accumulated Depreciation - Equipme ment2,880Depreciation Expense -Car1,440Advertising Expense14,349Utilities Expense21,312Insurance Expense6,000Rent Expense21,600Maintenance Expense4,380Salaries Expense41,400Interest Expense1,440Income Tax Expense11,684Increaseinthevalueofland2,800Asset Revaluation Res 461,357 . 461,357 Additional information which is already included in the adjusted trial balance: • The owners contributed an additional $5,000 cash to the business during 20XY. Required Choco-delight Limited’s financial year is from 1 January 20XY to 31 December 20X3. Prepare the following financial statements: a) Income statement for the year ended 31 December 20XY. Please show EBIT and NPBT. b) Comprehensive Income Statement for the year ended 31 December 20XY. c) Statement of Changes in Equity for the year ended 31 December 20XY. d) Balance sheet as at 31 December 20XY. SECTION THREE: THE ACCOUNTING CYCLE Answer the following questions (Please keep your answers concise, to the point and under five sentences for each question): a) At the beginning of the current fiscal year, the balance sheet of Kingston Enterprises Limited showed liabilities of $420,000. During the year, liabilities increased by $70,000, assets increased by $100,000, and paid-in capital increased by $40,000 to $190,000. Dividends declared and paid during the year were $28,000. At the end of the year, stockholders' equity totalled $452,000. Assuming that is all the information that is needed, calculate the profit for the year. b) Mairangi Limited uses the accrual method of accounting. The company has separate insurance policies on its building and its motor vehicles. Policy P5984 on the building was purchased on 1 January 20X0 for $12,000. The policy has a term of 4 years. Policy H4152 on the vehicles was purchased on 1 July 20X0 for $7,200. This policy has a term of 3 years. 1) What is the prepaid insurance as at 30 June 20X2? 2) What is the insurance expense in the year ending at 31 December 20X2? c) If a company received cash from a customer in the current financial year, but will only provide the service to the customer in the following financial year (i.e., the next accounting period), would we recognise the revenue in the current year? Why/why not? Discuss your answer from both cash-basis accounting and accrual-basis accounting assumptions.
DEVELOPMENT APPRISAL (URBAN 5115) Project Brief 2024/25 You are employed by a leading Planning and Property Development Consultancy and have been instructed by a client to prepare a feasibility and viability appraisal for a development site in Glasgow. Your client, Roseview Realty Ltd (RRL), is a prominent speculative developer that typically undertakes projects by borrowing the necessary capital and selling the completed development, subject to prevailing market conditions. RRL is considering Class 1A (retail) and Class 3 (food and drink) uses on the ground floor to enhance street-level activity, with the primary use of the upper floors being purpose-built student accommodation. However, RRL has also instructed your firm to compare the viability of this original proposal with an alternative use of your choosing. There is no rigid structure, but your report is expected to include the following: · An assessment of the site and the suitability of the proposed uses taking into account location, proximate developments and relevant development and planning policies. · A simple indicative 2D or 3D illustration of the scheme should be provided to show how it fits onto the site. Regardless of the method used, floor dimensions and areas should be clearly indicated. · A thorough review of the property market, demand and supply conditions, along with a careful estimation of key appraisal inputs based on an in-depth analysis of comparable properties. · A reasonably detailed description of the development process, outlining the expected stages from the initial site acquisition date (on the assignment due date) to final disposal. Development timeline is best presented with the aid of Gantt chart. · Discounted cash flow (DCF) appraisals used to estimate the maximum bid price your client should offer to purchase the freehold interest in the site. Two DCFs are required, one for the original intention of the RRL and another for your own alternative proposal. · A reflection on how land use impacts the viability of real estate development projects and the bidding capabilities of developers. Your reflection should be based on the results of your appraisals but should also cite relevant theory and empirical studies. · Detailed sensitivity analyses to identify and evaluate key risk variables. These analyses should only be conducted on your proposal. Data and Assumptions You are expected to collect your input data for the appraisals exploring secondary data sources e.g., Spon's architects' and builders' price book, CoStar, real estate market reports, professional and academic journals, newspapers, government reports, development policies and other supplementary materials available from the course Moodle, the university’s library and websites of relevant organisations. It is common to assume certain values or conditions relating to the proposed development and the appraisal, you are expected to state clearly all your assumptions and provide suitable justifications. In addition to any assumptions you might make, you should allow for the following: · Developer’s profit at 17.5% of the development value, development finance at 7.5% per annum, 6.5% for management cost, 10% for letting fee and 0.5% for sale fee. · If applicable, assume leases are on a Full Repairing and Insuring (FRI) basis with a 3-month fit-out period for relevant uses during which no rent will be received by the developer. · You should also allow a maximum of £50,000 for design cost, 5% of the construction cost for contingencies and 13% for professional fees. · Gyms/art galleries on higher floors in an office block should be treated as office space. · Buy-to-let housing can be valued using either the income method or the direct comparison method since the units are currently empty. If there is affordable housing in the proposal, you will need to discount appropriately. · When working out the maximum bid price for the sale, you should allow 6.5% land acquisition costs (to cover Land and Building Transaction Tax and associated legal and agent fees). Site Details The proposed development site (Figure 1) is 20 India Street, Glasgow, currently being marketed by CBRE. Overlooking Charing Cross Railway station, the site has been described as “a significant city centre development site”. Located on the doorstep of Glasgow’s cultural quarter, offering unrivalled access to Glasgow’s extensive transport network, as well as world-class leisure and food and beverage amenities that the submarket provides. The site is located west of Glasgow city centre in an area that has been transformed by two new major office developments, making it a viable development with several use options. The site with a total area of circa 0.52 hectares (55,757 ft2) benefits from proximity to the M8 motorway, Scotland’s busiest road and the main link with Edinburgh to the east and Glasgow International Airport to the west. The actual site is shown within the red dotted line on the map below. Figure 1: Proposed development site Submission Arrangement The report should be word-processed and contain no more than 2,500 words in line with the university’s assessment regulations. "Students are required to keep within 10 per cent of the specified word count” which includes titles, tables, footnotes, and appendices but excludes references/bibliographies. However, as you might have many tables to include in your report, you are allowed to screenshot your DCF, sensitivity and scenario analyses and add them within the report or as appendices. That way, you will be able to gain additional space for textual content. However, note that any other tables will count towards the word limit and should not be screenshot. “Assignments not submitted by the required deadline will be subject to a 2-mark deduction for each working day overdue, subject to a maximum of five working days. If an assignment is submitted after the five working days limit, the student will be awarded zero (grade H)”. Your calculations should be clearly laid out, using a font that is easy to read. You must score a grade of D3(9) or above for your submission to pass the course. The assignment is due at noon on Tuesday, 27 May 2025. You are advised to run the main body of your coursework through Turnitin as a draft before making the final submission. An electronic copy of the coversheet and guidance on how to use Turnitin can be found in the SPS Common Room. For further details about rules concerning word count, late submission and re-assessment, please consult the School or PGT handbook. Please note that you are expected to submit your MS Excel file along with the main report, using the same Turnitin link provided on Moodle. Marking Criteria Your report will be graded using the following criteria: S/n Criteria Weight 1 Location analysis, suitability of the proposed uses, layout and accommodation schedule 15% 2 Review of the property market and analysis of comparable properties 25% 3 Development timeline and justifications for assumptions made 15% 4 DCFs, recommendations on the maximum bid price for the site and sensitivity analysis 30% 5 Reflection on land use and impact on impacts the viability of real estate development projects and the bidding capabilities of developers 15% Guidelines for enquiries regarding your project It is normal for students to seek further clarification while writing the summative assessment, issues requiring further clarification might be generic or specific to individuals. The best way to ask such questions is to post them on the Moodle assignment forum where everyone can have a chance to see them and my responses. It will also prevent the same set of questions from being asked repeatedly unnecessarily. However, you are equally free to email me directly to ask questions that are peculiar to you. Please bear in mind that I might be unable to respond over weekends and holidays. Accordingly, I would like to enjoin you to ask all your questions by the last working day preceding the assignment submission due date so that I can see the questions and respond in time before you turn in your work. Additional Information CoStar provides market reports, and area analytics and contains a transaction database for commercial properties which will potentially be useful for this project. If you do not yet have access to CoStar or have any logging problems, please contact the course coordinator or email [email protected]. Besides the CoStar database, you may also need to consult other sources for real estate data, information on other sources of the real estate market and building cost data is available on course Moodle. Given the information already made available to you, there should be no reason for you to contact any external party (e.g., the city planning department, tenants, owners or surveyors) about this site. Any requests for material or information must be channelled through the course lecturer. On no account should you enter the areas of the site closed to the public, partly for your safety and partly for legal reasons. This is an independent submission and not group work. While we recognise the benefits of students studying and working in groups to hone their skills at valuation, appraisal and data collection and analysis, there is a point where this becomes unacceptable. Your interpretation of market evidence and the layout of your appraisals must be wholly independent. Marks will be deducted if there is evidence that any groups of people have submitted reports with elements that show joint efforts.
