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CS 4535: Software Design & Delivery

Fall 2026 | 2026-2027

Duration: Sep 9, 2026 - Dec 13, 2026

Course Schedule

Loosely, the course is organized as follows:
  • Onboarding (weeks 1 - 3): lectures every session — architecture, continuous delivery, safe releases, testing, monitoring, user research — alongside the ticket hunt and the column-groups bake-off
  • Studio (weeks 4 - 12): Mon standup + clinic · Wed tech talk or student presentations · Thu team work session, with demo days every two weeks
  • Hardening & handoff (weeks 12 - 14): feature freeze, ops playbooks, documentation, final demos
There is no final exam. The semester ends with final demos and the Learning Summary Report.

Section 03

WeekMonTueWedThuFri
Onboarding (weeks 1–3): a lecture every session, plus two assignments running in parallel — the ticket hunt (broad reconnaissance, due 9/16) and gradebook column groups (one deep vertical slice, due 9/24). Come to Thu 9/10 with a local dev environment running.
1
No class
No class
Sep 9
RELEASED: The Ticket Hunt
RELEASED: Project Bids
RELEASED: Reading Bid
Sep 10
Sep 11
No class
Project bids due Thu 9/17. Running projects announced Wed 9/23; final teams Mon 9/28.
2
Sep 14
Sep 15
No class
Sep 16
Sep 17
Sep 18
No class
3
Sep 21
Yom Kippur
No Class
Sep 22
No class
Sep 23
Sep 24
Sep 25
No class
Studio phase begins. Weekly rhythm: Mon standup + clinic · Wed tech talk or student presentations · Thu team work session, game day or demo day. Students merge to staging behind course feature flags; the instructor promotes to production periodically.
4
Sep 28
RELEASED: Declare Your Target Band
Sep 29
No class
Sep 30
User Research & Product Thinking
Oct 1
DUE: Declare Your Target Band
RELEASED: Checkpoint 1
Oct 2
No class
Async week, instructor at OOPSLA/ISSTA. The individual objective for this fortnight is an investigation in your team's area, not a shipped change: nothing needs to merge while nobody is watching Sentry. Artifact due Tue 10/13.
5
Oct 5
Async Standup + Clinic (no meeting)
Oct 6
No class
Oct 7
Async Tech Talk: Agents & Workflows (recorded)
Oct 8
Drill Zero: Async Triage (pass/fail)
RELEASED: Drill Zero — Async Triage Log (pass/fail)
Oct 9
No class
DUE: Drill Zero — Async Triage Log (pass/fail)
6
Oct 12
Indigenous Peoples' Day
No Class
Oct 13
No class
Oct 14
Standup + Clinic
DUE: Checkpoint 1
RELEASED: Checkpoint 2
Oct 15
Oct 16
No class
7
Oct 19
Oct 20
No class
Oct 21
Student Presentations 1: two readings, two pairs
Oct 22
Game Day 1: Runner Drift (telegraphed)
RELEASED: Game Day Postmortems (3)
Oct 23
No class
8
Oct 26
Standup + Clinic
Oct 27
No class
Oct 28
Student Presentations 2: two readings, two pairs
Oct 29
Demo Day 2
Oct 30
No class
9
Nov 2
Standup + Clinic
Nov 3
No class
Nov 4
Integration Session I: Cross-Team Technical Integration
Nov 5
Game Day 2: The Dashboard Lies
DUE: Checkpoint 2
RELEASED: Checkpoint 3
Nov 6
No class
10
Nov 9
Standup + Clinic
Nov 10
No class
Nov 11
Veterans Day
No Class
Nov 12
Demo Day 3
Nov 13
No class
11
Nov 16
Standup + Integration Session II (pre-freeze)
Nov 17
No class
Nov 18
Tech Talk: Risk Management & Release Readiness
RELEASED: Feature Freeze — flags set, ops playbooks drafted
Nov 19
Studio Work Session
Nov 20
No class
Feature freeze Mon 11/23. Weeks 13–14 are hardening, documentation and ops playbooks for the January 2027 handoff.
12
Nov 23
Feature Freeze Checkpoint
DUE: Feature Freeze — flags set, ops playbooks drafted
Nov 24
No class
Nov 25
Fall Break (Thanksgiving)
No Class
Nov 26
Fall Break (Thanksgiving)
No Class
Nov 27
No class
13
Nov 30
Standup + Clinic (Hardening)
RELEASED: Learning Summary Report
Dec 1
No class
Dec 2
Student Presentations 3: two readings, two pairs
Dec 3
Demo Day 4
DUE: Game Day Postmortems (3)
DUE: Checkpoint 3
Dec 4
No class
14
Dec 7
Retro, Postmortem & Learning Summary Workshop
Dec 8
No class
Dec 9
Final Demos I
Dec 10
Final Demos II & Handoff
DUE: Learning Summary Report
No class

Assignments

AssignmentTypeAssignedDuePoints
The Ticket HunthomeworkSep 9, 2026Sep 16, 2026-
Project BidshomeworkSep 9, 2026Sep 17, 2026-
Reading BidhomeworkSep 9, 2026Sep 24, 2026-
Onboarding: Gradebook Column GroupshomeworkSep 9, 2026Sep 24, 2026-
Declare Your Target BandhomeworkSep 28, 2026Oct 1, 2026-
Team Workspace & CharterprojectSep 28, 2026Oct 1, 2026-
Drill Zero — Async Triage Log (pass/fail)homeworkOct 8, 2026Oct 9, 2026-
Async Sprint: Focused Learning + Team Sync (Oct 2–13)projectOct 1, 2026Oct 13, 2026-
Checkpoint 1projectOct 1, 2026Oct 14, 2026-
First Implementation TickethomeworkOct 15, 2026Oct 29, 2026-
Checkpoint 2projectOct 14, 2026Nov 5, 2026-
Feature Freeze — flags set, ops playbooks draftedprojectNov 18, 2026Nov 23, 2026-
Code Review (continuous)projectSep 17, 2026Dec 10, 2026-
Reading Presentation (pairs)readingSep 28, 2026Dec 2, 2026-
Game Day Postmortems (3)projectOct 22, 2026Dec 3, 2026-
Checkpoint 3projectNov 5, 2026Dec 3, 2026-
Learning Summary ReportprojectNov 30, 2026Dec 10, 2026-

Office Hours

Jonathan Bell: On Discord, or by appointment

Location: Discord, or WVH 326 by appointment