Software Design and Development 2022 HSC exam pack (archive)

Students should:

• read the question carefully to ensure that they do not miss important components of the question
• have a clear understanding of key words used in the question and recognise the intent of the question and its requirements
• engage with any stimulus material provided and refer to the stimulus in the response
• communicate ideas and information using relevant examples
• consider using graphical solutions if appropriate
• show full and clear working out for all questions involving calculations
• review their response to ensure that it addresses the question requirements
• avoid rewriting or rephrasing the question.
• correctly use subject specific terms as appropriate
• recognise that examples provided in questions are there to clarify the requirements of the question and illustrate the general form of the data. Student designed algorithms, diagrams and metalanguage solutions should be able to process general data of this type, and the given data examples may not be specific input that need to be processed.

Question 21

In better responses, students were able to:

• draw on the list of developer responsibilities such as intellectual property and code of conduct
• clearly state the developer responsibility that they were describing
• provide an appropriate description of two responsibilities.

Areas for students to improve include:

• being familiar with NESA key words such as describe and outline
• developing their understanding of developer responsibilities.

Question 22

In better responses, students were able to:

• describe a reason for maintenance and provide a link to the software development cycle
• articulate a specific maintenance process such as updating software specifications (a)
• describe how well-written code affects the developer who must undertake maintenance of the code (b).

Areas for students to improve include:

• explaining the need for maintenance by giving reasons for it, instead of describing what happens when software is not maintained (a)
• providing specific ways to write code instead of providing documentation (b).

Question 23

In better responses, students were able to:

• address both perspectives when providing a comparison between the use of an interpreter and the use of a compiler
• clearly demonstrate the features of the two translation methods and their implications.

Areas for students to improve include:

• relating the implications of interpretation and compilation for the user of software
• making links between the use of software and the ways it can be translated.

Question 24

In better responses, students were able to:

• demonstrate correct interpretation of the EBNF definitions
• correctly identify and fix the syntax errors in the algorithm.

Areas for students to improve include:

• recognising the difference between syntax and logic errors
• interpreting EBNF statements as a whole and not in isolation. For example, some responses identified line 8 as an error because it ended with a comma. (This is true when considering the Print statement in isolation, but it is syntactically correct as specified by the Selection Statement)
• realising that whitespace (spaces, tabs and newlines) are generally not put into EBNF definitions
• interpreting the bracket types correctly and recognising their significance, for example, [ ] vs { } or the use of  |.

Question 25

In better responses, students were able to:

• relate features of their chosen approach with aspects of the scenario (a)
• demonstrate an understanding of how this app could be piloted (b)
• clearly outline different system testing methods (c)
• provide a wide variety of factors affecting the user’s experience (d).

Areas for students to improve include:

• justifying their chosen approach rather than explaining why other approaches were not appropriate (a)
• distinguishing between system testing and testing more generally (c)
• making clear links between their chosen factors and the quality of user experience (d)
• ensuring that their chosen factors are outside the developer’s control (d)
• clearly relating their responses to the given scenario when required.

Question 26

In better responses, students were able to:

• correctly identify CASE tools and explain how they can improve productivity of teams working on a large project
• effectively relate productivity savings in their description of specific products rather than their vague functionality.

Areas for students to improve include:

• recognising the difference between CASE tools and other tools like project management tools, communication tools, file management tools
• relating productivity improvement of a team of developers on a large project rather than productivity in general
• focusing on CASE tools and not project management tools such as Gantt charts.

Question 27

In better responses, students were able to:

• include all necessary processes from the scenario with adequate detail (a)
• state a relevant data structure and design relevant fields with appropriate data types (b)
• demonstrate an understanding of the Gantt chart format (c)
• explain how the project manager would use the Gantt chart to make use of the mentioned developers’ skills (c).

Areas for students to improve include:

• using a correct IPO diagram format effectively to show links between each input/process/output (a)
• constructing a data structure design (b)
• addressing the given scenario in their response, in particular, how the project manager would use the members and their skills (c).

Question 28

In better responses, students were able to:

• use a correct format, for example, a table to trace the values of phrase, Len, NewPhrase and done (a)
• setup their desk check table with reference to the algorithm (a)
• correct the errors using a variety of approaches (b)
• use the provided line numbers to more easily identify the specific line of the algorithm to which they were referring (b).

Areas for students to improve include:

• noting that an error would occur on Line 10 when phrase was reduced to a single character (a)
• reading the question carefully as in this question students were asked to correct the error in addition to identifying it (b)
• seeing the relationship between the desk check in (a) and correcting errors in (b)
• understanding of text extraction techniques, for example, how to remove the last character of a string (b).

Question 29

In better responses, students were able to:

• explain the issues that occur when inappropriate data types are used to achieve a purpose. For example, adding two integers will provide an arithmetic sum whereas adding two strings will concatenate
• provide a specific example rather than talk about data types in general, for example, when adding ‘3’ and ‘4’
• address this question from the point of view of the programmer rather than the different data items required when using an app.

Areas for students to improve include:

• providing explicit examples for data types to demonstrate knowledge
• knowing the different data types.

Question 30

In better responses, students were able to:

• successfully use loops and access the array of records to compare scores with a high score variable
• successfully loop through the array of records to print the names of players whose score matched the highest and second highest
• reference fields of the array of records correctly
• initialise variables used in the algorithm.

Areas for students to improve include:

• ensuring they attempt the appropriate algorithm to solve the problem
• demonstrating clearly how each element of the array is accessed.

Question 31

In better responses, students were able to:

• address both a program counter and accumulator’s purpose (a)
• use language to show contrast (a)
• show how the program counter changes the memory location reference during the fetch-execute cycle (b).

Areas for students to improve include:

• studying the components of the CPU and clearly articulating their purpose (a)
• interpreting Assembly Language commands and correctly tracking those changes (b)
• understanding how the program counter works during the fetch-execute cycle (b).

Question 32

In better responses, students were able to:

• include in their description the hiding of unnecessary details (attributes/methods) to enable more efficient programming (a)
• explain the passing of attributes/methods from parent to child class, enabling faster and more efficient coding (bi)
• write the attributes correctly and assign correct data types, and understand that common name was a parameter (bii)
• recognise the need for a database of photographs as reference points (c)
• recognise that there was no rule available to join the chain of facts (di)
• provide the correct query, and identify the correct positions of the variables (dii)
• provide reasons and real examples of various paradigms in (e), such as:
  • Object oriented: video games, for reusable code, attributes methods
  • Logic: AI, expert systems due to decision making from facts and rules
  • Imperative: explicit structure and better for calculations.

Areas for students to improve include:

• clearly articulating what abstraction is instead of describing encapsulation (a)
• correctly passing CommonName to the method and returning the correct value (bii)
• understanding the role of software that uses the logic paradigm and how it can be applied to the scenario described (c)
• analysing the given facts as they would by the computer rather than applying human logic to what is written (di)
• using variables correctly for the software to find the correct results (dii)
• recognising that programmer productivity depends on factors such as, learning curve, approach to testing, programmer experience or speed of code generation (e)
• describing how the paradigm example works and providing a valid example (e).

Question 33

In better responses, students were able to:

• provide TWO representations of how Integer values can be represented in Binary using worked examples (a)
• show worked steps for converting a Floating-Point Number including the bias value (b)
• provide a clear and well formatted Boolean Algebra representation of the given circuit (c)
• use an accurate truth table based on the question for reference (d)
• provide a clearly drawn logic circuit with correctly labelled inputs and outputs (d)
• interpret a given binary stream using the data stream rules and articulate the behaviour step by step (ei)
• convert decimal into binary and structure using the format required (eii)
• write a clear algorithm that performs all the requirements outlined, while using aspects outlined in prior the questions (eiii).

Areas for students to improve include:

• distinguishing between integer values and hexadecimal number bases (a)
• correctly convert to a 2’s complement integer value (a)
• differentiating between moving a decimal point in a positive (left) or negative (right) direction (b)
• representing each gate with the correct notation in Boolean Algebra (c)
• providing a truth table with outputs that match the rules in the question (d)
• correctly using AND and OR in the conditions of loops such as WHILE and REPEAT...UNTIL (eiii).