Revision Questions (1 Viewer)

[velox]

Im studying for half yearlies so ill have some revision questions in here. Would be great if i could get some help

What is the difference between 'top down design' and 'stepwise refinement' ?

Am i correct in saying that top down design is the process of breaking modules into smaller more manageable sections which then can be implemented into a programming language. And stepwise refinement being ..... ? Im not sure how to describe stepwise refinement?

One more question:

With a binary search, you can decide on how to sort the items right ? (because they need to be sorted before they can go through the binary search)...Or does it do it automatically?

 

[velox]

Anyone? I have exams coming up

 

[Ghost1788]

Stepwise refinement : An approach to problem solving where the problem is broken down into successively smaller components until each individual component is easily solvable

Top-down design : The process where the problem is refined into smaller subproblems, which are then treated as separate problems which may be further broken down

^^from Excel Glossary
Top down refers to the breaking down of code into manageable parts known as modules

stepwise refers to breaking down of a 'problem' into several smaller problems which can easily be solved

Hope i helped

EDIT: for half yearlies make sure you know all the types of sorts and searches as well as examples and how to write their algorithms. Algorithms are easy and get marks which many ppl lose out on so make sure u have that extra edge above the others.....

 

[velox]

so basically stepwise refinement is a process in top down design? Cos i was worried if i get a question relating the two.

 

[Ghost1788]

actually i think they are the same but the two refer to different points in the Software development Cycle
in the defining stage you would use stepwise to break up the problem
then when you have developed a rough solution to the problem top down would be used to break it up into modules , this is done to make the coding and maintining stages easier(to identify errors).