Project 4: Bridges & Branches
Bridges & Branches
CS 109 Spring 2021 Project 4
Summary
Project Objectives
Project Setup
Project Implementation
Part 1: User Input
Part 2: Call the Function
Part 3: Creating an empty figure
Part 4: Importing the .mat
Part 5: Plotting & Branches
No Other Functions
Only One Call To: plot, xlabel, ylabel
Generalizing Code for Big Data
Wrap Up Covering the Edge Cases
Submission & Grading
Submission to zyBooks
Submission to Gradescope
Style Grading
Copyright Notice
Attributions
Summary
This project is designed based on the NAE's Engineering Grand Challenge of "Restore and Improve U
an
Infrastructure". The data comes from the Illinois Department of Transportation. You will be visualizing a
data set that contains all the
idges on record for Cook Country.
Project Objectives
This project will further student understanding of the following MATLAB concepts:
● Using MATLAB Docs
● usage of .mat files
● basic function implementation
● plotting
● plot characteristics
● conditional expressions
●
anches
● a
ays
● a
ay indexing
Project Setup
To set up the project acquire the starter code and the project's three provided .mat files for testing.
1. Use the project's starter code to create a new script within MATLAB and name it project4.m.
2. Read through all the project instructions before implementing any steps. It is always good to
understand or at least know what the entire project is prior to implementing the first part. This
way you know all the pieces and don't accidentally implement an early part that will not play nice
with later parts and force you to redo work.
http:
www.engineeringchallenges.org/challenges/infrastructure.aspx
http:
www.engineeringchallenges.org/challenges/infrastructure.aspx
http:
apps.dot.illinois.gov
idgesinfosystem/search.aspx
https:
www.mathworks.com/help
https:
drive.google.com/drive/folders/12_wQ67CDtSbE0J9PdW8XEXE2hk-xJacB?usp=sharing
Project Implementation
Part 1: User Input
Obtain a value from the user. Valid values will be 1, 2, and 3. You will check validity later in the program.
Part 2: Call the Function
As this part of your code you must call the function you will be implementing the inner workings of. Recall
a function call simply uses the function name and provides any necessary inputs. The function name is
nbTester and it takes two inputs, a string literal that is the .mat file name and the option value that you
just acquired via user input in the previous step. At final submission of your code to Gradescope, your Part
2 should use
idgesSmall.mat so that it runs the small data set by default for the graders.
Part 3: Creating an empty figure
At times during this program's execution the user input or data may be invalid. This will yield an empty
figure without a plot on it. We can do this by calling the figure function at the beginning of our function
and then if nothing else executes in our function we will be left with an empty figure.
Part 4: Importing the .mat
The project's .mat file has all the data for plotting within it. One of the function inputs is a string literal
value that contains the file name of the .mat you should use. Three .mat files are provided so that you
may test your code with various data sizes. At final submission of your code to Gradescope, your Part 2
should use
idgesSmall.mat so that it runs the small data set by default for the graders.
Part 5: Plotting & Branches
The remainder of your code implements the plotting with the various customizations and implementation
constraints outlined in these instructions.
You are going to create three
anches, one for each of the three options.
option of 1 yields:
You can recreate this figure through visual inspection, but here is a written description:
● marker should be red
● marker should be upside
down triangle
● line style should be no line
● marker size will be 10
● x axis should be integers
● the x axis should be labeled
● the y axis should be labeled
● line width should be 2
● xtick labels should be the
names of the
idges
● xtick labels should be
otated by -45 degrees
● the grid should be on
Test your code on MATLAB
When you run your code, if you respond to the prompt with 1 the above should appear.
option of 2 yields:
You can recreate this figure through visual inspection, but here is a written description:
● marker should be blue
● marker should be an asterisk
● line style should be no line
● marker size will be 10
● x axis should be integers
● the x axis should be labeled
● the y axis should be labeled
● line width should be 2
● xtick labels should be the
names of the
idges
● xtick labels should be
otated by -45 degrees
● the grid should be on
For this option, some of the year reconstructed data is missing (because some
idges have never been
econstructed). Those years are 0 in the data set. That will mess up our plots because 0 is so much
smaller than XXXXXXXXXXTo fix this, set all zero data to NaN (not a number).
Test your code on MATLAB
When you run your code, if you respond to the prompt with 2 the above should appear.
option of 3 yields:
You can recreate this figure through visual inspection, but here is a written description:
● marker should be green
● marker should be a period
● line style should be no line
● marker size will be 10
● x axis should be integers
● the x axis should be labeled
● the y axis should be labeled
● line width should be 2
● xtick labels should be the
names of the
idges
● xtick labels should be rotated
y -45 degrees
● the grid should be on
Test your code on MATLAB
When you run your code, if you respond to the prompt with 3 the above should appear.
Implementation Constraints
No Other Functions
You may not write any other functions besides the bnbTester one.
Only One Call To: plot, xlabel, ylabel
The entire code you write for this project may only have the plot function called exactly one time. This
means if the grader performs a find (ctrl+f) on your script file for the word 'plot', the grader will only see it
once. Additionally, I would only see one instance of xlabel and ylabel. Therefore, make sure you are
avoiding repeated code by only placing what should be in the
anches inside them and leaving the rest
outside the
anches.
Failure to abide by these constraints will result in a maximum score of 0.
Testing within MATLAB and zyBooks
When you run your code, if you respond to the prompt with 1, 2, or 3, one of the above plots should be
produced (respectively). Once you have this base code done, you can test your code on Zybooks. Follow
the instructions in the comments of the starter code to know what you should copy and paste! If you
code is co
ect, your basic code should now pass the first three test cases on zyBooks.
Generalizing Code for Big Data
Once your base code is done, you are going to move on to think about generalizing your code. Right now,
you have produced plots for the provided four a
ays of 13
idges. But, if you wrote your code generally
(did not hard code), then you code should also be able to produce plots for all sizes of names, yearBuilt,
yearReconstruct, and score a
ays.
You can test out your generalized code now by trying it with these three function calls on zyBooks:
nbTester('
idgesBig.mat', 1)
nbTester('
idgesBig.mat', 2)
nbTester('
idgesBig.mat', 3)
You will probably notice that with so much data, it does not make sense to label the x axis with each
idge name. Therefore, you will need to add a new
anch to your code to handle this case. If the
number of
idges in the data is greater than 15, you should not label the x axis and also, should not
otate the labels (because they aren't any). To handle this case, simply keep the xticks, xticklabels, and
xtickangle at their default values (i.e. do not call them). Once you get that
anch in your code, you can
test again on zyBooks then submit, and your code should pass the next three test cases.
Here is what your plot should look like for option 1 on big data:
Wrap Up Covering the Edge Cases
Lastly, you are going to do some e
or handling. There are two cases to consider:
1. If the a
ays are empty (no
idge data available), your code should produce a blank figure and not
attempt to plot or customize anything. To do this, add another
anch that nests around
everything you have already written. Make sure the code you have written only gets executed fo
non-empty data a
ays.
2. If the user enters an invalid option (something other than 1, 2, or 3) then you should provide a
useful e
or message (e.g. "Invalid input value, input must be either 1, 2, or 3") and produce a
lank figure (do not attempt to plot or customize anything).
Once you handle these edge cases, your code should pass the remaining test cases. Below is what the
empty figure should look like, locally and online within Mathworks website.
Locally Online on Mathworks MATLAB
Submission & Grading
You must submit the same final code to both zyBooks and Gradescope.
The autograder will check some of your plotting, but not all. Your plot should match the examples exactly
(visually). Your plot and other items within your code will be graded manually on Gradescope, so please
keep in mind that the test cases within zyBooks are not exhaustive.
Submission to zyBooks
You may submit your code as many times as you need. Be sure to only copy the portions stated within the
comments of the starter code. When you have passed all the tests or as many as you believe you can
pass, proceed with submitting your final code on Gradescope.
Submission to Gradescope
Go to gradescope.com or follow the link from Blackboard or Piazza.
Required Submission Files: project4.m
Style Grading
Style is the readability of your code. As we progress through the semester, style will become important to
help reduce the amount of time debugging your code as poor style can quickly lead to syntax e
ors and
code misinterpretation. For project 4 the following will be checked:
1. Your submission has a proper comment header.
2. Your submission has visible white space allowing another person to easily read the code you
have submitted. This whitespace could include but is not exclusive to blank lines between
implementation steps, spacing around mathematical operations and assignments.
3. Your code should contain useful human readable comments that help explain in your own words
what code blocks (multiple lines of code) do.
4. Your code does not produce excessive superfluous output. (remember your semicolons)
Copyright Notice
Copyright 2021 Adam Koehler