The IIT Madras BS Software Engineering (Software Engineering) Quiz 2 paper sat on 12 Apr 2026, in the January 2026 term: 25 questions for 100 marks in 120 minutes. Every question is below with its answer. Take it as a timed mock test to be marked, or read it through first.
A software feature has already been released. Developers observe that users are struggling with the interface on a specific browser and release a patch to fix it. This activity belongs to which phase?
Design
Development
Testing
Maintenance
Correct answer
Maintenance
Two developers are working on different modules of an e-commerce system. One developer modifies a function’s parameters, causing the other developer’s code to break. Which concept would have helped prevent this issue?
Unit testing
Interface definition
Acceptance testing
Code refactoring
Correct answer
Interface definition
Before releasing a banking application, the development team tests individual functions such as “check balance” and “transfer money” in complete isolation. What type of testing is being performed?
Integration testing
Acceptance testing
Unit testing
Beta testing
Correct answer
Unit testing
A student team begins coding a project immediately after an informal discussion with users. After completion, they repeatedly modify the code to fix mismatches with user expectations. This approach is best described as:
Build-and-fix programming
Waterfall model
Spiral model
Prototype model
Correct answer
Build-and-fix programming
A software team wants to collect answers to specific, well-defined questions from thousands of geographically distributed sellers. Which requirement-gathering technique is most appropriate?
Interviews
Focus groups
Observation
Questionnaires
Correct answer
Questionnaires
Which of the following is a correct user story template as per BDD?
Feature–Role–Time
Input–Process–Output
Role–Feature–Benefit
Task–Module–Deadline
Correct answer
Role–Feature–Benefit
An e-commerce website allows returning customers to purchase items quickly by saving delivery addresses and payment details. This design primarily improves:
Effectiveness
Efficiency
Learnability
Safety
Correct answer
Efficiency
Multiple screens of a mobile application are drawn on paper, and switching between screens is simulated manually during discussions with users. Which prototyping technique is being used?
Storyboarding
Paper prototyping
Digital mock-ups
Coding a beta version
Correct answer
Paper prototyping
An e-commerce website allows users to browse products and check prices without requiring them to log in. Which heuristic for action does this design decision support?
Freedom
Flexibility
Recognition over recall
Consistency
Correct answer
Freedom
A project has an initial COCOMO effort estimate of 20 person-months. After considering cost drivers, the Effort Adjustment Factor (EAF) is 1.5. What is the final estimated effort?
20 PM
25 PM
30 PM
35 PM
Correct answer
30 PM
A person ensures that the development team delivers maximum value to the client and prioritizes work considering business needs and technical constraints. Which Scrum role is being described?
Scrum Master
Product Owner
Project Manager
Development Lead
Correct answer
Product Owner
A team completes 4 story points in one sprint. This value is used to predict future progress. What is this value called?
Throughput
Capacity
Velocity
Burn rate
Correct answer
Velocity
Several developers with critical expertise leave the organization midway through a project, causing delays. Which mitigation strategy BEST addresses this risk?
Reducing scope
Cross-training team members
Using third-party components
Increasing automation
Correct answer
Cross-training team members
A module performs a sequence of operations where each step depends on the previous one, but all steps contribute to one main goal. This is an example of:
Functional cohesion
Sequential cohesion
Coincidental cohesion
Temporal cohesion
Correct answer
Sequential cohesion
If class Book inherits from class Product, which statement is true?
Book has-a Product
Book uses Product
Book is-a Product
Product is part of Book
Correct answer
Book is-a Product
Which UML diagram is used to model message exchanges over time among objects?
Class diagram
Sequence diagram
Activity diagram
Use-case diagram
Correct answer
Sequence diagram
A developer designs a class with private data like and , and allows access only through methods such as and . This describes which of the following object-oriented programming concepts?
Inheritance
Encapsulation
Association
Dependency
Correct answer
Encapsulation
A team of 20 developers is working on a large web application. One developer commits faulty code to the main branch that crashes the system. Other developers are unable to test their own changes. The team wants to quickly revert to a stable version and identify who made the faulty change. Which feature of a Version Control System directly addresses this situation?
Branching
Version history tracking
Staging area
Distributed repositories
Correct answer
Version history tracking
A banking application calculates interest. Due to a wrong formula in the code, the system produces an incorrect interest amount for customers. In the same banking application, the developer finds that the line was written instead of This incorrect line is an example of:
Failure
Fault
Error
Test case
Correct answer
Fault
A video-streaming application is functionally correct, but users complain that it is very slow when playing high-resolution videos. The development team wants to find out: Which functions consume the most CPU time• Where memory usage is highest• Which parts of the program are performance bottlenecks• Which debugging tool or technique should the team use?
Logging
Dump & Diff
Profiling Tool
Backward Debugging
Correct answer
Profiling Tool
A photo-editing application applies a series of transformations to an image: first resizing, then filtering, then compression, and finally saving it to disk. Each stage takes input from the previous stage and passes output to the next. Which architecture best represents this system?
Client–server
Pipe-and-filter
Peer-to-peer
MVC
Correct answer
Pipe-and-filter
An e-commerce system performs the following steps when a customer places an order: 1. Create an Order 2. Notify the Seller 3. Call Packaging 4. Call Delivery Originally, every client had to call all these classes in the correct sequence. To simplify this, a new class was created with a method: This method internally creates all required objects and executes all steps in order. Which design pattern is being used?
Adapter
Facade
Builder
Factory
Correct answer
Facade
A software company builds a system to process both physical books and e-books. The interface contains the following methods: • • • • The e-book module must implement and even though they do nothing. Which principle is violated?
Open–Closed Principle
Interface Segregation Principle
Liskov Substitution Principle
Dependency Inversion Principle
Correct answer
Interface Segregation Principle
Which of the following are non-functional requirements? (Select all that apply)
The system must display new products within 5 seconds
The system should behave consistently over time
The seller can update product prices
The system should recover from invalid input
Correct answers
The system must display new products within 5 seconds
The system should behave consistently over time
The system should recover from invalid input
Which of the following are characteristics of heuristic (model-based) estimation techniques? (Select all that apply)
Use mathematical models
Relate effort to project size
Depend solely on expert intuition
Include models like COCOMO
Correct answers
Use mathematical models
Relate effort to project size
Include models like COCOMO
