So I have just started looking at the assignment, it has specified 4 use cases. Are these the only ones I should be worrying about or am I expected to flesh out my design and include others that I think are required, for example things like logging into the system, resetting passwords, updating user details, etc?
You don't have to design the whole system. Design only those components and services which is expected from you. I got BSCS(Big smokes Cigar Shop)-i stated in the assumptions that Authentication and Authorization modules, Admin module(web based UI application), Content Management System etc... already exists. I only talked high level about them at the interface or boundary levels that how other components and services can communicate with them-that's it. In fact my assumption list was almost 2 pages long with around 30 assumption points. In fact i used it more as way to specify what's in scope and what is out of scope plus disclaimers. My assumptions section was at the top of the assignment to tell the evaluator-this is what i have assumed and what i am going to design in the assignment.
You can think of the
SCEA assignment as a real life project where one need to know what is in scope and what is not?
Remember Cade has mentioned in the book-if you are devoting more than 100 hrs-either you are over doing the assignment or their is lack of skills(in my case i was lacking some skills in JEE5 and i went too detailed for the sequence diagram
)