The Computer Architecture dilemma

It all started with the Computer Architecture TA giving us 5 out of 15 in the final project, on the pretext that we had chapofied [copy-pasted] the project from somewhere. The "Five" was particularly helpful in getting me a 62 point something on this course [duhh! I was expecting more!]. Talk about the idiosyncrasies of individuals. So just so Hassaan came up with the idea of having a re-demo so that we could make up with the course instructor himself. A noble idea indeed, but none that me and Adnan were particularly optimistic that it would work out. And then we set about the task of presenting ourselves for the demo. We went all the way to city campus. The Course Instructor decided that he wasn't gonna check our code all along. Fair enough, but then how do you think you could substantiate the cheating allegation? So he decided to have a viva kind of demo. And that was it. He left no stones unturned in trying to somehow catch us in a loom, and strike away with our marks, but to his utter disappointment, that wasn't to be the case. What do you expect when you're thoroughly prepared? When he didn't get anything to have us embarassed on and to accept that we indeed had cheated and were a bunch of chays who were trying to make a chay out of him, he let us go, and asked us to provide us with the project. The most efficient and overly-enthusiastic Hassaan copied the whole folder, along with the help files, to his system. Not that I am blaming Hassaan of anything, but this Instructor was indeed looking out for something to have us implicated. And then he mailed us: Subject: your project Sent: 3/5/2005 11:05 AM Importance: Normal I forgot to ask you 1 more question In how many days you make this project. also give me starting and ending date Not that it was of any alarm to us, and I just mailed him back, with a little bit of clarification [I had in mind that he has in mind that it was in the TA's mind that we were cheating]. Here is what I mailed: From: me To: The CA Instructor Sent: 3/5/2005 1:30 PM Subject: RE: your project We started this project around mid-November, and got it almost completed till the start of January. It took almost a month considering that we didnt work during the finals. We dont remember the exact dates. We managed to complete such a comprehensive project in a month because the OS project resembles the JVM architecture and it helped us a lot. Regards. Phew! Considering that we indeed had this phase completed, and that we would get a "few" more marks in the project, we were at ease then. But bad days come faster than good ones. I got a mail from him almost the same day, with a bit of irony: From: The CA Instructor To: me Subject: RE: your project Sent: 3/5/2005 5:18 PM well the magnitude of the project does not show that you make it in a month time some of the files are created on feb 04 to may 04. It is not due to the system clock problem because some have the date of dec 04 and jan 05. there are also some csharp files moreover just tell me who is mujtaba? I think Fatema gives too much marks. Well, that was particularly enough for me. Personal enmity aside, this was no reason to discriminate among the students. I had to reply a last time, whatever he may think. From: me To: The CA Instructor Subject: RE: your project Sent: 3/7/2005 9:57 AM With all due respect, sir, as I had mentioned this project greatly resembled the Operating Systems project we had developed during Spring 2004. The OS project also needs us to develop a Virtual Machine like the one we developed in this project. Most of the help about how to set about designing the project was taken from the OS project. Only we had to modify the instruction set architecture and the methods to read the class file. The rest is almost the same. The issue of dates that you mention might stem out of the fact that we have reused files and code from our Operating System project. And that, I feel, is not an offence. Doing a quick search for "Mujtaba", I found that this was contained in one of the help files. There were plenty of help files that were used to understand the bytecode and the JVM architecture. I hope since you have this word document, you'll also have other documents and pdfs etc that may provide an insight to the lengths we went into building this project. And I do feel we are still not awarded accordingly. Regards. Somebody asked me to atleast change the attitude of the mail, but ho boy, that wasnt to be. I ve had enough and at that point I didnt care anymore about anything. In the end, I am not sure that he has awarded us marks or not. My final grade in Computer Architecture is posted as B-. Wondering how I can a B- on that 62 point something? Dont blame me for venting my anger on him. He has done a general upgrading. And I still dont have my marks.