ISC YEAR 2024

COMPUTER SCIENCE - PAPER 2

PRACTICAL EXAMINATION
Instructions and Guidelines for
Visiting Examiners

1. Preparation of Question Paper/s and conduct of

the Practical Examination

2. Blueprint of the Question Paper

3. Question Specific Guidelines &Instructions

4. Guidelines for Evaluation of Computer Science-

Paper 2(Practical)

5. Sample Question Papers

I. PREPARATION OF QUESTION PAPER/S AND
CONDUCT OF PRACTICAL EXAMINATION
The Practical Examination must be conducted between 1st October 2023 and
31st January 2024.

Steps to be followed for conducting Computer Science Practical

Examination.

Deciding the number of Batches and Dates for the Practical Examination/s
1. The Visiting Examiner must collect the soft copies/hard copies of all documents related to
the conduct of the Practical Examination from the Head of the School.
2. The Head of the School, in consultation with the Visiting Examiner and the
Chief/Supervising Examiner should decide the number of batches in which the candidates
of the School would take the practical examination. This should be done keeping in mind
the size of the laboratory and total number of candidates appearing for Computer Science
practical examination.
3. Each batch should be assigned a batch number – e.g., Batch 1 (Index no. 224001/001 to
224001/010); Batch 2 (Index no. 224001/011 to 224001/020). A record of this information
should be maintained by the Head of the School. A copy of this record should be submitted
to the Convener.
4. Date/s of Practical Examination for each batch must be decided according to the
convenience of both the Visiting Examiner and the School.
5. The candidates must be informed of the dates of the Practical Examination (for their batch)
at least one week in advance.
Finalising the Question Paper/s
1. The Visiting Examiner will be required to set the question paper/s for the candidate(s)
concerned based on the syllabus for the ISC Year 2024 Practical Examination and other
guidelines provided by CISCE. The question paper/s prepared could be similar to the
Sample Question Papers provided by CISCE in this document.
2. The Visiting Examiner should select the questions, as per the Blueprint and other
guidelines provided by CISCE, include relevant details and run the programs where
required, to ensure that the desired results are obtained before finalising the Question
Paper.
3. The Visiting Examiner should use a range of questions (as provided in the sample
questions) for each batch, while ensuring that all batches get Question Papers of similar
difficulty level.
4. After finalising the Question Paper/s, the Visiting Examiner must inform the Head of
the School, regarding the arrangements to be made in the Computer laboratory for the
conduct of the practical examination.

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Preparation and Storage of Question Paper/s prepared
5. The Head of the School, in presence of the Visiting Examiner and the Chief/Supervising
Examiner, should ensure that the question paper/s is/are photocopied in adequate
numbers (as per the number of candidates concerned), well in advance.

6. The photocopied question paper/s should be packed and sealed in envelope(s) by the
Visiting Examiner which should be labelled as follows:

Subject: Computer Science-Paper 2 Practical Examination

Date of Examination: _____________________

Batch Number:

Index No.(s):

Number of Question Papers packed:

Both, the Chief/Supervising Examiner, and the Visiting Examiner should put their
signatures across the seal of the envelope(s), with the date.

7. The Visiting Examiner should handover the sealed envelope(s) containing copies of the
finalised question paper/s to the Chief/Supervising Examiner for safe custody.

8. The Chief/Supervising Examiner must ensure that the sealed envelope(s) of the
question papers are kept securely, under lock and key, in a cupboard, in the office of
the Head of the School.

9. All concerned must maintain strict confidentiality of the finalised question papers.

Uploading of Marks awarded by the Visiting Examiner.

10. The marks awarded by the Visiting Examiner, as per the Guidelines for Evaluation of
Computer Science Paper 2 (Practical) (given on page 6), must be uploaded onto the
CAREERS Portal after the evaluation of answer script(s) of candidate(s) concerned.

11. The Visiting Examiner must also evaluate and upload the marks awarded for the
Project work and Practical files of the candidates.

12. After uploading the marks, the data must be saved on the Portal by clicking the ‘SAVE’
button. The final submission of marks to CISCE should then be made after the marks
of all the candidates of the School, for the given subject, have been uploaded onto the
Portal.

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13. It is necessary to ensure that the marks of all candidates are entered correctly, before
submitting the same to CISCE.

14. After the final submission of marks to CISCE, the Visiting Examiner must take a print-
out of the marks submitted, put his name, signature and date on each sheet. This print-
out of marks must be handed over in a sealed envelope to the Head of the School.

15. The marks awarded to the candidates must be treated as strictly confidential and must
not be disclosed to anyone by the Visiting Examiner.

16. The evaluated answer scripts must be packed securely in durable envelope(s). The
Chief/Supervising Examiner must sign on the packed answer script envelopes to
ensure that the answer scripts were packed in her/his presence and that she/he has
verified the number of scripts enclosed in the envelope.

All answer script envelopes must be addressed to:

The Chief Executive & Secretary
Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations
Plot No. 35-36, Sector 6,
Pushp Vihar, Saket
New Delhi – 110017

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BLUEPRINT OF THE PRACTICAL QUESTIONPAPER
The Computer Science Practical Question Paper consists of Three questions and the
candidate must select any ONE question. Each question must consist of four components.
The details /marks distribution is given below:

Algorithm
1. 3 marks

2. Program in Java with documentation 7 marks

3. Hard copy / printout 2 marks

4. Output / execution 3 marks

Total 15 Marks

The three programs must be based on the topics as given below:

Question 1. Number Logic / Date concept / Time concept/ Number encryption

Question2. Single dimensional array / Double dimensional array

Question 3. String manipulation / String encryption

In addition to the above, the Visiting Examiner will also be required to

evaluate the following for each candidate:

• Programming assignments done throughout the year (by the teacher) 10 marks

• Programming assignments done throughout the year (by the V.E.) 5 marks

Total 15 Marks

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QUESTION SPECIFIC GUIDELINES & INSTRUCTIONS
The Visiting Examiner, in consultation with the subject teacher, must decide on the
programs to set the question paper. The Sample Question Papers provided by CISCE may
be referred to for this purpose.
The questions must be set as follows:
Question 1: Number Logic / Date concept / Time Concept
The program should check the validity of a given input / range and output the desired result
in a formatted manner. Logic for checking the validity, extraction of digits from a number,
changing a numeric literal to String literal and vice-versa may be tested.

• Number logic- to extract digits from a number, checking and generating a particular
type of number (i.e. Smith Number, Kaprekar Number etc.).

• Date concept- to check validity of dates, to find the number of days between two given
dates in the same calendar year, future date etc.

• Time concept- to find the time elapsed between any two given time in a particular day,
to find the future time after some duration (in hours and minutes)

• Number encryption – to convert decimal numbers to different bases (Binary, Octal and
Hexadecimal) and vice versa. Coding of numbers using their ASCII values

Question2: Single dimensional array/Double dimensional array

The program should check the validity of the size of the matrix/array and output the
desired result in a formatted manner. Formula to check if the elements lie on the boundary,
non-boundary, diagonal etc. in a given matrix/array.
• Single dimensional array- merging of two arrays, to arrange the array elements in a
particular manner etc.
• Double dimensional array / matrix- to find the sum/sort the elements of each
row/column, boundary elements, non-boundary elements etc.
• Square matrix to find sum/sort elements of the diagonal, maximum and minimum
value with location in the matrix, mirror/inversion of the matrix etc.
Question 3: String manipulation / String encryption
The program to check the validity of a sentence/paragraph with the terminating character
given. Logic to extract the words from a sentence, characters from words, vowels, and
consonants etc.
• Paragraph input with a maximum of two sentences and finding the number of words in
each sentence.
• To separate the words beginning with a vowel in a sentence and find its frequency.
• To change the Upper-case characters to lower case and vice versa in a given sentence
along with the count of palindrome words present in the sentence, if any.

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IV.GUIDELINES FOR EVALUATION OF
COMPUTER SCIENCE PAPER–2 (PRACTICAL)
(for the use of the Visiting Examiners)

Marks (Out of a total of 30) for this paper are to be distributed as follows:
A. Assessment of practical examination: 15 Marks
B. Assessment of programming done throughout the year: 15 Marks
Part A: Assessment of Practical Examination (15 Marks)
Candidates are expected to plan their programs and test run them on the
computer. The various stages are to be assessed as follows:
1. Algorithm: [3]
❖ Choice of algorithm and implementation strategy. [1½]
❖ Complete and clearly expressed algorithm using any standard [1½]
schemes (i.e. pseudo code or step-wise) and according to the program.

2. Java Program: (Selected by candidate) [5]

(a) ❖ Knowledge of Input requirement and the choice of data type. [1]
❖ Clear description of classes, functional behavior, functional argument [1]
and return type and any formulae or special logic/method used.
❖ The program follows the algorithm correctly and is logically correct. [2]
❖ Use of correct and formatted output statement. [1]
(b) Documentation to be provided in the handwritten or printed coded [2]
program by comments/mnemonic names.
3. The final listing (hard copy) that the candidate submits at the end, [2]
follows the algorithm and is logically correct. Large differences between
planned program and the printout will result in loss of marks.
4. Execution and testing: [3]
❖ The program runs successfully on the sample inputs to produce the [2]
correct sample outputs (correct output on known inputs).
❖ The examiner should ask the candidate to run program on other [1]
inputs to ensure that it is correct. These would typically be the extreme
boundary conditions (correct output on unknown inputs).
❖ Candidates are required to execute programs using JDK
environment/ BlueJ/ Eclipse/NetBeans. (BlueJ allows the user to
write a class, create objects and test their functionality without
having to write public static void main ( ). Hence, the program
executed using BlueJ environment should also be accepted.)

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Part B : Assessment of programming done throughout the year (15 Marks)
The Subject Teacher will assess the year’s work of candidates(assignments done as practical work
through out the year) and award marks out of 10. These marks, along with the year’s work, should be made
available to the Visiting Examiner. After taking the internally awarded marks into consideration,
the Visiting Examiner should award marks out of 5, for the year’s work of candidates. The total
marks for continuous evaluation, therefore, shall be out of 15 marks(out of 10 marks awarded
through internal evaluation and out of 5 marks awarded by the Visiting Examiner).

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ISC YEAR 2024

COMPUTER SCIENCE PAPER 2

PRACTICAL EXAMINATION

SAMPLE QUESTION
PAPERS
PREPARING THE QUESTION PAPER
• The Sample Question Papers provided by CISCE include different
questions for each type of Practical Work given in the syllabus. These
questions may be used by the Visiting Examiner for setting the question
Paper/s.

• The Visiting Examiners are advised to go through the Instructions and

Guidelines for Visiting Examiners, before setting the Question
Paper/s.

• The questions must be selected as per the Blueprint and other details
provided by CISCE, include relevant details and run the program
himself/herself, where required, to ensure that the desired results are
obtained before finalizing the Question Paper.
• The text for the questions may be similar to the text used for the Sample
Questions.
• The provided Top Sheet, detailing the time provided for reading the
Question Paper, the duration of the Examination and other necessary
information, must be attached as the first sheet of the Question Paper.

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COMPUTER SCIENCE
PAPER – 2
PRACTICAL
(Maximum Marks: 30)
Time allowed: Three Hours
(Candidates are allowed additional 15 minutes for only reading the paper.)
They must NOT start writing during this time.)

The total time to be spent on the Planning Session and the Examination Session is Three hours.
After completing the Planning Session, the candidate may begin with the Examination Session.
A maximum of 90 minutes is permitted for the Planning Session.
However, if candidates finish earlier, they are to be permitted to begin the Examination Session.

This paper consists of three problems from which candidates are required to attempt any one problem.

Candidates are expected to do the following:

A. Planning Session:
1. Write an algorithm for the selected problem. [3marks]
(Algorithm should be expressed clearly using any standard scheme such as pseudo
code or in steps which are simple enough to be obviously computable.)

2. Write a program in JAVA language. The program should follow the algorithm and [7marks]
should be logically and syntactically correct. Document the program using
mnemonic names / comments, identifying and clearly describing the choice of data
types and meaning of variables.

B. Examination Session:

1. Code / Type the program on the computer and get a printout (hard copy). Typically, [2marks]
this should be a program that compiles and runs correctly.

2. Test run the program on the computer using the given sample data and get a [3marks]
printout of the output in the format specified in the problem.

Note: The candidates must not carry any stationery, items such as pen / pencil / eraser
to the Computer Laboratory for the Examination Session.

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SAMPLE PAPER 1

Solve any one of the following Problems.

Question 1

Hamming numbers are positive integer numbers whose prime factors include 2,3 and 5 only
Example:
n=6 is an hamming number as 6=2x3 .So its prime factors are limited to 2 ,3
n=8 is an hamming number as 8=2x2x2 and it has only 2 as its prime factors
n=90 is an hamming number as 90=2x3x3x5 which has only 2,3,5 as prime factors
n=14 is not a hamming number as 14=2x7 .It has 7 as one of its prime factor
n=44 is not a hamming number as 44=2x2x11. It has 11 as one of its prime factors

Design a program to accept any positive integer number and check if it is a Hamming number or
not. Display the result with an appropriate message in the format specified below. The program
should also generate error message if a negative number is entered.
Test your program for the following data and some random data.
Example 1
INPUT: Enter any number: 3600
OUTPUT: 3600= 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 3 x 3 x 5 x 5
3600 IS A HAMMING NUMBER
Example 2
INPUT: Enter any number: 5832
OUTPUT: 5832= 2 x 2 x 2 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x 3
5832 IS A HAMMING NUMBER

Example 3
INPUT: Enter any number: 7854
OUTPUT: 7854= 2 x 3 x 7 x 11 x 17
7854 IS NOT A HAMMING NUMBER
Example 4
INPUT: Enter a number: -120
OUTPUT: NEGATIVE NUMBER ENTERED. INVALID INPUT

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Question 2

Write a program to declare a square matrix M[][] of order ‘N’. Check if the matrix is a Doubly
Markov matrix or not. A matrix which satisfies the following conditions are Doubly Markov matrix
(i) All elements are greater than or equal to 0
(ii) Sum of each row is equal to 1.
(iii) Sum of each column is equal to 1.
Accept ‘N’ from the user where 3 <= N <= 9. Display an appropriate error message if ‘N’ is not in
the given range or the entered numbers are negative. Allow the user to create a matrix and check
whether the created matrix is a Doubly Markov matrix or not
Test your program for the following data and some random data:
Example 1
INPUT: N=3
Enter elements in the matrix: 0.5, 0.25, 0.25, 0.25, 0.75, 0.0, 0.25, 0.0, 0.75
OUTPUT: FORMED MATRIX
0.5 0.25 0.25
0.25 0.75 0.0
0.25 0.0 0.75

IT IS A DOUBLY MARKOV MATRIX

Example 2
INPUT: N=3
Enter elements in the matrix: 1.5, 3, 0.15, 0.25, 4, 1.0, 0.25, 1.0, 3
OUTPUT: FORMED MATRIX
1.5 3 0.15
0.25 4 1.0
0.25 1.0 3

IT IS NOT A DOUBLY MARKOV MATRIX

Example 3
INPUT: N=2
Enter elements in the matrix: 0.8, -4.0, 0.9, 3.5
OUTPUT: NEGATIVE NUMBERS ENTERED. INVALID ENTRY

Example 4
INPUT: N =12
OUTPUT: SIZE IS OUT OF RANGE. INVALID ENTRY

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Question 3

A snowball string is a sentence where each word is arranged in ascending order of their length and
is also consecutive.
For example “I am the Lord” is a snowball string as
Length of word ‘I’ is 1
Length of word ‘am’ is 2
Length of word ‘the’ is 3
Length of word ‘Lord’ is 4
The length of each word is one more than the previous word. Hence they are consecutive and in
ascending order.
Write a program to enter any sentence and check if it is a snowball string or not. The words in the
sentence may be separated by a one or more spaces and terminated by ‘.’ or ‘?’ only. The program
will generate appropriate error message for any other terminating character.
Test your program for the following data and some random data:
Example 1
INPUT: He may give bonus.
OUTPUT: IT IS A SNOWBALL STRING

Example 2
INPUT: Is the cold water frozen?
OUTPUT: IT IS A SNOWBALL STRING

Example 3
INPUT: Look before you leap.
OUTPUT: IT IS NOT A SNOWBALL STRING

Example 4
INPUT: The child is father of the man!
OUTPUT: INCORRECT TERMINATING CHARACTER. INVALID INPUT

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SAMPLE PAPER 2

Solve any one of the following Problems.

Question 1

Write a program in JAVA to accept day number (between 1 and 366) and year (yyyy) from the
user and display the corresponding date. Also accept ‘N’ from the user where (1<=N<=100) to
compute and display the future date ‘N’ days after the given date. Display error message if the
value of the day number or ‘N’ are not within the limit. Day number is calculated taking 1st January
of the given year as 1.
Test your program with given set of data and some random data
Example 1
INPUT: DAY NUMBER: 50
YEAR: 2023
N: 25
OUTPUT: ENTERED DATE: FEBRUARY 19, 2023
25 DAYS LATER: MARCH 16, 2023

Example 2
INPUT: DAY NUMBER: 321
YEAR: 2023
N: 77
OUTPUT: ENTERED DATE: NOVEMBER 17, 2023
77 DAYS LATER: FEBRUARY 2, 2024

Example 3
INPUT: DAY NUMBER: 400
YEAR: 2023
N: 125
OUTPUT: INCORRECT DAY NUMBER
INCORRECT VALUE OF ‘N’

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Question 2

Lucky numbers are a sequence of natural numbers that remain after removing second, third, fourth,
fifth and so on numbers respectively from a sequence of consecutive natural numbers.
Consider the sequence of first 20 natural numbers :
Removing every second number produces the sequence 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19
Next removing every third number produces the sequence 1, 3, 7, 9, 13, 15, 19
Next removing every fourth number produces the sequence : 1, 3, 7, 13, 15, 19
Further deleting every fifth number we get the sequence : 1, 3, 7, 13, 19
Deletion of every sixth number is not possible and the five numbers that are lucky to escape deletion
remain indefinitely.
Write a program to enter any positive natural number ‘N’ where (1<=N<=50) and generate lucky
numbers less than the given natural number.
Test your program with the following set of data
Example 1
INPUT: N=10
OUTPUT: LUCKY NUMBERS LESS THAN 10 ARE : 1, 3 , 7

Example 2
INPUT: N=25
OUTPUT: LUCKY NUMBERS LESS THAN 25 ARE : 1, 3 , 7, 13, 19

Example 3
INPUT: N=100
OUTPUT: NUMBER NOT IN RANGE. INVALID ENTRY

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Question 3

Write a program to accept a sentence which may be terminated by either ‘.’ , ‘?’ or ‘!’ only. The
words may be separated by a single blank spaces and are in UPPER CASE.
Perform the following tasks:
(a) Count number of vowels and consonants present in each word
(b) Generate the output of the frequency in form of a bar graph, where V denotes vowels and C
consonants as shown below:
Test your program for the following data and some random data:

Example 1

INPUT: HOW ARE YOU?

OUTPUT: WORD COUNT

HOW V
CC

ARE VV
C

YOU VV
C

Example 2

INPUT: GOOD DAY!

OUTPUT: WORD COUNT

GOOD VV
CC

DAY V
CC

Example 3

INPUT: LONG LIVE THE KING#

OUTPUT: INCORRECT TERMINATING CHARACTER. INVALID INPUT

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SAMPLE PAPER 3

Solve any one of the following Problems.

Question 1

A Vampire number is a composite natural number with an even number of digits that can be
factored into two natural numbers each with half as many digits as the original number and not
both with trailing zeros, where the two factors contain precisely all the digits of the original
number, in any order of counting multiplicity.
Example: 1260 = 21 x 60 ( where, 21 and 60 contain precisely all the digits of the number )
Thus, 1260 is a Vampire number.
Accept two positive integers m and n, where m is less than n and the values of both ‘m’ and ‘n’
must be greater than or equal to 1000 and less than or equal to 9999 as user input. Display all
Vampire numbers that are in the range between m and n (both inclusive) and output them along
with the frequency, in the format specified below:
Test your program for the following data and some random data.
Example 1
INPUT: m = 1002
n = 1640
OUTPUT: THE VAMPIRE NUMBERS ARE:
1260 1395 1435 1530
FREQUENCY OF VAMPIRE NUMBER IS: 4
Example 2
INPUT: m = 1810
n = 7800
OUTPUT: THE VAMPIRE NUMBERS ARE:
1827 2187 6880
FREQUENCY OF VAMPIRE NUMBER IS: 3
Example 3
INPUT: m = 8105
n = 9999
OUTPUT: THE VAMPIRE NUMBERS ARE:
NIL
FREQUENCY OF VAMPIRE NUMBER IS: 0
Example 4
INPUT: m = 174
n = 4500
OUTPUT: INVALID INPUT

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Question 2

Write a program to declare a matrix A [ ] [ ] of order (M × N) where ‘M’ is the number of rows
and ‘N’ is the number of columns such that both M and N must be greater than 2 and less than10.
Allow the user to input integers into this matrix. Display appropriate error message for an invalid
input.
Perform the following tasks on the matrix.
(a) Display the input matrix
(b) Rotate the matrix by 2700 degrees anti clock wise and display the resultant matrix
(c) Calculate the sum of the odd elements of the matrix and display

Test your program for the following data and some random data:
Example 1
INPUT: M=3
N=4
ENTER ELEMENTS: 8, 7, 9, 3,-2, 0, 4, 5, 1, 3, 6, -4
OUTPUT: ORIGINALMATRIX
8 7 9 3
-2 0 4 5
1 3 6 -4
ROTATED MATRIX ( 2700 ANTI CLOCK WISE )
1 -2 8
3 0 7
6 4 9
-4 5 3
SUM OF THE ODD ELEMENTS = 28
Example 2
INPUT: M=3
N=2
ENTER ELEMENTS: 9, 13, 41, 5, 6, -5
OUTPUT: ORIGINALMATRIX
9 13 41
5 6 -5
ROTATED MATRIX ( 2700 ANTI CLOCK WISE )
5 9
6 13
-5 41
SUM OF THE ODD ELEMENTS = 63
Example 3
INPUT: M=2
N = 10
OUTPUT: INVALID INPUT
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Question 3

Keyword cipher is a form of encryption technique. A keyword is used as the key, and it
determines the letter matching the cipher alphabet to the plain alphabet. Repeats of letters in the
word are removed, then the cipher alphabet is generated with the keyword matching to A, B, C,
etc. until the keyword is used up, whereupon the rest of the cipher text letters are used in
alphabetical order, excluding those already used in the key.
Encryption:
The first line of input contains the keyword which you wish to enter. The second line of input
contains the string which you have to encrypt.
Plaintext: A BCDEFGHI J K LMNOPQRS T UVWXYZ
Encrypted: K RYPT OSABCD E FG HI J LMNQUVWXZ
With KRYPTOS as the keyword, all A’s become K’s, all B’s becoming R’s, and so on.
Example:
Encrypting the message: KNOWLEDGE IS POWER when, Keyword is KRYPTOS
Decoded message: DGHVETPST BM IHVTL
Write a program to accept a Coded text in upper case and a Keyword. Using the above technique
decrypt the text and display.
Note: All the messages are encoded in uppercase. Whitespace, special characters, and
numbers remains unchanged.

Test your program for the following inputs:

Example 1
INPUT: ENTER KEYWORD: SECRET
ENTER TEXT TO BE DECODED: ZLJEFT DTOT
OUTPUT: DECODED TEXT: ZOMBIE HERE

Example 2
INPUT: ENTER KEYWORD: STAR WARS
ENTER TEXT TO BE DECODED: SPPSAG SP RSVJ
OUTPUT: DECODED TEXT: ATTACK AT DAWN

Example 3
INPUT: ENTER KEYWORD: PLAYERS
ENTER TEXT TO BE DECODED: Haln de yokl
OUTPUT: INVALID TEXT

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