Bit371 Capstone Experience For Drones Assessment Answers

1. Was the scope well defined at the start of the project and has it changed?
2. Has the project plan been adjusted to cater for variations?

Answer:

Introduction

Information system is an integrated set of components for collecting, storing and processing data for delivering information, knowledge and digital products.

In any organization there must be flow of data from one point to another and in the process of flow of this data there must be various processing involved and also results of the processes need to be stored in order to support other processes that will take place later using the data stored (Phillips and Nagle, 2007). An information system can be used in this organizations to enhance communication between various points also utilizes the computer components to support the operations in any organizations.

Various organizations has adopted this information systems to ensure digital movement of data into its various departments or levels, they may include banks, institutions of learning and enterprises. In this case we shall base our arguments in a Buyer-Seller set up with circulation of information around the buyer and the seller of an online shop setup.

Interaction between the seller and the customers is a problem usually for employed or studying customers who wake up early in the morning and return late in the evening. This means that it is either the buyer to make arrangements to get to the shop early in the morning or else wait till the late hours to make purchases from the shops which at times do not favour them.

Drones and Action Cameras System is an information system aimed at assisting the vendors with worked sample of Alpha Tech Website in the operations of providing services and goods to the buyers and help in keeping track of all the transactions in during the months (Kendall, 1995). This will help in the reduction of the paper work and the manual work done in the camera sector to store the data and calculations of bills and writing of receipts and their delivery to customers.

Project Background and Justification

Problem Definition

The Drones and Action Cameras System in Alpha Tech heavily depends on manual work done by the sellers of the Drones and Action Cameras.  There are various activities involved in the process of accomplishing their duties in the shopping process this include:

• Registering new users,
• Registering new Admins,
• Updating accounts of buyers after a transaction has occurred,
• Renting a room for Drones and Action Cameras storage,
• Calculating revenues and expenses
• Producing reports of various transactions.
• Hand delivery of receipts and when there is need to make communication with the vendors.

With the above transactions being done manually there arose a need to automate this activities to ensure that paper work has been reduced to the level best to ease the work of the sellers and vendors in charge of the shops. The activities will be performed in the following ways:

• Register new users by entering their details and also enter the amount paid to open an account in terms of deposit. This entered details is saved in a database.
• Auto calculations of purchases after all the required information about the billing is acquired(Pohl, 2010).
• Update the database when a transaction has occurred
• Production of receipts
• Production of reports

Purpose of the ProjectT

The purpose of the project is to develop a computerized system that will address the above mentioned problems, improve efficiency in carrying out management tasks in the Drones and Action Cameras selling Sector and provide a reliable system to produce receipts and send information to the buyers and vendors may be to send Local Purchase Order (order) or make communication to the buyers and vendors.

Objectives of the Project

The objectives of the project include:

• To secure all registered admin and users with a password.
• Email sending for communication purposes.
• The person in charge of the shop can produce a report.
• Auto calculation of transactions
• Production of monthly reports or on demand.

PROBLEM JUSTIFICATION

With the above mentioned limitations of the current manual system there arises a need for a computerized application to improve the operations of the current system. The implemented computerized system will help in keeping track of all details for registered users of the system in a secured database. Occurrences where the vendors give excuses that they didn’t receive the LPO will be reduced because the bills will send through the Email and also communications are done through same channel. Due to the use of password the security of the database is guaranteed. The sellers will not be calculating buyer’s balances as in the current system, this gives a chance for correct values after each month and cheating will be reduced.

MATERIALS AND METHODOLOGY

The entire development procedure for this system was based on incremental model of software development. The system was broken down into modules and subtasks .During the initial module development, an initial version of the system was developed it was then submitted to my supervisor and colleagues to criticize it (Arcuri and Briand, 2011). It is from their criticism that it was possible to know the user needs in details. Also the criticism helped to design the user interface and the development till the end of the project.  During the development process, the system went through the phases of feasibility study, requirements elicitation, requirements analysis, design, coding, verification and validation and implementation and support (Mark, 2000).

MATERIALS REQUIRED

Software requirement for development

• Operating System (Windows 7 and above).
• Web browsers: Mozilla, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer.
• Integrate Development Environment (IDE) tool.
• Gantt Project for project management.
• WAMP (Windows Apache MySQL PHP) Server.
• Macromedia Dreamweaver studio 8 and above.
•  
• XAMPP (Windows Apache MySQL PHP) Server 1.8.0 [PHP 5.4.4] and above.

Hardware Requirement for development

• PC, PROCESSOR; AMD Athlon (tm) II P360, Dual-Core Processor 2.40 GHz, with 2GB RAM and 500 Hard disk and 64 –bit Operating System.
• Flash disk.
• Compact disk.
•  
• Modem  

REQUIREMENTS SPECIFICATION

Functional Requirements

• Assist in password generation
• Keep track of all the accounts registered and their respective amounts.
• Help in account to account amount transfer
• Generate report on the accounts
• Produce receipts for transactions
• Register new accounts
• Delete accounts
• Top up for accounts

Non Functional Requirements

• The mean time failure of the system shall be at least three years.
• When updating the database the system must notify the users on the progress
• The system shall also notify users on wrong inputs and suggest the required inputs
• User’s authentication shall be via valid username and password for administrators.
• User’s authentication shall be via valid registration number and password for users (Chung, 2012). 

DESIGN

GENERAL OVERVIEW

System design is an integral part in any working software worth implementing.  In this section we shall look into the data aspect and component interface for

The system will generally interact with various entities from database server to user interface. This is as shown below.

We look at identification and formulation of data flow diagrams (model) which constituted architectural design and the identification of data structure for the application which constituted data structure design of this project (Juristo and Moreno, 2013). It’s the integral part in working software that is worth implementing. It shows how different entities interact within the system.  

System backend: The back end of the system consists of the SQL database and Apache server. SQL is used as a storage media for data entries (made from the webpage module) and processed information. The user is not aware of this as he/she just interacts with the interface provided for them in the front end (Kendall and Kendall, 2010).

System front end: This is the interface that the user interacts with in order to enter data. It is made possible by using web browsers e.g. Mozilla Firefox and internet explorer.
There are three design levels that were applied in development of the system which are

• Design Methodology
• Architectural design
• Component design
• Interface Design
• Database design 

INTERFACE DESIGN

In designing the systems’ interface, I attempted to emulate Jacob Nielsen’s usability heuristics as described below:

User control

The interface has been made to adapt to the needs of the user. I provided more than one way of doing same task. This is made possible by provision different links located at different parts for doing the same task

Match between system and real world

The web-page module was designed to emulate/resemble the normal requirements as it is in the educational sector.

Consistency

Consistency is about making similar things look and behave similar. The front end up to the back end of Online Shop is consistent. This provide users with a good chance to learn new contexts (and to detect new contexts), to concentrate on relevant tasks, to feel safe.

Buttons in the whole system are placed at the left side and top of each form in a consistent manner.

Minimalistic design

In each form, only information that is directly relevant to the task in hand is displayed.

Error recognition and diagnosis

While using the system a user can tell when an error has occurred as error messages are displayed and possible ways to get out of the error are suggested.

Help

The system provides support for users via a help page. i .e if the user has a log in problem.

DISCUSSION

Since the start of the course, there has been many aspects of programming that so far I have come across. Despite the fact that I have covered this many aspects there has many more things that I have to realize that are of much important in programing and coming up with a software. Drones and Action Cameras System has opened my eyes to the world of software development and I have come to know that many of those things that I thought are impossible in the field of software development, are capable and the fear of the unknown seem to be eliminate since it only requires exploration and research on matters that seem to be impossible.

In my coming up with this software I have been able to interact with the SQL database in details in the management of data storage and the security of the data in storage (NIIT, 2004). This has helped me enough since JavaScript, PHP and the database environment has not been easy for many for many learners and thus the fear of coming up with database driven software in web based environment.

Drones and Action Cameras System have also enabled me to come up with a standard software with the help of my supervisor who insisted on a good documentation for an easy to maintain software.

Drones and Action Cameras System have also enabled me see the importance of research and exploration to what other experts in the field of software development. This gives me a wider view of developing standard and quality software putting in concepts of java programming like android, dynamic websites and database management.    

RECOMMENDATIONS

Since this project has been developed by use of Open source Technologies it also an Open source and open for improvement. Even though the project was completed on the base of the requirement that were proposed the system is very much open to improvement and the following are some of the noted improvements that the system should look into.

• I recommend further improvements on the same project to ensure that the system is made distributed to serve more clients at a time.
• I recommend redistribution of this software to other students for learning purposes and come up with new ways of solving this same problem and come up with a mobile app for easy usage and be part of the evolving technology.

The department should look into it that students don’t just do projects that have been done previously but should come up with an archive that can hold all projects that have ever been done.

Finally students who have related projects should be assisted in the process of integrating them so that power of software’s developed locally can be harnessed.

CONCLUSION

The far the project has given me a chance to explore in the field of software development, I can conclude by saying that a lot need to be done starting from the supervision of the projects. Also the use of the administration supervisors who are held up by the administrative tasks should be reduced to ensure competent software developers are produced after the four years in the university.  

References

Arcuri, A. and Briand, L., 2011, May. A practical guide for using statistical tests to assess randomized algorithms in software engineering. In Software Engineering (ICSE), 2011 33rd International Conference on (pp. 1-10). IEEE.

Chung, L., Nixon, B.A., Yu, E. and Mylopoulos, J., 2012. Non-functional requirements in software engineering (Vol. 5). Springer Science & Business Media.

Juristo, N. and Moreno, A.M., 2013. Basics of software engineering experimentation. Springer Science & Business Media.

Kendall, K.E. and Kendall, J.E., 2010. Systems analysis and design. Prentice Hall Press.

Kendall, P.A., 1995. Introduction to systems analysis and design: a structured approach. Business & Educational Technologies.

Mark Maslakowski, 2000. Sam's Teach Yourself SQL in 21 Days. Sams Publishing

NIIT, 2004.Introduction to Software Application Programming. Prentice Hall

Phillips, C.L. and Nagle, H.T., 2007. Digital control system analysis and design. Prentice Hall Press.

Pohl, K., 2010. Requirements engineering: fundamentals, principles, and techniques. Springer Publishing Company, Incorporated.