The hardware tools I will be using:
- Intel ® Pentium 1.8 GHZ processor,
- RAM 253.424 kb memory,
- Compaq d10 v570 running
- Microsoft office XP.
- I will also be using a keyboard,
- Mouse
- My own Kodak digital camera.
I am using Microsoft Word and Kodak Easyshare (this is the camera I will be using to take photographs of the food I have prepared.) I will be downloading the pictures on to the file and importing them into word. I will be using Microsoft Word because I am unfamiliar with publisher and it will take too long to get to grips with it. I initially thought I might use Powerpoint as it would be fun to create, but decided against Powerpoint because it is used for presentation purposes and it won’t solve my problem because all my friends would have to sit at a computer to get the recipes. Also I am using Word because my project involves a lot of writing, formatting text and pictures and Microsoft word is the perfect tool for doing this.
Word has many special features which will help me with this project. It has a spelling and grammar checker making it easier for me to get the project correct and sounding perfect. I can insert clipart, Wordart, borders and download pictures in to my work to make it look neat and give it a professional finish. Word allows me to insert tables, which I will need when I write about the different temperatures as some of my friends have a gas cooker and others have an electric cooker. I can change the page alignment,
so that the recipes look neat in the centre of the page and the next recipe automatically goes onto a separate page. The copy and paste facility means I can use text without retyping long instructions, i.e. all pages will say ‘preparation time and cooking time’. I can easily save and store my project for me to edit the text later.
I will be getting my data from some of my favourite cookbooks. The cookbooks I will be getting them from will be Good Housekeeping, The Ultimate Menu Cookbook, Rick Stein’s Seafood Odyssey and 1000 Recipe Cookbook by Octopus. I have changed the ingredients from each recipe because some types of food I don’t like and I have slightly changed the step by step method to follow how I individually cook it.
I will input the data by typing all the information using the keyboard and mouse. I will be downloading pictures from my digital camera of each meal I create, I will be using Kodak Easyshare as this is what goes with my camera.
Hardware
I will need a PC to solve my problem and a colour printer. I will also be using a digital camera.
Software
I need to use Microsoft Word because it offers me the following tools and formatting devices:
- Bold to highlight the ingredients
- Tabs to get the step by step method next to the correct step
- Underlining
- Clipart for pictures on my front cover
- Wordart for titles of each meal and sub headings
- Fonts- I will be using Bradley Hands ICT for ingredients and Comic Sans MS for the method
- Bullet Points for the contents page
- Borders for the front cover
- Grammar and Spelling to check the cookbook is correct
- Print preview to view my work in full before I print it
- Cut and paste to move my work around
Processing
To make my cookbook look more eye catching and professional I will be doing the writing in different colours, using different fonts for the writing, using Wordart for titles and sub-headings, downloading pictures of the finished meal onto the page, putting tables of conversion charts.
Output
My final output will be:
- an A4 cookbook with pictures of each meal after they have been cooked.
- A contents page so they can find the meal they want to cook easily.
- An introduction so they know a bit about me and my life with cooking and food.
- A conversion chart so they know the equivalents in temperatures and weights and an order form so other people can order the book from me if they like the look of it.
Although I have decided to produce a book to give out to people on reconsideration it would be a good idea to put the recipes on the internet as this would reach a wider audience. I realise while my mum was talking with some friends that although people still like to entertain, it is very time consuming looking up recipes and set meals, and if they had a web site to visit with recipes already there, this could save them a lot of valuable time.
Backup
To backup my work I could use a CD-RW for my user to view and look through before I print out my cookbook. I will probably save it onto a floppy disc which is easy to store in a disc holder.
Security
I have to use a password to get onto my project so my private recipe collection is secure from other students who may try to use my ideas.
For designing the recipe layout:
Step 1: I will put in a header as my name.
Step 2: I will put the title of the recipe in Wordart at the top of the page.
Step 3: I will change the font to Bradley Hand ICT then embolden the writing, change the colour to red, size 12 and centre it. I will write about how many people the meal served, how long it took to prepare and cook, whether it was suitable for freezing or not and how many calories was in it.
Step 4: I will put Step 1, 2, 3 and 4 in Wordart beneath that to the left alignment.
Step 5: I will write the method in steps next to the step 1, 2, 3 and 4. I will do this in Comic Sans font, not in bold and the colour in blue, size 12.
Step 6: Beneath that I will then write the ingredients and centre the text again, change the font back to Bradley Hand ICT, embolden it and change the colour back to red, size 12.
Step 7: I will take a picture of the finished meal on my digital camera. I will connect the camera to the computer using a USB cable and download the pictures onto a file.
Step 8: I then will go to Insert, then down to Picture and to From File and select the picture of the meal and insert it onto the bottom of the page.
Test Plan:
I have proof read it, done a spell check and grammar check. To make sure everything was spelt correct and there weren’t any grammatical mistakes.
I will get a third party to do a test on my cookbook. I will get my mum and sister to look through it and as they both enjoy cooking and they will give me comments on the actual recipes. I will also get my dad and brother to do a test as well as they will give me more of and idea on the layout and presentation. They will tell me what they think I have done well and how they think I can improve it. Their comments are on a separate sheet.
I am happy to say that I solved the problem because I produced my cookbook with a front cover to inspire my friends, a contents page so they can pick what recipe they want to do and an introduction describing myself.
The comments were that they found the cookbook easy to read and they thought the layout was very good. They found it easy to find the recipes because of the contents page I did. The thought the recipes were easy to follow and concise. They liked the fact that I had pictures of the meal because my dad only looks at the pictures to see whether he would like the meal. The all thought it was attractively presented and couldn’t find any fault with the presentation.
However they thought that the recipes would be expensive to create and that they weren’t to everybody’s taste. It wasn’t for people on a budget and there were limited starters and desserts. My dad also would have liked to see some vegetarian dishes. They also thought that some of ingredients would be had to get.
Next time I will try to do recipes that would be cheaper. Have more of a range of recipes for everyone’s taste and have more starters and main courses. I will also put in couple of vegetarian dishes. I would keep the presentation and layout the same because nobody could find any fault with that.
The recipes also came out brilliantly showing how many it serves, how long it will take for them to prepare and cook, it also showed whether you could freeze it and how many calories was in it. I described the method they would need in order to for them cook it themselves, the ingredients also and a picture of the finished meal so they would know how to lay it out. I also created a conversion chart showing the different temperatures from gas marks to Centigrade to Fahrenheit because my friends have all different cookers. I did another conversion chart showing the metric and ounces equivalents because some of my older friends still work in ounces and pounds. I also created an order form so I can see if other people want my book. I created this using a macro because it saved me time and I could reproduce it as necessary without error.
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The user wanted it to be easy to read- I made it easy for the user to read by changing the fonts and sizes. Also I made sure the layout was spaced out.
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The user wanted at least 10 recipes- I did 10 recipes altogether and I think they came out really well. The layout of the page worked really well for me.
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The user wanted a professional front cover- The front cover was easy to do the only problem was they didn’t have very many inspiring pictures of food in the clipart section.
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The user wanted the ingredients of all the recipes- I got all of the ingredients for all of the meals and the amount needed of each ingredient whilst I cooked the meal myself.
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The user wanted the calories of each meal- I managed to find out the calories of each meal by getting a calorie counter, this I found quite hard to workout, but I successfully did it in the end.
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The user wanted it in sections- I decided to section it into starters, main courses and desserts. I did 1 more main course than the others because I thought not everybody has starters and desserts.
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The user wanted a contents page- I did a contents page at put it at the beginning of the cookbook so the user could see at a glance all of the meals instead of having to flick through the whole book.
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The user wanted a conversion chart for metric and imperial- I managed to find the metric equivalents in a cookbook and I decided to lay it out in a table, which made it look more professional.
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The user wanted another conversion chart for temperatures- I also found the table of temperature for different cookers in another book, this was harder to find and had to go to a library for this.
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The user wanted to know how long it took to prepare and cook- I timed how long it took me to prepare the meal and how long it took to cook as well for each meal, so the user could see if they had enough time to prepare and cook it.
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The user wanted a picture of the finished meal- For all of the recipes I managed to get a picture of the meal from digital camera. I found easy to do as I have had practice doing it before. The pictures came out very clear and would shoe the user hoe to lay the meal out.
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The user wanted a introduction- I decided to do a introduction so that the user would know a bit about myself.
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The user wanted a order form- I did and order form so that if any of my friends showed it to their friends and they wanted a copy for themselves, they could just fill out and hand it back. I recorded this as a macro to save me time and also to make sure the order forms were all the same without any errors.