Analysis of the Requirements
An upgraded MIS system at the college in the form of an online prospectus may benefit the staff in many ways. Currently the college is manually based and before the computerised online prospectus is put into action the system analysts in my opinion need to consider a few points:
- A user friendly interface is vital for the prospectus to be successful,
- A logical & well structured formation and software is necessary for the future success of the system,
- The prospectus should be easy to update, edit & remove unwanted,
- A good help guide and user manual should also be available for the system aimed at people with limited IT skills.
Limitations of the System & Redundant Objects
Looking at the whole system boundaries from modules to students at the college, there seems to be one object that is not relevant. This object is “Students” and therefore should be excluded from the possible noun list.
Some Benefits of having an online prospectus:
- Improvements in information flow from different departments in college,
- Faster responses from college & enquiries made at the office,
- Online prospectus would be available 24hrs a day to students,
- Will reduce the amount of man-hours needed to process data collection.
Identifying nouns as candidate objects
To be able to analyse the outlined text in the assignment and to identify nouns as possible candidate objects we must firstly be clear as to what ‘objects’ mean.
Objects model real world or fake world entities. Anything we see, interact with or quantify in some way can be classified as an object. Objects are therefore real things with unique properties and each has its own set of essential characteristics, which are:
(Hellingsworth, Hall, Anderson – 2001)
- Its STATE
- Its BEHAVIOUR
- Its IDENTITY
Identifying redundant, irrelevant or vague objects
Once we have identified the list of nouns that could be possibly used as candidate objects we need to identify clearly and remove any redundant or irrelevant objects as mentioned before from the system and also taking care not to include attributes or operations etc. The object that stands out from the current list of possible objects is:
This object in my opinion is not needed in the online prospectus and the reason for its irrelevance is the fact that it is not an important or necessary factor for the online prospectus & thus holds no key significance. People viewing or enquiring using the online prospectus will not be very interested in past or present students attending the college but more interested in the courses available and details of this nature.
This object is irrelevant also because the person enquiring using the online prospectus will not be interested in the parents of previous or present students. So therefore this object is not really needed and shouldn’t be apart of the online prospectus. Not including these dubious objects would save space and efficiency for the database, which will in turn save money.
As far as I can see all other objects from the table are relevant objects and are needed as part of the online prospectus.
Diagram 1
Above: Class diagram before presenting to the rest of the groups.
Class text including the classes responsibilities and collaborations
Class Name: Prospectus
Responsibility: it provides information about courses and also information about the college.
Collaborations: Courses provide course information and associated material to do with the courses.
Relationships: Prospectus to Courses will be a “1 to Many” relationship, this means we have many courses included in a prospectus, as seen below.
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Class Name: Courses
Responsibility: it provides information about different courses at the college & also information about different modules included in the courses.
Collaborations: “Modules” provide information about the modules and its related courses
Relationships: Course to Module, will be a “1 to Many” i.e. many modules to every course.
Class Name: Teacher
Responsibility: Teacher is the person going to teach the course or module. One teacher is the manager of a single course.
Collaborations: “Teacher” provides course information & also “Course” must have someone who manages it.
Relationships: Teachers to Courses, will be a “Many to Many” i.e. many Teacher can teach many diverse courses.
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Class Name: Modules
Responsibility: “Modules” provides a list of modules included in the courses & module information.
Collaborations: Every “Module” will be related to some type of “Course”.
Relationships: Modules to Courses, will be a “One to Many” i.e. one Course can have many modules.
Reminder: Diagram 1 is not the final version; some changes may be needed after another group meeting has taken place.
Diagram 2
Changes made from Diagram 1 are in Bold.
Diagram 3
Final Model of online prospectus:
In the final draft (Diagram 3) of the college prospectus I have added another class (department), since in reality a college will be sub divided in different departments and then these departments will have different courses.
Relationship between Prospectus and department:
Class Name: Department
Responsibility: “Department” provides information about the departments in the college and what courses are done in each of them.
Collaborations: Every “Department” will be related to & have many courses.
Relationships: Prospectus to Departments, will be a “One to Many” i.e. one Prospectus can have many Departments.
Maintenance Plan for Final Version
For a good and successful system to be of any use in the long run, it requires a product that is easily maintained so that its future is ensured. Systems once delivered and implemented, always need someone to ensure that the system meets the user requirements & thus kept updated regularly. A survey done by Lieutz and Swanson from the U.S. says that up to 48% of the total development time can be spent on maintenance. For the online prospectus the maintenance may include some of the following points: Keeping the system up-to-date and posting any changes to the courses, constant backing up of the system in case of viruses or damage to system, links and websites updated and changes to courses posted on website.
Maintenance is not always easy and encounters many problems during its cycle. However it has additional problems, as often the people carrying out the maintenance activities are not always the same as those producing the original software.
Poor documentation can present major problems for maintenance teams for example; when systems underwent changes to avoid the so-called “Millennium bug” problem. Systems that had been used for many years required modifications but this took time due to the lack of documentation. (Above Source: Hellingsworth, Hall & Anderson, 2001)
It may be important to have a system in place for documenting requests for any changes to the system and responses that would come from a “change request form” to the maintenance teams. These may include:
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Enhancements; including description of new requirements in detail, regular updates to college & course details. Maintenance teams should be striving for a user interface.
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Problem & Error Reports; including a full description of problems with website from email discrepancies to broken links of the website. A record of these would be carefully documented and reviewed regularly at maintenance team meetings.
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User Feedback; includes a system for the maintenance team to give feedback to user on any problems or errors with links & for any enhancements made. Timescale should be included of when the errors will be fixed.
Structured Maintenance Plan
For the maintenance plan to be effective I will be using the following structured plan. Having a good & complete software engineering documentation for the project helps a great deal with this plan. Any amendments or changes to the system will be documented professionally and kept safe in order to have a successful future system. An external contracting maintenance team will be in charge of updating the system & making sure it runs smoothly. Many companies can be found that specialised in just maintenance of other company’s software, databases & even their websites.
Bibliography & References
Using The Harvard Referencing System as a guide, these are my points of reference and the textbooks that I used to complete the assignment.
Reference Lists:
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B.HELLINGSWORTH, P.HALL & H.ANDERSON (2001), “Higher National Computing”, Newnes.
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Trevor Young (1999), “The Handbook of Project Management: A Practical Guide to Effective Policies and Procedures”, Kogan Page.
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Kenneth Blanchard, Spencer Johnson (2000), “One Minute Manager”, HarperCollins Business.
Web Site References:
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http://www.askmen.com/money/career/22b_career.html, “Power & Money”, Accessed on 16/03/03.
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http://cremesti.com/4managers.html, “Managerial Tips and Strategies”, Accessed on 18/03/03
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http://www.thisisworcestershire.co.uk/worcestershire/archive/2001/07/18/kidder_sport_football06ZM.html, “Managerial tips”, Accessed on 19/03/03
http://www.business.com/directory/management/advice/articles/, “Management Advice Articles”, Accessed on: 22/03/03
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http://bestezines.com/archives/2001/20010211.html, “Archive Material”, Accessed on: 22/03/03
