Assignment - First submission

Due date: 3 August 2015
Value: 5%
Objectives
The course objectives met by this assignment include:
• Course specifications are available online from the USQ website http://www.usq.edu.au/course/specification/current/ . Always check the USQ website for the latest version (year and course number).
On successful completion of this course, students should be able to:
1. demonstrate problem solving by understanding the program specifications and developing the correct solution in form of web application that complies with the course materials and the specified .NET software installations, and results in creation of distribute robust, reliable, secure, and user-friendly component-based web application
2. demonstrate academic and professional literacy by collating theoretical and practical course material into a workable application through understanding concepts and their practical application using .NET
3. demonstrate written communication skills by critical evaluation and writing up evaluation in a concise format
4. demonstrate management, planning, and organisational skills by setting and achieving design and development, in accordance with the specification, to be completed by the assigned due date
5. demonstrate creativity, initiative, and enterprise by translating the problem (program specification) into a solution (web application) that is efficient, economic, smart, and easily maintainable, and complies with the course material and specified .NET software installations
6. demonstrate an understanding of the following concepts and their practical application using .NET: advanced programming concepts; components; web interface design; advanced database access, search, and maintenance techniques; multi-tiered client-server applications; internet security; IIS web server; Windows services; web services; mobile wireless services.
Please read carefully:
• This assignment must be your own work.
• It is acceptable to discuss course content with others to improve your understanding and clarify requirements, but solutions to assignment questions must be done on your own.
• You must not copy from anyone, including tutors and fellow students, StudyDesk, or internet nor allow others to copy or see your work.
• Assignments that do not adhere to these requirements will be deemed to be the result of academic misconduct.
Always submit your assignment
Always submit your assignment by the due date, even if you have not completed everything or your find there are some issues. Tell us what is missing and what these issues are.
• You will be awarded some marks for the partial work that you have done, rather than missing out completely.
• You will receive feedback on your submission so that you can do better in the next submission.
• At the end of the semester the marks for all your submissions will add up to get you a better result. If you missed one submission, even if it is only 5%, this could just be what you might need at the end.
• Should you require a deferred examination, you would need to have submitted all your assignments.
• Active participation in all assignment submissions during the course are taking into consideration at the end of the semester in the event of students requiring make-up work.
Your assignment will be granted a grade based upon the professional judgement of the marker as to the degree of compliance you have achieved with the Requirements Definition and the level of your demonstrated knowledge of the course content, using the marking criteria as their guide. The grade granted will then be allocated a mark, the value of which has been defined by the University, for the purpose of entering it into Gradebook. The range of marks are:
Final mark Equivalent final grade Grade points
At least 85 High Distinction (HD) 7
At least 75 but less than 85 Distinction (A) 6
At least 65 but less than 75 Credit (B) 5
At least 50 but less than 65 Pass (C) 4
Less than 50 Fail (F, FNP, FNS, FNC or FLW) 1.5
At least 50 Ungraded Pass (P)* Not Applicable
*Only available within the non-stratified system in which a grade of P does not contribute towards a student’s GPA.

Web Application
For your assignment you are required to develop a web site (web application) with a shopping cart for a small retail business, which may either be a pharmacy, a clothing store, a hardware store, a book store, or a music store.
The web application will allow a retail type of your choice to display their products in the way requested in the assignment description, allow customers to add a product into a shopping cart, for the customer to view the shopping cart, see the total, be able to delete products or change the quantity, as well as have an option to continue shopping or to purchase (the purchase process will be specified later). The last step in the purchasing process will be the only way that products are then added to a Microsoft Access database.
The assignment for this course consists of three stages and three submissions, with the final submission incorporating all of the specifications from all of the specifications.
The first and second submissions are checkpoints for you to get feedback. This provides us with a snapshot of your development which allows us to provide you with feedback to improve your assignment.
The weekly workshop exercises and all other material of this course are linked to the various stages of this web application development. Students that have worked through these exercises have been shown better results and had more enjoyment of the course material.
Software development is different to report or essay writing – you need to work on your assignment every week as you need time to practice and learn, as well as time to think about your design and implementation.
The assignment is specifically designed to support you so that you gradually incorporate the material that you have learned each week. Every time you complete the weekly exercise and other material you should spend some time on your assignment and gradually incorporate the relevant functionality using the new skills you obtained.
The implementation of database and database components into your assignment will occur following the module that covers databases. The components prior to that will be used for the design, layout, and display of the products. Working through the posted workshop exercises will provide you with the understanding and ability to implement what you need for the assignment at each stage, so it is quite essential that you do these exercises.
Analysis and design
For this assignment, you are required to do some limited analysis given the time restrictions (only 12 weeks in the semester) we have. This assignment requires you to write a short essay on the various points below. Please follow the usual USQ requirements for essay writing, including providing the appropriate headings, Harvard referencing should you require it.

Understand the retail business
Choose a retail business from the list above.
Before software developers can provide a suitable solution, they must understand the business and how it operates (business processes). For this purpose you need to consider
• your selection of retail business, and provide a description
• consider the retail business of your choice from the list in this document to be family owned
• and the limitation to be financial and time
• Financial limitation means you need to provide only the functionality that satisfies the three assignment specifications.
• Time limitation is that you need to provide the relevant functionality at the due dates.
You may consider that the owner of your business has been operating for over 20 years from the city centre. While the business has been very successful in the past, the last three years have been difficult. Turnover has gradually reduced presumably due to the global financial crisis. There is also a trend of customers shopping online now. Despite the businesses’ internal review of its processes to reduce costs, they already had to let go of staff. While finances are fairly tight, the owner has decided that the business should also sell its products online.
However, as in the real world, rather than getting you to develop a web application that has all the bells and whistles, the limited amount of money requires a frugal design and development, yet still provide the functionality required. In these situation additional income through online purchases may provide sufficient profit over the next 12 months to consider a second iteration catering for further enhancements (that would not be part of this course).
In your essay:
1. Describe the retail type you selected
a. Provide the fictional name of the business
b. In one paragraph describe the product of this business
c. In two sentences describe the business rules that your retail business needs to have implemented (discounts, etc.)
Understand existing web applications with shopping cart
To better understand what customers would expect from an online business that displays its products and allows items to be added into a shopping cart, you are required to review two web sites, where one is of the same retail type as your selected retail business and one that is different.
The characteristics of these web sites must be so that they are:
• listing their products within categories (there may be drop down lists or links)
• that the customer can click on a product to see more information about the product
• that there is a link or button that allows the customer to add the product to a shopping cart
• that there is a link that leads to display of the items in the shopping cart
o which has functionality to change quantity or delete items
o with a link to either continue shopping or purchase the items
• determine how they implemented the purchasing process, which includes billing and shipping and payment details – DO NOT PURCHASE items for this process – it is not part of this assignment to purchase products – you are only asked to look, so proceed cautiously.
While you have the freedom of choice to select these web sites of your preference, the following restrictions apply:
- Do not use eBay, Amazon, or similar types of businesses as they are not functioning in the way as your business owner requires. These are different business models – not what we are doing in this course.
- Do not use web sites where you can only shop or look at products after you have registered and logged in. This is not what the business owner wants. A customer must be able to look at products and add to shopping cart without being forced to become a member at any stage.
- Warning:
o You are not required to purchase any items for the purpose of this assignment while you review these web sites.
o You are not required to divulge your details for the purpose of this assignment.
In an essay style document provide the URL of these two retail businesses. For each business, provide a list of three ways that these web sites can be improved. Be succinct in your description and do not write more than one page. However, do keep in mind that this essay is addressed to the business owner and that the continuation of your contract may depend on the professional presentation of this essay. While the sites you review are the competitors, it is important to be respectful of them.
In your essay
2. Provide the URL of each web site, woven into your sentences. Describe the retail business with one sentence only.
3. In two sentences for each web site, critically look at the layout, design, choice of color and positioning of images, and describe specifically what it is that makes it pleasing.
4. Only describe the following
a. The path you needed to take to find a product that you than added to the shopping cart
b. How to get back to the main page after you added one item to the shopping cart to then select another category
c. How you deleted an item from the shopping cart
d. Where the total amount of the shopping cart was displayed
Your list of web forms
In your essay
Use the table below to provide a list of the web forms that your application will have. Without knowing at this stage how to implement the functionality, you need to describe the functionality you are planning to implement – a maximum of two sentences for each web form. Describe what the form contains and what kind of functionality you are aiming for.
Note: The business home page needs to be named as Home.aspx.
Name of the web form Description/functionality of this web form
Home.aspx
To keep the development of this web application within the limited budget and time, the following is to be request have been made.
• Do not provide a search facility.
• The business owner prefers a really good design of the product categories and products, how they grouped and accessed.
• Each product should provide a small image, product name, cost and a button or link to add to shopping cart.
o Additional information about a product should be shown on a separate page when the customer clicks the product.
• Do not provide a ‘About’ or ‘Contact us’ page.
o Instead embed contact details on each page.
• Do not provide for login or registering a customer at this stage.
o Provide an order number at the end of the purchasing process.
• Cater for a typical shop front with a shopping cart and customer handling details.
The next assignment specifications will provide you with the exact details how the components should be implemented.
Show the web forms in the solution explorer
In Visual Studio 2012, create the web application using your surname, first name, and student number (i.e. BloggsJohn123456).
Then add the web forms that you listed above into the web application.
Please note: for this assignment you are specifically requested NOT to use the Site Master template. All web application MUST us an empty template (as you do each week in the exercises that are posted on the study desk).
In your essay
Using appropriate headings and appropriate description, place a print screens of the ‘Solution Explorer’ into your essay, showing the web forms you have added into your web application.
The emphasis is on providing the information you have been asked for not to satisfy a certain amount of words. Be succinct and clear.
XML
The business owner requested that all products MUST be stored in an XML file – NOT a database. You will be doing some database work later on when storing the shopping cart in the MS Access database, at this stage you need to show that you can implement the following functionality.
For this submission you are required to create an XML file for your retail business that contains the products details, category, image, and so forth. Group your products as described above, for example, if you selected a book shop, you would group products by genre (fiction, non-fiction, etc.), if you selected pharmacy then products would be group by categories (vitamins, hair products, etc.).
Your XML file must have three (3) groups (categories, genre) and within each of these groups five (5) products.
The aim is to use this XML file later with an XSLT and connect both to an XML control.
What to submit
Create a Zip file that must contain
1. Your essay containing the above requested material
2. XML file in Visual Studio with the categories and products for your retail business
Make sure that your zip file contains all the items that are required for this submission.
Please make sure to check that before you start your submission process.
Submit your zip file following the link to the study desk. This course does not use EASE, but the Moodle study desk assignment submission and the links will be active when required.