Creating a Functional Information System

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Creating a Functional Information System

• Automating Faculty Websites at Wells College

By Holly A. Bolton
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Introduction The Problem

• Fewer than 7 of Wells College faculty utilize
  available web space
• Approximately 40 of those pages are not current
• Why is this valuable communication tool not being
  utilized?
• Insufficient resources and support for setup and
  maintenance
• Faculty without web development knowledge are at
  a disadvantage

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Introduction The Solution

• What did I propose?
• An online automated website production tool
• Consistent look feel for all faculty pages
• Customizable content
• What you do NOT need to know
• Programming languages (HTML, JavaScript)
• FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
• Uploading documents to a server
• What you do need to know
• Access the internet
• Fill out forms
• Browse your computer for files

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Introduction The Solution

• What kind of information is accessible?
• Contact information and office hours
• Resume, independent research, publications, etc.
• Class information
• Meeting time and location
• Class documents such as notes, slides,
  assignments, tutorials, labs, etc.
• PowerPoint, Word, Excel, PDFs, images

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Background- Programming Languages

• HTML
• Hypertext markup language
• JavaScript
• Client-side executable language
• Allows HTML content to be dynamic
• PHP
• Hypertext preprocessor
• Server-side executable language
• A .php file is saved on a PHP server and referred
  to by a client-side browser

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Background- Programming Languages

• 1.) A browser requests a page by sending a
  message to the corresponding web server.
• 2.) The web server recognizes the request is a
  PHP script.
• 3.) The web server passes the PHP script to a PHP
  engine to be interpreted.
• 4.) The PHP engine executes the script and
  generates HTML code.
• 5.) The HTML code is returned to the browser for
  display

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Background- File Data Management

• SQL
• Structured query language
• PHP contains SQL commands
• MySQL Query Browser
• Visual interface to create and edit databases
• FTP
• File Transfer Protocol
• Regulates the transfer of the files
• Used to publish a web page
• Add your content to the interconnected set of
  documents that make up the World Wide Web
• PHP has built-in FTP commands

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System Development
How is this achieved?

• Conditional Statements
• If statements allow you to define statements or
  groups of statements that are executed only in
  specific circumstances.
• Each If statement contains one or more Boolean
  expressions whose values can be either true or
  false
• Each PHP page contains a set of If statements,
  each of which contain the code for unique HTML
  pages

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System Development
newUser.php
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System Walkthrough
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System Walkthrough

• New User Path

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System Walkthrough
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System Walkthrough

• Returning User Path

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Conclusion

• After 3,952 lines of code,Whats left?
• Enable JavaScript form validation
• Modify color scheme in the production tool for
  clear distinction from user pages
• Add a Delete Class option
• Complete on page pop-up help sections
• Another round of user testing

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Conclusion

• Thanks To
• Professor Carol Shilepsky
• Professors Scott Heinekamp Ken Larson
• Professors Jackie Schnurr, R. Joseph Hoffmann,
  Megan Callahan Leslie Miller-Bernal
• Family Friends

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Conclusion

• Questions?