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Capstone Project Cover Sheet

Capstone Project Name: Implementing an Online Database for Scientific Conference

Presentations

Student Name: Eric Forthman

Degree Program: BSIT

Mentor Name: Lori Hawker / Jason Jia – Capstone

Signature Block

Student’s Signature

Mentor’s Signature

Implementing an Online Database for Scientific Conference Presentations

Table of Contents

Capstone Report Summary …..…………………………………………………………... 3

Review of Other Work ..……..………………………………………………………....... 6

Rationale and Systems Analysis .………………………………………………………... 8

Goals and Objectives .……….………………………………………………………….. 10

Project Deliverables …………………………………………………………………….. 15

Project Plan and Timelines ..……………………………………………………………. 17

Project Development …………………………………………………………………... 20

Additional Deliverables ………………………………………………………………... 22

Conclusions …………………………………………………………………………….. 23

References ………………………………………………………………………………. 24

Appendix 1: Competency Matrix ….……………………………………………………. 25

Appendix 2: Database Table Schema …………………………………………………... 27


Capstone Report Summary

The main thrust of this project was to provide organized storage, platform neutral access

and a clearly organized web interface for a collection of slide presentations created in Microsoft

PowerPoint™ and subsequently used in lectures given at XYZ Association’s international

scientific conference.

The conference was one week in duration and was organized around a daily schedule of

topic-specific sessions held simultaneously in multiple meeting rooms. Many of the sessions

involved more than one lecture, each with a corresponding slide presentation.

A primary purpose of this project was to make the collection of the slide presentations

accessible through the internet. A calendar of sessions and lectures already existed, along with

previously submitted abstracts including titles and other information corresponding to the

lectures. This provided the initial logical layout for the main user interface, which has been

graphically presented as an html image map over the image file of the conference calendar.

Universal access to this material was also of concern. The required file type for

presentation submission is .ppt or .pptx (Microsoft PowerPoint™). While this file type can be

retrieved from the internet using many types of computer systems, it can only be displayed in

Microsoft’s IE browser, the desired paradigm is to allow any user to view these documents with

any currently available browser. To this end, the .ppt or .pptx files were converted to .pdf

(Portable Document Format), which was developed by Adobe Systems and is now an open

standard format for document files, readable on all modern computer systems and browsers.

Implementing persistent storage of the .pdf files was a straightforward matter using a

single directory on the web server. The logical organization needed to find and retrieve these

files was accomplished by employing a MySQL RDMS (Relational Database Management


System). Each file was named using a convention that included a session number, subject

category number, and a unique file number. These numbers along with other presentation

specific information collected from the abstracts make up the metadata used to populate the

database tables.

There are many options for the web hosting of an application. For this project, web

hosting has been implemented via the web-hosting provider Lunarpages. The option of shared

hosting on Linux servers with the MySQL database engine and PHP already installed came at a

very reasonable fee. Lunarpages also has an excellent 99.868% uptime rating for a 9-year period

beginning in December 2005 ([email protected], 2014).

The project started on schedule on July 21st 2013. Work proceeded smoothly without

issue until July 31. At this point in Phase II the database schema was addressed. XYZ uses an

Excel spreadsheet to record the metadata of each presentation. Due to an informal representation

in the association’s presentations metadata spreadsheet, multiple authors’ names, for a given

presentation, were grouped in single fields in the spreadsheet’s Authors column. The most

efficient way to import the data to the actual database table would be column-to-column data

transfer. This would cause a violation of the First Normal Form of relational database design in

the primary table, which, in a large database, could lead to a serious data redundancy problem.

Because of the relatively small size of this database and the additional time that would be

consumed by creating a new script to parse out each author name and write a new table, a

decision was made to go ahead without conforming to First Normal Form. From a practical

perspective, SQL queries were created using a “like” condition that can search through all the

column fields for author’s names, producing accurate results. Otherwise, the project proceeded

according to plan and the projected timeline was maintained without any setbacks. The project


was completed and operational on September 16, 2013. Final customer sign-off occurred on

September 18, 2013.

The sections of this document are:

1) Project Summary: The project overview as described in the current section.

2) Preview of Other Work: A review of similar projects to lend credence to the

implemented solutions.

3) Rationale and System Analysis: An examination of the technologies used in this

project.

4) Goals and Objectives: A detailed look at the project goals and objectives.

5) Project Deliverables: An explanation of the delivered results of the project.

6) Project Plan and Timeline: A timetable containing start date, end date and duration

for each listed task as executed to complete the project.


Review of Other Work

The technologies employed for the implementation of this project are HTML, CSS, PHP,

and MySQL. These technologies are all readily available in web-hosting environments. HTML

and CSS constitute the standard for rendering a user interface within a web browser. The

combination of PHP and MySQL are a very widely accepted and proven solution for the creation

of data driven web applications. The widespread usage of PHP can be seen in the alexa.com top

rankings of websites pertaining to programming languages. Websites that are PHP content

related or represent technologies constructed from PHP currently hold the positions of 3, 5, 7, 10,

14, and 22 as shown at alexa.com (Alexa, 2014).

There are many examples of websites using this combination of technologies. A web

design company named Mindfire Solutions has a list of its own case studies totaling well over

100 projects citing the use of HTML, CSS, PHP, and MySQL.

Here is a case study from Mindfire Solutions using the aforementioned technologies to

create an online repository targeted to a specific group of users.

“Video sharing community for bird and sports enthusiasts

Client:

Software Development Company

Industry:

Internet Software & Services

Technologies:

LAMP, Ajax, Javascript, Flash, HTML, CSS, PHP, MySQL, Lighttpd, Video

Streaming


Designed and implemented a highly secure web site similar to YouTube, where

users can share videos and pictures with the world. The website allows members

to view online videos, create forum discussions, blog and create groups with

whom they can chat, share videos and pictures online. The sites also allow Super

Administrators to login and manage users, videos, pictures, groups and forum

discussions. Super administrators can also create different user types who can

administer the site with their assigned permissions. One of the key features of

these sites is that it is self-managed and requires minimal administration. Key

features include conversion of video files uploaded by users to desired format

using FFMPEG, MENCODER, LAME, and FLVtool2 for video streaming. We

also configured and set up lighttpd for streaming and provided the client with a

flash video player that uses external interface to support JS calls and supports

streaming.” (Mindfire Solutions, 2014)

While there are additional technologies and features included in the Mindfire example

that were not necessary for our application, it shows the technologies of HTML, CSS, PHP, and

MySQL being used as fundamental building blocks in this type of project. In conclusion, these

very commonly used and accepted technologies provided a viable and stable infrastructure for

the project.


Rationale and Systems Analysis

The server side software technologies used for the creation of the application are PHP and

MySQL. These technologies were chosen for a variety of reasons. A pertinent concern for XYZ,

being a non-profit organization was, of course, cost. Both PHP and MySQL were created as open

source software, meaning that anyone may use these technologies without having to pay a hefty

licensing fee, which can make a smaller sized custom project, such as this one, unfeasible.

Another compelling argument is the very wide deployment of both PHP and MySQL. PHP is

the most commonly used dynamic web programming language in the world (BuiltWith, 2014). A

similar perspective can be shown for the use of MySQL. MySQL is the second most popular

database management system (DB-Engines, 2014), right behind the license-required Oracle

system. The pervasive deployment of these technologies has some advantages. User

documentation and working examples of PHP, MySQL, and the combination of the two are easy

to find and consume as necessary. Most web service providers have PHP and MySQL already

installed on their servers and included in the basic fee. The preceding facts extended to the

expertise of already knowledgeable and capable in house programmers, negating the need to hire

outside contractors.

As for client side technologies, ordinary web browsers were employed as a user interface

to further reduce costs and provided for availability as they are included in every major desktop

operating system and can be programmed with standard HTML and CSS. In order for the

presentations to be viewed in any modern web browser, regardless of vendor, the files were

converted to the PDF format, as plugins are available for most browsers. The users on any


system merely need to navigate to the project’s web site and install the free plugin, if necessary,

to begin accessing the repository files.

Another concern, the system uptime, was addressed during web host provider selection.

Selection of a reliable web host provider was accomplished by searching web reviews, the

provider’s operational statistics and through previous experience. The user’s ability to access the

application at any time they deem necessary was of the utmost importance.

The final product was presented as a read-only system where all the presentations were

gathered beforehand. However, the application was designed to allow for the addition of

presentations after the fact and the structure of the system can be reused for future repositories of

the same type.


Goals and Objectives

The goal of this project has been to enable XYZ conference attendees to access slide

presentations that were used in conjunction with various lectures during the course of a weeklong

event. A web hosted database driven repository provided for an efficient and effective means to

store, access and search this body of work. The objectives used to attain this result are broken

down into 4 phases.

1) Phase I: Obtained web hosting

a. Determined software requirements: The web-hosting service needed to be able to

provide the server side software that was necessary to implement the dynamic aspects

of the project as well as a database engine. This is an important consideration but one

which was easy to fulfill as I chose to use a couple of the most common open source

technologies, PHP and MySQL. This meant being able to select from the less

expensive web server plans that are implemented on Linux machines using Apache

web servers. Most web-hosting services offer this configuration known collectively as

LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP).

b. Chose a web-hosting company: Web-hosting companies number in the hundreds,

perhaps thousands, so a complete comparison is not practical. There are also many

sites that offer reviews and rankings. Having used a Los Angeles-based company

called Lunarpages for many years with almost no technical issues, I tend to gravitate

to what I am sure will function reliably. For good measure, I have checked out some

current reviews on the site Web Hosting Review. The Web Hosting Review 2014

Best Reviews and Comparisons shows Lunarpages in position 15 (Web Hosting

Review, 2014). This is likely due to the price listing of $8.95 a month. Competition


for web hosting is intense and all of the top rated plans come in under $10.00 a

month. Lunarpages price of $8.95 a month can be reduced to $4.95 a month by

choosing a two-year contract on the basic hosting plan, which for any organization is

a nominal cost. The resulting very competitive rate included a free domain name,

unlimited bandwidth, unlimited storage and unlimited MySQL databases on a LAMP

platform, which covered the main hosting concerns for this application.

c. Confirmed web host provider choice with customer: The preceding arguments were

presented to the client and approval was received.

2) Phase II: Configured production and development environments

a. Installed software in development environment to emulate deployment in the hosted

server environment: The development workstation for the project was running a

Windows XP SP3 operating system. However, this is not an issue for application

programming as is the paradigm for this project, the focus is on the server software

and application code that is run on top of the system. The technologies I worked with

are cross platform, so the code runs on both Windows and Linux. Next, an Apache

2.0 web server was installed on the workstation to mirror the Apache 2.0 on the

hosted server. Then PHP 5.3 and MySQL 5.5 were installed on the workstation, as

they were the current versions for the PHP interpreter and the MySQL database

engine supplied by the provider. All three pieces of newly installed software needed

to be configured to work to together in the development environment. This was

accomplished through configuration scripts that were included in each software

package. Additionally an open source FTP tool, WinSCP 5.1, was installed to allow

for a graphical view of the project directories on the hosted web server and for the


ease of transferring completed files from the development to the deployment

environment. The hosted web server’s ip address and secure port numbers were saved

to the WinSCP tool. The web server could then be logged into using the tool.

b. Created database and schema in both environments: This is the point where the

database schema was designed. The schema is the logical representation of the

database tables, the data fields (columns) and how they relate to each other, thereby

giving the ability to store and search metadata for each presentation. With the

database engine installed and the schema designed, the database tables could be

created.

c. Setup project directories in both environments: Directories were created for the

project as a whole, for public facing web pages, for .css files, and the collection of

.pdf files.

d. Conducted preliminary testing of server functionality and database operation: After

completion of the preceding steps the development and deployment environments

were tested using a small sample of data entries and SQL scripts to ensure that our

infrastructure was in working order.

3) Phase III: Additional preparation of development environment

a. Installed code editor: A good source code editor is a tool to increase programming

efficiency. Useful features include line numbering, syntax highlighting, and find and

replace. In keeping with the open source theme of this project, I chose Notepad++, a

free code editor that runs on Windows. Additionally, I used it in conjunction with

WinSCP to edit files on the deployment server.


b. Installed software for bulk file type conversion: To accomplish the goal of

converting each PowerPoint™ presentation into a PDF file. I researched a solution

that involved running OpenOffice software as a server process and an open source

Python program, PyODConverter (GitHub, 2012).

c. Wrote additional scripts to automate and manage conversion process: In order to add

a degree of automation to the file conversion process two Python scripts were needed.

One script simply took as input a directory of .ppt or .pptx files and executed the

conversion solution on every file one after another. This script initially served as a

test of the solution and as an after the fact process if metadata had already been

written to the database for a given presentation. The second script was similar to the

first with the addition of embedded SQL commands to populate the database with

metadata for each presentation as the conversion took place. Directories used as input

and output boxes were created on the workstation to further organize the process and

the automation script contained the code to make use of this feature.

4) Phase IV: Project Execution

a. Coded user interface and dynamic request web pages: The actual coding of the

deliverable product occurred in this phase. HTML and CSS were used to create the

visual interface. PHP coding was used for the dynamic interactions and to query the

database with embedded SQL.

b. Performed bulk file conversions and populated development database: The solution

outlined in section 3b and 3c was executed here.

c. Tested project in development environment: This involved testing of all links and

testing of all query types using the developed interface. All bugs and anomalies that


manifested in the development environment were corrected before moving the code

to the deployment environment.

d. Prepared deployment server: The completed project files were copied over to the

hosting web server and the project’s database was loaded with the completed

metadata entries.

e. Tested project in production environment: Again, this involved testing of all links and

testing of all query types using the developed interface. All remaining bugs and

anomalies were caught and corrected before the client signed off on delivery.

f. Created user documentation: Step-by-step instructions were written as .html files to

clarify the usage and operation of the application. These files were copied into the

application and given hyperlinks on the main web page.

g. Obtained final customer approval: The customer was given a formal demonstration of

the finished application. Questions and concerns were addressed and resolved. The

customer was satisfied and gave their final approval.


Project Deliverables

The primary deliverable for the project was an online database repository of XYZ’s scientific

slide presentations from the 2013 conference. A secondary deliverable was the establishment of a

web infrastructure to support the application, by way of a web-hosting provider. An ongoing

deliverable during development process was the formal and informal communication with

XYZ’s staff. This section outlines, in sequence, the deliverables that were presented to the

customer.

Phase I. Deliverables: High-level overview of the system and associated costs.

a. A listing of the software requirements and verification that the chosen web-

hosting provider met the technical requirements.

b. A comparison of costs from several other web-hosting providers to show

competitive pricing.

c. Independent documentation of web server uptime statistics illustrating the

reliability of the chosen web-hosting provider.

d. The high-level technical documentation detailing the functionality of the

application.

Phase II. Deliverables: Documentation that system resources were in place and passed

preliminary testing.

a. An accounting of software resources that were in place on the deployment server

and the matching software was installed on the development workstation.

b. Entity-Relationship charts that showed the database schema.

c. A diagram of the system directory hierarchy for the project.


d. Documentation of system test results. The project could not have moved forward

from this point without a positive test of the infrastructure.

Phase III. Deliverables: Documentation of the software resources that were in place.

a. A high-level explanation of the project’s custom document conversion process

including a discussion on the use of the open source software pertinent to this

process as well as the in house scripts developed to facilitate the batch processing,

file naming conventions, and database population. This document also confirmed

that the software was in place and passed operational testing.

Phase IV. Deliverables: Project execution that resulted in the fully functioning online

database application along with its operational documentation.

a. Weekly status meetings were held to keep the customer apprised of progress.

b. As part of the weekly status meeting, reports of the application’s test results on

the development system were presented, up to and including confirmation of the

fully functioning application the development environment.

c. Status reports were presented ad hoc for the transfer of the application to the

deployment environment.

d. A single final report was presented confirming the completed operational

application in the deployment environment.

e. Operational documentation was included by way of hyperlinks within the

application.


Project Plan and Timelines

Phase Activity Start Date End Date Duration

I: Obtain web hosting

Determine software requirements.

07/21/2013 07/23/2013 3 days

Select web host provider.

07/24/2013 07/25/2013 2 days

Confirm web host provider choice with customer.

07/28/2013 07/28/2013 1 day

Create Phase I deliverable: High-level overview of proposed system and associated costs.

07/29/2013 07/29/2013 1 day

II: Configure production and development environments

Install scripting software in development environment to mirror server environment.

07/30/2013 07/30/2013 .5 day

Install FTP tool in the development environment if necessary. Add host provider URL to FTP tool addresses in the development environment.

07/30/2013 07/30/2013 .5 day

Create database and schema in both environments.

07/31/2013 08/06/2013 5 days

Setup project directories in both environments.

08/07/2013 08/07/2013 .25 day

Conduct preliminary test of server functionality and database operation.

08/07/2013 08/07/2013 .75 day


Create Phase II deliverable: Documentation of the physical resources that are in place.

08/08/2013 08/08/2013 1 day

III: Additional preparation of development environment

Install code editor. 08/11/2013 08/11/2013 .5 day

Install software for bulk file type conversion.

08/11/2013 08/11/2013 .5 day

Write additional scripts to automate and manage conversion process.

08/12/2013 08/15/2013 3.75 days

Create working directories to be used during bulk file conversions.

08/15/2013 08/15/2013 .25 day

Create Phase III deliverable: Documentation of the software resources that are in place.

08/18/2013 08/18/2013 1 day

IV: Project Execution

Code user interface and dynamic request web pages.

08/19/2013 08/25/2013 5 days

Perform bulk file conversions and populate development database.

08/26/2013 09/05/2013 8 days

Test project in development environment.

09/08/2013 09/09/2013 2 days

Copy converted presentation files over to hosting web server.

09/10/2013 09/10/2013 .5 day

Load web server’s database with populated tables.

09/10/2013 09/10/2013 .5 day


Test project in production environment.

09/11/2013 09/12/2013 2 days

Create user documentation.

09/15/2013 09/16/2013 2 days

Obtain final customer approval.

09/17/2013 09/19/2013 3 days


Project Development

In Phase I XYZ’s expectations were determined and project requirements were gathered

accordingly. The concern of cost was paramount. One reason I obtained this contract is because

my rates and final project totals were significantly less than an audio/video contractor who had

been considered to record each session live. Besides not being a larger company with more

overhead, I was able to deliver an internet solution at a reasonable rate due to my ability to use

open source software and platforms. After discussions with XYZ’s staff about the project

requirements, I was confident that an open source approach would be feasible and the projected

cost would be more than satisfactory for the client. To this end, I chose a reliable web-hosting

provider that would provide the required infrastructure at a competitive rate.

Phase II was concerned with the design of the solution. Open source and universal

accessibility were major factors. My design addressed these concerns by implementing a

document conversion process that assured all presentations displayed on the web conformed to

the PDF format. Further conformity and accessibility were established by the use of the open

source software technologies of HTML, CSS, PHP, and MySQL for the coding of the project.

An integral part of the solution was the inclusion of a database. This provided convenient lookup

and search capabilities for the users and contributed to an efficient design behind the scenes, as

there were more than 500 documents to be managed.

For Phase III the project design was implemented. During this phase both the

development and deployment environments were established and configured. The documents

were put through the conversion process, the database was created and written to, dynamic web

pages were coded, and the static web pages were written. The completed application was tested

in the development environment to confirm basic functionality.


In Phase IV, troubleshooting took place. The application was rigorously tested in the

development environment. Next, it was migrated to the deployment environment and was tested

there until it passed with satisfactory results. This testing involved working extensively with the

user interface, from an end user’s perspective, to ensure the expected results were obtained and

any technical issues were caught before operational status was declared.

Phase V was the maintenance phase. After Phase IV was completed, the application ran

as planned without the need for intervention from myself or other technical people. A minimal

number of presentations needed to be cleaned up after the conversion process and a few XYZ

members submitted presentations after the fact. Both of these issues were addressed and

resolved.


Additional Deliverables

In order to emphasize the importance of the database to this application, I am including as

Appendix 2 a diagram of the table schema for the project. This is a representation of the database

structure, something an end user doesn’t need to consider, but the use of a database is critical to

an application where data and/or documents need to be organized in a logical fashion.


Conclusion

The project started on schedule on July 21, 2013. There were no major setbacks. In the

design of the database, there had been a question of whether or not to enforce the First Normal

Form and I made the decision to forego the First Normal Form. This decision did not affect the

quality of the end result and the schedule was maintained. The planning and implementation of

the document conversion process was successful and efficient. Coding of the dynamic and static

web pages went smoothly, again due to good planning. The web-hosting provider proved to be

effective and trouble free. Communication with the customer before the start and during the

project was clear and concise allowing for an effective and pleasant experience for all concerned.

The project ended on time September 18, 2013 with the formal customer signoff.


References

Alexa (2014). Top Sites in: All Categories > Computers > Programming Retrieved on June 19,

2014 from http://www.alexa.com/topsites/category/ Top/Computers/Programming

BuiltWith (2014). Programming Language Usage Retrieved on June 21, 2014 from

http://trends.builtwith.com/ framework/programming-language

DB-Engines (2014). DB-Engines Ranking Retrieved on June 21, 2014 from

http://db-engines.com/en/ranking

GitHub (2012). mirkonasato/pyodconverter Retrieved on June 24, 2014 from

https://github.com/mirkonasato/pyodconverter

Mindfire Solutions (2014). Projects Retrieved from on June 19, 2014

http://www.mindfiresolutions.com/php-mysql-lamp-development.htm

[email protected] (2014). Lunarpages Uptime Report Retrieved on

June 20, 2014 from http://uptime.besthostratings.com/viewreport.php?host=lunarpages

Web Hosting Review (2014). 2014 Best Reviews and Comparisons Retrieved on

June 23, 2014 from http://web-hosting-review.toptenreviews.com


Appendix 1: Competency Matrix

Domain Competency Explanation

Leadership and Professionalism

Upper-Division Communication and Interpersonal Skills

I engaged in discussions with client to fully understand the project requirements.

Organizational Behavior and Management Principles/Principles of Management

Strategic Planning I created a formal plan for the project implementation.

Liberal Arts/ Reasoning and Problem Solving

Systematic problem solving I understood the need for a vendor neutral application and devised a system to this end.

Evidence I used widely proven technologies to achieve a solution with a high level of operational confidence.

Liberal Arts/Quantitative Literacy

Constructing Arguments and Reasoning

I presented logical arguments in favor of the technologies used.

Liberal Arts/Language and Communication

Reading critically I critically evaluated documentation of software solutions to determine viability in project design.

Upper Division Collegiate Level Reasoning and Problem Solving

Planning and Information Gathering

I gathered information on open source resources for bulk document conversion and integrated a solution into the project to achieve this goal.

Language and Communication

Working with Sources I used pertinent sources with citations to reinforce arguments.

Writing Style, Citations, and Use of Sources

I employed APA Citations inline with quoted text and properly formatted and listed on references page.


Adaptation I have allowed for future extensibility of the project.

Networks Network Infrastructure and Associated Components

I used my knowledge of multiple computer operating systems in composing the solution.

Software Engineering and Development

Web Programming I applied my programming skills to the development of the solution.


Appendix 2: Database Table Schema

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