The Geograph

One of the websites which we had to specify and test for Information Systems Design was the Geograph.co.uk. That website was a complete eye-sore.

Use of serif fonts.... Poor GUI and usability throughout!!!! Who on earth chose that website?

All of this said, it was a relief when all of it was done. If only it took only the five hours it should have taken, instead of the one and half day it actually took though!!!!!

Anyway, next....

Dissertation Madness is over

Well after a long long time, my final year project is over.

Gone are the two demonstrations I had to give, the £100 I had to pay for emergency printing, and the headaches of having to program iOrganise.

That said, I can also say that it was an enjoying experience. It has shown that I can program, I can design and I can write...

What more would you want?

More than that, it has also allowed me to think about getting into ASP.Net as I seem to also enjoy web programming.

So maybe this is a start of a new me?

Design By Contract Reference

And http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cs/designbycontract.aspx

Assertions reference

Check this out for possible reference for assertions: http://devlicio.us/blogs/billy_mccafferty/archive/2006/09/22/Design_2D00_by_2D00_Contract_3A00_-A-Practical-Introduction.aspx

SQL Server 2005 Online Books - Full Text Search

Might be interesting for the find and replace feature

or a search feature:

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms142571.aspx
et

Building an MVP Framework for .NET. Part 1: The Basics of MVC and MVP

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/architecture/DotNetMVPFramework_Part1.aspx

Ian's comment - Week 4

Ian mentioned that there was a need to integrate the application with current standards

VCard is the standard for business card. This is assumed to be of CSV type. More research to be made on it.

Visual Studio Databases

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa730872(VS.80).aspx

this might help as it describes incorporating a database as part of the solution as opposed to being an external entity.

This somewhat breaks the law of our component based system, but it's not possible to add a new database to the server explorer unless you have a SQL Server client

iOrganise Diary/Journal

I've now "finished" the main GUI screens for iOrganiseHowever, there is a lot still to be done in terms of programming the GUI. For example the diary should have different views such as:

- Day on a page
- Three days on a page
- A week on a page
- A month on a page

From there we need to find a way to get the new entry to be represented on those slots....The journal is basically finished even if there is still a lot to do to work out how to list all the entries pertaining to a particular month and year.

test test test

improvement for addressbook / generic menu thingy

• form centred on the screen on startup
• the advanced search button is pressed in when clicked
• font type highlight does not disappear on mouse off
• phone book letter buttons - clickable region need to be round
• phone book letter buttons - white text (web colours)
• business card details - label text of textboxes to be inserted into the textbox so that they disappear when the user clicks on those text boxes...
• three buttons at the bottom - hand mouse over when mouse hovers over
• separators in between the file menu
• & for the file menu
• scroll bar for the available business cards
• tool tips - need writing
• the exit button needs to be fully shown - the bottom is cut off

Name for Organiser

iOrganise ******

My Integrated Organiser?

XML Schemas

1) Write an XML file
2) Click on "XML" -> "Create Schema"

However, you need to make sure the XML file has every possibility i.e. for a field to be optional you must put the same element twice, once with the data and once without... Which is why the guy writing the article suggests that you start with the XSD file -> You can easily miss something when generating from XML, so you need to at least check that the XSD is what you intended for it to be

XML Data type with special characters

http://www.jondavis.net/blog/post/2008/01/XML-Encoding-Text-Really%2c-Really-Easily.aspx

XSD and XML Schema

This document explains how you can use Visual Studio to pre-load an XSD file that can be used to generate/read a schema from an external source.

O'reilly also makes mention of the creation of your XML Schema through the use of the Visual Studio create New Schema tool

http://stimpy77.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!FE05918FD4D775C5!375.entry

The author of the site moved his blog to :

http://www.jondavis.net/blog/

Research idea 2

Interesting stats (though not nescesarily accurate, seems a reasonable indicator) - Would either justify stealing bits of their interface (critical comparison) - AND/OR evidence to support "upload blog" feature from journal http://www.elise.com/web/a/an_overview_of_the_weblog_tools_market.php

Research link for dissertation - 1

Thought this might be of interest for dissertation research/thinking about stuff: http://www.sdtimes.com/printArticle/LatestNews-20080115-20.html

Dissertation priority

To be producing tangible documentation and code for Ian

• Class diagram
• Documentation of Architecture Design
• Re-work GUI so that the buttons do something!
• Do a demo of how the XML would work - even if it's just using code/XML Docs
• Ensure all work undertaken is documented

Journal idea

Create each notebook page so that it's a journal entry.
The notebooks is to be called a journal instead

You can
-add
-delete
-edit that entry

The entry is time stamped and arranged in reverse chronological order.

Easier to program and maintain through the XML Document

The journal is based on the capabilities of blogger.com - simple editing but powerful
Maybe apply the same type of shortcut prescribed by blogger. Might make it somewhat intuitive

Dissertation update 25/01/08

Done (even if they will need reworking when design and requirements changes, it's still a template):

• Intro
• Aims and Obj
• Req Specs (v2)
• Gantt Chart
• GUI Design (Ideal, will need rewriting to a more realistic picture)
• GUI Mock-ups
• Design Specs (v2)

ToDo (to allow implementation + GUI production to commence):

• Language Comparison
• Critical Comparison of other applications - GoogleDocs and Calendar, Oracle Calendar, maybe Outlook
• Architectural Design - to be typed up and extended
• Class Diagram

Welcome

Hi everyone,

Here I will try to log academic and professional projects and updates to these.

Useful way of always staying online if you ask me!

Hope it's entertaining!