Part 1: Problems
Problem statement: The current
elearn platform does not have the function for the students to track on the
availability of the topics. Therefore, students do not know when others have
selected the topic they are planning to work on.
PACT Analysis
People
|
●
Student
will access to the system to select a topic from the list for their capstone
project
○
The
student must be in year three of their degree programme and
○
Student
required to pass all their year one and two subjects in order to enroll for
capstone project subject
○
They
must have specific skills and knowledge to select the topic as prerequisites
and expectations are stated
●
Lecturer
use it to keep track on the topics that selected by which student
○
Lecturer
released the topics must be related to their field
●
FYP
coordinator will be able to upload and edit the topic after receiving
confirmation of the topics from lecturer.
|
Activity
|
●
The
main activity of this system is to let student choose a topic from a list of
topics. Once they select ‘choose’, lecturer in charge of the particular topic
will be notified through email and meeting between both parties will be
discussed. Once the student has confirmed with lecturer, the topic will
greyed out from the list and it cannot be selected by others anymore.
●
The
system will be used in the beginning of every 6 months of the capstone
project.
●
The
information should be updated frequently based on availability of the topics.
●
Students
should accomplish task through a set of defined steps to select a topic,
while lecturer should monitor the topics being chosen and update the list
frequently.
●
Mistakes
made are allowed to change through the system.
|
Technology
|
Input
●
User
Input
○
Button
must respond in time and it should only take a short time to load (3
seconds).
○
Most
commonly used buttons should be easiest to find and use.
●
Student
information to allow lecturer to contact.
●
Each
of the lecturer is able to release the topics that are supervised by them to
the system.
●
Student
selects a suitable project topic by insert their name to the system.
●
Lecturer
updates the list to show availability of the topics.
Output
●
Interface
shows step by step instructions.
●
The
screen will display a list of topics on the screen when they log in to the
system.
●
Interface
will shows the student’s name and id with their chosen topic
●
Notification
email sends to lecturer.
Communication
●
The
lecturer and Student will have the communication details of each other after
chosen topic.
●
The
meetings would be scheduled between lecturer and student to have further
discussion on the topic
Content
●
Content
is updated, accurate and relevant.
●
Topic
is unavailable only when lecturer has confirmed with the student that
requested to work on the topic.
|
Context
|
Physical
●
When
the students have enrolled to capstone project, they are required to access
to the system in order to pick one of their interested topic.
●
Students
are able to access to the system in different places such as university, home
or any other places. Therefore, the system should be accessible for all the
student
Social
●
The
system will not only display the list of topic, details of the project such
as skills and knowledges that required to complete the project, and grading
scheme.
●
High
level of support is needed for first time user.
●
Lecturer
able to provide the right guidelines for the student to complete their
project through the meeting
●
Lecturer
and student are able to access to the system through different operating
system or browser
Organization
●
The
list of topic is only available to the students who enrolled for capstone
project
●
The
system can only control by the lecturer
|
Proposed Solution
The solution for tracking capstone
projects will provide a list of topics, where Student can easily select and
reserve the topic for themselves. The lecturer will be notified with the
selected topic with Student details where they can communicate further on the
topic.
After reserving the
topic that particular topic will be eliminated from the list, allowing other
students to choose the topics without creating chaos of confirming topics to
the lecturer, whether they are taken or not.
Types of Information to Collect to Verify Findings
Questionnaire will be used to collect the information
regarding the lecturer and student experience on using the system. This information
enable us to enhance the interface by improving their usability and
accessibility to the system, where this can fulfilled the their satisfaction.
As if the interface design is not user friendly, they will not willing to use
the system for this capstone project subject. This may caused them to prefer
using the manual method.
Part 2: User Research
Purpose of research
Research Method
The adopted research
methods for this study are survey questionnaire and interview, where student and
lecturer will be doing questionnaire and admin will be doing the interview.
This is because the amount of student and lecturer to be conducted on are more
than 10. While admin does not require questionnaire because only 1 person will
be asked. Hence, interview is chosen for admin.
Student Survey Form
In the initial version
of our survey, it is realised that questions that are irrelevant to our
research are included after evaluated by lecturer, where some questions are not
related to the research. Also, the length of the survey form is long.
Therefore, the form is amended to where participants just have to answer 3
direct questions. After giving out a few of the survey forms, it is realised
that most of the participants do not understand question 2 in the survey
because of the unclear instructions/question. In question 2, participant is
asked to rank from 1-5, where 1 is the highest priority. But the purpose of it
is to arrange them from 1 to 5, where participant thinks 1 is the most
important to him/her.
Capstone Project Topics (Version 1)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. Are you currently in your year 3
programme?
□ Yes
□ No
2. Do you think the current system is
effective for student to keep track on the capstone project topics?
□ Yes
□ No
3. Do you think that student can select
the capstone project topic and inform the lecturer through the system is more
convenient?
□ Yes
□ No
4. Do you agree that the confirmation
on capstone project topic through the system will be better than filling up the
agreement form?
1 2 3 4 5
Strongly disagree □ □ □ □ □ Strongly agree
5. Do you think it is better to
schedule a meeting through the system with all the available time slot?
□ Yes
□ No
6. What
are the difficulties you are facing while select the capstone project topic?
_______________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
7. H
________________________________________________________________________
8. Do you think it is useful if
feature(s) suggested above is included in the system?
□ Yes
□ No
9. Will
you consider to use this system for your selecting capstone project topic?
□ Yes
□ No
10. Would It be helpful knowing the
capstone project topics are taken at prior before selecting you own topic to
work on?
□ Yes
□ No
|
Capstone Project Topics (Version 2)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. How often do you use eLearn?
Please tick.
Never used Seldom Sometimes Often Always
□ □ □ □ □
2. What features would you like to include in the capstone portal? Please rank from 1-5 where 1 is the highest priority.
□ Capstone topic availability update
□ Meeting update
□ Feedback features to communicate between lecturer and student
□ Email system (to request topic from lecturer)
□ Topic listing
3. Please state, if any, feature(s) that you wish to have in capstone portal.
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
|
Capstone Project Topics (Version 2)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. How often do you use eLearn? Please tick.
Never used Seldom Sometimes Often Always
□ □ □ □ □
2. What features would you like to include in the capstone portal? Please rank from 1-5 where 1 is the highest priority.
_ Capstone topic availability update
_ Meeting update
_ Feedback features to communicate between lecturer and student
_ Email system (to request topic from lecturer)
_ Topic listing
3. Please state, if any, feature(s) that you wish to have in capstone portal.
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
|
Admin Interview
Initially we decided to
conduct survey on students, lecturers and administrator. However, survey is
effective only when you are collecting feedback from crowd/or people more than
10. The admin in our faculty is Miss Sandra. Since it is only 1 person, we
decided to conduct an interview instead, it is faster and more effective.
Capstone Project Topics (Admin)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. How often do you update the list of topics?
□ Daily
□ Weekly
□ Monthly
□ Never
2. On the scale 1-5, how convenient is it to maintain the capstone topics list?
1 2 3 4 5
Not at all □ □ □ □ □ Very much
3. On the scale 1-5, how time consuming is the process of updating topics to the list ?
1 2 3 4 5
Not at all □ □ □ □ □ Very much
4. Do you think the proposed solution would be successful?
□ Yes
□ No
If yes, please state: ____________________________________________________
5. On the scale 1-5, how convenient is it to update a new topic to the capstone topic list?
1 2 3 4 5
Not at all □ □ □ □ □ Very much
6. Do you think it is useful if feature(s) suggested above is included in the system?
□ Yes
□ No
If yes, please state:__________________________________________________
7. Do you agree that current system or process is not easy to use?
1 2 3 4 5
Strongly disagree □ □ □ □ □ Strongly agree
8. On the scale 1-5, how would you describe the overall performance with the current system?
1 2 3 4 5
Dissatisfied □ □ □ □ □ Completely satisfied
|
We came up with several questions in our interview
session with admin:
Interview
1.
How do the current eLearn capstone
system works from your perspective?
2.
How do you post capstone topics
currently?
3.
How convenient it is for you to
use the eLearn for capstone?
4.
Introduce our proposed features in
the new capstone system.
5.
How do you think about the current
system in showing availability of topics?
6.
How satisfied are you in topic
tracking?
7.
Are there any downsides of the
current system? What can be improved?
|
Lecturer
Survey Form
For the lecturer survey form, there are only minor
changes. The first version of the form is too lengthy and irrelevant.
Therefore, version 2 is came up with fewer direct questions. Also, similar to
the student survey form, the second question is unclear to the lecturers.
Hence, change is made to the question to inform participant to arrange instead
of ranking.
Capstone Project Topics (Version 1)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. How many students you are supervising?
□ One
□ Two
□ Three
□ Four
□ Five or over
2. Do you think the current system is effective for lecturer to keep track on the capstone project topics?
□ Yes
□ No
If yes, please state:________________________________________________________________
3. Do you think it is more
convenient to be notified through the system when one of your topics is chosen
by a student, rather than receiving email from student? Because notification is
generated automatically within short time.
□ Yes
□ No
If yes, please state:_______________________________________________________________
4. Do you think it is more
convenient to schedule a meeting with a student through the system rather than
through email?
□ Yes
□ No
5. Do you think it is useful if feature(s) suggested above is included in the system?
□ Yes
□ No
6. Do you agree that the current system or process is not easy to use?
1 2 3 4 5
Strongly disagree □ □ □ □ □ Strongly agree
7. Do you think there is any downside of this system design?
□ Yes
□ No
8. On the scale 1-5, how would you
describe the overall performance with the current system?
1 2 3 4 5
Dissatisfied □ □ □ □ □ Completely satisfied
|
Capstone Project Topics (Version 2)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand
the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone
project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone
project topics tracking.
1.
How many students you are
supervising?
□ One
□ Two
□ Three
□
Four
□
Five or over
2.
What features would you like to
include in the capstone portal? Please rank from 1-6 where 1 is the highest
priority.
□ Capstone topic availability update
□ Meeting schedule or update
□ Email system regarding the
selected topic and meeting details
□
Feedback features
to communicate between lecturer and student
□
Upload capstone
topics
□ Topic listing
3.
Please state, if any, feature(s)
that you wish to have in capstone portal.
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
4.
On the scale 1-5, how would you
describe the overall performance with the current system?
1 2 3 4 5
Dissatisfied □ □ □ □ □ Completely satisfied
5.
Do you think there is any
downside of the current system design?
□ Yes
□ No
6.
Please state, if any, the
downside of the current system design.
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
|
Capstone Project Topics (Version 2)
The purpose of conducting this survey is to understand the user's requirement for proposing a system to keep track of the capstone project topics. Please submit the feedback regarding the current capstone project topics tracking.
1. How many students you are supervising?
□ One
□ Two
□ Three
□ Four
□ Five or over
2. What features would you like to include in the capstone portal? Please rank from 1-6 where 1 is the highest priority.
_ Capstone topic availability update
_ Meeting schedule or update
_ Email system regarding the selected topic and meeting details
_ Feedback features to communicate between lecturer and student
_ Upload capstone topics
_ Topic listing
3. Please state, if any, feature(s) that you wish to have in capstone portal.
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
4. On the scale 1-5, how would you describe the overall performance with the current system?
1 2 3 4 5
Dissatisfied □ □ □ □ □ Completely satisfied
5. Do you think there is any downside of the current system design?
□ Yes
□ No
6. Please state, if any, the downside of the current system design.
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
|
Research
Method #1
Purpose of Research
From part 1, several
problems regarding the current capstone system have been drawn out:
● There
are no topic tracking in the capstone portal, so clashing in topic selection
among students might occur.
● Topic
uploading must be done manually by admin.
● Lecturers
are not aware of their topic being chosen.
● Difficult
for student and lecturer to communicate.
● Meeting
appointment can only be made through email.
Research Materials
The user research method that we adopt in here is questionnaire. Since questionnaire is able to collect large number of responses quickly, it will be conducted on some students and lecturers in the campus. The questionnaire for students consists of 3 questions in total, while lecturer has 6 questions. Both questionnaire includes title of the survey, purpose, and several questions. There are quantitative and qualitative data to be collected. The questions are then printed out and distributed to our subjects.
The user research method that we adopt in here is questionnaire. Since questionnaire is able to collect large number of responses quickly, it will be conducted on some students and lecturers in the campus. The questionnaire for students consists of 3 questions in total, while lecturer has 6 questions. Both questionnaire includes title of the survey, purpose, and several questions. There are quantitative and qualitative data to be collected. The questions are then printed out and distributed to our subjects.
Results
of Research
Lecturer
Survey
Student Survey
Analysis of Research Data
From the result of
lecturer survey, it is found that most of them are supervising more than five
students. Most of the lecturers are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied of the
performance of current system. However, 25% of them are not satisfied. They
would like to have features such as meeting schedule or update and capstone
topics uploading to include in capstone portal. The most important feature to
include in the new system are topic chosen notice, progress update, and meeting
schedule that allows rescheduling.
Furthermore, from the
students’ perspective, they would like to include email system so that they can
request topic from lecturer. The most important feature to include are
appointment system, topics availability listing, and email system.
Conclusion of Research
From stakeholders’ point
of view, features that they mentioned will be included in the new system. In
the new system, lecturer will be the one to upload their own capstone topics to
the portal. Lecturers will receive a notification once his/her topic is selected
by a student. Also, students and
lecturers can communicate their meeting schedule and project updates through
the email system. After a student confirming a topic, lecturers can cross off
the topic, which means students are not longer allowed to choose the topic
because it is not available anymore. Appointment system allows student to
choose a meeting slot with the lecturer in charge of the topic. Also, there
will be a list of sent email after the email has been sent out to lecturer when
student clicks ‘back’ button.
Research
Method #2
Purpose
of Research
Similar to research method #1, we found that there
are several problems regarding the current capstone system through part 1:
- There are no topic tracking in the capstone portal, so clashing in topic selection among students might occur.
- Topic uploading must be done manually by admin.
- Lecturers are not aware of their topic being chosen.
- Difficult for student and lecturer to communicate.
- Meeting appointment can only be made through email.
Research
Materials
To find out how admin’s
job and how he/she handle the capstone topics. Interview is one of our data
gathering techniques because it can help to explore the issues from one person.
Therefore, an interview will be conducted on admin of the capstone project in
our department, which is Miss Sandra. Questions that is relevant, as shown
under Admin Interview section, will be asked in the interview session.
Furthermore, additional questions might be asked if it is necessary. The
session will take approximately 5 to 10 minutes. All the questions and answers
will be jotted down by handwritten notes. At the same time, audio of the entire
session will be recorded as well to ensure all points are captured.
Results
of Research
Below are the questions
and answers being asked during the interview session:
1. How do the current
eLearn capstone system works from your perspective?
Sandra: The current system has information platform and
submission platform, where information platform is for handbook, timeline,
forms, and topic listing, while submission platform is for report submissions.
After reports are submitted, lecturers are able to view and grade them.
2. Do you get the topics from lecturers?
Sandra: Yes, I will get the topics from lecturers and compile
them in excel/worksheet then upload to the information platform.
3. On a scale of 1 to 5, how do you think this job task
(using elearn) is convenient to you?
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
Least Most
Sandra: So far this is the only system I have. If I do not
have this system, then I will be doing it manually in excel or words. So I
would say that this is the best system I have now. Therefore, it is 5, since
there are no other choices to upload the topics. In the current approach, the
coordinator ask lecturers to provide topics and set them deadlines, then admin
compile & upload.
4. Sandra: What are the features that you pull out in your
system?
Saaqib: Admin will have less work to do because lecturers are
uploading topics by themselves. Also, students will be known by themselves
after they take the topic, they will know who are their lecturer, and they can
have their lecturer’s email and discuss about meeting time. Lecturer will have
a list to show each topic taken by student. Student will acknowledge the
availability of the topic through the list of topic. If someone has taken the
topic, then it will be excluded from the list.
5. How much do you satisfied with the approach that we
mentioned (in availability of topics)/our system with a scale of 1-5?
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
Least Most
Sandra: Because it is all being done manually, so I would say
2.
6. Do you think there is any downside in the current system
where you think it can be improved?
Sandra: Overall it is good, since it is linked to turnitin,
can access multiple files and can track late submissions.
7. Can you rate the system?
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
Least Most
Sandra: 0, because it has to be done manually. Also, there is
no option in tracking the availability of topics. The current platform are unlike
Vine365, it does not have excel sheet for users to edit. In Vine365, the form
can be edited by everyone.
Analysis of Research Data
Miss Sandra mentioned
that topic uploading to the spreadsheet using excel is the most convenient way
currently that is the only choice to display the topics for now. Currently, to
upload topics, lecturers would send their capstone topic to programme coordinator
within particular deadline that is set by the coordinator. Then, coordinator
will collect from lecturers that wanted to provide topics for admin. Admin will
compile and put into an excel file, then upload it to elearn. However, Miss
Sandra is not very satisfied with the current approach because everything has
to be done manually. Furthermore, she compared the excel sheet with the form in
Vine365. She mentioned that excel sheet does not allow users to make changes
online. In Vine365, users can edit the form.
Conclusion
of Research
From the interview
above, there are a few items that Miss Sandra has mentioned, that it is not
supported by the current capstone platform in elearn. This leads us to propose
new features to our design. As there is concurrency issue in displaying topic
availability, topic being chosen should not be selected by another student,
even if it has not been confirmed yet. Therefore, topic that has been selected
by one of the students will be considered as taken, and it will not appear in
the list of topic anymore. Furthermore, topic uploading task will be handled by
lecturer themselves instead of admin. Lecturer will have an interface to enter
the details of topic and upload. Also, they can check whether their topic is
taken by student. To communicate with student for their meeting, lecturer can
send email through the email system. After the email has been sent out to
student, there will be a list of sent email when lecturer clicks ‘back’ button.
Ideation,
Prototyping and Evaluation
5
Thinking about Implementation and User Evaluations
A. Block Diagram of Solution
Figure 1 Block Diagram of Capstone System
The requirement phase has been completed
resulting in an overall architecture with selected tools and techniques in
place to develop a web system that would fulfil the proposed solution to
Capstone tracking. Figure 1 represents the complete schematic form of
representation of the Web Capstone system. The system is comprised of various
elements or systems to perform a unique function. This architecture includes
the externally visible properties and the relationship among the components.
The external properties include the web browsers to interact with the system.
Elearn is a web application which will act as a plugin to provide a base of our
system and will help in the achievement of the goal.
The system would be accessed with the same
username and password as of elearns in order to extract the information details
of faculty of science and technology. The use of plugin in a web application
system is a part of web development subject that we have finished in year two
of our course. The back end support is essential for the availability of the
data therefore a remote SQL database will be connected to the web application
all the time. The learning of database fundamentals and advanced database
subjects helped us to developed tables, to represent and save the data in the
right fields. The capstone system would be a web application that would be
hosted and put online for lecturers and students to access the system remotely.
This part of the system is a deployment into internet and is also a part of web
development subject. The knowledge of software engineering, web development and
database systems have helped in designing and development of working prototype
of the capstone system. There are two
subsystems in the capstone system that help in two different functions.
One of the subsystems helps the lecturers to view
the list of topics on the window and the lecturer has an option to upload their
new topics and to see the existing selected topics that have been chosen by the
students. The interface was provided where lecturers would upload the topic
with additional details. This new topic would be saved in the database with the
respective lecturer’s details extracted from the elearn web application.
The second
subsystem takes place from the student side where the student has a web page of
all the capstone topics to choose from. The student can choose the topic, this
selected topic details will be send to the lectures side as a notification and
to his selected topics list.
These two subsystems work together on the web.
Both subsystems provide each functionality that represents the capstone system
as a whole. The elearn web application
provides a plugin as a backend to login both lecturers and students. This system also includes a browser to
interact with the system and a remote database to store the data.
B. Design of user evaluation
Research Question
The research question was that the
current elearn platform does not have the function for the students and
lecturers to track on the availability of the topics or to track which student has taken which topic at first
place unless told by the owners of those topics. Both parties don't have a
medium where they can manage their topics efficiently.
Demographics
The stakeholders of this system
are students and lecturers of department of computer and information systems
(DCIS). The student access the system to select the topic from the list of
capstone topics. And lecturers will use it
to track the topics that are selected by the students.
Methodology
The fully
functional prototype is ready and ready to perform user evaluation. At first we set out to create our first
prototype from the list of requirements we have gathered, we needed to identify
the prototyping tools that is needed to accomplish our goal. The cognitive walkthrough was applied at
natural settings to evaluate the working
prototype. Each two members of lecturers and users tested the system naturals
and explored themselves. The purpose of
the natural settings was to establish a new design might cook up in the
evaluation or the existing ones are fully related to the stakeholders. The
evaluation took place in one of the empty rooms where the user was with laptop
to evaluate without any time limit. The response was collected in the form of recording and taking notes to
observe the response with the goal to be unobtrusive and not to affect what
users do during the evaluation. Their feedback was used as a basis to create
the next iteration of the prototype.
Feedback from the user also was paramount to determining how to improve
the interface on the next prototype.We also decided to implement the heuristic
evaluation inspection method to this prototype to evaluate our prototype
against the Benyon’s design principles to get a first proper iteration of the
system interface as a starting point.
Selection of data gathering method
The user
research method that we adopt in here is questionnaire. Since questionnaire is
able to collect large number of responses quickly, it will be conducted on some
students and lecturers in the campus. Both questionnaire include title of the
survey, purpose, and several questions. There are quantitative and qualitative
data to be collected.
To find out
how admin’s job and how he/she handle the capstone topics. Interview is one of
our data gathering techniques because it can help to explore the issues from
one person. Therefore, an interview will be conducted on admin of the capstone
project in our department, which is Miss Sandra. Questions that is relevant, as
shown under Admin Interview section, will be asked in the interview session.
Furthermore, additional questions might be asked if it is necessary. The
session will take approximately 5 to 10 minutes
Materials to collect data
To conduct
the questionnaire we choose to print out then distribute the questionnaire to lecturers and students for easy means of
conducting and to get quick responses. Also we used smartphone audio recorder
to record the interview sessions while evaluating the working prototype to get
the clear feedback as we can revert back to audio file if we miss something as
well as to ensure all points are captured.
To built the
high-fidelity prototype we used microsoft powerpoint as a the tool to create
the new iteration of the prototype, as
this tool easily create web page as
slides in powerpoint and provides hyperlinks that would look and work like web system.
Analysis technique
The
analysis technique that we used for quantitative data in questionnaire is by
calculating the average or percentage of total number of responses to the
category divided by total number of responses. The average is calculated for
5-point rating scale question and calculated percentage for dichotomous
questions. Then, it is visualized in bar chart for better understanding.
Response with higher average or percentage has more people choosing it. While for
qualitative analysis, we segregate the result by categories and rank it. Result
with most people mentioning it will be ranked as first. The analysis technique
for interview session is by recalling the recording and referring to
handwritten notes. For Heuristic evaluation in after each design stage, the
problem severity is referred then only judge based on it to redesign the
mock-up.
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