PROJECT PROPOSAL

Design & Development of Web 2.0 Learning Management Solution

Prepared by: PHP-Powerhouse Experts

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Objective of the Project:

To design and develop a search engine friendly Web 2.0 LMS integrated platform for The Centre for
Business and Professional Excellence having a very fresh, creative and delightful theme. The basic
concept of the website is to provide an online platform for users, especially students to get access to
online learning courses.

Scope of Work:

The scope of work in the discussed project includes the development of following modules.

Design modules. Description

Conceptualization / Visualization of the We shall do a detailed conceptualization and
website visualization of the website. In order to create a
framework of the entire project.
Implementation of Web 2.0 features Updated Web 2.0 features will be added to the
website, to make it interactive.
Integrating video's on the website Videos shall be added to the website to make it
more attractive.
Mock up designs To give a visual presentation of the website.
Implementation of AJAX technology AJAX shall be implemented instead of Flash
where ever applicable to make website more
search engine friendly
Main Navigation, sub navigation and other links Ensure proper navigation of the website both
main and sub.
Text and graphics inserted As per requirement suitable latest graphics &
text to match the same shall be inserted.
Source files and ownership rights We shall provide source files and ownership
rights to ensure complete security of the
website.
Images / Ads for website Banners and images hall be created for the
website.
Inner Pages Designing of the inner pages shall be done
Site-map Site-map for search engine crawling both

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 Google and Yahoo perspectives shall be
undertaken.
W3C validation HTML & X-HTML Linking According to W3C
Website Development Description
Table less website A table less, div based website will make it
more search engine friendly.
Google Analytics Integration of Google Analytics for statistical
data of visitors on the website
Integration with CMS / back-end This will be done in the best manner
Back-end & Moodle based CMS Development
Edit/remove/add Courses As per site requirement
Edit/remove/add Images As per site requirement
Edit/add/remove Meta data/Title tags For Better search engine ranking
Edit/add/remove Alternative tags/Anchor tags For Better search engine ranking
Edit/add/remove Banners As per site requirement
Edit/add/remove Blogs/Forums For better interactivity, search ranking and site
features.
Manage Videos As per site requirement
User Management For managing the members of the website.

Site Functionality

Student

•All Students must register before using the LMS

•The Student can then select from a range of courses (which have been uploaded by Teacher)

•The Student will pay to access course materials and exams.

•Payment can be recognized either via Paypal , Direct (via the use of a Course Code number issued
directly to the Student by The Administrator, Teacher) or by VISA.

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•Courses can be configured to be EITHER available to all Student OR only available to certain Groups.

•Once payment has been received, Student can retake exams as often as they wish within a pre-
configured time window (e.g. 3 months etc.)

•On completion of each exam, Student can review a report of his/her individual performance

•Exams can be time-based, multi choice or other formats.

•On completion of each exam, Student can choose to print or view a report detailing the correct answer
and the Student answer.

•Pop Up Calculator to assist with calculation of answers

•Student exams can be taken asynchronously

•The Student can complete a Course Evaluation form on completion of course.

Teacher

•The Teacher will review course activity reports for Groups and Individuals that have been assigned to
The Teacher by the Administrator.

•The Teacher has no role in Content Management

•Teachers can communicate, via LMS, with Student who are members of the Teachers Groups

•Student can be members of more than one User Group

Administrator

•Will allocate Student to courses, Student to Student Groups, Teachers to courses, and Teachers to
Student Groups

•Teachers can communicate, via LMS, with selected Student and Student Groups

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PROJECT WORK FLOW:

MODULES FUCNTIONALITIES

Site management  Site is managed by an administrator user

 Site is defined during setup. Defaults can be edited during setup or

globally accepted

 Site can be modified by a robust Site administration block.

 Plug-in activity modules can be added to existing Moodle

installations

 Plug-in "themes" allow the administrator to customize the site

colors, fonts, layout etc to suit local needs

User management Enrollments:

 After a user has been authenticated by the site or allowed in as a

guest, they can self enroll in courses.

 Courses can a limit enrollment in several ways. Student self

enrollment can be turned off.

 An "enrolment key" in a course, only allow certain Student to enter.

These keys can be give out face-to-face or via email and can be
changed.

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  Teachers, with permissions, can manually enroll Student or
unenrol Student in their courses.

 Course completion is a course prerequisite feature of Moodle 2.0

that allows scaffolding of courses.

 Course and site settings have options for automatic removal of

users

 Flat file or CSV files can automatically authenticate and enroll

Student in specific courses

 Each person needs only one account for the Moodle site. Each
account can have access to different courses, and the courses
resources and activities.

 Meta courses get their enrollment information from 1 or more

other courses.

Roles:

 Roles combine specific permissions for specific types of

participants. A user can be assigned a different role for each
context, such as a specific course.

 The administrator (admin) user account controls the creation of

courses and creates teachers by assigning users to courses and
giving them a role in that context

 New roles can be created, copied from existing roles and edited.
Some standard roles include: Course creator can create courses,

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 teach in them, and assign others to teacher roles.

 Non-editing teacher roles are available for adjuncts, and part-time

tutors.

 Student can participate and view activities but not create them

 Guests are view only users.

Course management Course Report:

 All grades for many kinds of activities can be viewed on one page.

 Graded activities can be further calculated or manually entered in

the Gradebook which is separated from the initial activity
calculation.

 Additionally categories of graded activities and display functions

allow for custom reports.

 Full user logging and tracking - activity reports for each Student are
available with graphs and details about each module (last access,
number of times read) as well as a detailed "story" of each
Student’s involvement including postings etc on one page.

Assignment Module:

 Assignments can be specified with a due date and a maximum

grade.

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  Student can upload their assignments (any file format) to the
server - they are date-stamped.

 Late assignments are allowed, but the amount of lateness is shown

clearly to the teacher.

 For each particular assignment, the whole class can be assessed

(grade and comment) on one page in one form.

 Teacher feedback is appended to the assignment page for each

Student, and notification is mailed out.

 The teacher can choose to allow resubmission of assignments after

grading.

 Allowing resubmissions can allow the teacher to progress monitor

Student projects/assignments as they evolve.

 Advanced assignments can allow multiple files to be uploaded. This

could keep together preplanning maps, outlines, research papers
and presentations.

Choice module:

 The Choice module is like a single question poll. Can either be used
to vote on something, or to get feedback from every Student

 Teacher sees intuitive table view of who chose what

 Student can optionally be allowed to see an up-to-date graph of
results

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 Forum Module:

 Different types of forums are available, such as course news, open-

to-all, one-thread-per-user and question/answers types.

 Forum posts can be emailed in several ways, some controlled by

the Student.

 Posts may have the author’s photo attached.

 Discussions can be viewed nested, flat or threaded, oldest or

newest first.

 Robust subscription methods for each forum

Teacher can force subscription for all members of the

course, either initially or permanently.

 Groups features allow options for more entry and viewing

limitations for Student.

 The teacher can choose not to allow replies to their posts

(announcements).

 Discussion threads can be moved between forums or split by the

teacher.

 Attachments can be made to posts and shown as part of message.

 Forum ratings can be used. These can be restricted to a range of

dates and included as part of a Student's grade

Glossary Module:

 The Glossary module is one of the modules that best illustrates the
way that Moodle can fundamentally improve upon the experience
of a traditional classroom

 When Student contribute to a course in a public place like the

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 glossary, their ideas are given weight and attention and often
result in a greater pride or ownership of the assignment

 Allows participants to create and maintain a list of definitions, like

a dictionary

 Student entries can be previewed by instructors before publishing

 Entries can be searched or browsed using alphabet, category, date,

and author

 A glossary of terms can be easily referenced by Student

 Almost any module of Moodle can be set to hyperlink -

automatically - to any word or phrase that is stored in or added to
the glossary

 Glossary items can be grouped in categories

 Participants can comment on glossary entries

 Entries can be rated using teacher-defined scales

 Glossaries can be easily exported and imported via xml

 Glossaries can be fully searched

 Glossaries can be viewed with different display formats

Lesson Module :

 A lesson is a single activity where a series of pages are presented to

the Student, usually based upon a Student's choice.

 Content seen by the Student is created with Moodle's HTML editor

tool.

 Student make choices by their answers to questions or by selecting

a button with a description. Their choices are linked to other pages
in the lesson.

This allows for a simple slide show type of presentation,

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 with content and questions.

It allows for a branching, adaptive presentation based upon

a Student's specific choice.

Navigation through the lesson can be straight forward or

complex, logical or random.

 Jumps are associated with each choice that link to other lesson
pages.

Jumps can be to a specific page or to a random page or a

page not seen by the Student.

 Choices that are answers to questions and can be scored and given
individual feedback.

Question pages include multiple choices, Multi-answer, T/F,

numeric, short answer and essay.

 Lesson settings offer the teacher many options such as:

Different scoring and grading potentials

Lessons can build upon each other through conditional
dependencies upon one another
Student attempts, time limits, minimum score and retakes
can be set for each lesson
Student may see progress bars, running score, and feedback
on their answers.
Password, start and end times, and other restrictions can be
placed on Student.

 Pages can be created one at a time or imported.

Resource Module

 Resources can display of many types of media content files by a

single link on the course page, such as: Word, PowerPoint, Flash,

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 Video formats, Audio formats

 Internal web pages (HTML formatted) can be created with HTML

editor tool

 Internal Text pages (no formatting)

 Files can be stored locally or the link point to remote locations

 Files can be uploaded and managed (zipped, unzipped, renamed,

moved) in the course

 Folders can be created and managed in the course and Student

given a link to the folder via a resource link.

 File handling in Moodle 2.0 has a File picker that is associated with
specific resources or activities, allowing uploads from server,
private, recent or on the fly. Files have attributes for author and
license/copyright.

 Content on the web can be linked to or seamlessly included within

the course interface.

Certificate Module  System generates a pdf certificate and sends to the Student

 The module will enable admin to generate PDF

certificates/diplomas for students of the course and is completely
customizable.

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  We can also add borders, watermarks, seals and even show grade
information.

ADMIN CONTROLS for CERTIFICATE MODULE ( suggested

parameters)

1 General Settings

1.1 Certificate Name

1.2 Introduction

2 Issue Options

2.1 Email Teachers

2.2 Email Others

2.3 Delivery

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 2.4 Save Certificates

3 Locking Options

3.1 Required course grade

3.2 Minimum required minutes in course

3.3 Dependent activities

4 Text Options

4.1 Print Date

4.2 Date Format

4.3 Print Code

4.4 Print Grade

4.5 Grade Format

4.6 Print Outcome

4.7 Print Credit Hours

4.8 Print Teacher Name(s)

4.9 Custom Text

5 Design Options

5.1 Certificate Type

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 5.2 Border Image

5.3 Border Lines

5.4 Watermark Image

5.5 Signature Image

5.6 Seal or Logo Image

Project Execution Structure:

At PHP-Powerhouse we are very diligent about each project that we take up. Our team works in an
extremely systematic and coordinated method, ensuring that you are kept informed and in loop
throughout the production and execution of your project.

S. No. Deliverables Description

1 SRS Draft A formal Functional Specification will be drafted based on the
information provided for the execution of the site project.
2 Approval Work will proceed on the SRS, only when you approve the drafted
document.

3 SRS Final We will complete the Functional specification in view of your comments.
4 Approval The final and formally approved specification will then be the basis for
delivering the final product.
5 Architecture Every project is staffed with an Architect who will close on the Technical
Design and Architecture of the websites. The Architect will ensure that
the database design is optimal, websites are scalable and the
development and design standards are set. Deliverable out of this phase is

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 database schema.
6 Project Kick-off The Project Manager will brief the programming team on the
requirements, Creative Design and Prototype Mock up Creative design
including logo designing, home page and other page mock ups, style
sheets, etc. will be initiated.
7 Creative- We will build a non-working prototype that will include all major screens.
Design/Prototype The user interface will be non-navigable, but complete in all respects.
Mock-up This will also include the look and feel of the site, logo, etc. We prototype
all the major screens and get approval before developing them.
8 Approval A review and approval on the prototype will be required from your end
for further actions.
9 Final Approval This will be considered as your Final approval, and development will
begin on the same.
10 Development We will begin writing the application. We follow all the standard
development processes, like design reviews, code reviews, unit testing
and peer testing.

11 Testing Our expert quality Analysts will test the software in-house. The hours
budgeted here will be used in testing throughout the development
process.
12 User Acceptance Complete system will be released for your testing.
Testing (UAT)
13 Feedback You will comment on the UAT results and provide approval to proceed.
14 Final Version We will provide quick turnaround to fix any problems that are pointed
out by you during UAT, resulting in the Final Version.
15 Approval You will review the Final Version and give your approval.
16 Launch We will provide our assistance in placing the product online

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Technologies

We propose using PHP/SMARTY based Moodle platform as a technology for your project. Reasons for
selecting this technology are given below:

Integration opportunities - All open source products, like phpBB and Wordpress, are created using
PHP. Adding new modules to the program as well as integrating with other open source projects
becomes seamless.

Scalability - Large sites like Facebook.com and mySpace.com are created using PHP.

Cost savings - Being open source, you don’t pay any license fee. Hosting for PHP is cheaper than that
for Microsoft technology.

Abstraction - Internet technology evolves too fast. Every year one has to update the look and feel of
the site because it gets outdated. Separating the presentation layer in SMARTY makes this job very easy
because you are not touching the heart of the application.

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Tier Role Technology
Presentation Tier This tier will contain the user CSS, SMARTY, Ajax , PHP
interface, which will be available
to the end users. All the Ajax
effects will be created using
yahoo UI framework
Business Tier This tier will manage business PHP code
processes, rules and logic. This
will contain the components and
the business logic.
Database Tier This tier contains database MYSQL
having all the data

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Architecture:

In order to provide accessibility, scalability, flexibility and robustness, the application should be built
using the MVC (Model, View, and Controller) architecture using SMARTY and PHP.

SMARTY is used to abstract the PHP code from HTML i.e. SMARTY becomes your presentation layer.

This architecture facilitates the separation of the application code from presentation. Typically, the
application code contains the business logic of your application, written and maintained in PHP code.
This is the heart of your application. It is a bad practice to keep business logic and presentation at the
same place. Presentation controls the view of the end user. This is the face of your application.

This architecture allows you to change the presentation without touching the business logic and
changing the business logic without changing the view.

Database:

We will use MYSQL 5.0 Database. All the queries and tables can be migrated to Oracle in future if you
want to scale the site.

Web Server:

Apache web server that runs on Linux will be used for the web server.

Operating System:

Linux 10.2 and Microsoft Windows will be used as the development environment.

Resource Allocation:

Project Team:

 A Project Manager who would manage complete development lifecycle of the project and
 would also communicate with client on regular basis.
 One Senior Graphic Designer, one Developer will be assigned to the project.
 Two testing and Quality Engineers will be assigned for testing the application.

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Features of Development life cycle:

Prototype and High Level Diagrams: - Documents are always necessary in a well defined
process but it is very difficult for Student to figure out upfront what they will get for their money.
Prototype and High level diagrams help the clients to have a clue of what will be delivered after
coding.

Module releases: - Every project is divided into multiple modules. As soon as a module is
completed we send the demonstration version to the Student. This enables Student to track
progress and notify us with any change in flow.

Periodic review and update to the client: - Project is reviewed by the project leader every
week and update is provided to the client about the schedule, completed targets and planned
targets for the next week.

Checklist method: - From planning to deployment, we follow checklist method, dramatically

reducing the commonly made mistakes made by the developers while coding, releasing and
deploying.

Well defined architecture: - We have developed a well-defined architecture. This helps us to

train newly recruited developers and leaders quickly. Since same architecture is followed in all
the projects, it enables us to manage manpower resources efficiently as everyone is familiar with
the architecture and can be deployed on any project in no time.

Common Libraries: - We have coded a set of libraries which the developers uses while coding
the application. These are common functions required while coding of any project. This helps
expediting the development and virtually eliminating bugs as these libraries are well tested and
optimized.

Knowledge management: - Common functions and solutions to challenges and issues are added
in our Knowledge management application. We believe in solving a problem or coding commonly
used function once. This also helps us reduce the development time.

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Task and bug tracking system: - Tasks while development and bugs while debugging are the
most important aspects of the projects.. Generally it becomes very difficult to manage bugs
where multiple Quality Engineers and developers are working on an application. For this, we
have a project management application to manage/track both bugs and tasks .Use of above
referred application with advanced reporting, tracking and auditing features not only makes it
easy to manage but also enables improvements in each project.

Source code and version control system: -Developing an application without source code and
version control is a big risk. We use Visual Source Safe for Microsoft Technologies and SVN for
other technologies.

Frequent review of SLA and planning documents by Project Leader: - Project leader is
responsible for meeting all requirements. Therefore project leader has to review the
development and SLA documents regularly to make sure project is on track and inform client
accordingly.

Warranty:

We stand by our work. There is a 90 days limited warranty on all our work. Once the application is
completely tested and has been launched for public use there will be one month of warranty period
where any bugs with the application are fixed. This period cannot be used to add any additional
features into the site. This period can be extended or reduced at the time of final signing of agreement.

Maintenance:

Maintenance, upgrades, changes, etc. will be provided at $10 per hour. For larger maintenance jobs, we
will be pleased to quote and lock the price based upon our hourly rates.

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Technical Accomplishments:

Over the past few years, PHP-Powerhouse has built a strong base in adorning skills based on different
technologies. We have developed several projects in the technologies listed below and are confident of
delivering clean and high quality code in anyone of them.

Web programming and Scripting:

Php 5.0
Ajax
XML, XHTML
CSS2.0
Java Script

Databases:
My SQL 4.0, 5.0
SQL Server

Platform:
Unix / Linux
Apache

Hope this is in line to your expectation, please let me know if any disconnect, so that I along with my
technical team of experts could put light on the same.

Looking forward to hear from you and henceforth building a long-term mutually beneficial
relationship.

Warm Regards
Priya
Business-Manger Development and Analyst
PHP-Powerhouse

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