01-02-2012, 03:58 PM
An Efficient Online Shopping System
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1. INTRODUCTION
Online shopping becomes increasing popular nowadays. It brings many advantages to both sellers and buyers. In
our project, we developed an online shopping system for our stakeholder, Metro Credit Union (MCU). In this
paper, we introduce our stakeholder and describe the existing problem, the user requirements, the project scope
and the project schedule. Next, we present our solution including the system analysis, the deviation between the
final and initial design, the functions of our online shopping system and the testing plan. Finally, we evaluate
our work in different aspects, present the area for further improvement and conclude our work.
2. PROJECT BACKGROUND
In this section, we briefly introduce our stakeholder and describe the existing problem, the project scope and the
system specification.
2.1 Our Stakeholder
Metro Credit Union (MCU) is a co-operative, non profit association for the purpose of creating a source of credit
available to its members who are the employees of MTR Corporation [1]. MCU always strive continuously to
look for improvement in all related business, so that its members can benefit from its services and obtain the best
value for money. Currently, MCU has 9,200 members representing 75% of the MTRC employees.
2.2 Existing Problem
MCU always organizes sales exhibition at discounted price to members. Due to the insufficient venue and lack
of manpower to manipulate the sales exhibition, MCU would like to develop an on-line shopping platform, so
that members could enjoy the service via MTR intranet web server instead of on-site. In addition, MCU can
easily estimate the sales volume and be able to negotiate a better discount from vendor. This is a saving time and
saving money unprecedented service to its members.
2.3 Scope of Project
MCU requires an online shopping system with a database keeping the inventory and the invoicing information,
and the system has to be migrated to the MTR Intranet web server. The online shopping system needs to have
three key features: (1) Only accessible by MCU members; (2) User friendly for computer illegitimate; and (3)
Easy to maintain by system administrators.
2.4 Potential Users of Our System
There are two groups of users in our system, they are MCU members and system administrators. They have
different authorities in our system which are shown as follows:
• Members – They are MCU members. They can view the detailed product information and their
shopping history. Besides, they are able to create, view, modify and cancel their shopping orders.
• Administrators – They are authorized MCU staffs to control the system. They are assigned with
different level of authority to maintain the information of inventory, invoicing, members and
administrators. Besides, they can make conditional refunds and print out transaction invoices. In
addition, administrators can execute summary reports and be responsible to maintain database.
3. SYSTEM ANALYSIS
In this section, we present the requirement specification, software and hardware requirements for both system
developers and system users, process model and data model.
3.1 Requirement Specification
In the following, we describe the functional requirements and non-functional requirements of our system.
3.1.1 Functional Requirements
Functional requirements define the functions that are requested by our stakeholder. Different functions are
needed by different system users. For members, there are three types of MCU members: Ordinary, Associate and
Suspended. An ordinary member is a general member. An associate member is a VIP member. A suspended
member is a member having limited rights to be served by MCU. Once a member login the system, it can
identify the type of the member. Besides, different administrators have different levels of authority to maintain
the system information. The system can identify the authority of an administrator after he login.
• Functional Requirements for Members
o Login
o Shopping cart
o Receive invoice
o View shopping history
o Search information of product
o Change of password
• Functional Requirements for Administrators
o Login
o Update information of product
o Update information of member
o Update information of administrator
o Update invoice and transaction
o Print Invoice
o Print Report
o Change of password
3.1.2 Non-functional Requirements
Non-functional requirements define the operational requirements and project schedule that are requested by our
stakeholder.
• Operational Requirements
o The system can be viewed by Microsoft Internet Explorer.
o The system can be executed on the MTR’s Intranet. The MTR Intranet web server runs on the
Windows server platform which supports Internet Information Server (IIS).
o We can only use Microsoft Access to develop the database.
• Project Schedule
o The development of system is completed by the end of June 2009.
o The mitigation testing and final user acceptance testing is scheduled at the end of July 2009.
o The system can be launched at the end of August 2009.
3.2 Software and Hardware Requirements
In the following, we describe the software and hardware requirements for system developers and system users.
3.2.1 Software and Hardware Requirements for Developers
During our system development, we have to design both static and dynamic website interfaces, create website
functions and a database system, edit photos and pictures, and print out reports, so its has a set of software and
hardware requirements.
