citizens registration management system - chapter four

CHAPTER

FOUR

Chapter Four: Implementation – Nigerian Citizens Registration Management System in Sudan

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By Suleiman Umar Abdullahi, supervised by Dr. Awad Mohamed

IMPLEMENTATION

PREFACE: The purpose of this phase (also called the coding or development phase) is to

convert the system design into source code, or in other words workable

solutions (programs).

4.1 DATABASE IMPLEMENTATION

Database Implementation or Physical Database Design is the process of

producing a description of the implementation of the database on secondary

storage; it describes the base relations, file organizations, and indexes design

used to achieve efficient access to the data, and any associated integrity

constraints and security measures. [10]

The following approach was used in the physical database design:

Tables

o Every entity has a primary key, as needed by entity integrity

constraint.

o Basic tables are created first to avoid pitfalls of referential integrity

and all columns of the basic tables are set to UNIQUE KEY to

avoid duplicates.

o Transaction tables are created with constraint on foreign keys (ON

UPDATE CASCADE ON DELETE RESTRICT) to avoid making

a record unreachable.

o All foreign keys are indexed to make references easier

Users

o ‘Staff’ Users (i.e. users with staff role as illustrated in the Use Case

diagram in Chapter Two) are only given SELECT, INSERT,

UPDATE privilege on all tables, except basic tables and Notes

table which were given additional DELETE privilege.

o ‘Admin’ User has full DBA privileges

[See Appendix C]


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4.1.1 DATA TYPES DESCRIPTION

Name Sql

Standard? Length Range Size Description

Char Yes Fixed 0 – 255 Length * 1

byte

The ASCII

character set uses

one byte to store

each character,

whereas the

Unicode character

set uses up to four

bytes per character.

Using Char as

opposed to VarChar

leads to larger

tables, but usually

faster processing,

because MySQL

knows exactly

where each record

starts

VarChar Yes Variable 0-255 1 byte per

character

The ASCII

character set uses

one byte to store

each character,

whereas the

Unicode character

set uses up to four

bytes per character.

Enum No

Fixed

(Differe

nt

definitio

ns will

have

different

lengths;

however

,

these

lengths

are fixed

once the

field is

defined.)

1–65,535 enumerated strings

1–255

enumerated

strings = 1

byte,

256–

65,535

enumerated

strings = 2

bytes

Enum (Enumerate)

data type is used for

limiting contents of

a column to one

choice.

Combination of

strings in the

enumerated list can

be stored as a

comma-delimited

list You can also

perform queries on

enumerated fields

based on their

indexes (the first

value starts at 1).

Enumerated fields

are sorted on their

index values, not

alphabetically. In

other words, they


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are sorted in the

order the values

were defined.

Text No Variable Max. 64KB Length + 2

bytes

It can contain more

text, the size

increases as the text

increase. The

additional 2 bytes

store length

TinyInt No Fixed -128 – 127 (Signed)

0 – 255 (Unsigned) 1 byte

All values are saved

in 1 byte

Int Yes Fixed

–2,147,483,648 –

2,147,483,647(Signed)

0 – 4,294,967,295(Unsigned)

4 bytes It stores only

decimal numbers

Date Yes Fixed ‘1000-01-01’ – ‘9999-12-31 3 bytes It only stores date

value.

DateTime Yes Fixed ‘1000-’01-01 00:00:01’ –

‘9999-12-31 23:59:59’ 8 bytes

It stores date value

and time.

TimeStamp Yes Fixed ‘1970-01-01 00:00:00’ –

‘2038-01-18 22:14:07’ 4 bytes

It is the only

Datetime data type

in MySQL v5.1 that

supports automatic

time stamping upon

update or insertion.

MediumBlob No Variable Max. 16MB Length + 3

bytes

It stores all type of

data (multimedia,

text strings, etc) in

bytes string. The

additional 3 bytes

store length.

Table 4.1.1- Database Data Types Description

Note: by default all tables created by MySQL are static tables, unless it contains

any of the data type with Variable length.


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4.2 USER INTERFACE

The User Interface portion of a software product is responsible for all

interactions with the user. Almost every software product has a User Interface.

In the early days of the computer, no software product had any User Interface

because the computers those days were batched systems and no interactions

with the users were supported.

The User Interface is the primary component of any software product that is

directly relevant to the users. Many users often judge a software product from

the User Interface. An interface that is difficult to use leads to higher levels of

user errors and user dissatisfaction. Users feel frustrated when a system behaves

in unexpected ways, i.e. when the issued commands do not carry out actions

according to intuitive expectations to the user. [3]

Normally, when a user starts using a system he builds a mental model of the

system and expects the system to conform to it. For example, if a user action

causes one type of system activity and response under some context, then the

user would expect similar response from other actions with same context.

Therefore, sufficient care and attention was taken to give the user a consistent

commands context.

In this system, pre-emptive mechanisms were taken to prevent as much user

errors as possible from occurring. A complex validation algorithm was used to

ensure that data inputted by user is in correct format and consistent. Every text

box has a maximum character length which corresponds with the same field size

in the database (except for fields that were not given a predefined character

limit, for example Notes and Job History fields), this prevent the user from

feeding in data that is beyond the field in the first place – which generally saves

user time and decreases error rate. A Server-Client validation approach was

used to validate data, which tries as much as possible to prevent insertion of

invalid data.

When designing the User Interface some features were put at top priority:

The system is not only suppose to do what it is supposed to do, but it has

to do it right. Moreover, it has to be done by whom is only authorized to

do it.


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A good Graphical User Interface with easy: speed of learning; speed of

use; speed of recall; consistent commands; attractive and appealing; and

that can support multiple skill levels.

A Graphical User Interface that provide user with feedback periodically

informing him that his request is been processed or is in progress.

4.2.1 USER INTERFACE SCREENSHOTS

Fig 4.1 – Login screen as the system is started, indicating to the user where to

insert his username as he hover his mouse over the username field.

Fig 4.2 – Login screen – showing warning message as the user entered invalid

username / password combination


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Fig 4.3 Login screen – The system is closing after 3 invalid login attempts

Fig 4.4 Main screen window (for users with staff role only) - at first start,

showing total number of: active citizens; dormant citizens; valid passports;

expired passports at the status bar.


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Fig 4.5 Log window - showing the successful and unsuccessful login attempts

to the system with date and time.

Fig 4.6 Change password dialog - it gives the user (with staff role) the freedom

to change his password whenever he feels like changing or when he thinks his

password has been compromised.


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Fig 4.7 Authority Window - showing list of passport authorities. All basic tables

has the same type of window


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Fig 4.8 Registration Form – the first name field is highlighted in red as the user

press save while the field is empty. Each field will highlight to red if invalid

data is inputted upon pressing save to tell the user the exact field that has

incorrect values.


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Fig 4.9 Registration Form – a dialog box showing a citizen is saved successfully

with his new registration number after all data has been validated


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Fig 4.10 Viewing Window – a citizen is viewed with all his records bundled in

one place


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Fig 4.11 Citizen Registration Information & Remarks ready to be printed


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Fig 4.12 Search Dialog – telling the user to select a search criterion

Fig 4.13 Report Dialog – telling the user to select a report criterion


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Fig 4.14 Sample of list report been generated using marital status (single)

criterion

Fig 4.15 Report sample been exported to Microsoft Excel directly from the

application. It can also be exported to pdf format for extensibility.


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Fig 4.16 Sample of Graph (pie chart) Report been generated using marital status

(single) criterion

Note: All graph reports with 4 or less variables (like Gender, Marital Status and

Activity Status) are generated using pie chart, while others with more variables

are generated with bar chart.


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Fig 4.17 Sample of Graph (bar chart) Report been generated using State of

Origin criterion


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Fig 4.18 Administrator Main Window (for users with Administrator role only) –

showing a new user with staff privilege is about to be created.

Note: In the current version of MySQL v5.1, the username has a maximum

length of 16 characters, while the password has a maximum length of 41

characters.


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Fig 4.19 Administrator Main Window – showing list of all users with their

usernames and roles.

citizens registration management system - chapter four

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