DECLARATION

I hereby declare that this project report entitled

E-LEAVE SYSTEM FOR FTMK

is written by me and is my own effort and that no part has been plagiarized without

citations.

STUDENT: LEE YEN SIN Date: 9 / I( (7 SUPERVISOR: PUAN NURAZLINA MD SANUSI Date: q h)OV. 200 3

ABSTRACT

The E-Leave system is to fulfill the requirement for the final year student to complete the final project. E-Leave system will upgrade the current leave management system at faculty ftmk E-leave is a smart online leave management system that allows users to apply for their leave conveniently. It is designed with auto-routing for approval and online leaves approving capabilities, making every level leave application a total breeze for both applying as well as those approving. These applications allow officer to view the employeelstaff leave history within one year. With these this functionality, employeelstaff will know their leave history, how many leave they left. Based on these history functionality employeelstaff know their leave left. Besides that e-leave can auto sending email notification to officer for approval and employeelstaff also can receive the email status notification.

ABSTRAK

Sistem E-Cuti adalah untuk memenuhi kehendak setiap pelajar tahun akhir untuk menyelesaikan projek akhir mereka. Sistem E-Cuti ini akan menaiktaraf pergurusan cuti yang ada sekarang di fakulti ftmk. E-cuti adalah satu pengurusan cuti pintar yang membolehkan pengguna memohon cuti dengan mudah. E-cuti direkacipta dengan kebolehan pengesahan cuti secara automatic melalui aplikasi laman web. Ini membolehkan proses pengesahan cuti di setiap peringkat menjadi lebih mudah untuk kedua-dua parti.; pengguna yang memohon cuti dan pihak yang memberi pengesahan cuti.Aplikasi ini membolehkan pegawai melihat sejarah cuti staff dalam masa I tahun. Dengan fungsi ini staf boleh melihat sejarah cuti mereka, berapa cuti yang tinggal dan sebagainya. Selain itu E-cuti, boleh automatic kirim pemberitahuan e-mail kepada pegawai untuk cuti pengesahan dan staf boleh juga menerima pemberitahuan e-mail tentang status cuti mereka.

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Project Background

E-leave is a smart online leave management system that allows users to apply for

their leave conveniently. It is designed with auto-routing for approval and online leaves

approving capabilities, making every level leave application a total breeze for both

applying as well as those approving.

These applications allow officer to view the employeelstaff leave history within

one year. With these this functionality, employeelstaff will know their leave history,

how many leave they left. Based on these history functionality employeelstaff know

their leave left.

Besides that e-leave can auto sending email notification to officer for approval

and employeelstaff also can receive the email status notification.

1.2 Problem Statement(s)

i) Waste energy and time

Staffs need to fill up the leave application form then pass the form to the clerk,

after that the clerk will pass it to the officer for approval. This will make the

leave process become slower and waste the energy and time for all the people

that involved in leave management.

ii) Not environmental friendly

Current leave application need us to print out the leave form. This will increase

the demand for paper and in directly will cause more trees will be destroy for this

purpose.

iii) Waste financial source

In the midst of current manually apply leave, it will waste more money for

buying papers, ink, files to keep the leave record, cabinet to store the files and

etc.

iv) Leave approval become much slower

Leave approval become slower because if the clerk or approving officer is not in

the office. Then the leave application will be delay. This will make the leave

process become annoying for the staffs who applies the leave.

1.3 Objective

The main purpose of the E-Leave system is to upgrade or improved the current

manually apply leave. There are several main objectives that this project is going to meet:

To use computer to apply leave such as annual leave, unpaid leave, maternity

leave, Haji leave, and emergency leave.

To prepare the HR (Human Resource) Department with more efficiency and

simplicity in leave processing.

To solve HR problem on viewing employee leave

To construct a calendar for user to choose the date.

1.4 Scope

E-Leave application is focus on human resource management. E-Leave limited

the scope to one of the faculty in UTeM which is faculty FTMK. The target user for E-

Leave can be categorized into three category based on the function they use the

application.

Staff of the faculty FTMK

Ketua Jabatan of the faculty FTMK

Dean of FTMK

The limitations of the project are listed below

This project is for applying leave only, does not have relation with the

payrol I.

Leave type is based on the need of the faculty FTMK.

Staff at FTML must have the internet connection to access the E-Leave

application.

This project only for applying the leave does not have relation with the

payroll system.

1.5 Project Significance

E-Leave is the solutions of the current manually apply leave. This project will

upgrade the leave management system at faculty FTMK because the staff here can apply

leave anywhere, anytime they like through online.

The leave application process become smoother because there are no waiting

period when staff apply for a leave. The leave record become more manageable because

all the leave record is store into database.

Besides that, officer can view the staff leave history without much difficulty.

This all can be achieve with the E-Leave system because all the data is store in the

database and make the searching become faster compare to manually search, the staff

need to search all files.

1.6 Expected Output

I

submit application receive appllcatio receive applica:to

approving approving user eleave officer officer

Level one Level Two

Figure 1.1: Level of approval for E-Leave system at FTMK

1.7 Conclusion

E-Leave being develop is to overcome the weaknesses of the current manually

apply leave. Chapter 1 is all about understanding the objectives of the E-Leave, problem

with the current scenario and why this project is important for faculty FTMK. E-Leave is

a web-based application for the staff to apply the leave through online. The next chapter

is more about the research on the E-Leave application and the project methodology that

we used to develop this project.

CHAPTER 2

LITERATURE REVIEW AND PROJECT METHODOLOGY

2.1 Introduction

Before start the development of one system, the first step that need to do is do the

research about the system. Literature review is necessary to unsure that your dissertation

does not repeat the mistakes that have been made in earlier studies. Methodology is

referring to the usage of special tools and strategies for data gathering and analysis.

2.2 Fact and findings

2.2.1 Case study 1: The importance of the application going online

" I t \as a lot more convenient." she s a y . "The problcm n i t h paper is that you have to

mail it. Thiligs get lost. Senditif it online \\:as more S C C L I I - ~ . "

Audrey Martinlio: a licsli~nan at Oliio State I.!nivcrsity

Nowadays, more and more people choose the simpler, quicker and more secure

alternate ways to settle their things by going online. There are myriad advantages for

online application:

Apply anywhere: Whether you're at honie, school or work. apply any\vliere you

have an Internet connection.

One click: I n general: once you click your mouse to send your application. that's

it - there's no tilrtlier paperwork.

Catch errors: Many online applications alert you if spaces are left blank;

preventing you fro111 sending an application that is missing required i~iformatio~i.

Imn~ediate confirmation: Clsually a page thanks you for your subnlission rislit

away. If you submit your application via email. save a "sent" copy.

Quick processing: Sponsors have the ability to score and select applications

automatically, which means less time to find out if you're a winner.

Save money: Tliere's no charse for postage. Plus. you avoid paying overnight

shipping costs if you need to subniit an application in a hurry.

Save time: Online applications enable you to complete more applications in less

time.

The online applications not only benefit the user but also the sponsors. By accepting

olili~ie applications, sponsors do not have to mail out applications. or ~naliually

process them lvhen they come back. saving time arid money.

"Paper costs r i lot of money 10 process: average mailing can be in the Ii~rndreds of

thousands of' dollars. The nioney we save can be used to fund more scholarships.

larger scholarships."

Greg I,ee, associate program nianager at thc Coca-Cola Scholars Foundation

2.2.2 Case study 2: Benefit of the E-Leave system

There are some of the benefits of the E-Leave system:

E-leave is a paperless application for employees to apply leave. It is an

environmental friendly application. Employees can apply their leave such as leave type

Annual, Sick, and Family, if eligible, leave balance, leave history anywhere anytime

without barrier. Employees can also view their leave history online. Reduction of

overhead costs involve in manually apply leave. Employees receive an email of approval

or Denial of their leave request faster. This will save the time and hectic for both parties

without need to wait the clerk to slowly processing the leave manually. Other than that,

company can save cost in buying the stationery for company such as ink, paper, file,

cabinet and etc.

2.2.3 Case study 3: Current E-Leave system

2.2.3.1 E-Leave for CIO

"E-leave is an easy to use Internet or web-based system for creation, submission,

confirmation and reporting of all type of leave."

The Division of the State Chief Information Officer (CIO) (2002)

The advantages of this e-leave system are employees can, at any time, see real-

time Annual, Sick, and Family, if eligible, leave balances, along with pending leave

(which is leave into the future). Besides that, user can also view online up to two years

of your detailed leave transaction history. Your leave stays on our mainframe leave

system even longer than two years, but will appear for a maximum of two full years in

the e-Leave system. Moreover employees will receive an email from their supervisor

notifying them of either an Approval or Denial of their leave request. It is a fact that

many employees would rather get an email confirmation than have to ask their

supervisor if they approved a leave request. Another advantage is that employees can go

into a negative PENDING balance by requesting leave they have not yet earned, e-Leave

does allow this. The employee and the Supervisor can both see that the leave is not

available at the present time. But using leave accrual calculations they can determine

that it will be available by the time taken, which is the key factor. The employee will be

accruing leave during this time. You might call this "eLayaway7', because you aren't

taking it until it's paid for. This is different than "advanced leave" which only an agency

director has the authority to grant. This allows employees up to fifteen days of sick leave.

Finally, e-leave system for CIO is very unique because it can allow the user to donate

the leave which is another advantage of the E-leave system for CIO.

2.2.3.2 E-Leave for JustLogin Pte

"E-Leave is a smart online leave management system that allows users to apply

for their leave conveniently anytime, anywhere. It is designed with the auto-routing for

approval and online leave approving capabilities, making every leave application a total

breeze for both those applying as well as those approving."

JustLogin Pte Ltd (1 999)

The system flow for this e-leave application is users submit the leave

application using e-leave system to the approving officer, and then the officer will

approve or reject the leave and then send email notification to the user.

This e-leave system is very unique because they have additional feature. User

can view who is currently on leave in the company at the company calendar. Moreover

this e-leave system is designed to handle the leave rules of different companies in

different countries. Each company is able to configure the leave rules to suit their

specific company policies. Besides that, leave records can be exported to any backend

system.

The different between the e-leave systems at CIO and JustLogin Pte are the e-

leave system at CIO does not have functionality that allow user to view who is currently

on leave through calendar, does not allows user to configure the leave rules to suit the

specific company policies. E-leave for CIO will fix the leave type based on the need of

theirs own company leave policies. Finally, e-leave system for CIO can not export leave

records to any backend system while the e-leave for JustLogin Pte have this

functionality.

2.2.4 Case study 4: Example online application in Malaysia

The Inland Revenue Board Malaysia (the IRB) is currently streamlining the tax

filing process through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) and

is working to reform tax administrative policies to embrace an electronic income tax

filing system (MIA, 2000; SGATAR, 2001). The main objectives of the IRB in

embracing an electronic filing (e-filing) system are to facilitate tax compliance and to

provide improved taxpayer service through administrative improvement.

The chief advantage of an e-filing system is that it integrates tax preparation,

tax filing and tax payment. With the e-filing system, taxpayers and tax practitioners can

file income tax returns electronically via the enabling technologies, rather than through

mail or by physically visiting the tax office. This may eventually make the art of tax

filing and tax payment easier.

Respondent's Age

E 25-24 yr old

m35-44 yr old

E45-54 yr old

I3 55 above n Figure 2.1: Pie chart of the respondent's age

Respondent Ethic

E Chinese

India

M a l a y

87% E l Others

Figure 2.2: Pie chart of the Respondent Ethic

Respondent's Qualification

Qualification

Bachelors' Degree

Masters' degree

75% I3 Diploma

Figure 2.3: Pie chart of the Respondent's qualification

A Malaysian survey towards an electronic filing system shows that the

dominant proportion of Chinese (Figure 2.2) in the respondents' group reflects the

reality in Malaysia where Chinese are the major players in accounting and tax practice.

Approximately 22% of the respondents were aged below 35 (Figure 2.1). The

predominant education level was professional qualification and university degree

(Figure 2.3).

Conclusion

The survey findings of this study have implications for tax policy makers and

tax practice management. One implication is that the survey results report that tax

practitioners are optimistic about new technology. Another implication of the study is

concerned with technology readiness and usage intentions (and ultimate usage) of the e-

filing system. The survey results show that Malaysian have a significant positive

correlation between technology readiness level and usage intentions of the e-filing

system.

E-Procurement or E-Perolehan (in Malaysia) is a systems that is used to obtain

materials and parts via the Web or using traditional ED1 standards either for internal

manufacturing (direct procurement) or office supplies and equipment (indirect

procurement).E-Perolehan is an electronic procurement system provided by the

Government to enable suppliers to sell their products or services on the

Internet. Through E-Perolehan, suppliers and contractors can receive, manage and

process orders or payments from Government agencies through transactions done

electronically on the Internet.

Based on the article, date August 2001, Malaysia provided RM270 million

(US$71 million) to launch e-Procurement telecenters nationwide. The purpose of the E-

Procurement telecenters nationwide is to target smaller sized suppliers, enabling them to

trade online with all Government procurement centers. E-Perolehan is one of the first

and largest pilot applications under the e-government flagship applications of Malaysia's

Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC). The telecenters facilitating the E-Perolehan project

will help non-IT savvy suppliers perform online transactions such as submitting

registration applications, providing catalog details or even getting connected to the

Internet.

Conclusion

Malaysia decided to expand the E-Procurement to other country, if the E-

Procurement is successful in improving the country government-to-business (G2B) e-

commerce service. "We are currently in early stages of discussions to explore various

ways of replicating the model to those interested countries. If this is achieved, we will be

able to connect these e-procurement centers into exchanges to gain economies of scale

and to create a greater opportunity for developing countries to prosper."

Datuk Mohd Salleh Masduki, Chief Executive of Commerce Dot Com

(CDC)

2.3 Project Methodology

The methodology that been apply in this project is System Development Life

Cycle (SDLC). SDLC is a conventional approach that has been first introduced. As a

methodology, the SDLC provides the structure, method, controls and checklist needed to

ensure successful development. There are five main phase in SDLC methodology:

~ e a s i b i l i ~ 7 A

A Analysis 3 Design

h n p l e m e n l 7

Test 7 Maintain

Figure 2.4: SDLC diagram

a) Feasibility phase

The feasibility study is used to determine if the project should get the go-ahead.

If the project is to proceed, the feasibility study will produce a project plan and

budget estimates for the future stages of development.

b) Requirement analysis and design

Analysis gathers the requirements for the system. This stage includes a detailed

study of the business needs of the organization. Options for changing the

business process may be considered. Design focuses on high level design like,

what programs are needed and how are they going to interact, low-level design

(how the individual programs are going to work), interface design (what are the

interfaces going to look like) and data design (what data will be required).

During these phases, the software's overall structure is defined. Analysis and

Design are very crucial in the whole development cycle. Any glitch in the design

phase could be very expensive to solve in the later stage of the software

development. Much care is taken during this phase. The logical system of the

product is developed in this phase.

c) Implementation

In this phase the designs are translated into code. Computer programs are written

using a conventional programming language or an application generator.

Programming tools like Compilers, Interpreters, Debuggers are used to generate

the code. Different high level programming languages like C, C++, Pascal, Java

are used for coding.

d) Testing

In this phase the system is tested. Normally programs are written as a series of

individual modules. The system is then tested as a whole. The separate modules

are brought together and tested as a complete system. The system is tested to

ensure that interfaces between modules work (integration testing), the system

works on the intended platform and with the expected volume of data (volume

testing) and that the system does what the user requires (acceptancelbeta testing).

e) Maintenance

Inevitably the system will need maintenance. Software will definitely undergo

change once it is delivered to the customer. There are many reasons for the

change. Change could happen because of some unexpected input values into the

system. In addition, the changes in the system could directly affect the software

operations. The software should be developed to accommodate changes that

could happen during the post implementation period.

SDLC model that are used to develop the e-leave system was iterative approach.

An iterative lifecycle model does not attempt to start with a full specification of

requirements. Instead. development begins by specifying and implementing just

part of the software. \vhich call then be re\lie\ved in order to identify further

requiremel~ts. This process is then repeated. producing r i new version of the

sotltware for each cycle of the model.

Start

Requirements

Reweirr,

Complete

Figure 2.5: Iterative Model

There are four main phase in Iterative methodology. The first phase is the

requirement phase. Recluirements phase, is \\here the requircmcnts for tlie soft\+are are

gathered and a1ialy7ed. Iteration should eventuall> result in a rcquirenients pliase that

prodt~ces a complete and tinal specification of requirements. The primary objectives of

the requirement phase are to identify the scope of the e-leave system for FTMK, to

ensure that the project is feasible and develop a schedule, resource plan and budget for

the remainder of the project.

In the design phase, the objective is to design the solution of e-leave system.

The design phase uses the information obtained during the analysis phase as its input.

High level design consists of developing an architectural structure for software programs,

database, the user interface and the operating environment. Low- level design entails

developing the detailed algorithms and data structures that are required for program

development.

The implementation and test phase is when the software is coded. integrated

and tested. The objectives is to have a reliable, well-working information system but

also to ensure that the users are all trained and that the organization is benefiting as

expected from the use of the e-leave system. All the prior activities must come together

during this phase to culminate in an operational system. There are five major activities

make up the implementation phase: construct software components, verify and test,

convert data, train users, document and install the e-leave system.

The review phase, in \vhicli the sofiware is evaluated. the current reqi~ircn~ents

are reviewed: and chancres and additions to requirements proposed. This phase is to keep

the system running productively during the years following its initial installation.

Besides that, if have other upgrades or enhancements can be carried out to expand e-

leave capability.

2.4 Project Requirement

2.4.1 Software Requirement

Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 (programming)

ASP.NET is a web application framework marketed by Microsoft.

Programmers can use it to build dynamic web sites, web applications and

XML web services. It is part of Microsoft's .NET platform and is the

successor to Microsoft's Active Server Pages (ASP) technology. There some

advantages for using the Asp.net:

a) Powerful database-driven functionality

Like ASP (Microsoft's language preceding ASP.Net), ASP.Net allows

programmers to develop web applications that interface with a database.

The advantage of ASP.Net is that it is object-oriented and has many

programming tools that allow for faster development and more

functionality.

b) Faster web application

Two aspects of ASP.Net make it fast -- compiled code and caching. In the

past, the code was interpreted into "machine language" when your

website visitor viewed your page. Now, with ASP.Net the code is

compiled into "machine language" before your visitor ever comes to your

site. Caching is the storage of information that will be reused in a

memory location for faster access in the future. ASP.Net allows

programmers to set up pages or areas of pages that are commonly reused

to be cached for a set period of time to improve the performance of web

applications. In addition, ASP.Net allows the caching of data from a

database so your website isn't slowed down by frequent visits to a

database when the data doesn't change very often.

ASP.Net was tested and found to be over 10 times faster for the average

user than Java's J2EE technology.

c) Memory leak and crash protection

ASP.Net automatically recovers from memory leaks and errors to make

sure that your website is always available to your visitors.

d) Multiple language support

Programmers can actually write their code in more than 25 .Net

languages (including VB.Net, C#, and JScript.Net). This allows

programmers to develop your site in the language they know best and it

means that you can more easily find programmers to support the work on

your site.

MySQL Server 2005 (database)

SQL Server

Database

Figure 2.6: SQL Server database

A database is a collection of information that is organized so that it

can easily be accessed, managed, and updated. In one view, databases can be

classified according to types of content: bibliographic, full-text, numeric, and

images.

The most prevalent approach is the relational database, a tabular

database in which data is defined so that it can be reorganized and accessed

in a number of different ways. Computer databases typically contain

aggregations of data records or files, such as sales transactions, product

catalogs and inventories, and customer profiles. SQL (Structured Query

Language) is a standard language for making interactive queries from and

updating a database. There are several advantages of using the SQL server:

The Microsofi platform is strongly biased to using SQL Server for the DBMS.

SQL Server also tends to be the simplest to develop on, has the largest

commi~nitg surrounding it, features the best support. and offers the greatest

number of books one every facet of development. Self maintenance and self

tuning: SQL Server is largely self maintaining and self tuning, requiring little

or no administrative input. This adds to the favorable impressions of SQL

Sewer. and increases the comfort level for department managers. Employees

are familiar with using Micl-osoft products. they know how to navigate

Microsoft support options ancl they feel comfortable with the look and feel of

Microsoft products.

MS Project 2003 (Project scheduling)

Internet explorer 6.0 (minimum)

Rational Rose (Software modeling)

2.4.2 Hardware Requirement

Intel Pentium 4 (minimum requirement)

40GB Hard Disk Drive

2.4.3 Network Requirement

Modem (For connection)

2.5 Project Schedule and Milestones

Project scheduling is very important for developing one system. In this e-leave

system there have four phase of milestone which is analysis, design, implementation and

evaluation. Analysis stage needs around 13 days to complete, design stage needs around

26 days to complete, implementation stage take a longest time to complete around 70

days and finally the evaluation stage needs around 26 days to complete it. The complete

Gantt chart for the project schedule can refer to Appendix A.

2.6 Conclusion

In this chapter, doing the research for the system before we develop the system

is a good practice for all the developer. Planning all the work start from proposing the

topic until implementing the project is an important step. Choosing the right

methodology for one system is very important because it will affect the whole system

development. The next chapter will be all about the analysis phase that we had defined

in this chapter

CHAPTER 3

ANALYSIS

3.1 Introduction

The analysis phase defines the requirements of the system, independent of how

these requirements will be accomplished. This phase defines the problem that the

customer is trying to solve. This is the phase where the problems defined earlier in the

planning stage are examined in greater detail. In the part of this chapter, the current

manually leave application at FTMK is examined to ascertain the business process and

problems encountered. The deliverable result at the end of this phase is a requirement

document. To display the findings of the analysis, concept SSADM will be used.

3.2 Problem analysis of current system

i) Leave application process required time and energy

Staffs need to get the annual leave balance from the clerk before they apply the

leave. After that, they need to fill in the leave application form and pass it to the

clerk. Clerk will then pass the application form to the Ketua Jabatan for the

approval and then finally go the faculty FTMK dean for the last approval. This

all process needs time to process and this will definitely waste many of the

resources and time.

ii) Staff needs to refer to the clerk to know their leave balance

Staffs need to go the clerk to check the leave balance before they can take the

leave application form. This will become the problem when the clerk is on leave

or not in the office at the moment; Staffs have to wait to get the leave balance

check.

iii) Clerk has to record all kind of leaves in one file.

Clerk needs to keep records of all the staff leave application in one file for future

documentation. This needs a lot of paper to do the recording; therefore manually

leave application is not an environmental friendly action.

iv) Waste of resources

Manually apply leave waste a lot of resources such as paper, printer ink, file, and

cabinet.

At the concept SSADM the first step that we need to identified is investigate the current

system flow. Figure 3.1 show the system flow of the current leave application in faculty

FTMK.

Start

Leave management

Fill leave application form

1 Pass up the leave

application to cleck

1 from the Ketua Jabatan

Not Approved Approved

i Send acknowledgement

to staff Pejabat pendaflaran for record~ng

I

1- End

Figure 3.1 : As-Is system